So here we are.
2015
When I was a child I thought 2015 would be a grad year of a shining future- spaceships and aircars and personal servant robots.
When I was a teen I thought it would be full of adventures and gritty noir.
When I finally was an adult and impartially assessed the future from every point of view I could find, especially with an eye to the long term historical perspective, I doubted our civilization would be able to get to that year without major alterations.
I was at least partially right on all counts.
'Robot servants' and 'Space ship liners' are no longer on the drawing board but actually in production for those with enough money to afford them.
Their is plenty of 'adventure' if you want to behave dishonorably and risk death while selling poisons on the corners of ghettos slum neighborhoods.
And our civilization has had a major transformation from enshrining personal freedom to attempting to ensure communal security.
The whole edifice of our global society has been altered beyond belief in so many ways by so many competing interests that predictions for the future can only paint the broadest outlines.
For this year--- I don't see any major unexpected black swans about to land on our heads.
Our civilization is going to keep on going the way it has - an incremental worsening of conditions for most and shiny improvements for a few.
I doubt OPEC will be able to keep oil (and thus energy) prices depressed much beyond 2016, but they will try to keep them down for as long as possible to punish those nations and companies that might try to compete with them.
I expect that in spite of (or perhaps because of) the reduced energy prices, the employment picture will not get much better for much of the USA and the world.
Countries already suffering civil disorder will slid into all out revolution and civil war, countries merely suffering protests will begin suffering civil disorder, etc, etc. At least for the most part. Places will burn out and settle on a new normal in a few of the places (the Ukraine perhaps?)
Ebola and other diseases will erupt to new levels of fatality world wide but not enough so to cause the gears of civilization to completely stop (not in 2015 at least).
I am expecting the prices of many key components of life, thanks to the OPEC price war, to not ratchet up too much faster than they have been, but I don't expect very many falls in prices either, anything of the sort will be countered by US printing presses trying to get the real rate of inflation into the 5-9% range.
I expect that, personally, I will be getting more exercise (by working toward my off grid home) and eating a healthier diet (partially from price issues and partially by choice).
I am hoping to put off my bankruptcy until 2016. We will see.
I am also hoping to get in a rain fed cistern, an excavation for a pond, a culvert and ditches for the drive way, and the excavating of the building site of phase 1 of our hobbit hut done. We will see about that too.
I don't expect to be buying any robot or taking even an airline flight, much less a space flight, any time soon. I expect that any 'adventures' I have will be more suffered through than enjoyed, and I expect, at least locally the collapse of western civilization will continue to seem a lot farther off (even though it is hurtling toward us all like an express train).
Buckle up, remember to enjoy the ride and laugh at the absurdity of it all.
