Future Shock

If you have a free hour or ten, check out some of the learned, mind expanding answers to this year’s edge.org question, which is “What game-changing scientific ideas and developments do you expect to live to see?”

I am going to try and cover some of the more interesting responses over the next few days. I’ll start with John Gottman’s anticipation of earthlike colonies: 

 

The technological changes were small at first. In 2007 a telescope was developed that could search for planets in the Milky Way within 100 light years of Earth. The next version of the telescope in 2008 did not have to block out the light of the new star to see the planets. It could directly see the reflected light of the planets closest to every star. That made it possible to do spectroscopic analysis of reflected light and search for blue planets like Earth. Within a decade, 100 Earth-like planets had been identified within 100 light years. In the next two centuries that number increased to 50,000 blue planets.

Within the next two centuries the seemingly impossible technical problems of space travel began to be solved. Problems of foil sails were solved. Designs emerged for ships that could get up to 85% of the speed of light within 2 years, using acceleration from starts and from harnessing the creative energy of empty space itself. The Moon, Europa and Mars were colonized. Terra-forming technologies developed. Many designs emerged for the spinning complete 2-mile Earth-habitat ship that produced a 1-g environment. Thousands of people wanted to make the trips.

Darwin and Crime

The Economist has a piece about how the study of evolution can be useful to policymakers. I’m unqualified to opine on that however the article did contain some fascinating bits of research:

That murderers are usually young men is well known, but Dr Daly and Dr Wilson dug a bit deeper. They discovered that although the murder rate varies from place to place, the pattern does not. Plot the rate against the age of the perpetrator and the peak is the same (see chart). Moreover, the pattern of the victims is similar. They, too, are mostly young men. In the original study, 86% of the victims of male killers aged between 15 and 19 were also male. This is the clue as to what is going on. Most violence (and thus most murder, which is simply violence’s most extreme expression) is a consequence of competition between young, unemployed, unmarried men. In the view of Darwinists, these men are either competing for women directly (“You looking at my girl, Jimmy?”) or competing for status (“You dissing me, man?”).

Research also shows why capital punishment may be ineffective as a deterrent against murder. If murder is indeed motivated by reproductive competition, you could conclude that capital punishment is ineffective because it presents the same risk of reproductive failure which motivated the crime in the first place.

Then there’s this, on rape:

Transferable Skills

The NYT has a piece on laid off bankers chasing literary/creative dreams:

With Wall Street hemorrhaging jobs, bonuses disappearing and the financial sector going through a seismic shift, some bankers and lawyers are switching lanes to more creative career paths. They are putting down their Wall Street Journals and picking up Variety as they try their hands at comedy, filmmaking and writing. “The economy couldn’t survive on speculation and what really amounted to advanced financial alchemy,” he said. “We are now realizing it is our human creativity that is our real capital. 

“The economic downturn is going to free up top talent to do other things that are going to change the metabolism of cities like New York in a very good way.”

Not so fast:

Still, Jonathan Bowles, director of the Center for an Urban Future, says that while there is no question that creative fields are not faring as badly as Wall Street right now, they are hardly immune to the economic downturn. The advertising, publishing and newspaper industries are all cutting jobs, he noted.

 

 

Green, Not-So-Green

TreeHugger reports on a new shoebox made from 100% recycled material:

Pretty cool, but, the real question is: How will this affect the  manufacture of gradeschool dioramas?

Also, just in case that story tempted you into indulging in any optimism about the green revolution, there’s this report in the NYT about an artificial beach currently under development in Dubai which will feature air conditioned sand. Yep. Air conditioned sand. That has to be the energy equivalent of burning hundred dollar bills in a fireplace, right?