I spend a fair amount of time wondering how the world could ever be saved. This is the start of a series about that. The chance is preposterously puny, admittedly, but I can not tolerate life without hope.
Still, my imaginings are far from wild. They are based on the loving, cooperative, trusting nature that natural selection hardwired into every one of us. We were naturally selected to be the tightest of teammates. We evolved to literally love thy neighbor. Nothing has changed in our DNA. The problem is that we have displaced ourselves from our own natural habitat. Fortunately, our brains are plenty big enough to deal with this problem if we ever find the collective will.
Finding that unified will is the challenge. We’ve long been duped into thinking that there is something ultimately positive about being rich and famous, and as such, have given great power to a small group of unsatisfied self-servers who’ve come to flourish in our modern, anonymous world.
The painful quest to forge personal advancement into self-worth creates echoes that strengthen the cultural pillars that support the Brokedown Palace with which we’ve become nauseously familiar. It’s left us anxious, angry, and overwhelmed in what could, with a few critical shifts in cultural values, be a wonderland.
If we’re able to survive long enough, despite our obsolete yet energetic tribalism, we will eventually realize what we are, and we’ll build a better society in tune with our deepest nature. I don’t doubt that. The risk is that our worst characteristics will remain unchecked until it’s too late. I’m not necessarily talking about extinction, but I also don’t care if the species endures or not. What I don’t want is to live through the expanding oppression and accelerated die-offs that appear imminent. Nor do I want our descendants to.
Bots and billionaires admittedly stand little chance of saving us, but it’s the best I’ve got. And it strikes me that their pairing of influence and basic sense might be enough to seed the change.
Let’s hope they succeed.
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