not the direction of travel. The cautious amongst us envisage timescales of centuries rather than decades before humans are overtaken or transcended by electronic intelligence – far transcending the chemical and metabolic limits of ‘wet’ or...
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who broke the sound barrier in free fall from a high-altitude balloon -- may have established ‘bases’ independent from the Earth – on Mars
and thereby cut costs compared to NASA or ESA. But they should be promoted as adventures or extreme sports -- the phrase ‘space tourism’ should be avoided. It lulls people into unrealistic confidence.
for instance) – using raw materials mined from the Moon or asteroids.
or NASA’s ‘New Horizons’ probe that transmitted amazing pictures from Pluto
the world chess champion. But Deep Blue was programmed in detail by expert players. In contrast
and perhaps damp down undue optimism about a technical 'quick fix' of our climate.
but combating its effects by geoengineering.
the sooner will their prices fall so they become affordable to developing countries – where more generating capacity will be needed -- where the health of the poorest billions is jeopardized by smoky stoves burning wood or dung -- and where...
only 2 percent of publicly funded R and D is devoted to these challenges. Why shouldn’t the percentage be comparable to spending on medical or defence research?
and won't gain much resonance by advocating unwelcome lifestyle changes now – when the benefits accrue mainly to distant parts of the world
this may not happen fast enough to prevent CO2 concentrations rising to dangerous levels.
and calculated that it would hit the Earth in 2080
I’d note one policy context when an essentially zero discount rate is applied – radioactive waste disposal
for instance applies commercial-style discounting -- and in effect writes off what happens beyond 2050. So
for different assumptions about future rates of fossil fuel use. For each such assumption there’s a spread bevause it remains unclear how much the climatic effects of CO2 are amplified by associated changes in water vapour and clouds – the....
mainly due to the burning of fossil fuels .
climate change is certainly not under-discussed – though it is under-acted-upon
preserving the richness of our biosphere has value in its own right
the greater will be all pressures on resources