MilitantDogOwner Posted April 17, 2012 Share Posted April 17, 2012 The rest will probably play out like some big budget Hollywood movie, of which the brain dead who watch them will now play their small part in it. I can't remember which film it was from, but this reminds of the quote "You're not a person, you're a walking happy meal to me". Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Lxxx Posted April 17, 2012 Share Posted April 17, 2012 I do sometimes look around at all the braindead, obese, zombie-fied consumers walking around texting on their iphone, chomping McDonalds, driving the car they haven't paid for to the house they haven't yet paid for, wearing expensive clothes that cost pennies to make in a sweatshop in China, to get home and sit down and watch shows like Britain's Got Talent which showcases other braindead people trying to become 'famous'......and wonder if it wouldn't actually be such a bad thing to press the reset button and start again after all. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Evil Goblin Posted April 17, 2012 Share Posted April 17, 2012 Evil Goblin you missed out technology from your list. Yes, technology should be on the list, given that it is doubtful if we can ever control the effects it produces and one day it might do for us! I realize end of times, Malthusian woe are popular at the moment, and fully agree that current behaviours are unsustainable - but the result will be change not end. I don't think it is wise to assume that because human ingenuity has enabled us to cope in the past necessarily means that it will continue to do so. We may well reach a tipping point where no matter what we do we cannot avert a disaster. I agree that it is possible to theoretically map out how disaster can be avoided by our changing our ways but I would suggest that looking at the way things have gone and continue to go does not give much cause for optimism. If E O Wilson is to be believed, we are already entering the Eromozoic Era - the era of solitude. Species extinction is occuring at something between a hundred and a thousand times the rate before the arrival of humans - Homo Rapiens is gutting the earth of biodiversity. As humans invade and exploit the last vestiges of wilderness, they destroy or destabilise the habitat of tens of thousands of species of plants, animals and insects. Human expansion goes hand in hand with the destruction of other creatures. The natural world in which we evolved is being transformed into a largely prosthetic environment. Developing countries seek to emulate the Western countries with the result that already unsustainable ravaging of the planet's natural resources is only getting worse. There is no sign that this is going to change. How will we get along in an environment denuded of so much biodiversity? Humans will never destroy the Earth but Earth and ourselves can so easily destroy humanity. Will we change our ways - I am not optimistic that we will, at least not until it has become clear the things have gone beyond redemption and our change will then be for nought. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
La_Dolce_Vita Posted April 17, 2012 Share Posted April 17, 2012 Evil Goblin you missed out technology from your list. I realize end of times, Malthusian woe are popular at the moment, and fully agree that current behaviours are unsustainable - but the result will be change not end. Will it? Other than the potential despair that pessimism of the future could bring, what makes you confident in the optimistic view of things? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chinahand Posted April 17, 2012 Share Posted April 17, 2012 The British Isles are amongst the most domesticated, controlled environments on earth - the vast majority of species have been driven to extinction and all that remains are those either small enough, or adaptable enough, to live in the domesticated environment humanity has created - even our high moorlands are man made environments - they used to be treed, but were clear cut in iron age times. The result is not armageddon. Two conversations are getting intermixed between this and the "Humans being too self centred" thread - what is happening to the earth is a decades long process which man will become aware of over generations. I am very vocally in favour of action on Climate change, but the result of inaction will not be "The Day After Tomorrow" - to listen to our survivalist friends they are anticipating running to the hills. If there was an asteriod strike - ok I agree. But the vast majority of scenarios involve change, mitigation and adaption. Things humanity has undergone thousands of times before. It is very difficult to imagine any scenario which would rob ALL of humanity of the scientic and technical expertise it has mastered. Even in populations as low as in the millions there is technical knowledge which would recover. Demographic transition is very visible - Europe, Korea, Japan, even China thanks to the one child policy are starting to face the dilema of fewer young people not ever growing populations. Growth is coming in places with low population densities and very unsustainable power and agriculture - ie wood stoves and subsistence farming. I agree that the world isn't in a good place at the moment - what has happened to the British Isle's ecological diversity is a tragedy and for it to occur in Africa, South America and South East Asia would be terrible with its loss of medicines and simply fascinating life which we should respect. Climate change and pollution are clear and present dangers - but it can be dealt with via concerted action over a 50 to 100 year period with little disruption. Certainly resource wars will happen - nothing new there - humanity's common lot has been misery for millenia and it isn't going to change this century. The tensions will be less if there are fewer people and more sustainable use of resources certainly, but the idea that humanity will collapse without it shows no understanding of just how adaptable we are as a species. I certainly don't want Bangladesh to implode, or for India and Pakistan to nuke each other over access to Himalayan water or whatever - but if those things happened life would carry on - yeah billions might be affected, but that is humanity's lot. I predict that by 2100 the world's population will not be below 5 billion and it will have a higher development index, happiness quotiant or whatever - broader index of wealth and health you want which supplies more information than just GDP as I admit economic diversity is not the b-all and end-all of this. Who'll take my bet? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Evil Goblin Posted April 17, 2012 Share Posted April 17, 2012 Who'll take my bet? Seems a pretty safe bet - how will you pay up if you lose? Unless you've converted to belief in the afterlife! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
nemo Posted April 21, 2012 Share Posted April 21, 2012 Yeah, science is great unless those pesky scientists make brain eating nanobots by mistake...... Sometimes I think they have - and tested them on a few Manxforums posters! As to the original subject - any progress towards defeating this horrible disease is welcome; not only to ease or erase the suffering, but also to let the god-botherers who claimed it was their deity's revenge on sinners know that it was no such thing. I am not a believer in god, but I do believe in Mother nature. She is trying her hardest to keep the worlds population in balance and failing. The more we try and eradicate various diseases, the more devious she has to be. If we 'cure' HIV, something else will rear it's ugly head and we will be back to square one. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iv7SUaece6E ~> the premise of this documentary is that the catalyst for mass aids infection came about through the human intervention of distributing polio vaccines that had been grown on the livers of butched SIV infected monkeys. This could easily be dismissed as a conspiracy theory, but if it is to be believed, the eradication of this disease could be seen as bringing balance to the equation Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Hungry Harrison Posted April 30, 2012 Share Posted April 30, 2012 http://medicalxpress...-cells-hiv.html Pretty important breakthrough that Boggles my mind how much we've advanced in the last 50 years or so. Good post and remarkable content. Thanks for posting it. There are so many being maintained on drug regimes which dont offer victims the hope of a cure but which do help the large drug companies maximise their revenues. Research focussed on curing this condition rather than just keeping the virus at bay can go a long way to promoting hope of a positive outcome. Hope is important. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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