What will the 2030s be like? - Could I even imagine how painful and horrific it might be?

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Probably even worse than now.

If collapse or human extinction haven't happened, the world will likely be closer to the "New World Order" of miserable pod-living, bug-eating, cybernetic serfs under an (even more) tyrannical globalist elite. And who knows just how crazy people could be then, even if the Western pendulum swings back from Clown World. The 2030s could be insanely far right, or an even more insane left.

One thing is sure: optimism for the future from the 20th century was wrecked by the reality of how flawed Homo sapiens are, and with 9/11. Too many blind followers and jerks don't make a good world.

Then again, something unexpected could happen that make the 2030s better.
 
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Aqua Panda said:
Depends on if we get a major conservative backlash to current day stuff. Kinda like how the 1980's Conservative wave was a big "fuck off" to the 1960's-1970's in a lot of ways. I personally doubt it at this point, but it could happen. (News media and academia is just WAY too dominated by the extreme left these days, but stranger things have happened when generations shift.)

We are going to have another major housing bubble pop sometime this decade. Inflation is shooting through the roof and we are on the verge of a major housing crisis starting in a few days when the Covid eviction moratoriums expire at the end of July. IMO the early 2030's will be a lot like 2009-2012 in dealing with the fallout and recovery. I really worry that the middle class will continue to shrink and the USA will become a nation of renters and landlords. (Which should be terrifying to anyone who knows how important a viable middle class is to a stable society. Unless something really major shifts, I'm expecting company towns to effectively come back in a big way through big tech.) Inflation is also really going to hurt people. I don't think a lot of people realize just how many will likely end up homeless when their spending power means jack with rents & food skyrocketing. Crime and theft is already starting to shoot up and it's going to get even worse when people are hungry and desperate. A LOT of people will basically decide to become monsters since current woke society already tells them they are and they have nothing to lose anymore.

China will likely get drunk on power when they become the #1 world economy if the projections hold true. They'll start throwing their weight around more. Especially in the South China Sea and Taiwan. However, I honestly expect the CCP to implode at some point. A LOT of their real economy is a house of cards and built on corruption and shoddy workmanship. Also, more and more of the Han Chinese have gotten a taste of a modern day middle class lifestyle and they like it. They will start to demand change and the CCP won't be able to Tienanmen Square it every time.

Russia is an open question. Putin is a dictator in all but name at this point and much will depend on his eventual successor. Either his current grip on power will remain with his eventual chosen prodigy or things will destabilize as a power vacuum opens up upon his death. (Or eventual infirmity if the Parkinson's rumors are true.)

I could go on and spitball for awhile, but those are the major Geo-political issues that are likely to spring up. Climate change is also going to become a bigger and bigger issue if temperature extremes keep getting worse. We got dangerously close to a few power grid failures when the west coast had the extreme heat domes earlier in the summer.
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You are a gentlemen and a scholar sir. I see these things myself, or at least I recognize what you are saying from the pieces of information I thought was true. I spot nothing wrong with your analysis except that it is prophetic. Too many spinning plates. Too many variables. Let a real professional take the helm.

Still, something is coming to a terrible head and everyone in charge talking about "sustainability" is acting like a schizophrenic on a bender.
 
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Just some random musings about politics and technology:

I'm cautiously optimistic since the first producers are moving away from the woke BS again. Guess caving to non-customers while driving away your fanbase wasn't a successful business model. The rate at which IPs are being ruined still outpaces this new development, but it's a start.

As someone who hates driving I welcome the advent of electric self-driving cars. It'll suck for everyone in the transportation industry though. I could even imagine that human-operated household cars might be banned from habitually congested inner cities.

China is a coin toss. They are pissing off other countries and public opinion is turning against them almost everywhere. But even amidst an ongoing genocide including concentration camps companies are still scrambling to suck up to them. That said, their demographic collapse after decades of the 1 child policy is drawing near and they have no way of preventing it. Huge parts of their workforce will retire at once with nobody to replace them, crippling their productivity and economy at once. With no retirement or welfare programs, uncle Xi may be dragged from his palace and consumed by angry senior citizens.

We may see another 9/11 with Afghanistan falling back into Taliban hands. Not necessarily in the US, but I'm almost certain it'll happen somewhere.

With ITER nearing completion we have a better shot at figuring out fusion power than we've had for decades, but I still don't think it likely to work. Personally, I hope to see space based solar farms, enabled through a cheaper and reusable launch system like Starship.

If global warming continues at the current rate, parts of the Middle East may start becoming completely nonviable for any large scale human habitation not long after 2030, as the Sahara Desert is now.

Basically, if the energy crisis is solved we're good since it takes care of almost every scarcity on Earth. If not, it'll suck.
 
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Some 90s fads will come back and the calendar will change.
I also may need a new liver.

Ten years isn’t going to end the world, it’ll just bring about a new generation of cringey social media kids trying to get famous on an internet that now requires you to verify your identification and forewords all of your postings to your employer.
 
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The future is so dark that you won't need eyes to see.

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