Talk:21st century

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[edit] Wikipedia Itself

I think that under Science / Technology Wikipedia itself should be included. It is a new type of encyclopedia and I believe it to be one of mankind's greatest collective achievements of the 21st century. Cockers 14:32, 22 August 2006 (UTC)

You're probably right (wikipedia should be mentioned) but take a step back. "Mankind's greatest...achievements?" It's an innovative and incredibly usefull website, but you're just being silly now. --Stevekl 19:22, 23 October 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Older comments

I'm going to add India to the countries affected by the tsunami. I'm surprised you ignored India, which more have died than in Thailand. I'll arrange it in this order: Indonesia, Sri Lanka, India, Thailand, and other countries. This is the order by largest number of deaths.

[1] explains how each millenium began in the "0" year "0, 1000, 2000..." rather than the "1" year (1, 1001, 2001...). Surely this means all the "Centuries" pages will need to be updated now a mathematical proof has been shown? --XinuX

I'm not sure if you are joking or not, but "Sorry, Sparky, but there are 11 patterns. You can't ignore the 0. It's always the first value in any number system. So a number system based on finger counting would be Base 11" is clearly wrong since 10 goes to the 2nd place. Therefore, everything he writes is of course, WRONG. Sorry couldn't resist. -Hmib 00:04, 26 May 2005 (UTC)
Sorry, Hmib, but you can create 11 symbols with your fingers. You have two symbols in base 2 (0-1), ten in base 10 (0-9), eleven in base 11 (0-10). Another way to look at it is that since by using your hands you can express the number ten with one show of hands, ten goes to the first place. I think you may have forgotten that "Everything You Know Is Wrong." 203.206.15.101 07:49, 15 May 2006 (UTC)
The problem with that website is that it is, to use a strictly technical term, bollocks. When the Christian calendar was created, 1 AD immediately followed 1 BC. There was no zero. And when counting was invented, it started with 1, and the concept of zero came along much later. Js farrar 22:49, 30 July 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Mass Killings

Should 9/11 really be listed as one of the mass killings? Honestly, it just pales in comparison to the others. Maybe list it in INFLUENTIAL EVENTS or something, but not mass killings, it puny. CJWilly

But it is one of the largest mass killings so far. The mass killings are ranked by total number of victims, 9/11 ranks 5th there. --Mixcoatl 13:44, 20 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Would natural disasters go under biggest killings? i started a new stub section for natural disasters just in case not--Thewayforward 17:42, 26 Dec 2004 (UTC)

Does anybody notice that we now seem to have six "mass killings" in the list of the five biggest mass killings? And does the tsunami/earthquake really count as a "mass killing" when it's a natural disaster? Dtobias 14:42, 8 Feb 2005 (UTC)

It should be relabeled as "Mass Deaths" to include situations in which people died but were not killed. Lue3378 06:29, 1 February 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Predictions

Does anyone mind if I remove Mr. Kurzweil's predictions? As someone who did AI-related research, I know his predictions in that area are totally bogus (as indeed any prediction for "real AI" arriving at any time more precise than "not soon, but beyond that no idea"), which doesn't give me any confidence in more of his prognostications. --Robert Merkel

I put them in as a curiosity, so that in the future we can check against his predictions. I hate it when people come up with all sorts of crappy predictions and later nobody takes them up on it. In fact, I would really like to add Moravecz's robot predictions as well (robots take over around 2050 if I remember correctly). Maybe we should somehow emphasize that they are just opinions, not generally shared. Other than random predictions, there's not much we can put into future timline articles anyway. AxelBoldt

Would it be better to start a page predictions for the 21st century? AxelBoldt

Yes, that would be an excellent idea. Sorry I didn't see this before. One thing that might be worth putting in is some of the climate change predictions, for instance. The more the merrier (provided they're from significant people or attract attention for some other reason). --Robert Merkel

I must say, the list of predictions is certainly interesting, and should be kept somewhere. -- Sam

Put your money where your mouth is. Visit longbets.org, a clever way to engage in futurism. Also useful for gathering controversial predictions for the 21st Century page. <>< tbc

I believe there should also be a page on fictional views of the 21st Century. The way the future used to be. How about 21st Century in fiction? --Lee M

There is Timeline of the future in forecasts. Welcome there, but please remember to tread lightly. Add the author, the year when the prediction was made and, if necessary, comment on the trustworthyness of the author. Paranoid 10:23, 20 Dec 2004 (UTC)

Future events in fiction are not necessarily forecasts; I agree that an article like 21st Century in fiction should be made. Also, Lee M, did you mean could be for "The way the future used to be," as it has not yet happened? Lue3378 07:18, 1 February 2006 (UTC)

Try timeline of fictional future events. 70.129.35.107 23:11, 5 July 2006 (UTC)

I object to Elizabeth II and Mahmoud Abbas being listed as "Influential people in politics" of the 21st century. Granted that this list is highly subjective, but still. Elizabeth II is the queen of a democratic, constitutional monarchy/monarchies, and as such does not exercise any political authority, being more of a symbolic head of state. While not only de jure heads of government are listed (Osama bin Laden), it contains mainly people whose political opinions has some sort of aspect of changing the world, for better or for worse. Elizabeth II does not fit into this. Crown Prince Abdullah does. As for Mr. Abbas, he was the prime minister for a little more than six months of the Palestinian authority, and resigned partly due to his lack of influence. In this case, Yassir Arafat is sufficient. I vote to remove these two. --Gabbe 13:01, May 28, 2004 (UTC)

I vote to remove Aznar. He didn't anything really influential, all he did was give some help to America. That doesn't make you influential, and he is irrelevent now. I don't think his term in office was that outstanding or influential. CJWilly

I don't think the predictions section belongs here at all, at least not in its current form. The predictions aren't sourced, and even if they were, unless they came from a particularly notable source (e.g. a UN commission studying the phenomenon in question) I don't see how they qualify as encyclopedic. --Soultaco 20:11, 17 September 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Predictions for the 21st century as of 2003

Please note that these predictions are controversial, and disputed by many other observers: they are listed here to show some late 20th century futurists' predictions of the events of the 21st century so that they may be compared with real events as they happen.

[edit] Influential Scientists/Mathematicians?

Stephen Hawking and Brian Greene as influential scientists of the 21st century? Why don't we start by looking at some Nobel laureates before we randomly promote two physicists and science writers as extremely influential scientists? Compare these with the scientists listed in the 20th century. There we find Albert Einstein, Niels Bohr, Max Planck, Enrico Fermi, James Watson.... Does either Hawking or Greene even come remotely close to these people? I think no. I'll look into this further, but if someone else could, I'd appreciate it too. -SocratesJedi 07:56, 23 Dec 2004 (UTC)

Indeed, it seems as though they've been included largely because they're bestselling authors and therefore prominent in the minds of whoever stuck them in. It'd be interesting to see some actual scientists' lists of influential scientists. Mr. Billion 08:45, 1 Apr 2005 (UTC)

The lists of influential scientists and mathematicians are both extremely poor, but at the same time, it's difficult to simply pick off Nobel Prize winners. The Nobel is generally awarded when the person is quite old and is no longer really doing research; Ray Davis, who won the Nobel Prize in Physics in 2002, for example, is retired and no longer really doing research. However, one could pick off Fields Medal winners, since they're generally quite young and still have many years of research left in them. That said, I think people like Edward Witten, Andrew Wiles, Nicholas Katz, Manjul Bhargava, Richard Taylor, Chandrasekhar Khare, Vladimir Voevodsky, Richard Borcherds, William Gowers, William Thurston, S-T Yau, Michael Freedman, Maxim Kontsevich, Curtis McMullen, etc, are worth considering for the mathematics list. (Witten for the science list as well.) nparikh

[edit] Influential people in politics as of 2005

Would Michael Moore warrant inclusion here? –– Constafrequent (talk page) 23:46, 11 Jan 2005 (UTC)

I think that people are placing down whoever the heck they want to in this section, probably due to national pride. Though I don't doubt that the Finnish, Italian, and Maletese Prime Ministers and Presidents are important to the people of the said countries, they do NOT deserve to be listed with people like George W. Bush, Hu Jintao, Saddam Hussein and others whose impact and importance so far in this century is actually worth it. Wurkwurk - November 2

I agree with Wurkwurk above. Latvia's prime minister is simply not an influential figure in politics, and about half of the present list join him. That's my view. The trouble is, everyone has a different view. "Influential" is a relative term, and I would argue in favour of scrapping this section completely. How do we go about doing this? Mikedaventry - 17.44, 22 Jan 2006 (GMT)

[edit] Influential People in Technology

Is it fair to say that the Google guys, Larry Page and Sergey Brin, can be included on this list? Google has changed the face of the internet and the way that people access information (i.e. linking to Wikipedia). Riffsyphon1024 02:47, 28 Jan 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Influential People in Entertainment

  • I think Britney Spears has been added and dropped more than once already. Is there any coherent criterion for who should be included or excluded other than people adding in whatever singers / actors / etc. they like and deleting the ones they don't?
  • The 'Boston Redsox'??? Who the hell put that there. Could someone please explain how some American baseball team has been influential to the world. --Jquarry 23:00, 11 May 2005 (UTC)
    • I saw that. I have to note that I am a huge Red Sox fan. When I saw it, I laughed and thought that someone probably wrote on the talk page that it didn't belong there. I was right, and I think that you're right. D. Wo. 06:20, 2005 Jun 15 (UTC)

[edit] Triple Conjunctions

Are all of these triple conjunctions posted by 85.74.7.23 really necessary? I believe because they happen so frequently, that they are usually not regarded as major astronomical events. -- Riffsyphon1024 03:39, 17 Feb 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Entertainment

I think we need to distinguish between influential and significant... Britney Spears and the Simpson girls may be significant in terms of sales and popularity, but I hardly think they (especially Ashlee Simpson) are influential... pomegranate 13:50, Feb 25, 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Joseph Ratzinger (Pope Benedict XVI)

Should he be considered for Influential People in Religion yet, or is it too early? -- Riffsyphon1024 19:02, Apr 19, 2005 (UTC)

I think it's too early. He hasn't accomplished anything yet other than don the papal crown. Mr. Billion 05:38, 20 Apr 2005 (UTC)
Looks like somebody's stuck him in anyway. Are we going to include every pope this century? If so, he warrants inclusion here simply by virtue of being Pope. If not, he will only warrant inclusion if he does something outstanding.
I think that over time we're probably going to see a lot of non-influential people inserted here, simply because immediacy makes things seem more important. If somebody reads the current version of the article at the end of this century, they may not have ever even heard of pope Benedict XVI because his reign will likely be relatively short, and there isn't any reason to expect him to do anything particularly remarkable. Whoever replaces George W. Bush will also almost certainly be placed here by someone, regardless of how active a president his replacement actually is. Mr. Billion 23:24, 25 May 2005 (UTC)
I think it is appropriate to place Pope Adol... I mean Pope Benedict XVI here. He has already stirred up quite a buzz, his reign is likely to determine the future of Catholicism, so on. It is not fair to compare this page with the 20th century, since this century has had only 5 years and the last century 100. We can delete stuff as they become less important. -Hmib 23:56, 25 May 2005 (UTC)
If the Dalai Lama and Falung Gong's founder are included, I see no reason not to include Ratzinger. John Paul II was far more influential in the 20th Century, while his reign in the 21st was not only short but also less important, compared to what he did in the 1980s and 1990s. As for Ratzinger, I would think that he should be included simply by virtue of being pope. If in, say, 20 or so years, his papacy turns out to be rather unimportant, we can delete him. The "too early" argument applies to the whole article. saturnight 23:30, Jun 21, 2005 (UTC)
All right, then. I've got no more objections. Mr. Billion 17:32, 22 Jun 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Science fiction set in the 21st century

There's got to be countless thousands of science fiction stories set in the 21st century. Maybe the section "Science fiction set in the 21st century" should instead be its own article or category? Either way, we'll eventually need some criteria for inclusion. Mr. Billion 05:57, 12 Jun 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Current Issues

A. Overpopulation bias?

The list of issues and concerns seems to be NPOV except for the section on overpopulation. It seems that the issue is biased to the supposition that overpopulation is evil. I believe the contrary. Densly populated nations like Luxembourg and Switzerland have higer quality-of-life indicies than sparsely populated nations like Mongolia and Angola. D. Wo. 06:29, 2005 Jun 15 (UTC)

I tried to NPOV it. -- Beland 00:12, 1 August 2005 (UTC)

Then again countries like India, Bangladesh, Rwanda, Indonesia and many others are overpopulated any paying the price. Canada has very very few people for its landmass - even its populated regions are not that dense - and its quality of life is very good. When it comes down to it, overpopulation is a threat that is harming the world and mankind itself. No benefit will come when all of nature is torn down for skyscrapers, that is self evident. Wurkwurk, November 2 I agree that concentrating on overpopulation not only is NPOV, but is also irrelevant for this timeframe. Overpopulation was an issue in the 1970s, and it lead to the instigation of birth control in the developing world. By all means, talk about food scarcity, environmental degradation or poverty, but other factors like civil disturbances and corruption are greater culprits than population size. If anything, ageing has emerged as a twentieth century issue as baby boom cohorts in rich countries begin to retire. Even in the developing world birth rates are falling.

B. Abortion is a major current issue

It is insufficient to list abortion merely as word in a one sentence blurb on morality, while "overpopulation alarms" (which promotes total access to abortion) gets a paragraph. To maintain balance here, it needs to be stated that millions of preborn babies are destroyed yearly in all major western countries, and many of these countries are pushing this upon third world countries as a solution to their problems of poverty. rjp2006 Jul 12

[edit] Large portions of the world have current population deficits..

Some areas have populations that are shrinking, not growing. Take Europe for example. If this trend has changed in the last 2-3 years, it hasn't changed much. The global population could easily double without becoming a major global problem.

Also, I always see some remark of "The War on Terror" on any political or social article even remotely related. I always see the criticisms of the 'war' but I never see the rebuttal as to why it might just be fighting the greater of two evils. Terrorist attacks involving islamic fundamentalists have been occuring since WW2. North Korea, for example, is an immediate threat to two U.S. allies, Japan and South Korea. Immediately after 9/11, the DOW industrial average dropped over 7% to around 8950, the largest decline ever in a single day. If you are referring to the Patriot Act, the slight majority think that the Patriot act doesn't go far enough. Note that only 13% know much about the Patriot Act. 60% know little or nothing about the Patriot act.

Just try to keep it objective for all readers. If you are going to start by listing criticisms, link the rebuttals as well. IMHO, McCarthyism and Nixon's strong arm tactics were more of a threat to civil liberties than the "War on Terror". Some would agree that the "War on Drugs" impedes on civil liberty more than the "War on Terror". Speaking of which, that page could use a Pro and Con list.

[edit] Influential people in Religion

I've removed Joel Osteen and Billy Graham, since their fame in the USA does not mean very much in the rest of the world. I've thought a bit about who should be included in this list, and I think it should suffice to list leaders of or very influential people in the largest world religions. Khamenei, Benedict XVI and the Dalai Lama should definitely be included. Now, I don't live in America so I don't know who are the main leaders in American Protestantism (maybe Graham should be included after all). I don't know much about Hinduism either. Can somebody help me here? --saturnight 12:18, July 25, 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Issues and concerns

Should there be an item added about morality (sexuality, media content, etc.)? Religion (clashes of civilizations, cultural integration, adapting to the 21st Century, secularity, recruitment, etc.)? Democracy? Human rights? Anything else of major global importance? -- Beland 01:21, 1 August 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Technology Missing?

The article reads as if technological progress comes to an end, frozen in time, since 2005, for the remainder of the century.

It is extremely likely that we will have the technology to:

  • record and communicate everything that we see and hear
  • live our life in virtual reality, rending physical transportation near pointless
  • augmented reality
  • read the spoken voices of the people around us
  • speak electronically without moving our mouths
  • construct visual maps of knowledge, making it possible to learn much faster than today

It is possible (likely?) that we will see:

  • human-level AI, and then post-human AI
  • nanotech assemblers
  • life extended to 150 (by isolating brain from body,) and then (within a few extra decades?) beyond (by siliconizing the brain)

I work on TaoRiver and WikiCities futures wiki.

LionKimbro

[edit] Alphabetical Order

In the Influential people in politics as of 2005 section, a note says the names are in alphabetical order. They are not. For instance, George Bush is right above Vladimir Putin while Jean Chretien is somewhere below both of them. It is probably easier to remove the note than to reorder them all.

[edit] Removed Outer Space

Outer space uninhabited for the last time (this moment may have already passed) Since the above makes no sense, I removed it. .

[edit] The 21st Century began in the 1990s?

Who keeps sticking this in here? It doesn't make sense. If the 21st century began in 1991, then "century" doesn't mean anything. It's an issue of semantics: To accept this, you'd have to redefine "century" to replace "100-year timespan" with something fuzzy like "social era" or "zeitgeist." You could certainly argue that "the modern age" began in 1991, but it does not make sense to twist the calendar for this purpose.

The "some historians" who supposedly think that the 21st century began in 1991 aren't referenced, and I've never heard of them except from the anonymous user who keeps sticking this in. Wikipedia shouldn't give undue space to fringe views, and this sounds particularly fringe and nonsensical. It's somebody's arbitrary division and personal terminology. --Mr. Billion 18:34, 22 December 2005 (UTC)

REPLY:

That would be me. True that, being I was born in 1990 I like to think of the '90s as part of the 20th Century, but they seem so 21st to me. I wrote instead that "many 21st Century trends began in the 1990s and one may say the 1990s are in the same social era as the 2000s and a different one from the 1980s and earlier decades". Many, if not most people would agree with that.

That's a bit POV, isn't it? ;) But I agree, the first decade of a certain century is always affected by the last decade of the preceding century. --TonyM ｷﾀ━( °∀° )━ｯ!! 18:59, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Facts about the 21st century?

Unsubstantiated content removed:

"The 21st Century is probably the last century without space travel being available to the masses"
"First century wherein the Internet has been essential"
"Increased technologies may eventually affect freedom and privacy"
"First century completely into the Digital Age"

None of these "facts" seem encyclopedic. Dev1n 20:58, 27 December 2005 (UTC)

I agree. I saw that added and intended to remove it, but got sidetracked by other tasks. Thanks. --Mr. Billion 00:55, 28 December 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Deaths in War (iraq)

Should we really have that Lancet study in there? Although it was definetely widely disseminated and is notable for maybe affecting people's views on the war, it's margin of error is absolutely enormous. Although the mean amount of deaths they predicted was 102,000, the 95% confidence interval is plus or minus 94,000. The study really isn't worth that much. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 209.50.91.70 (talk • contribs) 18:31, 11 January 2006.

[edit] Science and technology

This section is terribly overrepresented by space missions. Surely there must be other major discoveries on other scientific disciplines too!--Jyril 19:35, 27 February 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Another problem

The link to the year 2091, doesn't work and instead re-directs you to the main article, the 21st century....

shouldn't the twenty-first century be from 2000-2099 after all the first two digits should never match the century their in. Tell me what year was it 2,006 years before the year 2006.

1 BC. bob rulz 09:08, 26 May 2006 (UTC)


[edit] Archbishop of Canterbury?

Should he be under 'influential people in relgiion'? He is the head of the Anglican Church, and his opinions are considered important when it comes to international events...

[edit] Neuromancer

Why is Neuromancer by William Gibson listed under Television and film when it's a novel? And I don't think any date was given in the book.

I'm deleting it.

[edit] Astronomical Events: Eclipses?

Should we include eclipses in the Astronomical Events section or would that be too excessive? Valley2city 22:23, 22 October 2006 (UTC)

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