We have the brains and energy and passion to solve alternative energy, vertical farming, asteroid mining, carbon sequestration, and social democracy overnight1) Alternative Energy has a lot of minds working on it already. Success is dependent on the establishment of large scale infrastructure and changing societal expectations. One "Ah-Ha!" moment isn't going to cut it.
2) Vertical Farming is a world-saving problem that needs solving? Color me skeptical.
3) Asteroid Mining: Also requires establishment of large scale infrastructure.
4) Carbon Sequestration: The laws of thermodynamics are against you on this, unless you can marshal self-replicators harvesting a significant portion of the sunlight falling on the Earth. If we've gotten that desperate, it must mean that building sunshades at L1 has been made unavailable by groundside politics and/or the Kessler Syndrome.
5) Social Democracy Overnight: Why is this desirable, outside of theory? The whole of history indicates to us that collectivism works either on small scales, or as a disguised totalitarianism.
projects that generate capital for the already wealthy instead of promoting one iota of social good
Is that what the Industrial Revolution was? Or has industrialization raised 90% of the world's population out of poverty? Hint: It's the latter.
Another hint: Has there ever been a collection of intelligent, privileged young people who thought they could change the world into a utopia? I think you might want to study the history a bit. There was one utopian project which was implemented by privileged intellectuals, but which was also based on a good knowledge of history and human nature. Though flawed, that project worked, did some good, and has been going on for well over 200 years.
1) Alternative Energy has a lot of minds working on it already. Success is dependent on the establishment of large scale infrastructure and changing societal expectations. One "Ah-Ha!" moment isn't going to cut it.
2) Vertical Farming is a world-saving problem that needs solving? Color me skeptical.
3) Asteroid Mining: Also requires establishment of large scale infrastructure.
4) Carbon Sequestration: The laws of thermodynamics are against you on this, unless you can marshal self-replicators harvesting a significant portion of the sunlight falling on the Earth. If we've gotten that desperate, it must mean that building sunshades at L1 has been made unavailable by groundside politics and/or the Kessler Syndrome.
5) Social Democracy Overnight: Why is this desirable, outside of theory? The whole of history indicates to us that collectivism works either on small scales, or as a disguised totalitarianism.
projects that generate capital for the already wealthy instead of promoting one iota of social good
Is that what the Industrial Revolution was? Or has industrialization raised 90% of the world's population out of poverty? Hint: It's the latter.
Another hint: Has there ever been a collection of intelligent, privileged young people who thought they could change the world into a utopia? I think you might want to study the history a bit. There was one utopian project which was implemented by privileged intellectuals, but which was also based on a good knowledge of history and human nature. Though flawed, that project worked, did some good, and has been going on for well over 200 years.