No excessive carbon taxation will happen. No significant or global emergence of digital currencies (not including regular "electronic" dollars or euro). Meat may become more rare along with fish (due to still unregulated in 2030 overfishing and acidification), but there will be no or almost no lab grown food. Mass surveillance will propagate even more but privacy will not succeed or become sought by majority.
What Will Happen in the 2020s
251–260 of 692 posts
Re: What Will Happen in the 2020s
#252A few good takes, but China becoming the dominant global power? Not a good take. China is fairly good at a few things, namely lending money and manufacturing goods. What they aren’t good at is making people happy. See Hong Kong for the last 6 months. I don’t think the United States is becoming increasingly isolationist. I think we’ve seen a brief period of these attitudes, but it’s not indicative of the next decade i…
Watch a lecture by Peter Zeihan on YouTube. His entire thesis is the US is becoming isolationist. But yea I agree with you about China.
Re: What Will Happen in the 2020s
#253> people overestimate what will happen in a year and underestimate what will happen in a decade.
Last decade seemed like the opposite. So much happened every year, but nothing changed over the decade. The biggest change seems to be the expansion of aggrieved classes to include almost everybody. This only applies to “the West” of course. Changes elsewhere are perhaps striking.
Re: What Will Happen in the 2020s
#254Earlier quoted context omitted.
>The reason modern western leaders support house of Saud isn't that they're the good guys. They're just the best of what all realistic possibilities in the region, unfortunately. I doubt it. Saud family were interested in fighting the Ottomans, as were the British in WW1, and their interests aligned then. And during WW2, once it was found to provide access to oil, it only made sense for the west to make sure a stable…
> prevent a situation like Norway where the oil wealth is distributed to everyone and no longer able to be controlled by a handful of people. Isn't the wealth distributed to the saudis to keep them happy and inline?
Who knows what proportion of it is distributed. Money isn’t the only wealth. A high trust society with an open and accountable government is far more “wealth” for the average citizen than getting a check every month.
And if the Saudi king decides to stop the payments or kill you for speaking out against them (see Kashoggi assassination), what good is a few thousand in oil money while the royalty splits the billions with the US.
Re: What Will Happen in the 2020s
#255> We will see nuclear power make a resurgence around the world, particularly smaller reactors that are easier to build and safer to operate. Funny, I was digging into this issue just this morning. One family member supports Andrew Yang, but another won't support anyone who advocates for nuclear power. Despite Thorium not being fully proven yet, I lean toward agreement with Yang: https://en.howtruthful.com/o/nuclear_p…
I support nuclear power, however I doubt we will ever see many more reactors built in most countries. The growth of photovoltaic solar power combined with coming cheaper grid scale battery storage is going to wreck the economics for nuclear (including fusion if it ever works).
Solar wrecking the economics for nuclear looks unlikely to me: https://en.howtruthful.com/o/nuclear_power_can_replace_coal_...
Re: What Will Happen in the 2020s
#256There was a smattering throughout about areas where the US lags. There was a lot of discussion around #6 but I found #3 to be quite interesting, esp. the last sentence:
> Conversely the US becomes increasingly internally focused and isolationist in its world view
I wonder what are some people's thoughts on this - specifically if they agree and what are some of the potential impacts to US citizens and abroad (influence, wealth, industry leadership, etc)?
Re: What Will Happen in the 2020s
#257Earlier quoted context omitted.
I can see that. Or, even simpler, a delivery person hopes out with a package and the remote driver circles the block. Garbage trucks might be the first to have this system installed. You need two people to operate a truck currently, a driver and a guy in the back. It drives slow along the road, very predicable routes. Needs to be driven back to the yard once filled, and another truck to take over the route.
Many garbage trucks have only a driver now. The guy in back was replaced by a mechanical arm that grabs and lifts the garbage cans.
Also the ability to drive the truck, at least to some degree from controls at the back of the truck. In my neighborhood there are too many parked cars to be able to let the robotic arm do everything. I often see the driver at the back of the truck moving it forward and hoping off to position trash cans where the robotic arm can pick them up.
Re: What Will Happen in the 2020s
#258> Countries will create and promote digital/crypto versions of their fiat currencies Why? I don't see what would be the benefit of that. Fiat currency already is digital. And - at least where I live - domestic transfers are instant.
Yeah, if anything, central banks have been clear that cryptocurrencies are the devil and they will be shot down. From today on , EU adopts stricter controls for transferring Gold as well. If anything, there will be a backlash to this extreme capital controls , but theres no way governments will loosen the leash on money on their own volition
Re: What Will Happen in the 2020s
#259Earlier quoted context omitted.
I'm not following your logic. Yes, humans are leaving rural communities for cities, but I'm not sure how that exacerbates climate problems...unless they're all moving to New Orleans.
I’ve seen at least one article suggesting the end of centralization into cities. I suspect LEO based internet services will further help people move back to the country. All that’s needed is work out there.
A friend lived outside a city of 20,000 in rural Colorado. He dropped $10-20k to get fiber run out. It seems like a lot, but If that's literally the only thing keeping you from moving from the Bay Area to a small town, you just haven't done your research.
Re: What Will Happen in the 2020s
#260I think by the end (very end) of this decade it will become common place for at least the upper class to cryogenically freeze and store a cell culture to take advantage of advances in medicine that will also occur in this decade such as affordable / reliable processes for growing your own organs for transplant, etc.