4. Sight translation 2 Следующие 40 лет станут самыми важными в истории человечества

В настоящее время Запад занимает ведущее положение в мире. В Европе и Северной Америке проживает только одна седьмая часть населения нашей планеты, однако именно здесь создаются две трети богатств и производятся две трети вооружений мира. Именно на долю западных стран приходится более двух третей средств, расходуемых в мире на научно-исследовательские разработки. В среднем американские рабочие работают в семь раз продуктивнее китайских. Между тем в 1972 году, производительность труда в Америке превышала производительность китайских рабочих в 20 раз. Тогда на долю Китая приходилось 5% мирового производства, а сегодня приходится уже 14%.

Поднебесная является второй крупнейшей экономикой планеты (Япония на третьем месте) и первой с точки зрения выбросов углекислого газа в атмосферу. Самый быстрый суперкомпьютер находится в Китае. Китайские космонавты вышли в открытый космос, и, может быть, ступят на Луну раньше, чем американцы вернутся туда. Мы живем в эпоху, когда происходят самые судьбоносные изменения, касающиеся богатств, власти и престижа, со времени промышленной революции, которая привела Западную Европу к мировому господству 200 лет назад. Сила, толкающая сегодня Восток вперед, является той же самой силой, которая до этого определила взлет Запада — в основе ее лежит взаимодействие географических, экономических и технологических факторов.

5. Mini-conference

Famous Headline-Grabbing Predictions That Fizzled

Are today's headlines terrorizing your children?

1. GLOBAL COOLING (1970's)

In 1974, the National Science Foundation predicts that declining world temperatures herald the beginning of "the next glacial age."  A bestselling book in 1976, "The Cooling," states, "As Earth cools, as sunlight diminishes, as the range of snow and the length of winter increases, the possibility of a snow blitz grows greater and greater....Ice and snow covers more area today than even a decade ago, and by some indications the cooling has only begun."

OUTCOME. Global temperatures start heating up, putting an end to the global cooling issue.

2. THE LIMITS TO GROWTH (1970's) In 1972, in an influential and widely-publicized report entitled "The Limits to Growth," the Club of Rome predicts that the world's population will hit 7 billion by 2000.  As a result, there will be worldwide starvation as population growth outpaces the world's ability to feed itself.  The price of natural resources such as gold, copper, tin, and particularly oil will skyrocket during the remainder of the century as supplies dwindle.

OUTCOME. The world's population barely hits 6 billion by the end of the century.  Natural resources are more abundant  and are less expensive in real terms, than they were when The Limits to Growth was published. 

3. THE POPULATION BOMB (1970's and 1980's) In a bestselling and widely quoted book, "The Population Bomb," Dr. Paul Ehrlich writes, "In the 1970s and 1980s hundreds of millions of people will starve to death in spite of any crash programs embarked upon now. At this late date nothing can prevent a substantial increase in the world death rate..."

OUTCOME. The 1970's and 1980's end with a dramatic decline in worldwide famine and mortality.

4. THE IMPENDING JAPANESE ECONOMIC TAKEOVER (1980s) The Japanese economy expands robustly and begins to dominate high tech industries, under the direction of the Japanese government's Ministry of Trade and Industries (MITI).  A series of bestselling books argue that the American free-market economy can no longer compete against countries that establish a strong business-government partnership.

OUTCOME. The Japanese business-government collaboration collapses under its own bureaucratic weight, and is followed by fourteen years of economic stagnation in Japan.

5. NUCLEAR WINTER (1980's) In bestselling books such as "The Fate of the Earth," anti-nuclear activists warn that the ongoing buildup of nuclear arms could result in "nuclear winter," and the end of virtually all human life on earth.

OUTCOME. The U.S. continues to build up its nuclear weapons, which results in the peaceful end of the Cold War.

6. THE GREAT DEPRESSION OF 1990. In his bestselling book "The Great Depression of 1990," Dr. Ravi Batra predicts a collapse of the Western economies and a world depression that will arrive in 1990 and last for seven years.

OUTCOME. A recession in 1990-1991 is followed by a period of relative prosperity throughout the rest of the decade with next period of recession being expected.

7.(1990's) Y2K Hysteria builds as the year 2000 ("Y2K") approaches.  Most computer data bases only allow two digit years (for example, 1957 is entered as "57"), leading computer experts to believe that computers will read "00" as 1900.  A series of bestselling books such as "Time Bomb 2000" argue that there could be severe economic shutdowns and shortages as a result of this glitch.  In the words of one computer expert (but typical of many others), "The Y2K problem is systemic. It cannot be fixed. The interconnections are too many. A noncompliant computer will spread bad data and re-corrupt a compliant computer.  Either the noncompliant computers will re-corrupt the compliant ones, or else the compliant ones must cease all contact with noncompliant ones, thereby shutting down entire systems, most notably the banking system." 

OUTCOME. January 1, 2000 comes and goes uneventfully.