It’s a Singularity: When the number of humans alive will equal the number who have ever died
A number of key technologies are convergent on an inevitable result, which is a dramatic and explosive rise in the human population. Around 40% of Earth’s land is currently used for agricultural production, feeding seven billion people. However, as the population grows, the amount of land required to support this population will shrink, and will eventually be zero to sustain one trillion human lives. Bulk elements like gold will no longer be valuable in this age, as they are so easily produced by fusion separation from bulk rock. Value will instead be placed on biological material, and most importantly, the new technologies themselves.
These key emerging technologies and their impacts are listed below.
The most important thing is fusion power, which can be scaled up and down without requiring any special fuel. It will be possible to contain nearly all of agriculture in \”vertical farms\” that extend thousands of feet down. Cheap artificially-lighted, climate-controlled environments will allow the maximum efficiency for all food crops. Agriculture will cover almost no surface area and be largely produced underground, either on Earth or on the Moon.
2) Crispr-gene-edited foods allow the transformation of thousands currently inedible plant species into new fruits, vegetables, and cereals while also allowing for diversity of existing ones. All food consumed by humans has been genetically altered over thousands of years. This modification will now take place over a few years, instead of thousands.
3) Acellular Agriculture, in which yeasts are genetically engineered to produce proteins and milk without the use of any living mammals. This method was introduced to the market by 2020.
4) Cell-based meat is the production of meat from animals in bioreactors without killing the animals. The choice of meats will be expanded from just a few types of bulk meats, like beef, chicken and pork, to thousands.
5) Microorganism farming. For example, the company \”Solar Foods\”, which uses microorganisms in bioreactors to produce unlimited quantities of carbohydrates, proteins, and fats.
6) The life expectancy has been steadily increasing throughout human history. The average lifespan of humans will increase significantly with new developments in science. This will increase dramatically at some point.
In these circumstances, it is economically necessary to conserve global biodiversity. This diversity will form the basis of all future biological development, and will therefore be a source of value for this era. It will be necessary to keep a large portion of Earth’s surface untamed, and supplement that with countless ecosystems contained throughout the solar systems. Urban areas will merge with vast zones of interconnected \”deer and antlerless antelope\” to form a new bioengineered meat. All wild plants, including antelope, will also be needed as control stock for a parallel bioengineered agriculture system.
Earth and Terraformed Mars
Source:
https://www.facebook.com/photo/?fbid=1490911164634341
