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Up until a few decades ago, our visions of the future were largely —though by no means uniformly — glowingly positive. Science and technology wouldcure all the ills of humanity, leading to lives of fulfillment and opportunityfor all.
Now utopia has grown unfashionable, as we have gained a deeperappreciation of the range of threats facing us, from asteroid strike toepidemic flu to climate change. You might even be tempted to assume thathumanity has little future to look forward to.
But such gloominess is misplaced. The fossil record shows that manyspecies have endured for millions of years — so why shouldn’t we? Take abroader look at our species’ place in the universe, and it becomes clear thatwe have an excellent chance of surviving for tens, if not hundreds, ofthousands of years. Look upHomo sapiensinthe “Red List” of threatened species of the International Union for theConversation of Nature (IUCN), and you will read: “Listed as Least Concern asthe species is very widely distributed, adaptable, currently increasing, andthere are no major threats resulting in an overall population decline.”
So what does our deep future hold? A growing number of researchersand organisations are now thinking seriously about that question. For example,the Long Now Foundation has as its flagship project a mechanical clock that isdesigned to still be marking time thousands of years hence.
Perhaps willfully, it may be easier to think about such lengthytimescales than about the more immediate future. The potential evolution oftoday’s technology, and its social consequences, is dazzlingly complicated, andit’s perhaps best left to science fiction writers and futurologists to explorethe many possibilities we can envisage. That’s one reason why we have launchedArc, a new publication dedicated to thenear future.
But take a longer view and there is a surprising amount that we cansay with considerable assurance. As so often, the past holds the key to thefuture: we have now identified enough of the long-term patterns shaping thehistory of the planet, and our species, to make evidence-based forecasts aboutthe situations in which our descendants will find themselves.
This long perspective makes the pessimistic view of our prospectsseem more likely to be a passing fad. To be sure, the future is not all rosy.But we are now knowledgeable enough to reduce many of the risks that threatenedthe existence of earlier humans, and to improve the lot of those to come.
31. Our vision of the future used to beinspired by
[A] our desire for lives of fulfillment.
[B] our faith in science and technology.
[C] our awareness of potential risks.
[D] our belief in equal opportunity.
32. The IUCN’s “RedList” suggests that human beings are
[A] a sustained species.
[B] a threat to the environment.
[C] the world’s dominant power.
[D] a misplaced race.
33. Which of thefollowing is true according to Paragraph 5?
[A] Arc helps limit the scope of futurologicalstudies.
[B] Technology offers solutions to socialproblem.
[C] The interest in science fiction is on therise.
[D] Our immediate future is hard to conceive.
34. To ensure thefuture of mankind, it is crucial to
[A] explore our planet’s abundant resources.
[B] adopt an optimistic view of the world.
[C] draw on our experience from the past.
[D] curb our ambition to reshape history.
35. Which of the followingwould be the best title for the text?
[A] Uncertainty about Our Future
[B] Evolution of the Human Species
[C] The Ever-bright Prospects of Mankind
[D] Science, Technology and Humanity
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