{"id":1492,"date":"2011-12-15T11:33:07","date_gmt":"2011-12-15T11:33:07","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.soton.ac.uk\/comp6044\/?p=1492"},"modified":"2011-12-15T11:33:07","modified_gmt":"2011-12-15T11:33:07","slug":"future-society-vi","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blog.soton.ac.uk\/comp6044\/2011\/12\/15\/future-society-vi\/","title":{"rendered":"Future Society VI"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n

The only constant is change.<\/em> Heraclitus, 500 BC<\/p>\n

A global crisis<\/a> was predicted by Prof Beddington at the Sustainable Development UK 2009 conference because of the 50% food and energy jump, rise of 30%\u00a0 of fresh water need and climate change by 2030 when the population will reach 8 billion. The United Nations Environment Programme predicts widespread water shortages across Africa, Europe and Asia by 2025. The amount of fresh water available per head of the population is expected to decline sharply in that time.<\/em><\/p>\n

In the introduction of the Future Society envisioned by the Science Community <\/a>report the following problems are identified:\u00a0 In its \u201cJapan Vision 2050\u201d, the Science Council of Japan (SCJ) points to \u201cglobal environmental degradation\u201d, \u201cpopulation growth\u201d and \u201cthe widening North-South divide\u201d as major global problems of the 21st century that seriously threaten the sustainability of human society. As a way of solving these global problems, the SCJ proposes that steps should be taken to achieve a \u201cbalance<\/em> between environment and economy<\/em>\u201c. In recent years, the creation of innovations has been attracting interest in many countries. This is due to the expectation that breakthroughs forged by science, technology and innovation could solve these major global problems of the 21st century, and could achieve sustainability for humankind.<\/em><\/p>\n

The ideal society envisioned in the year 2025 will be a society in which people can live in health and safety, a society in which highly advanced information technology (IT) systems are widely used, a society in which Nature has been restored and local communities revitalized, a society in which efforts are made to solve the problems of the global environment and energy, and a society in which a suitable response has been found for the problems of water and food supply. This Report highlights innovations that should be promoted with a view to realizing this vision.<\/em><\/p>\n

The suggested solutions are presented in 2 chapters out of which we only selected some of them:<\/p>\n

    \n
  1. The ideal society of the future and the innovations to be promoted
    \nTo achieve a society in which everybody can live in good health by the year 2025, society will need to be given the means to address the problems of declining birthrates, aging and population shrinkage.<\/em>
    \nBiotechnology, information technology, and others must be integrated with a view to creating innovations that offer sufficient levels of medical and health care.<\/em>
    \nHere, I must add     my short article <\/a>written for the Bionanotechnology lecture about this life-saving technology.<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

    By integrating the development of artificial rainfall technology, desalination plants powered by solar batteries, water-retentive gel technology, and others, it will be possible to prevent desertification and create green areas in deserts.<\/em><\/p>\n

    By launching satellites that can convert solar energy into microwaves and transmitting those microwaves to Earth, photovoltaic power will be generated in outer space and the power used on Earth as a clean and efficient form of energy.<\/em><\/p>\n

    A voice-recognition portable automatic translation device will be developed to assist smooth communication between people from different parts of the world, greatly enhancing cross-cultural understanding.<\/em><\/p>\n

    2. Conditions, environments and systems for creating innovations<\/p>\n

    Deepening our understanding of science and technology, investigating \u201csocial<\/em>
    \ntechnology\u201d and the nature of systems that allow science and technology to fully demonstrate their social character<\/em><\/p>\n

    Teachers\u2019 ability to pass down the pleasure and fun of learning to their students should be fostered<\/em><\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

    The only constant is change. Heraclitus, 500 BC A global crisis was predicted by Prof Beddington at the Sustainable Development UK 2009 conference because of the 50% food and energy jump, rise of 30%\u00a0 of fresh water need and climate change by 2030 when the population will reach 8 billion. The United Nations Environment Programme […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":208,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[264],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1492","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-sociology-discipline"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.soton.ac.uk\/comp6044\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1492","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.soton.ac.uk\/comp6044\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.soton.ac.uk\/comp6044\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.soton.ac.uk\/comp6044\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/208"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.soton.ac.uk\/comp6044\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1492"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/blog.soton.ac.uk\/comp6044\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1492\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1494,"href":"https:\/\/blog.soton.ac.uk\/comp6044\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1492\/revisions\/1494"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.soton.ac.uk\/comp6044\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1492"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.soton.ac.uk\/comp6044\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1492"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.soton.ac.uk\/comp6044\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1492"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}