How long will the United States last heading toward the future of human society

[Windu Chi]

I ask this question because people in the U.S. think the country going to last until the sun burnout or until the galaxy fissile out.

 

I think the U.S. will probably last another 20-80 years before the human race start traviling the galaxy and old countries of Earth become less important as the discovery of new planets takes their places.

 

What opinions do anyone else have on the matter?

[Samuel Dravis]

I hope China gets their act together and puts serious effort into their space program. It might force the US to get up off our collective rear and make NASA something other than a joke in the space exploration business...

 

But for the question probably no more than 100 years at max. China and India are advancing quite rapidly and we simply don't have the population to stop their takeover of world trade.

[Dagobahn Eagle]

Is the question how long the nation of America is going to last? In that case, I vote(d) 500 years, give or take. There are people who consider the US to be doomed due to Bush's actions, but I think that'll just fade into history as a "second McCarthy era" and the nation will move on.

 

I don't think it'll crumble soon, or in 500 years, for that matter, but I just don't think I can see far enough into the future to determine what'll happen past that. It might actually last "until the galaxy fizzles out" for all I know.

 

It also depends on your definition of what "America lasting" means. Do we have to start the timer again when the country's occupied (ie. part of another nation) or separated (for example in civil war)? Or can the nation change its name and fundamental principles and even move its borders or become part of a union?

 

Is the USA 200 years old (timer starts at the Declaration of Independence), or younger than that (timer starting at end of Civil War, when the country was again whole)?

[Tyrion]

The US will most likely remain as de facto superpower(along with allies) for another 50 to 100 years, and afterwards could remain as a considerable power potentially for centuries. I'd imagine that in response to China, the US creates a very strong bond with Canada and Mexico in North America; abroad, we'd have allies in Europe, Japan, India, and maybe the Middle East depending on how our Westernizing process turns out(not likely, unfortunately). On top of that, China right now is about to enter a large bubble burst as their massive industrialition process is resulting in overwhelming cyclical overcapacity. Moreoever, China's population will not be as large as factor as one would think; neverminding the pitiful low wages that will have to be raised one day, America simply has more farmland to support larger populations than China.

[Dagobahn Eagle]

On top of that, China right now is about to enter a large bubble burst as their massive industrialition process is resulting in overwhelming cyclical overcapacity.

Could you translate that to those of us who aren't fluent in Economics;)?

[Tyrion]

Could you translate that to those of us who aren't fluent in Economics;)?

 

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cyclical_overcapacity

 

It means that the industrial capacity of China, such as its manfuacturing plants and coal refineries for instance, are being invested in to such as point wherein there is so much competition and saturation in the market that the products are cheapened to such a degree that it is not sustainable for a long period of time. Once the boom settles, the industrial capacity China has will go largely unused.

 

Did that help in clarification? I might be talking out of my ass for all I know, so it'd be nice if someone could double check to make sure I'm fairly correct.

[TK-8252]

Dagobahn pretty much hit every point I was going to make but was too lazy to do so.

 

And no, don't make NASA do anything. Make GM or Microsoft do it next time. NASA is just another incompetent government organization. Didn't you hear how recently they just announced that they can't find the original video they had of the moon landing?? The people who filed it away are either dead or not employed at NASA anymore and they can't find it! >_<

[Windu Chi]

I hope China gets their act together and puts serious effort into their space program. It might force the US to get up off our collective rear and make NASA something other than a joke in the space exploration business...

 

But for the question probably no more than 100 years at max. China and India are advancing quite rapidly and we simply don't have the population to stop their takeover of world trade.

 

You right, the missions NASA is doing now are laughable they have't taken the topic of galactic exploration serious enough for me.

 

From the time since the moon landing they have been showing laziness toward their purpose for existence. They seem have no intrest in galactic exploration for now or ever.

 

The failures they have shown since then have cause me to loose faith in their abilities.

 

The failures like the unfinish international space station, delayed man mission to Mars or the development new space propulsion devices(warp drive, wormholes or antimater propulsion drives).

 

Before now I believe NASA could do anything like builting amazing technologies like warp drive, wormholes or antimater propulsion drives.

 

Now I believe that the people at NASA are failures and disappointments as the rest of the so called geniuses on this planet that people expect great things to come from those supposedly special kind of humans.

[Tyrion]

I like how everyone skips solar exploration and inhabitance to galatic colonisation without missing a beat. We're still far away from leaving Earth as the principal homeworld for the human race.

[Windu Chi]

I like how everyone skips solar exploration and inhabitance to galatic colonisation without missing a beat. We're still far away from leaving Earth as the principal homeworld for the human race.

Well that's your opinion I still believe that the geniuses of this planet are reponsible for other worlds not being the other choices. So I am sick of tire of these geniuses geting credit for their failures.

[Pho3nix]

Probably 50-100 years. I hope humanity perishes before that though.

[swphreak]

I'm going to have to be a pessimist and say a hundred years. If not completely destroyed, the U.S. would surely be some sort of post-apocalyptic country a la James Cameron's Dark Angel (minus the genetically engineered super soldiers). We'd have no oil, and since we're so heavily dependant on it, we'd be royally screwed. I don't see China or India being overly effected by the lack of oil, since I beleive the majority of their populations do not own a vehicle.

 

If the next few Presidents actually manage to care about the future, and bring more focus and attention to alternative fuels, we might stand a chance. But as it is, oil and automobile executives only care about fattening their wallets, and not about the fact that there might not be a future to spend all their money.

[toms]

Its an interesting thread, though i don't knw what to vote as i'm not clear if it is "how long until the US is destroyed utterly" or "how long until the US becomes irrelevant" or "how long until the US is no longer a dominant superpower".

 

I'll admit I know nothing about economics, but I don't see the US remaining the most powerful nation in the world for more than about 20 years.

 

Whatever minor bubbles they have along the way, I'd see china overtaking it within that time. In theory India should too.. though they never seem to live up to their potential. If russia ever gets its government and ecconomics sorted then it would have the potential to be pretty powerful too.

 

Even mexico, south america and africa have a lot of potential if they ever get out of their cycles of disasters and debt for long enough.

 

The interesting thing will be what happens to the world economy now that a lot of 3rd world debt has been written off, fair trade is an issue, and if these countries are able to start developing strong economies. Currently the economic dominance of the West (wih the USA at the top of the pile) is built almost entirely on cheap goods and labour from poor countries.

 

With the advent of TV and the internet those people are looking enviously at the lifestyles of us in the west. If more of the profits for good and services make their way into the economies of those countries, and they aren't crippled by debt repayments, then they are going to rapidly rise in stature. ANd with that their expectations will rise, and the wages they pay their staff will rise, and the price of all our goods will rise.

 

It will be interesting to see if we can maintain a world of $50 shoes and $300 laptops when we ahve to pay a lot more to people in wages. I don't think we can.

 

So what happens? Global crash? Maybe. Rich/Poor splits become more internal than international? (eg: poor people in midwest living in 3rd world conditions, being paid peanuts, like their poor coleagues in africa.. while the rich in both countries get richer)Or maybe even the old rich (europe, us) become the new poor, providing labor for the new economic leading countries.

 

Be interesting to see if in 50 or 100 years time Mexico is trying to stop illegal US immigrants from crossing it's borders won't it?

 

As for post appocalyptic settings, i think that serenity might have got a lot of it right. Not the cowboy stuff, but the weird mix of western and oriental influences. Be interesting to see if we are all still posting on LF in 40 years time, but on Chinasoft operating systems and IndiaLabs laptops.

[Det. Bart Lasiter]

It'll crumble after a few hundred years unless we manage to give a damn who runs this country and make major reforms to our current form of government (i.e. dissolve the Democratic and Republican parties in order to allow the nation a greater selection of cantidates and disallow "political contributions"). I do think however, that because of the enormous financial strength of the U.S., this country could survive for quite some if its people could get their **** together.

[Dagobahn Eagle]

Its an interesting thread, though i don't knw what to vote as i'm not clear if it is "how long until the US is destroyed utterly" or "how long until the US becomes irrelevant" or "how long until the US is no longer a dominant superpower".

Exactly.

 

On-topic:

Well, we are screwing the planet big-time. It's been proven beyond all doubt that we humans cause global warming with our Co2-emissions, and that the next generations will have to suffer because of it (hasn't it also been proven that the global warming is what causes the extreme weather). Not to mention over-fishing, pollution, rain forests chopped down, what-have-you.

 

It'd be nice if US politicians in power did more to stop it, instead of increasing Co2 emission-ceilings, going to war for oil, and failing to restrict automobile traffic (which'd help tremendously).

[Windu Chi]

Exactly.

 

On-topic:

Well, we are screwing the planet big-time. It's been proven beyond all doubt that we humans cause global warming with our Co2-emissions, and that the next generations will have to suffer because of it (hasn't it also been proven that the global warming is what causes the extreme weather). Not to mention over-fishing, pollution, rain forests chopped down, what-have-you.

 

It'd be nice if US politicians in power did more to stop it, instead of increasing Co2 emission-ceilings, going to war for oil, and failing to restrict automobile traffic (which'd help tremendously).

 

They won't be going to the war for oil for long that crap is runing out if people don't want to be it or not I don't give a damn.

 

There is however a another possible source for natural gas but we will have to get off our lazy asses and travel 10.15 AU to find (AU=92,955,825.4792014 miles) it, which I am talking about Saturn's moon Titan.

 

Titan is mostly compose of methane (which is natural gas fuel) gas in a frozen state.

 

So you can say the next war will be a solar system war for that untouch resource or other resources spread out through the solar system .

 

That is another thing that baffle me about oil companies and their igorance, there are contunless untouch resources out there in the rest of the solar system.

 

Why are'nt they hell-bent on trying to exploit those resources by investing strongly in space exploration; NASA are'nt doing s**t with their abilities.

 

They are a disgrace but that's another topic of discussion.

[TK-8252]

and failing to restrict automobile traffic (which'd help tremendously).

 

 

You want politicians dictating how much automobile traffic there can be? Sounds a bit authoritarian! When oil starts getting more expensive than it already is, the free market will eventually step in to solve such a crisis through clean and renewable energy sources.

 

If you're hoping that the government can solve such a problem... don't count on it. The government is good at wasting billions of dollars on projects that go no where... "America is addicted to oil" is a good example.

[swphreak]

There is however a another possible source for natural gas but we will have to get off our lazy asses and travel 10.15 AU to find (AU=92,955,825.4792014 miles) it, which I am talking about Saturn's moon Titan.

 

Titan is mostly compose of methane (which is natural gas fuel) gas in a frozen state.

 

So you can say the next war will be a solar system war for that untouch resource or other resources spread out through the solar system.

 

Seeing as how it costs a lot of money and a considerable amount of fuel to launch a small space shuttle into orbit, I don't forsee mining any other planet for resources anytime soon. Plus, it takes considerable time to reach other planets, especially Saturn.

 

Also, there will never be a "solar system war" as long as we're all on one planet, and fighting for an unreachable resource is pointless.

[Windu Chi]

Seeing as how it costs a lot of money and a considerable amount of fuel to launch a small space shuttle into orbit, I don't forsee mining any other planet for resources anytime soon. Plus, it takes considerable time to reach other planets, especially Saturn.

 

Also, there will never be a "solar system war" as long as we're all on one planet, and fighting for an unreachable resource is pointless.

 

I understand what you are saying, but if we don't start exploring for other resources in the solar system very soon the the next war we will be figthing is over air.

 

As atmosphere deteriorate from the poisonous current energy resource controlled by idiot oil companies.

[swphreak]

windu6, stick to only posting constructive responses in the Senate. What you just posted did not contribute. And there is an edit button. There is no need to double post.

 

 

 

You want politicians dictating how much automobile traffic there can be? Sounds a bit authoritarian! When oil starts getting more expensive than it already is, the free market will eventually step in to solve such a crisis through clean and renewable energy sources.

 

If you're hoping that the government can solve such a problem... don't count on it. The government is good at wasting billions of dollars on projects that go no where... "America is addicted to oil" is a good example.

 

They already dictate how much pollution autombiles can produce, but yeah, the government will never do anything til the last minute. Unless we get some new blood in the government and get rid of the old generation running things into the ground.

 

Here's to hoping someone can get this to work on a larger scale.

[Dagobahn Eagle]

You want politicians dictating how much automobile traffic there can be? Sounds a bit authoritarian!

Yup, but I think that's a necessary evil. And it's the government's roads, after all;).

 

There are already programs that temporarily allow only cars with license plates ending with even numbers to drive on this day and only odd numbers on that day, for example. We need more of those. And we need more and cheaper collective transport (a bus ticket in Houston to anywhere in the city was only one dollar (good show)) and more support for pedestrians (sadly lacking in Houston).

 

You still did'nt answer my question. Where does that leave you?

I suppose it leaves me as a realist. In the grander picture, we're just a parasite sending the planet and ourselves straight to the Hot Place.

 

Science Illustrated (a Scandinavian popular-scicence magazine) arrived in my mail-box today, and this particular issue focused on us humans. Among other things, it ran an article on the five fatal mistakes of fallen civilizations of old. According to Collapse: How civilizations choose to fall or succeed, by Jared Diamond, lists these factors as fatal to civilizations:

• Environmental destruction.
• Climate changes.
• Hostility towards neighbours.
• Failing interaction.
• Poor ability to adapt.

The problem is that today it's not just one or two civilizations making these mistakes, but the entire world. So... Yes, we might be in deep trouble.

[TK-8252]

There are already programs that temporarily allow only cars with license plates ending with even numbers to drive on this day and only odd numbers on that day, for example. We need more of those.

 

I shudder to think of such a society.

[Windu Chi]

I suppose it leaves me as a realist. In the grander picture, we're just a parasite sending the planet and ourselves straight to the Hot Place.

 

Science Illustrated (a Scandinavian popular-scicence magazine) arrived in my mail-box today, and this particular issue focused on us humans. Among other things, it ran an article on the five fatal mistakes of fallen civilizations of old. According to Collapse: How civilizations choose to fall or succeed, by Jared Diamond, lists these factors as fatal to civilizations:

• Environmental destruction.
• Climate changes.
• Hostility towards neighbours.
• Failing interaction.
• Poor ability to adapt.

The problem is that today it's not just one or two civilizations making these mistakes, but the entire world. So... Yes, we might be in deep trouble.

 

What about saving this planet? Did you ever think of that?

 

When are you people is going to get it through your thick heads and stop living in lah lah land by believing we won't ever colonize other planets in the galaxy.

 

Yes I think about saving this planet but it's a whole galaxy still left to explore.

 

I am not like the rest of yall, I want to discover greater and better things out there in the universe.

 

When the United States and other countries become less important because the discovery of new worlds by using telescopes of by finding

a way to get to those planets in a reasonable amount of time.

 

I want to be there to experiance those amazing wonders.

[TK-8252]

I don't think that colonization is even possible. Earth is the only planet that supports human life; all the other planets are either too hot, too cold, too much gravity, or too little gravity. This IS the only planet we have... but we want to enjoy it too. The answer isn't to put in place authoritarian measures that restrict our movement... it's to do what Brazil did... make all the cars run on rice or corn. But things are too good for us now, so we don't see any reason to do such a thing. Eventually we WILL have to though because it's what the market demands. When oil gets too expensive for the average citizen, oil companies will have no choice but to invest in other sources of energy.

[Dagobahn Eagle]

I shudder to think of such a society.

I keep forgetting you're right-wing, do you know that? Comments like that one always get the drop on me:D!

 

When are you people is going to get it through your thick heads and stop living in lah lah land by believing we won't ever colonize other planets in the galaxy.

I know we'll either eventually abandon ship or go down with it (as a matter of fact, the latest issue of Science Illustrated covered that, too:p). But it won't happen this century, or for that matter the next one, if you ask me.