The world is a mess.
That is what I see.
Do you see it differently?
Those who read me regularly know many of the reasons I believe society is currently in decline, and most stem from the way the economy is incentivised, because that is what we act upon. It doesn't really matter what aspects of the mess we look at, all of them tie back to a couple fundamental points, where greed and the desire for more is the driving force behind every action. But it isn't the desire for more wellbeing which might at least lead to some good, it is the desire for more power over others by collecting wealth and using it to influence the situation.
As a result, there is war, there is starvation, there is addiction, there is violence, there is environmental devastation and there is a an increase in suffering at every level of society. And, while the wealth at any cost mindset is at the top of the financial chain, it is going to continue to impact on all of us.
People will get more disillusioned, more violent, more ill, more depressed, more lonely, more idiotic, more polarized, more self-centred - and less able.
And as many people like to look on the bright side of life and say it is about perspective, this isn't a Rorschach test, there isn't some random inkblot on a piece of paper to be interpreted. It is obvious. Reframing it as being optimistic is bullshit. To ignore what is obvious is to choose ignorance over understanding.
As much as I think that humans can be awesome (and some are) and how we could build a society that flourishes for the foreseeable future, that is not what I see. I see repetition of past mistakes at a greater velocity and speed than the past could manage. We have become for more efficient at speeding our own destruction, all in the name of increasing the profit margins to feed the ego of a few power-hungry fools.
Fools?
Not idiots. They might very well be at the higher end of intelligence, but that doesn't mean they aren't foolish. Because as they keep grabbing more and more control, they are creating their own cage too and eventually the conditions they created, will be the bars that contain them.
Are the good times gone for good?
Possibly.
What is going to be the catalyst that drives humanity into a new age of innovation and advancement of humanity itself? What are the technologies that are going to take us forward into a period of time where fear is reducing and opportunity to be our best is increasing? Will the promise of AI to reduce work repetition and drudgery by humans be used to empower us to be more creative, or just replace us for extra profit?
Do you feel safer than you did ten years ago?
As the war machines have started turning, rearmament happens globally, and the hunger of the few for power and control over the many grows exponentially, where do you see it leading, for you? For the people you love? For your community? Your city, country, continent?
Even if you have wealth and survive, what world will it be?
While "normal" people kill each other over which imaginary lord they pray to, or who someone is loving, or which fucking toilet sign is appropriate - the greedy get more of what they want. The entire system is fed on turning people against each other, whilst still wanting to be part of a group, a community - to belong.
We all belong to the problems of the world.
But maybe, I am the disillusioned individual, floating in a sea of people who have clarity and understand this world far better than I. Maybe everyone else looks into the mess and sees beauty and grace and people who are constantly improving to be better versions of themselves, to build a society that is continuously advancing to be more rewarding for participants, more compassionate for those who need help, and always looking to improve, to make things better tomorrow, than they are today.
Is it just me?
There is order in the chaos, but the order doesn't bring value for the majority of humanity, as it is an algorithm that drives division between people in order to bleed them dry of any value they might have - and any energy and will to change course.
We are the ink, smeared between pages.
When the same ink could have been used to write poetry and music.
What do you see?
Taraz
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I think your view is more pessimistic than my view. I believe the world has always been a mess. When were the good old times? Empires rise, empires fall. There are brief pauses between endless wars and nobody ever gave a rat's ass about the good of humanity. People fight for power and when they come to power they fight to death to keep it. This is how it has been from the dawn of humanity.
If anything I see the world after World War Two as almost a golden age of humanity, there were still wars, but the biggest scale war since WW2 has been one in Ukraine as it already claimed more lives than Afghanistan a Vietnam wars combined. Still all of these are small compared to WW1 and WW2.
What comes next is unknown, could be a WW3, or AI Apocalypse or Terminator type future, or could be the biggest golden age of humanity so far has known...
But the good happened incrementally, because the mechanism of economic growth required reality of some sort, something to be produced, to be sold, and people to make it. Now, that is not the case. Wealth can be made with no attachment to the physical world.
Up until the early 70s. Then shareholder wealth became the driving force, as did using debt to extract from the masses.
The last is the least likely.
I opt for that new golden age that awaits future humanity; I certainly won't live to see it at seventy years old… I hope my son Matthew and my grandchildren will be fortunate enough to experience it.
Who knows, with the pace of the technological change accelerating we might live in a different world five to ten years from now and even at your age you might see the start of it... At 49 I am sure I will see where this AI thing is going... But I choose to be an optimist and think that human conditions tend to improve on average with time. I would certainly not choose to live in the world that was 100 or 300 years ago...
It is not about going back, it is about going forward. Our advancement in areas of technology have increased to the point it is costing us humanity. The goal of technological advancement shouldn't be to generate wealth for the owners, but to take us forward. The average improvement you speak of is because the past mechanisms required actual improvement to generate wealth. That is not the case today.
All this new nuclear testing stuff has me a bit uneasy. I'm actually a fan of nuclear power, but not this kind!
Perhaps rather than testing weapons, they should be investing into testing ways to make clean, safe, fission energy.
I totally agree with you there!
Maybe the remedy is toppling the greedy few. But that is hardly possible. Enlightenment of the masses? A good, workable solution, but might not be very effective in this situation.
For any problem to be solved, the fundamental reason that birthed that problem has to be addressed. The fundamental reason for the problem in the world today could be the way the systems that power our world are structured, to give control to the few and keep the many under. To encourage greed. Maybe the systems need to be renovated. But by who?
The only thing clear to me is that the many has to rise in Rebellion against the few and demand for their welfare. But who will stir this rebellion?
Maybe someone or a group that is enlightened and selfless who's willing to transfer their ideas to the general masses and move them to action. And it would have to happen on a global scale. Like the movements that rose throughout Europe from country to country, seeking to remove monarchical governments and replace them with democratic ones. Many of them succeeded. But will this one succeed? Quite unlikely. The powerful, greedy few will do everything to ensure it doesn't.
Yep. I think I am looking for some indication that the future is going to be better, without having to rely on blind faith. Yet, I don't really see it and no one has given me a view with some compelling evidence behind it.
It can only be by those who don't have power now, because the powerful now will never give it up.
Have you noticed that "welfare" has changed meaning over the last decades from our wellbeing, to a handout given by those in control?
I often tell my students that although we were born as humans, we have not truly become humans. Because we are mentally fragile, greedy, and violent. Nowadays, we seem to be becoming safer day by day. Especially in the present, I never feel safe. To be honest, on a personal level, I myself am also very depressed about our future and present. That is because of all the social or security-related reasons. It also seems to me that we have left the good times behind.
And "going back" isn't the answer, going forward better is. We just aren't going forward better at the moment.
I see that we are in the world with "the others" and we are responsible. Descartes was right, when he summed it up very well: I think, and therefore I exist.
And I think we aren't doing a very good job of existing to our potential.
The constant chase for money and influence is obviously harmful to society overall. I wonder whether there is still a chance for us to move towards something better, or we are just making the same mistakes as before.
There is always a chance, but the probabilities seem incredibly low at the moment.
Hi, friend @tarazkp. That image reminds me of a photograph often used in psychiatric and psychological evaluations. I've always described it as half a walnut reflected in the image, evoking the wings of a butterfly.
Everyone, based on their own experience, will see in that image what best suits them, but there are those who deceive themselves and, depending on who asks the question, claim to see BEAUTIFULLY IDEAL things to convince the psychiatrist and thus obtain early release. I've known people like that, real criminals, manipulators…
Early release from the psychiatrist, to be another crazy person in society.
The world is full of diverse minds, despite the efforts of systems to alienate those who are antisocial, those who defy the norms. I was reminded of a trilogy: Veronica Roth's Divergent trilogy, comprised of the books Divergent (2011), Insurgent (2012), and Allegiant (2013). It's set in a dystopian, post-apocalyptic Chicago. All three are very relevant to your post.
Diverse minds, doesn't mean all minds have good ideas, nor that all behaviours should be condoned.
That part of "is it just me* well it isn't, I also studied and made research on the system chaos brings with it, the majority craves for more innovation based on technology and in mother way, weaponized instrument so deadly are also made advanced, because man never seems to find peace within his minds, using the concept of a particular country "always shall be superior" than others. I can't forget the maim values this brings also which is peace and humanity value nut why yet are they making what cam wipe put humanity in a blink of an eye. To me I see peace and harmony but yet see threats and destruction long with it.
It is so sad how the world now operate on greediness, the greedy omes derive joy in taking more than what they ought to get, if not none, same way the rich takes from the door masses to enrich themselves. Thank you for this @tarazkp you're indeed a eye opener
Oh it is not just you; me as well.
I certainly do not feel safer than I felt 10 years ago. Much earlier than 10 years ago, in the 60s perhaps, people used to say that the future is bright. I've seen this in old movies and documentaries. Well, the only bright thing about this future is the blinding electricity. Values are at an all time low, development, as you have insinuated, is only for a select few. There is indeed a decline and many blame it on technology. That's a reach, or not. It's really all interconnected. I think of a perfect example of failure to learn from past mistakes. The first law and development movement which saw a decline, especially after a critique by David Trubek and Marc Galanter, nicknamed "Scholars" and forty years later, the criticisms were still being ignored. There's some improvement now, but only with fragmentations in the subject area. The core problems pointed out, including selective benefits for the so-called helpers and non-contextual approaches, are still glaring.
This paragraph right here, especially the first statement which I know you know is the Nigerian reality, sums it up in my opinion. Greed is really a significant bane of harmonious human existence.
As optimistic as I am, for at least my own locality - Nigeria, the end is not in sight and solutions seem impossible to reach or implement.
In finality, I actually think the ability of people to actually think for themselves these days, allowing for rapid and widespread indoctrination, is a major contributor to, and difference, between yesterday and today.
Wow!
Some of us look and see, some others don't even look cause they don't wanna see.
Many time I've asked my self and asked some friends when debates emerge from the present situation and future one.
Why is it so hard to live peacefully our lifes without looking at other's and wanting to take by force what they have that we might want?
Why the obsession of dominion and power over the rest?
Why doesn't fighting can only mean effort, perseverance, improvement and hard work?
Why the killings?
-Why mountains of money if you don't need all that to live well?
There are many others.
We've been given many chances to make it right and keep making it wrong, losing in the road everything what's valuable, enlarging more and more the distance between what's supposed to be close. Using resources to kill life rather than to improve it, making bigger holes every time to the world we live in in the way towards total destruction.
Future scares me. Maybe not for me, better or worse I've lived(sirvived mostly) and done a couple of nice things, but, my sons? My childs are starting in this chaos their life. What good is for them in this future that's being "built" down. No good at all, and that makes me sad, cause it is humanity's fault, powerful's fault and we are paying slowly and harder the highest price. Even when they will get to pay as well, they won't even feel it, theirs will be a one time hard payment, ours is a long lasting suffering one.
right. smart people acting foolish and unwise.. :( might does NOT make right.
ps. I see a butterfly. :)
Cheers!