reply to post by AQ6666
I look at it this way. If we do survive another five thousand years, it will not be because we carried on as normal, business as usual, governments
and senates and congress, or houses of parliament and local councils and blah blah blah....
If we survive another five thousand years, it will be because at some point we realised that we were wasting our potential as an entire species, by
constant bickering, war, allowing poverty to claim lives, by working for the individual gain of our own persons, families, and nations, rather than
doing things solely because mankind as a whole will benefit from them. An example would be fitting every dwelling with solar panels, and/or other
clean energy production methods, disconnecting the unwieldy and increasingly redundant power grids, and making every building capable of producing its
own power. There are technologies that exist today which could make these things a reality, and yet because of self interest and a desire to accrue
vast sums of money, the creators of these technologies (or more often, their bosses) insist on charging through the eyeballs for these things.
Under a totally revamped system of thinking, especially in terms of things like self interest, these technologies would be distributed simply because
it would be better if everyone had them. Can you imagine what it would be like if a person did not have to pay vast amounts of money per year, just to
heat, light and power their homes? It would lead to a totally new age of mankind! Freedom of energy would be a staggering change to lay at the feet of
mankind! It would open up the way for everything else to come down in price, because the cost of living would be so much cheaper, as would the
production and logistical cost of every product. Having been liberated in this manner, it is entirely possible that the human race might stop
attaching arbitrary value to these products, or indeed the lives of people whose job it is to produce them. We might, if such a thing came about,
actually be able to make a currency free society work on a global scale, where everyone has everything they need, without having to kill themselves to
make it happen, as is the case in many countries and states.
People would be able to afford to live healthier lives, in a cleaner environment, and would also have the freedom and time to think deeply about
things, something that is missing in the average, every day life today. We occupy ourselves with irrelevances, and are occupied with others by our
governments, and by companies which provide vital services. But if the basics of life were provided by technological mastery, people would have time
to spend on learning things they WANT to know, rather than being constantly obsessed with learning things that will make them rich enough to live free
of torment. Motivation would change, from a need to amass fortune, to a need to push the boundaries of what is possible, by innovative application of
technology, by huge exertion of willpower, by all the means available to man.
I believe that at this point, mankind would seek to shake off the chains placed about its shoulders by its position in the universe, and learn how to
move itself around the cosmos in a more efficient manner than it currently does.
If the human race fails to do these things, it does not DESERVE to survive.