World Politics News   Articles for World Politics Course

Canada has just completed its longest and most expensive national election and has shifted from the center-right government of Stephen Harper (who had been Prime Minister for ten years) to a center-left government of Justin Trudeau (the son of a former Prime Minister).  The change in policies are likely to be dramatic, the most notable of which is a move toward more stimulating central government fiscal policy.  The Liberal Party government is somewhat of an anomaly in a world of governments that are shifting toward the right.

The earth has experienced five previous mass extinction events (that we know of).  Researchers are arguing that human-induced changes in the environment are moving us toward a sixth mass extinction event that will unquestionably have catastrophic effects on humanity.  According to The Guardian:

The scientists argue then that the changes would be so extreme, and so unlike anything that the Earth has ever seen before, that it could represent a geological shift as big as the rise of microbes on the planet or the rise of multicellular organisms.

Many of the most extreme changes can yet be avoided, but there is little question that some changes have already been set into motion.  It is hard to tell how much time the world has to change course.

Many analysts are becoming quite concerned about the development of military robots.  With advances in artificial intelligence, it is highly likely that weapons could be roboticized to deal with situations that commanders might believe are too risky for human soldiers. That impulse is certainly admirable, but a real danger exists that the ease of killing without risk to soldiers (as evidenced by the dramatic increase in the use of weaponized drones) might lead to unintended and catastrophic consequences.  The time to think about the pitfalls of such innovations is before the weapons are developed.  The rapid development of atomic weapons without any thought about the practical effects of the existence of such weapons is a clear example of the technology outpacing our sense of ethical behavior.