As I understand it, according to Star Trek canon, once that hippy guy makes faster-than-light travel work, we will be contacted by the Vulcans. The Vulcans are a few jumps ahead of us on the technology ladder. They share all their goodies.
In Enterprise, Captain Archer says it took mankind seventy-five years to solve all the world’s problems and get ready for deep space travel.
The Vulcans give us room-terperature fusion, engines that can travel at some fraction of the speed of light, other stuff I cannot think of. (Oddly no Holidecks or transporter beams.)
Technology is important of course, but so is the certain knowledge that there are other people out there, and that we can travel to the stars.
Given all that, what would mankind go about solving all the world’s problems?
Do you mean, HOW would mankind solve all its problems?
Well, with cold fusion and replicators, we would have a source of energy that, for all intents and purposes, is inexhaustible; and then we could turn that into chinos, hot dogs and Pabst Blue Ribbon, thereby eliminating hunger, poverty, and all world strife!
As an individual, I’m working on solving my problems but promise as soon as I’m finished, I’ll begin solving the world’s problems and them move on to tackling what the universe has to offer. Just be patient.
Limited energy is key, but in truth we have no way to make electricity into fish and chips, let alone chinos. Further does giving everyone everything they want solve problems? Somebody would probably want my head on a stick after all.
If we fix Africa for the Africans, we screw it up for European tourists. One choice precludes another.
It seems that as technology advances we do tend to solve our problems better. Many of our health problems are either solved or improved compared to 200 years ago. Poverty isn’t the issue it once was, fewer people are hungry or poor. According to Steven Pinker violence rates keep going down.
I’m guessing it is the same basic trendline. The world gets better in its level of education, medicine, science, technology, media transparency, etc. and uses that to solve its problems like we’ve been doing. But I don’t know why meeting the vulcans would be such an important step, unless they tell us how to solve all our problems.
However that doesn’t explain how ethnic or religious strife would be solved. Or constant criminal activity that isn’t done for money (sexual abuse as an example).
Huh, I don’t know who Tommy Shaw is, but that doesn’t make sense to me.
The busier you are, the less time you have to sit around and think about the people you hate, the things you want to steal, the people you want to make war with.
Look at it this way - how would Man behave if there was freedom from want?
In Star Trek, Roddenberry posited that with superior healthcare, plentiful replicated food and low/no-cost energy, the underlying causes of war, poverty, starvation, etc. would disappear in 75 years.
In The Matrix, Agent Smith shares that the first attempts at the Matrix failed - “whole crops were lost” - because humans couldn’t process a world without need and imbalance.
Utopian vs. Dystopian out of the same root cause - and both make great stories.
Tommy Shaw, member of Styx, wrote the song Too Much Time On My Hands off the album Paradise Theatre. At one point in the lyric, the person who feels they are frittering their life away thinks about using the time to become president, solve the world’s problems, etc. - all a way of highlighting how meaningless the current life of the character is…
If we can make a society without want, and everyone’s basic needs are fulfilled, then that would do a lot in stabilizing mankind. I imagine that with the tech the Vulcans gave us, we were able to slow but gradually eliminate poverty and hunger for everyone, not just the haves. I would guess that for a lot of people, that’s all they really need, a roof over their heads, clothes, and enough food to be happy.
The existence of aliens also throws a lot of old superstitions and religions out the window, as they would be essentially proven false. Given how much I think religion contributes to world suffering, I would happily imagine that occurrence.
The reason this world failed is that people woke up, since the Matrix is fake. Assuming we don’t live in a simulation, dissatisfaction wouldn’t wake us up from this existence. Possibly given 75 years, we could somehow learn to deal with utopia. On the other hand, if Matrix people just suddenly started to off themselves, if that happened in this world, well, that’s just a self solving problem.
