What is Future: Definition and 784 Discussions

The future is the time after the present. Its arrival is considered inevitable due to the existence of time and the laws of physics. Due to the apparent nature of reality and the unavoidability of the future, everything that currently exists and will exist can be categorized as either permanent, meaning that it will exist forever, or temporary, meaning that it will end. In the Occidental view, which uses a linear conception of time, the future is the portion of the projected timeline that is anticipated to occur. In special relativity, the future is considered absolute future, or the future light cone.In the philosophy of time, presentism is the belief that only the present exists and the future and the past are unreal. Religions consider the future when they address issues such as karma, life after death, and eschatologies that study what the end of time and the end of the world will be. Religious figures such as prophets and diviners have claimed to see into the future.
Future studies, or futurology, is the science, art, and practice of postulating possible futures. Modern practitioners stress the importance of alternative and plural futures, rather than one monolithic future, and the limitations of prediction and probability, versus the creation of possible and preferable futures. Predeterminism is the belief that the past, present, and future have been already decided.
The concept of the future has been explored extensively in cultural production, including art movements and genres devoted entirely to its elucidation, such as the 20th-century movement futurism.

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  1. P

    Future direction needed for Uni student

    Currently I am doing first year BSc. I like to become a pure mathematician or a theoretical physicist. The trouble is I cannot decide on which one. They say ‘do what you enjoy most’. But in this case I enjoy both equally as much. For example, I read about quantum mechanics or string theory...
  2. D

    Can We Predict the Evolution of Future Humans?

    From http://www.whatwemaybe.org/ His new book is free to download from http://www.whatwemaybe.org/
  3. M

    Unlocking the Mystery of Telling the Future

    i think the world is going in tracks. you know how people can really tell the future? they must of somehow already experienced this happening which means the world could have been born 100 times and we just don't know it b/c it happens then blows up and know one is left to remeber what was...
  4. R

    News The future - A question of opinion

    There are claims that we hear everyday that with the free trade, globalization, and the spread of liberal values, the borders between the nations are gradually disappearing and the concept of a nation will gradually vanish, that the world will eventually become a global village speaking one...
  5. M

    Will Continents Join Together in the Future?

    Sorry, very stupid question though, but will our continents drift and join together trillion years later on ? thank you.
  6. V

    Is It Normal to Feel Uncertain About My Future Career Path in University?

    I entered university fall 2004 to study engineering physics. The course program was quite interesting and I am pretty satisfied with what I`ve learned so far. But i think i don't have that much interest in all sorts of machines and stuff like that. I could say i like calculus and pure math more...
  7. N

    Future of Electrical Engineers

    Q. What do most Electrical Engineers do typically in the real world? i.e what kinds of jobs do they hold? What kind of jobs can EE major's do with a bachelor's degree? Do they deal with circuits all the time in their careers? Answers, ideas or criticisms appreciated.
  8. R

    The future of solar technology

    As we all know, Solar cell technology is not widely used around the world. Moreover, it can offer powerful energy as well as reliablities that is some conditions due to cloudy days. What do you think of the future of this technology? Can it become an efficient technology so that it can replace...
  9. S

    Can a Star in a Jar be the Ultimate Weapon?

    If this is probable:http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/4270297.stm then 'Stars in a Jar' would be the ultimate weapon, clean thorough and totally effective. Lets say the evidence existed from the LAN 'newmexico' database, and this mysteriously vanished along with other relevant papers...
  10. M

    Our future in our own hand

    Climate change has become a reality and is mainly due to the anthropogenic changes. When we talk about climate change its what actually happened during last 150 years to the Earth climate after human industrial revolution. Although the major contibution to these human induced changes goes to...
  11. N

    Revolutionizing Fuel: Discover Browns Gas and Water Fuel Converters

    I found this website [PLAIN]www.waterfuelconverters.com[/URL] and I applaud the owner. Electrolysis is easy, and finally someone is doing something about it. Browns gas is much safer than gasoline.
  12. N

    Revolutionizing Fuel with Water Fuel Converters - Electrolysis Made Simple

    I fount this site [PLAIN]www.waterfuelconverters.com[/URL]. Electrolysis is easy, and finally someone is doing something about it. I am an electrical engineer and I applaud the owner of the company.
  13. A

    QUICKIE FV or PV? FUTURE OR PRESENT

    HI I need to make a line diagram for this question and don't know what formula to use future or present can someone tell me please Mike wants to buy a snowmobile. His parents decide to lend $9000 at 10%/a compounded monthly, if he agrees to repay the amount by making equal monthly (at the end...
  14. P

    Did the University of Utrecht uncover evidence that people can sense the future?

    In the 'black box can see the future' thread from awhile ago, the following part can be read: Does anyone know any more about these experiments? I would like to see some published papers on this. Have they been debunked or explained in some way?
  15. D

    Princeton:Black Box sees Future

    http://www.rednova.com/news/display/?id=126649 Here you will find info about a box that sees into the future through numerical analysis of random numbers... Sounds kinda like numberology to me... At the bottom of the page are links to go to the direct website at the bottom of the page...
  16. P

    Can a random number generator predict the future?

    "'It's Earth-shattering stuff,' says Dr Roger Nelson, emeritus researcher at Princeton University in the United States, who is heading the research project behind the 'black box' phenomenon." They say this box that generates random numbers, 1 or 0, generated many more 1's just before princess...
  17. W

    Guidance for Pursuing a Dual Career as a Pilot and Theoretical Physicist

    can anybody give me an idea on what i should do since i want to become a pilot for the aorforce and a theoretical physicist?
  18. D

    Exploring Space: Mankind's Unknown Future

    is it so smart to send a machine into unexplored space wit hinfo about Earth and mankind and all that stuff. like they did with voyager or pioneer or w/e it was they sent past saturn and into deep space. i mean who knows what's out there. but by the time it reaches any other galaxy eaarth would...
  19. G

    In The Future Beyond The Dark Era

    Will our universe be a quantum vacuum...just one big vacuum with particles so spread apart that its very near to a pure vacuum-like state
  20. BobG

    News Mapping the Global Future - 2020

    This makes for some interesting reading. http://www.foia.cia.gov/2020/2020.pdf The rise in economic power of China and India is pretty much a given. One prediction is really striking. They predict the world's economy to grow by 80 percent over 2000 levels. At that rate, the worst that...
  21. M

    Ramen Noodle Dilemma: What's the Future?

    What's going to happen to me if I continue to subsist, almost entirely, on Ramen Noodles?
  22. Ivan Seeking

    Information Technology and the Future of Cities

    http://www-agecon.ag.ohio-state.edu/class/AEDE680/Irwin/pdf/60.pdf
  23. S

    Uncertainty Principal and calculating the future :p (Question)

    Wouldn't it be neat if you could build a computer good enough (ignore this current day impossiblity) to hold and calculate everything you need to be able to tell the future? Obviously (um... right?), there's also more physics we need to figure out before we could actually be able to do somthing...
  24. cronxeh

    What does the future hold for engineering careers?

    Hello again PF community. Id like to hear your thoughts regarding the future of engineering fields and where you think we will be in 5, 10, 15 years from now. As an engineering major I don't really know which i'd like to do - Civil Engineering would seem useful if I wanted to build my own...
  25. K

    Time Travel Possible in future?

    People say and have decently backed up that time travel is not possible by saying that you would have to rearrange every particle back to where it was. Instead of rearranging the particles of everything. What if u could take all the information and I mean every aspect and formation of every atom...
  26. S

    Future study in Quantum Information Theory/Computing

    I am currently a freshman at rutgers university and I am planning to do a double major in Physics and Mathematics with a minor in Comp Sci. I am very much interested in the research fields of Quantum Information Theory and Quantum Computing and I was wondering if anybody could recommend a track...
  27. Ivan Seeking

    Past sea-level suggests troubling future

    http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2004-11/ru-lap110804.php
  28. wolram

    Shed any light on future weather patterns

    Can anyone shed any light on future weather patterns for the uk In our local paper it is reported that we may be in for the coldest winter since records began, is this due to the ice caps melting, or is it a local phenomena?
  29. P

    News Presidents (or future presidents) religion, an effect on the election?

    Hi everyone, I'm new and just wanted to say hello before i got into this topic so...hi! I am sure many of you know that John F. Kennedy was the first and only (as of now) United States President that was Catholic. I too am Catholic (although not as involved as some members of my church)...
  30. W

    Is Warp Velocity Really the Future of Space Travel?

    is coming:http://arxiv.org/abs/astro-ph/0410511 :approve:
  31. N

    Future of Fire: What's In Store?

    I've got a project for school where we have to pick one invention/discovery and prove that it is the best invention/discovery in the history of mankind. One of the requirements is to show how it will continue to be the best discovery in the future. I've done a bit of searching and brainstorming...
  32. P

    E.O. Wilson's 'The Future of Life'

    I just finished E.O. Wilson’s “The Future of Life” and was kind of disappointed by it. It was the first book of his that I have read. Given my interest in evolutionary biology and his 2 Pulitzer prizes writing on the subject of biology, I had high hopes for it. Parts of it were interesting -...
  33. P

    Could 3D Video Technology Change the Way We Live and Interact Online?

    I thought about the possibility of having several live streaming web cams focused on the same area, feeding all this information at once into a HD, and having it resurrected as a 3D (4D?) world wherein users could enter and float around like flies, talk to one another, and even manipulate remote...
  34. C

    Medical Future of Medicine: Can We Reach Atomic Level?

    From my understanding, researchers around the globe are studying more and more into gene therapy and "smart molecules". As many of you all know, these could possibly end up curing numerous forums of cancer as well as many herditary diseases that kill many each year. This brings me to my...
  35. Raven

    Predicting the Future in 5 Years: Make Your Prediction Now

    Put simply, I would like to know what some of you think the future will bring in five years. What do you think the world will be like in the year 2009? What will the population size be? What will the latest gadgets and electronics do? How much will we rely on oil, alternative sources of...
  36. benzun_1999

    Exploring Future Scientific Possibilities: Teleportation & Beyond

    Hi all, Can anyone tell me what we can expect in the near future from a science perspective? I know it is not possible to travel faster than light but is teleportation possible? TVs without screen? -benzun
  37. V

    How long till we can travel into the future?

    Can someone please tell me how fast we would need to travel in order to go a relatively short distance into the future? Just a matter of years really…
  38. S

    Pam asked about the future of strings?

    String theory needs the graviton. But guess what. They would have to freely admit to gravity waves having not be proven, yet theorectially they have moved past this with the gravitons introduction. It would seem premature,:) yet this is the way of it that the mathematics have gone down this...
  39. Y

    Will humans need computers in the future?

    Will humans "need" computers in the future? My question is will humans relay on computers so much in the future that they will think they can't live without them? Some people say we "need" them, but the first humans didn't.
  40. Z

    Apprehension about future career in science

    I am a new college student who is very unsure about the career I want. I am between computer science and physics. I think I may enjoy being a video game designer/software engineer more than anything else, but I really want to be as smart as possible and have a complete physics education...
  41. Z

    Apprehension about future career in science

    I am a new college student who is very unsure about the career I want. I am between computer science and physics. I think I may enjoy being a video game designer/software engineer more than anything else, but I really want to be as smart as possible and have a complete physics education...
  42. A

    Future development of MBE or nanotechnology

    What's you all expect the future development of MBE and nanotechnology?
  43. H

    Messages from the Future: Is Time Travel Possible?

    Once on the discovery channel, I saw a special on Time Travel & Time Machine. They showed various types of designs, some ridiculous & some interesting..One that caught my attention was a "spiral" glowing machine..It was spiral shaped containing lasers (as far as I can remember)..Cant remember...
  44. F

    The reality of past present and future

    After some sixty plus years of observation, I'm starting to believe that every single action is destine to happen based on any number of prior events leading up to that point in time. And, we have no control over the outcome. The other day I was doing a thought experiment about "time" as...
  45. B

    Time travel into future possible

    If I say die at 45 have have myself frozen and in 500 years time they unthaw me medicine is advanced they can bring me back to life with my memory just as how I knew it before I passed away than from my point of view id have trvelled in time to 500 years into future right ? no diff from a time...
  46. U

    Is there only one possible future? Is free will an illusion?

    Hello, I've just joined this forum, and I hope this is the correct place to ask these questions ... Anyone want to talk about time? I love thinking about this notion ... Einstein believed in ‘block time’, that the future is already there, that there’s no difference between the past, the...
  47. Q

    Are Dreams a Window into the Future? Exploring the Mysteries of Dreaming

    :cool: Did anyone have a dream come true - So true that it's just plain weird? ... maybe even beyond explanation? :smile:
  48. A

    No future? (I never studied chemistry. Am I finished?

    Hi I am in my final year of A-levels (Grade 12), and have applied to some universities home and abroad for Electrical Engineering (for States and Can., Fall 2004). Universities in Pakistan won't let me apply for ANY form of engineering (even mechatronics). I always thought Elec. Engineering...
  49. D

    Help Needed: High School Math Test Decides My Future

    My school is making the students take a test that compares us with all the other schools in our area. It includes mental mathematics, number sense, reasoning etc. Unfortunately, I forgot a lot of the way to solve these things and a few are 'trick' questions. I need help on the ones I am...
  50. P

    Is it possible to use physics and mathematics to accurately predict the future?

    :eek: I read a newspaper a few days ago.. the Articles was about some physics teacher, who mathemtically preicted when the country war was going to end, and it really happened! :eek: how do you apply physics and mathematics to predict the future ? :confused: Teach me please
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