Morning
It appears that the American people have elected a convicted felon and climate denier to one of the most powerful offices on Earth. It seems that the political party that has bent to that man’s will has gained control of the United States Senate, and that the United States House of Representatives may follow.
There’s no sugarcoating how bad this is. The next four years will likely be a profoundly chaotic and scary time in many ways. Bad things will happen. People will suffer. It really sucks.
It’s also not the end of the world. That phrase has entered our parlance as a dismissive minimization, but it’s a simple statement of fact. The world is a very, very big and complex place, too big to be contained or even summarized by the most gigantic of events or seemingly all-consuming of trends. Many great and terrible things can be happening simultaneously on overlapping timescales. The twentieth century saw the hideous atrocities of the World Wars and Cold War, and also witnessed unprecedented technological innovation and massive improvements in public health, civil rights, and human living standards.
Even as American politics descend into darkness - at least for a time - many ongoing trends outside the control of voters will continue to strive to make a better world for humanity and its biosphere.
Solar power will keep getting cheaper and keep being built more and more across the world, transitioning humanity’s energy system to run on clean electrons faster than almost anyone believed possible.
Researchers are finding that solar farms can benefit desert ecosystems.
Battery technology is just beginning an incredible Cambrian explosion of diversification and innovation. We’ve been using carbon as our main energy storage molecule for centuries, and now we’re exploring the rest of the periodic table. The renewables revolution is just getting started.
Enhanced geothermal technology is poised for a massive breakout, hopefully bringing a new solar-level clean-electron champion into the fray to accelerate cleaner air and slow climate change.
Global energy-related carbon dioxide emissions are set to peak in 2024 or 2025.
The World Grid is being built, high-voltage power line by high-voltage power line.
GLP-1 agonists will continue to transform healthcare, offering the hope of mass progress against maladies ranging from obesity to addiction.
The new malaria vaccines will save tens of thousands of children in sub-Saharan Africa from agonizing, pointless deaths, and mRNA vaccine technology writ large have the potential to vanquish many ancient diseases in our lifetimes.
Ordinary public health measures from water filtration to indoor plumbing continue to spread, improving quality of life for millions.
Access to electricity continues to advance, with renewable energy set to speed Africa to electrify faster than expected.
Digital connection bringing advanced warning of extreme weather events has caused the global number of deaths from natural disasters to decline sharply even as the atmosphere grows more turbulent.
Humanity’s understanding of the universe will continue to grow, with amazing new discoveries in fields from galactography to genetics.
Brilliant new inventions like precision fermentation, microtargeted fertilizer-applying drones, climate-resilient crops like “short corn,” farm bots, methane-eating microorganisms, and more will continue their unheralded transformation of farming, ensuring a historically abundant food supply and reducing environmental damage even amidst climate disruption.
Dedicated conservationists will continue to work tirelessly to help wildlife populations rebound around the world, and perhaps soon de-extinct some species once thought to be lost forever.
People all over the nation and the world will care for their loved ones. They will be kind to the humans and animals they encounter. They will shelter and protect those who are unjustly persecuted. They will work, dream, imagine, create, inspire, seek, explore, hope. They will do what they can to make their facets of the world better places to live in. In times of horror, we can still be good and true.
Thank you. While this is obviously bad, we can't focus the future down to a single day. Yes this day will have major consequences but the world is complex and no one can predict the future. The last four years kickstarted a climate revolution and it'll be hard to put the brakes on it because there's a real need and a real business case for it, despite whatever roadblocks new the new administration tries to put up.
Thank you.