The Future: six drivers of global change Part 16

On the other hand, the increasing interconnections among businesses and industries all over the world has generated powerful commercial momentum that is highly resistant to any effort by governments to rein in its more destructive tendencies. Earth Inc. is now the dominant source of influence over governments. Fortunately, there are a great many examples of the emergence of a global conscience on the Internet that has exerted powerful pressure to correct injustices and moral failures such as child labor, abusive working conditions, false imprisonment, s.e.x slavery, persecution of vulnerable minorities, and destruction of the environment, among other causes.

In some countries, this new emergent capacity for the development of a collective global conscience has also contributed greatly to policies aimed at solving the climate crisis. The number of gra.s.sroots, Internet-based NGOs devoted to safeguarding the ecological system of the Earth has been growing. The remaining question that is crucial to our future is whether the requisite force of truth necessary to bring about a s.h.i.+ft in consciousness powerful enough to change the current course of civilization will emerge in time.

* In the old days before pesticides, farmers understood that turtles, birds, and bats were their friends. To protect the turtles from the plow, farm boys and girls would walk the fields in many areas prior to plowing to rescue turtles. They would put them on fence posts, and after the tilling was done the turtles would be released, generally at sunset.

Additionally, climate alterations caused by changes in the gravitational pull from ice sheets have measurable effects on relative sea level rise in some areas.

Another reason is that at low lat.i.tudes, a much greater fraction of the trapped energy goes into evaporation (evaporative cooling) than into heating the air.

For a larger version of the following image, click here.

CONCLUSION.

"So often do the spirits Of great events stride on before the events, And in today already walks tomorrow."

-SAMUEL TAYLOR COLERIDGE THE PERSONAL JOURNEY I HAVE TAKEN IN WRITING THIS BOOK BEGAN with that single question which demanded an answer more thoughtful than the one I first offered. My search for a better answer has led me to new questions that also demand answers-especially from political, business, civic, and faith leaders around the world.

To begin with, who are we? The initial answer, once again, is readily available: we are h.o.m.o sapiens. "Beings that know." The usual suspects. We have been on a very long journey already-from forests to savannahs to farms to megacities; from two to thousands to millions to billions; from stones to plows to a.s.sembly lines to nan.o.bots; from syllables to encyclopedias to airwaves to the Global Mind; from families to tribes to communities to nations.

But that is the way we have been. Where our journey takes us next will depend upon what kind of beings we humans choose to be. To put it another way, our decision about the way we choose to live will determine whether the journey takes us, or whether we take the journey.

The currents of change are so powerful that some have long since taken their oars out of the water, having decided that it is better to surrender, enjoy the ride, and hope for the best-even as those currents sweep us along faster and faster toward the rapids ahead that are roaring so deafeningly we can hardly hear ourselves think.

"Rapids?" they shout above the din. "What rapids? Don't be ridiculous; there are no rapids. Everything is fine!" There is anger in the shouting, and some who are intimidated by the anger learn never to mention the topic that triggers it. They are browbeaten into keeping the peace by avoiding any mention of the forbidden subject.

For now at least, that is how some in the news media behave. They are terrified to even utter certain words-like "climate," for example-lest they trigger rage from those who don't want to hear about the destructive changes gaining momentum. The result is an almost pathological silence concerning the most important challenges we face, and a dangerous collective disregard for the future consequences of our present actions. But ultimately, that is not really who we are.

Anyone who spends time thinking about the possibilities of a better future must first make an a.s.sumption about human nature. Idealists who want and hope for the best sometimes make the mistake of thinking that intrinsic human nature can change, and will improve according to their hopes. Cynics enjoy catching that mistake and pointing out that human nature doesn't change at all.

My own way of thinking about human nature is neither idealistic nor cynical. I believe there is a difference between intrinsic human nature-which I agree does not change, and the aspects of human nature we routinely express, which can and do change. The 35,000-year-old paintings in the caves at Chauvet, in France, and the figurines made by our ancient ancestors in Eurasia and Africa, clearly reflect a consciousness and sensibility not very different-perhaps not intrinsically different at all-from our own. But in other ways, we are very different indeed.

We are each individuals, but as all of our major faith traditions teach us, we are all connected to one another. And science teaches us that human nature is inherently social. The social groups to which we belong have their own form of evolution. Some behaviors and norms survive from one generation to the next and others are discouraged. Habits and customs become rituals and rules, which evolve over time into cultures, social systems, laws and inst.i.tutions, and which exercise a profound influence over which aspects of human nature we express.

Consider what we have learned about the human genome: even though 99.9 percent of them are identical in every human being, our 23,000 genes-and millions of proteins-contain a universe of possibilities. Some genes are expressed while others remain inchoate, vestigial. Sometimes, capacities that evolved in the distant past are awakened for new purposes when our circ.u.mstances change. Consider also what neuroscientists have learned about the human brain: neuron trees grow dense and vibrant when they are used; others atrophy when they are not.

Some have long believed that the most important strategy for empowering the "better angels of our nature" is education. And while I certainly agree that high-quality, universal education is not only desirable but essential, it is not sufficient. Some of the worst atrocities in human history have been organized and perpetrated by well-educated villains.

Ignorance and misunderstanding are certainly enemies of genuine progress, just as knowledge, integrity, and character are crucial to our success. But the evolution of our collective behaviors, and the emergence of a genuine understanding of how deeply our connected fates are intertwined with the health of the ecological system of the Earth, will depend upon the choices we make about the structure of the systems we use. The way we measure what we do and the results of our actions, the way we communicate with one another, and the incentives and disincentives we build into our political, economic, and social systems all have a powerful influence on the future.

Behaviors that bring rewards become more common. Those that don't diminish. The elements of our nature that are activated by rewarded behaviors gain strength. Social groups establish values that reflect both the behaviors they wish to reward and those they want to discourage. These values become embedded in tribes, communities, nations, economic systems, inst.i.tutions, and cultures.

I fall back on the example that inspired me and has inspired people throughout the world for more than two centuries: the enduring genius of the U.S. Const.i.tution stemmed from its authors' clear-eyed, dead-on understanding of human nature-even though it was limited to white males-and their design of structural safeguards that discouraged the impulse to egotistical power-seeking and incentives that rewarded the impulse to resolve their differences through collective reasoning that maximized the likelihood of creative compromises based on the pursuit of the greater good.

The separation of powers and checks and balances woven into the design of the Const.i.tution embodied a sophisticated understanding of how to discourage some behaviors inherent in human nature and encourage positive ones instead. Others have tried to structure economic systems with incentives that unleash creativity and dynamism, encourage behaviors deemed of value, and discourage other behaviors that are destructive to the common good.

Over time, we have come to recognize that the way we measure economic value also exerts a kind of evolutionary force on behavior-and that the things not measured at all are ignored as if they have no value, either positive or negative. When we change the measurements of value, the nature of the incentives, and the structure of the systems we use for making political, economic, and social decisions, we inevitably encourage the expression of some aspects of human nature and discourage others. So while intrinsic human nature may not change, the expressions of human nature-the aspects of our nature manifested in our behaviors and choices-can and do change readily in response to the incentives we establish as a basis for civilization. And they shape our future.

If we signal to business, for example, that unlimited pollution will incur no cost or penalty, it is of little use to then decry them as immoral when they respond predictably to the incentives we give them. When we signal to our politicians that victory in elections is best a.s.sured by spending most of their time asking for large sums of money from people and corporations that have special agendas for the shaping of public policies after the election, we incentivize politicians to express in their behavior negative aspects of human nature familiar to all of us-because they are intrinsic to all of us-even though most of us suppress them and understand fully why we should be discouraging the soft bribery and betrayal of the public trust that predictably results.

More serious problems arise when those who benefit from these distorted incentives and dysfunctional rules manage to gain sufficient political power to prevent reforms that would encourage the aspects of human nature that we want to see manifested in political and economic decision making.

Long periods of stability, which most of us naturally prefer, can enhance the vulnerability of any political or economic system to exploitation by those who have learned to distort its rules and incentives. Decades ago, the late University of Maryland political economist Mancur Olson published an extensive a.n.a.lysis of how elites in any society come to acc.u.mulate a steadily larger share of wealth and influence, and then use it to block reforms of the incentives and rules that work to their advantage.

Consider the vulnerability of monocultured crops to the steady evolution of pests who learn to circ.u.mvent the natural defenses of the plants to eat their fill. Consider the vulnerability of computer systems to hackers when the pa.s.swords and other safeguards remain unchanged for an extended period of time. The intrinsic nature of the pests doesn't change. Their learned behaviors-and the genes they express-do.

Democracy and capitalism have both been hacked. The results are palpably obvious in the suffocating control of policy decisions by elites, the ever increasing inequalities of income and growing concentrations of wealth, and the paralysis of any efforts at reform. And the public's ability to express their revulsion in more constructive ways, rather than surrendering to cynicism, is dampened by the structure of our dominant means of ma.s.s communication, television, which serves mainly to promote consumption of products and entertain the public, while offering no means for interactive dialogue and collaborative decision making.

Fortunately, the awakening of the Global Mind is disrupting established patterns-creating exciting new opportunities for emergent centers of influence not controlled by elites and the potential for reforms in established dysfunctional behaviors. Yet the emergence of Earth Inc. has magnified the power and reach of our economic engines, even as it has hardened the incentives, measurements of value, and rules of behavior that reward unsustainable exploitation of limited resources, the destruction of ecosystems crucial to the survival of civilization, unlimited flows of pollution, and the disregard of human and social values.

The outcome of the struggle to shape humanity's future that is now beginning will be determined by a contest between the Global Mind and Earth Inc. In a million theaters of battle, the reform of rules and incentives in markets, political systems, inst.i.tutions, and societies will succeed or fail depending upon how quickly individuals and groups committed to a sustainable future gain sufficient strength, skill, and resolve by connecting with one another to express and achieve their hopes and dreams for a better world.

Here are the most important questions to be answered and battles to be won: Can Americans reestablish the healthy functioning of the U.S. political and economic system to the point where it can once again provide visionary leaders.h.i.+p to the community of nations? It may well be that an alternative form of global leaders.h.i.+p will emerge in the Global Mind, but that is uncertain for now and is likely to take time that we don't have.

It is theoretically possible, though extremely unlikely, that some other nation will rise to this challenge. It is also possible that the tectonic changes that have reorganized the equilibrium of power in the world, s.h.i.+fting it from West to East and redistributing it throughout the world, will make it difficult for the U.S. to once again provide the strength and quality of leaders.h.i.+p it offered during the second half of the twentieth century. The world's loss of confidence in the United States following the catastrophic political, military, and economic mistakes of the early twenty-first century accelerated this s.h.i.+ft in power, but was not its fundamental cause.

Still, the best chance for success in shaping a positive future and avoiding catastrophe is the reestablishment of a transcendent capacity for global leaders.h.i.+p by the United States. And for those who have difficulty believing that the promise of American democracy can be redeemed, remember that the promise America offers the world has been resurrected in the past during some very dark days. Its revolution was almost stillborn. It nearly tore itself in two during the Civil War. The domineering crimes of the robber barons exceeded the excesses of today's ambitious t.i.tans. Dest.i.tution during the Great Depression, the devastating blow at Pearl Harbor while Hitler rampaged through Europe, and the brush with Armageddon during the Cuban Missile Crisis were all followed by renewals of the American spirit and a flouris.h.i.+ng of the values at the heart of the American Dream. So America can certainly be renewed again, and its potential for world leaders.h.i.+p can be restored.

Will it be? The answer to that question will have a profound effect on the future of humankind.

How quickly can inst.i.tutions be adapted to the Internet? Even though the potential for the reestablishment of reason-based decision making through collaborative processes empowered by the Global Mind are exciting and promising, long-established inst.i.tutions are notoriously resistant to change. The speed with which business models have been disintermediated and new models have emerged offers reason for hope.

But attention and focus are diluted on the Internet. The variety of experiences available, the ubiquity of entertainment, and the difficulty in aggregating a critical ma.s.s of those committed to change all complicate the use of the Internet as a tool for inst.i.tutional reform. The addition of three billion people to the global middle cla.s.s by the middle of this century, however, may be accompanied by new and more forceful demands for democratic reforms of the kind that have so often emerged with the growth of a prosperous and well-educated middle cla.s.s in so many nations.

Will there be sufficient safeguards and constraints placed on the impulse of governments to use the Internet as a means of gathering information about individuals and using it to establish unhealthy forms of centralized control? Will the impulse of nations to engage in conflict produce more destructive forms of cyberwar and mercantilist nationalism? As the severity of our challenges becomes ever clearer, I am hopeful, even confident, that enough concerned committed individuals and groups will join together in time and self-organize creatively to become a force for reform.

Will China's economic juggernaut continue, and if so, will its emergent commitment to safeguard the environment overtake its mercantilist imperative? Will its success in lifting standards of living and diminis.h.i.+ng poverty lead to political reforms that produce a transition to democratic governance?

Will the progressive subst.i.tution of intelligent machines for human labor result in increased structural unemployment, or will we find ways to create new jobs and adequately compensate those filling them? There is no shortage of work to be done, but the dominance of corporations and the encroachment of the market sphere into the democracy sphere have taken a toll on the initiative and will necessary to structure new employment opportunities in the creation of public goods in fields like education, environmental remediation, health and mental health, family services, community building, and many other challenges that must be met.

Will the emergent potential for altering the fabric of life and the genetic design of human beings be accompanied by the emergence of wisdom sufficient for the far-reaching decisions that will soon confront us, or will these technologies be widely dispersed without adequate consideration of the full spectrum of consequences they could entail?

Will the social compacts in developed nations survive the simultaneous effects of demographic changes that are placing heavier per capita burdens on those in the workforce even as jobs and incomes are lost to the combination of robosourcing and outsourcing? Will new models for restoring income support and health care to the growing population of older people be created to replace the twentieth-century model?

Will the world community adequately support fertility management in developing countries with high population growth rates, continue to empower women, and improve child survival rates? The answer to these questions will determine the level of global population and the degree of stress humanity places on the natural systems of the planet. Will the unique plight of Africa be recognized and adequately addressed?

Will we provide the incentives to quickly decarbonize the global economy and sharply reduce global warming pollution in time to stabilize and then reduce the global warming pollution that is so threatening to the climate stability on which the thriving of our civilization depends?

These are hard questions that imply hard choices. Human civilization-indeed, the human species-is already in the early stages of the six emergent changes described in this book. They are beginning to transform our planet, our civilization, and the way we work and live our lives. Some of them are degrading self-governance, the fabric of life, the species with which we share the Earth, and the physical, mental, and spiritual nature of humanity.

The complexity of these changes, the unprecedented speed with which they are occurring, their simultaneity and the fact that they are converging, each with the others, have all contributed to a crisis of confidence in our ability as a civilization to think clearly about where they are taking us, much less to change their trajectory or slow their momentum.

But if we face these choices with courage, the right answers are pretty clear. They're controversial, to be sure. And making the right choices will be hard. Yet we do have to make them. We do have to decide. Soon. If we were to decide not to reclaim control over our destiny, the rest of our journey would become very hard indeed.

These currents of change are strong, and they are indeed sweeping us into a future that is very different from what we have known before. What we have to do-in the context of this metaphor-is deceptively simple: steer! That means fixing the prevailing flaws and distortions in capitalism and self-governance. It means controlling the corrosive corruption of money in politics, breaking the suffocating rule of special interests, and restoring the healthy functioning of collective decision making in representative democracy to promote the public interest. It means reforming markets and making capitalism sustainable by aligning incentives with our long-term interest. It means, for example, taxing carbon pollution and reducing taxes on work-raising revenue from what we burn, not what we earn.

More than 1,800 years ago, the last of Rome's "Five Good Emperors," Marcus Aurelius Antoninus, wrote, "Never let the future disturb you. You will meet it, if you have to, with the same weapons of reason which today arm you against the present." His advice is still sound, though soon after his reign the Roman Empire began the long process of dissolution that culminated in its overthrow 300 years later.

SO WHAT DO WE DO NOW?.

Arming ourselves with the "weapons of reason" is necessary but insufficient. The emergence of the Global Mind presents us with an opportunity to strengthen reason-based decision making, but the economic and political systems within which we implement even the wisest decisions are badly in need of repair. Confidence in both market capitalism and representative democracy has fallen because both are obviously in need of reform. Fixing both of these macro-tools should be at the top of the agenda for all of us who want to help shape humanity's future.

Our first priority should be to restore our ability to communicate clearly and candidly with one another in a broadly accessible forum about the difficult choices we have to make. That means building vibrant and open "public squares" on the Internet for the discussion of the best solutions to emerging challenges and the best strategies for seizing opportunities. It also means protecting the public forum from dominance by elites and special interests with agendas that are inconsistent with the public interest.

It is especially important to accelerate the transition of democratic inst.i.tutions to the Internet. The open access individuals once enjoyed to the formerly dominant print-based public forum fostered the spread of democracy and elevated the role of reason and fact-based public discourse. But the ma.s.sive s.h.i.+ft in the last third of the twentieth century from print to television as the primary medium of communication stifled democratic discourse and gave preferential access to those with wealth and power. This s.h.i.+ft eclipsed the role of reason, diminished the importance of collective searches for the best available evidence, and elevated the role of money in politics-particularly in the United States-thereby distorting our search for truth and degrading our ability to reason together.

The same is true for the news media. The one-way, advertiser-dominated, conglomerate-controlled television medium has been suffocating the free flow of ideas necessary for genuine self-determination. In 2012, for example, it was nothing short of bizarre when the United States held its quadrennial presidential election in the midst of epic climate-related disasters-including a widespread drought affecting more than 65 percent of the nation, historic fires spreading across the West, and an epic hybrid hurricane and nor'easter that shut down large portions of New York City for the second time in two years-with not a single question about the climate crisis from any member of the news media in any of the campaign debates.

The profit-driven blurring of the line between entertainment and news, the growing influence of large advertisers on the content of news programs, and the cynical distortion of news narratives by political operatives posing as news executives have all degraded the ability of the Fourth Estate to maintain sufficient integrity and independent judgment to adequately perform their essential role in democracy.

The Internet offers a welcome opportunity to reverse this degradation of democracy and reestablish a basis for healthy self-governance once again. Although there is as yet no standard business model that yields sufficient profit to support high-quality investigative journalism on the Internet, the expansion of bandwidth to accommodate more and higher-quality video on the Internet may soon make profitable business models viable. In addition, the use of hybrid public/private models for the support of excellence in Internet-based journalism should be vigorously pursued.

The loss of privacy and data security on the Internet must be quickly addressed. The emergent "stalker economy," based on the compilation of large digital files on individuals who engage in e-commerce, is exploitive and unacceptable. Similarly, the growing potential for the misuse by governments of even larger digital files on the personal lives of their citizens-including the routine interception of private communications-poses a serious threat to liberty and must be stopped. Those concerned about the quality of freedom in the digital age must make new legal protections for privacy a priority.

The new digital tools that provide growing access to the Global Mind should be exploited in the rapid development of personalized approaches to health care, what is now being called "precision medicine," and of self-tracking tools to reduce the cost and increase the efficacy of these personalized approaches to medicine. The same Internet-empowered precision should be applied to the speedy development of a "circular economy," characterized by much higher levels of recycling, reuse, and efficiency in the use of energy and materials.

Capitalism, like democracy, must also be reformed. The priority for those who agree that it is crucial to restore the usefulness of capitalism as a tool for reclaiming control of our destiny should be to insist upon full, complete, and accurate measurements of value. So-called externalities that are currently ignored in standard business accounting must be fully integrated into market calculations. For example, it is simply no longer acceptable to pretend that large streams of harmful pollution do not exist where profit and loss statements are concerned.

Global warming pollution, in particular, should carry a price. Placing a tax on CO2 is the place to start. The revenue raised could be returned to taxpayers, or offset by equal reductions in other taxes-on payrolls, for example. Placing a steadily declining limit on emissions and allowing the trading of emission rights within those limits is an alternative that would also work. For those nations worried about the compet.i.tive consequences of acting in the absence of global agreement, the rules of the World Trade Organization allow the imposition of border adjustments on goods from countries that do not put a tax on carbon pollution.

The principles of sustainability-which are designed, above all, to ensure that we make intelligent choices to improve our circ.u.mstances in the present without degrading our prospects in the future-should be fully integrated into capitalism. The ubiquitous incentives built into capitalism-which embody the power of capitalism to unleash human ingenuity and productivity-should be carefully designed to ensure that they are aligned with the goals that are being pursued. Compensation systems, for example, should be carefully scrutinized by investors, managers, boards of directors, consumers, regulators, and all stakeholders in every enterprise-no matter its size.

Our current reliance on gross domestic product (GDP) as the compa.s.s by which we guide our economic policy choices must be reevaluated. The design of GDP-and the business accounting systems derived from it-is deeply flawed and cannot be safely used as a guide for economic policy decisions. For example, natural resources should be subject to depreciation and the distribution of personal income should be included in our evaluation of whether economic policies are producing success or failure. Capitalism requires acceptance of inequality, of course, but "hyper" levels of inequality-such as those now being produced-are destructive to both capitalism and democracy.

The value of public goods should also be fully recognized-not systematically denigrated and attacked on ideological grounds. In an age when robosourcing and outsourcing are systematically eliminating private employment opportunities at a rapid pace, the restoration of healthy levels of macroeconomic demand is essential for sustainable growth. The creation of more public goods-in health care, education, and environmental protection, for example-is one of the ways to provide more employment opportunities and sustain economic vibrancy in the age of Earth Inc.

Sustainability should also guide the redesign of agriculture, forestry, and fis.h.i.+ng. The reckless depletion of topsoil, groundwater reserves, the productivity of our forests and oceans, and genetic biodiversity must be halted and reversed.

In order to stabilize human population growth, we must prioritize the education of girls, the empowerment of women, the provision of ubiquitous access to the knowledge and techniques of fertility management, and the continued raising of child survival rates. The world now enjoys a durable consensus on the efficacy of these four strategies-used in combination-to bring about the transition to smaller families, lower death rates, lower birth rates, and stabilized population levels. Wealthy countries must support these efforts in their own self-interest. Africa should receive particular attention because of its high fertility rate and threatened resource base.

Two other demographic realities should also command priority attention: The continued urbanization of the world's population should be seen as an opportunity to integrate sustainability into the design and construction of low-carbon, low-energy buildings, the use of sustainable architecture and design to make urban s.p.a.ces more efficient and productive, and the redesign of urban transportation systems to minimize both energy use and pollution flows. And second, the aging of populations in the advanced economies-and in some emerging markets, like China-should be seen as an opportunity for the redesign of health strategies and income support programs in order to take into account the higher dependency ratios that threaten the viability of using payroll taxes as the princ.i.p.al source of funding for these programs.

With respect to the revolution in the life sciences, we should place priority on the development of safeguards against unwise permanent alterations in the human gene pool. Now that we have become the princ.i.p.al agents of evolution, it is crucially important to recognize that the pursuit of short-term goals through human modification can be dangerously inconsistent with the long-term best interests of the human species. As yet, however, we have not developed adequate criteria-much less decision-making protocols-for use in guiding such decisions. We must do so quickly.

Similarly, the dominance of the profit motive and corporate power in decisions about the genetic modification of animals and plants-particularly those that end up in the food supply-are beginning to create unwise risks. Commonsense procedures to a.n.a.lyze these risks according to standards that are based on the protection of the long-term public interest are urgently needed.

The continued advance of technological development will bring many blessings, but human values must be preserved as we evaluate the deployment and use of powerful new technologies. Some advances warrant caution and careful oversight: the proliferation of nanomaterials, synthetic life-forms, and surveillance drones are examples of new technologies rife with promise and potential, but in need of review and safeguards.

There are already several reckless practices that should be immediately stopped: the sale of deadly weapons to groups throughout the world; the use of antibiotics as a livestock growth stimulant; drilling for oil in the vulnerable Arctic Ocean; the dominance of stock market trading by supercomputers with algorithms optimized for high-speed, high-frequency trades that create volatility and risk of market disruptions; and utterly insane proposals for blocking sunlight from reaching the Earth as a strategy to offset the trapping of heat by ever-mounting levels of global warming pollution. All of these represent examples of muddled and dangerous thinking. All should be seen as test cases for whether or not we have the will, determination, and stamina to create a future worthy of the next generations.

Finally, the world community desperately needs leaders.h.i.+p that is based on the deepest human values. Though this book is addressed to readers in the world at large, it is intended to carry a special and urgent message to the citizens of the United States of America, which remains the only nation capable of providing the kind of global leaders.h.i.+p needed.

For that reason, and for the pride that Americans ought to feel in what the United States has represented to humanity for more than two centuries, it is crucial to halt the degradation and decline of America's commitment to a future in which human dignity is cherished and human values are protected and advanced. Two priority goals for those who wish to take action are limiting the role of money in politics and reforming outdated and obfuscatory legislative rules that allow a small minority to halt legislative action in the U.S. Senate.

Human civilization has reached a fork in the road we have long traveled. One of two paths must be chosen. Both lead us into the unknown. But one leads toward the destruction of the climate balance on which we depend, the depletion of irreplaceable resources that sustain us, the degradation of uniquely human values, and the possibility that civilization as we know it would come to an end. The other leads to the future.

To my mother, in honor of the 100th anniversary of her birth: Pauline LaFon Gore

October 6, 1912December 15, 2004

She gave me a future, an abiding curiosity about what it holds, and a sense of our common human obligation to help shape it.

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS.

I AM GRATEFUL FOR THE SUPPORT, ENCOURAGEMENT, AND LOVE OF MY partner, Elizabeth Keadle, during the writing of this book, for her advice while reading and listening to successive drafts of every chapter, and for her particular insights into the life sciences chapter. Special thanks also to my brother-in-law, Frank Hunger, whose constant wise counsel and lifelong friends.h.i.+p have been so important to me throughout this project; and to my entire family for their encouragement and support.

This book would not have been possible without my extremely able research team, Brad Hall and Alex Lamballe, whose dedication, diligence, loyalty, and skill are exceptional in every way. I also want to thank their families for their understanding and support during the long hours of work that often spilled over into the weekends and holidays that were a significant part of the time I have devoted to writing this book over the last two years. Their character, good humor, stamina, and grit are impressive and greatly appreciated. For the initial stage of the research, Adam Abelkop was also of invaluable help, and I am especially grateful for his willingness to postpone his doctoral program to be a part of this project. After Adam's sabbatical was over, Dan Myers, on my staff in Nashville, pitched in often, always with a commitment to excellent research.

As I wrote in the Introduction, this book had its origin eight years ago when I began to focus on the drivers of global change and started collecting ideas and research. I regarded the initial detailed outline as primarily a personal exploration of an unusually compelling question, and I was gratified that it also turned out to have practical value as an input to the investing road map that my partners and I used at Generation Investment Management in launching a new initiative in "sustainable investing." I am particularly grateful to my Generation co-founder, David Blood, and all of my other Generation partners for the conversations over the years that have enriched my understanding of so many of these issues.

As I continued to elaborate on the outline, I began to think it might have value to a larger audience, but it was not until Jon Meacham decided to join Random House as a senior editor that I actually set out to write this book. Upon reading that news, I called my agent, Andrew Wylie (to whom I also once again express my grat.i.tude here), and told him why I thought Jon was the perfect editor for this book. The three of us met in New York to discuss the idea, and a week later the project was launched. Upon its completion, I can say without exaggeration that I could not have written it without Jon, who has become a close friend and neighbor in Nashville. His wisdom, insights, and guidance have, unsurprisingly, been truly extraordinary. Thanks also to Gina Centrello, Susan Kamil, Tom Perry, Beck Stvan, Ben Steinberg, London King, Sally Marvin, Steve Messina, Benjamin Dreyer, Erika Greber, Dennis Ambrose, and the entire editorial, production, and marketing team at Random House.

Graham Allison, my close friend and a mentor for forty-five years, organized a two-day scoping exercise at the Belfour Center of the John F. Kennedy School of Government at Harvard after the initial stage of research two years ago. I am extremely grateful to Graham and the extraordinary group of other thinkers who generously took the time (and in many cases traveled long distances) to spend two days in Cambridge in intensive and stimulating discussions of the issues covered in the outline: Rodney Brooks, David Christian, Leon Fuerth, Danny Hillis, Mitch Kapor, Freada Kapor Klein, Ray Kurzweil, Joseph Nye, Dan Schrag, and Fred Spier.

I am also indebted to the distinguished group of expert reviewers who took the time to read parts or all of the first draft of the ma.n.u.script. Their a.s.sistance in correcting mistakes, suggesting additional material, providing nuance, and aiding my understanding of subjects about which they have forgotten more than I will ever learn is deeply appreciated: Graham Allison, Rosina Bierbaum, Vint Cerf, Bob Corell, Herman Daly, Jared Diamond, Harvey Fineberg, Dargan Frierson, Danny Hillis, Rattan Lal, Mike MacCracken, Dan Schrag, Beth Seidenberg, Laura Tyson, and E. O. Wilson.