Homo sapiens, 2106 A.D.

This week Seed is asking the question: "Will the 'human' race be around in 100 years?" Since I suggested the question, I have a quick set of answers. I believe there are three primary categories of alternatives: 1) The rate of technological (both bio & computational) change will continue to accelerate, and "humanity" as we know it will be transcended beyond comprehension. 2) Our complex technological society will collapse as our artifactual matrix overwhelms our cognitive substrate, and the sociological response will be like that of lemmings over a cliff. We will revert back to some sort of post-pre-modern scenario where expectation of affluence is attenuated and the liberties and freedoms we take for granted will be constrained back to historical proportions. 3) We continue as we are, basically a very advanced primate leveraging our innate cognitive capacities to the point where we explore creation of the universe itself with ...