Nuclear winter is the theory that severe and prolonged global climatic cooling will happen after a large-scale nuclear war. This assumes that fires can inject soot into the stratosphere. This would block some direct sunlight from reaching the surface of the Earth. This would then lead to widespread crop failure and famine. Nuclear-winter scenario researchers …
Baidu plans to expand its robotaxi ride-hailing services across 30 cities in China in two to three years to serve a wider range of users. Robin Li, founder of Baidu, said at the 2021 ABC Summit. Currently, there are about 500 test vehicles in the Baidu Apollo self driving program and they are the first …
The Dixie Fire is now over 434,000 acres and destroyed the town of Greenville last night. Greensville, California has a population of 817. Taylorsville was just evacuated with a population of 198. The #DixieFire is now the 3rd largest fire in CA history at 434,000 acres. There will be triple digit temperatures in many parts …
Medicine Hat, Alberta, Canada has had functionally zero homeless for about six years. Japan, Singapore and Denmark also have been very successful in dealing with homelessness. Singapore is a multi-ethnic society with about 6 million people. Hamilton, Canada ( a city with a population of 750,000) has also has great success reducing homelessness. Medicine Hat’s …
Urban areas are richer and more productive. Research shows that doubling the population and increasing urban density boosts productivity by about 15%. Roman cities were connected by the distance someone could walk in one hour. Self-driving cars, trucks and buses will be able to eliminate traffic jams and then have steadily increasing safe operating speeds. …
The Bank of America global analyst predicts that China will sustain an average 4.7% annual GDP growth from now to 2035 which will result in a doubling of China’s GDP. Qiao predicts that China’s GDP will pass the US GDP in 2027-2028. China’s GDP is currently 30% less than the USA. China (including HK and …
Starlink has opened preorders for service expected to be available in the second half of 2021. Elon Musk expects Starlink to achieve 16ms to 19ms by the summer of 2021. SpaceX will reach 10 gigabits per second download speeds eventually. For $499, Starlink users get a terminal package to communicate with the constellation. Beta participants …
Nextbigfuture has covered many of the ideas of Alexander Bolonkin. Bolonkin He was a Russian-American scientist and academic who worked in the Soviet aviation, space and rocket industries. He died on Christmas day 2020 at the age of 87. Bolonkin held 17 patents. He proposed the idea of domed cities as a protection against nuclear …
Youtube Channel Boring Revolution has detailed tracking of all current and potential Boring Company projects. There were the small tunnels in Los Angeles and the expanding Las Vegas projects. The Las Vegas projects look like they will be $300-400 million in revenue for Boring Company. Boring Company is completing or has completed about $80-90 million …
How different can things get by 2100? Prediction site Metaculus attempts to ponder what a fundamental change to the human condition would be like. Nick Bostrom, philosopher and Founding Director of the Future of Humanity Institute at the University of Oxford, argues that only two events since the dawn of humanity have fundamentally changed the …
The official purchasing power parity (PPP) statistics say that China’s PPP GDP is $24 trillion, but people can buy 30% more than those figures indicate. Reviewing cost of living data and living in China videos indicates that China’s PPP GDP is $31 trillion. There are now comprehensive online comparisons of costs between global cities. This …
