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George Friedman, The Next 100 Years



 
 
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  #1  
Old January 24th 09, 05:36 PM posted to sci.space.policy
Martha Adams
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Posts: 371
Default George Friedman, The Next 100 Years

This newsgroup's topic looks at the future. Has anyone else here
thought of looking to see what *other* people are thinking about the
future? I've just acquired a copy of Friedman, and his 'The Next 100
Years' seems to me to want serious reading. Which I'm doing now.

I think I see a serious error in the book. He projects another world
war in the future, in which there is a major space war component. What
he completely misses, in my view, is he doesn't see the *major*
consequences of orbiting space junk after some large satellites have
been destroyed. Well, that's one view of the future.

Which reminds me of John Naisbitt's two Megatrends books. I read one of
those almost 30 years ago, and it had slipped from my memory. Now I
want to find a copy of his first Megatrends book, and read it again.

Because, here we are thinking about the future, and doesn't it make a
lot of sense to look around at what others have thought about the
future? If we do our homework, maybe *we* can say and do things that
have a useful impact.

Titeotwawki -- mha [sci.space.policy 2009 Jan 24]


  #2  
Old January 24th 09, 07:53 PM posted to sci.space.policy
Pat Flannery
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Posts: 18,465
Default George Friedman, The Next 100 Years



Martha Adams wrote:
I've just acquired a copy of Friedman, and his 'The Next 100 Years'
seems to me to want serious reading.


I've got a copy of a book of the same title by C.C. Furnas from 1936.
People who write such books do not lack ego.
Furnas starts out the book with eugenics of course - which was very big
in the US at the time - ten years later, amid the ruins of Germany,
everyone started rethinking that concept and its social effects.

Pat
  #3  
Old January 25th 09, 05:38 AM posted to sci.space.policy
Quadibloc
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Posts: 7,018
Default George Friedman, The Next 100 Years

On Jan 24, 11:53*am, Pat Flannery wrote:
Martha Adams wrote:


* I've just acquired a copy of Friedman, and his 'The Next 100 Years'
seems to me to want serious reading.


I've got a copy of a book of the same title by C.C. Furnas from 1936.
People who write such books do not lack ego.
Furnas starts out the book with eugenics of course - which was very big
in the US at the time - ten years later, amid the ruins of Germany,
everyone started rethinking that concept and its social effects.


To such an extent that even specious arguments are used against it.

Obviously, "eugenics" aimed at ethnic minorities isn't eugenics.
Taking action against the harm done by genetic defects, though, would
seem entirely legitimate.

One book I read noted that eliminating Huntingdon's chorea by eugenics
would be ridiculous, since because that is a dominant gene which
manifests itself late in life, attempting to prevent anyone being born
with it would prevent many healthy children from being conceived. To
which "So what?" is all the answer that's needed.

Of course, a more common argument concerns recessives. The human
genome is big. The average person has genes for, say, 100 lethal
recessives. Which doesn't inhibit reproduction, since the chance of
even one of those recessives being the same in one's mate is low. But
given that, since "sterilize everybody" is not a recipe for an
improved human species, isn't eugenics impossible?

This is not true, it just shows a lack of thought. Yes, one can clean
up the gene pool in such a circumstance.

Just pick a set of recessives to eliminate in one generation, small
enough so that only part of the population is sterilized. Then, in the
next generation, add some more recessives to the list, since the first
group will be eliminated except for new mutations. And repeat with
each generation.

The objections to eugenics aren't practical ones. Instead, the moral
objection that humans aren't lab animals to be bred as desired, and
the fact that having one's own biological children is a deeply-
ingrained human desire, are the objections that matter.

Ultimately, though, I don't think it would be a nightmare if people
decided that for the sake of their children's well-being, they would
opt exclusively for assisted reproduction so that harmful genetic
disorders could be excluded from their gametes before fertilization
would be allowed to take place. Such a future would not be a
nightmare; getting rid of Down's syndrome, for example, is a good
thing in the way that getting rid of polio is a good thing, if you
don't do it by going around and shooting the sufferers.

John Savard
  #4  
Old January 25th 09, 06:13 AM posted to sci.space.policy
Martha Adams
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Posts: 371
Default George Friedman, The Next 100 Years

"Quadibloc" wrote in message
...
On Jan 24, 11:53 am, Pat Flannery wrote:
Martha Adams wrote:


I've just acquired a copy of Friedman, and his 'The Next 100 Years'
seems to me to want serious reading.


I've got a copy of a book of the same title by C.C. Furnas from 1936.
People who write such books do not lack ego.
Furnas starts out the book with eugenics of course - which was very
big
in the US at the time - ten years later, amid the ruins of Germany,
everyone started rethinking that concept and its social effects.


To such an extent that even specious arguments are used against it.

Obviously, "eugenics" aimed at ethnic minorities isn't eugenics.
Taking action against the harm done by genetic defects, though, would
seem entirely legitimate.

One book I read noted that eliminating Huntingdon's chorea by eugenics
would be ridiculous, since because that is a dominant gene which
manifests itself late in life, attempting to prevent anyone being born
with it would prevent many healthy children from being conceived. To
which "So what?" is all the answer that's needed.

Of course, a more common argument concerns recessives. The human
genome is big. The average person has genes for, say, 100 lethal
recessives. Which doesn't inhibit reproduction, since the chance of
even one of those recessives being the same in one's mate is low. But
given that, since "sterilize everybody" is not a recipe for an
improved human species, isn't eugenics impossible?

This is not true, it just shows a lack of thought. Yes, one can clean
up the gene pool in such a circumstance.

Just pick a set of recessives to eliminate in one generation, small
enough so that only part of the population is sterilized. Then, in the
next generation, add some more recessives to the list, since the first
group will be eliminated except for new mutations. And repeat with
each generation.

The objections to eugenics aren't practical ones. Instead, the moral
objection that humans aren't lab animals to be bred as desired, and
the fact that having one's own biological children is a deeply-
ingrained human desire, are the objections that matter.

Ultimately, though, I don't think it would be a nightmare if people
decided that for the sake of their children's well-being, they would
opt exclusively for assisted reproduction so that harmful genetic
disorders could be excluded from their gametes before fertilization
would be allowed to take place. Such a future would not be a
nightmare; getting rid of Down's syndrome, for example, is a good
thing in the way that getting rid of polio is a good thing, if you
don't do it by going around and shooting the sufferers.

John Savard

=========================================

I don't see how this thread jumped over to eugenics and genetics in its
very first response. I think I'm still in *sci.space.policy*, where the
future is of great interest. Apart from a lot of useful information,
two things in particular were interesting the

1) In the first chapter of the book, a sort of a preface, he illustrates
what a difference *20 years* makes across time. Having lived in it, I
had not noticed this key point that in 20 years, *almost everything
changes.* For example, we have some people working at space access
projects now that are expected to run for nearly that length of time. I
had commented that it was a bad idea to go so slow, because not least,
it's two or more Presidential turnovers and each President will want to
make his mark there. So *20 years is serious time*.

2) And the second thing I am finding from this book is, how do you think
about large topics? Usually the current bills, the groceries, and
what's going on in cyberspace are my daily topic. My attention span
there is maybe a few months wide for the things that are larger in time.
But here is Friedman, thinking in decades and centuries: if I'm going to
do anything like that, it pays off big for me to review how someone else
does it. So Friedman looks like a mighty good book to be reading.

Also, by the way, there's John Naisbitt, who published a book in 1982
titled 'Megatrends.' And a followup book a few years later. Now I need
to review some of Naisbitt's work to see how he did what he did.

I don't expect anyone to predict the future, but it sure is interesting
to see some pointers on how to think about it. It's really another kind
of fiction, more work to read than say Heinlein or Tolkein or O'Brian,
but after all it's another topical area. I'm going to get a lot out of
Friedman, 'The Next 100 Years,' and I won't fall aside into some strange
and disconnected topic like ...eugenics? ??

Titeotwawki -- mha [sci.space.policy 2009 Jan 25]


  #5  
Old January 25th 09, 07:03 AM posted to sci.space.policy
Pat Flannery
external usenet poster
 
Posts: 18,465
Default George Friedman, The Next 100 Years



Quadibloc wrote:

To such an extent that even specious arguments are used against it.

Furnas is perfect; he was a Olympic athlete, and a very smart chemistry
professor at Yale... the very epitome of a Rhodes Scholar.
And someone who will certainly save all of us Anglo-Saxons from any
contamination of our bloodlines via the mongrel races of humanity, as
Cecil Rhodes would have.
Key to understanding this concept is of course the basic inferiority of
the Negroid races in relation to the Aryan/Caucasian races. The Negroids
great physical strength can never be controlled by the innate nervous
sensibility that the white man posses, and of course any sort of
physical sport practiced by this sort of semi-ape creature must
inevitably be of the most basic and crude type if it is to succeed.
As examples, both Baseball and Golf would stand far beyond their
abilities due to the degree of thought and coordination that such
sophisticated interactions of the mind and body would require.
In the same way, the hope that any Negro could ever achieve high office
in our land must be dismissed as a foolish phantasm, as the crude
development of the Negro throat and its limited ability to understand
any sophisticated form of language such as English must inevitably make
it a clown when trying to speak in a articulate manner.
There shall never be any Negro member of Congress of any note, much less
a president... a concept as foolish as thinking that the spiral nebula
of the skies are of any great size compared to our own blessed and
singular solar system. :-)


Pat
  #6  
Old January 25th 09, 07:34 AM posted to sci.space.policy
Pat Flannery
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Posts: 18,465
Default George Friedman, The Next 100 Years



Martha Adams wrote:


I don't see how this thread jumped over to eugenics and genetics in
its very first response.



Expect the unexpected! That is the very basis of the forward march of
humanity's mental evolution!
If you heard a clawing at the door, and looked through the peephole in
it to see nothing, you might think it is one of Scott Lowther's cats
fleeing from his desert survivalist hideaway due to being driven
half-mad and half-blind from being photographed too much, and invite it
in to protect it, in your mercy.
But what if it _wasn't_ one of those?
What... if instead... it was crouching Saber-Tooth Tiger thrown through
some sort of time warp that ended up gnawing a bone of a Mastodon
directly in front of your door?
How the Hell are you going to deal with _that_ situation when you open
the door?
Huh?
How are you to going deal with _THAT_?
You had better be thinking pretty damn fast at that moment, Homo Sapiens
Girl, hadn't you?
That's just a hypothetical situation, but it's something worth thinking
about.
I think about it.
I think about it _a lot_. :-D

Pat
  #7  
Old January 25th 09, 09:38 AM posted to sci.space.policy
Pat Flannery
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Posts: 18,465
Default George Friedman, The Next 100 Years



Martha Adams wrote:

Expect the unexpected! That is the very basis of the forward march of
humanity's mental evolution!
If you heard a clawing at the front door, and looked through the
peephole in it to see nothing, you might think it was one of Scott
Lowther's cats fleeing from his desert survivalist hideaway due to being
driven half-mad and half-blind from being photographed too much with a
strobe flash...and invite it in to protect it...in your mercy.
But what if it _wasn't_ one of those?
What... if instead... it was a crouching Saber-Tooth Tiger thrown
through some sort of time warp that ended up gnawing a bone of a
Mastodon directly in front of your door?
How the Hell are you going to deal with _that_ situation when you open
the door?
Huh?
How are you to going deal with _THAT_?
You had better be thinking pretty damn fast at that moment, Homo Sapiens
Girl, hadn't you?
Because if you don't, there's a very good chance you are going to be
ripped limb-from-limb by a extinct carnivore.
...and although this would make a most interesting eulogy in the
newspaper (and a pretty damn good "X-Files" episode also) it's not worth
dieing for, and is a sure recommendation for carrying a .45 caliber
pistol with you whenever you open the front door for any reason whatsoever.
Of course, that's just a hypothetical situation, but it's something
worth thinking about.
I think about it.
I think about it _a lot_. :-D

Pat
  #8  
Old January 25th 09, 02:57 PM posted to sci.space.policy
Ian Parker
external usenet poster
 
Posts: 2,554
Default George Friedman, The Next 100 Years

On 24 Jan, 16:36, "Martha Adams" wrote:
This newsgroup's topic looks at the future. *Has anyone else here
thought of looking to see what *other* people are thinking about the
future? *I've just acquired a copy of Friedman, and his 'The Next 100
Years' seems to me to want serious reading. *Which I'm doing now.

I think I see a serious error in the book. *He projects another world
war in the future, in which there is a major space war component. *What
he completely misses, in my view, is he doesn't see the *major*
consequences of orbiting space junk after some large satellites have
been destroyed. *Well, that's one view of the future.

Which reminds me of John Naisbitt's two Megatrends books. *I read one of
those almost 30 years ago, and it had slipped from my memory. *Now I
want to find a copy of his first Megatrends book, and read it again.

Because, here we are thinking about the future, and doesn't it make a
lot of sense to look around at what others have thought about the
future? *If we do our homework, maybe *we* can say and do things that
have a useful impact.

Surely one of the major facts of the next 100 years, if not THE major
fact is AI. AI in space and AI otherwise. The "singularity is
predicted for round about 2040.

Questions :-

1) Do we believe in singularities?

2) If we don't what major advances can we see.

I would not seek to predict 100 years. In the next 20 I would predict
the following.

1) Within 5-10 years robots with numan manual dexterity.

2) Within 20 swarm based AI of considerable power.

3) An end to Microsoft within Obama's term (I am assuming 2 terms). He
has pledged investment in broadband. This will cut away Microsoft and
all the companies shifting boxes. We will get all our software from
the Web. It will be partitioned so that some of it runs on our
computer, some on Google servers.

4) A workable Von Neumann machine within 15 years.

Pace of space developments will be set by AI. No people beyond LEO
until we get a VN machine. If Constellation is cancelled, and it looks
as if it will be, there won't be anybody beyond LEO for the period
specified.

How does this feed into policy? Well one should decide whether NASA
can help technology along or whether it should concentrate on space
ratring components. Mining asteroids, for example depends on getting
robots space rated as soon as they appear.

All I have said is simple extrapolating current trends.

It will probable be 30-40 years before we get things like nanotech
based spacesuits. Basic robotics is fairly well advanced. Nanotech is
still very much in the fundamental research stage.

Wars etc. will depend on the choices we make. I can only say "I hope
not" but you cannot predict. I don't know about what will happen in
the Middle East as far as conflict is concerned. As far as technology
is concerned the Mediterranean will be desalinated. How this will plug
into conflict is another question.


- Ian Parker
  #9  
Old January 25th 09, 03:09 PM posted to sci.space.policy
Quadibloc
external usenet poster
 
Posts: 7,018
Default George Friedman, The Next 100 Years

On Jan 24, 11:03*pm, Pat Flannery wrote (and
largely quoted):

Furnas is perfect;


Rightly, we've rejected racism. But eugenics is rejected even in
legitimate forms that have nothing to do with racism. As I've noted,
though, probably a model approximating that of "Beyond This Horizon",
and further restricted to negative eugenics, is all that one might
expect of people to accept.

As examples, both Baseball and Golf would stand far beyond their
abilities due to the degree of *thought and coordination that such
sophisticated interactions of the mind and body would require.


Ah, yes: Willie Mays and Tiger Woods being well known to us.

In the same way, the hope that any Negro could ever achieve high office
in our land must be dismissed as a foolish phantasm,


Which is particularly perfect at this point in time.

There shall never be any Negro member of Congress of any note,


But there might be ones not noteworthy? Apparently he remembered
Reconstruction, or something.

much less
a president... a concept as foolish as thinking that the spiral nebula
of the skies are of any great size compared to our own blessed and
singular solar system.


Ah, yes. Not someone whose advice I would wish to follow at the
Kentucky Derby. A perfect record of backing the wrong horses indeed.

John Savard
  #10  
Old January 25th 09, 05:44 PM posted to sci.space.policy
Martha Adams
external usenet poster
 
Posts: 371
Default George Friedman, The Next 100 Years

"Ian Parker" wrote in message
...
On 24 Jan, 16:36, "Martha Adams" wrote:
This newsgroup's topic looks at the future. Has anyone else here
thought of looking to see what *other* people are thinking about the
future? I've just acquired a copy of Friedman, and his 'The Next 100
Years' seems to me to want serious reading. Which I'm doing now.

I think I see a serious error in the book. He projects another world
war in the future, in which there is a major space war component. What
he completely misses, in my view, is he doesn't see the *major*
consequences of orbiting space junk after some large satellites have
been destroyed. Well, that's one view of the future.

Which reminds me of John Naisbitt's two Megatrends books. I read one
of
those almost 30 years ago, and it had slipped from my memory. Now I
want to find a copy of his first Megatrends book, and read it again.

Because, here we are thinking about the future, and doesn't it make a
lot of sense to look around at what others have thought about the
future? If we do our homework, maybe *we* can say and do things that
have a useful impact.

Surely one of the major facts of the next 100 years, if not THE major
fact is AI. AI in space and AI otherwise. The "singularity is
predicted for round about 2040.

Questions :-

1) Do we believe in singularities?

2) If we don't what major advances can we see.

I would not seek to predict 100 years. In the next 20 I would predict
the following.

1) Within 5-10 years robots with numan manual dexterity.

2) Within 20 swarm based AI of considerable power.

3) An end to Microsoft within Obama's term (I am assuming 2 terms). He
has pledged investment in broadband. This will cut away Microsoft and
all the companies shifting boxes. We will get all our software from
the Web. It will be partitioned so that some of it runs on our
computer, some on Google servers.

4) A workable Von Neumann machine within 15 years.

Pace of space developments will be set by AI. No people beyond LEO
until we get a VN machine. If Constellation is cancelled, and it looks
as if it will be, there won't be anybody beyond LEO for the period
specified.

How does this feed into policy? Well one should decide whether NASA
can help technology along or whether it should concentrate on space
ratring components. Mining asteroids, for example depends on getting
robots space rated as soon as they appear.

All I have said is simple extrapolating current trends.

It will probable be 30-40 years before we get things like nanotech
based spacesuits. Basic robotics is fairly well advanced. Nanotech is
still very much in the fundamental research stage.

Wars etc. will depend on the choices we make. I can only say "I hope
not" but you cannot predict. I don't know about what will happen in
the Middle East as far as conflict is concerned. As far as technology
is concerned the Mediterranean will be desalinated. How this will plug
into conflict is another question.


- Ian Parker

==========================================

Well ...read the book. Much you say here, Friedman works on. It's
useful to see what he says and how he gets to that. Settlements in
space will be hard to do. I expect space settlements will prove to be
the largest and hardest human accomplishment of the coming millennia.
And the most productive, for reasons Frederick Jackson Turner's 1893
paper points to. See also, works by Robert Zubrin, such as his 'The
Case for Mars.'

I feel very doubtful about 'singularities.' It seems very adolescent to
me to be feeling, 'something big and catastrophic is about to happen,'
when in fact, in these days it's going on all the time. It's an
impressive word, 'singularity,' but I see no practical usefulness to it.
It adds up to nothing significant, only a small buzzword or distraction.
The acronym I use for closing postings reflects reality, and it's been
around for a while:

Today is the end of the world as we know it -- Titeotwawki

And after 70+ years of looking at this world, I can only say, *It's
True.*

But the future is a whole another matter. As someone said at ISDC 2005
(my first ISDC), "To predict the future, make it." But as you may have
noticed, making a future *that works* is hard to do; and success does
not follow upon proceeding blindly. That's why I've become so
interested lately in how people think about the future. That big a
topic is just too big to simply jump into, however full of young and
adolescent energy you may happen at the time to be.

Some people -- a very few -- will set themselves to work and come up
with something. I'm trying to. Some people, for whatever reason,
won't. For example, I wouldn't bet a small fermented turd on this
"Quadibloc" character over the long run. See his postings above, where
he advertises so noisily all about ...himself.

Titeotwawki -- mha [sci.space.policy 2009 Jan 25]


 




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