Read
recently a dystopic sci-fi short story set near the end of this
century in
which a floating city of refugees is overturned by one of the then
frequent super typhoons in the Philippine archipelago. The “hero”
then must flee from super biotech Chinese police. Nothing about the
story line offered reason to look forward to the world that will be
brought about by climate change, environmental damage, rising
sea-levels and technology-enabled authoritarianism. Indeed, the end
of the century will most probably be one of desperation,
displacement, disease, poverty and death for billions. Made me
wonder what is the meaning and purpose of any of the lives we live
now if it leads to this. The answer seems to me to be that there is
no meaning but there may be purpose.
Most
who live
in the wealthy countries of North
America, Western Europe and the Pacific Rim enjoy lives of security,
well-being, comfort and accomplishment. In the past 200 years,
advances in industry, agriculture, transportation, and technology
have improved the lives of many others and reduced poverty globally.
While not everyone shares in this progress, collectively, the human
race has never had it better. But the good times and bad times come
in waves – light ages followed by dark ages – and the next one
may indeed be a super typhoon.
Throughout
history, periods
during which many lived relatively well are followed by times of
collapse. During the golden
age
of Rome, its citizens enjoyed relative stability and comfort. When
Rome fell, Europe entered the centuries of the dark ages. Other
civilizations rose and fell in their own spaces and times. This was
probably true in prehistory as well. Homo sapiens almost went
extinct at least twice before: around 195,000 years ago and again
some 70,000 years ago. Both times it took hundreds to thousands of
years to recover. We now live in a global civilization that has
entered the age we created from scratch, the Anthropocene. When our
global light age ends, the dark age will therefore also be
globalized.
What does this mean for those
of us alive now? Well, we can enjoy what
we have. Beyond that, nothing.
Ages swing from good to bad and back again. It seems likely they will continue
to do so. None of this has any meaning, it just is. At most, it has
perhaps been the engine of human evolution as overcoming the past dark age allows us to rise a little bit further in the next light one.
But
we can not claim credit for our relative
well-being. We were just born lucky.
And we also cannot be blamed for the past centuries of burning
fossil fuel and despoiling nature. We were merely alive when the
bill came due. But we can still have purpose. At
some point in the next century, humanity will reach a new
equilibrium with the changed earth. So we can try to live more
sustainably now and do everything we can to ready the world and the
next generations for what is to come so that the next age is a light
one.
