What if AI could barely get there but Climate Change beat them to it? What if we are doomed before the Machine can save us? Moore’s Law and Computational Speed can only regulate and reduce power inefficiency somewhat, but not when Homo sapiens keep finding creative ways to increase electric consumption e.g. checking how many Likes on their last Facebook postings – BTW, I applaud fb Unlikes its Likes.
We are our worst enemies. We think upward mobility is the “Stairways to Heaven” e.g. other kinds of mobility in space and time – foresight: a gentleman from Kenya fathered our US X-President, an Israeli gay Ph.D. meditated through 3 bestsellers. People ignited and followed through with their aspiration and ambition from one generation to the next, from Karamazov to Kennedy, Murakami to Harari, with or without machine-aided feature. We trumpet and hail the machine in our machine age (because it is sexy and rides the latest wave and delivers high ROI) at the expense of human initiatives (air-traffic controller asleep at the wheel? what about air cargo went haywire?).
In just two decades, the big Fives: Amazon, Apple, Google, Microsoft and Facebook have risen above and amazed the likes of Exxon, Mobil, BP, Ford and GE. What’s in the water? Meanwhile, a generation of Opioid addicts, many talented and brainy, got sidelined. I cry for Argentina! All the massive torts won’t make up for the Medicare abuse just as MAGA won’t bring back and undo all past mistakes and mismanagement from FEMA (Katrina) to ACA (Seniors still drive up North for more affordable prescription drugs).
Upheavals in climate, politics, economic inequality (too big to fail) and decrease in empathy (too big a gap between Zuckerberg and those SF homeless folks) create a perfect storm for 2020.
Silos and herd (peer) mentality prevent people from even pretend to zoom out for a more cosmic view (heck, you go to the bathroom and take off your tie when the rest had already ditched theirs). I am getting to a phase of my life when what used to be my future shock now becomes my present reality; I grieve for the state of affairs we find ourselves in i.e. pretending that empathy is abound. I beg to differ that technological change will only be incremental (it is for a fact , exponential) to give us time to adjust.
No, we cannot, because ROW cannot keep pace, still cannot afford their contraceptives (not when Pornhub is widely available wherever broadband is – Canada should make condoms as available as its websites). We will share our space with 7 Billion then 9 Billion, each person uses up to 228,000 calories per day. Who will deliver clean water when it is in short supply ( for ex. Mekong River) and clean up when it is risen and flooding, who will build affordable schools and provide health care to the huddled mass. Before euthanasia comes back in style and by necessity, I argue for a return to thrift, to the land, of neighborliness (global), kindness and respect (for both nature and man). Malthus was wrong once, but what if he is right this time around.
After all, let’s say, we all evolved animals, at least, don’t kill one another. Let’s pretend we are all made in the image of God, baptized in water and fire. Wouldn’t that make Phoenix out of us all – bone-crushed then rise again.
When 9 Billion phoenixes all rise like drones, that’s quite a force to be reckoned with, even in an inter-Galactic battle of any imagination. But first, sustainable after putting the (future) shock behind.
Thang Nguyen 555 
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