Back in the halcyon days, when I somehow got paid for messing with the minds of the impressionable youth of UAF, I liked to ask said minds to project themselves back in time 400 years, to take a look around and report back what, if anything, they noticed different between those times (counting back from now, for example, to the Lords Year 1620. (James I was King, if that helps) and our own times: changes in musical tastes, ethics, physics, theology or attitudes regarding leprosy, for instance.
1620 CE was earlier than heart transplants, genetic engineering and baseball. It was before George Washington and water-seal toilets. Oxygen wouldnt be invented until the mid-1700s (Really: no Periodic Table of Elements, no radioactivity). The Holy Inquisition was in practice: pious religious officials were still torturing heretics and burning witches. It was before abortion rights. Autochthonous peoples in many parts of the world had not been introduced to the blessings of European economics, religion and warfare. It was before Facebook.
Things had changed in the last 400 years. Bigly. My students always got that answer right.
Then Id ask them to project themselves 400 years into the future, to the early 25th Century, say, to look around, to report back. I asked them to pay particular attention to the way our descendants in 2420 look back on our (presumably long-obsolete) ways of doing things: our medicine, say, or our governmental systems, or our responses to global hunger, overpopulation, pollution.
This was a harder task. The problem with prognostication is that we normal people are not particularly good at it, being annoyingly set in our ways. This is not to say that we cant make predictions, but even deeply considered and finely calibrated events such as space launches, brain surgery, or steering an oil tanker around Bligh Reef occasionally go awry. Some events, like nuclear meltdowns or worldwide pandemics, can present unanticipated difficulties.
I asked my students to avoid fantasies like self-aware computers, two-way wrist radios or honest politicians. I was hoping for revolutionary ways of perceiving the world, something on the order of the atalatl, General Relativity or Akira Kurosawa. I was angling for new stuff: examples of true scientific, artistic or musical invention.
My students always protested. Were on to you, old man, you you English teacher! Youve been harping all semester about how we mortals really cant see into the future, that we make up the future with our words. Now you want us to think something no one has ever thought before!
Thats exactly what I wanted them to do, of course. To be fair, really new ideas are not particularly common. It took humans millennia to come up with the atlatl (c.20,000 BCE), even longer to invent the calculus (c.1665 CE) or germ theory (c.1840). But without inventive ways of looking at the world, humanity might still believe that malaria is caused by bad air, that light travels across a medium called luminiferous ether, or that things burn because they contain phlogiston.
Theres been much talk lately of returning to normal, but I wonder if thats really what we want. I wonder if normal isnt what got us into our present public health and economic crises. I think for a lot of people in our community normal is worrying about buying groceries, paying the rent, health care, personal safety.
In this Year of Our Trump and the Corona pandemic (known also to certain elderly cynics as the beer virus or the sniffles) the question for my students would be, Given that we really cant see into the future and given that our current pandemic is unlikely to be our last, whats our best strategy for the survival of Our People (defined however you like) for the next seven generations or so?
Id hope for some inventive thinking along the lines of how to take care of every person on Earth in honest and practical ways. Emphasizing that we have plenty to be humble be about when predicting the future, Id ask them to come up with ideas never tried before. Id suggest that food, shelter and health care need never to be money-dependent, for example. Id ask our youth for creative ways of feeding people, sheltering people, caring for people all people on this, our planetary spaceship.
Id invite them to approach the task with an honest and generous spirit.
Lynn Basham lives in Fairbanks. He taught atthe University of Alaska Fairbanks as an instructor, mostly in the English Department, for about 20 years and retired about10 years ago.
Read more:
Inventing the future for humankind | Community Perspectives - Fairbanks Daily News-Miner
- Genetic Engineering and Its Applications StudyBullet.com - March 9th, 2025
- The Future of Gene-Editing Treatments for Rare Diseases - March 9th, 2025
- Biotechnology & Genetic Engineering: An Overview - Sciencing - March 9th, 2025
- Hoping to revive mammoths, scientists create 'woolly mice' - NPR - March 9th, 2025
- CRISPR Breakthrough Unlocks the Genetic Blueprint for ... - SciTechDaily - March 9th, 2025
- Mice have been genetically engineered to look like mammoths - The Economist - March 9th, 2025
- Gene modification can create bigger, better tomatoes, but should we do it? - Earth.com - March 9th, 2025
- "Colossal woolly mouse" created by scientists in effort to reconstruct the woolly mammoth - CBS News - March 9th, 2025
- Biotech company hoping to revive woolly mammoth, creates woolly mouse: Study - Straight Arrow News - March 9th, 2025
- Colossal Creates the Colossal Woolly Mouse, Showcasing Breakthroughs in Multiplex Genome Editing and Trait Engineering on the Path to a Mammoth -... - March 9th, 2025
- Colossal Biosciences is one step further in quest to bring back the woolly mammoth - Austin American-Statesman - March 9th, 2025
- Biotech Company Creates 'Woolly Mouse' as a Step in Its Quest to Resurrect Woolly Mammoths Through Gene Editing - Smithsonian Magazine - March 9th, 2025
- 'We didn't know they were going to be this cute': Scientists unveil genetically engineered 'woolly mice' - Livescience.com - March 9th, 2025
- These Genetically Engineered Mice Have Thick Woolly Mammoth Hair - ExtremeTech - March 9th, 2025
- Genetically altered mouse to pave way for resurrection of wolly mammoth? - Hindustan Times - March 9th, 2025
- Turning back the aging clock: Billions of dollars are probably being wasted on genetic manipulation techniques that likely wont work - Genetic... - March 9th, 2025
- OF WOOLLY MICE AND MAMMOTHS - Particle - March 9th, 2025
- Woolly mouse unveiled by firm hoping to bring more extinct animals back to life - The National - March 9th, 2025
- How scientists created woolly mice as part of their quest to bring back the woolly mammoth - The Indian Express - March 9th, 2025
- A Woolly What? - Brownstone Research - March 9th, 2025
- $1 Million Awarded to Continue to Develop Genetically Engineered Stem Cell Products to Fight Gastroesophageal Cancer - PR Newswire - February 15th, 2025
- Engineered animals show new way to fight mercury pollution - EurekAlert - February 15th, 2025
- Genetically modified foods: benefits and applications - Meer - February 15th, 2025
- Genetically modified zebrafish and fruit flies munch on mercury to make it less toxic - Yahoo - February 15th, 2025
- Principles of Genetic Engineering - PubMed Central (PMC) - February 7th, 2025
- The next 'big thing' in genetically modified crops: Drought-tolerant and herbicide resistant wheat. Here's what you need to know - Genetic Literacy... - February 7th, 2025
- Genetic engineering and biotechnology: The future of food is here - Yourweather.co.uk - February 7th, 2025
- Scientists Just Achieved a Major Milestone in Creating Synthetic Life - Yahoo! Voices - February 7th, 2025
- Two males give birth to child in incredible science experiment; the baby is now an adult | Mint - Mint - February 7th, 2025
- Genetic Engineering - The Definitive Guide | Biology Dictionary - January 27th, 2025
- Constitutive expression of Cas9 and rapamycin-inducible Cre recombinase facilitates conditional genome editing in Plasmodium berghei - Nature.com - January 27th, 2025
- What is Genetic Engineering? - Baker Institute - January 27th, 2025
- ARCUS breakthrough: An advanced gene editing tool appears to have cured an infant of an early onset metabolic disorder - Genetic Literacy Project - January 27th, 2025
- Your cells are dying. All the time. - Genetic Literacy Project - January 27th, 2025
- How Genetic Modification is Changing the Future of Conservation - MSN - January 27th, 2025
- Researchers genetically engineer yeast to produce healthy fatty acid - University of Alberta - January 27th, 2025
- genetic engineering summary | Britannica - September 13th, 2024
- The great gene editing debate: can it be safe and ethical? - BBC.com - September 13th, 2024
- Anti-biotechnology campaigners embrace classic crops, are suspicious of hybrid varieties and claim genetic modification violates nature. Heres a... - September 13th, 2024
- Will IL-11 Control Extend Human Life One Day? Early Results are Tantalizing - Securities.io - September 13th, 2024
- Viewpoint: As New Zealand edges toward relaxing its ban on gene edited foods, experts weigh in - Genetic Literacy Project - September 13th, 2024
- Farmers in Brazil and Argentina ramp up growing of genetically-modified drought tolerant wheat that can grow in subtropical regions - Genetic Literacy... - September 13th, 2024
- Scientist explains why we'll never have a real Jurassic Park - and people are crestfallen - indy100 - September 13th, 2024
- Genetic engineering techniques - Wikipedia - January 9th, 2024
- 20.3: Genetic Engineering - Biology LibreTexts - January 9th, 2024
- Genetic engineering - DNA Modification, Cloning, Gene Splicing - December 13th, 2023
- Global Gene Editing Market Poised for Significant Growth, Projected to Reach $14.28 Billion by 2027 - EIN News - December 13th, 2023
- Principles of Genetic Engineering - PMC - National Center for ... - May 17th, 2023
- Quitting: A Life Strategy: The Myth of Perseveranceand How the New Science of Giving Up Can Set You Free - Next Big Idea Club Magazine - May 17th, 2023
- 18 Human Genetic Engineering - Clemson University - March 29th, 2023
- Pros and Cons of Genetic Engineering - Benefits and Risks - March 29th, 2023
- How artificial skin is made and its uses, from treating burns to skin cancer - South China Morning Post - March 29th, 2023
- Genetic Engineering - Meaning, Applications, Advantages and Challenges ... - March 13th, 2023
- Revolutionary Specialty Enzymes Transform Industries, Projected to Reach $2.2 Billion by 2031 - Billion-Dollar - EIN News - March 5th, 2023
- Explained: What is genome editing technology and how is it different from GM technology? - The Indian Express - April 2nd, 2022
- Scribe Therapeutics to Participate in Upcoming Goldman Sachs The New Guard: Privates Leading the Disruption in Healthcare Investor Conference - Yahoo... - April 2nd, 2022
- San Antonio Zoo In Discussions on Woolly Mammoth Project - iHeart - April 2nd, 2022
- Xenotransplantation trials will require adjusting expectations, experts say - STAT - April 2nd, 2022
- 5 Interesting Startup Deals You May Have Missed In March: Restoring The Woolly Mammoth, Faux Seafood And Lots Of Bees - Crunchbase News - April 2nd, 2022
- Synlogic to Present Data on Phenylketonuria and Homocystinuria Programs at the Society for ... - KULR-TV - April 2nd, 2022
- The Bay Area food tech industry is creating more than vegan burgers. Heres whats next - San Francisco Chronicle - April 2nd, 2022
- Student Startup Teams to Compete For $110000 Cash Prize Pool in U of A's Heartland Challenge - University of Arkansas Newswire - April 2nd, 2022
- Should we test for differences in allergen content between varieties of crops and animal species? - Open Access Government - April 2nd, 2022
- Genetic Engineering - Courses, Subjects, Eligibility ... - December 22nd, 2021
- Scientists Used CRISPR Gene Editing to Choose the Sex of Mouse Pups - Singularity Hub - December 22nd, 2021
- Report calls for broad public deliberation on releasing gene-edited species in the wild - EurekAlert - December 22nd, 2021
- RNA and DNA Extraction Kit Market Study | Know the Post-Pandemic Scenario of the Industry - BioSpace - December 22nd, 2021
- Opinion: Allow Golden Rice to save lives - pnas.org - December 22nd, 2021
- It's time for an alliance of democracies | TheHill - The Hill - December 22nd, 2021
- Aridis Pharmaceuticals Announces a Pan-Coronavirus Monoclonal Antibody Cocktail That Retains Effectiveness Against the Omicron variant, other COVID-19... - December 22nd, 2021
- 2021: when the link between the climate and biodiversity crises became clear - The Guardian - December 22nd, 2021
- Wuhan lab leak now the most likely cause of Covid pandemic and the truth WILL come out, experts tell MPs... - The US Sun - December 22nd, 2021
- Biotech ETFs That Outperformed Last Week - Yahoo Finance - December 22nd, 2021
- Human genetic enhancement - Wikipedia - October 5th, 2021
- Viewpoint: Part 1 Opposition stirred by anti-GMO advocacy group propaganda fading in the developing world, as more countries embrace crop... - October 5th, 2021
- Amyris Partners with Inscripta to Enhance Development of Sustainable Ingredients Using the Onyx Genome Engineering Platform - WWNY - October 5th, 2021
- Kingdom Supercultures raises $25m to expand Non GMO suite of microbes to unlock new flavors, textures, and functionalities in food & beverage -... - October 5th, 2021
- Fact check: Genetically engineering your salad with the COVID-19 vaccines? We're not there yet. - USA TODAY - October 5th, 2021
- Making the Transition from an Academic to a Biobusiness Entrepreneur - Genetic Engineering & Biotechnology News - October 5th, 2021
- Is The New York Times Finally 'Learning To Love GMOS'? - American Council on Science and Health - October 5th, 2021