This question, obviously, is impossible to truthfully answer. However, thinking about the future implies reflection on the current state of humanity and what will be different in 10 years. Nowadays, in this big giant mess of things, my feelings fluctuate between having absolutely no hope for a promising future and seeing small positives that make me think of how good civilization has the potential to be.
Thinking about the future also triggers reflections about human history. Reading about history, from my perspective, is simply reading about unequal societies, injustice, war and violence throughout the human era. Even though we live in a world with so many cruel and harsh injustices, we are in many ways living in the best time human history has ever seen. Women and people of color have finally broken into many white male dominated fields, before COVID we were at a historical low for global poverty, hunger, and disease, and gay marriage has been becoming legal in a mass movement across the globe. Still, even in this hopeful state, civilization is as it has always been: Cruel and unjust.
In my stolen textile from that era, that message is what I want to get across. I want to combine three key points: inevitable overwhelming destruction, inevitable cultural change for the slightly better, and my personal growth through it all.
Now, I will answer specific questions about my future guesses.
What does it feel, smell, sound, or look like?
Personally, and not at a larger world scale, I hope I have the blessing of finding success in my field and pursuing my passions, supporting and being supported by a great group of friends and family, and living in a physical space that keeps me happy and healthy(I’m picturing nature, dogs, healthy cooking, and developing skills in hobbies I am interested in). Also, I would like to not live in the US.
How do people travel?
Electric car, public transportation, electric planes maybe!
Unfortunately still: car overcrowding, mass traffic, planes with combustion engines
How do people interact?
Sadly, a lot of interaction is virtual. And I hate that, not looking forward to it. One of the most traumatizing aspects of COVID is the fact that humanity has accelerated to online and virtual work and will likely stay that way forever. The next epidemic is already here, and its loneliness.
What do people eat, wear, or spend time doing?
A mix of sustainable and fast fashion, based off of income/class sadly
vegan/vegetarian revolution, however entire populations still swear by red meat
People spend most of their time using tech and connecting not-in-person(and this legit breaks my heart loll)
What are the environment and cities like?
Scenario A: Complete and utter climate destruction.
Scenario B: Somehow, we immediately and completely shift our entire culture to save the climate.
Scenario C(the most likely one): We save some climate shit, lose most of it, but adapt as a civilization to somehow survive. Dystopian future arrives at an accelerated pace.
Cities: Some cities have been decimated by potential nuclear war and infighting, others have developed sustainable green ec-hubs. New major cities pop up in previously developing countries and emissions increase anyway.
The Environment: the great barrier reef is completely destroyed. However, tech innovations make farming and agriculture more sustainable. The duality of man, I guess.
Do we have more technology or less?
Wayyy more, for the better. Technology and a lot of its new applications give me a lot of hope.
Unfortunately, also maybe AI overlord. Yikes.
What happened between now and the next 10 years to make 2030 the way it is?
NOTE: I try not to hope too much, so im mentally preparing for some bullshit like this:
Trump is re-elected
COVID doesn’t stop spreading for years
Cultural and actual revolution in the United States
The current environmental and social issues we are experiencing in 2020 make imagining the year 2030 a very interesting challenge. I can imagine both an idealistic and catastrophic future that is entirely dependent on how we respond to our current natural and social climate. In 10 years, our generation will be assuming positions of power, and we can choose to steer away from destruction.
In 2030, the effects of climate change will still be felt heavily pronounced around the world, and the impact on industrial first world countries will bring more unrest but also more collective action is dismantling the system that currently allows mega-corporations to reign unchecked. There will be more jobs in clean energy, and people will be supporting sustainable practices in farming and fishing etc. The cultural shift in opinion around climate change will come with a transition in the public away from selfish and cynical ideologies towards upholding collective, generous, and attentive values. This transition will demand people to change their habits of consumption, and there will be continued resistance.
Mass consumption of media and resources is not sustainable, but technology continues to make things faster and shorten our attention spans. There is a great amount of distractibility in the media and pop science we consume now, and that can entertain illusions about reality. We’re often so distanced and desensitized to the media we consume, and we move on to the next trending topic without much further discussion. The pandemic has derailed our lives and shaken our sense of comfort, but the shutdown has also given us a chance to finally slow down, self-reflect, and realize just how vulnerable and dependent we actually are. In 2030, I’d like to imagine that excessive and rapid consumption is no longer the accepted norm. This will not immediately fix or magically undo all of the environmental and social damage, but more people will pick their heads up and pay attention to problems they have managed/chosen to avoid.
The scariest thing I can imagine for the environment in 2030, however, is nothing. We are such a future oriented society, and usually people only think about extinction as a process that wipes out an entire species in every age group at once. But in the age of fossil fuels, extinction can happen covertly when the first days of life become simply too difficult for the youngest members of a species to survive. In 2030, there are no corpses making flashy trending headlines, just increasing handfuls of nothing. All of life has the right to renew, regenerate, and heal itself, and while the idea of absence is terrifying to me, I can only hope that the weight of it all will show people just how reliant on nature we really are.
Empty fishing net due to overfishing and bycatch
Photos from Vik Muniz’s “Wasteland” art project documentary (2011). This series highlights the catadores of Brasil who are forced to resort to picking valuable recyclable materials from garbage. It’s a call to remediate overconsumption and careless disposal in modern culture
