10 Most Important Things That Will Happen In The Next 20 Years

With our redefining of the city, we will also have to come to terms with the fact that the "wild" will also mean something very different in the future.

The development of human society is essentially the gradual separation of man from nature and we are now pretty much at the point where we live alongside the natural world, rather than within it. We have removed ourselves from nature and can now only really class ourselves as observers.

Wild habitats such as forest and moorland are being lost to urbanisation and climate change as we speak and the success of many species will depend on their ability to adapt to city living.

Biodiversity is rapidly decreasing, both as a direct and incidental result of our meddling with the natural world. We do show an instinct for conservation (perhaps a guilty conscience?), but generally speaking we will only choose to save the creatures with the fluffiest fur and the biggest doe eyes, the rest of the less charismatic flora and fauna will have to cling on without our help. 

The loss of pollinators and plankton will have a greater global impact that the extinction of pandas, but, unfortunately, they don't look as good on the leaflets.

Our idea of a natural environment in the future will probably be an artificial construction itself, with carefully roped off areas of "wilderness" where the rest of nature that isn't human will have to try to survive and we'll visit occasionally for family holidays.