Climatopolis

We are an adaptive species. Unlike the birds and butterflies, Matthew Kahn writes, we humans can adapt to whatever new world comes our way. An optimist in a pessimistic group, he focuses the upside of a disaster. For one thing, the Rust Belt could receive an overdue makeover. Given the steady declines of Cleveland, Buffalo, and Detroit, it sounds like a joke today to imagine them vibrant again. However, Kahn points to the revitalizations of Boston and New York City after the dreadful 1970s. If global warming makes the Sun Belt too sunny and unlivable, perhaps what was old will become new again. Foresight, he says, will be the key. People who buy Detroit property today for next-to-nothing will look good if the city booms again. "Climate change will create big profit opportunities for insurance companies that are nimble enough to accurately price the real-time risk that policy owners (such as homeowners) face in different locations," he writes.

His oddly specific prediction: We're all going to eat dried fruit in the future. Kahn reasons that growers will want to hold inventory to deal with market fluctuations brought on by climate-related agricultural disasters, and dried fruit keeps.