Futurology: Delphi method, Causal layered analysis, Patrick Dixon, Scenario planning, Future history, Failure mode and effects analysis, Social ... class forecasting, Forecasting, Prediction
FuturePundit (Free subscription) | 1 hour ago
Writing in The Economist Geoffrey Miller says in 2010 human genetic research results will show some politically beliefs about human nature are correct. Looking ahead to 2010 and beyond I am reminded of Dr. Elisabeth Kubler-Ross's 5 stages of death. I think these apply to beliefs as well. Human geneticists have reached a private crisis of conscience, and it will become public knowledge in 2010. The...
FuturePundit (Free subscription) | yesterday
Ron Guhname (not his real name), The Inductivist, used data from the General Social Survey to look at the question of whether the legalization of abortion in America caused a change in selective pressures for intelligence. Using the GSS Wordsum test as a rough measure of intelligence Ron finds that abortion did not appear to change the selective pressures for higher or lower intelligence. The selective...
FuturePundit (Free subscription) | yesterday
For those unaware, Dan Neil of the Los Angeles Times writes excellent car reviews. He's got one up from his own test drive of the forthcoming Chevrolet Volt pluggable hybrid electric vehicle. It accelerates with a big husky twist of its electric motor. Actually, you can even chirp the front tires if you push the go-button hard enough -- very unlike a golf cart. It corners confidently and brakes crisply...
This14U (Free subscription) | yesterday
If you do this a lot then time to consider if it makes any sense If it is your job fine If it is because you worry then not so fine The future is just that the future Not something that many can see and those who really can will not usually share it with others because it is not the thing to do We are asked why not? Our answer is because you can set things in motion that you have no right to interfere...
FuturePundit (Free subscription) | yesterday
A familiar story for many species around the world. NEW YORK (November 24, 2009) -- The Wildlife Conservation Society (WCS) announced today a report revealing that the last remaining population of Siberian tigers has likely declined significantly due to the rising tide of poaching and habitat loss. WCS says the report will help inform Russian officials of what needs to be done to protect remaining...
FuturePundit (Free subscription) | yesterday
Uranium burned in a research program for next generation Advanced Gas Reactor (AGR) fuel burns far more efficiently than existing light water reactors. WASHINGTON, D.C. — Idaho National Laboratory (INL) scientists have set a new world record with next-generation particle fuel for use in high temperature gas reactors (HTGRs). The Advanced Gas Reactor (AGR) Fuel Program, initiated by the Department...
FuturePundit (Free subscription) | 29/11/2009
Regular readers know I'm a big fan of a general movement toward more use of electric power for transportation, heating (using heat pumps), and for other applications where fossil fuels are currently used directly. Yesterday I discovered another reason to like electric motors: They are quieter on a river that is rich with wildlife. You end up finding more of the noisy wildlife. In my case the wildlife...
FuturePundit (Free subscription) | 29/11/2009
An aging population costs lots of money to treat for all their diseases. Rejuvenation therapies would therefore save a lot of money for disease treatments. Our aging population will double the number of people with diabetes even without an increase in prevalence at each age. In the next 25 years, the number of Americans living with diabetes will nearly double, increasing from 23.7 million in 2009 to...
PC Plus (Free subscription) | 27/11/2009
With 2009 now over, our eyes must inevitably turn to 2010. In Arthur C Clarke’s famous novel, this was the year when the Russians and Americans teamed up on a universe-redefining mission to uncover the secrets of reality. In the real world, there’ll probably be a slightly faster iPhone. All things considered, we’ll call it a draw. But what else can we expect? We’ve dug out...
FuturePundit (Free subscription) | 26/11/2009
That tire rots your brain. Women who store fat on their waist in middle age are more than twice as likely to develop dementia when they get older, reveals a new study from the Sahlgrenska Academy. The study has just been published in the scientific journal Neurology. "Anyone carrying a lot of fat around the middle is at greater risk of dying prematurely due to a heart attack or stroke," says...
FuturePundit (Free subscription) | 26/11/2009
An Oak Ridge National Laboratory program to do deep retrofits of housing for energy efficiency comes up with an average $20k price tag. How can this pay itself back? Deep energy retrofits are renovations to existing structures that use the latest in energy-efficient materials and technologies and result in significant energy reductions. Jeff Christian, the ORNL buildings technologies researcher heading...
FuturePundit (Free subscription) | 26/11/2009
Some former fast track suburbs have lost population since the recession started. The recession and housing collapse have halted four decades of double-digit growth for nearly half of the nation's biggest rapidly expanding suburbs. Twenty-four of the 53 cities of 100,000 or more that grew by at least 10% every decade since 1970 lost population in the last two years. This is blamed on the recession....
GeekMedia (Free subscription) | 25/11/2009
Awesome or Scary? The basic AR tools are already available - Bionic Eye does simple things really well, while Layar has the potential to do a whole lot more if mobile handsets had more memory. Face Recognition is already available on social photo editors (and on iPhoto) as long as you give it something to work from: ie tag some faces and it will recognise them in future. As William Gibson said "The...
FuturePundit (Free subscription) | 25/11/2009
Will China's lack of democracy give it a leg up in the next wave of human space exploration? Michael Hanlon argues the next big step in space exploration takes too much time for a democracy to fund it. It may simply be that space exploration is incompatible with US democracy. A Mars shot would take four presidential terms at least. No president will ask taxpayers to fund something he won't be around...
FuturePundit (Free subscription) | 24/11/2009
A person's own purified adult stem cells can reduce pain from a form of heart disease. CHICAGO --- The largest national stem cell study for heart disease showed the first evidence that transplanting a potent form of adult stem cells into the heart muscle of subjects with severe angina results in less pain and an improved ability to walk. The transplant subjects also experienced fewer deaths than those...
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