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No, we shouldn't, because it isn't true. Civilization will muddle on, as it always has, with periodic ups and downs. The oceans aren't going to boil. The econom

No, we shouldn't, because it isn't true. Civilization will muddle on, as it always has, with periodic ups and downs. The oceans aren't going to boil. The economy will stop growing, almost an inevitability as our populations continue to shrink, and we will find ways to accommodate that. Doom prophets existed in all ages, telling us the end was nigh. It never was, and it isn't now. Trying to convince people that everything is hopeless and that despair is all that remains to us is not only incorrect, it's downright evil.

ndsipa_pomu 3y ago
Typically, the periodic "downs" are usually referred to as that particular civilisation collapsing (e.g. fall of Rome). Our current civilisation is far more brittle than previous ones due to its unusual size and reliance on technologies. Previous civilisations could revert to simpler agrarian based ones without involving the death of a significant percentage of the world's population, but I'm having difficulty seeing how we would manage a simple failure such as pollinators dying out (e.g. by toxic microparticles).
- agent327 3y ago
  Periodic downs are mostly minor things, and even during major things like the fall of Rome, there weren't gangs in chariots roaming the country side looking for the last barrel of gasoline, like some demented pre-industrial Mad Maximus. And I don't buy the "but NOW it's all different" excuse. People haven't suddenly lost the ability to come up with solutions to problems. We aren't far more brittle either; if anything, our ability to ship in goods from other continents makes us far more resilient for anything less than a sudden planetary-scale event. And no, a rise in global temperatures of 0.01 degrees does not qualify as such. This desperate desire for civilization to end is the logical consequence of all the horrifying propaganda that has been blasted into our heads over the last decades. People like the author of this article lost the will to live, and just wish for it to be over. And not just by taking the easy way out either; they feel betrayed by civilization in general and want to take it out with them. We have been brought to a very dark and dangerous place, and it is going to kill a lot of people that are no longer able to tell truth from fiction. But civilization? That will be fine; it will continue, and the children of those who weren't demoralized will thrive. Oh, and the problem with honeybees is that we have too many now. Look it up. There was a problem, people jumped to solve it, and did too well, so now we have too many of the critters...
  - ndsipa_pomu 3y ago
    > We aren't far more brittle either; if anything, our ability to ship in goods from other continents makes us far more resilient for anything less than a sudden planetary-scale event. We are pretty much totally reliant on our current ability to ship food across the world which does make our current situation unprecedented. If we have a couple of years of various crop failures (e.g. due to weather patterns changing), then there will be a significant number of people dying. We don't have the necessary stockpiles to sustain the world's population for the amount of time required to drastically change how we do things.
    - agent327 3y ago
      Actually we do: we grow a lot of food to feed cattle, which we can switch to human consumption (and we get to eat the cattle too). We produce a huge surplus of food. And the potential of disaster does not imply the sky is falling. The potential for disaster is always there. That's still no reason to sit down and give up.

ndsipa_pomu 3y ago

Typically, the periodic "downs" are usually referred to as that particular civilisation collapsing (e.g. fall of Rome). Our current civilisation is far more brittle than previous ones due to its unusual size and reliance on technologies. Previous civilisations could revert to simpler agrarian based ones without involving the death of a significant percentage of the world's population, but I'm having difficulty seeing how we would manage a simple failure such as pollinators dying out (e.g. by toxic microparticles).

agent327 3y ago
Periodic downs are mostly minor things, and even during major things like the fall of Rome, there weren't gangs in chariots roaming the country side looking for the last barrel of gasoline, like some demented pre-industrial Mad Maximus. And I don't buy the "but NOW it's all different" excuse. People haven't suddenly lost the ability to come up with solutions to problems. We aren't far more brittle either; if anything, our ability to ship in goods from other continents makes us far more resilient for anything less than a sudden planetary-scale event. And no, a rise in global temperatures of 0.01 degrees does not qualify as such. This desperate desire for civilization to end is the logical consequence of all the horrifying propaganda that has been blasted into our heads over the last decades. People like the author of this article lost the will to live, and just wish for it to be over. And not just by taking the easy way out either; they feel betrayed by civilization in general and want to take it out with them. We have been brought to a very dark and dangerous place, and it is going to kill a lot of people that are no longer able to tell truth from fiction. But civilization? That will be fine; it will continue, and the children of those who weren't demoralized will thrive. Oh, and the problem with honeybees is that we have too many now. Look it up. There was a problem, people jumped to solve it, and did too well, so now we have too many of the critters...
- ndsipa_pomu 3y ago
  > We aren't far more brittle either; if anything, our ability to ship in goods from other continents makes us far more resilient for anything less than a sudden planetary-scale event. We are pretty much totally reliant on our current ability to ship food across the world which does make our current situation unprecedented. If we have a couple of years of various crop failures (e.g. due to weather patterns changing), then there will be a significant number of people dying. We don't have the necessary stockpiles to sustain the world's population for the amount of time required to drastically change how we do things.
  - agent327 3y ago
    Actually we do: we grow a lot of food to feed cattle, which we can switch to human consumption (and we get to eat the cattle too). We produce a huge surplus of food. And the potential of disaster does not imply the sky is falling. The potential for disaster is always there. That's still no reason to sit down and give up.