Just the other day I was talking to cleverbot when it asked me what do I think about the "World's Problems". So it got me thinking and considering we live in such profound world with advanced technology why wouldn't I come up with solutions to world's problems?
The biggest problem we have today, which could solve all other problems, is source of clean and plentiful energy. So what we need is a development of nuclear fusion. It only uses salt water so no waste or large mining and very minimal pollution.
Now I know what you're going to ask "Why can't we go with fission instead?" and indeed during 1950's it was planned that only in US there will be 1000 fission power plants and lots of breeders by the year 2000 and yet there is only 100 fission plants and no breeders. So what happened? The answer is bad reputation. Fission scares people, when the breakdown happens it is visible that people don't have any control over it's reactors, you can not shut them off. And it also it creates lots of garbage. None of that problems comes with fusion which reactors, that are basically hot plasma, just get turned off.
People would welcome fusion plants and desire them in their vicinity.
#2 world hunger
Once we have fusion reactors we will have cheap electricity and can build them all over the world, including deserts which could then be turned into food growing plantations. Imagine all those deserts terraformed! Plus, plants would also serve as additional carbon remover. We could have lots and lots of cheap food.
#3 gasoline price & wars for oil, oil spills, fracking
Again with fusion we can easily make artificial methanol and run existing cars on it. We would not need oil for it, even for making plastics considering we could take carbon and hydrogen from other sources.
#4 garbage
Lots of clean energy would mean that we could use it to destroy all kind of garbage disparting it on constitutional elements.
#5 global warming and ocean acidification
Even now we can build machines that could suck the carbon out of air and water, but the problem is they would need to use dirty energy to do it, but with fusion it would be a different story. Also read #2.
#6 population growth
Ok so some would say with cheap food people would start mating like crazy and have much more kids. But is that really a case? First of all we would have much more livable space for new people, second with lots of cheap energy and elements we could use 3D printers much more, that could even make more computers. Give everybody in the world few computers, games and internet and they will not want to have many kids because kids draw them away from games and computers. I mean rich people don't usually have more kids then poor one.
#7 religion
Certainly with using less and less oil lots of those religious dictatorships will be weaker since they are fueled by money from oil. Also as science progresses more and more even the more narrow-minded people will get their eyes opened. Lots of religious tempers are kind of based on despair and the fact that we are all fighting each-other for food and shelter, but if those things get very easy access then people will be more tolerant toward each-other. Why not create a world where no one ever needs to die because of hunger, thirst or lack of shelter? It is doable with fusion.
#8 animal endangerment
Well if you combine all of the above you solve this problem.
So certainly we should devote more time and money into developing nuclear fusion and people at ITER are doing it, but unfortunately very slow and they could do it much faster. Dr. Brian Cox, for instance, thinks there should be a Manhattan like project but for developing fusion.
So solving world problems is all on psychological level. We could do it, we are intelligent enough, but will we do it or surrender to destruction?
The biggest problem we have today, which could solve all other problems, is source of clean and plentiful energy. So what we need is a development of nuclear fusion. It only uses salt water so no waste or large mining and very minimal pollution.
Now I know what you're going to ask "Why can't we go with fission instead?" and indeed during 1950's it was planned that only in US there will be 1000 fission power plants and lots of breeders by the year 2000 and yet there is only 100 fission plants and no breeders. So what happened? The answer is bad reputation. Fission scares people, when the breakdown happens it is visible that people don't have any control over it's reactors, you can not shut them off. And it also it creates lots of garbage. None of that problems comes with fusion which reactors, that are basically hot plasma, just get turned off.
People would welcome fusion plants and desire them in their vicinity.
#2 world hunger
Once we have fusion reactors we will have cheap electricity and can build them all over the world, including deserts which could then be turned into food growing plantations. Imagine all those deserts terraformed! Plus, plants would also serve as additional carbon remover. We could have lots and lots of cheap food.
#3 gasoline price & wars for oil, oil spills, fracking
Again with fusion we can easily make artificial methanol and run existing cars on it. We would not need oil for it, even for making plastics considering we could take carbon and hydrogen from other sources.
#4 garbage
Lots of clean energy would mean that we could use it to destroy all kind of garbage disparting it on constitutional elements.
#5 global warming and ocean acidification
Even now we can build machines that could suck the carbon out of air and water, but the problem is they would need to use dirty energy to do it, but with fusion it would be a different story. Also read #2.
#6 population growth
Ok so some would say with cheap food people would start mating like crazy and have much more kids. But is that really a case? First of all we would have much more livable space for new people, second with lots of cheap energy and elements we could use 3D printers much more, that could even make more computers. Give everybody in the world few computers, games and internet and they will not want to have many kids because kids draw them away from games and computers. I mean rich people don't usually have more kids then poor one.
#7 religion
Certainly with using less and less oil lots of those religious dictatorships will be weaker since they are fueled by money from oil. Also as science progresses more and more even the more narrow-minded people will get their eyes opened. Lots of religious tempers are kind of based on despair and the fact that we are all fighting each-other for food and shelter, but if those things get very easy access then people will be more tolerant toward each-other. Why not create a world where no one ever needs to die because of hunger, thirst or lack of shelter? It is doable with fusion.
#8 animal endangerment
Well if you combine all of the above you solve this problem.
So certainly we should devote more time and money into developing nuclear fusion and people at ITER are doing it, but unfortunately very slow and they could do it much faster. Dr. Brian Cox, for instance, thinks there should be a Manhattan like project but for developing fusion.
So solving world problems is all on psychological level. We could do it, we are intelligent enough, but will we do it or surrender to destruction?
teachings of the Bible are so muddled and self-contradictory that it was possible for Christians to happily burn heretics alive for five long centuries. It was even possible for the most venerated patriarchs of the Church, like St. Augustine and St. Thomas Aquinas, to conclude that heretics should be tortured (Augustine) or killed outright (Aquinas). Martin Luther and John Calvin advocated the wholesale murder of heretics, apostates, Jews, and witches. - Sam Harris, "Letter To A Christian Nation"
