It may only be 14 years away, but experts say life in the year 2020 is going to be very different. Popular science magazine Cosmos recently asked some of the world’s leading scientists to forecast the future, and this is what they came up with:

By 2020 the North Pole will be almost entirely free of ice and the West Antarctic ice sheet will also be breaking up. Seas will rise and earth’s low-lying areas will be flooded. Apart from the challenge to human survival, the animal and vegetable kingdoms will be hard hit too, with many species heading to extinction. And this is all just 14 years away.

Depending on how we respond to this atmospheric warming, our power sources in 2020 will be much more diverse, with wind, wave and solar energy becoming more important. Cars will probably run on diesel fuel, or electric and petrol hybrid engines. They also predict the extinction of the four-wheel-drive!

According to astronomers at SETI (that’s the Search for Extra Terrestrial Intelligence Institute), by 2020 life will have been found in outer space. They say the race is now just determining which of their various technologies will find our galaxial neighbours first.

A cure for cancer may well be found by 2020. At the very least deaths from common cancers will be greatly reduced.

The technology we use by 2020 will be impressive. As far as computer games are concerned, we’ll no longer sit in front of a keyboard and screen—handheld devices will connect us to people across the globe while we’re standing in the supermarket que. And self-cleaning surfaces will be found in our homes. Coated with ultraviolet-light- absorbing particles, the kitchen bench of tomorrow will disinfect itself better than a swipe of the sponge with a dash of bleach.

By 2020 scientists even predict the rise of ‘intelligent clothes’. Special fabrics fitted with monitors will study our health as we work, sleep and exercise; sports clothes will tell us if we’re stretching or bending in ways that are harmful, and some clothing will even be embedded with mobile phone chips—if we’re injured our body temperature and physiology will trigger the chip and call the nearest hospital.

And by the year 2020 folks, the new era of domestic bliss will have dawned. No more cleaning, dusting or doing the laundry. No more ironing, folding clothes or tidying the house. No wiping up of the toddler’s dribble or vacuuming up hubby’s toenail clippings. These tasks will all be done by our own domestic robots. Androids are predicted to be the ‘must have’ item of the 2020s and are even expected to be treated like pets, according to the Cosmos article.

So, technologically, scientifically, environmentally and inter-gallactically, life in the year 2020 is forecast to be unique indeed. But will we be any happier? Will we be more fulfilled or content?

Winning the war on cancer suggests so, but our environmental future suggests not. If the pundits are right, we’ll be cancer free at the same time we’ll be overwhelmed by natural disasters.

But leaving the dramatic cases aside, will our wireless, internet-enabled global gaming consoles and ‘must have’ domestic robots help in our quest to find meaning and harmony? Recent research out of Duke University in the US suggests people have fewer close ties with family and friends today than 20 years ago. It’s suggested our rapid adoption of the internet is a major contributing factor to this break down in face-to-face contact. And as for the robots, maybe we’re losing something by giving up the dirty work of household chores. I’ll never forget hearing a leading suicide-prevention expert explaining his method of working with depressed teenagers. The first thing he does is take them into the kitchen to do a load of washing up. Before the automatic dishwasher arrived, some of the best conversation between parents and children took place at the kitchen sink. So often our technologies save us time but leave us lonely, don’t they.

Ultimately, the future’s unknown. But if half of this Cosmos article is right, in our ecological and technological decisions we’ll need the wisdom of God to ensure we don’t do more harm than good. On that note a proverb from The Message Bible comes to mind:

Trust God from the bottom of your heart;
don't try to figure out everything on your own.
Listen for God's voice in everything you do, everywhere you go;
he's the one who will keep you on track.