Futurists have their heads in the clouds

Mr Hoel trash-talks his colleagues and then commits the very sins that he derides: wanting something shiny, failing to assess how long something will take, and failing to consider the incremental steps needed, and whether they will each make sense on their own: how do we get there from here?

He mentions the need to start from things that already exist in embryonic form, but omits a few important embryos: the effects of climate destabilisation, decreasing dependence on fossil fuels, artificial meat and dairy, for example. In biotech he merely picks out embryo selection and anti-aging technologies (ooh, shiny), but there is much more potential than that. Cancers, for instance. Metabolic disorders. Parasites (think malaria).

The phrasing "a minority-led country" is deeply weird and, to me, racist. It's like something out of the 1990s. What he means is that people of European descent or appearance ("white") will no longer be the majority of voters in the USA. While in itself fairly minor, it's an example of the slipshod, superficial thinking that the piece, and the whole genere of futurism, evidences.

"Education will be online"? Maybe a small quantity of tertiary education and in-service career-related training, but MOOCs have failed for reasons based firmly in human nature. How do we get there from here? Primary education, online? Secondary? Vocational courses? How do we get there from here?

I'm going to stop there.

Global warming, hello?