Future Timeline

funkervogt wrote: ↑Fri Jul 08, 2022 3:33 pm

wjfox wrote: ↑Fri Jul 08, 2022 2:58 pm 2050 – Power armour and robotic patrol dogs are in use by South Korean police forces

https://www.theinvestor.co.kr/view.php? ... 0705000089

I think that's a fair prediction, though they won't be confined to South Korea. The key enabling advance will be more energy-dense batteries.

By 2050, there will be powered, wearable exoskeleton suits that can operate for at least eight hours continuously on a single battery charge, and their batteries won't be larger than a briefcase. Some police and paramilitary organizations in rich countries will wear them.

Getting humanity used to or even consider being part of a machine. Super synthetic or at most half to little cybertech is nice.

2086 – Global population is peaking

"In this new release, the UN projects that the global population will peak before the end of the century – in 2086 at just over 10.4 billion people."

https://ourworldindata.org/world-population-update-2022

Also, the prediction for India overtaking China has been changed again. It's now expected to happen next year (was previously 2027).

wjfox wrote: ↑Tue Jul 12, 2022 9:36 am 2086 – Global population is peaking

"In this new release, the UN projects that the global population will peak before the end of the century – in 2086 at just over 10.4 billion people."

https://ourworldindata.org/world-population-update-2022

I don't think population projections for that far in the future should ever be trusted.

2032 – Digitised smells are increasingly common

https://www.idtechex.com/en/research-ar ... oses/27165

https://www.idtechex.com/en/research-re ... ecasts/869

2036 – The first Chinese probe to Neptune

https://www.universetoday.com/156509/ch ... o-neptune/

"If current trends continue, renewable energy production should be on track to provide more power than natural-gas fueled plants in the late 2030s."

https://newyorkeconomicjournal.com/rene ... the-2030s/

The Viper launch to the moon has been delayed until 2024. viewtopic.php?f=26&p=23405#p23405

I'm going to update our global warming predictions, as most of them are about 10 years out of date.

For instance, I no longer believe we'll reach 4°C of warming. Definitely 2°C, and probably 2.5°C, with a small chance of 3°C.

That isn't to downplay climate change, of course – even a rise of 2°C will be disastrous. But I now think it's more likely that temperatures will start to plateau around 2060-2070, since emissions are likely to have peaked in the prior 20-30 years. It's clear that solar, wind, and other renewables will account for a huge percentage of electricity in the near future. EVs will displace ICE vehicles; the shipping industry is likely to see a massive overhaul of its container vessels; even many airlines will be going low or zero-carbon. We also know that companies are now developing zero carbon cement, hydrogen-based steel-making, and other disruptive technologies. Efforts are also underway to begin mass reforestation programs in many countries.

Alongside all this, a vast industry of gigaton-scale direct air capture will be emerging. We are likely to see at least some geoengineering too – I think one of the poorer countries in Africa/Asia may unilaterally decide to unleash balloons of sulphur dioxide, when their situation becomes desperate. This may have some unpredictable consequences, and is a bit of a wildcard, but I think it's worth a mention somewhere.

The graph below is roughly what I envisage (excluding possible abrupt/temporary cooling from geoengineering).

https://phys.org/news/2022-06-temporari ... earth.html

Possibly, but then we don't know enough about what sort of runaway effects could be triggered even at 2 or 2.5C of warming, for example with releases of methane from melting permafrost in Siberia or other mechanisms we might not even currently be aware of. Historically, climate change has also rarely been linear. There can be very sudden bursts of warming or cooling on very unpredictable bases. Ice core studies have revealed that about 8,000 years ago, during the last post-glacial climatic optimum, there was a period of about a decade when temperatures rose by 7-8 degrees C. I'm not saying that's likely this time around, but a levelling off of CO2 emissions from human activity might not necessarily correspond to a linear calming down of climate change. The present increases of CO2 in our atmosphere have already guaranteed a warmer climate for about a thousand more years.