One factor which everyone seems to be overlooking in this thread is the future impact of biotechnology. Sure, evolution by natural selection has largely halted for the human race - we were, on average, probably at our fittest about 10,000 years ago, before the introduction of agriculture. However, artificial evolution will soon take over. There are two main forms - purely biological evolution through genetic engineering, and a continued evolution in our collaboration with devices. We are on the verge of achieving the first. We may soon be able to eliminate many genetically related diseases and conditions. While Rifkin and other Luddites rail against the unnaturalness of it all, they will fail. There are too many cases where GE is an unquestionable good. If parents had the option of the following traits in their children, how many would refuse? * Perfect teeth - natural immunity to caries. * Immunity to cancer. * Immunity to AIDS (about 1% of the current population is naturally immune) * Ditto many other diseases, genetic and infectious. All the above may be available in the next 20 years. (The anti-AIDS gene maybe in 10 - it looks like an easy one). In the longer run, almost anything that can be imagined may be possible, including physical immortality and increased intelligence. Secondly, we've evolved as a tool-using species for a million years, and our technology is as much a part of our inheritance as are our genes. Where will it take us no one knows, but the future will be richer and stranger than we can imagine. Our machines will help re-make what it is to be 'human'. This includes all devices - cyborg or external, nano or macro, sentient or dumb. So I'm not too worried that the cull rate due to sabre-tooth tigers has dropped off, nor even that the irresponsible are no longer starving to death, which Tim would seem to want. Our technology can and will overcome these little problems. 'Not in vain the future beckons, Forward, forward let us range. Let the great world spin forever Down the ringing grooves of Change.' - Tennyson Peter Trei trei@process.com