As I savor my fresh coffee this morning I am thinking about mortality - not mine, but mankind in general. I suspect some of y'all may not be on board with where I am going so just consider it food for thought.
We watch a lot of the history channel and are fascinated with the apparent sophistication of earlier civilizations, especially their mysterious demise, e.g., Mayans, Indus Valley, Easter Island etc. In a larger sense I wonder if there was a parallel civilization on earth with a high degree of 'sophistication' and technology that maybe rivaled our own and also "disappeared' perhaps 'self destructed.' It seems that 'mankind' whatever that concept means is inclined to accept or promote the seeds of its own destruction. If perpetuation of mankind were a primary goal, it seems like we could and would do a better job at pursuing behavior and policies that would support that end.
Our pursuit of short term objectives without regard for the environment and preservation of our natural resources is one example which comes to mind. I use the term 'finite' very deliberately. We can can argue with size of the reservoir, but it is definitely not infinite. How long can we pollute the oceans and foul the land before it is uninhabitable? Perhaps less quantifiable are behaviors. How long do we survive if we keep killing each other off with planes and bombs as opposed to cooperation to pool our resources and energy to 'level the playing field.' We have enough nuclear weapons in storage all over the place to level the earth several times over. The explosion in Beirut should remind us of the possibility of one our nuclear silos going poof.
Of course, that concept of global cooperation would be labeled 'socialism' or some other heinous adjective designed to eschew a cooperative world order so I won't go there today.
On a micro level, I am distressed to see issues that are 'locally' self-destructive masquerading with names like freedom of choice or individual rights but are essentially destructive in nature. The current pandemic comes to mind. Something like 30% of the population is going to pursue their own ends and the rest of us be damned because nobody is going to tell them how to behave. So, beaches will be packed and news conferences will be attended and people will breathe on each other and fill the room with coughing without protection, and it will be labeled 'that's the way it is." Someday, we might have a 'real' pandemic that could wipe us out in short period of time, just like the scifi movies. How will we behave then?
I'm not convinced we have a long-term lease on this earth - long-term in astronomical terms, so maybe societies come and go like in some cyclical fashion. But why speed up our demise with self-destructive behavior? The only answer I can intuit is that we make choices to live in the short-term, and are willing to accept the price of those choices because we won't be here in the 'long term.' Maybe it really doesn't matter in the long haul because the sun is eventually going to burn out if a meteor or super volcano doesn't get us first.
On that happy note, I am moving on this morning.