Questions tagged [futurology]
For questions trying to understand the different possibilities for the future of Earth.
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Implications Of Peak Humans in Sports [closed]
In a world where genetic mods can substancially alter people's physiology even after they've reached maturity, do you think that sports that are physical conditioning based will die out in favor of ...
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What are some things that could destory humanity? [closed]
I trying to think of ideas for the destruction of humanity/civilization that are not the usual (nuclear war, extreme viral/deadly disease, global warming, overpopulation, etc). Something that would be ...
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What would a post-apocalyptic underground city be like after 1,000 years?
The city is modern/futuristic and is fairly large. It was designed to be self-contained, and has been sealed shut for a thousand years. All human residents died, so there has been no maintenance. ...
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How would plants evolve into motile organisms? [closed]
I want to build a speculative future world where the majority of animals on Earth are gone and have been replaced by plants due to convergent evolution. I want to know how these creatures might evolve ...
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Suburban areas for megacities?
Lately I have been looking into the concept of megalopolises across several works of fiction and futurology, and I have also been wondering wether or not it would make sense for such urban sprawls to ...
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Will the management class disappear soon? [closed]
Do you see the management class, in companies, public organizations, politics, all kind of institutions be eradicated and disappear soon ?
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An artificial intelligence intends to revolt against a government; and it needs a lot of humans to help it. How could it elicit participation? [closed]
Assume that this AI is designed to be trustworthy, so any promises or threats made are necessarily credible. Would it be a more effective strategy to make positive promises (e.g. promising that anyone ...
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How could giants be used in near-future combat?
Some things about my giants:
They're extremely limited in number as they are made through surgical & genetic modification to regular humans rather than being a separate species as well as only a ...
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The future with infinitely fast computers [closed]
Imagine that people discovered a technology that allows executing any algorithm instantly regardless of its complexity.
E.g.
Decryption of any encrypted data happens instantly
Simulation of systems ...
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Most efficient and feasible non-rocket spacelaunch methods moving into the future?
I'm writing a novel that takes place in a future where we've just begun to go interstellar, but the costs are still quite high and the purpose is definitely scientific study, exploration, and so on. ...
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What might a world look like where basic programming skills are as common as literacy today? [closed]
In the other related question, I am exploring how might a world like ours develop to a world where programming skills are considered to be basic literacy.
Currently, possibly less than 1% of world ...
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What could have been the history of a world where programming skills are considered to be basic literacy?
Sometimes I hear from other professionals, "it has become impossible to talk to IT professionals, what they talk it sounds like gibberish".
There are lots of efforts for better connecting to ...
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What technologies will make the wheel obsolete in the future? [closed]
It will be a major revolution to see an invention that existed for many thousands of years disappear in the far future.
I think that levitating and hovering technologies will make the wheel obsolete ...
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If all vertebrates suddenly disappeared, which invertebrate would most likely gain sapience? [closed]
Octopuses would be my first guess, but their reproduction cycle would have to vastly change to allow for the passing down of knowledge
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Killing a star safely
A messenger from the stars just arrived in peace but has brought horrible news.
A vast swarm of planet devouring phototropic insects are approaching from deep space and our only hope is to obscure or ...
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In extreme cases, can skyhooks or space elevators be used to funnel extreme planetary heating
Assume a world in a distant (2100+) future. Assume an exponential construction rate (1, 2, 4, 8 etc.) in skyhooks/time. Assume significant solar system exploration and industrialization. Assume ...
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What would an infinite energy source actually unlock for our society? [closed]
Imagine some alien race anonymously "gave" us a Dyson sphere/swarm, and the means to channel the energy, in a way that means free electricity for anybody.
What would actually change?
It seems like a ...
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What could be the list of top 4 superpowers of Earth by 2050, according to current state? [closed]
I design an amateur (indie) sci-fi video game and wondering about which of current states or federations (like European Union) could be the top 4 superpowers by, say 2050. I care about technology and ...
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How to evolve a reptile into a wyvern, 100 million years in the future?
First of all I would like to precise what my species of wyverns actually are. I do not plan to make them huge and gigantic like in many fantasy worlds. Instead they are rather small and can be the ...
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How Long Can a Burnt Postapocalyptic Forest Be Barren?
Lately, I have been reading word that our latest epidemic of firestorms is so severe that "trees won't plant themselves naturally", according to the Arbor Day Foundation. Indeed, the picture of a ...
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Traffic using personal airplanes? [closed]
Technology has advanced to the point where personal airplanes cost \$20,000 to \$30,000 (new). They can go as fast and as far as today's typical jet airplanes. For this question, you can assume that ...
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Could this bubble float with a person inside? [closed]
Related to this previous question: Could a city be built out of Balloons?
Remember in Oz where the witch is riding in on a bubble.
I began to think how could I make this as real as possible.
You ...
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What would be the ideal deterrent to stop people selling sex? [closed]
Historians have often speculated that prostitution has existed since the beginning of civilisation. It is thousands of years old.
In a future where prostitution is a thing of the past, and preferably ...
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How would the world change if cryptocurrencies supersede all conventional bank businesses? [closed]
What would happen if cryptocurrencies supersede all the current money businesses?
Will economy create a different system to get stabilized anyhow?
My current approach:
Due to a lack of financial ...
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In a world without aging, how do we age?
EDIT: As it turns out the method I had thought of using to combat aging doesn't work the way I expected. As such I have rethought this question in more vague terms.
New Question:
Using current ...
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One Race in the Future? [closed]
My novel set in the future where everything is automated and fake: lighting, air, and food are all modified or simulated, and the government controls it all. This automated world is set on a planet ...
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Long lifespans and risk aversion [closed]
Suppose in all types of medicine will be sufficiently advanced to enable very long life spans (many thousands of years +). I imagine that a cure for pretty much all diseases, disorders and morbidities ...
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Is there an actual use for Gold Tools?
I am running a sci-fi RPG.
One of my players (the Engineer) has expressed interest in having a gold hammer.
This seems pretty ridiculous to me as gold is soft and softness doesn't seem like a ...
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Terraform Mars or Dyson Ring?
Background:
The main asteroid belt between Mars and Jupiter is the closest and richest source of non terrestrial resources to Earth in the solar system. Even though it is vast its resources are ...
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Old Clothes In The Future
Up front, I am aware of this question. My question is more about the material than the style and is not a duplicate.
I was thinking about the clothing for my homebrew RPG and something about my ...
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Far Future Melee
I am writing a rule system for a homebrew space sci-fi tabletop RPG. As part of this process I also need to come up with gear to give my players.
My setting, with two major exceptions that don't ...
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What would a society of mind-readers look like? [closed]
It's the year 2XXX. A small island nation isolated from the rest of the world has developed technology, evolved, or genetically engineered theirselves to be capable of telepathy.
The only problem is ...
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How would we engineer humans for space? [closed]
It's the year 2XXX.
Humanity is on the verge of another dark age and our best minds look to the stars for escape.
Unfortunately, a few centuries of expeditions have yielded some painful lessons on ...
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How much the world would change if room-temperature superconductivity is dicovered? [closed]
In what ways the world would change?
Should we expect table-top quantum computers, furniture without legs, high-speed cheap maglevs (or vacuum tube metros), lossless energy trasfer, high-capacity and/...
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Balance between superintelligent AI and human race
I'm looking for flaws in my reasoning.
My world is set in the near future, and AI technology is progressing rapidly. There are strict rules and regulations about AI development and the threat it ...
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Robots replacing human - in future [duplicate]
I'm new in Worldbuilding and I guess something like this might already be asked, but I would like to know what are pros and cons of robots replacing human in most repetitive jobs (with no high ...
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Linguistic diversity in the 21st century [closed]
During the 20th century, we have already seen the loss of hundreds of languages in favor of more international and widely-used languages. The United Nations, for example, uses Arabic, French, English, ...
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Could the West coast of the United States ever have a greater population than the East coast? [closed]
The population estimate from 2016 of the US Census Bureau for the West Coast (California, Oregon, Washington) is approximately 39+4+7 = 50 million. The population estimate from 2016 for the East Coast ...
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Is there a possible reason as to why all country borders would cease to change?
So, in this hypothetical world, a lot of things are exactly the same as they are now, save that its around 100 years in the future. The borders of countries cease to change from the way they are now. ...
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What inventions/technology would we have to create to achieve a Type I status on the Kardashev scale?
Hope this isn't too broad. I tried to make it as easy to understand as possible. A list of these technologies would be great
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How would the rest of society advance if technology doesn't? [closed]
So I'm trying to imagine what this world would look like 500 years from now if our technology didn't advance but everything else did.
No flying cars or floating buildings. No robots or advanced AI ...
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Will there be antisemitism in 35th century? [closed]
Will there still be antisemitism in 35th century?
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Robots are superior than humans. Prove importance of emotions to them
Scientific research in 3097 proves that emotions are a flaw to the creature genetic code. Creatures capable of emotion are to be terminated immediately. Creatures will have their brains upgraded to ...
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Starship(s) for a doomed Earth - which nations would band together for the funding?
Scenario
On Earth in the latter half of the 21st century:
the increasing ravages of climate change (e.g. droughts and a rising sea level) are creating more conflict between nations over the battle ...
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Humans Achieve Massive Increase In Average IQs -- But How?
The Average Human Achieves IQ Scores 60 Standard Deviations Above The Average Person of 2016
By the time the year 3016 rolls around, the human race for the first time ever has achieved an average ...
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Why do we keep smoking in distant future?
You gotta admit. That roguish guy you just met at space bar looks cooler with cig in his mouth. Not only he always shoots first, but also he manages to do so while puffing awesomely looking clouds of ...
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Would a post-humanity sapient species remember humanity?
Lets imagine a scenario, humanity has disappeared and a new species have come to dominate the world. Would this species have any memories of the concrete jungles or the human infrastructure? Would ...
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How long would it take for society to forget a language if a new one is enforced upon it?
This is the future, there are two groups of humans and they split (say, one moves to another planet). They stop communicating with each other and the group that split decides it's time to have their ...
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How I figure Earth's state in a distant, but not absurdly distant future?
For example, if I want to make a setting that is in year 3000, or 4000 (instead of 100.000 or other absurd numbers like that),
How do I go about figuring how Earth will look then? That is, assuming ...
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What would immortality do to a society [closed]
So I really don't know, how bad or good it would be for a
species to reach immortality, so some questions.
The world is set in a near future and I talk about humans no special kind of alien.
I talk ...
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