Possible Futures: Introduction
The visions and versions of the future described in these pages assimilate and synthesize a broad range of climatic, demographic, ecological, geological, social, economic, and other factors. The better you understand the factors, the better you'll be able to evaluate these possible futures, and the wiser you'll be when making choices about your own future. In other words, don't start your reading about the TEOTW(AYKI) here, unless you already have a lot of background about the way things are!
About the organization of the rest of the "Possible Futures" section: Many of these source materials, including most of the books, span two or more of my arbitrary and possibly less-than-ideal subdivisions. If appropriate, I repeat their listing in different sections to ensure that surfing gets you what you're looking for. In general, here are main topics in each subdivision:
Ecology: Every species faces limits to growth—and overshoot, if it is no smarter than yeast.
Collapse: How and why earlier societies collapsed.
Thoughtful Realism: The future will be smaller, slower, and simpler, but
perhaps better.
Dire Projections: The future will be smaller, slower, simpler, and grim.
Transition: Individuals and communities will make a transition in the years ahead, ready or not. Why not be ready?
Finally, I also include some links to Business-as-Usual & Optimistic scenarios....but not many.