Note: Homo sapiens - wise humans. What a joke. In the end, might makes right. Nothing has changed since the caveman.
In fact, it is interesting that Krugman wasn't even extrapolating current trends at the time of his writing. He was predicting resource constraints and the end of suburbia at a time when gasoline prices were low, and he was writing against the then current conventional wisdom about the information society.
So it is an interesting kind of look to the future. The peak-to-trough part of the business cycle is an outlier. Carnot would have died laughing.
THE Twank:
The other day I realized that the Repubs have boxed themselves in when it comes to the US economy. If anything BAD is reported, the Dems claim that it's a result of 8 years of Bush. If anything GOOD happens, the Dems claim it's the Obama plan working. Heads I win, tails you lose. Cute. And I thought, what the Repubs need to do is let things simmer down. Let things improve somewhat and after, say, 3 - 4 months of people breathing a breath of fresh air (God, we dodged a bullet. The worst is over. God Bless Obama!) let the hammer fall. How you ask? Two methods come to mind. The obvious: Stock Market manipulation. Let the DOW tank from the 8000's to the 4000's. And Two: Hyperinflation. Jack up the prices of food/fuel and watch all hell break loose. And who will be blamed? Obama, of course. So, my prediction. Things settle down/get better between now and mid July, and then the fun begins. I'll note this comment and come back to it in mid Aug. '09.
So, my prediction. Things settle down/get better between now and mid July, and then the fun begins. I'll note this comment and come back to it in mid Aug. '09.
Oh what a wicked web we weave, when we post comments on the internet and then some unkind soul remembers what we posted and expects a follow-up just like we said.
</poetry>
until all that'll be left are black holes which will coalesce into one
I was under the impression that the theory went on to say that the black holes would gradually lose their mass through Hawking radiation ("The Dark Era," I think it's called). Conservatives want live babies so they can raise them to be dead soldiers. - George Carlin
And The Big Bang Theory is a popular American sitcom. The peak-to-trough part of the business cycle is an outlier. Carnot would have died laughing.
Here's an idea for a novel: an all-out war breaks out among millenial factions when they realise that there's too many of them and only 144 thousand should remain alive when the rapture happens, say, a year hence. The peak-to-trough part of the business cycle is an outlier. Carnot would have died laughing.
But of course, good futurism is not a prediction about the future, but rather the working out of a scenario. Whether the working out of the scenario is useful depends on how well worked out it is.
Indeed, if we imagine the useful impacts a futurist scenario can have, one of the best might well be warning us of the consequences of doing something or not doing something sufficiently well that we take action to prevent the scenario from taking place.
As prophecy, that would be a self-defeating failure. As futurism, it would be a signal success. I've been accused of being a Marxist, yet while Harpo's my favourite, it's Groucho I'm always quoting. Odd, that.
