Futurology

Futurology is the attempted study of the future, by extrapolating present technological, economic or social[?] trends, or by attempting to predict future trends. Futurology, in other words, attempts to use the techniques of science fiction as a fortune-telling tool.

Predicted futures, as of 2003, range from predicted ecological catastrophes[?], to a utopian future where the poorest human being lives in what would be regarded as wealth and comfort in 2002 terms, to the transformation of humanity into a posthuman lifeform, to the destruction of all life on Earth in a nanotechnological disaster.

Many business gurus[?] present themselves as futurologists.

Some attempts have been made at cosmological futurology, attempting to predict the long-term future of the entire universe, typically predicting either the heat death[?] of the universe, or a cosmic Big Crunch.

Futurology, although sometimes based on science, cannot follow the scientific method, as it is not falsifiable except by waiting for the future to happen.

It is instructive to compare predictions of the future made in the 19th century to see how accurately they predicted the present.

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Futurologists:

• Arthur C. Clarke
• Freeman Dyson
• George Gilder[?]
• Michio Kaku[?] [1] (http://www.mkaku.org)
• Hans Moravec[?] [2] (http://www.frc.ri.cmu.edu/~hpm/)
• Nicholas Negroponte
• Alvin Toffler

Topics in futurology:

• Hubbert curve
• The Skeptical Environmentalist

Books predicting the future:

• The Population Bomb
• Limits to Growth
• Future Shock
• Rees, MJ[?]. Our Final Hour[?]. Basic Books; 2003. ISBN 0465068626.

See also:

• Futurism
• Malthusian catastrophe
• Transhumanism
• Technological singularity
• RAND Corporation
• Sociology
• Ecology
• Drake equation

External links

• Principia Cybernetica: Links on Future Development (http://pespmc1.vub.ac.be/FUTDEVLI)
• Links to the Future (http://www.sfutures.com/web-lnk1.htm) from Strategic Futures International
• The Foresight Exchange (http://www.ideosphere.com/fx/index): on-line market for predictions
• Long Bets (http://www.longbets.org/): predictive bets by public figures
• Progress and its Sustainability (http://www-formal.stanford.edu/jmc/progress) by computer scientist John McCarthy
• Humanity's Future (http://humanknowledge.net/Thoughts#Futurology): challenges, possible catastrophes, & timeline