Comments on: Charlie Stross’ FAQ for the 21C http://grinding.be/2009/03/03/charlie-stross-faq-for-the-21c/ Wed, 08 Feb 2012 22:02:53 +0000 hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.3.1 By: m1k3y http://grinding.be/2009/03/03/charlie-stross-faq-for-the-21c/comment-page-1/#comment-22830 m1k3y Wed, 04 Mar 2009 23:22:41 +0000 http://grinding.be/?p=1650#comment-22830 being adaptable is key. for more on Known Unknowns check this out http://www.strategicstudiesinstitute.army.mil/Pubs/Display.Cfm?pubID=890 I haven't had a chance to read it yet, but it looks very interesting! being adaptable is key.

for more on Known Unknowns check this out
http://www.strategicstudiesinstitute.army.mil/Pubs/Display.Cfm?pubID=890
I haven’t had a chance to read it yet, but it looks very interesting!

]]> By: bob http://grinding.be/2009/03/03/charlie-stross-faq-for-the-21c/comment-page-1/#comment-22782 bob Wed, 04 Mar 2009 13:33:35 +0000 http://grinding.be/?p=1650#comment-22782 I could have told you the internet and climate change were going to continue apace for the foreseeable future. But just like Mr. Stross I couldn't tell you exactly how. The only thing to really take away from this is the second quoted answer. We really don't know what is going to happen and never will. Even when we see something coming we have a really bad track record with predicting just how fundamentally it will change things. I loved reading sci-fi from the 70s when I was growing up but if computers had turned out like they were in those books I wouldn't be typing this on the internet right now. For all we know by the end of the next decade everything will be solar powered and a new species of genetically engineered microbes will be eating all the plastic out of the ocean while we eat them (along with a side of vat grown cow) and all our new plastic will be made with the CO2 we are sucking back out of the atmosphere. But in reality it will be something no one saw coming that solves those problems. The only thing you can know about the future is that there will be "unknown unknowns" (I think I'm going to regret it forever that Donald Rumsfeld got to coin this phrase) and that they will change the world in ways you can't possibly predict. That is it. Any other prediction is just marketing. Just as Stross points out the things that we consider fundamental today, things that changed everyone's live's over the last century weren't even dreams when that century began. The only rational response is to keep living your life and do your best to adapt to events as they unfold. I could have told you the internet and climate change were going to continue apace for the foreseeable future. But just like Mr. Stross I couldn’t tell you exactly how.

The only thing to really take away from this is the second quoted answer. We really don’t know what is going to happen and never will. Even when we see something coming we have a really bad track record with predicting just how fundamentally it will change things. I loved reading sci-fi from the 70s when I was growing up but if computers had turned out like they were in those books I wouldn’t be typing this on the internet right now.

For all we know by the end of the next decade everything will be solar powered and a new species of genetically engineered microbes will be eating all the plastic out of the ocean while we eat them (along with a side of vat grown cow) and all our new plastic will be made with the CO2 we are sucking back out of the atmosphere. But in reality it will be something no one saw coming that solves those problems.

The only thing you can know about the future is that there will be “unknown unknowns” (I think I’m going to regret it forever that Donald Rumsfeld got to coin this phrase) and that they will change the world in ways you can’t possibly predict. That is it. Any other prediction is just marketing. Just as Stross points out the things that we consider fundamental today, things that changed everyone’s live’s over the last century weren’t even dreams when that century began.

The only rational response is to keep living your life and do your best to adapt to events as they unfold.

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