Jun 25 2014 : The Economic Times (Delhi)
15 WAYS THE WORLD WILL BE AWESOME IN 2050
When you consider the ongoing social and economic progress and the coming innovations in science and technology, there's plenty of room for optimism
CHILD MORTALITY Between 1990 and 2012, the number of under-5 child deaths went from 90 deaths per 1,000 live births to 48 deaths per 1,000 live births, according to a 2013 report from UNICEF .The Copenhagen Consensus on Human Challenge report ex pects the rate dropping to 31 per 1,000 live births in 2050.
VACCINES AND CURES Researchers are confident that within 20 years they can design a vaccine to stop the spread of HIV , which currently kills anywhere from 1.5 million to 2 million people per year. A US vaccine already exists for meningitis. A rheumatoid arthritis drug recently cured a young child's leukemia.
A modified measles vaccine put another woman's cancer into remission.
LIVE FOREVER In the coming decades, scientists hope to upload the contents of human brains into computers, allowing people to live forever. Neuroscientist Randal Koene and Russian financial-backer Dmitry Itskov are trying to transfer human consciousness and brain functions to an artificial body by 2045 by “mapping the brain, reducing its activity to computations, and reproducing those computations in code,“ according to Popular Science.
FEWER POOR “By 2035, there will be no more poor countries,“ Bill Gates wrote earlier this year. The global poverty ratio will fall from about 21% in 2005 to less than 2.5% in 2050, and the number of people living in absolute poverty will decline by another billion, according to the United Nation's Food and Agriculture Organizations.
ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE Hans Moravec of Carnegie Mellon University's Robotics Institute predicts that by 2050 freely moving robots that outperform humans both physically and intellectually will run entire businesses by themselves. That could allow humans to “occupy their days with a variety of social, recreational and artistic pursuits, not unlike today's wealthy leisure classes,“ he wrote in Scientific American.
CLEAN ENERGY If the world invests enough in clean energy , we will be able to rely almost entirely on renewable energy by 2050 -cutting energy sector greenhouse gas emissions by 80%, according to a World Wildlife Fund (WWF) report.
SELF-DRIVING CARS In the next decade, major car makers expect to release cars with self-driving features, such as steering, parking, gear-shifting, and braking, the Milken Institute predicts. Experts say most driverless cars will operate entirely without a human occupant's control by 2035.
Driverless cars will be safer because they eliminate human error, which causes 90% of car accidents, according to the Institute. Electric cars will also be widespread by 2050 -a tremendous benefits for the environment.
GENDER EQUALITY The rising participation of women in the workforce will continue to change dynamics at home. In 2050, men and women in much of the developed world will do an equal share of childcare and housework, according to an Oxford University study of 16 European and Bloomberg North American countries, in addition to Australia and Israel.
GLOBAL LITERACY Currently , 23.6% of the global population can't read, costing about 7% of worldwide GDP , according to “ A Scorecard for Humanity ,“ a report from the Copenhagen Consensus Center.
By 2050, experts estimates that illiteracy rates will fall to just 12% and cost only about 3.8% of GDP .
FEWER WARS From 2009 to 2050, the number of countries involved in internal armed conflicts will decrease by more than 50%, according to a report from International Studies Quarterly . The study predicted that, in 2050, 7% of countries will be embroiled in internal conflicts, down from 15% in 2009. Reasons for the decline of violence include more education and the high cost of war. “It has become too expensive to kill people,“ the report's co-author University of Oslo Political Science Professor Håvard Hegre told Apollon. “Modern society is dependent on economic development. It is too expensive to use violence to destroy this network.“
INTERNET EVERYWHERE In “The World We Made,“ Forum for the Future founder Jonathon Porritt predicts that by 2050, more than 8 billion people will go online, 97.5% of the population then. Currently , about 40% of the globe has internet access, with 78% of users in developed countries and 32% in developing countries. That's about 2.85 billion people, many of whom get internet access from mobile phones.
ORGAN TRANSPLANTS Technology is unlocking ways to prolong life while people wait for transplants. Dialysis replaces kidneys for people who need a transplant, and, more recently , artificial hearts have been able to keep some patients alive while they wait for a new one. In the next 35 years or so, artificial and lab-grown organs will create a more permanent solution for patients, who won't have to wait for another person to die before getting a life-sustaining organ. We are already implanting lab-grown bladders and vaginas. Other organs -from hearts and lungs to skin -are on their way .
REPRODUCTIVE TECHNOLOGY These days, women only have a very general sense of when in their lives they'll stop being fertile, but in the future, women will have more “personalized“ biological clocks so they'll know exactly when they'll stop being able to make babies, Alexis Madrigal has written in The Atlantic. Couples of the future will also have a better idea of when they should try to conceive. Personal hormone trackers that detect bodily changes through the skin could become a normal part of tracking our fertility .
DESIGNER BABIES Scientists are currently working on genetic engineering to help make sick children healthy by removing or replacing diseased genes. This could later be used to perfect children by genetically engineering away crooked teeth or bad eyesight, improve IQ. “[I] n a couple of decades, and certainly by 2050 ... we'll choose its sex and its appearance and stuff like that, but we can bump up his IQ by 10 points, or by really giving the very latest technology , you get 15 points more of IQ,“ Yale professor and computer scientist David Gelernter told Big Think.
UNIVERSAL TRANSLATOR The “universal translator“ -an imaginary device that lets people who speak different languages communicate instantly -has been featured in sci-fi shows like “Star Trek.“ The Economist noted last year that it may not be long before automatic simultaneous translation becomes the norm in the real world, too. In the future, you may be able to go to a foreign country and speak fluently with the locals just by wearing a pair of special goggles or using a phone app.
Business Insider Illustrations: ANIRBAN BORA
VACCINES AND CURES Researchers are confident that within 20 years they can design a vaccine to stop the spread of HIV , which currently kills anywhere from 1.5 million to 2 million people per year. A US vaccine already exists for meningitis. A rheumatoid arthritis drug recently cured a young child's leukemia.
A modified measles vaccine put another woman's cancer into remission.
LIVE FOREVER In the coming decades, scientists hope to upload the contents of human brains into computers, allowing people to live forever. Neuroscientist Randal Koene and Russian financial-backer Dmitry Itskov are trying to transfer human consciousness and brain functions to an artificial body by 2045 by “mapping the brain, reducing its activity to computations, and reproducing those computations in code,“ according to Popular Science.
FEWER POOR “By 2035, there will be no more poor countries,“ Bill Gates wrote earlier this year. The global poverty ratio will fall from about 21% in 2005 to less than 2.5% in 2050, and the number of people living in absolute poverty will decline by another billion, according to the United Nation's Food and Agriculture Organizations.
ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE Hans Moravec of Carnegie Mellon University's Robotics Institute predicts that by 2050 freely moving robots that outperform humans both physically and intellectually will run entire businesses by themselves. That could allow humans to “occupy their days with a variety of social, recreational and artistic pursuits, not unlike today's wealthy leisure classes,“ he wrote in Scientific American.
CLEAN ENERGY If the world invests enough in clean energy , we will be able to rely almost entirely on renewable energy by 2050 -cutting energy sector greenhouse gas emissions by 80%, according to a World Wildlife Fund (WWF) report.
SELF-DRIVING CARS In the next decade, major car makers expect to release cars with self-driving features, such as steering, parking, gear-shifting, and braking, the Milken Institute predicts. Experts say most driverless cars will operate entirely without a human occupant's control by 2035.
Driverless cars will be safer because they eliminate human error, which causes 90% of car accidents, according to the Institute. Electric cars will also be widespread by 2050 -a tremendous benefits for the environment.
GENDER EQUALITY The rising participation of women in the workforce will continue to change dynamics at home. In 2050, men and women in much of the developed world will do an equal share of childcare and housework, according to an Oxford University study of 16 European and Bloomberg North American countries, in addition to Australia and Israel.
GLOBAL LITERACY Currently , 23.6% of the global population can't read, costing about 7% of worldwide GDP , according to “ A Scorecard for Humanity ,“ a report from the Copenhagen Consensus Center.
By 2050, experts estimates that illiteracy rates will fall to just 12% and cost only about 3.8% of GDP .
FEWER WARS From 2009 to 2050, the number of countries involved in internal armed conflicts will decrease by more than 50%, according to a report from International Studies Quarterly . The study predicted that, in 2050, 7% of countries will be embroiled in internal conflicts, down from 15% in 2009. Reasons for the decline of violence include more education and the high cost of war. “It has become too expensive to kill people,“ the report's co-author University of Oslo Political Science Professor Håvard Hegre told Apollon. “Modern society is dependent on economic development. It is too expensive to use violence to destroy this network.“
INTERNET EVERYWHERE In “The World We Made,“ Forum for the Future founder Jonathon Porritt predicts that by 2050, more than 8 billion people will go online, 97.5% of the population then. Currently , about 40% of the globe has internet access, with 78% of users in developed countries and 32% in developing countries. That's about 2.85 billion people, many of whom get internet access from mobile phones.
ORGAN TRANSPLANTS Technology is unlocking ways to prolong life while people wait for transplants. Dialysis replaces kidneys for people who need a transplant, and, more recently , artificial hearts have been able to keep some patients alive while they wait for a new one. In the next 35 years or so, artificial and lab-grown organs will create a more permanent solution for patients, who won't have to wait for another person to die before getting a life-sustaining organ. We are already implanting lab-grown bladders and vaginas. Other organs -from hearts and lungs to skin -are on their way .
REPRODUCTIVE TECHNOLOGY These days, women only have a very general sense of when in their lives they'll stop being fertile, but in the future, women will have more “personalized“ biological clocks so they'll know exactly when they'll stop being able to make babies, Alexis Madrigal has written in The Atlantic. Couples of the future will also have a better idea of when they should try to conceive. Personal hormone trackers that detect bodily changes through the skin could become a normal part of tracking our fertility .
DESIGNER BABIES Scientists are currently working on genetic engineering to help make sick children healthy by removing or replacing diseased genes. This could later be used to perfect children by genetically engineering away crooked teeth or bad eyesight, improve IQ. “[I] n a couple of decades, and certainly by 2050 ... we'll choose its sex and its appearance and stuff like that, but we can bump up his IQ by 10 points, or by really giving the very latest technology , you get 15 points more of IQ,“ Yale professor and computer scientist David Gelernter told Big Think.
UNIVERSAL TRANSLATOR The “universal translator“ -an imaginary device that lets people who speak different languages communicate instantly -has been featured in sci-fi shows like “Star Trek.“ The Economist noted last year that it may not be long before automatic simultaneous translation becomes the norm in the real world, too. In the future, you may be able to go to a foreign country and speak fluently with the locals just by wearing a pair of special goggles or using a phone app.
Business Insider Illustrations: ANIRBAN BORA
