Travel

Despite the growing conversation on the topic of how our lives contribute to global warming, more and more people will be able to travel internationally. The Airbus success story only supports this statement. By the end of 2019, Airbus had become the world’s largest plane-manufacturer for the first time since 2011, having delivered a forecast-beating 863 aircraft, seizing the crown from embattled US rival Boeing. Considering that commercial planes would have an average of 300 seats, that is 258,900 additional people flying on Airbus aircraft alone. Some calculations suggest that there is a nation in the sky as, depending on the source, about 1,000,000 people are estimated to be up in the air at any given moment.

Carbon offsetting

Offsetting our carbon footprint will become a regular part of our lives. And as we are now used to tracking the steps we have walked in a day, we will equally get accustomed to tracking our impact on the planet Earth. We kind of need to. This will create a new business industry, which is currently taken care of by non-profit NGOs. And make no mistake – this has been an ongoing topic. The Guardian brought a summary on carbon offsetting back in 2011. Airlines will offer carbon offsetting products directly in their booking flow, a green option will become a filter in our search for products and services.

Human immortality

It's peculiar. When religious thinkers speak of immortality, we tend to laugh at them. But as soon as Silicon Valley scientists and tech evangelists - as they symptomatically denounce themselves - touch the same topic, they are soon featured on the cover of Times. And while DNA enhancements remain a divisive topic probably restricted only to the rich, the continued growth of the human population and potential of human immortality creates a problem scientists can agree on: how many of us are simply too many? The answer is yet to be found.

Infinite scroll

A function, about which its inventor – designer Aza Raskin (Abstract, s02 e05 on Ian Spalter) – said he would forever atone for. A function which has been widely adopted on social media platforms, across media outlets and search engines represents a psychological problem for us and revenue opportunity for them. We have lost the stopping cues, the sense of “reaching the end”, the idea of having enough. And so we have collectively wasted hundreds of millions of human hours looking at things an algorithm chosen for us. Billions of alternative universes. And it is about time we demand ethical algorithms.

Education system

Our Western education system is bound to be disrupted. It is almost surprising that it hasn’t happened yet. But when we look at the distribution of state budgets, it is clear that our culture prefers to spend money on tangible results, such as building infrastructures, railways and roads, rather than an abstract education system. it will be expensive, painful, but inevitable if we want to create a self-confident generation that is able to stand up in the new world. An average current school system is designed to create people who think that they are expected to always know the right answers. And that is one of the many fields in which machines are so much better at – information storage. And our effort to compete with them is simply futile.

Disruption

While Uber had promised to disrupt the rigid taxi industry, and Airbnb had claimed the same about hotels – and we all collectively bought in – all we might get out of this deal is an unprecedented level of disruption to our planet and our communities. Legal tax optimisation (read off shore taxing), residents vanishing city centres, property prices rising to utmost heights. Shared economy, we have learnt, doesn’t necessary mean shared prosperity.

Contemporary art

The world of contemporary art will become less and less “understandable” as more and more artists fight for attention. For likes, views and influence. And so we shall get accustomed to seeing a banana being sold for $150,000. However, in the case of this infamous banana sold in Miami, it was never about the banana. It was about us and about what we pay attention to and why. An art piece we might not want, but deserve.

Artist Maurizio Cattelan duct taped a banana to a wall, titled it "Comedian", and sold 5 editions of the artwork for as much as $150,000 each. Why did it capture our attention, curiosity, and memes? What does it mean?

Populism

The Anglo-Saxon policy of creating a democratic environment has been replaced by boundless populism, which is spreading like a plague. And many nations have been inspired, such as Brazil or Turkey. Several nations have already rejected civility and the common good. And they put the rhetoric of independence in a vacant place without looking at others. And this populism, unrestrained by questionable social networking algorithms, creates an environment in which clear, striking but often unrealistic promises win voters who often cannot cope with the understanding of our accelerated times.

Deepfakes

For the first time in our human history, we may witness seemingly legitimate conflict, which has in fact been fabricated using AI. How can we say what is real?

Automation

The technological revolution will continue to bring automation to an increasingly wide range of occupations. However, the disappearance of hundreds of thousands of positions is not yet on the table. We just have to realise that competing with machines in disciplines such as the ability to remember, precision, or the ability to produce products with consistent quality is simply fighting with windmills. Our strengths as humans dwell in the art of combination, our imagination and finding new solutions.

Habit changes

Our generation has self-inflicted an expectation, that in line with our conscious way of living, we are to make habit changes. Recycle even more. Uber less. Social garden more. Travel internationally less. Offset more. Some of these we will see happening, for example more offsetting, more green equivalents to products and services, while others are less likely to change quickly, like international travel – our generation is hooked on exploring, discovery and gaining experiences. And while Greta has been pointing out some important topics, not all of them will be changed immediately.

Here is to the new decade

And if you feel a little nostalgic now, here is the past decade in pictures according to The New York Times.

This article is a sober attempt to discuss a few ideas I have been reading about. It does not attempt to provide answers to our collective problems, as I have nowhere near the vast amount of knowledge required to even begin to understand our current affairs on a root level.