Free For All - The Free Liberal Blog: Crystal Ball?

August 2008

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I make NO book on this list, but someone recently asked me what the US and the world will be like in 40 years. Here's my best guess:

* A nuclear bomb will be used, probably on Iran, maybe on Israel.
* Oil will be supplanted as the world's major energy source, possibly by hydrogen.
* Someone will step forward, possibly on their death bed, and acknowledge that indeed the Iraq War was fought on false pretenses. It will come out that W didn't know, but Cheney did. This will lead to the GOP falling out of favor more than it did after Nixon.
* India will pass Japan and Germany in industrial and technological output.
* Nanotech breakthroughs will make unimaginable advances that will be far more consequential than the Industrial Revolution.
* New immigrants will stave off the impending fiscal insolvency of the US and its pension "systems."
* Irrefutable evidence will be found that "we are not alone."
* One third of the US population will be millionaires.
* Barack Obama will be elected President in 2016. His running mate will be a woman.
* Kid Rock and Pam Anderson will divorce, if they haven't already.
* Total government spending will fall to 30% of GDP, minor progress, but hardly a "win."

Life will be easier than even now, but there will be several "panics." There will be a somewhat scary climate shift, but nothing like THE DAY AFTER TOMORROW. Theories about "global warming/Ice Age" will persist, but rendered moot by the shift to hydrogen.

-Robert Capozzi

Comments

It is not enough to say oil will be supplanted by hydrogen; you must specify nuclear-generated or solar-generated hydrogen.

Hydrogen generated FROM OIL, or from another fossil fuel, has long been a very high-tonnage industrial chemical, and the advantages it brings to motoring have long been available. Motorists have not found these advantages compelling, so it is likely the solar- or nuclear-generated fuel that supplants petroleum-derived liquid hydrocarbons will not be hydrogen. It could be nuclear gasoline.

Posted by: G. R. L. Cowan | September 25, 2006 04:24 PM

I don't think the hydrogen economy is going to happen. It's a lousy fuel: explosive, hard to contain, voluminous, etc.

I refer, of course, to liquid or gaseous hydrogen. Hydrogen in the form of hydrocarbons is an excellent fuel. I use it today.

Cowan's boron link is very interesting. However, I don't think burning boron or magnesium in motor cars is practical. The temperatures are too high, and you need to recover the soot. Boron, magnesium, or aluminum in recyclable primary batteries, however, is a definite possibility.

My prediction is that long-range motor vehicles will continue to burn hydrocarbons; however, those hydrocarbons may well be from nuclear, solar, or biomass generated hydrogen. Short range cars using batteries may become popular. There are some interesting technologies already in development, including lead-acid batteries with carbon fiber substrates and rechargeable magnesium batteries.

The future could be rosy, or it could be grim. It is hard for me to tell. Advanced technology has the potential to make the world wealthy, but it also has the potential to make genocide cheap enough for NGOs. Nuclear bomb technology is old technology.

Biotechnology is scarier. Implant a gene in corn to produce a highly allergic protein and then spread the pollen. Engineer a better smallpox and things get ugly quickly.

What happens when bacteria engineered to produce plastic decide to live in our guts? Or bacteria designed to mass produce certain hormones? The green technology folks are engineering bacteria to rapidly decompose cellulose to make ethanol. What happens if this bug proves viable in the wild?

Posted by: Carl Milsted | September 27, 2006 06:29 PM