Humanity has a problem.Our genes compell us to exalt, at the expense of each other. We are born as a competitive species, and this creates winners and losers. In our day and age the biggest winners are the owners of corporations, who leverage emerging technologies to exclude anyone outside the corporate pecking order from having a dignified human existence. This started slowly thousands of years ago, and it may have literally become bred in to the human genome.
Do note however that static, dictatorial societies have rarely resulted in progress. "Winners" don't change their strategies. Progress has largely been the domain of revolutions.
Now visualize thousands of years of tyrants, and you will also be able to visualize thousands of years of latter holocene predation, cultural selection and literally domestication of the human species. Casual study of genes found in graves are an indication that most western worlders are exclusively the survivors of mostly urban populations - the genes of "commoners", the genes i.e. people living in medieval countrysides have been pushed largely in to extinction.
Even in a few centuries the selective pressure has been strongly slanted and predisposed towards favoring
law-abidingdocile homo sapiens. This has clearly escalated in the last few centuries. As Ray Kurzweil postulates a climb towards a Singularity, I counter-postulate a climb towards a culmination of genocide. Global civilization has now become a human civilization of planetary consent, aquiescence and apathy. The end point is quite near; human labor will end soon. This is a catastrophic and potentially lethal culmination of progress, and may have profoundly dehumanizing consequences for the majority of the species.We can already clearly see these consequences in most of the third world, where humans are treated as chattel (to be exploited), pests (to be eradicated) or resources (to be harvested). But as we reach an end point where labor itself loses any inherent value, and the worth the majorities of humans lies in their displacement into the margins, there looms the seductive economic consequence in the form of "convenient" mass-genocide. If nobody needs any humans for labour, and all labour is done by means of investments in robotics, then those that own these automated systems will have to compelling reason to even acknowledge those without worth. This trajectory clearly implies the formation of an ever more numbing destitution of the majorities of people. Now if I were to make this argument compelling, most rational humans reading these words would rebel and kill those in charge. However we live in a confusing and complex world, and we live in a world where superficiality has become a virtue.
Once the hyper-rich 0.1% surround their estate with automated defense systems; once money itself is relegated to the dustbins of history; once the 99% depend on sheer pity for food, security, luxury, energu, space or resource we are all beggars to be spared a convenient and quick death. Disparity + obiquitous automation is effectively lethal.
One of my core values is space colonization and industrialization. This is a tricky one to sell to people, because in the ideas of the public Space is a luxury and a money waster. It shouldn't be, and space can actually be for the enrichment and betterment of mankind. There are massive amounts of directly accessible ores on the moon and nearby asteroids and we can generate profits with them well within our lifetimes. There is exponentially more harvestable solar energy in Low Earth orbit. The riches of near Earth space can be the ultimate wealth trickledown effect. Something about the international macro-economic systems should change so it becomes a pressing priority to liberate these resources. It won't be cheap, and convincing people won't be easy.
We need new means of mobility, in terms of changing citywide infrastructures and cityplanning and means of transportation. The end esult must be some alternative for oil, or (in the short run) a dramatic decrease of fossil fuel consumption.
Our societal democratic systems have been a godsend, compared to what has come before; but we need better democracy quickly. Democracy must protect against excessive speculation and exploitation. Democracy must excise the ghastly predatorial effects of corporatization. Most importantly, this hypothetic new way governance must defend us against populism, as well as cultimate aspects of society and our industries that give us inceased growth and wealth.
Most people in our modern societies find themselves competing against pityfully poor people in the third world, while both those in the 'developed' nations make less, and those in the developing world are still dirt poor. It seems the only people benefitting are those allready offensively rich. That's why we need societal safeguards. I advocate the implementation of an absolute guaranteed basic income, to make sure people can have a dignified life, and not be pushed into barren destitute by what is effectively social darwinism.
Our world is spiraling out of control. Our leaders can no longer be trusted. Big money is taking over, and the media are lying their ass off. We need to expose this societal rot, and fight it tooth and nail. We should avoid the ultimate eventuality - violent revolution - at all costs, but we are sure headed in that direction.
Do make up your own mind about what comes next.
Maybe we'll get lucky.
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