Why are we in danger of going the way of the dinosaurs? What has caused progress to slow and governments, leaders and experts to suddenly become gridlocked, unable to solve our most dangerous problems?
The answer is complexity.
There's no denying it. Even the most brilliant among us is trapped in the same biological spacesuit -- a spacesuit that requires millions of years to develop new features. So what happens when the complexity of the problems we have to solve simply exceeds the capabilities we humans have evolved to this point?
The answer is that we come to an impasse. We reach a "cognitive threshold" beyond which we cannot progress. Another way to say this is that humans, and human societies, can go no further than their inherited biology will allow them to. It's an evolutionary reality that's haunted us since the beginning of time.
It's an issue I take on in my new book, "The Watchman's Rattle," which explores what happens when complexity races ahead of the brain's ability to manage it and the underlying reasons experts and governments can no longer fix global crises and conflict. In my book, I aim to connect the dots between crime, oil prices, Wall Street, global warming, nuclear waste and childhood violence, and explore the answer to our most challenging problems that lies in the greatest weapon of mass instruction ever known: the human brain.
But here, with an eye on survival, I compiled a list of the top ten things we could do to stay a few steps ahead of extinction.
Adrian Grenier: We're Driving the Bluefin Tuna Population Towards Extinction
Peter Seligmann and Harrison Ford: America's Commitment to Nature: Another Endangered Species?
|
Post a Comment
Will human-beings go extinct? I doubt it. Will there be far fewer human-beings on this planet a hundred years from now? Yes. Almost guaranteed.
But we don't all sink or swim together. Whether it's "fair" or not (by whatever arbitrary standard you apply), the developed world will fare much better than the rest.
At some point, maybe our population will actually be forced back down to a sustainable level.
I think one of the most harmful things we can do for the long-term health of the planet and our species is take a "we need to save them all" approach.
It seems like many people who live in industrialized nations think that third world nations should just toughen up and fend for themselves.
The irony of this attitude is that 3rd world nations aren't contributing as much to the problem as developed nations, yet the 3rd world is far more vulnerable to the effects of industrial pollution, especially water pollution.
"South Africa is especially vulnerable to oil spills due to the high volume of oil transported around the country's coasts by ship from the Middle East to Europe and the Americas."
http://www.corrosion-doctors.org/AtmCorros/mapSA.htm
The US is responsible for about 29% of carbon emissions.
http://climateprogress.org/2009/06/01/us-responsible-for-29-of-carbon-dioxide-emissions-over-past-150-years-triple-chinas-share/
Not to be outdone, our industrial competitor, China is poised to become the biggest polluter on the planet.
To be honest, I think industrialized nations owe it to the third world to make up for the fact that we have been making a profit from basically stealing their resources and destroying the planet while were at it.
Yeah, it sucks for all those people. They should do everything they can to bring their populations down to sustainable levels before nature does it for them.
It's not social Darwinism, it's just Darwinism: survival of the species. Too many people. Those who are most vulnerable won't make it.
Fair or not.
Tyrannasaurus Rex: Nooooooooo!
Brontosaurus: Nooooooooo!
Triceratops: Noooooooo!
Roaches: What ev!
That's about how we'll end up!
The premise for your is absolutely correct. If we are unable to adapt ....
http://www.reasoned.org/rs_text2.htm#part 2 - Balance of Nature
"Today's neuroscientists have developed tools that improve the rate at which the human brain can load and retain content and solve increasingly complex problems." If true this may be good or bad for survival. If complexity is the problem being able to handle more complexity could lead to really terrible results.