The mega-problems of the 21st century

Here’s something worth pulling your attention to…

“The mega-problems of the 21st century” by Dr. James Martin

1. GLOBAL WARMING Global warming will lead to severe climate change. Unless stopped, it will upset the basic control mechanisms of planet Earth. 2. EXCESSIVE POPULATION GROWTH World population may grow to 8.9 billion people, with a growing demand for consumer goods and carbon-based energy, far exceeding what the planet can handle.

3. WATER SHORTAGES Rivers and aquifers are drying up. Many farmers will not have the water essential for food growing. There will be wars over water.

4. DESTRUCTION OF LIFE IN THE OCEANS Only 10% of edible fish remain in the oceans, and this percentage is rapidly declining.

5. MASS FAMINE IN ILL-ORGANIZED COUNTRIES Farm productivity is declining. Grain will rise in cost. This will harm the poorest countries.

6. THE SPREAD OF DESERTS Soil is being eroded. Deserts are spreading in areas that used to have good soil and grassland.

7. PANDEMICS AIDS is continuing to spread. Infectious pandemics could spread at unstoppable rates, as they have in the past, but now with the capability to kill enormous numbers of people.

8. EXTREME POVERTY 2 to 3 billion people live in conditions of extreme poverty, with lack of sanitation. The difference between rich and poor is becoming ever more extreme.

9. GROWTH OF SHANTYCITIES Shantytowns (shantycities) with extreme violence and poverty are growing in many parts of the world. Youth there have no hope.

10. UNSTOPPABLE GLOBAL MIGRATIONS Large numbers of people are leaving the poorest countries and shantycities, wanting to find a life in countries with opportunity.

11. NON-STATE ACTORS WITH EXTREME WEAPONS Nuclear or biological weapons are becoming easier to build by terrorist organizations, political groups or individuals, who are not acting for a given state.

12. VIOLENT RELIGIOUS EXTREMISM Religious extremism and jihads may become widespread, leading to large numbers of suicide terrorists, and religious war between Muslims and Christians.

13. RUNAWAY COMPUTER INTELLIGENCE Computers will acquire the capability to increase their own intelligence until a chain reaction happens of machines becoming more intelligent at electronic speed.
 
14. WAR THAT COULD END CIVILIZATION A global war like World War I or II, conducted with today’s vast number of nuclear weapons and new biological weapons, could end civilization.

15. RISKS TO HOMO SAPIEN’S EXISTENCE We are heading in the direction of scientific experiments (described by Lord Martin Rees) that have a low probability of wiping out Homo sapiens. The combination of risks gives a relatively high probability of not surviving the century.

16. A NEW DARK AGE A global cocktail of intolerable poverty and outrageous wealth, starvation, mass terrorism with nuclear/biological weapons, world war, deliberate pandemics and religious insanity, might plunge humanity into a worldwide pattern of unending hatred and violence – a new Dark Age.