Weekend Assignment #324: America 2062
Next Tuesday is my birthday, I am not quite 50 yet, but when I was a little girl I liked to sit and imagine what the world, more specifically, America, would be like when I reached 50! Having nearly arrived at my goal age, I am now aiming for another 50 years! So, in honor of my 48th birthday, I want you to search your imaginations, and tell what I can expect in the year... 2062!
Extra Credit: Tell me, is the world anything like you imagined it would be when you grew up? What's different? What's the same?
I have literally never tried to imagine what the world would be like in 50 years. I asked myself why not and my response was:
“Because according to Star Trek, we are hip deep in World War III right now and it is going to get worse before it gets better. I don't want to think about it.”
I looked it up, and it was actually the Eugenics War that started in the mid-1990s. World War III wasn’t until 2026.
But the grain of truth to that snark is that so much of the sci-fi to which I was exposed as a child involved some kind of apocalyptic war somewhere in the timeline and I couldn’t stand it. I think that since I didn’t want to imagine the how we got there, I didn’t contemplate what was on the other side.
So with my utter lack of imagination on the subject, I will say that the world in 50 years will contain a device that effectively responds to the command: “Tea, Earl grey. Hot.” And there will be No More Homeless Pets.
About Me
- Anne
- I am an HR professional, perennial student, and volunteer. I read all sorts of articles on personal finance and also the travel section and plenty of books and I will tell you all about them. I still believe "if you want to get something done, you ask the busiest person". I live in Glenview, IL.
Crowdrise is about online fundraising, event fundraising, volunteering and having the most fun in the world while doing it. Crowdrise is way more fun than anything else aside from being all nervous about trying to kiss a girl for the first time and her not saying something like 'you've got to be kidding me.'
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With Their Backs to the World: Portraits from Serbia, by Asne Seierstad
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5 comments:
Amen to the no more homeless pets. I'm pretty sure we were supposed to also be living on the moon at this point and have personal jet packs.
Hi Anne
Yeah... what you said... "no more homeless pets." If we humans spent more time caring for our animals and their well being, we might not have enough time to wage useless wars. Just a thought. I think I will keep that thought though... no more homeless pets, or maybe even no more homeless people, one day... not too long from now.
:) Carly
Since reading 1984 in 1984 I kind of gave up on scifi predicting stuff. The future is probably going to be more or less like the present. A bit blah and rather nasty. And I wouldn't even count on that tea machine. I think what the Hitchhikers'guide to the galaxy taught us is that these things never work.
It's interesting that you cite Star Trek as a source of pessimism about the future, at least with respect to imminent wars. I think of the original show as being basically optimistic, with a reasonably peaceful and enlightened Federation. For me, it's not until DS9 that the Starfleet universe starts to become a downer place again. But I admit that the Eugenics Wars were a nasty blip of pessimism for me back in the day!
@Sandrine, I don't think the point of 1984 was about predicting the future. That's part of why it's still relevant today, in 2010, 26 years after Winstone was assassinated by agents of the Party.
It's true, a lot of visions of the future are dystopic - even the optimistic ones, like Star Trek, send us through a dystopic ringer before human spirit re-emerges and triumphs. The sad thing is, it's probably true. Human spirit is great, but we often have to experience some pretty harsh tragedies before we'll accept a wake-up call...
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