Do you have hope for mankind?

by noontide 14 Replies latest jw friends

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  noontide

  Let me start off by acknowledging that my current mood/thoughts reflect the fact that I’ve watched a few documentaries recently (Blackfish, Surviving Progress, etc.) and they got me thinking about the future of mankind. Mainly the question, do I hold out hope for the future of mankind?

  A small part of me does. Most, if not all of us here, were taught the promise of an earthly paradise. I don’t believe mankind will ever achieve this kind of utopia, or even a technological (Star Trek) kind of society. However, I do think that if man manages to get their act together, they might just make the future fairly livable for future generations. But this kind of thinking, on my part, seems to be disappearing. I mainly see two other alternatives for mankind.

  The saddest is, man deploys their nuclear weapons. This is one Pandora’s box that I think is impossible to close. Even with today’s reduction in nuclear weapons, they still exist. I’m not talking about nuclear energy, but nuclear weapons. As long as these exist in a weaponized form, it would only be a matter of time before someone uses them for their intended purpose. It may take 100 or 200 years, but it only takes one crazy person/dictator/leader to set of a horrific chain of events.

  The other scenario is, mankind is shocked into changing. What I mean by this is that an event, whether by the cumulative effects of mankind’s activities (the pollution/destruction of animal/habitats/ecosystem), or a single shocking event, would force mankind into changing their ways. This would have to be a major and catastrophic event that affects all of mankind, forcing them to think about the earth as a whole and how their activities affect everyone. Think of it this way, if you are playing with a rifle and you shoot your leg off, you quickly learn to stop playing with a rifle. It hurts like hell, but you learned your lesson. I think that mankind could go through something like this. They could eventually hurt themselves so bad (globally), to where they learn their lesson enough to turn things around. But this lesson would have to hurt, a lot. This hasn't happened yet, but I do think it will, eventually.

  Anyway, I don’t mean to bring everyone down, just wondering what you think of mankind’s future. So what say you? Do you have hope for the future of mankind?
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  designs

  We're good for at least 4 centuries if we get our population and our excessive pollution under control.
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  OneEyedJoe

  Every generation thinks the prior generation is hopelessly old fashioned and the next generation are stupid and doomed. I suspect things will keep getting better for a good while.
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  Godsendconspirator

  “Our youth now love luxury. They have bad manners, contempt for authority; they show disrespect for their elders and love chatter in place of exercise; they no longer rise when elders enter the room; they contradict their parents, chatter before company; gobble up their food and tyrannize their teachers.” - Socrates (469-399 BC)
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  Hortensia

  I agree. It is quite possible that some loony running a country with nuclear power might just fire a nuclear weapon off, starting a really bad bad war. Or, some disease like ebola could cause massive death around the world. Most likely scenario is that humans will just keep polluting the earth until it just can't sustain life any more. How long? A few more generations of it and the world is doomed!

  All I can do is vote, and contribute as little as possible to the pollution myself.

  It is rather discouraging to see how fast the Islamic State nutsos have moved, one possible future is that religious extremists will get power over more and more of the world.
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  peacefulpete

  The current religious uptick is troubling, but apart from that humans have been on a role toward greater civility and higher quality of life for the past 200 years.

  The big picture is easy to loose sight of with all the sensational and negative media coverage. Really in every measurable aspect of life we are making huge strides. In the western world, the environment is cleaner today than 50 years ago by far, China and the developing countries are actually starting to change their ways as they have seen the health issues grow.

  Pinker's book, The Better Angels of Our Nature, while written before all the recent religious stupidity, does a great job defusing the panic if you are interested in a good read.

  The waste we now indulge in is clearly not sustainable but the simplest of adjustments can be made, and doubtless will be made. Unfortunately there is plenty of cheap fossil fuels available to enable our addiction to them for a good long time. Climate change is most certainly gonna bite but we will adapt.

  IMO, The biggest practical things to address are developing economical ways to produce meat without the environmental and ethical issues of using animals (plant sourced eg. http://www.marketplace.org/topics/sustainability/plant-based-hamburger-leaves-blood-plate , or cultured meat eg. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/In_vitro_meat) and greater use of next generation nuclear energy. The Molten Salt Reactor research is extremely promising and the tip of the iceberg when it comes to energy sources that we haven't begun to tap. If the human race made just those two adjustments the world would be a VERY different place.

  Chin up, humans are going to be around (in some form)for millions of years and by then they will likely look different and live on other worlds.
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  Gregor

  Sorry to burst your bubbles but it has been determined that there is a huge asteroid that will obliterate the earth in no less than 20 million years.

  Sounds like a joke but our descendants will be here in 20 million years and it will be very disruptive to their lives.

  Then there is always MAD (mutually assured destruction) if the crazies start lobbing nukes.

  Most of us will be "safely dead" and it will be of no inconvenience to us.
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  talesin

  I think that Western civilization is in decline, and that is part of a natural cycle. The world will carry on, and so will humanity. Of course, like Gregor said, humans could cause a catastrophic event (growing up during the Cold War, I never lived in fear because of the naval base - I knew there would be instant nuking, so never concerned myself :P), but we have no control over that.

  
  
  
  tal
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  NAVYTOWN

  I'm very surprised when people fail to mention Artificial intelligence as THE biggest future threat to humankind. At the rate AI research and development is going, by the end of this century at the latest, there will be artificially intelligent humanoids FAR more intelligent than any human being. Once these have been created and become self-replicating, humans will then be second on the IQ rankings. And how long will it be before these super- intelligent 'beings' decide that 10 billion humans are WAY too many for the Earth to support. And with the humans now being second in intelligence, why keep them around at all?? This is to me the biggest threat humanity as we know it will face in the next 100 years. Some may call this too far-fetched. But, wouldn't the Internet have been considered equally impossible to people who were living back in 1900???
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  prologos

  I have hope, because all indicators are in an up direction for the do-gooders, the researchers, the healers, the innovators. Are there throw-backs to darker times? of course. but:

  The light is getting brighter in the real world.