Just about every movie I can think of that involves the future shows our destiny as one of living in a social dystopia, victims of pollution, an oppressive omnipotent government, oppressive technology... dark grim futures...

Is this what our future holds? Does Hollywood have it right? Is there no potential for enlightenment or are we doomed to live in the future envisioned by Orwell?

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"Play until it hurts, then play until it hurts to not play."
http://soundcloud.com/darkside124 HOF 2013, MM Champion 2014

Living in an OK future doesn't make for good movies.

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No, but it isnt a interesting film/book if the future is just our current situation with better tech.

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Think for a minute about who makes movies.

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CSFMB 2014 Nascar Pick 'em Champion

We don’t have a trillion-dollar debt because we haven’t taxed enough; we have a trillion-dollar debt because we spend too much. — Ronald Reagan

Jews?

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Yes, we are certainly heading that way. Just not as soon as some movies would have you believe.

No. The future will be great once the Constitution is finally eroded enough to keep us safe.

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You do not talk to me like that! I work too hard to deal with this stuff! I work too hard! I'm an important member of the CSFMB! I drive a Dodge Stratus!

Spmack?

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I don't remember half the time if I'm hiding or I'm lost

Well, books too, not just movies but yeah, I'm not saying Hollywood is a prognosticator here but even Nostradamus thought so too apparently and he wasn't selling films... I'm just asking what your thoughts are. Are we heading toward that future? I would wager now that we are. GPS trackers exist in nearly every one of our pockets. You think that your microphone or camera can't be turned on remotely without your knowledge if one were so inclined to do so? Our government is invading nearly every private facet of our lives today... so I am thinking we're on our way. Perhaps when our economy is done collapsing we'll experience an acceleration of these things?

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"Play until it hurts, then play until it hurts to not play."
http://soundcloud.com/darkside124 HOF 2013, MM Champion 2014

If television and movies are to be believed as future representations of society....

Crystal meth addicted zombie vampire serial killers who ride super hero transforming dragons!

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@audioidkid

In reality, the erosion of privacy, and the constant growth of technology has made us safer.

Whether it is worth the cost of the age of privacy being over is another debate, but we are certainly safer now than we were before.

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You do not talk to me like that! I work too hard to deal with this stuff! I work too hard! I'm an important member of the CSFMB! I drive a Dodge Stratus!

Ok... stop focusing on movies here. That's just an example of the vision, not saying they're predicting the future. I'm just using that as an example of what it may look like. I'm asking if that's where we are headed or are we capable of living an enlightened, blissful future...
So forget movies... do you believe we're heading toward utopia, or dystopia?

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"Play until it hurts, then play until it hurts to not play."
http://soundcloud.com/darkside124 HOF 2013, MM Champion 2014

From whom?

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"Play until it hurts, then play until it hurts to not play."
http://soundcloud.com/darkside124 HOF 2013, MM Champion 2014

Darkside is Divergent.

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Anybody here seen my old friend Bobby?
Can you tell me where he's gone?
I thought I saw him walkin' up to The Hill
With Elon, Tulsi, and Don

I'm telling you... Google Ray Kurzweil. He will tell you how technology will affect us and when. He's been very accurate thus far. He is optimistic about technology and our future.

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Utopia, though the idea of a total utopia is probably unrealistic.

I hope I am alive during a time in our society when so much of our labor has been modernized that it will be considered a good thing that people don't have to work.
Other people and other countries.

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You do not talk to me like that! I work too hard to deal with this stuff! I work too hard! I'm an important member of the CSFMB! I drive a Dodge Stratus!

Yes, we are safe from one group of people, because we have given up our rights to a different set of people who we think are less dangerous.

Maybe they are.

I would argue that we're in more danger than ever before. I don't think we're safer at all. Certainly not being protected by an erosion of our rights.

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"Play until it hurts, then play until it hurts to not play."
http://soundcloud.com/darkside124 HOF 2013, MM Champion 2014

Domestically, violent crime is way down. Internationally, we have such a strong connection with just about every other country that even if we disagree there really isn't a benefit on either side to mess with it in a serious way. Russia may be the only outlier to that, but they are so connected to Europe that they can only do so much.

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You do not talk to me like that! I work too hard to deal with this stuff! I work too hard! I'm an important member of the CSFMB! I drive a Dodge Stratus!

Very accurate vs other futurists?

Seems pretty hit and miss just from a quick google search. Seems he hit on a lot of stuff in the 90's but his 2009 predictions were pretty off

I'm pretty optimistic about the future as far as happiness. Culturally, I think we are trending towards being one big suburban mall

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O judgment! Thou art fled to brutish beasts,
And men have lost their reason.

Hell yes!

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You do not talk to me like that! I work too hard to deal with this stuff! I work too hard! I'm an important member of the CSFMB! I drive a Dodge Stratus!

That Google search would be wrong.

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The United States + Curtis Mathes = MATCH

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Power is always in the hands of the masses of men. What oppresses the masses is their own ignorance, their own short-sighted selfishness.
- Henry George

My personal finance strategy is to wait on the near-inevitable collapse of society and rely on my street-fighting skills and black heart to propel me to the top of a Mad Max-esque hellscape.

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1926-1931-1934-1942-1944-1946-1964-1967-1982-2006-2011

In reality? We will probably always be on the metaphorical brink of dystopia, but we will always be able to correct it. Nature is about balance and balance means that sometimes things will shift one way and a correction is needed. Humans are about invention and for the most part, we have done a great job of reducing the corrections.

The best example of this is food production. Population increases, so more food needs to be produced. Famine sets in and people die. We invent ways to produce more food through industrialization and genetic modification rather than trying to actually control the population growth causing the lack of availability of food. We give this food for a short-term fix to the famine, yet the population grows and a famine appears somewhere else or in the same place as the original.

While we have amazing access to food like no society ever has had in the history of this planet, there is no guarantee that it won't be at risk as the population grows at a rate never before seen on this planet. We always *look* like we are on the brink of being wiped off this planet from famine, acid rain, global warming, nuclear war, disease, etc., but humans always seem to find a way of avoiding it, adapting to it and/or surviving it. I think this will just continue into the future.

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Hoffy... "Humans" have been on Earth for roughly 12,000 years, if we are talking "settled" humans who have used agriculture as a primary means of food. This is out of several billion years. Have we really always overcome? I would argue that we've never really been challenged. A single asteroid would end this entire dream.

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We are still here, are we not? I would say, "Yes," we have overcome everything because we are still on this planet and are the dominant species.

But what have we overcome, as a species?

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Everything that has been thrown at us, either by nature or ourselves, that's what.