Listen closely, this is an excellent summation of U.S. Petro-Dollar Hegemony and recent maneuvering into what will be the next major world war. As Brexit was a convenient excuse for serious socio-economic issues there, U.S. officials without any solutions to the inherent problems of Corporate Capitalism: massive economic inequality and ecological degradation, among others, are looking for a convenient exit to serious economic stagnation:
“He was simply unable to let things be foggy. Since they always are, this kept him pretty active.”
~ Robert Oppenheimer, regarding Enrico Fermi
Fermi’s paradox, named after Enrico Fermi, refers to the contradiction between the lack of evidence and the high probability for the existence of extraterrestrial civilizations. The basic points of the argument, as detailed by physicists Enrico Fermi and Michael H. Hart, are described by Wikipedia as follows:
1. There are billions of stars in the galaxy that are similar to the Sun, many of which are billions of years older than Earth.
2. With high probability, some of these stars will have Earth-like planets, and if the Earth is typical, some might develop intelligent life.
3. Some of these civilizations might develop interstellar travel, a step the Earth is investigating now (sic).
4. Even at the slow pace of currently envisioned interstellar travel, the Milky Way galaxy could be completely traversed in about a million years.
According to this line of thinking, the Earth already should have been visited by extraterrestrial aliens. In an informal conversation, Fermi noted no convincing evidence of this, leading him to ask, “Where is everybody?”
Several hypotheses have been forwarded to explain Fermi’s paradox, including that it is the nature of intelligent life to destroy itself. This is the argument, again detailed by Wikipedia, that technological civilizations may usually or invariably destroy themselves before or shortly after developing radio or space-flight technology. Possible means of annihilation are many, including war, accidental environmental contamination, or poorly designed artificial intelligence. This general theme is explored both in fiction and in scientific hypothesizing. In 1966, Sagan and Shklovskii speculated that technological civilizations will either tend to destroy themselves within a century of developing interstellar communicative capability or master their self-destructive tendencies and survive for billion-year timescales. Self-annihilation may also be viewed in terms of thermodynamics: insofar as life is an ordered system that can sustain itself against the tendency to disorder, the “external transmission” or interstellar communicative phase may be the point at which the system becomes unstable and self-destructs.
In other words, according to this perspective, our demise was guaranteed when the first technologically advanced civilization arose. As we know from myriad examples on Earth, uncivilized societies are capable of persisting for many thousands of years (at least). In contrast, there are at least six paths to near-term human extinction on Earth, each rooted in civilization. It seems we are following the extinction path as if it’s a handbook. Were I so inclined, I’d write the relevant book:Dummy’s Guide to Extinction.
The fastest and seemingly most-likely path to near-term human extinction on Earth is abrupt climate change. The refereed journal literature tackles the topic of hothouse Earth with a paper in the 9 February 2016 issue of Nature Communications: “Water-rich planets such as Earth are expected to become eventually uninhabitable, because liquid water turns unstable at the surface as temperatures increase with solar luminosity. Whether a large increase of atmospheric concentrations of greenhouse gases such as CO2 could also destroy the habitability of water-rich planets has remained unclear. Here we show with three-dimensional aqua-planet simulations that CO2-induced forcing as readily destabilizes the climate as does solar forcing. The climate instability is caused by a positive cloud feedback and leads to a new steady state with global-mean sea-surface temperatures above 330 K” (330 Kelvin is about 57 C, compared to today’s temperature of about 15 C).
Even if it were not too late, it’s not as if we’re interested in making any substantive effort. Most people within civilization are too enamored with money — and what it buys — for that trick. If we were interested in enacting substantive changes, it’d still be too late.
Abrupt climate change is here. It’s not a problem for the future. Instead, it’s a predicament in which we are embroiled now.
It seems we reached the least desirable outcome consistent with Fermi’s paradox: Industrial civilization is sufficiently technologically advanced to drive us to extinction. The only surprise to most of today’s informed witnesses is that it happened on our watch.
Also have a look at the X22 report, I agree with most everything the host there Dave hast to say about the economy and geo-politics but harbor a suspicious our views differ on the very serious and prominent threat of Anthropogenic Climate Change, which he does not cover in any fashion.
The X22 report is updated nearly on a daily basis, I recommend subscribing and starting from about a two weeks ago to get up to speed with our situation.
If things get to the point where I am starving and completely exposed to the elements not ending it at that point will be really challenging. But this is food for thought for anyone also coping with the failure of the Dominant Culture's spectacular failure in socio-economic terms and is contemplating the easy way out. 1% with 99% of the wealth, where Corporations are considered people, an economy predicated on permanent war and completely outmoded energy and motive technologies, what could possibly go wrong?
"Yeah I'm worried about spiritual karma, having read Michael Newton's Journey of Souls etc. From what I gather we are here to have a particular experience (whether we perceive as positive or negative is immaterial) that is a required experience for the development of our soul identity. The experience could also be karmic debt, and might even be the result of suicide in a former life, forcing us to endure a commensurate amount of suffering all over again in a future life of our choosing.
That's pretty much the only thing stopping me a this point. I have the means and the courage to do it. (method has a 95% + success rate, look at the chart, I'm not sure if discussing means here results in having the mods go crazy or what).
This is an exciting time to be alive, we are witnessing either an unprecedented transition where Humanity moves from being earth-bound to actually exploring the cosmos or the extinction of said organism. What we are all experiencing is the the direct consequence of the failure of the dominant paradigm (it's continue perpetuation, i.e. Oil Empire, benefiting only an extreme minority of the species, see the following film Thrive), in socio-economic and ecological terms.
We cannot have Infinite Growth on a Finite Planet. We cannot have massive economic inequality (1% vs. 99% not being hyperbole). We cannot have an economic model dependent on infinite consumerism with the planet offering limited source material and a limited pollution sink. We cannot destroy bio-diversity to the tune of 200 distinct species a day and expect to continue to have a living planet before long. We cannot continue to use patently outmoded energy technology that alters the climate in short order (the Shadow Govt releasing the reverse engineered alien tech, i.e. zero point energy and anti-gravitic in nature, stuff Tesla was working on that the FBI confiscated and has refused to release to this day only accounts for the energy side of things is only a part of the picture; we are literally eating the planet alive). We cannot continue to survive with an antiquated reality tunnel / basal paradigm, as Robert Anton Wilson would call it, i.e. Judeo-Christianity. It's time to incorporate what we have learned from Quantum Physics, Psychic Phenomena the existence and presence of ET and the actual state of communicative and motive technologies into a new paradigm that has as it's end the synergistic holism of man, technology and nature. To do otherwise is to continue rapidly down the path of the Near Term Human Extinction / 6th Mass Extinction (est. 2026-2030 time-frame, re: Methane Clathrate Gun).
What do you think a lot of society's problems stem from?
Tribal consciousness combined with unimaginably powerful technology.
Let me elaborate:
1.Short term thinking
2.Greater amount of time spent in a fearful state, of a heightened sense of insecurity.
3.Excessive materialism, relating directly with 2, this is exacerbated when we seek to fulfill our sense of security through materialism to include fulfilling ones perceived sense of ranking among peers, acceptance of those within the tribal order and the acquisition of a mate.
This kind of consciousness results in the need to over-consume the natural world and develop unjust socio-economic relationships. Invariably, multiple tribes begin to encroach on contested land and conflict ensues with usually the most technologically advanced as victors (Guns, Germs and Steel; Jared Diamond) necessitating the need for the development of a highly stratified, hierarchical order where a certain percentage of the society can be freed from tribal living requirements and allocated to the task of inventing new technologies requisite for the transition from a tribe to an Empire. The eventual transformation from a tribe to an Empire can never jettison what would by then be considered the completely anachronistic and even barbaric institutions, slavery and outmoded organized religion (such as has been thoroughly refuted by Science) for these institutions are the bedrock of the Empire in question. For example in the U.S, Corporate Personhood and the level of economic inequality, now even having surpassed that of the Gilded Age, although completely mystifying any good natured, sensible person of a developed level of consciousness seem to be unquestioned truths (although the Occupy Wall Street, Zeitgeist and even Anonymous movements have seriously challenged as of recent).
To briefly sum up, all of our problems and their manifestation here as a veritable living hell world for the majority of it's inhabitants on a planet capable of much greater spiritual cohesion, coherence (Human and Mind, Human and Nature, Human and Technology, Human and Human) are rooted directly in Fear / Fear Based Consciousness.
Fear served us relatively well when the world was far more inhospitable but at this critical juncture our continued survival depends on our active participation in evolving our consciousness. Time is relative, we can, with pure intent and effort, greatly accelerate our psycho-spiritual evolution.
“The real problem of humanity is the following: we have paleolithic emotions; medieval institutions; and god-like technology. And it is terrifically dangerous, and it is now approaching a point of crisis overall.” - EO Wilson
I'm afraid if we do not do so and do so in time we will not survive the mounting, converging crises currently placed at our doorstep (Anthropogenic Climate Chaos, Biodiversity Loss, 400 Ticking Nuclear Time-Bombs, nearly all of whom sitting on geological fault lines, a global socio-economic order with Slavery, Eco-cide and Genocide as it's pre-requisites).
Anyone whose taken an Astronomy course in the past 30 years is likely familiar with Drakes Equation, wherein one of the factors of the Equation is the possibility of a civilization capable of IR spectrum communication (light and radio) succumbing to the unwanted effects accompanying unsustainable "development" (turning the Amazon rain forest into a Wall Mart parking lot is not development unless the end goal of the organizing principle in question is to develop a living planet into the Death Star) before said IR communication reaches an audience.
We are either witnessing the death of an organism that failed to consciously evolve from a collective fear based paradigm and consciousness to one of greater inclusiveness, empathy and compassion or it's painful birth-pangs.
I am currently in this sub-reddit because I am at a dead-end with this life. My 1987 Volvo station-wagon that I live out of in San Francisco, as a homeless veteran, decided to give up the ghost today and I fear this may be either the start of something exciting or the end of this life experience by way of self-inflicted gun-shot wound to the head.
That's where I am personally on the Empire Failure / Collapse of Industrial Civilization / NTHE time-line.
It's interesting to point out that while I have a two year degree, am a veteran having seen combat and separated honorably am forced to live in my 1987 Volvo whose only choice of work are minimum wage wage-slave jobs that truly, in every way, approximate slavery in a city renowned for it's affluence.
I can see the shrewd logic behind the $13 an hour wage in a city whose median apartment cost is $3500., the rich always need more money and will go at any length to get it, including medicating the supporting population in question with Sodium Fluoride coupled with an education system designed to produce obedient factory workers who respond reliably, in a Pavlovian manner, to various stimuli placed in the environment, to include the ringing of a bell signalling the time for them to take a break of move to the next job task.
Here's some good information on NTHE, the science is constantly evolving as new feedbacks are discovered and added to the approximate 30 or so there are already, including the Methane-Clathrate "Gun". Last I checked, the revised consensus is that we have until 2026 until NTHE, precipitated by drought induced crop failure, begins in earnest:
Our problems will remain intractable and we will head down the path of NTHE barring some form of meta-physical Jungian rapid shift in consciousness.
Based on how I've seen Humanity respond to our problems in the past decade, from 2006 until now, I don't place a lot of faith in us changing any time soon. The super wealthy, whose hands are the only ones on the levers, have become completely detached from reality, many of whom already were religious fundamentalists to begin with who truly believe in "Jesus descending from the clouds to save the good white Christians".
We're fucked. I will probably be gone in a few weeks, as will everyone reading this at some point in time.
