Nevermind, It's Not the End of the World

#endoftheworld

The Mayans, just so you know, didn't predict anything.

New Agers have attached a 'transformational event' to a date in the Mayan calendar because that's what they do.

Doomsday predictors, having been proved wrong in 2003, then changed their prediction (let's look closely at that sentence) to 2012, also attaching their fantasy to a date in the Mayan calendar because that's what they do.

For some reason, dead Stone Age Mesoamerican cultures have an 'ooh!' factor when it comes to understanding the universe, despite not managing to invent the wheel.

The actual cataclysm being spoken of is a collision with 'planet Nibiru', which doesn't exist. The cataclysm was first mentioned in 1995 by Nancy Lieder, who says she receives messages from extra-terrestrials from the Zeta Reticuli star system through an implant in her brain. 

She claimed 'Planet X', as she called it at the time, was going to collide with us while denying comet Hale-Bopp was real. 

Nancy Lieder

In 2003 Lieder had her own dogs put down so as to save them suffering during the cataclysm, and to provide herself with food in the chaos afterwards. She went on the radio in LA to advise everyone else do the same. Think about that for a minute.

In 1996 Lieder associated Planet X with planet Nibiru, which pseudo-scientist Zecharia Sitchin claimed was mentioned in ancient Babylonian texts but not one scholar has ever backed up. 

That dot there, apparently. Except no.

Sitchin denied any connection between Nibiru and Lieder's claims. He said fictional Nibiru will pass us by in 2900AD. However, he did claim aliens called the Annunaki might come to Earth in 2090AD.

Here's some science to wash your brain clean.

What Makes Star Wars Star Wars?

This is my checklist for the 2015 Star Wars sequel, the as yet unnamed Episode VII

What do we know and love about Episodes IV-VI? The story is simple, things are black and white. Ok, light and dark.

Bad Guys are cruel and come in two styles:

Oppressors:
English Nazis attended by American junior Nazis and faceless drones.
No one smiles unless their evil plan is about to succeed.
Their evil plans never succeed.

Scum & Villainy:
Revolting aliens, cool humans, scary monsters. Scruffy gangsters all. They laugh when others suffer.

“He’s the brains, sweetheart!”
Good Guys aren’t always so good, but they do the right thing:
Classic all-American heroes, short on schemes and long on courage.
Relaxed mavericks or zealous newbies, they all have some growing up to do. Luckily there are mentor types on hand to guide them, and then die.
Supported by trustworthy WW2 Allied forces, they fight against terrible odds and win.

Tech:
Well-used, covered in unfathomable ‘greeblies’, with no fixtures, fittings or fastenings in sight
Impossible to tell what button does what or even what a display screen is displaying. On the rare occasion a screen is visible, the display is very basic.
There are no Health & Safety considerations whatsoever!
There is a very cool spaceship.

Things that need to change:
There is only one person of ethnicity in the galaxy.
When women do appear they need rescuing.

What I definitely do not want to see:
• Roddy McDowell as a cloned Emperor Palpatine building a third Death Star which gets destroyed by two guys, their sidekick mutual girlfriend/sister and a big, non-speaking alien.
• A bunch of Force Ghosts hanging out, like the dead princes in Stardust.
• A blue alien in charge of what’s left of the Empire.
• Tattooine as the bright centre of the galaxy. Again.
• Anyone saying “Yippee!”

What I want to see:
• Mark Hamill, Carrie Fisher and Harrison Ford.
• Jedi Master Luke Skywalker mentoring a Padawan. A female one would be good.
• The Millennium Falcon, patched up and still in service, used by the new heroes after Han Solo builds up their expectations then reveals the ‘hunk of junk’ he’s giving them to use.
• Chewbacca with grey fur.
• Leia as a Jedi.
• A film that is recognisably Star Wars and rooted in the original trilogy, true to their spirit and style (well, the first two anyway), but not just a re-hash of Episode IV.

Am I asking too much? No! Of course not! The producers and the director will be paid millions and, if the original cast are involved, I’ll bet Episode VII breaks all box office records. They have at least two years to get it right. It’s worth thinking it through properly and getting the fans on board. Yes, they will still make money. Do it right and they could make history too.

(Edit 21.12.2012)

Costume:
Let’s all first agree to forget the epic continuity error that was Ben Kenobi’s Tattooine desert peasant wear becoming the basis of the Jedi Order uniform in the prequels.
…
Actually, let’s just spend a little time with it first.
Ben Kenobi and Yoda go into hiding for 20 years…AND THEY STAY IN UNIFORM THE WHOLE TIME!
In the original trilogy the robes are seen on several non-Jedi. Uncle Owen dresses this way, as do several of the background characters in Mos Eisley. Even in the prequels many Tattooine residents are seen dressed in a similar fashion. Because light, cheap fabrics in voluminous layers is what poor people wear in deserts.
http://jimdavies.blogspot.co.uk/2012/05/how-jedi-should-dress.html
This stupid costume decision wasn’t always the plan. George Lucas had other (better) ideas, but dropped them in favour of keeping the Jedi “instantly recognisable”. Follow this link for a chance to say “Oh for f…. Why didn’t he stick with the original plan???”

http://boards.theforce.net/threads/lucas-original-jedi-plan.50006663/
If Jedi costumes in Episode VII follow the same desert robe theme, as I suspect they will, it will at least be justified because Luke only encounters Ben and Yoda while they’re dressed in desert clothes (floor-length clothing in a swamp, Master Yoda? Is that such a good idea?).

A monk in simple robes is a well known real world thing and it could add to an atmosphere of humility the Jedi badly need to hold onto in the sequels. It’ll probably be the ONLY token of humility, though, because Jedi are thugs.
In the prequels the Jedi rough people up, intimidate and manipulate them. They get their own way by strong-arm tactics supporting a corrupt and ineffective Republic while easily switching between roles as law enforcement and military commanders. If there is a New Republic, it will be interesting to see whether the Jedi will become the bullies they were before. If not, if they maintain a humble disposition as shown by Ben Kenobi in Episode IV and by Luke in Episode VI, even in the face of death, perhaps it will justify all that nonsense and slaughter after a prophecy said The Chosen One would ‘return balance to The Force’. Maybe the Jedi were on the wrong path and needed to be purged; the Sith were, according to George, like a cancer sapping life from The Force and needed to be removed. Seems a bit of a harsh way to do it though. So now what?
The problem is how to include the mandatory lightsabre battles without reviving the Sith and making an even bigger nonsense of the prequels. I predict at least one previously unknown former Jedi (like Count Dooku) who escaped the slaughter due to his (it will almost certainly be a man) inactive status. There’ll be a complex reason why he left the Jedi Order and why he now feels he can reappear with a red lightsabre and start a ruckus, but he may just appear in a black costume with a bad temper and we’ll get no further explanation. I think I prefer the second option.
So, on to the other costumes.

Arguably the most iconic things in the films are the legions faceless armoured minions. Stormtroopers quite possibly inspired a generation or two of film-makers and costume-makers to learn their trades. I know they were the main reason I became a costume prop-maker, along with several of my friends who still work in that field. Stormtroopers and TIE fighter pilots are my absolute favourite things about the original trilogy. I’ve wanted a Stormtrooper costume since I was eight. The 501st are a testament to the sustained popularity of the costumes.
http://www.501st.com/

Will there be Stormtroopers in Episode VII? I hope so, but I may be hoping for too much. Do we want a new type of minion or a familiar one? Will using the old ones make it look like they’re not trying? And that 40 years have gone by and the enemy are still in the same suits? This could be a deal maker or breaker for me, but I honestly don’t know what they should do.
I do want to see weird, complicated hairstyles on the women though!

Categories, Labels and Astronomy

Space moderators, you need to sort out your admin and classifications.


This morning a ‘science’ page on Facebook posted a thing saying there are 13 planets in our solar system, including 4 ‘dwarf planets’. But that’s misleading and shows a failure to grasp the basics of astronomy. This is roughly how the categories go -
Planets (8)
They’re big and round. They fall into 2 subgroups:
Rocky (4) - Mercury, Venus, Earth, Mars.
Gas Giants (4) - Jupiter, Saturn, Neptune, Uranus.

Moons (lots)
They go round planets and minor planets.

Minor Planets (innumerable)
They’re NOT planets so it’s a very stupid name, and there are sub-groups which make it even more confusing:
Dwarf Planets, NOT planets, also known as Plutoids because a lot of people for no good reason are upset that Pluto isn’t classified as a planet anymore (do they own property there or something? Wtf?), (5) - Eris, Ceres, Pluto, Haumea, Makemake
Asteroids (millions)
Trojans (loads and loads and loads), it’s complex and all about their orbit.
Centaurs (around 44,000), unstable and behave like both comets and asteroids.
Kuiper Belt Objects (over 100,000 with diameter >100km, and far, far more smaller ones)
More info on 'minor planets' here.

Saying “There are 13 planets” is wrong and misinformed. Ceres is a tiny little thing, much smaller than our moon. Like a Malteser next to a melon.

Just to confuse things further, outside the solar system there are Brown Dwarf stars that are like huge gas giant planets not quite massive enough to ignite and become a star. They’re a link between gas planets and stars and the only real difference is how much stuff is inside them.

Stars themselves are categorised as one family because they’re all on fire, but the differences between them are huge. 

Have a look at this image showing the difference in size between our local star and CY Canis Majoris.

Here’s a chart of star types by colour...

...and the same star types (minus the tiniest two types) by size.

The categories will never be right and never be fixed because the universe is not here for our convenience. It is not ours to define, only to stick temporary labels on. In time those labels will fall off although nothing has changed except our perception. Why mention this at all? Because when we label something we stop thinking about it. We give it a name and a pigeonhole and we leave it there. Labels change the physical nature of our brain and shape how we think. The more fixed our categories the more stagnant our thinking.

“If our small minds, for some convenience, divide this universe into parts -- physics, biology, geology, astronomy, psychology, and so on -- remember that nature does not know it!”
Richard Feynman

“[The] obsession with order is contrary to the nature of ideas, and the world. Without constant reminders that categories are malleable inventions of convenience and not manifest in the world itself, the possibility of free thinking and progress is denied.”
Scott Berkun

“However much we divide, count, sort or classify [things] into particular things and events, this is no more than a way of thinking about the world: it is never actually divided.”
Alan Watts

The Meaning of Life

On my way to work I often pass the big, inviting glass double-doors of a church annex. Large, friendly banners are draped above and either side advertising The Alpha Course and displaying a cartoon figure struggling to carry a question mark almost as big as himself. The slogan offers a chance to explore the meaning of life.
I find the concept of a meaning to life to be without meaning. As a teenager I was desperate to understand things that I believed were obscured by esoteric and unfathomable mysticality. It seemed obvious to me that science was merely a way of measuring things, but that the occult offered a way to look deeper. Astrophysicists scratched their heads over quasars while UFOlogists brought the distant universe much closer. My physics teacher copied words from a text book onto an overhead projector and made no effort to teach us, yet mystics spanning centuries keenly bestowed their knowledge. Tarot seemed able to reveal more aspects of the human spirit than Freud could.
It took a long time, many years of reading and a bachelor’s degree in science for me to realise that the problem wasn’t with science, it was with me. I lacked sufficient knowledge to judge correctly and had taken a short path that gave quick rewards. The methodology was always out there for me to find but my guides in the sciences were woefully poor at introducing me to the concepts and values of empirical experimentation and the axiomatic language of maths that underlies reality and slowly, piece by piece, reveals its nature to us.
I read Douglas Adams religiously and watched as many Monty Python films as I could find on video or get to see on the big screen by lying about my age. I knew this ‘meaning of life’ issue was a big one much debated by comedians and philosophers alike. I assumed that anything such luminaries chose to debate must be a worthy topic. Why else would it crop up so often?
I didn’t then know of any neurological reasons behind the genesis of such questions in the human psyche. I’d never heard of teleology - the act of assigning agency to something, placing meaning and design in a naturally occurring phenomenon - and how we are inclined to take that view owing to the statistical advantage it gives to any animal in surviving long enough to breed and rear its young.

I had no idea about the sophistication of belief and the tenacity of unfounded certainties. Asking for the meaning of life makes as much sense to me now as asking for the meaning of the sea. It’s just the wrong question. Like the six yr old on ‘Nina and the Neurons’ who asked “what are trees for?” Meaning assumes intent. Intent assumes a designer. I don’t believe in a designer of any kind. Belief requires a provocation. To me there is sufficient evidence of naturally occurring processes that would give rise to life and enough time for it to happen. To me that’s a marvel far greater than anything dreamt up in mythology or occultism.

Imagine a parallel universe where, shortly after time began, human civilisation and 2012 technology had sprung into existence. Complete, whole. Unchanging. 13 or so billion years later you go to a job interview. Two smartly dressed people ask pertinent questions and, at the end of the interview, they tell you to expect a response once HR had processed their assessment. Three days later you get a call to say you were successful and after a week a letter arrives to confirming the appointment. You report for duty and dutifully carry out the tasks you receive by email from your boss who is stationed overseas. Every month HR sends you a payslip and the money shows up in your account. A lot of what you do requires initiative and self-management. After a year in the job you start to wonder if your boss is really earning his pay and whether you get paid enough for what you do.
One day you find an error with your pay and call HR to let them know. No answer. You head over there and find the office where they’re supposed to be is empty except for someone vacuuming the carpet. They tell you in all their years of vacuuming they’ve never once seen a single person working in HR. How could this be? You try to contact your boss and get no reply. No surprise as the two of you have yet to speak. You contact the two people who interviewed you and they have no answer for you. No, they’ve never actually met anyone from HR and never seen the boss, but there are thousands of employees at the company and they themselves have worked there for years without any problems with payslips. The company has been around for hundreds of years, as everyone knows, and sometimes there are errors but they always seem to sort themselves out in time one way or another.
You start investigating. Your role gives you privileged access to important data. Unlike many employees you can see, if you look hard enough in the right places, how things fit together, company history, structure, communications. What you find shocks you. The company isn’t hundreds of years old, it’s thousands of years old! And, to your utter amazement, it’s origins go back billions of years!
After months of research you finally manage to put together a picture of how it might have happened. It all started when a single speck of static emerged from the background fuzz, its only distinction that it could bind together with another speck. Something innate in the specks caused them to bond in pairs under certain circumstances. The right kind of communications network was all it took. The double-specks had different characteristics and certain qualities began over millennia to emerge. They began to bind with other pairs and, eventually, an arms race began. Some collections of specks were harder to absorb due to the interference they generated in the static. Some were able to negate that interference with another type. On and on. A process of random traits and the resulting vulnerabilities or advantages emerged and after countless iterations and variations more complex groups were formed that sustained themselves and caused the static around them to form into identical structures.
One day a complex ball of static found a way to attach itself to an email. It travelled between accounts mindlessly and without purpose. Each time it landed it left an imprint which spawned another version of itself. Harmless to the system it travels through, soon there were many copies, undetected at the time and multiplying exponentially. In a short time there were countless trillions of them and the free static required to make new copies became scarce. Another arms race ensued. The complexity increased and in time forms arose that used the medium in which they travelled to give them shape and sustenance. They mimicked the communications they attached themselves to, appearing as spam emails and random jumbles of letters. Millions upon millions were deleted by users every day. But some emails, those that seemed to have some meaning in them, were occasionally saved or replied to, giving the complex patterns hidden within them a chance to replicate and an advantage over the others. The more meaning hinted at in the jumble of letters the greater the chance of it being saved from instant deletion and the greater the opportunity to reproduce.

Countless years passed by, the emails became more complex. Human users were as oblivious of the transmission of the purposeless emails as they were of the bacteria on their skin. Eventually, after billions of years, a complexity arose out of the simplicity of avoiding deletion and gaining opportunities to reproduce. The emails had formed into whole chains of apparent meaning, mutually supportive and collectively perpetuating the perfect environment to continue without end. The system developed a richness and became reliant on many varieties of emails to sustain itself. Wider communication networks gave rise to whole new levels of interaction between what appeared, to the unsuspecting humans passing the communications back and forth, to be individual people and departments. Random changes in the pattern gave rise to these varieties, some taking the form of more complex communications such as payment instructions to and from banks. Anything that met with resistance – anti-virus software, security checks, failure to complete the process – was quickly erased. But among the billions and billions of electronic messages spawned in the teeming ocean of cyberspace there were some which by chance met the criteria of the banks and completed a transaction. Mostly these were seen as errors and corrected, the payments repaid. But a tiny number happened under circumstances conducive to their success. Namely they gave rise to a payment paired up with a communication that explained it sufficiently. The bank and recipient allowed the transaction to stand and a new kind of symbiosis came into being. Eventually an ecosystem of self-sustaining communications had created an environment that not only allowed for successful transactions and the supporting communications, but also created them. Blindly manoeuvring the required ingredients into place by a process of multiple discarded failures and few retained successes, over vast reaches of time and after incalculable numbers of individual attempts, the appearance of a company and employer was formed. Without intent and only seeming that way to human eyes because that is the only way they can explain such things. Why else would it be so? Not how. ‘How?’ would be the better question, but centuries of civilisation have wasted time and effort asking instead ‘why?’, a question that, counter-intuitively, blinds us to the world we live in. Only you, having seen a crack appear in the status quo and having cause and desire to question it, were able to fathom the mystery of how the company came to be, when all your fellow employees failed to even notice there was a question to be asked.

Science, unlike the occult and the mystical, doesn’t seek to ask the question that closes avenues of possibility. It seeks to ask the questions that lead to more questions. By its nature science will always give rise to more mystery and more confusion because that is the nature of the universe and is the wonder of it all, and far more wonderful than anything dreamed up by human beings.

BBC Drama ‘Sherlock’, season 2 finale – workings out and spoilers.

Here's a bit of loose fiction-logic inspired by a fan discussion on The Guardian website (I do love a debate on the logic in a piece of fiction!) ...

http://www.guardian.co.uk/tv-and-radio/tvandradioblog/2012/jan/16/sherlock-how-fake-own-death?commentpage=1#comment-14167428

... and by Holmes' famous circumstantial certainties that follow the pattern, if not the spirit, of pure logic.

In the source material by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, Sherlock Holmes faked his own death (as a retcon) and Moriarty died permanently. But we can't make any assumptions from that.

So here's my fiction-logic workings out.

In the TV show:
SH shown at length to be uncomfortable with gratitude and attention.
Conversation with JW - becoming too famous to be a private detective.
Hanging manikin seen - indicated unmentioned line of investigation.
JW dismissed manikin as unimportant, ignorant of its use.
Conclusion - SH already looking into faking his own death prior to Moriarty break-ins.

Mycroft – Very smart. Plans ahead. Exceptionally well informed and connected, distant from SH, but watches over.
Likelihood of involvement – certainty.
Role? Tidying up, hands off, non-direct.
Conversation with Molly evening before SH ‘death’.
“You. I need you.” SH is not romantic. Molly is a mortician.
Homeless network referenced as easy to bribe.
M previously referenced complex-seeming puzzle achieved simply by buying off well-placed people.
Two assassins remain alive with protection of SH their priority.

Conclusion – SH plans assisted by Mycroft, Molly, homeless network and (perhaps unwittingly) assassins.

Is Moriarty dead?
Yes.
Very hard to fake bullet to the brain at close range.
Plenty of time to check body.
Body not mentioned in headlines – removed? Who by?
Would Rich Brook’s death negate M’s ‘SH a fraud’ claims?
M body moved by SH agents, Mycroft agents or M agents?

M decided SH not ‘ordinary’, distinction between M and SH blurred or lost.
M has erased all records of himself to become Rich Brook, specifically created to ruin SH.
M’s ‘final problem’ is not specified.
In source material ‘Final Problem’ announced SH death, actual at time of writing (meaning of title = SH’s last case).
In TV show ‘final problem’ known only to M, spoken of in tones to suggest dreary, bothersome.
Conjecture – final problem what to do about SH? Two sides to a coin. M seeking unity?
Distinction between SH and M removed, nature of problem changed.
M = fearless, thorough, large ego, arrogant, assumes superiority, unusual sense of ‘self’.
M thanks and blesses SH, then removes himself.
Most expedient way to unite the two sides and hurt/disrupt SH. M’s death drive SH to jump? Symmetry in death?
M assuming he’s out-thought SH and left him no alternatives.

Conclusion – M killed himself confident SH would do same.

SH face, not voice, seemed to cause reaction in kidnapped girl.
Mask - too obvious? Where would SH find it if used in fake death? Alternatives - Look-alike/disguise? Video/photo?
Girl conditioned to show fear of SH. Double? Conditioning using photo and torture? (unlikely as no reference by police to torture)
Spy cams at 221B. Video made by M to scare kidnapped children?
Loose narrative thread to be tied up at later date.

Conclusion – someone or something used SH face.

Is SH dead?
No.
M can’t be impersonating SH if M dead.
SH ‘double’ unlikely to still be dressed as fugitive presumed dead.
SH creature of habit, likely to dress same as usual.
No reference so far to SH skill with disguises.

SH alone in St Bart’s had enough time to make necessary arrangements.
Meeting place chosen by SH.
SH squash ball in hospital - in armpit, trick used by mediums (nod to Conan Doyle) to stop pulse in wrist. Ball already in possession.
SH bouncing ball as if bored – suggests enough time to plan and organise, but without leaving hospital.
Several seconds shown of pulse being taken in wrist.
If SH mask not found/used SH must have fallen. Into what?
Truck only possibility shown.
Chance of truck in place at correct time and rubbish being soft, unlikely. Truck arranged by SH.

Conclusion – SH brought forward and amended existing plans to fake suicide.

Plot:
Moffat/Gatiss sophisticated writers, not amateurs.
Tendency to play ‘long game’.
Clues in other episodes?
Wholesale lifting of plot from other episodes (e.g. Baskerville hallucinogen) against narrative tradition, may incite calls of foul. Unlikely unless has small effect.
Introduction of character unseen to resolve plot – as above. Deus ex machina.
Plot resembles SH methods, so clues were hidden in plain sight. Referenced throughout series (e.g. Adler measurements, Moriarty code).
More to ‘IOU’ than so far revealed? Much effort made, increased from apple to graffiti in several places.
Who owes SH? Irene Adler.
When ACD’s SH explains to JW the answer always seems obvious once you know where to look.

Conclusion – Nothing new or overly complex will be introduced. Explanation will be simple. No Tesselator.

Coat:
Could have been cleaned.
SH could have more than one (behind the scenes: costume dept has 3).
If double used by M, could come from him.
E-bay.
Show is in fictional world where Belstaff did not discontinue it.

Conclusion – coat not relevant.


Summary:

Sherlock was already looking into faking his own death prior to the Moriarty break-ins.
He brought forward and amended them to beat Moriarty and save his friends’ lives.
The faked suicide was assisted by Mycroft, Molly, the homeless network and (unwittingly) the two remaining assassins.
Moriarty killed himself confident Sherlock would do the same.
Someone or something used Sherlock’s face, possibly a double but more likely a mask or video.
Nothing new or overly complex will be introduced as a deus ex machina, the explanation will be simple.
The coat’s appearance in the final scene is easily explained and not important to the plot.
And no Tesselator was used.

Twenty predictions from BBC.co.uk readers for life 100 years from now

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-16536598

The numbered predictions below are not mine. They were on the BBC website (link above) and I felt the need to engage with them and all of the comments are my own. The 'expert' opinions are omitted but can be found on the BBC page should you wish to read them. I have no affiliation with the BBC and I'm not a futurologist, any more than most people are.

In the tradition of futurology, I will be speaking here in certainties. No hedging bets. Actually that’s not quite true. I shall throughout be wandering between faux certainty and strong hunches vaguely hinted at. The future is a wave of time collapsing into the most probable forms through some version of quantum mechanics, so at this point a fuzzy, self-contradictory stance is entirely accurate.

I disagree with most of the predictions and with the experts’ opinions on a lot of them. The predictions say a lot about individual issues and interests, current national preoccupations and fantasies, but don’t seem to engage much with actual trends in culture and scientific progress. The ubiquitous ‘cyborg brain’ predictions are on the same level as ‘personal jet-packs’ and as unlikely in 100 years as they are now, unless there is a revolution in psychology leading to unprecedented progress in understanding how the brain works. Traditionally it’s been a very slow process. Psychology became a science around 5000 years after physics did, demonstrating how bad we are at noticing our thought patterns. Emotions weren’t even recognised as a part of decision-making until 1985 (this is still not accepted by science in general). Advances in psychology take around 150 years to filter out into the world of non-psychologists due to the massive resistance to most of the ideas (unless it’s bad news that fits with our prejudices, then it takes less time but is poorly understood and usually misquoted).

Freud still comes up a lot, many years after his ideas were refuted and any sliver of accuracy gleaned from them and used by other, for the most part unknown psychologists.

Bowlby’s post-war ‘delinquent mother’ notion was mentioned in parliament a couple of years ago despite the last 30 years of research arguing against it.
Even if the mysteries of the brain are solved, the population won’t want to know. Evidence so far is that the answers won’t be well received as they are, somewhat predictably, counter-intuitive.

In practical applications the advances in cybernetic technology will first be in the use of brain signals to switch things from one state to another, becoming more refined to allow us greater control. But don’t we already have fingers for that? Brain-controlled devices will mostly benefit the disabled and won’t get much government funding or will be too expensive to roll out to everyone who needs it. The tech already exists for brain and computer assisted prosthetics (see Simon Lewis’ TED Talk “Don’t take consciousness for granted”), but you won’t see it on anyone who isn’t wealthy.

Ok, to the predictions.

1. Oceans will be extensively farmed and not just for fish (Jim 300)

I expect much more land to be turned over to food production before they farm the seas for crops. Urban developments using the sides of skyscrapers will be quicker, easier and cheaper. Before anything is farmed in the sea (assuming the salt water issue is resolved) we’d have to figure out how to harvest it cheaply and how to keep the hag fish from eating it all. Life in the sea has had longer to evolve and to come up with winning strategies, so if we think pests on land are tricky we’ll be in for a shock on the ocean floor. I predict underwater farming will become successful and widespread only after we build stable large-scale under-sea environments and I doubt we’ll do that by 2112.

2. We will have the ability to communicate through thought transmission (Dev 2)

As PT says, this will be in electronic form, so not thought transmission at all. There’s confusion between using the ‘power of the mind’, i.e. the electricity that fluctuates as we think, and actually willing something to happen remotely. We can do this now so it’s not that big a deal. Driving a vehicle by thinking ‘left’ and ‘right’ is the same principal as thinking ‘tennis’ and ‘artichokes’. As long as there is a distinct difference in how the driver feels about those things. The subtle difference between thinking left and right is actually quite tricky for the devices to pick up, so the driver may have to be trained to think about Bjorn Borg when he/she wants to go left and about a giardiniera pizza to go right. The tech will become more sophisticated and sensitive, but essentially this will just replace getting up and doing it with your hands.

If people can learn to visualise their thoughts very clearly they might tap in to similar tech used in current speech recognition, but only if the thought patterns for each word are distinct. Devices will pick up on changes in the brain, not on thoughts. And as each person’s brain is different every device will have to be calibrated to an individual, with the equivalent of several sessions of physio to bond the machine with the user. If we ever invent telepathy the first thing we’ll discover is that each person has their very own unique thought-language.

3. Thanks to DNA and robotic engineering, we will have created incredibly intelligent humans who are immortal (game_over)

No. Well, maybe some very rich people or pseudo-people who could go on for centuries as long as their bodies are maintained by mortal technicians. They won’t be incredibly intelligent though. They might have some abilities that enable them to process numbers very quickly, either through access to a device that inputs to their brain, but this isn’t much different to a person trained to manually work an abacus. If we have a calculator plugged into our brain we still need to operate it and know what data to enter. If the implants do too much of the work it’s not you doing it, it’s a machine and you just see the results, exactly like reading a screen. You can’t know that the answer is right or how it was reached, you can only observe the results shown to you.

Brains are organs for ‘knowing’ and anything that simply presents information to a brain is by definition external. Augmenting the brain so it ‘knows’ something within the internal systems of cognitive functioning is still so far beyond us that we can’t even begin to imagine how we might do it. We can’t say how knowledge is acquired so that it becomes something we ‘know’, where or how it’s stored, or how we assign priorities to it. No cybernetic advances will go beyond some variation of visual/auditory input until cognition is better understood.

4. We will be able to control the weather (mariebee_)

No. Influence in some small way maybe, but with huge consequences that will make it too problematic to bother with. The weather is made up of interconnected systems that cover the whole planet, from the mountaintops to the deepest ocean floors. It’s too erratic to predict more than three days in advance so weather control will be a small affair, no doubt causing mayhem for neighbouring regions. The people with the money for weather control will spend it on buying up land in the areas that have the weather they want.

5. Antarctica will be "open for business" (Dev 2)

Yes, totally. Resources and the fortunes tied up with them are the irresistible force of human civilisation. Nothing is sacred if it’s needed to keep the machine going.

6. One single worldwide currency (from Kennys_Heroes)

No. Too many people care about remaining separate and too many eggs in one basket. A global economic collapse would be devastating with no one to bail us out.
On the other hand, a universal ‘virtual currency’ via online markets and agencies like PayPal is possible in some form, but why not just continue providing a hidden conversion from local currency as they do now? That would remove the need to work out what the exchange rate is between, say, pounds and online credits. The software does it for you and you just decide if the cost in local cash is acceptable. This is already happening.

7. We will all be wired to computers to make our brains work faster (Dev 2)

No. See above. Brains won’t work faster for being wired to machines, anymore than watching a TV or using a computer make us quicker. Yes watching David Attenborough in the Congo is quicker than going there myself, but it’s not the same thing. It hasn’t sped anything up, it’s replaced it with a simulation by proxy.

8. Nanorobots will flow around our body fixing cells, and will be able to record our memories (Alister Brown)

Ok, what are memories made of? Where are they? Are they permanent or do they change with time, mood and situation? (Answers: unknown, unknown, no, yes, yes and yes) Memories aren’t what most people think. They’re not little reference libraries we use to look up information about the past. I know you think that’s what they are, but that’s because your brain is programmed to feel that way. The evidence shows that different memories are accessed depending on context and mood, and that memories change a lot over the years in order to reinforce feelings we have in the here and now.

We don’t, on a conscious level, doubt and question ourselves. We construct certainties. If people could use faultless recording instruments (nanobots in our eyes and ears that play back information as it was received at the time) they would be so upsetting and challenging to us they’d be almost universally rejected. Scientists and artists would love them though.

Fixing cells, maybe. Curing cancer, maybe. Memories no.

9. We will have sussed nuclear fusion (Kennys_Heroes)

And have the power of a star inside a tiny, flimsy building less than one Astronomical Unit from a major residential area. Whoopee.

10. There will only be three languages in the world - English, Spanish and Mandarin (Bill Walker)

With a million local variations of each.

11. Eighty per cent of the world will have gay marriage (Paul)

Only if the swing towards right-wing fundamentalism is reversed or we come out the other side of it. Attitudes change on a sociological pendulum, they don’t occur along a straight line of ‘progress’.

12. California will lead the break-up of the US (Dev 2)

No. Too much money tied up in it.

13. Space elevators will make space travel cheap and easy (Ahdok)

No, but they might have made enough carbon nanotubes to make it possible to build one or two for the richest space-faring nations – China and India.

14. Women will be routinely impregnated by artificial insemination rather than by a man (krozier 93)

Only if the robot-brains we’re all using have failed to successfully assimilate sexual desire.

The psychology of procreation and parenting is usually tied up with the bonding and nurturing of people in love. The processes have evolved together and it’s only our modern contraceptualised society that separates sex and pregnancy. Couples often decide to have a family together. Women aren’t baby-making robots and child-bearing isn’t a mechanical process outside the social arena of relationships.

15. There will be museums for almost every aspect of nature, as so much of the world's natural habitat will have been destroyed (LowMaintenanceLifestyles)

I don’t think so. The emotional burden will be too unpleasant. Who would want to go to a museum displaying the enormity of human-based calamity? Exhibit after exhibit screaming at you that your awful species is guilty of wholesale destruction across the planet. Not a fun day out.

16. Deserts will become tropical forests (jim300)

Reverse that and then yes. Forests will disappear, soil will erode, deserts will expand and sea-levels will rise from all the water contained within the trees.

17. Marriage will be replaced by an annual contract (holierthanthou)

No. People are still romantics who live in social groups. Marriage is a celebration of this and will always have a place in one form or another. Church weddings will be rarer. Hilariously, in the UK poverty-stricken churches will offer non-denominational marriages in an attempt to get money from the increasing number of atheists. Immigration to the UK from the US will rise dramatically as America becomes increasingly extreme in its outlook.

18. Sovereign nation states will cease to exist and there will be one world government (krozier93)

Not a chance. Too many people want a slice of the pie. This would only happen if the major corporations were running everything and decided to construct a single puppet government for them to control more easily.

19. War by the West will be fought totally be remote control (LowMaintenanceLifestyles)

There’s a Flash Gordon novel about this.
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Flash-Gordon-War-Cybernauts-Alex-Raymond/dp/0352301546

I read it many years ago and I think the message was that if you fight wars where no one dies it has no purpose. It’s the tragedy that gives it meaning and makes us seek an end to it. An increase in tech will cause a increase in the urge to start wars (for those that get them) and a corresponding increase in ‘collateral damage’ (i.e. civilians). Tech wars will be opposed by populations and civil unrest will be rife, as soon as the ‘wow factor’ wears off and people tire of watching foreigners die on YouTube.

See also Star Trek (the original series) episode ‘A Taste of Armageddon’ http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Taste_of_Armageddon

20. Britain will have had a revolution (holierthanthou)

A war is more likely. Some sort of economy/resources driven conflict thinly veiled with rhetoric about maintaining our values against a monstrous threat. Current trends suggest we’ll be at war with someone in the east or middle east and we’ll be on the side of the US. But in 100 years the US might well be an imperialist puritan dictatorship that we and the rest of a tattered Europe oppose in a bizarre ‘what if’ replay of World War 2 that finds us allied with Germany against the Americans.
Either way I predict a lot more riots in Europe and the US before the end of this decade.

More readers' predictions

• English will be spelled phonetically (jim300)

No. Too much opposition and too much confusion between homophones. People forget the importance of etymology in text-based communication. Phonetically written homophones can be misread to give very different meanings.
More likely the far eastern influence on pronunciation will have a big effect globally and text messaging and equivalents will provoke a codified form of recognised informal English. Forms will probably have to state that they must be filled out in pen and refraining from use of ‘txt-spk’.

• Growing your own vegetables will not be allowed (holierthanthou)

How will they stop you? How will this be policed?

• The justice system will be based purely on rehabilitation (Paul)

Only if humans come to terms with the evidence that retribution is counter-productive and we let go of the desire for revenge. A tenth of the money spent on punishing crime is spent on preventing it. American prisons make vast profits from prisoner workforces so prevention is very bad for business. Expect that model to be rolled out in the UK as soon as British consumers completely boycott sweat shops and Third World slave labour.

Politicians trade on the fact that criminals are seen to be punished, and unfortunately prevented crimes are invisible. No politician will claim the glory for something not happening without being challenged; someone will have evidence it happened by chance. The stats beloved of politicians everywhere due to the revulsion they cause in the average person will always be used to maintain a ‘crime & punishment’ approach until voters learn to grasp the basics and realise they’re being duped continuously by their leaders and by their own brains. I predict it will take more than 100 years to iron out all those wrinkles.

• Instead of receiving information from the media, people will download information directly into their brains (krozier93)

Maybe, if broadcast to be ‘read’ or ‘heard’ internally, but it will interfere with normal senses far more than headphones or texting while driving and cause a lot of death (unless we all end up in chairs like in Wall-E).

If the idea here is to receive news as thoughts, then no. See above. Several times.
Apart from the major issue with understanding how thoughts work, each brain would need unique information calibrated specifically for it. Not financially viable unless some kind of thought-news-filter is invented.

• Crops will be grown in sand (jim300)

They already are: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hydroponics

No mention of humanity living under the Red Star of the Solar Federation by the year 2112 or of the ruling Priests of the Temples of Syrinx? How disappointing.

Primus inter pares (first among equals)

1. People are biased.
2. People are alike.

Out of a million high school students surveyed just 2 percent said they were below average in their leadership ability (Gilovich 1991). Similar results show up every time a study like this is done. On average people claim to be above average.

Our ‘bias blind spot’ stops us recognising our own cognitive biases, so not only is it happening around us all the time influencing how we see ourselves and everyone else, we’re also programmed to ignore it!

The ‘halo effect’ is where we confuse a pretty face for someone we might get on with. It works backwards too, and with crowds. If we’re apalled by the huge number of people surrounding us we stop seeing them as other humans and they become unattractive and less interesting. Eventually they become obstacles to what we want to do. Next it’s road rage and shinning up the nearest drainpipe with a hunting rifle.

This is also the inspiration for all zombie films.

Contrary to convention, the heroes of zombie films aren’t tenacious survivors battling mounting odds, they’re people with no empathy who have started killing random strangers. The classic movie zombie is YOU seen through the eyes of a murderous sociopath.

That thing you like? Most people like that. That thing you do when no one else is around? We all do it. That song that really speaks to you? Us too.

The way to stand out from the crowd is to never go with your first or second ideas. Abandon them and go with the third, fourth or fifth idea, because everyone else at this point in their creative journey is thinking the same thing you are. It's the things we think of as we push on that make us individuals, nurturing our idiosyncracies and using them to influence our choices. Paradoxically, these ideas often resonate more effectively with others because they still speak of human experience, yet perhaps in a less frequently or even wholly original way.

The universe is trying to return to a unified state of sameness so it can end and start again. Fighting it takes effort. Differences between people are small but they build up over time. The more stuff you do the more it will stand out, the more you or your work will become defined. Originality is shaped by hard work and experience. We’re shaped from before we’re born and right through our lives to be the simplest thing we need to be to fit our surroundings, and right now at the beginning of the 21st Century that means being one of a crowd. And we hate it.

We’re fantastic at adapting to change, but we can bring about changes too. If we change the way we look at things, how we think about things, how we respond or react to things, we can change everything we do, see and feel.

No one is special. Everyone is special. Next time you meet a zombie bear in mind they’re meeting one too.

Modern Consumerism and Buyer's Choice

With the introduction of the 'Boycott Sopa' app, information instantly available to consumers is set to change.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/cifamerica/2012/jan/12/boycott-sopa-app-informed-consumer-citizen?INTCMP=SRCH

Knowledge is power. And for consumers that power comes from where they choose to spend their money.

If you want to update Marxism you might say that, as well as using workers as the means of production, consumers are used to convert produce into money. Workers control the means of production and consumers control the profit, so a boycott is a strike further along the chain.

Our culture still tends to see workers as possessions of employers, but that view is changing as more and more people start thinking about ‘work/life balance’. Even the term infers that your work no longer defines you (cf. Fight Club “You are not your job” and such reactionary institutions as HM Queen and the quiz show Fifteen to One that categorise people entirely on the basis of name and occupation).

On the surface consumers are celebrated for their independence, but companies use all manner of tricks to maintain ‘customer loyalty’. In reality ‘loyalty’ is mostly inertia. Evidence from the fossil record and from evolutionary psychology suggests humans have flourished because we excel at adapting to change, but it doesn’t follow that we crave it. We cope by being very good at re-establishing stability once it’s been lost. Marketing and sales people play on our instincts to manoeuvre us onto plateaus they create for us - farmed salmon in sea-cages thinking ours is the whole ocean to swim in.
By becoming aware of the nets we make them disappear. We must overcome our fear of the ocean and head out for the deep water of freedom.