This will be the world in 2030, according to ten of the most influential people on the planet

Credit: Pixabay

Due to the finitude of our lives, we usually forget that we not only live in a moment of important social and technological changes but that they occur much faster than at any other time in human history. After all, some 400,000 years passed between the discovery of fire and the construction of the first knives and spearheads, but only half a century between the invention of the television and the takeoff of the internet.

Increasingly, great entrepreneurs and politicians often become fortune-tellers. In many cases, that has something of self-fulfilling prophecy: it is easier to know where the shots will go in the immediate future if your influence reaches all corners of the planet and your wealth is equivalent to the GDP of many countries in the world, in the same way, that the best fortune-teller in a team’s lineup is their coach.

This is what Bill and Melinda Gates have done this week in their annual letter about big bets about the future. This year, the couple has indicated that, by 2030, the number of child deaths will have halved, polio will probably have disappeared and the agricultural revolution that they intend to set in motion will have made Africa self-sufficient. There is no doubt that their visions take into…