Foresight turns out to be a critical adaptive strategy for times of great stress.

The difference between e-mail and regular mail is that computers handle e-mail, and computers never decide to come to work one day and shoot all the other computers.

My own suspicion is that a stand-alone artificial mind will be more a tool of narrow utility than something especially apocalyptic.

But here's the ugly truth: nature doesn't care about democracy, or who's right, or what's fair. And because of the slow-change aspect of climate, we can't wait until the worst effects are upon us to make a decision -- by then, it would be far, far too late. The scenario we may be faced with is one where doing something for the wrong reasons, run by the wrong people, may still save more lives than holding out for a more appealing option.

Even if we were to stop putting out greenhouse gases right now, we'd still face decades of warming.

Is there a better example of natural selection in action than 'Project Runway?'

A good scenario doesn't make a good science fiction story - but it's a setting within which a good science fiction story might be told.