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Lowering our standard to sub-Saharan Africa is a shortcut to extinction. We need science and accompanying "standards" to remain as they are. I'd personally rath

Lowering our standard to sub-Saharan Africa is a shortcut to extinction. We need science and accompanying "standards" to remain as they are. I'd personally rather look elsewhere before resorting to authoritarianism. What we IMO need is a push towards more technology, actually more resource use, more science and more rational thinking of any kind in general. We need to get out of the sub-Saharan mindset. Living in harmony with nature is not, and never was, sustainable and if it ever held any weight it is now a hollow, unproductive pipe-dream. We are created to do interesting things, hence the brains. So let's make interesting shit happen instead of waving flags in each-other's face and complaining about not being in harmony with the gods. You ask how we sell that as a sunny future? Assuming the unwashed masses want to face the truth I'd think after some scrubbing they'd generally be onboard with a rational, abundance-filled, space-faring fucking utopia. Engaging further with our cultural and religious psychoses should be disincentivized and probably banned as the extinction-level threat it is. If you ask me, nationalism is the greatest threat humanity ever faced. Also - while we still have nations - not voting for raging religious demagogues would be a start.

birksherty 6y ago
> Lowering our standard to sub-Saharan Africa is a shortcut to extinction. > Living in harmony with nature is not, and never was, sustainable > need is a push towards… more resource use > We are created to do interesting things, hence the brains Nothing above is true. Humans are exactly like cancer cells on Earth and may be universe is we go everywhere. Grow at any cost and kill the host finally. If we are capable of doing good ethical things does not matter because we never did that and will not. Uncomfortable but truth.
- robben1234 6y ago
  It's all every species are though. Consume the resource, survive yourself. There's a natural way of balancing the amount of consumers if resources aren't enough. Wolves population will die out to a smaller number if there's not enough food even after moving places. We could be limited by that, or we could step over it using science. After all wild cats don't think if it's ethical to eat prey. Or understand the concept of ethics. But we do. What saves Earth for now is the fact that we can't move away easily. Even with all the money and desire we don't have an independent settlement outside of the planet. There's lot of things required before we are able to, and then even more before moving to Mars, for example, is as easy as moving between Europe and Americas. Then the Earth will be doomed. Who would care about not only insects, but the fate of the planet, when we could just move residents somewhere else. Like we do now on a smaller scale, and always did.
pinipedman 6y ago
> Engaging further with our cultural and religious psychoses should be disincentivized The sort of techno-optimism you're espousing here amounts to a religion as well. It's a religion to which the majority of the developed world appears to subscribe. It seems to be losing adherents to disillusionment, albeit incredibly slowly. The prevalence of views similar to yours are one of the reasons why I don't foresee a positive future. I suspect society will continue down your suggested path of more technology and more resource consumption believing it to lead to some sort of salvation. I see it instead as the furtherance of human's destructive tendencies which have only grown more potent with every increase in humanity's capacity to effect its will via technological development.

birksherty 6y ago

> Lowering our standard to sub-Saharan Africa is a shortcut to extinction. > Living in harmony with nature is not, and never was, sustainable > need is a push towards… more resource use > We are created to do interesting things, hence the brains Nothing above is true. Humans are exactly like cancer cells on Earth and may be universe is we go everywhere. Grow at any cost and kill the host finally. If we are capable of doing good ethical things does not matter because we never did that and will not. Uncomfortable but truth.

robben1234 6y ago
It's all every species are though. Consume the resource, survive yourself. There's a natural way of balancing the amount of consumers if resources aren't enough. Wolves population will die out to a smaller number if there's not enough food even after moving places. We could be limited by that, or we could step over it using science. After all wild cats don't think if it's ethical to eat prey. Or understand the concept of ethics. But we do. What saves Earth for now is the fact that we can't move away easily. Even with all the money and desire we don't have an independent settlement outside of the planet. There's lot of things required before we are able to, and then even more before moving to Mars, for example, is as easy as moving between Europe and Americas. Then the Earth will be doomed. Who would care about not only insects, but the fate of the planet, when we could just move residents somewhere else. Like we do now on a smaller scale, and always did.

pinipedman 6y ago

> Engaging further with our cultural and religious psychoses should be disincentivized The sort of techno-optimism you're espousing here amounts to a religion as well. It's a religion to which the majority of the developed world appears to subscribe. It seems to be losing adherents to disillusionment, albeit incredibly slowly. The prevalence of views similar to yours are one of the reasons why I don't foresee a positive future. I suspect society will continue down your suggested path of more technology and more resource consumption believing it to lead to some sort of salvation. I see it instead as the furtherance of human's destructive tendencies which have only grown more potent with every increase in humanity's capacity to effect its will via technological development.