What will the UK look like in 10-20 years time?

drc

So, what will the UK look like in 10-20 years time? Will house prices be much reduced or going through the roof? What will the economy be like? Will we have Balkanisation of large parts of the country? Will we have unprecedented flooding and submergence of parts of land? Will the inhabitants of planet x have staged a huge takeover of the earth?

If you mix together the predictions from the conspiracy theorists, global warming people and those in government, the future looks dire. But what do you think it will really look like? A better or worse place than it is now?

ninky_2

i'm not one who believes it is possible to see into the future mystic meg style since so much of the future depends on our own (collective) actions.

looking 2000 years in the future i think humans will still be around, after horrible wars and manmade disasters, we will probably have learned how to colonize or create other living areas in space, we will have started to see the evolutionary effects of civilization - genetic selection and medical advance leading to longer (if not eternal) and healthier life. we will no longer have religion in the sense of a belief in a divine being. family and relationships will not exist in the same way we know them now since reproductive technologies and social advances would make these units obsolete. co-operation will be more evident in human behaviours as competitve needs will be seen as self-defeating.

we will have learned how to control the earth weather patterns. we will use this to manage and protect the natural environment which, after the ability to reproduce human genetic material, will be seen as the highest value resource we have.

housing will be completely different, more recyclable and flexible with moveable units.

we will be using renewable energy such as magleve technology and geothermal.

ninky_2

10-20 years time it will look a bit like it does now but more overcrowded, more stressful, more global conflicts and more manmade disasters.

and when we look in the mirrror more grey hairs and wrinkles.

ad9898_3

I'm not sure about most of the things you mention, the economy for instance is very difficult to predict. One thing we can look at is energy, if we don't do something soon we are going to be in serious trouble. North Sea oil & gas are declining and we are importing quite a lot of gas from Norway. The problem is, due to peak oil, Norway is predicted to stop their exports by the mid 2020's, conserving what gas they have left for their own consumption.


There are lots of other issues connected to this subject, but I will leave it at just that one for now. Basically though, scientifically, we need Eureka moment in the next 20 years or so otherwise the way of life we have now will start to look unrecogniseable. Infinite growth in economies, population, energy usage etc.... is impossible in a finite world, so where much of the future is uncertain, that part is fact, and needs to be addressed urgently.

lostinrates

ad and ninky have made me wonder.

I'm looking at a property I have almost dismissed because of road noise and pollution from the road. Dh likes it regardless of the major road network it sits next to. But in the future, as the car industry changes, might it not be that cars are considerably less noisy..like the electric vehicles that creap up on one, and continue to be less polutant? Maybe a purchase for the long term by a main road isn't as dream shattering in the long term?

vivatifosi

ninky wrote: »

and when we look in the mirrror more grey hairs and wrinkles.

Thank goodness for hair dye!

Its funny, I've got to an age now (in my 40s) that I've started to look back on the "good old days" in a way that my parents did and my grandparents before them. They always thought the past was better. That included a past in which my nan contracted tuberculosis and my mum as a child was buried under the rubble of her house in the second world war when the street she lived in was bombed.

Its easy to look back on the past with fondness because its a known quantity. In the future I look forward to developments that mean people aren't taken so young by cancer, hopefully a cure for Alzheimers which has to be one of the cruellest diseases around, and I'll probably end up "needing" a whole host of gadgets that I've got by all my life without because they haven't been invented yet. The downsides? I think we've lost our sense of community, particularly with the fragmentation of the working class and that this will continue to worsen. I do worry about the environment, though at the moment I'm more concerned about the economy in 20 years time and whether my finances will be in order to retire about then.

purch

What will the UK look like in 10-20 years time?

It'll be raining !!

ninky_2

lostinrates wrote: »

ad and ninky have made me wonder.

I'm looking at a property I have almost dismissed because of road noise and pollution from the road. Dh likes it regardless of the major road network it sits next to. But in the future, as the car industry changes, might it not be that cars are considerably less noisy..like the electric vehicles that creap up on one, and continue to be less polutant? Maybe a purchase for the long term by a main road isn't as dream shattering in the long term?

you know what, i was putting this EXACT same thought to a friend the other day. quite handy as my flat looks out on a park but is marred by traffic noise / vibrations. however, they pointed out that because of the health and safety issues of silent vehicles they are being fitted with artificial noise makers (!?)

ad9898_3

purch wrote: »

It'll be raining !!

Probably all the time, flooding all those New Builds that Prescott wanted us to build on the flood plains. He will obviously have gone the way of the dodo by then, so has little care of what will happen in the future.

lostinrates

ninky wrote: »

you know what, i was putting this EXACT same thought to a friend the other day. quite handy as my flat looks out on a park but is marred by traffic noise / vibrations. however, they pointed out that because of the health and safety issues of silent vehicles they are being fitted with artificial noise makers (!?)

Yes, my dad got tapped by an electric vehicle a couple of weeks ago , h:rolleyes:is fauklt he stepped out not hearing it. :rolleyes:

Oh goodness, this has made me wonder though. I really hate not knowing the future

ninky_2

lostinrates wrote: »

I really hate not knowing the future

but the alternative is knowing it. which could be a whole lot more unpleasant.