“It is to look at where we are now, what we are doing now, and to consider where some of our current behaviors and unattended problems might take us. I considered drugs and the effects of drugs on the children of drug addicts. I looked at the growing rich/poor gap, at throwaway labor, at our willingness to build and fill prisons, our reluctance to build and repair schools and libraries, and at our assault on the environment. In particular, I looked at global warming and the ways in which it’s likely to change things for us. There’s food-price driven inflation that’s likely because, as the climate changes, some of the foods we’re used to won’t grow as well in the places we’re used to growing them. Not only will temperatures be too high, not only will there not be enough water, but the increase in carbon dioxide won’t affect all plants in the same ways. Some will grow a little faster while their weeds grow a lot faster. Some will grow faster but not be as nutritious—forcing both their beasts and us to need more to be decently nourished. It’s a much more complex problem than a simple increase in temperature. I considered spreading hunger as a reason for increased vulnerability to disease. And there would be less money for inoculations or treatment. Also, thanks to rising temperatures, tropical diseases like malaria and dengue would move north. I considered loss of coastline as the level of the sea rises. I imagined the United States becoming, slowly, through the combined effects of lack of foresight and short-term unenlightened self-interest, a third world country.”