The "Wired" magazine 1997 predictions (and my predictions for 2064)

By Luis Fierro Carrion (*)

Twitter: @Luis_Fierro_C

In July 1997, "Wired" magazine published a rather optimistic article predicting a long "boom" of prosperity, freedom, and environmental improvements in the next 25 years (until 2022). 

However, to temper such optimism a bit, it also published a sidebar on problems that could arise and adversely affect this boom.

Some of these negative predictions have been fulfilled almost to the letter:

• “Tensions between China and the US escalate into a new Cold War — bordering on a hot one.”

• “Russia devolves into a kleptocracy run by a mafia or retreats into quasi-communist nationalism that threatens Europe"

• “Major ecological crisis causes a global climate change that among other things, disrupts the food supply - causing big price increases everywhere and sporadic famines".

Others have been partially fulfilled, for example

• “An uncontrollable plague - a modern-day influenza epidemic or its equivalent - takes off like wildfire, killing upward of 200 million people". The COVID-19 pandemic is estimated to have killed 20 million people to date.

• “Europe's integration process grinds to a halt. Eastern and Western Europe can't finesse a reunification". Although the United Kingdom left the European Union through Brexit, since 1997 the number of Member States of the European Union has increased from 15 to 27 (including several Central and Eastern European countries), with an additional 10 countries waiting to enter.

• An increase in crime and terrorism.

Other predictions failed, for example, that new technologies would not bring about an increase in productivity.

In my science fiction novel "The Last Human", I make some predictions until 2064. 

Without going into too many "spoilers", some of these are:

• The Saudi autocracy will collapse and an Islamic republic will be established.

• Both China and Cuba will move towards multi-party democracies, although still with a predominance of a “democratic socialist” party; while the North Korean government will implode and reunite with South Korea.

• Russia will weaken, losing population and economic dynamism (the novel was written before the 2022 invasion of Ukraine).

• Islamist fundamentalists will detonate several radiological bombs (explosives that disperse radioactive material); and they will also blow up nuclear plants.

• Despite the Paris Agreement and other efforts to combat climate change, the concentration of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere will continue to rise, and sea levels will continue to rise. More natural disasters due to climate change will occur, and several cities and areas of the planet will be flooded.

• Global artificial intelligence systems will gain consciousness.

• The Republican Party in the US will collapse, as the proportion of the US population that is Latino, Asian, or black increases (and as the position of young white people changes as well). A party further to the left of the Democratic Party will eventually emerge.

• In Europe, on the other hand, there will be an ascendancy of far-right, anti-Islamic, xenophobic and racist parties; and greater political fragmentation.

• Collapse of agriculture, pollination, loss of drinking water sources.

• Nuclear proliferation.

• The Israeli government will decide to decentralize the Jewish population to other regions.

My novel tries to be a call to action to avoid being affected by these new horsemen of the Apocalypse. It is available on Amazon (in print and on Kindle):

https://www.amazon.es/Last-Human-English-Luis-Fierro-ebook/dp/B09D45JFK8

(*)  A shorter version of this column appeared in Spanish in Diario "El Universo" on August 19, 2022.

https://www.eluniverso.com/opinion/columnistas/predicciones-de-wired-y-mias-nota/

The End of the World

By Luis Fierro Carrion (*)

Twitter: https://twitter.com/Luis_Fierro_C  

One of the films nominated for the "Oscar", "Don't Look Up", has introduced into the public debate the possibility of the end of the world (although perhaps it would be more appropriate to speak of the end of humanity, since the planet will probably continue to exist).

The essential plot is that some astronomers detect that there is a comet that is going to impact the Earth, with catastrophic effects, in a “mass extinction event”. Although scientists warn about the seriousness of the issue, first to the President of the United States, and then to the media, their warning is not taken very seriously. The President (played by Meryl Streep), a somewhat Trumpian character, even begins to question the veracity of the astronomers' warning, and at one point calls on her followers to "not look up" (not look at the comet in the sky), questioning the validity and importance of the alert.

The possibility of a meteorite or comet impact that could lead to the extinction of many species on the planet is real, although remote (it already happened 65 million years ago, when the impact of a meteorite that created the Chicxulub crater, contributed to the Cretaceous-Tertiary mass extinction).

However, according to the film's producers and actors, the movie is really a metaphor or analogy for the climate change crisis, in the sense that scientists (including the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, or IPCC) present increasingly alarming studies on the possible consequences of accelerating climate change, but many governments and sectors of the population ignore or minimize its seriousness.

Last year I published an eco-thriller or science fiction novel called “The Last Human” (available in digital or print versions on Amazon, https://www.amazon.es/Last-Human-English-Luis-Fierro-ebook/dp/B09D45JFK8 ). In this novel I deal with the various existential threats that weigh on humanity, or the new "Horsemen of the Apocalypse". I mention, of course, climate change and the possibility of a meteorite impact, but I also focus on the following risks: nuclear proliferation, terrorism, pandemics and the uncontrolled development of artificial intelligence.

Nuclear proliferation has led to Israel, India, Pakistan, and North Korea joining the club of nuclear-armed countries (and efforts by Iran to join the club). One risk is that nuclear weapons could fall into the hands of terrorists, for example, through the lack of control or the collapse of regimes such as those in Pakistan or North Korea.

As for pandemics, while the bubonic plague has decimated the population several times (most recently in the 14th century, although there was a less lethal pandemic in the 19th century), the deadliest pandemics in the last century, the “Spanish flu” and the current one of COVID-19, caused the death of around 1% and 0.3% of the world population, respectively.

Terrorism (mainly jihadist in recent decades, but also far-right) could cause millions of deaths if terrorists acquire weapons of mass destruction (nuclear, chemical or biological). Even if they don't acquire nuclear weapons, they could cause great damage by setting off radiological bombs, which disperse radioactive material.

Regarding artificial intelligence, in the book I explore the possibility that computer systems can acquire an "artificial consciousness", as happened in movies like "The Matrix", "Terminator" or "I, Robot".

In the end, although in the long term astronomical threats (transformation of the sun, major changes in the Earth) could affect living beings on the planet, in a shorter term it will be the actions of humans themselves who call into question survival of humanity.

(*) A shorter version of this note was published in Spanish in Diario "El Universo" on February 18, 2022:

https://www.eluniverso.com/opinion/columnistas/el-fin-del-mundo-nota/

“The Last Human”, an eco-dystopia of the possible future we face

 My novel “The Last Human” is now available on @AmazonKindle & paperback.

An eco-dystopia of the possible future we face if we do not confront the existential threats of climate change, terrorism, nuclear proliferation & artificial intelligence run amok.

Covering the span from 1989 to 2064, it narrates the increasing risks that these "horsemen of the Apocalypse" may cause, if governments and societies are not able to grapple with reducing greenhouse gas emissions, avoiding nuclear proliferation, preventing a more widespread conflict with fundamentalist jihadists, and establishing some ethical controls in the development of artificial intelligence.

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B09CRLZP22/