#future
# tech
The American healthcare system today is a mess of paperwork and confusion. More data and smarter, fact-based decision making could improve its highly mixed outcomes.
# tech
The march of automation is imminent. How we plan for it is crucial for the future of the global economy.
# space
Our nearest stellar neighbor has a planet. Where do we go from here?
# oddities
Hyperventilating conspiracy theories used to be fringe phenomena on the internet look on as curiosities. Now, they're being incorporated into the GOP platform.
# space
Development wonks want entrepreneurs trying to start a new age of space exploration to abandon their effort and throw good money after bad at the developing world.
# space
Space exploration and long term settlements of alien worlds might actually be a recipe for creating new countries with their own cultures, languages, and armed forces.
# tech
While thinking of our bodies as divine or entirely in utilitarian terms is unhealthy, there is a middle ground to consider.
# politics
We don't know what will happen to North Korea now that Kim Jong Il is dead, but we know it's not going to be good.
# tech
No, computers didn't predict the Arab Spring. Their vague outputs are just being sold as predictions after the fact.
# tech
It's hard to understate just how ambitious a project to visit another star would have to be in order to truly succeed.
# politics
The Tea Party is gladly willing to sabotage science, education, technology, and anything else that reminds them that the world is changing because to them, change is scary.
# politics
Could Earth's population be slowly but surely shrinking over the long term?
# tech
In the future, we might be putting far fewer people in jail and far more under constant surveillance. But will virtual prisons work?
# science
Can we really crunch enough numbers to predict future trends, products, and people's behaviors?
# tech
Predictions are difficult, especially about the future. But what futurist ideas seem to be on the right track and more likely to happen than not?
