Gefira 59: Astride the Borderline Between the Past and the Future

“Astride the Borderline Between the Past and the Future” or Gefra 59 says goodbye to 2021 and looks beyond 2022. The year that is coming to its end has left the world with a mountain of money in circulation, which by no means implies that money creation has reached its limits. To the contrary. The system in which money is loaned on condition that more is paid back, the system in which numerous measures aimed at saving world economy – like quantitative easing along with the steps taken to cushion the effects of the global lockdown that does not appear to end anytime soon – the system that enlarges the heap of banknotes exponentially seems to be doomed. This is what we are leaving behind and what will – no doubt – linger on well into the rest of the 2020s. And besides?

Besides, we will be more and more intensely confronted with the development of science and technology that forcibly enter our lives, our biological and psychological lives. It is gene editing, artificial intelligence, the internet of bodies, and the merge of them all that is meant here. We – or at least our children and grandchildren – are promised to become supermen and superwomen, equipped with capabilities like infrared vision, very low muscle fatigue, resistance to ionizing radiation, hand-free control of external devices and remote thought exchange between individuals. Our lives will be longer and we will possibly attain immortality, while death will be a thing of the past. What do you feel when you hear about such a future: excitement or fear?