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Speculation: What will the next 50 years bring?

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Boomer Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Sun Apr-16-06 09:09 PM
Original message
Speculation: What will the next 50 years bring?
Bearing in mind that so far all scientific predictions have grossly underestimated the pace and intensity of global warming, the conventional yardstick of "by the year 2100" seems a rather coarse measure for predictions. By the end of century our planet may well be changed beyond recognition, but few of us on this forum will be around to witness it and confirm our speculations.

If you believe, as I do, that we have already passed the infamous tipping point in global climate change, what effects are we likely to experience first-hand in our lifetime? In my case, another 50 years is theoretically possible (a few relatives in my family have reached 100), and it's certainly within the reach of many on this forum, so what do you think you are likely to face in your specific country or region as you grow older?

A Few Predictions

Within five years a total collapse of the ocean ecosystem - say good-bye to seafood of any kind; escalating food prices as agricultural yields drop and oil prices rise.

Within the next decade the coastal US will be pounded mercilessly, and at least several major cities (such as Houston or Miami or Norfolk) destroyed. Meanwhile, wild fires and water shortages in the western U.S. will strain community services to the breaking point. Urban riots will break out in summer as increasingly large numbers of people simply can't afford the basic necessities of life and the heat drives people to near-insanity; violent crime escalates as the desperate have-nots begin to rob the have-all-we-wants.

Within 20 years we'll see shortages of food (regardless of price) and the massive depopulation of the Western states as potable water supplies become insufficient to support signficant population density and fires wipe out even more small towns and rural residents. Coastal communities will also be gradually abandoned as rebuilding proves to be economically unfeasible. The rich and super-rich will take advantage of green technologies but the majority of the U.S. population will be too poor to change the infrastructure of their houses or their communities. The U.S. economy collapses as food and energy take all income from the working classes (the middle class having largely disappeared).

Within 30 years, gated communities will need armed guards to protect property of the still-got-stuff. Modest homeowners will be renting out rooms to the displaced to help cover the cost of utilities and everyone who isn't rich will be scrabbling to find enough food to eat. Large-scale agribusiness will fail due to prohibitive energy expenses and adverse local weather events that wipe out entire crops. Even home gardens will begin to falter as hand-tended plants fail to withstand temperature and weather extremes. Wider spread of tropical diseases into what were once temperate climate zones. High casualties from tornadoes, floods, hurricanes, storm surges, mud slides, fires will become routine.

Within 40 years famine -- which has wiped out many third-world populations -- begins to appear in the U.S., especially among the displaced populations that have never managed to recover financial and are living in vast shanty towns that ring every major city. Any form of energy, no matter how dirty or environmentally unsound, will be used to keep the infrastructure running. Increased pollution, contaminated water, along with increased incidences of tropical diseases, cholera, anti-biotic resistant TB and strep, will contribute to plummeting life expectancies.

Within 50 years... I'll be out of the picture entirely. Thank god.
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CrispyQ Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Sun Apr-16-06 09:13 PM
Response to Original message
1. Pretty grim.

Sadly, I think you're prediction is fairly accurate.
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Warpy Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Sun Apr-16-06 09:13 PM
Response to Original message
2. I just want to survive the insane men in the White House
I want to write the eyewitness history of this time.

I will not be kind.
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joemurphy Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Sun Apr-16-06 09:31 PM
Response to Original message
3. I won't be around. So, bon chance, mes amis. n/t
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agincourt Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Sun Apr-16-06 09:32 PM
Response to Original message
4. If your predictions are correct,
Many people will simply terminate their physical existence like Hunter S Thompson did. If this stuff does come true, the abortion debate will be one of the most foolish controversies ever to come into existence.
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Boomer Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Mon Apr-17-06 09:19 AM
Response to Reply #4
11. Nonsense
Humans are much more tenacious than you give them credit for, and the drug-addled Hunter S Thompson is a poor yardstick for predicting responses. Sane people don't commit suicide, they just fight to survive, even when the odds are overwhelmingly against them.

A better analogy for disaster would probably be the Bubonic Plagues of the Middle Ages. For the people of the time it seemed as if the world was doomed; they watched nearly half the population around them die in agony, without ever understanding why. If ever there was a time for despair, that was it, but people didn't kill themselves outright even when they assumed they were destined to die, too. Some went a bit nutty and joined the flagellants, others caroused in a party to end all parties, and some just kept going about their daily routine (as best they could).

Even if there is a massive die-off of millions, even billions, of people, each individual person will try to survive for as long as s/he can. It's in our nature. Just like buying a lottery ticket. There's always that one in a gazillion chances that you'll hold the winning ticket.
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hatrack Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Sun Apr-16-06 09:36 PM
Response to Original message
5. Damn! And here I thought I was the official bearer of bad news!!
Well cut my legs off and call me Cassandra!!

:toast:
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Boomer Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Mon Apr-17-06 09:21 AM
Response to Reply #5
12. Yeeewwww. That sounds messy!
:hi:
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villager Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Sun Apr-16-06 10:12 PM
Response to Original message
6. well, goddamnit, I just planted my first vegetable garden in years
earlier today.

That gesture isn't enough to withstand the coming storms, but I still say: let a thousand (edible) flowers bloom!
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Delphinus Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Mon Apr-17-06 06:26 AM
Response to Original message
7. Pretty gloomy, but probably right on the money.
My son lives in AZ and we had a conversation a few weeks ago about the Megalopolis that's coming between Phoenix and Tuscon. I went off on a tangent about the water use and about being in a desert and about the population explosion and about the peak oil situation .... and he had no answers for the questions I had. Neither do most of the people out there thinking this Megalopolis is just a great thing.

Sad.

Suicide is going to be a viable option.
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NMDemDist2 Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Tue Apr-18-06 10:49 AM
Response to Reply #7
13. that's one reason I'm moving out of PHX
to a place with a deep artesian aquafer

i'm getting a few acres, gonna grow a garden and install solar technology in a place small enough to have some opportunities for barter

depending on space even get a horse or donkey and a cart, but at least some chickens and other critters

gonna start eating more vegitarian too

i'll probably not live long enough to see the chaos it will become, but am gonna try to be as self sufficent as possible "just in case"
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Memory Container Donating Member (108 posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Mon Apr-17-06 06:41 AM
Response to Original message
8. I'd give it more like 75 years...
For all that to come to pass.

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brokensymmetry Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Mon Apr-17-06 07:56 AM
Response to Original message
9. Perhaps a bit too optimistic.
I expect global famine to hit in 20 years - or perhaps less. It will be the beginning of the die-off; population will decline over several decades from the present 6.5 billion to about 1 billion.

This will trigger mass migrations, which will render the present immigration debate laughable.

Given the various pressures you mention, the U.S. and global economies will be under severe stress, and governments will probably resort to massive inflation, thus wiping out the savings of the formerly middle class. The $1,000,000 they had in their 401k will be consumed in a year - or less.

Peak Oil is likely to hit sometime between now and 2010. Given our dependence on oil for agriculture, along with climate change and the death of the oceans, all else will follow.

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Boomer Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Mon Apr-17-06 09:08 AM
Response to Reply #9
10. Yup, I deliberately held back
I took the most conservative view of the changes I believe are coming, knowing that even that "optimism" would be considered apocalyptic alarmism by some people. I won't be surprised if the slide happens much faster and much harder.

There are sooo many factors at work and I barely touched on the economic issues -- such as when our national economy will collapse -- because it's beyond my comfort zone of expertise. Suffice it to say that I've paid off my mortgage and I'm currently pulling money out of savings to fix up my house. I figure it's the one tangible asset I'll have once money becomes worthless. My broker gets a little nervous and keeps reminding me that I need to save for retirement and it's all I can do not to laugh in her face. The only retirement I'm likely to have is when I'm unemployed and there are NO jobs to be had.

The ocean ecosystem is already collapsing, but I figure it'll be a few years before the full scope is obvious to Joe Average.

And I'm really nervous about agricultural yields because they've been dropping worldwide at the same time that our world food supply is down to just a few months (six, I think). Just when we need it the most, the last of our farmland is being plowed up for McMansions and shopping malls. Meanwhile Monsanto and other spawn of Satan are f*cking around with genetically engineered crops that are contaminating the planet's gene pools and their hybrid seeds are creating dependence on their product catalog.

So, yeah, global famine in 20 years is not out of the realm of possibility.

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CCBeck Donating Member (12 posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Tue Apr-18-06 12:19 PM
Response to Original message
14. This will be big I think in the next 50 years :)
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Delphinus Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Tue Apr-18-06 04:09 PM
Response to Reply #14
15. Welcome, CCBeck!
Interesting - I was just reading something on the 'net about the rise in asthma and how it *might* be affected by the depletion of oxygen.
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