UPDATED: No offense, but what the hell is wrong with US troops in Iraq? Have they gone insane from the stress? Who in their right minds thinks that capturing Reuters reporters, making them stick their finger up their ass and then licking it is a good idea???
In the very near future, technologies will exist for the production of free energy (zero point, cold fusion, whatever). At about the same time, devices will be produced that are extremely advanced versions of current rapid prototyping machines — that is, a machine that can build any other machine (or object). This is an inevitability. Combine these things and everything is free and we can do anything we want.
However, that doesn't mean that all of a sudden we have an egalitarian world and everything is Gene Roddenberry perfect and happy and free. Even though most of us probably want it, we can't all have a private island and a 1000 ft. yacht. The world isn't that large. So we have to ask ourselves, what will happen when the wealthy — the first recipients of this technology — actually receive it? What will they do with infinite assets and infinite power? What will they do when they realize that they have less than a month before nearly everyone on the planet has similar power, and that even in a best case scenario, there will be world war to control the assets of the planet?
It's obvious, isn't it? They will immediately and decisively launch all-out attacks on everyone below them. It is the only way they can survive. Hunter-killer robots, bio-weapons, wholesale nuclear strikes on poor countries. It's the only thing they can do. And even among themselves they'll fight, until only a few dozen are still alive, incredibly powerful, fabulously wealthy, and terribly lonely. They'll tour the continents of the planet in beautiful airships and transform it into a paradise.
The above is utterly unavoidable and it is extremely unlikely for it to play out any other way… And even if the play is slightly different, this is the only logical end to this phase in human evolution. Enjoy every day you have left. If you're going to have your guts ripped out by an android on December 16th, 2006, and there's nothing you can do to stop it, you might as well have fun until then… either that or figure out how to get very rich soon.
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