The world is in a pretty precarious position, but it has been so many times. I guess the difference is that this is the first time in history that the entire world is so connected, and the events in one location have direct repercussions in others. Even if we go back 90 years to world war two, it really wasn't a world war, it was just a very large war, that spanned multiple large countries with large armies, and large economies. If we were to have a global war now, it would be catastrophic, as it would spawn truly global fighting, that would impact heavily on every country on earth.
As long as it doesn't go nuclear, the species would likely to survive.
But, survival of the species only requires a few hundred thousand people really, so billions can die and humanity can go on. And, make no mistake, there are people out there who would be quite happy for this outcome, as they count themselves among those who would survive that level of disaster. And there are those who believe that the problem with the world is overpopulation is the problem anyway, so having a cataclysmic war fits nicely into their belief system. They can justify all that death and destruction, because it meets their moral position.
My beliefs are worth more than human life.
It is no different than people who drive around in massive trucks unnecessarily, justifying it by saying that climate change isn't man-made, or that there is nothing that can be done otherwise, so I will do what I want now. And because it is somewhat "unprovable" they feel safe that they can't be proven wrong. Yet, if looking from a risk mitigation standpoint, their position is very poor. And not-surprisingly, when things go wrong, the same people are often the first to demand help from authorities, and neighbours.
People want to do what they want, and want to be supported when what they do fails.
People want freedom, but they don't want to take responsibility for the consequences of their actions. And whenever there is any ambiguity, they hide in the grey and say "how was I meant to know", even though all evidence suggested that it was pretty obvious that their actions would lead to the results they got.
Resource disparity is probably the biggest threat to our existence currently, because there have been many simulations and plenty of live case studies as to what happens when there is disparity. Essentially, there is no "going gently into the night", the oppressed will fight back. It doesn't happen immediately, but there is some kind of tipping point where the suffering gets enough that first one, and then more, and then masses of people will join a movement that overwhelms the rulers or the system that they feel is oppressing them.
The unfortunate thing about us humans, is that while we have pithy statements like "learn from the past" and others like "learn from other's mistakes" - we are fucking terrible at actually doing so. Instead, rather than heeding the cautionary tales, we have to make the mistakes already made by others, and often, won't make any changes to our own lives until we have hit rock bottom. It is much like how people act in economic downturn, rather than making financial decisions to cutback or take a second job early, people would rather keep bleeding their savings and taking on more debt to maintain their lifestyle.
We are stupid.
I always find it interesting to consider how intelligent we are at developing tools throughout our evolution as a species, but when it comes to our social ability and abilities to work together for general improvement, we are still as bad as cavepeople. We could have an awesome society of thriving, but we don't, because we have a society hellbent on competing for arbitrary prizes. If the ultimate prize is human wellbeing, would we be spending so much time competing for money?
But what do I know. Perhaps the people who are just looking to maximise themselves at the expense of others are doing god's work after all, and this is exactly what we should be doing as members of the group. Maybe the world is overpopulated, and instead of having conscription to fight in wars, we should have conscription for termination. Numbers pulled out of a hat and people executed to take the resource load off the earth.
Or maybe it should go on IQ. Or perhaps on vertical jump height.
Make it random, and then we can all justify it and not feel guilty, because we didn't have a choice in the matter. Make it a practical decision, rather than a moral one, so that we can improve our species condition by culling indiscriminately.
Get those numbers to go up, by telling people their number's up.
Success of the species might depend on it.
So it is worth it, right?
Taraz
[ Gen1: Hive ]
This reminds me of the episode in the original series of Star Trek, where two nations had been at war forever and the computers were now controlling it by not doing any fighting, just selecting an equal number of each side's population to go to the euthanasia booths to keep things balanced.
If you've never read it, Piers Anthony's "Triple Detente" is worth seeking out. It's a science fiction novel from the 1970's and has a really brilliant and original take on the subject. It's one of those books that's so thought-provoking that it stays with you forever.
!BBH
You are a Trekkie!
I haven't seen it, nor read the book mentioned, but I suspect life will keep imitating art, with humanity getting evermore twisted.
What's really scary is that I'm old enough to have seen the original Star Trek the first time around, before they remastered and repeated them. All through my childhood I thought it was filmed in black & white 😆
!BBH
What would you like on your gravestone? I will start preparing it ;D
How about "Emergency Nuclear Fallout Shelter under this slab" ? 😈
!BBH
!LOLZ
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I don't know that I've personally seen people claim the world is overpopulated for a long time, I think (in my circles at least) that thinking has evolved to the wealthy are consuming way more than their share of resources. One billionaire with a private jet has more impact on the planet than entire villages or regions of people.
Given that, conscription for termination wouldn't have any real impact because that 0.1% have such a massive outsized impact.
I don't know what you call a long time, but I have heard it pretty recently from many in different contexts. I think people are jumping on the rich consume too much, without recognising that they are the rich. The majority of the world have never been on a plane.
The amount of energy that goes into food production, the need for housing materials, the factories for goods - it would go down massively. The rich aren't buying from Amazon and Temu.
Personally I'm very aware that I'm considered rich to the vast majority of the world, but my consumption is absolutely dwarfed by those that have private jets or large yachts or massive homes. Removing the consumption of a multi-millionare would be considerably more beneficial to the planet than removing me or you, by several orders of magnitude.
Sure rich people aren't buying from Temu and aren't living in thousands of houses, but private jet usage alone is devastating to the planet... and then add in all the huge houses, the massive estates not used for food production, the luxury items that are carbon-intensive, etc.
Yes, at an individual level for sure, but once you tally up the millions like you? So, by the same token, if the billionaire can remove a million like us, then they can continue on merrily.
Yep - but add up the production, transport and disposal of all that crap - and it is pretty extreme.
I get what you are saying, but we are all complicit.
Absolutely, I'm not denying we all have an impact... you could get rid of poorest 66% of humankind OR you could get rid of the top 1% to have the exact same impact.
The greatest good comes from the 2nd option.
The problem is, get rid of the 1% and they will be replaced by the next 1%
I actually disagree with this... if there was an actual consequence for over-consuming and the top 1% were punished for it, I think we'd actually see a far more equitable approach from the next 1%... and if not, maybe the next 1% after that.
We are literally talking about the trolley problem here. To heal the atmosphere, you have to choose between terminating 80,000,000 people or 5,280,000,000 people - what do you choose?
I wonder what gives them such confidence that they would survive. I mean bombs can kill rich just as well as the poor...
I used to think this. But was never so extreme in my views that I would wish for war or other disasters. I just thought that having 2 kids should be enough for most people for a few decades. Now I somehow changed my mind and believe that human stupidity and greed are bigger problems than overpopulation.
Money. Many think they can buy safety, but it only works to a point.
I think if resources were spent on making the world better, rather than servicing greed, the population amount would be fine.
There was a show on I watched recently and it was about a major natural disaster and how it ultimately led to nuclear war as countries scurried to position themselves to best take advantage of the left over resources. It was quite interesting and a scenario I hadn't considered. I think this post fit really well with that narrative.
I have little doubt it is what people would do. We tend to act from our conditioning, even when conditions have changed.
It seems that the only scenario where billions of people would be dead is in the case of nuclear or biological warfare. And under either scenario it would seem to be very risky of anyone regardless of their power or money... They could still end up dead.
It seems some are willing to take that risk? And when it comes to the emotional stability of people these days - maybe they don't care.
That would be a very stupid risk to take...
SP500 has fallen more than 1000 points. When I see such a drop and potentially even cheaper stock prices I stop spending money. I start digging through my closets to sell as much stuff as I can that I don't need :) And I will probably sell one of my two apartments this year to invest in good assets.
What would you consider good assets?
NVIDIA, Sberbank, BTC and a little bit of HIVE :)
A chilling, yet realistic, assessment of our interconnected world. The scale of a modern global conflict is truly terrifying.
It is going to get pretty messy I believe. Maybe I will get hit by a bus before that.
Well freedom in the other way is spelt as responsibility. You cannot want to be free without taking responsibility for your actions which of course like you said is what we mostly do. It’s called the law of cause and effect but Humans would always be humaning I guess. Pretty complex creatures 😂
People don't think that much about what being free means though - there is no such thing.
As in
Indeed no such thing as freedom
We are under one yoke or the other with life
Sometimes that can be a lot to grapple with 😫
There are other means rather than a simple war in today's world. Now they use them, but who knows, perhaps the world might lead to World.War III.
World war three seems probable.
People always think money will save them, but bombs don’t care who’s rich. We keep making the same mistakes over and over again, there's still war, greed, wasting resources. When do we learn, sadly we don't, at least we look like we do until the smoke clears, dust settles and time passes and you see the exact same stuff happening again
But bomb shelters aren't made for the poor.
Well that's very true too
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I am really struck with the part "we are stupid" wherein we already know what's what and what's not but we still keep on tracking the tracks of others and what for? To commit the same mistake or we are just fools or really stupid to believe that we can change the outcome of the other person? Hmmm 🤔