Forcasts For 2008 and Beyond
Source: World Future Society
THE FUTURIST Magazine has published their selections for the annual Top Ten Forecasts. Here are the predictions. Read the article linked above for the details.
1. The world will have a billion millionaires by 2025.
2. Fashion will go wired as technologies and tastes converge to revolutionize the textile industry.
3. The threat of another cold war with China, Russia, or both could replace terrorism as the chief foreign-policy concern of the United States.
4. Counterfeiting of currency will proliferate, driving the move toward a cashless society.
5. The earth is on the verge of a significant extinction event.
6. Water will be in the twenty-first century what oil was in the twentieth century.
7. World population by 2050 may grow larger than previously expected, due in part to healthier, longer-living people.
8. The number of Africans imperiled by floods will grow 70-fold by 2080.
9. Rising prices for natural resources could lead to a full-scale rush to develop the Arctic.
10. More decisions will be made by nonhuman entities.
2. Fashion will go wired as technologies and tastes converge to revolutionize the textile industry.
3. The threat of another cold war with China, Russia, or both could replace terrorism as the chief foreign-policy concern of the United States.
4. Counterfeiting of currency will proliferate, driving the move toward a cashless society.
5. The earth is on the verge of a significant extinction event.
6. Water will be in the twenty-first century what oil was in the twentieth century.
7. World population by 2050 may grow larger than previously expected, due in part to healthier, longer-living people.
8. The number of Africans imperiled by floods will grow 70-fold by 2080.
9. Rising prices for natural resources could lead to a full-scale rush to develop the Arctic.
10. More decisions will be made by nonhuman entities.
I think that #4, counterfeiting currency, the most likely prediction, and #8 that Africa will have a 70-fold increase in floods the most unlikely. Mainly because I don't think sea levels will rise that much with global warming, or that much if they do. The most fascinating for me is #5, that the earth is on the verge of a significant extinction event. I'm not sure why, because I don't fear it, nor discount it.
Which do you find the most likely? The Most unlikely? The most fascinating? Post your responses in the comments.