There are two main groups of thinkers about the future: those who are
pessimistic and those who are optimistic. The pessimists emphasize
problems about the environment, global warming, overpopulation, resource depletion,
pollution, and environmental degradation. The optimists emphasize
technological progress, and the seemingly endless capacity for man
to come up with technological solutions to problems. In this blog I
like to strike a balance between optimistic and pessimistic themes.
But perhaps you are looking for a blog which is more unabashedly
optimistic or pessimistic. Below is a guide to various blogs about
the future, divided into two categories: the optimistic and the
pessimistic.
Optimistic Blogs
Next Big Future (www.nextbigfuture.com).
The Next Big Future blog is one of the most popular blogs of the
technological optimists. In the original version of this post (written just after a particularly bad post on Next Big Future), I complained about unalloyed optimism at this site. But in the past six months the site has had a very balanced approach, and has had many excellent posts. Check this site out if you haven't already.
Singularity Hub (www.SingularityHub.com)
This blog is basically a collection of news stories about exciting
futuristic technological developments. This blog doesn't have much
in the way of thoughtful essays. But there is an interesting Debate
Central tab, where the blog users comment on any of dozens of
future-related debate topics.
Kurzweil Accelerating Intelligence (http://www.kurzweilai.net)
This site is associated with Ray Kurzweil, who is pretty much the
king of the technological optimists. The site features a very cheery
set of essays and news stories, highlighting exciting technological
breakthroughs on the horizon. The site promotes Kurzweil's idea of a
coming technological singularity in which machines become more
intelligent than men. The front page features a link to a fun
chatbot you can talk to, a chatbot named Ramona who has a face and
moving lips. Some of the answers the chatbox gives are surprisingly
intelligent.
Pessimistic Blogs
The Automatic Earth (www.theautomaticearth.com)
For years this blog has been one of the main blogs of economic
pessimism. It features long, thoughtful essays by authors who seem to
think that our economic system is a house of cards on the verge of
collapse. Similar essays can also be found almost every day at www.zerohedge.com, which posts more frequently.
ApocaDocs (www.apocadocs.com)
This site features news items related to global warming, pollution,
ecological collapse, and resource depletion. Those who care to
believe that we are headed for ecological doom will find ample
supporting evidence at this site.
Our Finite World (www.ourfiniteworld.com)
The author of this blog is an actuary who writes interesting,
thoughtful articles about upcoming problems that may be caused by
mankind overshooting its supply of resources such as oil.
James Kunstler blog
(http://kunstler.com/writings/clusterfuck-nation/)
James Kunstler is an incisive writer who has a blog that is
pessimistic about many things, particularly the ability of our
society to adapt to resource depletion without massive upheavals.
Each of his posts get many comments. I don't care for the layout of
the blog (which only gives you a few sentences of each blog entry).
Collapse of Industrial Civilization
(www.collapseofindustrialcivilization.com) For those who like their
pessimism full blast, this graphically slick blog should do the job.
This is a type of blog called a “doomer” blog, and at times it is
downright scary. The author makes no attempt at balance or
restraint. This blog features a superb blog roll on its left border, which gives
the latest stories from dozens of interesting blogs.
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