21st century

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

"20XX" redirects here. For the video game, see Seven Samurai 20XX.
Millennium: 2nd millennium - 3rd millennium - 4th millennium
Centuries: 20th century - 21st century - 22nd century
Decades: 2000s 2010s 2020s 2030s 2040s 2050s 2060s 2070s 2080s 2090s

The 21st century is the present century of the Gregorian calendar. It began on January 1, 2001 and will last to December 31, 2100, though common usage mistakenly believes January 1, 2000 to December 31, 2099 to hold this distinction. Technologically it is different from the 20th century mostly by changes brought about by the Digital Revolution of the 1980s, 1990s and 2000s.

Contents

[edit] Important developments, events, achievements

[edit] Politics

[edit] Science and technology

Initial date of the 21st century
Enlarge
Initial date of the 21st century

[edit] Space Exploration

[edit] Medicine

[edit] Personal Technology

  • 2006 80% of world land surface has coverage by cellular networks for mobile phone use.
  • Mobile phone usage approaches 100% in developed countries. [2]

[edit] Other

[edit] Conflicts and civil unrest

[edit] Worldwide deaths from war and terror attacks

Furthermore, there are several wars and dictatorships continuing from the 20th century. In most cases, the death toll is unclear. See also [4].

[edit] Natural disasters

[edit] Sports

[edit] Issues and concerns

Some of the things that have dominated discussion and debate so far in this century include:

  • Globalization. Advances in telecommunications and transportation, the expansion of capitalism and democracy, and free trade agreements have resulted in unprecedented global economic and cultural integration. This has caused (and is continuing to cause) huge economic and cultural shifts which have been the subject of considerable controversy. Gladly, the gradual shift towards greener capitalism, aka ethicism, promises to make good the globalization movement, and bring more unity to an often too divided world. It is summised* [5] that gradual ethical steps in three main areas (animals and the environment, employees, and consumers), are what will turn the tide in a favourable direction. The three stakeholders responsible for these changes are: governance, industry, and consumers.
  • Overpopulation. The United Nations estimates that world population will reach 9.1 billion by mid-century. Such growth raises questions of ecological sustainability and creates many economic and political disruptions. In response, many countries have adopted policies which either force or encourage their citizens to have fewer children, and others have limited immigration. Considerable debate exists over what the ultimate carrying capacity of the planet may be; whether or not population growth containment policies are necessary; to what degree growth can safely occur thanks to increased economic and ecological efficiency; and how markets should accommodate demographic shifts. Evidence forms that developed countries (such as Japan) suffer population implosion, and the population debate is strongly tied with poverty.
  • Poverty. Poverty remains the root cause of many of the world's other ills, including famine, disease, and insufficient education. Poverty contains many self-reinforcing elements (for instance, poverty can make education an unaffordable luxury, which tends to result in continuing poverty) that various aid groups hope to rectify in this century.
  • Global warming. The overwhelming majority of climate scientists think that the earth is currently undergoing significant anthropogenic (human-induced) global warming. [6] The resulting economic and ecological costs are hard to predict, and by the end of the 21st century could be quite severe.
  • Other environmental changes. Trends such as increased pollution, deforestation and biodiversity loss occurring in the 20th century are likely to continue into the 21st century.
  • Resource depletion may be a significant issue, with economic and environmental implications. Resources that could be depleted soon include oil and natural gas.
  • Global power. Issues surrounding the cultural, economic, and military dominance of the United States and its role in the world community have become even more pointed given its recent military activities, problematic relations with the United Nations, disagreement over several international treaties, and its economic policies with regard to globalization. Integration of the European Union and the African Union have proceeded.
  • Intellectual property. The increasing popularity of digital formats for entertainment media such as movies and music, and the ease of copying and distributing it via the Internet and peer-to-peer networks, has raised concerns in the media industry about copyright infringement. Much debate is proceeding about the proper bounds between protection of copyright, trademark and patent rights versus fair use and the public domain, where some argue that such laws have shifted greatly towards intellectual property owners and away from the interests of the general public in recent years, while others say that such legal change is needed to deal with the threat of new technologies against the rights of authors and artists (or, as others put it, against the outmoded business models of the current entertainment industry). Domain name "cybersquatting" and access to patented drugs to combat epidemics in third-world countries are other IP concerns.
  • Technology developments show no sign of ending. Communications and control technology continues to augment the intelligence of individual humans, collections of humans, and machines. Cultures are forced into the position of sharply defining humanity and determining boundaries on desire, thought, communication, behavior, and manufacturing. Some predict that by the middle of this century there will be a Technological Singularity if artificial intelligences are created that are smarter than humans. If these then create even smarter AI's technological change will accelerate in ways that are impossible for us to foresee.
  • Energy is becoming scarce and more expensive, due to the escalating demand for petroleum ("oil") and oil-based products such as gasoline and kerosene, unmatched by production. Discovery of new oil fields has not been sufficient to sustain current levels of production, and some fear that the earth may be running out of economically viable oil. While complete depletion will not happen in the near future, some fear that a peak in production will cause an end to the trend of economic expansion in modern society, perhaps resulting in a collapse of modern civilization itself. Most economists argue that alternative sources of energy will prevent this disaster.

The United Nations lists global issues on its agenda here and lists a set of Millennium Goals to attempt to address some of these issues.

However, it is important to note that the current year is only 2006, which means we are only at the start of the century. Therefore, it is impossible to make detailed predictions about the future of this century.

[edit] Significant people

[edit] Influential people in politics as of 2006

(in alphabetical order)

[edit] Influential people in religion as of 2006

[edit] Influential people in technology as of 2006

[edit] Influential people in science as of 2006

[edit] Influential people in mathematics as of 2006

[edit] Influential people in the arts as of 2006

[edit] Astronomical events

[edit] Science fiction set in the remaining years of the 21st century

[edit] Television and film

[edit] Computer and video games

[edit] Novels

[edit] Decades and years

1990s 1990 1991 1992 1993 1994 1995 1996 1997 1998 1999
2000s 2000 2001 2002 2003 2004 2005 2006 2007 2008 2009
2010s 2010 2011 2012 2013 2014 2015 2016 2017 2018 2019
2020s 2020 2021 2022 2023 2024 2025 2026 2027 2028 2029
2030s 2030 2031 2032 2033 2034 2035 2036 2037 2038 2039
2040s 2040 2041 2042 2043 2044 2045 2046 2047 2048 2049
2050s 2050 2051 2052 2053 2054 2055 2056 2057 2058 2059
2060s 2060 2061 2062 2063 2064 2065 2066 2067 2068 2069
2070s 2070 2071 2072 2073 2074 2075 2076 2077 2078 2079
2080s 2080 2081 2082 2083 2084 2085 2086 2087 2088 2089
2090s 2090 2091 2092 2093 2094 2095 2096 2097 2098 2099
2100s 2100 2101 2102 2103 2104 2105 2106 2107 2108 2109

[edit] See also

[edit] External links

This article or section does not cite its references or sources.
Please help improve this article by introducing appropriate citations. (help, get involved!) This article has been tagged since November 2006.
Millennium Century
4th BC: 40th BC 39th BC 38th BC 37th BC 36th BC 35th BC 34th BC 33rd BC 32nd BC 31st BC
3rd BC: 30th BC 29th BC 28th BC 27th BC 26th BC 25th BC 24th BC 23rd BC 22nd BC 21st BC
2nd BC: 20th BC 19th BC 18th BC 17th BC 16th BC 15th BC 14th BC 13th BC 12th BC 11th BC
1st BC: 10th BC 9th BC 8th BC 7th BC 6th BC 5th BC 4th BC 3rd BC 2nd BC 1st BC
1st:   1st   2nd   3rd   4th   5th   6th   7th   8th   9th 10th
2nd: 11th 12th 13th 14th 15th 16th 17th 18th 19th 20th
3rd: 21st 22nd 23rd 24th 25th 26th 27th 28th 29th 30th
4th: 31st 32nd 33rd 34th 35th 36th 37th 38th 39th 40th
Retrieved from "http://en.wikipedia.org../../../2/1/s/21st_century.html"