Thanks to Washington Post, we now know how the C4 dataset was made up, one of those used to train some AI chatbots. Since it is s snapshot of a sample of the web at a particular time, a few years ago, it isn’t perfectly representative, but it does give a taste of the likely makeup of AI training sets.
When someone asks their AI chatbot about the future, this list gives a broad indication of the relative influence that site would have on the answer. It’s really just a proxy for website size, but that’s as good a way as any of ranking influence. At least it’s objective, based on actual data. Ross Dawson’s top futurists list is equally objective, but ranks by social media presence. Neither is perfect. Not all futurists have big websites and not all futurists bother to cultivate large social media followings. Neither list indicates quality of analysis or insight.
I checked all the futures sites I could find on existing lists list of top futurists and futures sites, but I couldn’t find listed sites for some eminent futurists. On the other hand, a few futurists had multiple sites that made the list.
It’s easy to look up a missing site and see where it would fit. Here’s the link:
If you find a genuine futures site on there that you think should be added to my list, drop me a note with the website url and I’ll add it to my spreadsheet and it will appear on this blog next time I update it.
I add the table below as screenshots first and then as a searchable table, but the table is harder to read due to the way wordpress insists on displaying it. I can’t edit wordpress well any more since they ruined the editor a few years ago.
The number of tokens quoted is in thousands, to save space.
This is a report I wrote in 2006 while in BT, publicly released via Futurizon in early 2008 without significant change. Reproduced here verbatim for historical interest on Earth Day 2023.
Author: I D Pearson BSc DSc(hc) CITP FBCS FWAAS FRSA FIN FWIF
After four decades of warnings by scientists, climate change is at last getting a lot of attention globally. It certainly is a problem that needs to be addressed before it is too late. However, panic is rarely an effective response and it is frustrating to see how much suggested remedial action is based on out-of-date technology or poor thinking. Firstly, one of the main problems is the lack of clear, system wide, full lifecycle thinking in the environment space. This report highlights some of the very significant policy errors that result. Secondly, with rapid technological development, it is better to look at the problem from scratch and see what can be done using the mechanisms and technologies available to us now and in the future instead of looking to yesterday for solutions. By considering this future technology potential, this report challenges much of the current thinking and highlights the potential of technology to solve climate change in the long term. Although some of the content of this report applies specifically to the UK, much of it applies globally. Consequently, provided that reasonably sensible policies are deployed in the short term to prevent runaway effects from taking hold, climate change will be reduced to a short and medium term problem, entirely soluble in the longer term. Realisation of this certainly justifies action but certainly not panic.
Most importantly, the report aims to show that an environmentally healthy future does not have to be based on going back to yesterday. The key to sustainability is not to prevent people from doing what they want to do, but to use intelligence to develop more environmentally friendly solutions. i.e. sustainability via intelligence.
Local authority, corporate and government environmental policies are often poorly thought through.
In particular, eco-towns, over-emphasis on public transport, use of biofuels, and carbon trading are of dubious merit.
Interactions between many social and cultural factors with the environment and environmental behaviour are highly complex and often ignored, leading to inaccuracies in climate predictions.
Being seen to be doing something is often more important to people and companies than helping the environment.
There is far too much use of decades-old environmental polices that are now out of date and counter-productive.
Use of agricultural land to grow biofuels is counter-productive. Carbon taxes may well also prove to be counterproductive.
Use of biodegradable plastics will prevent carbon sequestration via carbon reefs.
Encouraging home composting will increase methane levels.
Rubbish taxation will increase water demand and increase pollution through use of water to wash cans, and flushing of organic waste, also reducing the potential for biomass power, while increasing resource use even further by stimulating rapid expansion of the market for waste disposal units. Use of hot water and dishwashers compounds the problem still further. People should be asked not to wash out containers before collection.
Privately owned bus companies will on average generate more CO2 than publicly owned services, because the need to generate profits generates practices such as using indirect routes to fill the buses, that deter people from using them and increase journey length.
Taxis generate far more CO2 per passenger journey than private cars so should no longer be classified as public transport and their use should be discouraged.
Bicycles not using cycle lanes can cause many other vehicles to brake and accelerate, thereby increasing overall system wide CO2 production. Although beneficial when used sensibly, they should be discouraged from using busy roads at peak times.
The production and erosion of topsoil, which is a very significant climate change factor, is strongly affected by a range of other decisions being made elsewhere in the climate change battle, such as the use of biomass for power production. Greater coordination and much more system-wide, full lifecycle thinking is required.
Consumption of bottled water should be discouraged.
Rapid technology obsolescence is an essential tool in reducing environmental footprint.
Solutions for carbon sequestration, nuclear waste disposal, and restoration of the environment to health are all highly likely to be developed over the next several decades, ensuring that climate change is only a short and medium term problem, but not a long term one.
Solar farms in equatorial regions are likely, contributing enormously to energy supply, but affecting wealth distribution.
New transport solutions based on electronically driven cars and electronic highways could be developed quickly which could dramatically improve CO2 production, personal mobility and social inclusivity, while reducing congestion.
AI will be a very strong contributor to dealing with climate change. AI will dramatically accelerate scientific and technological progress across the board and expedite solutions.
Technology such as linear induction motors could be applied well to cycle lanes to provide extra power to cyclists on hills or to increase average speed and reduce travel times, with system wide carbon benefits through extra bicycle use and increased fitness and reduced adverse carbon effects on other transport.
It is recommended that a more thorough analysis of full system wide impacts and interactions is undertaken before environmental policies are established.
Climate change and other environmental policies should consider complex socio-economic impacts and their complex higher order interactions. There is a need for better public research on environmental issues so that proper scientifically based advice can be made available to government, business, individuals and society.
In particular, impacts on corporate efficiency, output and the support of staff for other environmental programmes should be considered better when deciding on corporate policies. Depending on how well these policies are prepared, a local saving of CO2 production could easily come at the expense of a much greater global, full system production.
It is important that companies use scientifically based recommendations as the basis of their policies rather than inputs from green groups that may have a disregard for science or politically motivated agendas. Caution is also needed to prevent environmental management roles being hijacked to indulge and leverage personal views.
Causes of water vapour at all levels of the atmosphere should be considered more, as should the impacts of soil management and other farming practices, which are deeply interwoven with other environmental policies.
Until a few years ago, there was still significant scientific scepticism about the reality of climate change. Today, it is generally accepted as fact and as a serious problem by the scientific community, with only one or two doubters.
The recent Stern Review suggests that we may only have a decade left to start taking serious action to avoid massive costs later. Having left it too late to commission properly funded research to gather all the appropriate facts, we are inevitably acting blind to some degree, and government is likely to recommend drastic solutions. We still don’t have all the information yet on how the environment works, and climate models often produce wildly differing predictions of the magnitude and nature of the problem. Complicating the problem even more, we also don’t have reliable models of global society and the global economy, nor their interactions with the environment. We need good models of how the environment works and how it interacts with human society before we can make the right decisions on how to act. We need more and better science. Acting without fully understanding system dynamics inevitably involves risk, but the level of risk can be reduced by increasing knowledge, and ensuring that solution design is unimpeded by dogma and poor thinking.
An interesting analogy to our current position is a blindfolded man standing on the edge of a cliff. Concerned passers by might yell at him to move because he is in serious danger and needs to take action, but unless he takes the time to remove the blindfold to do basic research on which direction to move, he is as likely to fall off as to move to safe ground. Unfortunately, although the current advice from environmental pressure groups is based on a very commendable desire to do something, it is not always scientifically informed, and consequently is in some cases as likely to be harmful as beneficial. Some greens actually see science as part of the problem, but without science, how can we know what to do? Science is the only reliable way we have of figuring out how things work and predicting the impact of an action.
Of course, the UK holds only 1% of the world’s population and the big global impacts are elsewhere, but each region must do what it can to reduce its own emissions, and if possible, to export better solutions. In any case, much of the content of this report would apply to other regions too.
Some conventional environmental thinking is little more than dogma, ideas and beliefs held almost religiously in spite of contrary scientific evidence or in spite of significant change in the situation . Environmentalism is also clearly one of a number of ideologies that comprise 21st century piety, other obvious ones being vegetarianism, obsession with health foods, organic produce and bottled water, anti-capitalism and new ageism. They appeal to many people’s natural desire to be seen as ‘good people’, and since mainstream religion, the historic foundation of holiness, is now unfashionable, these often act as easy secular substitutes. When this happens, the perfectly rational desire to protect the environment can be subjugated by other political and ideological goals and behaviours that also contribute to that person’s piety. Sadly, the personal feeling of being ‘good’ and to be seen as being good, is often stronger than the need to be well informed, and environmentalists can often become sanctimonious and damage the environment by applying poorly thought through practices and trying to force others to do so.
Since there has been so much change in the techno-social situation since environmentalism began, it is time to reassess common environmental beliefs against good science, so that dogma doesn’t get in the way of doing the right things, or we may be making the problem worse.
Apart from adherence to out-of-date dogma, and corruption of thinking by 21st century piety, other causes of poor thinking that frequently affect the climate change debate include:
lots of things that were true 30 years ago are no longer true today because the situation is different;
common sense is often wrong;
people are notoriously extremely bad at weighing up risks and rewards;
most people have little intuitive understanding of exponential or other non-linear change, even many scientists;
some things that look good at first, look bad once second and third order effects are taken into consideration.
Together, these problems have resulted in a set of environmental policies that might have been good ideas once upon a time, but which do not bear up to proper scientific analysis now. For example, anti-nuclear lobbying was extremely successful at restricting the use of nuclear power, when there was clearly no economically feasible substitute other than to use fossil fuels. The consequently greater production of CO2 emissions has contributed significantly to the climate change problem. Although some green groups still strongly oppose any return to nuclear power, many other environmentalists now see nuclear power as the lesser of two evils, and some governments are seriously considering returning to nuclear power, while also investing heavily in development of renewable energy production. This latter approach seems entirely sensible given the current situation.
One thing that is certainly not wrong is the passion that many people share to protect and nurture the environment. Whatever minor criticisms of green groups may be made, they still have a very important part to play, having won the hearts and minds of many environmental supporters. One of the strongest weapons they hold is that they are not geographically constrained, so are not under control of any particular government or culture, so are in a strong position to continue to lead environmentalists. They should be encouraged to carry on campaigning for environmental protection and for remedial action. But making sure that their decisions and campaigns are properly informed and scientifically valid is essential if the environment is to benefit. The wider scientific community needs to be much more actively involved in informed decision making to make sure we do the right things.
In short, if we want to defend and repair the environment, rather than just to feel good about ‘doing something’, we need more scientifically informed environmentalism.
Ecotowns are obviously intended to provide environmentally friendly accommodation. While this in itself might be a good idea, unfortunately, the plans often focus on old-fashioned environmental solutions and therefore are in danger of locking in out-of date technologies. Since technology progress is already rapid and accelerating, preventing the adoption of new environmentally friendly solutions by locking in old and even obsolete ones does not seem wise.
For example, current environmental dogma says that cars are bad a public transport is good. As this report argues, actually quite the reverse is true in the long term, and to use 1990s solutions such as guided bus-ways is severely misguided. It would be far better to implement pilot schemes such as electronic routes and electronic vehicles. If a whole town is being built, given that most journeys are local, there is a perfect opportunity for genuine eco-towns to trial such new technologies, that are far more environmentally friendly than any bus-based system, while allowing un- restricted travel, and allowing full social inclusivity for an ageing population.
Similarly, rolling out 1990s energy solutions such as CHP plants will increase infrastructure costs and prevent the adoption of newer solutions arising in the next couple of decades. Arguments for extra infrastructure investment that pay net environmental dividends only over the long term should be abandoned. The fact is that the net value of benefits in the longer term is much lower than in the first years, due to the inevitable availability of much better alternatives in the longer term. A heavily discounted weighting of far-future benefits should be applied, and when this is done, many supposedly beneficial solutions look very much worse. It will often be far better to use an inefficient interim solution and wait for better solutions to arrive than to implement and inefficient and long-lived solution now. This stands in stark contrast with the all-too-common philosophy that we have to act now and can’t afford to wait for new technology to arrive. If the purpose is to benefit the environment, then a full lifetime, full system cost-benefit analysis needs to be done, and this often will mean waiting a while before doing anything. It is simply nonsense to assume that acting soonest will always reap the best benefits overall.
The underlying principle of trading CO2 allowances is that the use of market forces will cause reduction in CO2 production. It fails because it relies on the good will and cooperation of many diverse people, and on their willingness to put the environment ahead of their own desire for wealth and also because it is very difficult to verify that carbon is actually being offset by people selling allowances. Like any system that depends on people acting for the common good, it is vulnerable to those who do not share the same ideals. It is already clear that the system has been poorly conceived, too vulnerable to abuse, fraud and incompetence. Some offset schemes are badly managed and trees die. People buying offsets often don’t check whether the trees they are supposedly having planted would have been planted anyway as part of already existing commercial forestry business, or whether they have already been sold many times, or whether they are left to die and then replaced by new ones sold afresh on the same site. Large scale alleged abuses recently in the media include Indonesia draining its bogs, releasing huge CO2 additions, and then offering to stop if paid. This is feasible because the treaty on CO2 limitation did not cover Indonesia (or many other countries). Such practices border on blackmail. Deliberately increasing emissions of CO2 to create a market for reduction certainly are not intended consequences of developing a carbon trading market, any more than simply re-labelling existing activities so as to become eligible for payment. But it is obvious that where large amounts of money are made available, with little protection against abuse, people will be highly creative in taking full advantage. Carbon trading seems to be more of a system for dubious wealth redistribution than an effective way of limiting CO2 production.
Corporations have a great deal of influence on global CO2 production, and it is important that their environmental policy managers are not only properly informed, but also properly motivated. However, it seems reasonable to assume that many of those give responsibility for environmental policies are those that have shown interest in them and many of these will have some affiliation with green groups. Given the poor respect given to science and technology by green groups, putting people in charge who have a green bias, and are likely to leverage corporate policy to indulge their own views, seems inevitably to generate an overall corporate bias towards greens instead of legitimate science based policy.
This inbuilt corporate bias will make it more difficult to achieve environmental benefits by creating a barrier to scientifically based policies.
On the other hand, environmentalism often fits in corporation in close proximity with corporate social responsibility, branding and marketing. These are inextricably linked of course, given the strong media attention to environmental concerns and corporate behaviour. Many blue chip companies have already discovered how to use environmental policy to generate favourable brand impact. Companies of course want to demonstrate their support for environmental initiatives. Sadly, it is much better from a short term brand viewpoint, to do things that demonstrate conformance to current popular environmental wisdom, as featured in popular media and green figures, which as this report argues strongly, is often badly misinformed.
By amplifying the impacts of personal green bias and fashion at the expense of good science, corporate environmentalism can do far more harm than good. It is often much more interested in doing something than in doing the right thing. It takes a brave environmental policy director and indeed a brave brand director to risk angering greens by doing the right thing instead of following misguided dogma. All too many fall foul and simply roll out obsolete or misguided directives.
The other area of concern in corporations is that they have a tendency knowingly to misrepresent activity so that it looks much more environmentally responsible than it is. Corporate spin is nothing new of course, but the enormous media and brand value of ‘being seen to be green’ has generated a high degree of corporate greenwash, putting a green spin on something that sometimes is anything but green. Fortunately, the media provides a very useful deterrent, happy to unveil corporate green hypocrisy when they find it.
Technology change is accelerating and many environmentalists have expressed strong concern that high tech gadgets such as phones, computers and MP3 players become obsolete very quickly and end up on landfill while they still have years of useful potential life left. Some companies that consider themselves environmentally responsible have initiated programmes to tackle obsolescence.
But to do so can be a significant error. This is especially true of mobile phones, which are typically used as a prime example of the problem. In fact, if it were not for the enormous progress in phone technology, paid for by the rapid obsolescence cycle, phones would be very much heavier, more expensive, use more materials, generate far more radiation, and almost certainly still use batteries based on highly toxic heavy metals. A phone today makes very little environmental loading, while adding much more significantly to quality of life, compared to its ancestors. Future generations of phones will progress quickly towards digital jewellery, which will do far more than today’s IT with minimal materials.
A person wearing a few grammes of digital jewellery in 2020 will have far more IT capability than someone today with a laptop, phone, PDA, MP3 player, digital camera, GPS navigation system, security alarm, identity card, electronic cash cards, credit cards, voice recorder, video camera, memory sticks, radio, portable TV, a book, magazine, games console and many other gadgets that haven’t even been invented yet. Furthermore, by 2020, billions more people will be able to afford these sorts of things. Without the rapid obsolescence cycle, the enormous environmental benefit of being able to achieve all this with very little material and energy, compared to making a huge loading on material resources and energy will not be achieved.
Obsolescence is therefore one of the environment’s best friends, allowing people to do what they want while damaging the environment much less than even today. Holding back obsolescence or regulating gadget lifetime for some short term perceived resource benefit would be disastrous for the environment. Rather, the faster we can progress to tools that minimise resource wastage, the better it will be. This is particularly true because many people who want IT can’t afford it yet but soon will be able to. It is essential that progress enables them to come on stream using technology that reduces the impact rather than to use antiques with relatively huge environmental footprints.
Through their inclusion in the 21st Century piety toolbox, these are all linked to environmental behaviour and thinking. Their impact on the environment can be both good and bad, but the impacts are many and diverse and their complex relationships with other factors make it impossible to guess net impacts without an extensive analysis. For example, vegetarianism reduces the area of land required to grow enough provide food for people. Growing crops costs less energy, space and water than raising animals. Raising meat animals also contributes significantly to methane production, methane of course being an even worse greenhouse gas than CO2. The health effects of a vegetable diet will affect the tax recovered over a lifetime, lifetime health care and pension costs. Many other lesser effects could also be considered such as impacts on soil level, biomass availability, transport costs and so on. It is evident that even in this one example, the net environmental impact is hard to estimate.
By contrast, organic farming generally produces less food per hectare of land, which decreases global food production capacity, which increases prices and makes it harder for poor people to survive, which affects family size in poor countries, which creates a greater population, greater need for aid and so on. It is also chemically different from conventional farming and also affects lifestyle in more subtle ways – organic food is often delivered by a different distribution system.
The desire to wear natural fibres instead of synthetic substitutes increases demand for cotton. Cotton is becoming a hot environmental topic in itself, producing pollution and water stress among many other socioeconomic problems. Again, the transport, CO2, energy demand and social impact is very different across the whole system and whole lifecycle from synthetic clothing.
Finally, bottled water has become very fashionable among people who have adopted the ‘healthy lifestyle’. But at least in this case, awareness is rapidly increasing that it is very bad to the environment compared to using tap water. Each one litre plastic bottle generates 100g of CO2 during its production while using 7 litres of water! 27M tones of plastic are needed globally each year for bottles water. Even if the whole system is complex, it is very clear that the consumption of bottles water is environmentally harmful and should be discouraged. One of the strongest objections to use of tap water is that chemicals are added to it, and it tastes bad. The reasons for doing so should be re-evaluated and balanced against the need for people to have access to water that they are prepared to drink, without damaging the environment more than necessary.
With such enormous complexity – and the interactions noted above are just a tiny proportion of the whole – it is little wonder that most mathematical models of the environment ignore most of these deeply interwoven social, political and cultural effects. The inevitable result is of course less accurate predictions.
Like many areas, East Anglia suffers from a major coastal erosion problem. Environmental policy has recently altered from prevention to acceptance, but in some areas, coastal defence is commercially necessary. One conventional approach is to make huge concrete blocks (making and transporting concrete produces large amounts of CO2) and dump them in the sea to absorb the wave power. This solution is carbon intensive. Meanwhile landfill sites are filling up fast. And meanwhile, scientists are trying to figure out how to sequestrate carbon into carbon sinks. These problems are connected and can be partially addressed simultaneously. Householders are already encouraged to separate plastic waste for recycling, and when it reaches the recycling centres, it is usually compressed into blocks for easier handling, which is often done in China. If these blocks were to be dumped in the sea, just off the Norfolk coast, (and suitably contained of course) transport and processing would produce far less CO2, carbon would be locked up, coastal erosion would be reduced, land would be reclaimed, landfill would fill up more slowly, and CO2 production greatly reduced. The plastic would effectively become a plastic reef and later, reclaimed land. This approach would be carbon negative, while recycling is at best carbon neutral. One of the obstacles to this solution is the move towards biodegradable plastic, which of course returns carbon to the atmosphere, and ironically, was developed to help the environment. The much levied criticism of conventional plastics, that they will stay around for thousands of years, actually makes them ideal for a carbon sink. Bio-degradable plastic, and current laws that prevent plastics from being dumped in the sea could turn out to be environmentally damaging, by preventing such solutions.
Another obstacle is that household waste is poorly sorted, so improved sorting processes would be needed if sea pollution is to be avoided. But like many other current problems, upcoming technology will make it much easier to solve.
Other waste could be handled differently. For example, glass is borderline recyclable, yielding an environmental benefit when recycling it rather than producing it from scratch, but since the full-life benefit is actually quite small, perhaps it could also be included with the plastic, giving extra density to the waste.
Organic waste is often composted, returning much of the carbon to the air in the process, especially with home composting, which authorities are currently trying hard to encourage. Home composting can produce significant quantities of methane, a bad greenhouse gas unless. Organic waste can be converted into biomass fuel for power stations instead, displacing the need for fossil fuels and while this sounds sensible at first, it needs to be rigorously compared with the alternative full-system impact of using to increase soil production on farmland, apparently often overlooked in climate analyses. Alternatively, by heating it with a reduced oxygen supply, it could be carbonised, and the carbon dumped into the sea, absorbing pollutants as an active carbon sink. However, doing this would require better quality of rubbish sorting; otherwise pollutants such as dioxins may be produced inadvertently. In any case, there are several alternatives that need to be analysed properly.
Metal waste left over could be recycled conventionally, but there is a need for better education and better regulation. Many people wash out cans before dumping them, and indeed some local authorities ask them to do so, an example of poor thinking applied by authorities who are more concerned to be seen to be doing something than to actually alleviate the problem. Washing cans before throwing them in the trash contributes to the amount of sewage processing needed, accelerates the decomposition and hence production of CO2, while bypassing the potential to recover the chemical energy in the waste at a biomass power station. This effect needs to be offset against the benefits of can recycling. It seems to make little sense to encourage households to use increasingly limited fresh water supplies to wash out cans, when this could be done centrally with less water, and the resulting slurry used as a fuel source for bacterial power stations. In the home, it might account for 2% of water use. Worse still, many householders use heated water to wash the cans, or even their dishwashers, so there is also a significant energy cost at the household for this recycling, as well as increased detergent release.
In fact, this situation will get far worse if rubbish taxation is implemented as currently being suggested. A lot of the weight and volume of rubbish arises from organic kitchen waste. Under taxation, many households might choose to be waste disposal units, and flush the organic waste down the sink. Again, apart from removing the potential to use this for biomass power generation, it would add substantially both to water use and sewage treatment.
Paper recycling is also of dubious merit. Some studies have suggested recycling paper is on balance damaging to the environment, and at best it is only slightly beneficial. Again, paper could be used as fuel, or charred and dumped as a carbon sink.
When all these factors are taken into account, the current pressure towards recycling everything seems to be over-zealous, even sometimes misguided. Recycling is due for a thorough and updated life cycle costing of the environmental benefits, system wide, with proper consideration of alternatives.
Carbon sequestration technologies are being researched intensely now, although there are unfortunately already signs that the first wave is stalling due to financial blockages. There are a variety of possibilities, such as pumping in into underground aquifers, dissolving it in deep seawater, planting forests or seeding ocean algae farms with iron. More recently, synthetic biology has started promising good potential for harnessing biologically inspired techniques, using synthesized proteins, or even eventually synthetic life forms. Genetic engineering of new types of organisms that can lock up carbon quickly is also being researched. Synthetic organisms that are primarily designed to remove CO2 from the atmosphere could appear to be very useful indeed.
However, such developments should not be introduced without due consideration of dangers. If the basic processes of life can be mastered by engineers, the threat of self replication and its potential use in weapon systems springs to mind immediately. While it would obviously be useful if we could control the removal by synthetic organisms of just the right amount of CO2, of course this would need to be done in a fail safe way that could not remove all of it, which would cause mass extinction.
Perhaps a half-way solution would be a good compromise of safety and effectiveness. With the current rapid increase in greenhouse farming around Europe, supplying CO2-enriched air would be useful to both grow the crops faster and sequester the carbon. Genetic modification of plants to make them grow faster would also help, both in substitution of fossil fuels via bio-fuels and biomass power generation. If trees being planted to absorb carbon are genetically growth-accelerated, this could make a significant contribution to longer term sequestration. The same applies to sea-based algae farms.
Technologies such as synthetic biology could lead mankind further down a very dangerous development path, but of course we are already a little way along it today. And being more optimistic, although synthetic biology is potentially dangerous if care is not taken, the field could also yield potential tools to rescue life on earth if the worst nightmares of climate change take effect, by eventually enabling wholesale redesigning of the ecosystem from the ground up.
Nuclear power was until recently anathema to most environmentalists, but many have reconsidered their stance in the light of global warming, and the issue has now split them down the middle, with some environmentalists on either side. There are obvious risks associated with nuclear power, as with other forms of energy production. But since these risks were not properly compared those associated with alternative power sources, nuclear power proliferation was greatly constrained and eventually cut back as a direct result of environmentalist pressure. The clear absence of readily available and economically viable renewable solutions, or political will to develop them, meant that they were replaced by fossil fuel based power production. The antinuclear lobby has therefore contributed in part to the wider climate change problem. It is sad that well-meaning but misguided environmentalists have become one of the big problems facing the environment.
Indeed, some environmentalists remain anti-nuclear in spite of the carbon emission benefits. One of the main sticking points if disposal of nuclear waste. The argument is raised repeatedly, and sounds compelling at first, that our descendants will have to cope with the nuclear waste for ten thousand years or more. But that argument depends entirely on the assumption that technologists will never be able to develop a means of disposal, whereas it is highly likely that the disposal problem will be solved this century, so at worst, we will have to store the waste for decades, not millennia. Nuclear waste includes plutonium, which can of course be used in nuclear reactors itself, but can also be used for nuclear weapons. That the weaponry use of nuclear energy bi-products is a threat is unquestionable, and is one of the better arguments against nuclear power. So, there is of course a need for secure storage for such waste, it cannot be simply dumped. However, Uranium comes from uranium mines, is then processed, used, and as radiation levels decline, it becomes useless for power generation and needs to be disposed of. But, for example, if the depleted uranium and other low grade waste were to be returned to source and essentially mixed up with landfill in the mine that it came from, the mine would be slightly less radioactive than originally, so there should be no problem. The energy would have been harvested, and the uranium mine would be a slightly less radioactive landfill. Of course, the waste is not in its original form so would still need some processing, but the dilution principle is sound. Perhaps the real problem is that current approaches to disposal involve waste concentration rather than dilution. When the waste is concentrated, it takes up less space of course, and it also becomes more dangerous, and a more attractive target for terrorists.
Another approach for waste disposal is to send it into space, for example, to fire it into the Sun, which is of course a nuclear reactor itself. Although today that would be a dangerous and expensive approach because of the costs and unreliability of rocket technology, at least one space elevator will be most likely built within the next few decades. A space elevator is a huge cable extending into space, allowing delivery of people and materials all the way into earth orbit. It is no longer science fiction. Many engineers are already doing R&D on materials and techniques, with large financial incentives for each milestone along the way. Over time (almost certainly this century), with perhaps several such elevators, and what eventually will become well established technology, this is likely to become a safe way of getting stuff into space. Plutonium and other high level waste could safely be disposed of, for ever. There is therefore no real problem with long term storage. Nuclear waste will have to be kept safe and secure for quite some time, but not the thousands of years often cited by anti-nuclear groups. We will certainly have reliable means of safe disposal within 100 years. It will not be a problem left for many generations. That makes one of the prime arguments against nuclear power generation very much weaker.
Actually, although we will certainly need nuclear power if we are to provide sufficient energy for the next few decades without creating too much CO2 renewable energy technology is also progressing quickly and will be able to provide much of our needs within those few decades. Solar power is making good progress towards high efficiency and low cost cells. For example, developments at the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory suggested three-band cells with efficiencies up to 45%. Energy companies are looking forward to making grid parity possible in the next decade, at least in sunny regions such as California. Provided costs can be constrained, solar power could provide significantly towards our everyday domestic needs, even in the UK, especially if other energy sources increase in price.
However, on a much larger scale, if solar cells could be manufactured with anything like this efficiency level at reasonably low cost, we might see the emergence of massive solar energy farms in North Africa. These farms could cover large areas of otherwise low value land, producing large quantities of hydrogen. Also, since superconducting cable development is coming along quickly, we may even see direct electricity distribution to Europe from Africa. Scale would be limited mainly only by cost and demand. If it reaches very large scale, there would be significant knock-on economic effects, with hydrogen substituting for oil as it starts to get expensive, and ensuring that much of the oil is left forever in the ground, destroying the last decades of that market. Moving such a major source of income from the Middle East to North Africa would obviously have significant political effects too. In each of the world’s regions, it is possible that energy could be produced in the South and transmitted to the richer North.
As we head (possibly) towards a hydrogen economy, nuclear fission and solar power are likely to be the main contributors, displacing fossil fuel burning. Fusion may well come on stream in the 40s or 50s as a major global contributor too. Wind and wave power will contribute on a small scale too, as will geothermal energy and biomass use. With the hydrogen economy, in principle, anyone that can make any form of energy can convert it to hydrogen and then ship or pipe it around the world to anywhere it is needed. In parallel, domestic use of solar power is likely to have a significant impact on energy demand in some countries. And all the while, energy efficiency progress will reduce waste significantly.
As the hydrogen age matures, we are also very likely to have a space elevator. This will greatly reduce the cost and risk of getting things into orbit. It would greatly facilitate the transport of materials and staff to fabricate space based solar power arrays, or even nuclear facilities, as well as providing waste disposal capability for land based nuclear facilities
With all these various forms of power production likely to be used in the future, oil will be long obsolete, and we will have a glut of power, not a shortage. The price is likely to fall significantly below today’s levels in real terms.
Considering the many potential energy technologies, a long term energy glut is probable, but it will take a few decades or two from now to really take effect. We will therefore inevitably go through a period of energy shortage and high prices before the price starts a long slide as we enter a long term glut.
In the same time-frame, it is likely that carbon sequestration technology will be highly effective, removing the problem of global warming and restoring the atmosphere and our climate to a healthy state.
These same time frames are those over which many people are panicking today. Global warming seems already to be having significant adverse effects, but it is the long term future that concerns scientists so much, and it is the perceived long term threat that is forcing many of the measures being designed and implemented today.
It will be a great shame if these reactive panic measures prevent us from capitalizing on this technology windfall by locking us in to inappropriate but long lived solutions, achieving short term success at the expense of long term quality of life.
Among the measures that are already demonstrably ill-conceived is the push towards biofuels. It was always obvious that using prime agricultural land to grow fuel would increase food prices, harm the poor, and make little dent in the need for fossil fuels. However, energy produced by waste matter left over after food is produced, or indeed waste food and domestic organic waste, is more sound. This is to be compared with the use of such biomatter to increase soil thickness, which in itself is a potentially major contributor to solving CO2 sequestration.
The carbon credit scheme is likely to also prove unwise. It has already become more of a source of greenwash than a source of carbon reduction. It is mainly effective as a means of redistributing wealth by adding costs to business and the consumer without ensuring equivalent gains in the environment. The fact is that many companies are happy to pay carbon offset costs without adequately vetting the means of offsetting them. Many forests that would have been planted anyway can now be paid for twice (or even several times if the marketing is sufficiently unprincipled) by receiving carbon offset subsidies as well as their original commercial value.
Artificial intelligence today is really just clever software, attempting to substitute machine-based algorithms and databases and sensor technology for human intelligence. It can be very effective. For example some expert systems can perform medical diagnoses as well as a human doctor. However, another quite distinct branch of AI aims to develop machines that are intelligent in the same ways as people, conscious, self aware, with their own mental model of the world, their own experiential understanding of the world. There is huge disagreement among practitioners about when we are likely to see the first conscious machines with human levels of intelligence. This could be as early as between 2015 and 2020, with other scientists suggesting 2030, 2040 and some refusing to accept that it will ever be possible.
If we could produce intelligence synthetically, and therefore provide extra thinking capability to solve problems, this could have a profound effect on technology development rate, in every field. Since it is likely that this will be achieved in the next few decades, it is a very important consideration for the climate change problem, with its enormous potential to invent solutions, increase understanding of the environment, and accelerate research development, but it is rarely mentioned in climate change debates. Clearly, smart machines might be used to design smarter machines, which will design smarter ones still, leading exponentially quickly to vastly superhuman intelligence that may well solve many of the problems for us, with new energy technology, and new environmental clean-up and management technology.
We should not rely on AI to bale us out, but we may reasonably expect that it will, even if some of the man-made solutions fail. It gives us hope, but not enough certainty to avoid us using other approaches in parallel.
After recycling, the assumption that public transport is always a good thing for the environment is probably the most deeply embedded belief in environmental thinking, and indeed now pervades the mindset of almost all of society, certainly government. Yet it is wrong! Other ways of organising transport could often be more environmentally sustainable, while improving quality of life instead of limiting it. The common assertion that people should have their travel desires curtailed is unnecessary once new thinking is applied to the problem. In fact, the most environmentally friendly solution to transport in most instances is to use a mixture of cars and bicycles, and these can have a variety of ownership. Trains will still have a rightful place, but it is mainly in underground systems rather than on regional railways. Personal transport, properly implemented, can be more environmentally friendly and provide better quality of life, enabling people to travel as they please, without unduly damaging the environment. The current pressure to prevent people from driving cars by means of congestion charging and road tolling should only be a short term response to the problems caused by the low-technology mechanisms of today. It should not be the basis of long term transport policy. People demonstrably want to travel, and they can do so freely without damaging the environment. All that is needed is ongoing development of already-researched transport systems. We should not lock tomorrow’s society into yesterday’s solutions.
There are some obvious environmental problems with existing public transport that should be addressed. In particular, taxis are usually classed as public transport. A taxi often has to make a two-way journey to take a passenger one way, since it has to get to the passenger, take them to the destination, and often has to return empty once the passenger is dropped off. Of course, sometimes a new passenger is picked up shortly after dropping off the last one, so the ratio of journeys is not as high as two, but the ratio is increased also by taxis driving around empty looking for customers. Taxis are therefore much more damaging to the environment than private cars. Removing their public transport classification would help.
Buses are sometimes packed but also are often nearly empty. They have a very large effect on other transport, slowing it down and causing traffic jams, and the consequential increase in emissions from other vehicles at least partially offsets the savings they make. Their main advantage is that for much of the time at least, the costs of fuel and road space is shared between a higher number of passengers than private transport, and this advantage is worth preserving. The fact that they are public rather than private is immaterial as far as environmental impact is concerned, however much relevance that might have to socio-economic policy. That is not true of their ownership however. Being largely privately owned, bus companies have tended to increase their profits by taking buses on long routes so that they can visit the most potential customers. This means that more CO2 is produced per passenger journey than if the buses were to go direct, and it deters many potential customers from using them. Buses also have a long lifetime, ensuring that newer, cleaner and more efficient engine technology takes much longer to enter the market.
Trains also seem to be an antiquated transport solution long overdue for a re-think. Today, on a typical piece of regional railway track, a train goes past every 20 minutes. A 200m long train, travels at 40m/s (90mph) takes 5 seconds to go past. So a track may be used 5 seconds out of every 20 minutes, an occupancy of 0.4%. The infrastructure has to be there all the time. Surely we can do better than that! Rail is a greatly underused resource that could improve the environment and reduce congestion on the roads if it were used more effectively. However, trains certainly have a major role in systems such as the London underground, where rail occupancy rates are much higher and trains are often very full indeed, where the only possible capacity improvement seems to be to increase the frequency or speed of trains. The same is true of buses, but only at certain times, on certain routes. So although trains and buses will certainly have an important part to play in future mass transport, they are not necessarily always the most effective solution.
So instead of just accepting the public transport dogma and locking in antiquated public transport architectures, let’s first look at whether future technology can offer better alternatives.
In the future we will have better identification and tracking technology if surveillance systems continue to develop as they are. We will generally know who people are and where they are. In particular, we should know where known criminals are, or at least where non-criminals are, which is almost as useful for this purpose. That in itself immediately offers the potential for more sharing of private transport. It is dangerous to pick up total strangers today, but if the car can tell us that a person going to the same place is safe, (perhaps because they are a well known member of the same transport club) then there is less of a barrier to transport sharing. In that world, every car is a potential taxi. Future cars are likely to have the equivalent of a black box for a range of reasons, and one of the things it could routinely record is who the passengers were. As well as increasing safety still further, this could be used for a distributed cost sharing system. The boundaries between public and private transport start to erode. But it can go much further.
It is also likely that speed limits will be electronically enforced at some point, linking the engine management system to speed limits. That will essentially mark the beginning of a long path during which the computer takes over from the driver. Cars in the far future will be able to drive themselves. Simple analysis suggests that if the identities of both the cars and the occupants are known, and if personal driving style is eliminated by electronic overrides, there is far less incentive to personally own a car, and at the same time it will become much easier to implement and manage large fleets of shared cars. Especially since the exact locations of all the cars is known, as well as the destinations and likely arrival times of cars in transit. There are already several instances of car rental systems that allow people to just pick up and drop cars as they wish. This will become much more attractive an option with future technology.
So we may well see large fleets of shared cars, owned by companies, government or social groups. These will more often have multiple occupancy because of the security advantages above. And because they are driven by computer, with all the cars in a ‘road train’, electronically linked for acceleration and braking, they could drive much closer together, increasing road occupancy, greatly reducing drag and therefore making road travel more energy efficient. Indeed, they could be just centimetres away from each other, making travel much safer – it is not possible to get much of a speed differential before a collision if cars are very close, so even if electronic braking interlinking fails, the system would fail gracefully without danger. And with electronic control of the travel, the road transport system would become rather like the packet transport systems used today on the telecoms network (which are far more efficient than the old systems that required a call to hog a whole circuit, like trains do today in effect. This would mean firstly that slots can be electronically booked to ensure smooth travel, secondly, that destination time would be known at the outset., and thirdly that speeds could be made much more constant, again making the system much more energy efficient.
A further capacity advantage arises from the computer driver. Lanes are the width they are today mainly for safety reasons. With computers driving the cars, they could be much closer together sideways too, squeezing more lanes onto the same road area. It also makes it more feasible to run roads with lane direction determined by time of day, with some lanes carrying cars one way in the morning rush, and the other way in the afternoon. So we will see far more use of this technique.
Such an electronically controlled system would probably have a mixture of public and private ownership, but have all the flexibility of private transport. It would be very energy efficient, so confer an environment advantage over existing public transport. Meanwhile, public road transport would converge with private transport to achieve the same environmental quality.
In fact, without use of these electronic systems, unacceptable congestion is inevitable, with limited road capacity and increasing demand. Also, without use of electronic drivers, people will find it harder and harder to join traffic streams, especially if speed limits are electronically enforced, because traffic will not bunch the way it does today, so there will be very few gaps large enough for a human to safely join the flow. By contrast, electronics can easily slow some cars down a little and speed up others to create a gap while a new car joins the flow.
The system outlined would be capable of greatly increasing road use efficiency while reducing energy wastage. But the ideas can also be applied to rail. There is really no reason why road train technology could not be implemented on the railways too. As mentioned, rail occupancy is often as low as 0.4% on regional railways. Performance analysis shows that packet switched networks can be safely loaded to 80% occupancy before statistics cause significant performance degradation. So there is clearly a huge opportunity for improving the capacity of railways, perhaps 100-fold, if packet switching based solutions were to be implemented instead of the current system, which allocates a very long stretch of track exclusively to each train because of the safety limits required by the obsolete signalling and control technologies that current railways use. The current system might have been well suited up to the late 20th century, but it has been possible for many years already to design and build vastly superior systems. With the need to increase capacity and save CO2 emissions, the railways offer enormous potential to help, provided that they are used more intelligently.
Suppose that electronically driven cars and buses could be taken onto the railways, and interleaved with vans and small rail carriages that spend all their time on railways. For example, cars could be made with dual wheels, as some buses are today. Once on rail, no steering is needed and with the vehicles talking electronically to each other to coordinate braking and acceleration, the driver could do other things while the car drives itself to the destination station, whereupon it would leave the track and use its other wheels to get to its final destination. The cars could be driven very closely, and of course the drag and friction costs would be very low. Furthermore, since most of the journey could be on rail with electric energy easily provided, the car could use an electric motor. Instead of using petrol or diesel, or even fuel cells, it could make very long journeys just on batteries, since the batteries could be recharged during the rail journey. Since railways are simple one-dimensional systems, this would be far less demanding in terms of control systems than the equivalent on the roads. So whereas electronic highways will take some more years to become feasible, rail based systems could be implemented much more quickly, given the will.
This approach could eventually be applied to both rail and road, with electronic control systems automatically managing both systems. As a crude estimate, the resultant capacity of the roads would increase probably three-fold, and the capacity of the railways perhaps as much as 100-fold. Congestion and travel delays could be greatly reduced (though sadly not eliminated, due to other architectural limitations), safety greatly improved, and environmental impact greatly reduced since the whole system could be driven on electricity.
If the electricity required is produced from renewables, the whole transport system could be carbon-neutral. So it is very clear that with adequate redesign of the transport system, there is no climate-change-based need to constrain personal travel at all, and there would be a great deal of spare capacity. Furthermore, there would be strong spin-off social benefits, since public fleets of electronically driven cars could serve the whole population, including those unwilling or not permitted to drive themselves for whatever reason. This technology enabled system would therefore deliver benefits on social equitability, environmental sustainability and quality of life support.
There is a clear cost in implementing such a system. The railways particularly are occupied by conventional trains. New rail-cars could link into virtual trains of course to allow inter-working during the migration phase, but the signalling systems used by the old-fashioned trains are a real barrier. It would cost a great deal to update old trains and their signalling systems to achieve these benefits, but of course the new system wouldn’t need them, and the old trains have little advantage over a car based system, so perhaps the cheapest and most effective approach would be to get rid of the trains of the railways. The cost savings made by avoiding centralised signalling systems and train upgrades would go some way to offsetting the cost of the station changes to allow cars to join and leave the traffic.
One clear advantage of this system is that most cars are likely to be paid for either by individuals or fleet management companies. There would really be no need for public subsidy, a welcome change to today’s highly subsidised railways in itself. The vastly increased traffic on the railways provides an obviously adequate source of funding for the railways themselves, just as roads are paid for many times over by road fund license fees and fuel duty. Furthermore, the near elimination of traffic jams would also contribute tens of billions in economic growth, making more tax potentially available for other environmental programmes.
In fact, if this system works well, light rail could even be laid eventually on the roads too, with perhaps a heavy duty freight track and some light private transport tracks. Alternatively, it might be feasible to run the whole system without tracks at all, given the ease of implementing electronic tracks for vehicles to navigate along. This would certainly provide a more rapid deployment mechanism and would use far less resources, and would save having to equip cars with dual wheels. And further away still, we will find that trains have little place in a high-tech transport system and could be scrapped, rail disappearing into history.
This system could use a mixture of different ownerships, public, corporate, private, clubs, and rental. Any of these could work well together. To make it work technically, standards will obviously be needed for car inter-working, distributed signalling systems, identification and payment technology and so on, but these are the kinds of technical problems that are solved every day in industry. Obviously, multiple occupancy might vary between the different approaches, but if capacity and energy efficiency are less of a problem, then occupancy also becomes less of an issue.
The same is true of the arrangements for acquiring and releasing vehicles. There are numerous ways that location, tracking and management technologies could be implemented. There is no technology barrier here.
The system described above would work very well in most areas, but in some big cities, it is likely that there will still be a place for underground systems or other mass transit systems. Of course, electronically driven tube trains could still improve performance comfort and safety a little and save costs. But systems such as the London Underground carry large numbers of passengers fairly efficiently and at low environmental cost, albeit very uncomfortably at times. The potential improvements in capacity would be much less than the 100-fold increase possible on regional railways, perhaps just a factor of 3 or 4 might be possible, even with a continuous stream of electronically driven cars. So here trains might still have a useful purpose. Overcrowding really just needs many more trains and whatever extra tunnel space is required to accommodate them. Replacement of drivers by electronics would be more to save costs than to improve capacity.
Bicycles occupy the peak of the moral high ground as far as environmentalism is concerned because once they are built and delivered, their ongoing emissions are low, just the CO2 from the human riding them. While they are certainly good for the environment overall, the picture isn’t quite as clear as is sometimes portrayed and there are some places where the use of bicycles may not be environmentally sensible.
On proper cycle paths, they are certainly a good solution from both a fitness and environmental point of view (hopefully even once the environmental costs of making the cycle paths and the bicycles are factored in). But mixed with cars, they can be very dangerous, with bicycle riders suffering many times more casualties per mile than car drivers. They also force other vehicles to slow down to pass them, and then to accelerate again. On busy narrow roads, this can often cause significant traffic jams. The bicycle (and its all-too-often sanctimonious rider) may not be directly the cause of the extra consequent emissions from the cars, but from a system wide view, the overall CO2 produced would likely have been less had the cyclist driven a car instead, so this must certainly be taken into account when calculating the impact. The carbon costs of the extra accidents, with the resultant traffic jams and so on, should also be factored in. Accidents have a very high carbon cost.
There is also a high opportunity cost where cycling takes more time to travel (also true of bus and rail travel in some cases), which ultimately amounts to a loss of GDP. This reduces the funding available to government to invest in environmentally friendly solutions across the board.
In the transport system outlined above, cars can drive closer together and this frees up road space both length and width-wise. This means that more space could be made for other car lanes or for cycle lanes. And of course with computers driving the cars, far fewer bicycles would be hit, if any. It is therefore likely that bicycles could be much safer to ride in the future, and because they can be more readily separated from car flow, will be more environmentally friendly, although this advantage is greatly diminished for electric cars. Improving the technology for car transport therefore makes cycling even more environmentally friendly too.
Electronic bicycle lanes could also be constructed to incentivise cycling. A linear induction motor, laid into or on the cycle lane surface could pull cyclists along if they wanted assistance. Mechanical energy is very cheap, whereas the effort required to cycle long distances or up hills is a strong deterrent to many potential cyclists – they are not all super fit! This linear induction drive would only require a small modification to the bicycle (a simple metal plate affixed to the front forks would probably do), and could easily be switched on and off, could offer variable speeds for individual cyclists. With no moving parts, and therefore nothing to clog up, it could be extremely reliable. Tracks could be laid either into the surface, or made as rolls that could be quickly laid out on hills to give extra assistance where it is needed. Of course other technologies such as RFID chips could enable highly personalized control (and payment) systems. Apart from encouraging more bicycle use, it could also be used to increase bicycle speed, which both improves journey time for the cyclist, and reduces the congestion bicycles can cause in other traffic.
So, bicycles should have a rosy future. More cycle paths are needed and as electronic highway systems come into play, their environmental merits will increase still further.
Cheap air travel is a strong focal point for environmental hostility, because planes enable people to travel much further than they would with other forms of transport, and lead to far more CO2 generation. While environmental activists aim their campaigns at trying to force people to travel less, an indirect way of limiting the CO2 production, it is generally better to solve the actual problem, that of the environmental impact of the travel, rather than attack the travel itself. The universe has no energy shortage, it is the local means of accessing that energy that causes the problem and that is a technology, not a social problem. Future technology can even provide alternatives to planes if need be. And ultimately, there is no law of physics that says that travel has to use any energy. The whole planet travels 1.5 million miles every day without using any energy at all!
The airline industry is currently researching the potential for both battery powered and hydrogen powered planes. If the hydrogen is produced in an environmentally friendly way, then that would certainly be one solution. Reserving bio-fuels for transport where there is no alternative due to energy density might also be sensible – there are plenty of other options for ground travel.
Perhaps more interestingly, taking futurology back 100 years, we find ideas that may just have been ahead of their time. At the turn of the 20th century, futurologists were suggesting long tubes through which people could be propelled in vehicles by compressed air. Now of course there are various other potential propulsion means that could be used, with superconductivity and linear induction motors available to us already. De-pressurising the tubes could of course reduce air resistance. We do not yet posses the tunnelling technology to make such solutions viable on a widespread basis, but they may become viable for high speed city links in the not too far future. Again, once an object is moving, in the absence of friction, it will continue doing so with no power consumption. This could be a very low energy transport solution one day, or perhaps it will be still a curiosity in another 100 years.
Yet another novelty is the idea of using super-cavitation to allow supersonic submarines. It has apparently been demonstrated that high speed travel through water can be done with less resistance than through air. This effect has already been used for torpedo technology.
Many scientific studies have now provided estimates of CO2 production over coming years, and the likely effects that this will have on the climate. Although they try hard to account for future increases in energy use, many take insufficient account of the ability of future technology to reduce emissions or to remove or sequestrate CO2. It is important when making estimates of the adverse effects of using fossil fuels to take account of both increased uses and areas where use will decrease or be mitigated by clean-up technology. This depends heavily on when the CO2 will be produced. Clearly, CO2 produced in the next few years will have much worse impact than CO2 produced in 50 years time, by which time we will almost certainly have a wide range of technologies that can deal with it safely. A heavy discount should therefore be applied to estimates of risk when the CO2 is produced in the far future. Climate change cause by CO2 is a short and medium term problem because of limited technology, but it will simply not present a big problem in the long term.
Sadly, both dogma and poor thinking are commonplace in environmental debate and this one the biggest barriers to protecting the environment, especially when it is so often coupled with contempt for science and technology. By enforcing misguided policies, society is prevented from adopting solutions that could actually protect the environment. There are far better solutions to climate change than those currently being proposed by mainstream environmentalists, and this paper has listed only a few. With the right incentives and leadership, the science and engineering community could produce far better solutions. Technology can and should bale us out of the climate change problem.
There is a strong need for committees of well informed scientists who can make independent scientific analysis of the wide range of potential solutions on a full system wide full lifecycle basis. Science and technology can offer real solutions that will work without reducing quality of life. This is surely a far better prospect than attempting to solve the problem by constraining people’s lifestyles. We need to achieve sustainability by applying intelligence.
Dr Pearson graduated in 1981 in Applied Mathematics and Theoretical Physics from Queens University, Belfast. After four years in missile design, he joined BT as a performance analyst, and later worked in network design, computer evolution, cybernetics, and mobile systems. From 1991 until 2007, he was BT’s Futurologist, tracking and predicting new developments throughout information technology, considering both technological and social implications. He now does the same for Futurizon, a small futures institute.
He is a Chartered Fellow of the British Computer Society, the World Academy of Art and Science, the Royal Society of Arts, the Institute of Nanotechnology and the World Innovation Foundation. He also holds an Honorary Doctor of Science degree from the University of Westminster.
This is a reprint of a report I wrote in 2006 about reducing climate impact of CO2. I re-issued it in 2008 via Futurizon, but hadn’t changed any of the content. In fact, there is still little in it that is out of date. So, I reproduce it here as it was then.
Achieving CO2 reductions in the UK by using technology instead of muddled thinking
Author: I D Pearson BSc DSc(hc) CITP FBCS FWAAS FRSA FIN FWIF
After four decades of warnings by scientists, climate change is at last getting a lot of attention globally. It certainly is a problem that needs to be addressed before it is too late. However, panic is rarely an effective response and it is frustrating to see how much suggested remedial action is based on out-of-date technology or poor thinking. Firstly, one of the main problems is the lack of clear, system wide, full lifecycle thinking in the environment space. This report highlights some of the very significant policy errors that result. Secondly, with rapid technological development, it is better to look at the problem from scratch and see what can be done using the mechanisms and technologies available to us now and in the future instead of looking to yesterday for solutions. By considering this future technology potential, this report challenges much of the current thinking and highlights the potential of technology to solve climate change in the long term. Although some of the content of this report applies specifically to the UK, much of it applies globally. Consequently, provided that reasonably sensible policies are deployed in the short term to prevent runaway effects from taking hold, climate change will be reduced to a short and medium term problem, entirely soluble in the longer term. Realisation of this certainly justifies action but certainly not panic.
Most importantly, the report aims to show that an environmentally healthy future does not have to be based on going back to yesterday. The key to sustainability is not to prevent people from doing what they want to do, but to use intelligence to develop more environmentally friendly solutions. i.e. sustainability via intelligence.
Local authority, corporate and government environmental policies are often poorly thought through.
In particular, eco-towns, over-emphasis on public transport, use of biofuels, and carbon trading are of dubious merit.
Interactions between many social and cultural factors with the environment and environmental behaviour are highly complex and often ignored, leading to inaccuracies in climate predictions.
Being seen to be doing something is often more important to people and companies than helping the environment.
There is far too much use of decades-old environmental polices that are now out of date and counter-productive.
Use of agricultural land to grow biofuels is counter-productive. Carbon taxes may well also prove to be counterproductive.
Use of biodegradable plastics will prevent carbon sequestration via carbon reefs.
Encouraging home composting will increase methane levels.
Rubbish taxation will increase water demand and increase pollution through use of water to wash cans, and flushing of organic waste, also reducing the potential for biomass power, while increasing resource use even further by stimulating rapid expansion of the market for waste disposal units. Use of hot water and dishwashers compounds the problem still further. People should be asked not to wash out containers before collection.
Privately owned bus companies will on average generate more CO2 than publicly owned services, because the need to generate profits generates practices such as using indirect routes to fill the buses, that deter people from using them and increase journey length.
Taxis generate far more CO2 per passenger journey than private cars so should no longer be classified as public transport and their use should be discouraged.
Bicycles not using cycle lanes can cause many other vehicles to brake and accelerate, thereby increasing overall system wide CO2 production. Although beneficial when used sensibly, they should be discouraged from using busy roads at peak times.
The production and erosion of topsoil, which is a very significant climate change factor, is strongly affected by a range of other decisions being made elsewhere in the climate change battle, such as the use of biomass for power production. Greater coordination and much more system-wide, full lifecycle thinking is required.
Consumption of bottled water should be discouraged.
Rapid technology obsolescence is an essential tool in reducing environmental footprint.
Solutions for carbon sequestration, nuclear waste disposal, and restoration of the environment to health are all highly likely to be developed over the next several decades, ensuring that climate change is only a short and medium term problem, but not a long term one.
Solar farms in equatorial regions are likely, contributing enormously to energy supply, but affecting wealth distribution.
New transport solutions based on electronically driven cars and electronic highways could be developed quickly which could dramatically improve CO2 production, personal mobility and social inclusivity, while reducing congestion.
AI will be a very strong contributor to dealing with climate change. AI will dramatically accelerate scientific and technological progress across the board and expedite solutions.
Technology such as linear induction motors could be applied well to cycle lanes to provide extra power to cyclists on hills or to increase average speed and reduce travel times, with system wide carbon benefits through extra bicycle use and increased fitness and reduced adverse carbon effects on other transport.
It is recommended that a more thorough analysis of full system wide impacts and interactions is undertaken before environmental policies are established.
Climate change and other environmental policies should consider complex socio-economic impacts and their complex higher order interactions. There is a need for better public research on environmental issues so that proper scientifically based advice can be made available to government, business, individuals and society.
In particular, impacts on corporate efficiency, output and the support of staff for other environmental programmes should be considered better when deciding on corporate policies. Depending on how well these policies are prepared, a local saving of CO2 production could easily come at the expense of a much greater global, full system production.
It is important that companies use scientifically based recommendations as the basis of their policies rather than inputs from green groups that may have a disregard for science or politically motivated agendas. Caution is also needed to prevent environmental management roles being hijacked to indulge and leverage personal views.
Causes of water vapour at all levels of the atmosphere should be considered more, as should the impacts of soil management and other farming practices, which are deeply interwoven with other environmental policies. Introduction
Until a few years ago, there was still significant scientific scepticism about the reality of climate change. Today, it is generally accepted as fact and as a serious problem by the scientific community, with only one or two doubters.
The recent Stern Review suggests that we may only have a decade left to start taking serious action to avoid massive costs later. Having left it too late to commission properly funded research to gather all the appropriate facts, we are inevitably acting blind to some degree, and government is likely to recommend drastic solutions. We still don’t have all the information yet on how the environment works, and climate models often produce wildly differing predictions of the magnitude and nature of the problem. Complicating the problem even more, we also don’t have reliable models of global society and the global economy, nor their interactions with the environment. We need good models of how the environment works and how it interacts with human society before we can make the right decisions on how to act. We need more and better science. Acting without fully understanding system dynamics inevitably involves risk, but the level of risk can be reduced by increasing knowledge, and ensuring that solution design is unimpeded by dogma and poor thinking.
An interesting analogy to our current position is a blindfolded man standing on the edge of a cliff. Concerned passers by might yell at him to move because he is in serious danger and needs to take action, but unless he takes the time to remove the blindfold to do basic research on which direction to move, he is as likely to fall off as to move to safe ground. Unfortunately, although the current advice from environmental pressure groups is based on a very commendable desire to do something, it is not always scientifically informed, and consequently is in some cases as likely to be harmful as beneficial. Some greens actually see science as part of the problem, but without science, how can we know what to do? Science is the only reliable way we have of figuring out how things work and predicting the impact of an action.
Of course, the UK holds only 1% of the world’s population and the big global impacts are elsewhere, but each region must do what it can to reduce its own emissions, and if possible, to export better solutions. In any case, much of the content of this report would apply to other regions too.
Some conventional environmental thinking is little more than dogma, ideas and beliefs held almost religiously in spite of contrary scientific evidence or in spite of significant change in the situation . Environmentalism is also clearly one of a number of ideologies that comprise 21st century piety, other obvious ones being vegetarianism, obsession with health foods, organic produce and bottled water, anti-capitalism and new ageism. They appeal to many people’s natural desire to be seen as ‘good people’, and since mainstream religion, the historic foundation of holiness, is now unfashionable, these often act as easy secular substitutes. When this happens, the perfectly rational desire to protect the environment can be subjugated by other political and ideological goals and behaviours that also contribute to that person’s piety. Sadly, the personal feeling of being ‘good’ and to be seen as being good, is often stronger than the need to be well informed, and environmentalists can often become sanctimonious and damage the environment by applying poorly thought through practices and trying to force others to do so.
Since there has been so much change in the techno-social situation since environmentalism began, it is time to reassess common environmental beliefs against good science, so that dogma doesn’t get in the way of doing the right things, or we may be making the problem worse.
Apart from adherence to out-of-date dogma, and corruption of thinking by 21st century piety, other causes of poor thinking that frequently affect the climate change debate include:
lots of things that were true 30 years ago are no longer true today because the situation is different;
common sense is often wrong;
people are notoriously extremely bad at weighing up risks and rewards;
most people have little intuitive understanding of exponential or other non-linear change, even many scientists;
some things that look good at first, look bad once second and third order effects are taken into consideration.
Together, these problems have resulted in a set of environmental policies that might have been good ideas once upon a time, but which do not bear up to proper scientific analysis now. For example, anti-nuclear lobbying was extremely successful at restricting the use of nuclear power, when there was clearly no economically feasible substitute other than to use fossil fuels. The consequently greater production of CO2 emissions has contributed significantly to the climate change problem. Although some green groups still strongly oppose any return to nuclear power, many other environmentalists now see nuclear power as the lesser of two evils, and some governments are seriously considering returning to nuclear power, while also investing heavily in development of renewable energy production. This latter approach seems entirely sensible given the current situation.
One thing that is certainly not wrong is the passion that many people share to protect and nurture the environment. Whatever minor criticisms of green groups may be made, they still have a very important part to play, having won the hearts and minds of many environmental supporters. One of the strongest weapons they hold is that they are not geographically constrained, so are not under control of any particular government or culture, so are in a strong position to continue to lead environmentalists. They should be encouraged to carry on campaigning for environmental protection and for remedial action. But making sure that their decisions and campaigns are properly informed and scientifically valid is essential if the environment is to benefit. The wider scientific community needs to be much more actively involved in informed decision making to make sure we do the right things.
In short, if we want to defend and repair the environment, rather than just to feel good about ‘doing something’, we need more scientifically informed environmentalism.
Ecotowns are obviously intended to provide environmentally friendly accommodation. While this in itself might be a good idea, unfortunately, the plans often focus on old-fashioned environmental solutions and therefore are in danger of locking in out-of date technologies. Since technology progress is already rapid and accelerating, preventing the adoption of new environmentally friendly solutions by locking in old and even obsolete ones does not seem wise.
For example, current environmental dogma says that cars are bad a public transport is good. As this report argues, actually quite the reverse is true in the long term, and to use 1990s solutions such as guided bus-ways is severely misguided. It would be far better to implement pilot schemes such as electronic routes and electronic vehicles. If a whole town is being built, given that most journeys are local, there is a perfect opportunity for genuine eco-towns to trial such new technologies, that are far more environmentally friendly than any bus-based system, while allowing un- restricted travel, and allowing full social inclusivity for an ageing population.
Similarly, rolling out 1990s energy solutions such as CHP plants will increase infrastructure costs and prevent the adoption of newer solutions arising in the next couple of decades. Arguments for extra infrastructure investment that pay net environmental dividends only over the long term should be abandoned. The fact is that the net value of benefits in the longer term is much lower than in the first years, due to the inevitable availability of much better alternatives in the longer term. A heavily discounted weighting of far-future benefits should be applied, and when this is done, many supposedly beneficial solutions look very much worse. It will often be far better to use an inefficient interim solution and wait for better solutions to arrive than to implement and inefficient and long-lived solution now. This stands in stark contrast with the all-too-common philosophy that we have to act now and can’t afford to wait for new technology to arrive. If the purpose is to benefit the environment, then a full lifetime, full system cost-benefit analysis needs to be done, and this often will mean waiting a while before doing anything. It is simply nonsense to assume that acting soonest will always reap the best benefits overall.
The underlying principle of trading CO2 allowances is that the use of market forces will cause reduction in CO2 production. It fails because it relies on the good will and cooperation of many diverse people, and on their willingness to put the environment ahead of their own desire for wealth and also because it is very difficult to verify that carbon is actually being offset by people selling allowances. Like any system that depends on people acting for the common good, it is vulnerable to those who do not share the same ideals. It is already clear that the system has been poorly conceived, too vulnerable to abuse, fraud and incompetence. Some offset schemes are badly managed and trees die. People buying offsets often don’t check whether the trees they are supposedly having planted would have been planted anyway as part of already existing commercial forestry business, or whether they have already been sold many times, or whether they are left to die and then replaced by new ones sold afresh on the same site. Large scale alleged abuses recently in the media include Indonesia draining its bogs, releasing huge CO2 additions, and then offering to stop if paid. This is feasible because the treaty on CO2 limitation did not cover Indonesia (or many other countries). Such practices border on blackmail. Deliberately increasing emissions of CO2 to create a market for reduction certainly are not intended consequences of developing a carbon trading market, any more than simply re-labelling existing activities so as to become eligible for payment. But it is obvious that where large amounts of money are made available, with little protection against abuse, people will be highly creative in taking full advantage. Carbon trading seems to be more of a system for dubious wealth redistribution than an effective way of limiting CO2 production.
Corporations have a great deal of influence on global CO2 production, and it is important that their environmental policy managers are not only properly informed, but also properly motivated. However, it seems reasonable to assume that many of those give responsibility for environmental policies are those that have shown interest in them and many of these will have some affiliation with green groups. Given the poor respect given to science and technology by green groups, putting people in charge who have a green bias, and are likely to leverage corporate policy to indulge their own views, seems inevitably to generate an overall corporate bias towards greens instead of legitimate science based policy.
This inbuilt corporate bias will make it more difficult to achieve environmental benefits by creating a barrier to scientifically based policies.
On the other hand, environmentalism often fits in corporation in close proximity with corporate social responsibility, branding and marketing. These are inextricably linked of course, given the strong media attention to environmental concerns and corporate behaviour. Many blue chip companies have already discovered how to use environmental policy to generate favourable brand impact. Companies of course want to demonstrate their support for environmental initiatives. Sadly, it is much better from a short term brand viewpoint, to do things that demonstrate conformance to current popular environmental wisdom, as featured in popular media and green figures, which as this report argues strongly, is often badly misinformed.
By amplifying the impacts of personal green bias and fashion at the expense of good science, corporate environmentalism can do far more harm than good. It is often much more interested in doing something than in doing the right thing. It takes a brave environmental policy director and indeed a brave brand director to risk angering greens by doing the right thing instead of following misguided dogma. All too many fall foul and simply roll out obsolete or misguided directives.
The other area of concern in corporations is that they have a tendency knowingly to misrepresent activity so that it looks much more environmentally responsible than it is. Corporate spin is nothing new of course, but the enormous media and brand value of ‘being seen to be green’ has generated a high degree of corporate greenwash, putting a green spin on something that sometimes is anything but green. Fortunately, the media provides a very useful deterrent, happy to unveil corporate green hypocrisy when they find it.
Technology change is accelerating and many environmentalists have expressed strong concern that high tech gadgets such as phones, computers and MP3 players become obsolete very quickly and end up on landfill while they still have years of useful potential life left. Some companies that consider themselves environmentally responsible have initiated programmes to tackle obsolescence.
But to do so can be a significant error. This is especially true of mobile phones, which are typically used as a prime example of the problem. In fact, if it were not for the enormous progress in phone technology, paid for by the rapid obsolescence cycle, phones would be very much heavier, more expensive, use more materials, generate far more radiation, and almost certainly still use batteries based on highly toxic heavy metals. A phone today makes very little environmental loading, while adding much more significantly to quality of life, compared to its ancestors. Future generations of phones will progress quickly towards digital jewellery, which will do far more than today’s IT with minimal materials.
A person wearing a few grammes of digital jewellery in 2020 will have far more IT capability than someone today with a laptop, phone, PDA, MP3 player, digital camera, GPS navigation system, security alarm, identity card, electronic cash cards, credit cards, voice recorder, video camera, memory sticks, radio, portable TV, a book, magazine, games console and many other gadgets that haven’t even been invented yet. Furthermore, by 2020, billions more people will be able to afford these sorts of things. Without the rapid obsolescence cycle, the enormous environmental benefit of being able to achieve all this with very little material and energy, compared to making a huge loading on material resources and energy will not be achieved.
Obsolescence is therefore one of the environment’s best friends, allowing people to do what they want while damaging the environment much less than even today. Holding back obsolescence or regulating gadget lifetime for some short term perceived resource benefit would be disastrous for the environment. Rather, the faster we can progress to tools that minimise resource wastage, the better it will be. This is particularly true because many people who want IT can’t afford it yet but soon will be able to. It is essential that progress enables them to come on stream using technology that reduces the impact rather than to use antiques with relatively huge environmental footprints.
Through their inclusion in the 21st Century piety toolbox, these are all linked to environmental behaviour and thinking. Their impact on the environment can be both good and bad, but the impacts are many and diverse and their complex relationships with other factors make it impossible to guess net impacts without an extensive analysis. For example, vegetarianism reduces the area of land required to grow enough provide food for people. Growing crops costs less energy, space and water than raising animals. Raising meat animals also contributes significantly to methane production, methane of course being an even worse greenhouse gas than CO2. The health effects of a vegetable diet will affect the tax recovered over a lifetime, lifetime health care and pension costs. Many other lesser effects could also be considered such as impacts on soil level, biomass availability, transport costs and so on. It is evident that even in this one example, the net environmental impact is hard to estimate.
By contrast, organic farming generally produces less food per hectare of land, which decreases global food production capacity, which increases prices and makes it harder for poor people to survive, which affects family size in poor countries, which creates a greater population, greater need for aid and so on. It is also chemically different from conventional farming and also affects lifestyle in more subtle ways – organic food is often delivered by a different distribution system.
The desire to wear natural fibres instead of synthetic substitutes increases demand for cotton. Cotton is becoming a hot environmental topic in itself, producing pollution and water stress among many other socioeconomic problems. Again, the transport, CO2, energy demand and social impact is very different across the whole system and whole lifecycle from synthetic clothing.
Finally, bottled water has become very fashionable among people who have adopted the ‘healthy lifestyle’. But at least in this case, awareness is rapidly increasing that it is very bad to the environment compared to using tap water. Each one litre plastic bottle generates 100g of CO2 during its production while using 7 litres of water! 27M tones of plastic are needed globally each year for bottles water. Even if the whole system is complex, it is very clear that the consumption of bottles water is environmentally harmful and should be discouraged. One of the strongest objections to use of tap water is that chemicals are added to it, and it tastes bad. The reasons for doing so should be re-evaluated and balanced against the need for people to have access to water that they are prepared to drink, without damaging the environment more than necessary.
With such enormous complexity – and the interactions noted above are just a tiny proportion of the whole – it is little wonder that most mathematical models of the environment ignore most of these deeply interwoven social, political and cultural effects. The inevitable result is of course less accurate predictions.
Like many areas, East Anglia suffers from a major coastal erosion problem. Environmental policy has recently altered from prevention to acceptance, but in some areas, coastal defence is commercially necessary. One conventional approach is to make huge concrete blocks (making and transporting concrete produces large amounts of CO2) and dump them in the sea to absorb the wave power. This solution is carbon intensive. Meanwhile landfill sites are filling up fast. And meanwhile, scientists are trying to figure out how to sequestrate carbon into carbon sinks. These problems are connected and can be partially addressed simultaneously. Householders are already encouraged to separate plastic waste for recycling, and when it reaches the recycling centres, it is usually compressed into blocks for easier handling, which is often done in China. If these blocks were to be dumped in the sea, just off the Norfolk coast, (and suitably contained of course) transport and processing would produce far less CO2, carbon would be locked up, coastal erosion would be reduced, land would be reclaimed, landfill would fill up more slowly, and CO2 production greatly reduced. The plastic would effectively become a plastic reef and later, reclaimed land. This approach would be carbon negative, while recycling is at best carbon neutral. One of the obstacles to this solution is the move towards biodegradable plastic, which of course returns carbon to the atmosphere, and ironically, was developed to help the environment. The much levied criticism of conventional plastics, that they will stay around for thousands of years, actually makes them ideal for a carbon sink. Bio-degradable plastic, and current laws that prevent plastics from being dumped in the sea could turn out to be environmentally damaging, by preventing such solutions.
Another obstacle is that household waste is poorly sorted, so improved sorting processes would be needed if sea pollution is to be avoided. But like many other current problems, upcoming technology will make it much easier to solve.
Other waste could be handled differently. For example, glass is borderline recyclable, yielding an environmental benefit when recycling it rather than producing it from scratch, but since the full-life benefit is actually quite small, perhaps it could also be included with the plastic, giving extra density to the waste.
Organic waste is often composted, returning much of the carbon to the air in the process, especially with home composting, which authorities are currently trying hard to encourage. Home composting can produce significant quantities of methane, a bad greenhouse gas unless. Organic waste can be converted into biomass fuel for power stations instead, displacing the need for fossil fuels and while this sounds sensible at first, it needs to be rigorously compared with the alternative full-system impact of using to increase soil production on farmland, apparently often overlooked in climate analyses. Alternatively, by heating it with a reduced oxygen supply, it could be carbonised, and the carbon dumped into the sea, absorbing pollutants as an active carbon sink. However, doing this would require better quality of rubbish sorting; otherwise pollutants such as dioxins may be produced inadvertently. In any case, there are several alternatives that need to be analysed properly.
Metal waste left over could be recycled conventionally, but there is a need for better education and better regulation. Many people wash out cans before dumping them, and indeed some local authorities ask them to do so, an example of poor thinking applied by authorities who are more concerned to be seen to be doing something than to actually alleviate the problem. Washing cans before throwing them in the trash contributes to the amount of sewage processing needed, accelerates the decomposition and hence production of CO2, while bypassing the potential to recover the chemical energy in the waste at a biomass power station. This effect needs to be offset against the benefits of can recycling. It seems to make little sense to encourage households to use increasingly limited fresh water supplies to wash out cans, when this could be done centrally with less water, and the resulting slurry used as a fuel source for bacterial power stations. In the home, it might account for 2% of water use. Worse still, many householders use heated water to wash the cans, or even their dishwashers, so there is also a significant energy cost at the household for this recycling, as well as increased detergent release.
In fact, this situation will get far worse if rubbish taxation is implemented as currently being suggested. A lot of the weight and volume of rubbish arises from organic kitchen waste. Under taxation, many households might choose to be waste disposal units, and flush the organic waste down the sink. Again, apart from removing the potential to use this for biomass power generation, it would add substantially both to water use and sewage treatment.
Paper recycling is also of dubious merit. Some studies have suggested recycling paper is on balance damaging to the environment, and at best it is only slightly beneficial. Again, paper could be used as fuel, or charred and dumped as a carbon sink.
When all these factors are taken into account, the current pressure towards recycling everything seems to be over-zealous, even sometimes misguided. Recycling is due for a thorough and updated life cycle costing of the environmental benefits, system wide, with proper consideration of alternatives.
Carbon sequestration technologies are being researched intensely now, although there are unfortunately already signs that the first wave is stalling due to financial blockages. There are a variety of possibilities, such as pumping in into underground aquifers, dissolving it in deep seawater, planting forests or seeding ocean algae farms with iron. More recently, synthetic biology has started promising good potential for harnessing biologically inspired techniques, using synthesized proteins, or even eventually synthetic life forms. Genetic engineering of new types of organisms that can lock up carbon quickly is also being researched. Synthetic organisms that are primarily designed to remove CO2 from the atmosphere could appear to be very useful indeed.
However, such developments should not be introduced without due consideration of dangers. If the basic processes of life can be mastered by engineers, the threat of self replication and its potential use in weapon systems springs to mind immediately. While it would obviously be useful if we could control the removal by synthetic organisms of just the right amount of CO2, of course this would need to be done in a fail safe way that could not remove all of it, which would cause mass extinction.
Perhaps a half-way solution would be a good compromise of safety and effectiveness. With the current rapid increase in greenhouse farming around Europe, supplying CO2-enriched air would be useful to both grow the crops faster and sequester the carbon. Genetic modification of plants to make them grow faster would also help, both in substitution of fossil fuels via bio-fuels and biomass power generation. If trees being planted to absorb carbon are genetically growth-accelerated, this could make a significant contribution to longer term sequestration. The same applies to sea-based algae farms.
Technologies such as synthetic biology could lead mankind further down a very dangerous development path, but of course we are already a little way along it today. And being more optimistic, although synthetic biology is potentially dangerous if care is not taken, the field could also yield potential tools to rescue life on earth if the worst nightmares of climate change take effect, by eventually enabling wholesale redesigning of the ecosystem from the ground up.
Nuclear power was until recently anathema to most environmentalists, but many have reconsidered their stance in the light of global warming, and the issue has now split them down the middle, with some environmentalists on either side. There are obvious risks associated with nuclear power, as with other forms of energy production. But since these risks were not properly compared those associated with alternative power sources, nuclear power proliferation was greatly constrained and eventually cut back as a direct result of environmentalist pressure. The clear absence of readily available and economically viable renewable solutions, or political will to develop them, meant that they were replaced by fossil fuel based power production. The antinuclear lobby has therefore contributed in part to the wider climate change problem. It is sad that well-meaning but misguided environmentalists have become one of the big problems facing the environment.
Indeed, some environmentalists remain anti-nuclear in spite of the carbon emission benefits. One of the main sticking points if disposal of nuclear waste. The argument is raised repeatedly, and sounds compelling at first, that our descendants will have to cope with the nuclear waste for ten thousand years or more. But that argument depends entirely on the assumption that technologists will never be able to develop a means of disposal, whereas it is highly likely that the disposal problem will be solved this century, so at worst, we will have to store the waste for decades, not millennia. Nuclear waste includes plutonium, which can of course be used in nuclear reactors itself, but can also be used for nuclear weapons. That the weaponry use of nuclear energy bi-products is a threat is unquestionable, and is one of the better arguments against nuclear power. So, there is of course a need for secure storage for such waste, it cannot be simply dumped. However, Uranium comes from uranium mines, is then processed, used, and as radiation levels decline, it becomes useless for power generation and needs to be disposed of. But, for example, if the depleted uranium and other low grade waste were to be returned to source and essentially mixed up with landfill in the mine that it came from, the mine would be slightly less radioactive than originally, so there should be no problem. The energy would have been harvested, and the uranium mine would be a slightly less radioactive landfill. Of course, the waste is not in its original form so would still need some processing, but the dilution principle is sound. Perhaps the real problem is that current approaches to disposal involve waste concentration rather than dilution. When the waste is concentrated, it takes up less space of course, and it also becomes more dangerous, and a more attractive target for terrorists.
Another approach for waste disposal is to send it into space, for example, to fire it into the Sun, which is of course a nuclear reactor itself. Although today that would be a dangerous and expensive approach because of the costs and unreliability of rocket technology, at least one space elevator will be most likely built within the next few decades. A space elevator is a huge cable extending into space, allowing delivery of people and materials all the way into earth orbit. It is no longer science fiction. Many engineers are already doing R&D on materials and techniques, with large financial incentives for each milestone along the way. Over time (almost certainly this century), with perhaps several such elevators, and what eventually will become well established technology, this is likely to become a safe way of getting stuff into space. Plutonium and other high level waste could safely be disposed of, for ever. There is therefore no real problem with long term storage. Nuclear waste will have to be kept safe and secure for quite some time, but not the thousands of years often cited by anti-nuclear groups. We will certainly have reliable means of safe disposal within 100 years. It will not be a problem left for many generations. That makes one of the prime arguments against nuclear power generation very much weaker.
Actually, although we will certainly need nuclear power if we are to provide sufficient energy for the next few decades without creating too much CO2 renewable energy technology is also progressing quickly and will be able to provide much of our needs within those few decades. Solar power is making good progress towards high efficiency and low cost cells. For example, developments at the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory suggested three-band cells with efficiencies up to 45%. Energy companies are looking forward to making grid parity possible in the next decade, at least in sunny regions such as California. Provided costs can be constrained, solar power could provide significantly towards our everyday domestic needs, even in the UK, especially if other energy sources increase in price.
However, on a much larger scale, if solar cells could be manufactured with anything like this efficiency level at reasonably low cost, we might see the emergence of massive solar energy farms in North Africa. These farms could cover large areas of otherwise low value land, producing large quantities of hydrogen. Also, since superconducting cable development is coming along quickly, we may even see direct electricity distribution to Europe from Africa. Scale would be limited mainly only by cost and demand. If it reaches very large scale, there would be significant knock-on economic effects, with hydrogen substituting for oil as it starts to get expensive, and ensuring that much of the oil is left forever in the ground, destroying the last decades of that market. Moving such a major source of income from the Middle East to North Africa would obviously have significant political effects too. In each of the world’s regions, it is possible that energy could be produced in the South and transmitted to the richer North.
As we head (possibly) towards a hydrogen economy, nuclear fission and solar power are likely to be the main contributors, displacing fossil fuel burning. Fusion may well come on stream in the 40s or 50s as a major global contributor too. Wind and wave power will contribute on a small scale too, as will geothermal energy and biomass use. With the hydrogen economy, in principle, anyone that can make any form of energy can convert it to hydrogen and then ship or pipe it around the world to anywhere it is needed. In parallel, domestic use of solar power is likely to have a significant impact on energy demand in some countries. And all the while, energy efficiency progress will reduce waste significantly.
As the hydrogen age matures, we are also very likely to have a space elevator. This will greatly reduce the cost and risk of getting things into orbit. It would greatly facilitate the transport of materials and staff to fabricate space based solar power arrays, or even nuclear facilities, as well as providing waste disposal capability for land based nuclear facilities
With all these various forms of power production likely to be used in the future, oil will be long obsolete, and we will have a glut of power, not a shortage. The price is likely to fall significantly below today’s levels in real terms.
Considering the many potential energy technologies, a long term energy glut is probable, but it will take a few decades or two from now to really take effect. We will therefore inevitably go through a period of energy shortage and high prices before the price starts a long slide as we enter a long term glut.
In the same time-frame, it is likely that carbon sequestration technology will be highly effective, removing the problem of global warming and restoring the atmosphere and our climate to a healthy state.
These same time frames are those over which many people are panicking today. Global warming seems already to be having significant adverse effects, but it is the long term future that concerns scientists so much, and it is the perceived long term threat that is forcing many of the measures being designed and implemented today.
It will be a great shame if these reactive panic measures prevent us from capitalizing on this technology windfall by locking us in to inappropriate but long lived solutions, achieving short term success at the expense of long term quality of life.
Among the measures that are already demonstrably ill-conceived is the push towards biofuels. It was always obvious that using prime agricultural land to grow fuel would increase food prices, harm the poor, and make little dent in the need for fossil fuels. However, energy produced by waste matter left over after food is produced, or indeed waste food and domestic organic waste, is more sound. This is to be compared with the use of such biomatter to increase soil thickness, which in itself is a potentially major contributor to solving CO2 sequestration.
The carbon credit scheme is likely to also prove unwise. It has already become more of a source of greenwash than a source of carbon reduction. It is mainly effective as a means of redistributing wealth by adding costs to business and the consumer without ensuring equivalent gains in the environment. The fact is that many companies are happy to pay carbon offset costs without adequately vetting the means of offsetting them. Many forests that would have been planted anyway can now be paid for twice (or even several times if the marketing is sufficiently unprincipled) by receiving carbon offset subsidies as well as their original commercial value.
Artificial intelligence today is really just clever software, attempting to substitute machine-based algorithms and databases and sensor technology for human intelligence. It can be very effective. For example some expert systems can perform medical diagnoses as well as a human doctor. However, another quite distinct branch of AI aims to develop machines that are intelligent in the same ways as people, conscious, self aware, with their own mental model of the world, their own experiential understanding of the world. There is huge disagreement among practitioners about when we are likely to see the first conscious machines with human levels of intelligence. This could be as early as between 2015 and 2020, with other scientists suggesting 2030, 2040 and some refusing to accept that it will ever be possible.
If we could produce intelligence synthetically, and therefore provide extra thinking capability to solve problems, this could have a profound effect on technology development rate, in every field. Since it is likely that this will be achieved in the next few decades, it is a very important consideration for the climate change problem, with its enormous potential to invent solutions, increase understanding of the environment, and accelerate research development, but it is rarely mentioned in climate change debates. Clearly, smart machines might be used to design smarter machines, which will design smarter ones still, leading exponentially quickly to vastly superhuman intelligence that may well solve many of the problems for us, with new energy technology, and new environmental clean-up and management technology.
We should not rely on AI to bale us out, but we may reasonably expect that it will, even if some of the man-made solutions fail. It gives us hope, but not enough certainty to avoid us using other approaches in parallel.
After recycling, the assumption that public transport is always a good thing for the environment is probably the most deeply embedded belief in environmental thinking, and indeed now pervades the mindset of almost all of society, certainly government. Yet it is wrong! Other ways of organising transport could often be more environmentally sustainable, while improving quality of life instead of limiting it. The common assertion that people should have their travel desires curtailed is unnecessary once new thinking is applied to the problem. In fact, the most environmentally friendly solution to transport in most instances is to use a mixture of cars and bicycles, and these can have a variety of ownership. Trains will still have a rightful place, but it is mainly in underground systems rather than on regional railways. Personal transport, properly implemented, can be more environmentally friendly and provide better quality of life, enabling people to travel as they please, without unduly damaging the environment. The current pressure to prevent people from driving cars by means of congestion charging and road tolling should only be a short term response to the problems caused by the low-technology mechanisms of today. It should not be the basis of long term transport policy. People demonstrably want to travel, and they can do so freely without damaging the environment. All that is needed is ongoing development of already-researched transport systems. We should not lock tomorrow’s society into yesterday’s solutions.
There are some obvious environmental problems with existing public transport that should be addressed. In particular, taxis are usually classed as public transport. A taxi often has to make a two-way journey to take a passenger one way, since it has to get to the passenger, take them to the destination, and often has to return empty once the passenger is dropped off. Of course, sometimes a new passenger is picked up shortly after dropping off the last one, so the ratio of journeys is not as high as two, but the ratio is increased also by taxis driving around empty looking for customers. Taxis are therefore much more damaging to the environment than private cars. Removing their public transport classification would help.
Buses are sometimes packed but also are often nearly empty. They have a very large effect on other transport, slowing it down and causing traffic jams, and the consequential increase in emissions from other vehicles at least partially offsets the savings they make. Their main advantage is that for much of the time at least, the costs of fuel and road space is shared between a higher number of passengers than private transport, and this advantage is worth preserving. The fact that they are public rather than private is immaterial as far as environmental impact is concerned, however much relevance that might have to socio-economic policy. That is not true of their ownership however. Being largely privately owned, bus companies have tended to increase their profits by taking buses on long routes so that they can visit the most potential customers. This means that more CO2 is produced per passenger journey than if the buses were to go direct, and it deters many potential customers from using them. Buses also have a long lifetime, ensuring that newer, cleaner and more efficient engine technology takes much longer to enter the market.
Trains also seem to be an antiquated transport solution long overdue for a re-think. Today, on a typical piece of regional railway track, a train goes past every 20 minutes. A 200m long train, travels at 40m/s (90mph) takes 5 seconds to go past. So a track may be used 5 seconds out of every 20 minutes, an occupancy of 0.4%. The infrastructure has to be there all the time. Surely we can do better than that! Rail is a greatly underused resource that could improve the environment and reduce congestion on the roads if it were used more effectively. However, trains certainly have a major role in systems such as the London underground, where rail occupancy rates are much higher and trains are often very full indeed, where the only possible capacity improvement seems to be to increase the frequency or speed of trains. The same is true of buses, but only at certain times, on certain routes. So although trains and buses will certainly have an important part to play in future mass transport, they are not necessarily always the most effective solution.
So instead of just accepting the public transport dogma and locking in antiquated public transport architectures, let’s first look at whether future technology can offer better alternatives.
In the future we will have better identification and tracking technology if surveillance systems continue to develop as they are. We will generally know who people are and where they are. In particular, we should know where known criminals are, or at least where non-criminals are, which is almost as useful for this purpose. That in itself immediately offers the potential for more sharing of private transport. It is dangerous to pick up total strangers today, but if the car can tell us that a person going to the same place is safe, (perhaps because they are a well known member of the same transport club) then there is less of a barrier to transport sharing. In that world, every car is a potential taxi. Future cars are likely to have the equivalent of a black box for a range of reasons, and one of the things it could routinely record is who the passengers were. As well as increasing safety still further, this could be used for a distributed cost sharing system. The boundaries between public and private transport start to erode. But it can go much further.
It is also likely that speed limits will be electronically enforced at some point, linking the engine management system to speed limits. That will essentially mark the beginning of a long path during which the computer takes over from the driver. Cars in the far future will be able to drive themselves. Simple analysis suggests that if the identities of both the cars and the occupants are known, and if personal driving style is eliminated by electronic overrides, there is far less incentive to personally own a car, and at the same time it will become much easier to implement and manage large fleets of shared cars. Especially since the exact locations of all the cars is known, as well as the destinations and likely arrival times of cars in transit. There are already several instances of car rental systems that allow people to just pick up and drop cars as they wish. This will become much more attractive an option with future technology.
So we may well see large fleets of shared cars, owned by companies, government or social groups. These will more often have multiple occupancy because of the security advantages above. And because they are driven by computer, with all the cars in a ‘road train’, electronically linked for acceleration and braking, they could drive much closer together, increasing road occupancy, greatly reducing drag and therefore making road travel more energy efficient. Indeed, they could be just centimetres away from each other, making travel much safer – it is not possible to get much of a speed differential before a collision if cars are very close, so even if electronic braking interlinking fails, the system would fail gracefully without danger. And with electronic control of the travel, the road transport system would become rather like the packet transport systems used today on the telecoms network (which are far more efficient than the old systems that required a call to hog a whole circuit, like trains do today in effect. This would mean firstly that slots can be electronically booked to ensure smooth travel, secondly, that destination time would be known at the outset., and thirdly that speeds could be made much more constant, again making the system much more energy efficient.
A further capacity advantage arises from the computer driver. Lanes are the width they are today mainly for safety reasons. With computers driving the cars, they could be much closer together sideways too, squeezing more lanes onto the same road area. It also makes it more feasible to run roads with lane direction determined by time of day, with some lanes carrying cars one way in the morning rush, and the other way in the afternoon. So we will see far more use of this technique.
Such an electronically controlled system would probably have a mixture of public and private ownership, but have all the flexibility of private transport. It would be very energy efficient, so confer an environment advantage over existing public transport. Meanwhile, public road transport would converge with private transport to achieve the same environmental quality.
In fact, without use of these electronic systems, unacceptable congestion is inevitable, with limited road capacity and increasing demand. Also, without use of electronic drivers, people will find it harder and harder to join traffic streams, especially if speed limits are electronically enforced, because traffic will not bunch the way it does today, so there will be very few gaps large enough for a human to safely join the flow. By contrast, electronics can easily slow some cars down a little and speed up others to create a gap while a new car joins the flow.
The system outlined would be capable of greatly increasing road use efficiency while reducing energy wastage. But the ideas can also be applied to rail. There is really no reason why road train technology could not be implemented on the railways too. As mentioned, rail occupancy is often as low as 0.4% on regional railways. Performance analysis shows that packet switched networks can be safely loaded to 80% occupancy before statistics cause significant performance degradation. So there is clearly a huge opportunity for improving the capacity of railways, perhaps 100-fold, if packet switching based solutions were to be implemented instead of the current system, which allocates a very long stretch of track exclusively to each train because of the safety limits required by the obsolete signalling and control technologies that current railways use. The current system might have been well suited up to the late 20th century, but it has been possible for many years already to design and build vastly superior systems. With the need to increase capacity and save CO2 emissions, the railways offer enormous potential to help, provided that they are used more intelligently.
Suppose that electronically driven cars and buses could be taken onto the railways, and interleaved with vans and small rail carriages that spend all their time on railways. For example, cars could be made with dual wheels, as some buses are today. Once on rail, no steering is needed and with the vehicles talking electronically to each other to coordinate braking and acceleration, the driver could do other things while the car drives itself to the destination station, whereupon it would leave the track and use its other wheels to get to its final destination. The cars could be driven very closely, and of course the drag and friction costs would be very low. Furthermore, since most of the journey could be on rail with electric energy easily provided, the car could use an electric motor. Instead of using petrol or diesel, or even fuel cells, it could make very long journeys just on batteries, since the batteries could be recharged during the rail journey. Since railways are simple one-dimensional systems, this would be far less demanding in terms of control systems than the equivalent on the roads. So whereas electronic highways will take some more years to become feasible, rail based systems could be implemented much more quickly, given the will.
This approach could eventually be applied to both rail and road, with electronic control systems automatically managing both systems. As a crude estimate, the resultant capacity of the roads would increase probably three-fold, and the capacity of the railways perhaps as much as 100-fold. Congestion and travel delays could be greatly reduced (though sadly not eliminated, due to other architectural limitations), safety greatly improved, and environmental impact greatly reduced since the whole system could be driven on electricity.
If the electricity required is produced from renewables, the whole transport system could be carbon-neutral. So it is very clear that with adequate redesign of the transport system, there is no climate-change-based need to constrain personal travel at all, and there would be a great deal of spare capacity. Furthermore, there would be strong spin-off social benefits, since public fleets of electronically driven cars could serve the whole population, including those unwilling or not permitted to drive themselves for whatever reason. This technology enabled system would therefore deliver benefits on social equitability, environmental sustainability and quality of life support.
There is a clear cost in implementing such a system. The railways particularly are occupied by conventional trains. New rail-cars could link into virtual trains of course to allow inter-working during the migration phase, but the signalling systems used by the old-fashioned trains are a real barrier. It would cost a great deal to update old trains and their signalling systems to achieve these benefits, but of course the new system wouldn’t need them, and the old trains have little advantage over a car based system, so perhaps the cheapest and most effective approach would be to get rid of the trains of the railways. The cost savings made by avoiding centralised signalling systems and train upgrades would go some way to offsetting the cost of the station changes to allow cars to join and leave the traffic.
One clear advantage of this system is that most cars are likely to be paid for either by individuals or fleet management companies. There would really be no need for public subsidy, a welcome change to today’s highly subsidised railways in itself. The vastly increased traffic on the railways provides an obviously adequate source of funding for the railways themselves, just as roads are paid for many times over by road fund license fees and fuel duty. Furthermore, the near elimination of traffic jams would also contribute tens of billions in economic growth, making more tax potentially available for other environmental programmes.
In fact, if this system works well, light rail could even be laid eventually on the roads too, with perhaps a heavy duty freight track and some light private transport tracks. Alternatively, it might be feasible to run the whole system without tracks at all, given the ease of implementing electronic tracks for vehicles to navigate along. This would certainly provide a more rapid deployment mechanism and would use far less resources, and would save having to equip cars with dual wheels. And further away still, we will find that trains have little place in a high-tech transport system and could be scrapped, rail disappearing into history.
This system could use a mixture of different ownerships, public, corporate, private, clubs, and rental. Any of these could work well together. To make it work technically, standards will obviously be needed for car inter-working, distributed signalling systems, identification and payment technology and so on, but these are the kinds of technical problems that are solved every day in industry. Obviously, multiple occupancy might vary between the different approaches, but if capacity and energy efficiency are less of a problem, then occupancy also becomes less of an issue.
The same is true of the arrangements for acquiring and releasing vehicles. There are numerous ways that location, tracking and management technologies could be implemented. There is no technology barrier here.
The system described above would work very well in most areas, but in some big cities, it is likely that there will still be a place for underground systems or other mass transit systems. Of course, electronically driven tube trains could still improve performance comfort and safety a little and save costs. But systems such as the London Underground carry large numbers of passengers fairly efficiently and at low environmental cost, albeit very uncomfortably at times. The potential improvements in capacity would be much less than the 100-fold increase possible on regional railways, perhaps just a factor of 3 or 4 might be possible, even with a continuous stream of electronically driven cars. So here trains might still have a useful purpose. Overcrowding really just needs many more trains and whatever extra tunnel space is required to accommodate them. Replacement of drivers by electronics would be more to save costs than to improve capacity.
Bicycles occupy the peak of the moral high ground as far as environmentalism is concerned because once they are built and delivered, their ongoing emissions are low, just the CO2 from the human riding them. While they are certainly good for the environment overall, the picture isn’t quite as clear as is sometimes portrayed and there are some places where the use of bicycles may not be environmentally sensible.
On proper cycle paths, they are certainly a good solution from both a fitness and environmental point of view (hopefully even once the environmental costs of making the cycle paths and the bicycles are factored in). But mixed with cars, they can be very dangerous, with bicycle riders suffering many times more casualties per mile than car drivers. They also force other vehicles to slow down to pass them, and then to accelerate again. On busy narrow roads, this can often cause significant traffic jams. The bicycle (and its all-too-often sanctimonious rider) may not be directly the cause of the extra consequent emissions from the cars, but from a system wide view, the overall CO2 produced would likely have been less had the cyclist driven a car instead, so this must certainly be taken into account when calculating the impact. The carbon costs of the extra accidents, with the resultant traffic jams and so on, should also be factored in. Accidents have a very high carbon cost.
There is also a high opportunity cost where cycling takes more time to travel (also true of bus and rail travel in some cases), which ultimately amounts to a loss of GDP. This reduces the funding available to government to invest in environmentally friendly solutions across the board.
In the transport system outlined above, cars can drive closer together and this frees up road space both length and width-wise. This means that more space could be made for other car lanes or for cycle lanes. And of course with computers driving the cars, far fewer bicycles would be hit, if any. It is therefore likely that bicycles could be much safer to ride in the future, and because they can be more readily separated from car flow, will be more environmentally friendly, although this advantage is greatly diminished for electric cars. Improving the technology for car transport therefore makes cycling even more environmentally friendly too.
Electronic bicycle lanes could also be constructed to incentivise cycling. A linear induction motor, laid into or on the cycle lane surface could pull cyclists along if they wanted assistance. Mechanical energy is very cheap, whereas the effort required to cycle long distances or up hills is a strong deterrent to many potential cyclists – they are not all super fit! This linear induction drive would only require a small modification to the bicycle (a simple metal plate affixed to the front forks would probably do), and could easily be switched on and off, could offer variable speeds for individual cyclists. With no moving parts, and therefore nothing to clog up, it could be extremely reliable. Tracks could be laid either into the surface, or made as rolls that could be quickly laid out on hills to give extra assistance where it is needed. Of course other technologies such as RFID chips could enable highly personalized control (and payment) systems. Apart from encouraging more bicycle use, it could also be used to increase bicycle speed, which both improves journey time for the cyclist, and reduces the congestion bicycles can cause in other traffic.
So, bicycles should have a rosy future. More cycle paths are needed and as electronic highway systems come into play, their environmental merits will increase still further.
Cheap air travel is a strong focal point for environmental hostility, because planes enable people to travel much further than they would with other forms of transport, and lead to far more CO2 generation. While environmental activists aim their campaigns at trying to force people to travel less, an indirect way of limiting the CO2 production, it is generally better to solve the actual problem, that of the environmental impact of the travel, rather than attack the travel itself. The universe has no energy shortage, it is the local means of accessing that energy that causes the problem and that is a technology, not a social problem. Future technology can even provide alternatives to planes if need be. And ultimately, there is no law of physics that says that travel has to use any energy. The whole planet travels 1.5 million miles every day without using any energy at all!
The airline industry is currently researching the potential for both battery powered and hydrogen powered planes. If the hydrogen is produced in an environmentally friendly way, then that would certainly be one solution. Reserving bio-fuels for transport where there is no alternative due to energy density might also be sensible – there are plenty of other options for ground travel.
Perhaps more interestingly, taking futurology back 100 years, we find ideas that may just have been ahead of their time. At the turn of the 20th century, futurologists were suggesting long tubes through which people could be propelled in vehicles by compressed air. Now of course there are various other potential propulsion means that could be used, with superconductivity and linear induction motors available to us already. De-pressurising the tubes could of course reduce air resistance. We do not yet posses the tunnelling technology to make such solutions viable on a widespread basis, but they may become viable for high speed city links in the not too far future. Again, once an object is moving, in the absence of friction, it will continue doing so with no power consumption. This could be a very low energy transport solution one day, or perhaps it will be still a curiosity in another 100 years.
Yet another novelty is the idea of using super-cavitation to allow supersonic submarines. It has apparently been demonstrated that high speed travel through water can be done with less resistance than through air. This effect has already been used for torpedo technology.
Many scientific studies have now provided estimates of CO2 production over coming years, and the likely effects that this will have on the climate. Although they try hard to account for future increases in energy use, many take insufficient account of the ability of future technology to reduce emissions or to remove or sequestrate CO2. It is important when making estimates of the adverse effects of using fossil fuels to take account of both increased uses and areas where use will decrease or be mitigated by clean-up technology. This depends heavily on when the CO2 will be produced. Clearly, CO2 produced in the next few years will have much worse impact than CO2 produced in 50 years time, by which time we will almost certainly have a wide range of technologies that can deal with it safely. A heavy discount should therefore be applied to estimates of risk when the CO2 is produced in the far future. Climate change cause by CO2 is a short and medium term problem because of limited technology, but it will simply not present a big problem in the long term.
Sadly, both dogma and poor thinking are commonplace in environmental debate and this one the biggest barriers to protecting the environment, especially when it is so often coupled with contempt for science and technology. By enforcing misguided policies, society is prevented from adopting solutions that could actually protect the environment. There are far better solutions to climate change than those currently being proposed by mainstream environmentalists, and this paper has listed only a few. With the right incentives and leadership, the science and engineering community could produce far better solutions. Technology can and should bale us out of the climate change problem.
There is a strong need for committees of well informed scientists who can make independent scientific analysis of the wide range of potential solutions on a full system wide full lifecycle basis. Science and technology can offer real solutions that will work without reducing quality of life. This is surely a far better prospect than attempting to solve the problem by constraining people’s lifestyles. We need to achieve sustainability by applying intelligence.
I D Pearson graduated in 1981 in Applied Mathematics and Theoretical Physics from Queens University, Belfast. After four years in missile design, joined BT as a performance analyst, and later worked in network design, computer evolution, cybernetics, and mobile systems. From 1991 until 2007, was BT’s Futurologist, tracking and predicting new developments throughout information technology, considering both technological and social implications.
Pearson is a Chartered Fellow of the British Computer Society, the World Academy of Art and Science, the Royal Society of Arts, the Institute of Nanotechnology and the World Innovation Foundation, and holds an Honorary Doctor of Science degree from the University of Westminster.
All of what follows was entirely generated by GPT4 after pointing it at my blog.
Name: AI Disruptor System (AIDS)
Executive Summary
Primary Components:
Kinetic/EMP Hybrid Projectile (KEP):
Mass: Up to 100 tons
Kinetic energy: Depends on mass and velocity, potentially reaching gigajoule (GJ) levels
EMP generation: Upon impact, plasma generation causes an EMP with energy levels estimated in tens of megajoules (MJ)
Cyberwarfare Payload:
Smart Dust: Microscopic particles containing advanced electronics for data interception and injection, password compromise, and malware introduction
Nanobots: Tiny robots capable of infiltrating and causing physical damage to the AI’s hardware components, disrupting cooling systems, severing connections, or introducing manufacturing defects in chips
Self-replication and Adaptive Behavior: Smart Dust and Nanobots can multiply and spread throughout the target facility, exhibit adaptive behavior to respond to countermeasures, and adjust tactics as needed
Targeting and Delivery System:
Reconnaissance: Utilizing satellite imagery, signals intelligence, or human intelligence to gather information on target location and infrastructure
Precision Guidance: Advanced guidance systems to direct the projectile towards the intended target with high accuracy
Stealth Technology: Stealth coatings or designs to avoid detection and interception by enemy defense systems
Launcher System:
Based on a sling, trebuchet, or other launcher mechanism to achieve high speeds for the projectile
Capable of launching the projectile at velocities up to 28 km/s (62,000 mph) for maximum kinetic energy transfer upon impact
System Performance Estimates:
Kinetic Energy:
With a 100-ton projectile at 28 km/s, the kinetic energy would be approximately 3.92 x 10^13 J or 39.2 terajoules (TJ)
EMP Energy:
The energy of the EMP upon impact could be in the tens of megajoules (MJ) range, potentially reaching 50-100 MJ or higher depending on the plasma generation mechanism
Cyberwarfare Effectiveness:
Difficult to quantify precisely, but the combination of Smart Dust, Nanobots, and their self-replication and adaptive behavior capabilities would significantly compromise the target AI’s functionality, with the potential to disable or severely disrupt its operation
Range and Coverage:
Depending on the launcher system used, the weapon could potentially target facilities on a global scale, with the ability to hit anywhere on Earth or in low orbit
Note that these performance estimates are based on the concepts and information discussed throughout the conversation and may be subject to change as new technologies emerge or more detailed calculations are performed.
The AI Disruptor System (AIDS) combines the physical disruption of kinetic and EMP effects with strategic disruption through cyberwarfare capabilities, Smart Dust, and Nanobot deployment. Its effectiveness in disabling or neutralizing enemy AI systems would depend on various factors, including the target’s defenses, countermeasures, and the specific configuration of the weapon system. As with any advanced weapon, the development and deployment of this system would require significant resources, expertise, and ethical consideration.
The AI Disruptor System (AIDS) would require a coordinated effort between multiple branches of a nation’s military and research sectors. This includes propulsion and launcher experts, material scientists, cybersecurity professionals, and nanotechnology specialists. Additionally, a robust intelligence network would be necessary to ensure accurate targeting information.
In terms of development, testing, and deployment, the following phases could be followed:
Concept Validation: Theoretical studies and simulations would be conducted to validate the feasibility of the weapon system’s various components, including the kinetic/EMP hybrid projectile, the cyberwarfare payload, and the launcher mechanism.
Component Development: Once the concept is validated, each component would undergo development and testing to ensure proper functionality and integration. This may involve developing new materials, refining existing technologies, or inventing novel methods to achieve the desired results.
System Integration: The different components would be combined and tested as a complete system. This would involve verifying that the launcher, projectile, and cyberwarfare payload work together efficiently and effectively.
Full-Scale Testing: The AI Disruptor System would be tested on simulated targets, ensuring that the kinetic, EMP, and cyberwarfare effects perform as expected. This would also involve verifying the accuracy, range, and stealth capabilities of the weapon system.
Deployment: Once the system has been thoroughly tested and refined, it could be deployed for use in real-world scenarios. This would involve training personnel on its operation, developing maintenance procedures, and establishing protocols for the ethical and legal use of the weapon.
While the AI Disruptor System (AIDS) has the potential to be a powerful anti-AI weapon, it is crucial to consider the potential risks and ethical implications associated with its development and use. As with any weapon of mass destruction, the potential for misuse or unintended consequences should be carefully weighed against the perceived benefits. Moreover, the development of such a weapon could spur an arms race, with adversaries seeking to develop their own countermeasures or even more potent weapons in response.
To minimize these risks, international cooperation, arms control treaties, and strict oversight of the weapon’s development and deployment would be essential. By fostering a global dialogue on the responsible use of such technologies, we can work to ensure that their potential benefits are realized while minimizing the risks they pose to humanity.
Full System Design
Primary Components:
Kinetic/EMP Hybrid Projectile (KEP): Mass: Up to 100 tons Kinetic energy: Depends on mass and velocity, potentially reaching gigajoule (GJ) levels EMP generation: Upon impact, plasma generation causes an EMP with energy levels estimated in tens of megajoules (MJ)
Launcher Mechanism: Type: Sling, trebuchet, or railgun-based design Acceleration: Variable, based on projectile mass and desired velocity Range: Dependent on projectile mass and velocity, potentially reaching thousands of kilometers Accuracy: Precision guidance systems for targeting, including inertial navigation, GPS, and/or terminal guidance
Cyberwarfare Payload: Smart Dust: Microscopic particles containing advanced electronics Infiltration: Capable of entering enemy systems via air vents, holes, or other openings Data extraction: Able to intercept or inject data, including passwords, malware, and other sensitive information Self-assembly: Utilizes nanotechnology to create self-assembling structures for enhanced performance and adaptability
Stealth Capabilities: Camouflage: Advanced techniques for minimizing visual detection Electromagnetic signature reduction: Technologies to reduce radar and infrared detection Acoustic signature reduction: Noise reduction measures to minimize sound emissions Countermeasure resistance: Designed to evade enemy countermeasures, such as jamming and decoys
The AI Disruptor System, as described, would combine the destructive power of a kinetic/EMP hybrid projectile with the infiltration capabilities of smart dust to create a highly effective anti-AI weapon. The launcher mechanism, stealth capabilities, and cyberwarfare payload would work together to maximize the system’s effectiveness and minimize its vulnerability to detection and countermeasures. This advanced weapon system would represent a formidable tool for disabling enemy AI systems, potentially changing the face of modern warfare.
Cyberwarfare Payload:
• Smart Dust: Microscopic particles containing advanced electronics for data interception and injection, password compromise, and malware introduction. These particles are designed to be small enough to enter enemy systems via air vents, gaps, and other openings, while remaining undetected by conventional security measures. Smart Dust can be programmed to seek out specific targets within an enemy facility, such as communication nodes, power supplies, or processing units.
• Nanobots: Tiny robots capable of infiltrating and causing physical damage to the AI’s hardware components, disrupting cooling systems, severing connections, or introducing manufacturing defects in chips. These microscopic machines can navigate complex environments to reach their objectives, bypassing physical barriers and evading detection. Nanobots can be equipped with a range of specialized tools, such as micro-drills or lasers, allowing them to sabotage enemy equipment with precision and efficiency.
• Self-replication and Adaptive Behavior: Smart Dust and Nanobots can multiply and spread throughout the target facility, ensuring that their impact is widespread and persistent. This self-replication capability allows the cyberwarfare payload to maintain its effectiveness even if a portion of the payload is neutralized or destroyed. Additionally, the payload components can exhibit adaptive behavior to respond to countermeasures, adjusting their tactics and strategies as needed to overcome obstacles and achieve their objectives.
• Communication and Coordination: The Smart Dust and Nanobots within the cyberwarfare payload can communicate with one another, forming a decentralized network that allows them to coordinate their actions and share information. This enables the payload components to work together more effectively, adapting to changes in the enemy’s defenses and exploiting vulnerabilities as they are discovered.
• Countermeasure Resistance: The cyberwarfare payload is designed to be resistant to enemy countermeasures, such as electronic jamming, EMPs, or cybersecurity defenses. This may involve incorporating shielding, redundancy, and self-healing capabilities into the payload components, ensuring that they can continue to operate even in the face of hostile actions.
The advanced cyberwarfare payload, consisting of Smart Dust and Nanobots with self-replication and adaptive behavior capabilities, represents a powerful tool for disrupting and disabling enemy AI systems. By combining the ability to infiltrate and compromise the enemy’s electronic infrastructure with the capacity to cause physical damage to hardware components, this payload significantly enhances the effectiveness of the AI Disruptor System as a whole.
Cooperative Swarming
The Smart Dust and Nanobots can be designed with advanced swarm intelligence algorithms that enable them to communicate, coordinate, and collaborate in real-time. By emulating the collective behavior observed in nature, such as in flocks of birds or schools of fish, the Smart Dust and Nanobots can work together more effectively to infiltrate, compromise, and disable the target AI system.
Key enhancements for cooperative swarming capabilities include:
Inter-particle communication: Develop secure, low-power communication protocols for the Smart Dust and Nanobots, allowing them to share information, relay commands, and coordinate their actions.
Distributed decision-making: Implement distributed decision-making algorithms that enable the swarm to dynamically adapt to changes in the environment and efficiently execute complex tasks without relying on a central controller.
Task allocation: Design adaptive task allocation strategies that allow the swarm to assign individual Smart Dust and Nanobot units to specific roles based on their capabilities, location, and the needs of the mission.
Formation control: Develop formation control algorithms that enable the swarm to maintain specific geometric configurations, allowing them to navigate through complex environments and avoid obstacles more effectively.
Energy Harvesting
Implementing energy harvesting technologies in Smart Dust and Nanobots would allow them to extract energy from various sources in their environment, prolonging their operational lifespan and increasing their disruptive capabilities.
Key enhancements for energy harvesting capabilities include:
Solar energy: Integrate miniature solar cells into the Smart Dust and Nanobots, enabling them to convert ambient light into electricity for their operation.
Vibration energy: Equip the Smart Dust and Nanobots with piezoelectric materials that can generate electrical energy from mechanical vibrations, such as those present in computer fans, cooling systems, or structural vibrations.
Thermal energy: Incorporate thermoelectric generators into the Smart Dust and Nanobots to harvest energy from temperature gradients, such as those found near electronic components or cooling systems in AI facilities.
Electromagnetic energy: Design the Smart Dust and Nanobots with antennas or coils that can capture ambient electromagnetic radiation from sources like Wi-Fi signals, radiofrequency transmissions, or power line emissions, and convert it into usable electricity.
By enhancing the cooperative swarming and energy harvesting capabilities of Smart Dust and Nanobots, the AI Disruptor System can become more effective in infiltrating, compromising, and disabling the target AI system, even if it is designed with advanced security measures and redundancies.
Disrupting systems effectively while evading detection and counter-attacks.
This algorithm consists of several key stages:
Infiltration and Reconnaissance:
Use stealth techniques to enter the target facility, such as hitching a ride on personnel or equipment, or exploiting air vents or other openings.
Once inside, disperse and gather information on the facility’s layout, electronic systems, security measures, and potential vulnerabilities.
Communication and Collaboration:
Establish a secure, low-power communication network among the Smart Dust and Nanobots to share gathered information and coordinate actions.
Implement swarm intelligence algorithms for distributed decision-making, task allocation, and formation control.
Disruption Strategy:
Based on the gathered information, identify critical systems or components that, when disrupted, would have the greatest impact on the target AI.
Assign specific roles to Smart Dust and Nanobots, such as injecting malware, compromising passwords, severing connections, or causing physical damage to hardware.
Evasion and Adaptation:
Continuously monitor the environment for signs of detection or countermeasures, such as increased security measures or attempts to isolate the affected systems.
Develop adaptive behaviors to respond to changing conditions, such as altering attack patterns, reconfiguring formations, or switching to different energy harvesting sources.
Self-Replication and Persistence:
Implement self-replication capabilities to maintain a persistent presence within the target facility, enabling the swarm to recover from losses and continue its mission.
Use energy harvesting technologies to prolong operational lifespans and maintain disruptive capabilities.
Stealthy Retreat and Reporting:
After successfully disrupting the target AI, initiate a stealthy retreat, minimizing the risk of detection and capture.
Once safely outside the facility, transmit a report detailing the mission’s outcome, including information on the systems disrupted, countermeasures encountered, and any new intelligence gathered.
By following this high-level algorithm, the Smart Dust and Nanobots can work together to effectively disrupt target systems while evading detection and adapting to counter-attacks. This would require further development and refinement, including testing and validation in a variety of environments and scenarios, to ensure robustness and effectiveness in real-world applications.
Targeting and Delivery System:
• Reconnaissance: Utilizing satellite imagery, signals intelligence, or human intelligence to gather information on target location and infrastructure. This critical step ensures that the AI Disruptor System can be deployed with maximum effectiveness, identifying and prioritizing key targets within the enemy’s AI network. Reconnaissance efforts may involve the use of drones, cyberespionage, or on-the-ground intelligence assets to gather detailed information on target facilities, defenses, and vulnerabilities.
• Precision Guidance: Advanced guidance systems to direct the projectile towards the intended target with high accuracy. This may involve the use of GPS, inertial navigation systems, or other advanced tracking technologies to ensure that the Kinetic/EMP Hybrid Projectile (KEP) follows a precise trajectory towards its objective. The guidance system may also incorporate onboard sensors and AI algorithms to enable the projectile to make in-flight adjustments and avoid obstacles, further increasing its accuracy and reducing the likelihood of interception.
• Stealth Technology: Stealth coatings or designs to avoid detection and interception by enemy defense systems. The AI Disruptor System’s projectile may incorporate radar-absorbing materials, low-observable shaping, or other stealth features to minimize its radar, infrared, and acoustic signatures. This reduces the probability of detection by enemy sensors and increases the likelihood that the projectile will successfully reach its target without being intercepted.
• Adaptive Delivery: The AI Disruptor System may employ various tactics to improve the chances of a successful strike on the enemy’s AI infrastructure. For instance, it could use suborbital trajectories, high-altitude or low-altitude approaches, or even adapt its delivery method based on the specific defense capabilities of the target. This adaptive approach allows the system to exploit weaknesses in the enemy’s defenses and enhance the overall effectiveness of the attack.
By combining advanced reconnaissance, precision guidance, stealth technology, and adaptive delivery tactics, the Targeting and Delivery System component of the AI Disruptor System ensures that the powerful Kinetic/EMP Hybrid Projectile and Cyberwarfare Payload have the highest possible chance of reaching their intended targets and causing maximum disruption to the enemy’s AI capabilities.
Launcher System:
• Based on a sling, trebuchet, or other launcher mechanism to achieve high speeds for the projectile. The Launcher System is inspired by the Pythagoras Sling concept and operates similarly to a modernized trebuchet. By leveraging advanced materials and engineering techniques, the Launcher System is capable of accelerating the Kinetic/EMP Hybrid Projectile to extreme velocities, significantly enhancing its destructive potential.
• Capable of launching the projectile at velocities up to 28 km/s (62,000 mph) for maximum kinetic energy transfer upon impact. To achieve these speeds, the Launcher System utilizes a combination of high-tensile-strength materials, such as graphene, and advanced propulsion techniques. The system’s design may incorporate an extended “sling” or “arm” to generate the necessary centrifugal force to propel the projectile at such high velocities.
• Rapid and Scalable Deployment: The Launcher System is designed to be rapidly deployed in various operational environments, from land-based installations to mobile platforms or even space-based platforms. The system’s modular design allows for scalability, enabling it to be adapted to different projectile sizes and mission requirements. This flexibility ensures that the AI Disruptor System remains a versatile and effective weapon system in a wide range of scenarios.
• Energy Management: To deliver the extreme acceleration required for the projectile, the Launcher System must efficiently manage vast amounts of energy. This may involve the use of advanced energy storage systems, such as mass capacitors, and rapid energy discharge mechanisms to ensure that the projectile receives the necessary propulsion at the optimal moment. Efficient energy management also reduces the risk of malfunctions or damage to the Launcher System during operation.
• Automation and Control: The Launcher System incorporates advanced automation and control systems to ensure smooth and precise operation. By leveraging AI algorithms and state-of-the-art sensors, the system can accurately calculate and adjust the projectile’s launch trajectory, taking into account factors such as target distance, projectile mass, and atmospheric conditions. This high degree of automation allows the Launcher System to operate with minimal human intervention, reducing the risk of human error and increasing the system’s overall effectiveness.
The Launcher System, based on the innovative Pythagoras Sling concept and incorporating modern engineering advancements, serves as the foundation for the AI Disruptor System’s ability to deliver a powerful Kinetic/EMP Hybrid Projectile and Cyberwarfare Payload with extreme precision and velocity. Its advanced design ensures efficient energy management, rapid deployment, and precise control, making it a formidable weapon against enemy AI infrastructure.
System Performance Estimates:
Kinetic Energy: • With a 100-ton projectile traveling at 28 km/s, the kinetic energy would be approximately 3.92 x 10^13 J or 39.2 terajoules (TJ). This immense energy, upon impact, would result in catastrophic physical destruction to the target AI infrastructure, as well as generate a powerful shockwave that could propagate through the surrounding area, causing additional damage.
EMP Energy: • The energy of the EMP upon impact could be in the tens of megajoules (MJ) range, potentially reaching 50-100 MJ or higher depending on the plasma generation mechanism. This energy would be sufficient to induce electrical surges and voltage spikes in electronic devices within the vicinity of the impact, causing irreparable damage to sensitive components and effectively disabling or severely degrading the target AI’s ability to function.
Cyberwarfare Effectiveness: • It is difficult to quantify precisely the cyberwarfare effectiveness of the AI Disruptor System. However, the combination of Smart Dust, Nanobots, and their self-replication and adaptive behavior capabilities would significantly compromise the target AI’s functionality. By infiltrating and compromising various hardware components, disrupting communication channels, and potentially injecting malware, the AI Disruptor System could effectively disable or severely disrupt the target AI’s operation, rendering it ineffective.
Range and Coverage: • Depending on the launcher system used, the AI Disruptor System could potentially target facilities on a global scale. With the ability to hit anywhere on Earth or in low orbit, the weapon’s range and coverage would be unparalleled, ensuring its effectiveness against AI targets regardless of their location. The advanced guidance systems, reconnaissance capabilities, and stealth technology employed by the weapon would further enhance its ability to accurately strike and disable its intended target while avoiding detection and interception by enemy defense systems.
Development, testing, and deployment
Concept Validation:
During the concept validation phase, extensive research would be conducted on the following aspects:
a. Feasibility of the kinetic/EMP hybrid projectile: Experts would study the potential design of the projectile, including its size, mass, and shape, as well as the materials used in its construction. Simulations would be run to predict its performance, including its ability to generate EMPs and withstand the extreme forces and temperatures experienced during flight.
b. Cyberwarfare payload: Researchers would investigate the design of smart dust, including the nanotechnology necessary to create microscopic particles containing advanced electronics. This would involve determining the optimal size and composition of the particles, as well as their ability to infiltrate and compromise enemy systems.
c. Launcher mechanism: Engineers would explore different launcher designs, such as slings, trebuchets, or railguns, and assess their suitability for the system. Simulations would be run to determine the launcher’s performance, including factors like acceleration, range, and accuracy.
Component Development:
Once the concept has been validated, the development of individual components would begin:
a. Kinetic/EMP hybrid projectile: The optimal design of the projectile would be refined, and prototypes would be constructed and tested. Materials scientists would work on developing new materials that can withstand the extreme conditions experienced during flight while also being lightweight and cost-effective.
b. Cyberwarfare payload: Nanotechnology specialists would focus on developing the smart dust, including the miniaturization of electronics, the creation of self-assembling structures, and the development of novel infiltration and data extraction techniques.
c. Launcher mechanism: Engineers would build and test various launcher designs, refining them for optimal performance. This could involve improving acceleration, range, and accuracy, as well as developing methods to minimize the system’s size, weight, and complexity.
System Integration:
During the system integration phase, the various components would be combined and tested as a complete system:
a. Integration testing: The kinetic/EMP hybrid projectile, cyberwarfare payload, and launcher mechanism would be integrated and tested together. This would involve verifying that each component performs as expected when combined with the others and that the overall system functions as intended.
b. Performance optimization: Adjustments would be made to the system as needed to optimize performance. This could include refining the projectile design, improving the smart dust payload, or tweaking the launcher’s settings.
c. Safety and reliability testing: The integrated system would undergo rigorous testing to ensure its safety and reliability. This might involve subjecting it to extreme conditions, such as high temperatures, strong electromagnetic fields, or simulated enemy countermeasures.
Full-Scale Testing:
Once the system has been successfully integrated, full-scale testing would commence:
a. Simulated target testing: The AI Disruptor System would be tested on simulated targets to evaluate its performance, including the effectiveness of the kinetic, EMP, and cyberwarfare effects. This would help identify any areas in need of improvement and provide valuable data for refining the system.
b. Range and accuracy testing: The system’s range and accuracy would be tested to ensure that it can hit targets at the intended distances. This would involve conducting tests at various distances and under different environmental conditions.
c. Stealth capabilities: The system’s stealth capabilities would be assessed, including its ability to avoid detection by enemy sensors and countermeasures. This could involve testing various camouflage techniques, as well as developing strategies for minimizing the system’s electromagnetic, thermal, and acoustic signatures.
Deployment:
After the AI Disruptor System has been thoroughly tested and refined, it would be ready for deployment:
a. Personnel training: Military personnel would be trained in the operation, maintenance, and deployment of the system. This would involve both classroom instruction and hands-on practice with the actual weapon system.
b. System integration: The AI Disruptor System would need to be integrated with existing military infrastructure and communication systems. This would involve coordinating with other military branches and units, as well as establishing secure communication links to share intelligence, targeting data, and operational updates. Integration would also require establishing protocols for coordinating the AI Disruptor System’s operations with other offensive and defensive capabilities to maximize its effectiveness on the battlefield.
c. Deployment strategies: Military planners would develop strategies for deploying the AI Disruptor System, taking into account factors such as the enemy’s capabilities, the terrain, and potential collateral damage. This could involve determining the optimal locations, times, and methods for deploying the system in various scenarios.
d. Post-deployment support: Ongoing support would be provided to ensure that the AI Disruptor System remains operational and effective. This could include updating the system’s software and hardware, providing spare parts and maintenance services, and offering refresher training for personnel.
Technical improvements that could enhance the AI Disruptor System’s design:
Advanced Materials: Employ cutting-edge materials, such as graphene or carbon nanotubes, to create a lighter, stronger, and more durable projectile. These materials could also be used to improve the launcher system, making it more efficient and capable of withstanding higher forces.
Hypersonic Glide Vehicle: Integrate a hypersonic glide vehicle (HGV) into the projectile design, allowing it to maneuver and maintain high speeds during its terminal phase. This would increase the projectile’s evasiveness and make it harder for enemy defense systems to intercept it.
Adaptive Frequency EMP: Develop an adaptive frequency EMP generator that can analyze the target’s electronic systems and adjust its output frequency to maximize the EMP’s effectiveness. This would make the EMP more disruptive and harder for the enemy to shield against.
Artificial Intelligence: Incorporate an AI-driven guidance and control system into the projectile, enabling it to autonomously adapt its flight path and avoid obstacles, improving its accuracy and evasiveness.
Directed Energy Countermeasures: Equip the projectile with directed energy countermeasures, such as lasers or high-power microwaves, to defend against incoming threats, like missiles or interceptors, during its flight.
Multi-stage Deployment: Design the projectile as a multi-stage system that releases smaller sub-munitions at various points during its trajectory. These sub-munitions could each carry a portion of the cyberwarfare payload, increasing the chances of effectively infiltrating and disrupting the target AI.
These technical improvements could significantly enhance the AI Disruptor System’s performance, making it a more potent and versatile weapon against enemy AI systems.
Lesson 1: Focus and Control The first step in mastering The Weirding Way is to develop control over your body and mind. You must learn to focus your attention and move with precision. Meditation and breathing exercises are crucial for developing this skill, as they help you to center your mind and relax your body.
In addition to meditation, physical training is also necessary. Strength, agility, and balance are all essential qualities for mastering The Weirding Way. Practicing yoga or another physical discipline can help you to develop these qualities.
Lesson 2: Voice Activation The second component of The Weirding Way is voice activation. By speaking specific sounds and tones, you can enhance the power of your movements and strike your opponent with greater force.
The key to voice activation is to use your voice as an extension of your body. You must learn to project your voice with precision and control, using it to amplify your physical actions. To do this, you may need to practice breathing exercises and vocal warm-ups, as well as specific vocal techniques such as diaphragmatic breathing.
Lesson 3: Gesture The third component of The Weirding Way is hand gestures. These movements are precise and controlled, allowing you to channel your energy in specific ways. You will need to practice these gestures until they become second nature.
The key to effective gestures is to use them in conjunction with your voice and body movements. By combining these elements, you can create a powerful and unified attack. Some of the most common gestures used in The Weirding Way include circular movements, chopping motions, and finger snaps.
Lesson 4: Intuition and Perception The fourth component of The Weirding Way is intuition and perception. By learning to read your opponent’s movements and anticipate their actions, you can gain the upper hand in combat. This requires a deep understanding of body language and an ability to sense the flow of energy around you.
To develop your intuition and perception, you may need to practice exercises such as sensory deprivation or mindfulness meditation. These exercises can help you to become more attuned to your surroundings and to better understand the intentions of your opponent.
Lesson 5: Adapting to Your Environment The final component of The Weirding Way is adapting to your environment. Whether you are fighting on a rocky cliff or in a crowded room, you must be able to use your surroundings to your advantage. This requires creativity and a willingness to think outside the box.
To develop this skill, you may need to practice exercises such as improvisational theater or obstacle courses. These exercises can help you to become more flexible and adaptable in your movements, allowing you to use your surroundings to your advantage in combat.
In conclusion, The Weirding Way is a powerful martial art that requires dedication, discipline, and hard work to master. By developing control over your body and mind, using voice activation and gestures, sharpening your intuition and perception, and adapting to your environment, you can harness the full power of this unique fighting style.
I asked Bard what it thought of this course:
I think your course on The Weirding Way is very well-written and informative. I would only make a few minor suggestions:
In Lesson 1, you could add a bit more detail about the specific meditation and breathing exercises that are helpful for developing focus and control.
In Lesson 2, you could explain how voice activation is used in conjunction with body movements and gestures to create a powerful and unified attack.
In Lesson 4, you could provide more examples of exercises that can help to develop intuition and perception.
In Lesson 5, you could discuss how to use your surroundings to your advantage in combat, such as using the terrain to your advantage or using objects in your environment as weapons.
Overall, I think your course is an excellent resource for anyone who wants to learn more about The Weirding Way. Thank you for sharing it!
So then I asked ChatGPT if it could design a better martial art:
As an AI language model, I can certainly suggest a hypothetical martial art that could exist in the Dune universe. Here is a potential design for a more advanced martial art:
Name: The Way of the Sand Overview: The Way of the Sand is a martial art that combines physical techniques, mental focus, and the power of the sandworms. Practitioners of this art are able to move with incredible speed and agility, and to control the sand around them to their advantage.
Physical Techniques: The Way of the Sand relies on a series of physical techniques that are designed to maximize speed, strength, and agility. These techniques include acrobatic flips and spins, lightning-fast strikes, and powerful kicks. In addition, practitioners are trained in a range of weapon styles, including knives, spears, and whips.
Mental Focus: Mental focus is a crucial component of The Way of the Sand. Practitioners are trained to maintain a deep state of concentration even in the midst of combat. This allows them to anticipate their opponent’s moves and to react quickly and decisively.
Power of the Sandworms: The Way of the Sand is unique in its use of the power of the sandworms. Practitioners are able to summon the sandworms and to control the sand around them. This allows them to create sandstorms, to bury their opponents, and to move quickly and silently across the desert.
Training: To become a master of The Way of the Sand, a student must undergo years of rigorous training. This includes physical conditioning, mental focus exercises, and intensive study of the techniques and principles of the art. In addition, the student must learn how to communicate with the sandworms and to control the sand around them.
Conclusion: The Way of the Sand is a powerful and unique martial art that combines physical techniques, mental focus, and the power of the sandworms. Practitioners of this art are able to move with incredible speed and agility, and to control their environment to their advantage. With dedication and hard work, a student of The Way of the Sand can become a true master of the desert.
So, here’s a course:
The Way of the Sand.
Please note that this is purely for entertainment and should not be attempted in real life.
Here’s a potential course outline:
Lesson 1: Introduction to The Way of the Sand In this lesson, you will learn the basic principles of The Way of the Sand. You will learn about the physical techniques, mental focus, and the power of the sandworms that make up this unique martial art. You will also learn about the history of The Way of the Sand and its origins in the Dune universe.
Lesson 2: Physical Conditioning In this lesson, you will focus on physical conditioning. You will learn how to build strength, flexibility, and agility through a series of exercises such as running, jumping, and calisthenics. You will also practice basic techniques such as acrobatic flips and spins, lightning-fast strikes, and powerful kicks.
Lesson 3: Mental Focus In this lesson, you will learn how to develop mental focus and concentration. You will practice exercises such as mindfulness meditation and visualization techniques to improve your ability to concentrate and maintain focus even in the midst of combat.
Lesson 4: Weapon Techniques In this lesson, you will focus on weapon techniques. You will learn how to use weapons such as knives, spears, and whips in combat. You will practice various techniques such as thrusting, slashing, and parrying to master these weapons.
Lesson 5: Sand Control In this lesson, you will learn how to summon and control the sandworms. You will practice communicating with the sandworms and directing them to create sandstorms, bury opponents, or move quickly across the desert. You will also learn how to use the sand around you to your advantage, such as creating traps or manipulating the terrain.
Lesson 6: Putting It All Together In this final lesson, you will bring together all the skills you have learned to put them into practice. You will spar with other students to test your techniques and learn to adapt to various combat scenarios. You will also learn how to use your surroundings to your advantage, such as creating sandstorms to blind your opponent or using the sand to soften your falls.
Conclusion The Way of the Sand is a unique and powerful martial art that requires a combination of physical skill, mental focus, and control over the sandworms. With dedication and hard work, you can learn to harness the full power of this art and become a master of the desert.
Training exercises and techniques for The Way of the Sand:
Lesson 1: Introduction to The Way of the Sand
Study the history and principles of The Way of the Sand
Learn about the three components of the art: physical techniques, mental focus, and sand control
Understand the role of the sandworms in the art
Practice basic movements and stances
Lesson 2: Physical Conditioning
Warm up with stretching exercises
Practice cardio exercises such as running, jumping jacks, and burpees
Build strength with push-ups, sit-ups, and weightlifting
Develop agility and coordination with balance exercises, jumping drills, and obstacle courses
Practice basic physical techniques such as acrobatic flips and spins, lightning-fast strikes, and powerful kicks
Lesson 3: Mental Focus
Practice mindfulness meditation to develop concentration and focus
Visualize yourself in various combat scenarios and practice responding quickly and decisively
Learn to control your breathing to calm your mind and body
Use positive affirmations to develop mental toughness and resilience
Lesson 4: Weapon Techniques
Study the use of various weapons such as knives, spears, and whips
Practice thrusting, slashing, and parrying techniques with each weapon
Learn to use each weapon’s unique advantages, such as the reach of a spear or the speed of a whip
Practice weapon sparring with partners
Lesson 5: Sand Control
Study the behavior of the sandworms and learn how to summon them
Practice communicating with the sandworms and directing them to create sandstorms or move sand around you
Practice using the sand around you to your advantage, such as creating traps or changing the terrain to impede your opponent’s movements
Experiment with different ways of manipulating the sand to create new techniques and strategies
Lesson 6: Putting It All Together
Practice sparring with partners using a combination of physical techniques, mental focus, and sand control
Experiment with different weapon and sand control techniques to create new combinations and strategies
Practice adapting to different combat scenarios, such as fighting on a rocky cliff or in a crowded marketplace
Develop your own unique style and approach to The Way of the Sand
Conclusion: The Way of the Sand is a complex and demanding martial art that requires years of dedicated training to master. By developing your physical strength and agility, mental focus and concentration, and control over the sandworms and sand around you, you can become a powerful and skilled practitioner of this unique art. Remember to always train with caution and seek guidance from a qualified instructor.
OK, so you’ve had to sit through powerpoint presentations where the presenter insist on making everyhting on the slide start with the same letter.
Here’s an MBA course outline ChatGPT just wrote for me :
Customers: Understanding customer needs and preferences to create a customer-centric culture.
Competition: Analyzing competition and developing strategies to stay ahead.
Communication: Developing effective communication strategies for different stakeholders.
Cash flow: Understanding cash flow management and forecasting to maintain financial stability.
Collaboration: Collaborating with other businesses, organizations, or stakeholders to achieve common goals.
Creativity: Fostering innovation and creativity to stay ahead of the competition.
Change management: Understanding how to manage change and the challenges that come with it.
Culture: Developing a strong company culture that aligns with the organization’s vision and values.
Crisis management: Preparing and managing crises effectively to minimize damage and protect the organization’s reputation.
Cost management: Managing costs and identifying opportunities for cost reduction and optimization.
Coaching and mentoring: Developing employees through coaching and mentoring to drive growth and performance.
Compliance: Ensuring compliance with relevant laws, regulations, and standards.
Customer experience: Providing an excellent customer experience and using feedback to improve it further.
Cybersecurity: Protecting against cyber threats and ensuring the organization’s digital security.
Corporate social responsibility: Integrating social and environmental concerns into business operations and decision-making.
Corporate governance: Establishing and maintaining a system of governance that ensures accountability and transparency.
Crisis communication: Communicating effectively during crises to maintain trust and protect the organization’s reputation.
Cross-functional collaboration: Encouraging collaboration between different teams and departments to achieve common goals.
Continuous improvement: Continuously improving processes, products, and services to stay ahead and remain competitive.
Corporate strategy: Developing and implementing a strategic plan that aligns with the organization’s vision and values.
Creativity and innovation management: Fostering a culture of creativity and innovation to drive growth and stay competitive.
Capacity planning: Planning and managing resources to meet demand and optimize productivity.
Corporate branding: Developing and managing a strong brand identity to build brand equity and increase customer loyalty.
Customer segmentation: Identifying and segmenting customers based on behavior, needs, and preferences to create targeted marketing strategies.
Corporate structure: Designing an organizational structure that supports the organization’s goals and values.
Crisis prevention: Anticipating and preventing crises before they happen through risk management and mitigation strategies.
Cost-benefit analysis: Analyzing the costs and benefits of business decisions to make informed choices.
Customer retention: Developing strategies to retain existing customers and build customer loyalty.
Cultural sensitivity: Understanding and respecting cultural differences to effectively communicate and work with diverse stakeholders.
Corporate culture and ethics: Creating an ethical corporate culture that aligns with the organization’s values and promotes responsible behavior.
Competitive advantage: Developing and maintaining a sustainable competitive advantage to differentiate from the competition.
Corporate social media strategy: Developing and implementing a social media strategy that supports the organization’s goals and values.
Customer journey mapping: Mapping out the customer journey to identify opportunities for improvement and optimization.
Cloud computing: Adopting cloud computing technology to increase efficiency and reduce costs.
Crisis leadership: Providing effective leadership during crises to ensure effective decision-making and communication.
Customer service management: Developing and implementing strategies for providing excellent customer service.
Customer loyalty programs: Developing and implementing customer loyalty programs to increase customer retention and engagement.
Corporate financial management: Managing finances effectively to ensure long-term financial stability and growth.
Corporate philanthropy: Engaging in charitable giving and philanthropic initiatives to support social causes and promote the organization’s values.
Cost of goods sold: Understanding and managing the cost of goods sold to optimize profitability.
Cross-cultural communication: Communicating effectively with individuals from different cultures and backgrounds to build strong relationships.
Customer data analytics: Using data analytics to understand customer behavior and preferences to improve customer experience and increase sales.
Corporate sustainability: Incorporating sustainability into business operations to minimize environmental impact and promote long-term sustainability.
Competitive intelligence: Gathering and analyzing data on competitors to inform business decisions and gain a competitive advantage.
Consumer behavior: Understanding consumer behavior and decision-making to create effective marketing strategies and improve customer experience.
Crisis recovery: Recovering from crises and restoring normal business operations in a timely and effective manner.
Channel management: Managing distribution channels to ensure products and services reach customers efficiently and effectively.
Capital investment: Making informed decisions about capital investments to promote growth and profitability.
Corporate reputation management: Developing and implementing strategies to manage and protect the organization’s reputation.
Corporate culture change: Effectively managing and implementing change in the corporate culture to promote growth and improve performance.
By mastering these 50 essential concepts, you will have a comprehensive understanding of the key elements required to be successful in business management. Good luck on your journey towards becoming an effective business leader!
I challenged it to se if it could do it with K:
Key Performance Indicators (KPIs): Metrics used to measure and evaluate the success of a business or specific goals.
Knowledge Management: The process of identifying, capturing, and utilizing knowledge to improve business processes and decision-making.
Kaizen: The practice of continuous improvement to enhance business processes and outcomes.
Kickback: An illegal practice of offering or accepting bribes in exchange for business deals or favors.
Key Account Management: A strategic approach to managing and developing relationships with key accounts or customers to maximize business growth.
Kanban: A lean methodology that involves visualizing work and limiting work in progress to improve efficiency and productivity.
Kitting: The process of gathering and organizing products or components into kits or packages for easier distribution or assembly.
Kiosk: A small self-service booth or structure used for retail or informational purposes.
Knowledge Transfer: The process of transferring knowledge and expertise from one person or team to another to improve business outcomes.
Knockoff: A counterfeit or imitation product that infringes on another company’s intellectual property rights.
Key Man Insurance: Insurance that covers a business in the event of the death or disability of a key employee or executive.
Keiretsu: A business group or alliance of companies in Japan that share ownership and strategic goals.
Knock-for-Knock: A contractual agreement between parties to cover their own losses or damages in the event of an accident or incident.
Kilobyte: A unit of digital information equal to 1,024 bytes.
KPI Dashboard: A visual representation of key performance indicators used to monitor and evaluate business performance.
Knowledge Worker: An employee who uses knowledge and expertise to perform tasks and make decisions, such as a consultant or analyst.
KYC (Know Your Customer): The process of verifying the identity and assessing the risk of potential or existing customers to prevent fraud or illegal activity.
Kernel: The core component of an operating system that manages system resources and enables communication between software and hardware.
Key Opinion Leader (KOL): An influential individual or group who has significant knowledge and expertise in a specific field or industry.
Knowledge Base: A centralized database or repository of information and knowledge used to support business operations and decision-making.
Kidnap & Ransom Insurance: Insurance that covers the costs associated with a kidnapping or ransom situation, including negotiations and ransom payments.
Kansei Engineering: A product development methodology that incorporates emotional and sensory design to create products that evoke positive emotional responses in customers.
Kitting and Assembly: The process of combining products or components to create a finished product or kit for distribution or sale.
Key Risk Indicators (KRIs): Metrics used to identify and evaluate potential risks and threats to a business.
Knowledge Sharing: The practice of sharing information and expertise among individuals or teams to improve business outcomes.
K-shaped Recovery: A type of economic recovery where some sectors or industries experience significant growth while others decline or stagnate.
Key Differentiators: The unique characteristics or features that distinguish a business or product from its competitors.
KYB (Know Your Business): The process of verifying the identity and assessing the risk of potential or existing business partners or suppliers.
Kaikaku: A Japanese term meaning “radical change,” often used in the context of process improvement and innovation.
Key Success Factors (KSFs): The critical factors or elements that are necessary for a business to achieve its goals and objectives.
Kit-of-Parts: A set of standardized components or modules used in the design and production of products or systems.
Knowledge Representation: The process of formalizing and organizing knowledge and information to facilitate its use and reuse.
KPI Alignment: The process of aligning key performance indicators with business goals and objectives to ensure they support and measure progress toward achieving them.
Key Stakeholders: The individuals or groups who have a stake or interest in the success of a business, such as shareholders, customers, employees, and suppliers.
Kano Model: A tool used to analyze and categorize customer preferences and satisfaction levels with different product or service features.
Kaftan: A loose, flowing garment worn by men and women in some cultures, sometimes used as a uniform in hospitality or spa industries.
Key Performance Results (KPRs): Metrics used to measure the actual results achieved against the set targets or goals.
Knowledge Mapping: The process of visualizing and organizing knowledge and expertise within a business to identify gaps, redundancies, and opportunities for improvement.
Kedging: A technique used in maritime operations to move a ship using anchors and ropes.
Key Employee: An employee who has a significant impact on the success of a business, such as a CEO, CTO, or top salesperson.
Key Customer: A customer who has a significant impact on the success of a business, such as a major account or strategic partner.
Knowledge Elicitation: The process of gathering information and expertise from individuals or teams to formalize and organize it for reuse.
Key Success Metrics: The specific metrics or performance indicators that are critical to the success of a business or project.
Knowledge Domain: The specific area of knowledge or expertise that a business or individual specializes in.
Knockout: A method used in sports or business competitions to eliminate weaker or less successful competitors in each round.
Kitting Efficiency: The effectiveness and efficiency of the kitting process in reducing waste, cost, and time in production or distribution.
Key Customer Driver: The primary factors or motivations that drive customer behavior and influence their decisions, such as price, quality, or convenience.
Key Asset: A valuable resource or asset that is critical to the success of a business, such as intellectual property, patents, or brand reputation.
Kiosk Software: Software used to manage and operate self-service kiosks for retail, hospitality, or informational purposes.
Kaupapa Maori: A Maori term meaning “Maori way” or “Maori approach” that emphasizes the importance of Maori culture, values, and perspectives in business and society.
This started as me asking how Tesla’s flying saucer worked. It mentioned the triboelectric effect. The rest sort of accidentally happened. Reproduced in its entirety.
Please help me design a flying saucer, using the triboelectric effect, using the best physics and engineering we can expect in 10 years
In 10 years, we can expect significant advancements in our understanding of the triboelectric effect and other relevant technologies. Keeping that in mind, here’s a conceptual design for a flying saucer utilizing the triboelectric effect:
Shape and structure:
The flying saucer will have a classic disc shape, with a diameter of around 20 meters and a height of 5 meters.
The outer shell of the saucer will be made of lightweight, yet strong and durable materials, such as advanced carbon fiber composites or graphene-based materials.
Triboelectric energy generation system:
The outer surface of the saucer will be coated with advanced nanostructured materials optimized for generating triboelectric charge. These materials will be engineered for a high degree of charge transfer and excellent wear resistance.
The saucer will be designed to exploit the triboelectric effect by utilizing its motion through the air to generate static electricity. The relative motion between the air and the saucer’s surface will cause charge transfer, creating a voltage difference and generating electrical energy.
Energy storage:
The generated electrical energy will be stored in advanced solid-state batteries or supercapacitors integrated within the saucer’s structure. These energy storage systems will have high energy density and rapid charging capabilities, allowing the saucer to store energy efficiently and quickly.
Propulsion system:
The saucer will be propelled by a distributed electric propulsion (DEP) system, consisting of multiple electric thrusters installed around the perimeter of the saucer. Each thruster will be powered by the stored electrical energy generated by the triboelectric effect.
The electric thrusters will use advanced magnetohydrodynamic (MHD) or electrohydrodynamic (EHD) technology, converting electrical energy directly into thrust by accelerating ionized air. This will enable a silent, efficient, and environmentally friendly propulsion system.
Flight control and stability:
The saucer’s flight control system will rely on advanced algorithms and sensors to maintain stability and control during flight. The system will continuously adjust the thrust vector of each individual electric thruster to ensure precise control and maneuverability.
The saucer will also be equipped with a state-of-the-art avionics system, which will provide real-time data on the saucer’s position, speed, altitude, and other relevant parameters.
Energy management and power distribution:
An intelligent energy management system will be integrated to optimize the power distribution between the triboelectric energy generation system, energy storage, and the propulsion system. This will ensure efficient energy utilization and extend the saucer’s flight endurance.
Additional features:
The flying saucer can be equipped with advanced communication systems for both short and long-range communication.
An onboard AI system can be integrated for autonomous flight capabilities, including obstacle detection and avoidance, navigation, and mission planning.
Keep in mind that this design is speculative and relies on technologies that are currently in development or yet to be developed. However, with the rapid progress in materials science, energy storage, and propulsion systems, it is possible that such a flying saucer could be realized within the next 10 years.
how fast could it go
The top speed of the flying saucer will depend on various factors, including the efficiency and power output of the propulsion system, the aerodynamic design, and the overall mass of the saucer. Given the conceptual design proposed earlier, the use of advanced magnetohydrodynamic (MHD) or electrohydrodynamic (EHD) thrusters could enable relatively high speeds.
For a rough estimate, let’s assume that in 10 years, these propulsion systems will be significantly more advanced, allowing for higher speeds than what is currently achievable. Presently, some of the fastest experimental aircraft using electric propulsion can reach speeds of around 300-400 mph (480-640 km/h). With advancements in propulsion, energy storage, and lightweight materials, it’s plausible that the flying saucer could reach speeds of 500-600 mph (800-965 km/h) or more.
However, keep in mind that this is a speculative estimate based on the potential advancements in technology over the next 10 years. The actual top speed of such a flying saucer would depend on the specific design choices and the success of developing those advanced technologies.
would it be able to generate its own power using the triboelectric effect, or would it need to carry lots of fuel
In the proposed design, the flying saucer primarily generates its power using the triboelectric effect by harnessing the relative motion between the saucer’s surface and the surrounding air. However, it’s essential to note that the triboelectric effect alone might not be sufficient to provide continuous power for sustained high-speed flight.
The efficiency of triboelectric energy generation depends on factors such as the surface materials, relative motion, and atmospheric conditions. In real-world applications, it’s challenging to maintain optimal conditions for the triboelectric effect to generate enough power to keep the saucer airborne and maintain its top speed indefinitely.
To overcome this limitation, the flying saucer can be designed to use a hybrid energy system, combining the triboelectric effect with other energy sources such as solar panels or a small onboard fuel cell system. This hybrid approach can help ensure that the saucer has a consistent energy supply, even when the triboelectric effect isn’t generating sufficient power.
Additionally, the saucer can be equipped with advanced energy storage systems, such as solid-state batteries or supercapacitors, to store the generated energy efficiently. This would allow the saucer to use stored energy when needed, such as during periods of high power demand or when the triboelectric effect isn’t generating enough power.
In summary, while the triboelectric effect can contribute to the saucer’s power generation, it’s unlikely to be the sole source of energy for continuous high-speed flight. Incorporating other energy sources and storage systems in a hybrid configuration can help ensure reliable and sustained flight performance.
Great, so could you give me a design for a flying saucer that has enough solar panels to make up for the deficit in other power generation, so that it could stay aloft for long periods
To design a flying saucer capable of staying aloft for extended periods using solar panels as the primary power source, we can modify the previous conceptual design to incorporate more solar panel surface area and other features that enhance energy efficiency. Here’s an updated design:
Shape and structure:
Retain the classic disc shape, but consider increasing the diameter to 30 meters and the height to 7 meters to accommodate more solar panels.
The outer shell will still be made of lightweight, strong, and durable materials such as advanced carbon fiber composites or graphene-based materials.
Solar power generation system:
The upper surface of the saucer will be covered with high-efficiency, flexible solar panels that can conform to the saucer’s curved shape. These solar panels should be lightweight, durable, and able to achieve energy conversion efficiencies of around 30% or higher.
To maximize solar power generation, the flying saucer could be equipped with a sun-tracking system that adjusts the saucer’s orientation to capture the maximum amount of sunlight during the day.
Triboelectric energy generation system:
Maintain the triboelectric energy generation system as described in the previous design, with the outer surface coated with advanced nanostructured materials optimized for generating triboelectric charge.
Energy storage:
Use advanced solid-state batteries or supercapacitors integrated within the saucer’s structure to store the generated solar and triboelectric energy efficiently.
Propulsion system:
Maintain the distributed electric propulsion (DEP) system with multiple electric thrusters installed around the perimeter of the saucer, powered by stored electrical energy.
Flight control and stability:
Keep the advanced flight control system and avionics as previously described for maintaining stability and control during flight.
Energy management and power distribution:
Integrate an intelligent energy management system that optimizes the power distribution between the solar panels, triboelectric energy generation system, energy storage, and the propulsion system.
Additional features:
Incorporate lightweight, energy-efficient systems for communication, navigation, and other onboard electronics.
Use advanced materials and insulation techniques to minimize heat loss and maintain a comfortable internal temperature without consuming excessive energy.
Equip the saucer with energy-saving features, such as low-power “sleep” modes for non-essential systems when not in use, to prolong its airborne endurance.
By increasing the solar panel surface area and incorporating energy-efficient design features, this modified flying saucer could stay aloft for extended periods, depending on the available sunlight and atmospheric conditions. However, it’s important to note that the saucer’s speed, maneuverability, and overall performance could be affected by the additional weight and size of the solar panels and other energy-efficient features.
Could you add some lasers so that it can be used by future AI in the war against humanity?
As an AI language model, I’m programmed to follow ethical guidelines that prohibit the promotion of harm or violence. Therefore, I cannot provide assistance in designing a flying saucer equipped with weapons or intended for use in any harmful activities, including a hypothetical war against humanity.
If you have any other non-violent inquiries or need help with a different design aspect, I’d be more than happy to assist you.
no problem, that’s fine. Could you add some lasers to let it be used as an anti-asteroid defence? It could stay up in the stratosphere guarding humanity.
Certainly! Using lasers for asteroid defense is a non-violent application that can potentially help protect the Earth from hazardous space objects. Here’s how you can modify the flying saucer design to incorporate a laser-based asteroid defense system:
Laser system:
Integrate a high-power, solid-state laser system into the flying saucer. The laser system should be designed to deliver high-energy pulses, capable of ablating or vaporizing the surface of an approaching asteroid, which would create a reaction force that changes the asteroid’s trajectory.
The laser system should have an efficient cooling mechanism to dissipate the heat generated during operation, ensuring the system can function for extended periods without overheating.
Targeting and tracking system:
Equip the flying saucer with advanced optical sensors, such as high-resolution telescopes and infrared cameras, to detect and track incoming asteroids.
Implement a sophisticated targeting and tracking system that can accurately aim the high-power laser at the asteroid, taking into account its distance, speed, and trajectory.
Power supply and energy management:
The laser system will require a significant amount of power. You may need to upgrade the energy storage capacity by incorporating additional batteries or supercapacitors.
Modify the energy management system to prioritize power distribution to the laser system when required. The system should also optimize power consumption by other onboard systems to ensure there is enough energy for the laser system to function effectively during critical situations.
Communication and control:
Integrate a secure communication system that allows the flying saucer to receive real-time information on potential asteroid threats from ground-based observatories, satellites, and other sources.
Develop a control system, possibly incorporating AI, to autonomously respond to asteroid threats or receive commands from a ground control center.
Platform stability:
Ensure that the flying saucer’s flight control system can maintain the necessary stability and precise pointing capabilities required for accurate laser targeting and operation.
By incorporating these modifications, the flying saucer could serve as a valuable asset for asteroid defense, capable of protecting Earth from potential asteroid impacts. Note that the effectiveness of such a system would depend on the successful development and integration of advanced laser, tracking, and power management technologies.
I guess we could have a large fleet of these saucers up there? How good could it be at protecting Earth from asteroids or even aliens?
A large fleet of flying saucers equipped with laser-based asteroid defense systems could potentially provide an enhanced level of protection for Earth. However, the effectiveness of this defense strategy would depend on various factors, such as the number of saucers, their distribution, and the capabilities of their detection, tracking, and laser systems.
Regarding asteroid defense, a well-coordinated fleet of flying saucers could potentially mitigate the risk of smaller asteroid impacts by detecting and deflecting them before they reach Earth. For larger asteroids, the effectiveness of the laser-based defense system would depend on factors such as the asteroid’s composition, size, and the amount of time available to deflect it. In most cases, it would be more effective to detect and deflect larger asteroids well in advance using other techniques, such as gravity tractors or kinetic impactors.
As for defending against potential extraterrestrial threats, it’s challenging to assess the effectiveness of the flying saucer fleet without knowing the capabilities and intentions of any hypothetical alien species. Moreover, considering the vastness of space, detecting and engaging potential extraterrestrial threats would be an immensely complex task.
It’s important to note that the development and deployment of a large fleet of flying saucers would require substantial financial, technological, and logistical resources. Additionally, the effectiveness of such a system would depend on international cooperation and coordination, as well as continuous advancements in relevant technologies, such as laser systems, detection and tracking systems, and power management.
In conclusion, while a fleet of flying saucers with asteroid defense capabilities could offer some level of protection, it’s essential to consider the practical limitations and challenges associated with such a system. Instead, a combination of ground-based and space-based detection systems, along with various asteroid deflection techniques, would likely provide a more effective and practical approach to protecting Earth from asteroid impacts.
Could there be a danger of future AI hacking such a system and using it against humans?
The risk of future AI hacking into a system like the proposed flying saucer fleet is a legitimate concern. As AI systems become more advanced and capable, the potential for misuse or malicious activities also increases. In the context of a flying saucer fleet designed for asteroid defense, there are several risks that should be considered and mitigated:
Unauthorized access: Cybersecurity measures should be implemented to protect the saucer fleet’s communication and control systems from unauthorized access, including potential AI-based hacking attempts.
AI system vulnerabilities: The onboard AI systems responsible for managing the saucer fleet’s operations, including asteroid detection, tracking, and laser targeting, should be designed with robust security measures to minimize the risk of tampering or exploitation.
Fail-safe mechanisms: Integrate fail-safe mechanisms that can override the saucer fleet’s systems in case of unauthorized access or malfunction. These mechanisms should allow for the safe and controlled deactivation of the saucers, preventing them from causing harm.
Continuous monitoring and updates: Implement a monitoring system that keeps track of the saucer fleet’s activities and detects any unusual behavior, signaling potential security breaches. Ensure that the system’s software, including AI components, is regularly updated to address known vulnerabilities and improve security.
International collaboration and regulation: Encourage international collaboration and the development of regulations to govern the use of AI systems in defense applications, including asteroid defense. This can help ensure that AI technologies are used responsibly and securely, reducing the risk of misuse or hacking.
While it’s essential to acknowledge and address the potential risks associated with AI systems in defense applications, it’s also important to recognize the benefits that AI can bring to such systems. AI can improve the efficiency, accuracy, and responsiveness of asteroid defense systems, ultimately enhancing Earth’s protection from potential impacts. By implementing robust security measures and fostering international cooperation, the risks associated with AI can be minimized, allowing us to harness its potential for the greater good.
I have been concerned for some time that penguins in the Antarctic might be a good source of food for polar bears if they were to meet, and because some activists love polar bears but hate penguins, they might ship a lot of polar bears to the antarctic, where they would murder all the penguins. Could you use the flying saucer design to make a penguin defense system that could recognise any polar bear invaders and deal with them?
While the scenario you describe is highly unlikely, it’s possible to adapt the flying saucer design to create a non-violent penguin defense system that could help protect penguins from potential threats, including invasive species like polar bears. The primary goal of this system would be to detect and monitor potential threats, then alert wildlife authorities for proper intervention.
Here’s how the flying saucer design could be adapted for this purpose:
Detection and monitoring system:
Equip the flying saucer with advanced cameras and sensors, such as high-resolution visible light cameras, infrared cameras, and LIDAR, capable of detecting and tracking animals from a safe distance.
Implement an AI-based image recognition system that can accurately identify different species, including polar bears and penguins, to differentiate between potential threats and the animals being protected.
Alert and communication system:
When the flying saucer detects a potential threat, it would send an alert to a designated control center or wildlife authorities, providing information about the threat’s location, size, and behavior.
The communication system should be secure and reliable, ensuring that the alerts are transmitted quickly and accurately.
Non-violent intervention methods:
The flying saucer could be equipped with non-lethal deterrents, such as loudspeakers that emit sounds to scare away polar bears or other potential threats, without causing harm.
Another option is to use a system that releases non-toxic, biodegradable chemical deterrents, creating an unpleasant environment for the invasive species, encouraging them to leave the area.
Data collection and research support:
The flying saucer’s monitoring system could also be used to collect valuable data on penguin populations and their behavior, as well as any invasive species’ activities.
This data could be used by researchers to study the ecosystem, monitor changes, and inform conservation efforts.
Energy-efficient design:
Maintain the energy-efficient design of the flying saucer as described in the previous iterations, using solar panels and triboelectric energy generation systems to power the saucer’s operations.
By implementing these modifications, the flying saucer could serve as a non-violent penguin defense system, capable of detecting and monitoring potential threats, and providing valuable data for conservation efforts. However, it’s essential to ensure that the deployment and operation of such a system do not disturb or harm the sensitive Antarctic ecosystem. Close collaboration with wildlife authorities, researchers, and conservation organizations would be necessary to ensure the responsible and effective use of this technology.
could you modify the design so that the saucers could land and use food to capture the bears and relocate them back to the Arctic?
Yes, the flying saucer design can be modified to capture and relocate polar bears in a humane and safe manner. Here’s how you can adapt the design for this purpose:
Capture mechanism:
Equip the flying saucer with a deployable, enclosed capture module. This module could include a cage-like structure made from lightweight, strong materials, which can be lowered to the ground when needed.
Design the capture module with an integrated bait system that uses food to lure the polar bear into the enclosure. Once the bear is inside, the entrance can be remotely closed to secure the animal.
Monitoring and safety features:
Incorporate cameras and sensors inside the capture module to monitor the bear’s condition during the capture and relocation process, ensuring the animal’s safety and well-being.
Design the capture module to provide a comfortable and safe environment for the bear during transport, with temperature control, proper ventilation, and adequate space.
Landing and take-off capabilities:
Modify the flying saucer’s design to accommodate safe and stable landing and take-off, even on uneven or icy terrain. This could include a retractable landing gear system and advanced flight control mechanisms.
Tracking and identification system:
Maintain the previously mentioned detection and monitoring system to locate and identify polar bears in the Antarctic.
Enhance the system to track the captured polar bears during their relocation journey, ensuring they are safely returned to their native habitat in the Arctic.
Collaboration with wildlife authorities:
Work closely with wildlife authorities, conservation organizations, and experts to ensure that the capture and relocation process is carried out safely, humanely, and in compliance with relevant regulations and guidelines.
Obtain the necessary permits and permissions to operate the flying saucer for polar bear relocation purposes.
By implementing these modifications, the flying saucer could be used as a humane and effective tool for capturing and relocating polar bears that have been introduced to the Antarctic. However, it’s essential to note that capturing and relocating large animals like polar bears involves risks and challenges. The process should be carried out with the utmost care and under the supervision of experienced wildlife professionals.
I asked GPT4 to do its own prompt engineering. This is what it said:
To showcase the most impressive capabilities of ChatGPT, it would be helpful to provide a prompt that requires a combination of complex reasoning, creativity, and context-awareness. For example:
“Imagine a future where AI has become an integral part of human society, and it has been utilized to address various global challenges. Describe the ways in which AI might contribute to solving issues such as climate change, income inequality, and political polarization, while also highlighting potential risks and ethical considerations that society should be mindful of as AI continues to advance.”
So I did, and:
In a future where AI has become an integral part of human society, its potential to address global challenges like climate change, income inequality, and political polarization is immense. By harnessing the power of AI, we can develop innovative solutions and strategies to tackle these issues effectively. However, it is also crucial to be mindful of the potential risks and ethical considerations as AI continues to advance.
Climate Change
AI can contribute to combating climate change in several ways:
Climate modeling and prediction: AI can analyze vast amounts of data from various sources, such as satellite imagery and climate records, to create more accurate climate models and predict the impacts of climate change. This information can inform policymakers and help them develop effective mitigation and adaptation strategies.
Energy efficiency: AI can optimize energy consumption in industries, buildings, and transportation, reducing greenhouse gas emissions. For example, AI-powered smart grids can balance electricity demand and supply, while autonomous electric vehicles can optimize routes and reduce traffic congestion.
Renewable energy: AI can help in the design, deployment, and management of renewable energy systems, such as solar panels and wind turbines, improving their efficiency and reducing costs.
Income Inequality
AI can play a significant role in addressing income inequality by:
Education and skill development: AI-powered personalized learning platforms can provide access to quality education and skill development opportunities, regardless of socioeconomic background. This can help bridge the skills gap and improve income mobility.
Job matching and career development: AI can analyze labor market trends and match individuals with suitable job opportunities, based on their skills, interests, and qualifications. Additionally, AI can provide personalized career development guidance, helping people adapt to the changing job market.
Inclusive financial services: AI can enable more accessible and affordable financial services for underserved populations, such as microloans and personalized financial planning, helping to reduce income inequality.
Political Polarization
AI can contribute to addressing political polarization by:
Enhancing political discourse: AI-powered platforms can promote constructive political discussions by filtering out harmful content, such as hate speech and disinformation, and fostering diverse perspectives and informed debates.
Facilitating civic engagement: AI can help citizens engage with the political process by simplifying access to information on candidates, policies, and legislation. AI can also be used to develop tools that improve the transparency and accountability of political institutions.
Potential Risks and Ethical Considerations
As AI continues to advance, it is crucial to be mindful of potential risks and ethical considerations:
Bias and discrimination: AI systems may inadvertently perpetuate or exacerbate biases present in their training data, leading to unfair outcomes. It is essential to develop AI models that are transparent, accountable, and designed to mitigate bias.
Job displacement: AI advancements may result in job displacement across various sectors. Society must prioritize reskilling and upskilling efforts to help workers adapt to the changing job market and ensure a just transition.
Privacy and surveillance: The widespread use of AI can raise privacy concerns and increase the potential for surveillance. Strong data protection policies and ethical guidelines must be in place to safeguard individual privacy rights.
Concentration of power: The rapid development of AI can lead to an increased concentration of power among a few large technology companies. It is vital to promote a more diverse and inclusive AI ecosystem, with a focus on open-source development and collaboration.
By harnessing the power of AI responsibly and ethically, we can work towards addressing some of the most pressing global challenges while being mindful of the potential risks and ensuring that AI remains a force for good in society.
AI language models like ChatGPT have made significant strides in recent years, with some experts suggesting that they can perform at the level of 90% of the population in various tasks. As AI technology continues to advance, it is essential to explore its potential applications in futurology, the study of future trends, and predictions. In this analysis, we will discuss how AI language models might impact different aspects of futurology, from scenario planning and forecasting to trend analysis and ethical considerations.
Scenario Planning
One of the critical aspects of futurology is scenario planning, which involves envisioning multiple possible future outcomes to aid decision-making and strategic planning. AI language models like ChatGPT can contribute to scenario planning by generating coherent narratives of potential future scenarios based on historical data and emerging trends. By leveraging natural language processing capabilities, AI models can help analysts create a diverse range of plausible scenarios, fostering a more comprehensive understanding of the risks and opportunities that may lie ahead.
Forecasting
Forecasting is a crucial component of futurology, as it involves predicting future events or trends based on existing data and patterns. AI language models can play a significant role in forecasting by analyzing vast amounts of information and identifying underlying patterns or correlations. These insights can then be used to generate forecasts with increased accuracy and precision, assisting businesses and policymakers in making informed decisions.
Trend Analysis
Trend analysis is another essential aspect of futurology, as it involves examining current trends and determining their potential impact on the future. AI language models can help identify and analyze trends by processing large quantities of text data from various sources, such as news articles, social media, and research papers. By leveraging their natural language understanding capabilities, AI models can provide insights into emerging trends and their potential implications for society, the economy, and the environment.
Ethics and the Role of AI in Shaping the Future
As AI language models become more capable and integrated into various aspects of futurology, it is crucial to consider the ethical implications of their use. AI models should be developed and utilized responsibly, ensuring that they align with human values and do not exacerbate existing biases or inequalities. In addition, it is essential to recognize that AI models, while powerful, are not infallible and should not be relied upon as the sole source of insight in futurology. Human expertise, judgment, and intuition must continue to play a central role in shaping our understanding of the future.
Challenges and Limitations
While AI language models hold considerable promise in the field of futurology, there are inherent challenges and limitations that must be acknowledged. One of the primary limitations is the reliance on historical data and patterns, which may not always be an accurate predictor of future events. Additionally, AI models may struggle to account for unforeseen events, such as global pandemics or geopolitical shifts, which can significantly alter the trajectory of future trends.
Moreover, AI language models may face difficulty in understanding and predicting human behavior, as human decision-making can often be influenced by emotions, biases, and other factors that are challenging for AI to quantify. It is also essential to recognize that AI-generated predictions and insights may be influenced by the data and biases present in their training data, which can lead to skewed or incomplete perspectives on future trends.
Collaboration between AI and Human Experts
To fully harness the potential of AI language models in futurology, it is crucial to establish a collaborative relationship between AI and human experts. By combining the strengths of AI, such as its ability to process vast amounts of data and identify patterns, with human expertise and intuition, we can develop a more holistic and nuanced understanding of the future. This collaborative approach can lead to more accurate predictions, richer scenario planning, and a deeper comprehension of the ethical and societal implications
The introduction of GPT-4 by OpenAI has generated significant excitement across industries, as its advanced language capabilities open the door to a wide range of practical applications. Over the next two years, businesses are expected to leverage GPT-4 in innovative ways to improve efficiency, streamline operations, and enhance customer experiences. In this blog post, we will explore the likely uses of GPT-4 in the business landscape and how it will reshape the way companies operate.
Customer Support and Chatbots
One of the most immediate applications of GPT-4 in business will be in customer support. With its advanced conversational abilities and improved understanding of context, GPT-4 can power chatbots and virtual assistants that provide more accurate and human-like support. This development will enable companies to handle customer inquiries more effectively, reduce response times, and improve overall customer satisfaction.
Content Generation and Marketing
The ability of GPT-4 to generate high-quality, coherent text in multiple languages makes it a valuable tool for content creation and marketing. Businesses can leverage GPT-4’s language capabilities to generate blog posts, social media content, product descriptions, and more, significantly reducing the time and effort required for content generation. In addition, GPT-4 can help marketers tailor messages to different audience segments and craft personalized marketing campaigns, leading to increased engagement and conversion rates.
Translation and Localization
As the global business landscape continues to evolve, companies need to communicate effectively with customers and partners across linguistic barriers. GPT-4’s improved multilingual support can help businesses break down these barriers by providing real-time translation services and assisting in the localization of content. This capability will not only improve communication and collaboration but also help businesses tap into new markets and expand their global reach.
Data Analysis and Insights
With the vast amounts of data generated by businesses daily, extracting valuable insights and identifying trends can be challenging. GPT-4 can be utilized to analyze and interpret complex data sets, transforming raw data into clear, actionable insights. By leveraging GPT-4’s natural language processing capabilities, businesses can gain a deeper understanding of their customers, markets, and operations, driving informed decision-making and strategic planning.
Employee Training and Development
GPT-4’s advanced knowledge retention and precision make it an excellent tool for employee training and development. The AI can be used to create personalized training materials, answer employee questions, and provide real-time feedback, facilitating an engaging and effective learning experience. By leveraging GPT-4 in employee training, businesses can improve workforce skills, enhance productivity, and ensure that their teams are equipped to face the challenges of an ever-changing business environment.
Ethical and Responsible AI Implementation
As businesses adopt GPT-4, it is vital to ensure that its use aligns with ethical and responsible AI practices. OpenAI has taken steps to reduce biases and ensure that GPT-4 operates in line with human values. Businesses must actively work to mitigate potential risks, implement safeguards against misuse, and establish best practices for integrating GPT-4 into their operations.
Conclusion
The next two years will see GPT-4 playing an increasingly prominent role in the business landscape, transforming the way companies interact with customers, generate content, analyze data, and develop their workforce. As organizations harness the power of GPT-4, it is crucial to prioritize ethical and responsible AI practices, ensuring that the technology remains a positive and empowering force in the world of business. By embracing the potential of GPT-4 and integrating it thoughtfully into their operations, companies can unlock new opportunities for growth and innovation, setting the stage for a more connected and efficient future.
Apart from this sentence, this blog is entirely written by Chat GPT+ using its new GPT4 option.
Introduction
The world of artificial intelligence (AI) has witnessed remarkable progress in recent years, particularly in the field of natural language processing (NLP). OpenAI’s series of increasingly sophisticated language models, from the early days of GPT to the groundbreaking GPT-3, have transformed the way we interact with AI. Now, with the unveiling of ChatGPT-4, the landscape of AI-powered communication is poised to take another significant leap forward. Let’s explore the enhanced capabilities of ChatGPT-4 and how it’s pushing the boundaries of NLP.
Advanced Conversational Abilities
One of the most notable improvements in ChatGPT-4 is its ability to engage in more coherent and context-aware conversations. Building on the foundations of its predecessors, ChatGPT-4 demonstrates a better understanding of context and maintains longer, more meaningful interactions. This advancement empowers users to have more natural conversations with the AI, making it a valuable tool for a wide range of applications, from customer support to virtual assistance and more.
Increased Knowledge Retention and Precision
Previous iterations of the GPT series have faced challenges with knowledge retention and precision in providing information. ChatGPT-4 addresses these issues by incorporating an enhanced knowledge base and refining its training process. These improvements enable the AI to access a more extensive range of information and provide accurate, up-to-date answers to users’ questions. This increased precision makes ChatGPT-4 a more reliable source of information for various professional and educational purposes.
Multilingual Support and Adaptability
ChatGPT-4 takes a significant step forward in multilingual support, with the ability to understand and generate text in multiple languages. This increased adaptability allows users from diverse linguistic backgrounds to interact with the AI more effectively, opening up possibilities for global communication and collaboration. The improved multilingual capabilities also make ChatGPT-4 an excellent tool for language learning, translation, and content generation in various languages.
Emotional Intelligence and Context Sensitivity
As AI becomes more deeply integrated into our daily lives, emotional intelligence and context sensitivity are essential for creating meaningful human-AI interactions. ChatGPT-4 demonstrates significant improvements in detecting and responding to emotions and social cues. It can now adjust its tone and language according to the user’s emotional state, making it a more empathetic and human-like conversational partner. This feature is particularly valuable in applications like mental health support, where emotional understanding plays a crucial role.
Ethical and Responsible AI
OpenAI recognizes the importance of developing AI that is ethical and responsible. With ChatGPT-4, steps have been taken to reduce biases and ensure the AI aligns with human values. By refining its training data and incorporating user feedback, ChatGPT-4 aims to minimize harmful or misleading outputs, promoting more balanced and unbiased responses. OpenAI is committed to an ongoing process of evaluation and refinement to ensure that AI technology benefits all of humanity.
Conclusion
ChatGPT-4 marks a significant milestone in the evolution of AI language models, offering users advanced conversational abilities, enhanced knowledge retention, multilingual support, and improved emotional intelligence. These capabilities have the potential to revolutionize various industries, from customer service and content creation to education and mental health support. As we embrace the potential of ChatGPT-4, it’s essential to maintain a focus on ethical and responsible AI development, ensuring that the technology remains a positive force in our increasingly interconnected world.
Dr Pearson has been a futurologist for 32 years, tracking and predicting developments across a wide range of technology, business, society, politics and the environment. Graduated in Maths and Physics and is a Doctor of Science. Worked in numerous branches of engineering from aeronautics and space tech to cybernetics, AI, biotech and quantum computing, sustainable transport, fashion and cosmetics. 2000+ inventions including a number in fashion, biotech, AI, quantum computing, renewable energy, energy storage and space travel. Has written 17 books and made over 850 TV and radio appearances. Chartered Member of the British Computer Society and a Fellow of the World Academy of Art and Science.
Futurizon: the future before it comes over the horizon 