Will the future be an Utopia or Distopia?

So I was watching a video and near the end of the video the guy who made it started talking about whether the future of the world is going to be an utopia or a distopia.

And he further explained his position by stating that some people are optimists and other people are pessimists, but that there are also optimistic pessimists and pessimistic optimists. And of course there is also the realists, who are actually quite rare.

So lets break down what the 5 ideas.

The True Optimist believes the future of the world will be an Utopia and it is going to be Awesome.

The Pessimistic Optimist believes the future of the world will be an Utopia and it is going to be Horrible.

The Realist believes the future of the world will be more or less like it is now and it will be neither better or worse. The argument here is that Realists takes the world as it is, not as they would like it to be, because they have realized that nothing really changes. It is always two steps forward, two steps back.


The Optimistic Pessimist believes the future of the world will be a Distopia and it is going to be Awesome.

The True Pessimist believes the future of the world will be a Distopia and it is going to be Horrible.

So for the people who believe that an Apocalypse is approaching, they have to be a Pessimist. If they also think that the Apocalypse is going to be fun/interesting/provide new opportunities, then clearly they are an Optimistic Pessimist.

The True Pessimist however would believe that the Apocalypse will happen and that there is nothing we can do to prepare for it. We are all screwed, so don't bother being a prepper.

Myself, I don't consider myself to be a prepper. But I do have a bugout bag just in case.

And I admit, I do kind of fantasize what the Apocalypse could be like... Hunting, farming, living off the land, rebuilding society. Sounds nice.

So I guess that makes me an Optimistic Pessimist.

On the flip side, if there is no Apocalypse, I would still argue that we are heading towards a Distopian future where robotics and technology displaces large numbers of out-of-work poor people, and how various countries solve that problem in the future will be problematic.

1. Capitalist Countries will say corporations have the right to use robots as much as they want, and reap all the benefits. The poor are just lazy. Combine this with a police state, and you basically have a plot similar to RoboCop where police-robots kill the poor people whenever they rebel.

2. Communist Countries will say corporations have a duty to pay taxes, supporting a communist / welfare state wherein people no longer need to work, and the biggest problem is people finding something to do with all their spare time.

Both of these options have their pros and cons, clearly.

But since the USA/Canada are currently heading in the direction of a capitalist distopian police state, I am afraid that makes me a True Pessimist. Because it will be a distopia and it is going to be horrible.

One could argue we are already living in a distopia. How else do you explain Donald Trump in the White House?

It is really just a matter of time before the coal industry realizes it can replace all of its workers with robots. All those coal miners that voted for Trump are going to be out of work completely sometime in the next 20 years.