Where are we going? Is there some intentionality about our direction or are we willing to simply let events determine the destination. We must realize that many of those events will be determined by people in positions of leadership and power who may not have the best interests of humanity as part of their calculations. There is also another calculus at work, that is the direction the planet follows as it attempts to reach some new equilibrium to respond to the damage that we humans have wrought on its basic systems. Unless we drastically change our ways of dealing with this planet, we will have little say in how this all turns out.
Right now, it looks like we are turning our backs on any workable solutions, choosing instead to turn those choices over to those who make it all a kind of economic determinism and competition for leadership and domination which leads only to win-lose options or war.
Too many seem willing to turn it all over to authoritarian leadership, no matter how devoid of any redeeming qualities, to allow self-indulgence and the dark gods of violence. Out of that smoke will emerge a system of corporate or other economic entities operating like modern warlords dominating the landscape and the lives of those who must now serve them.
If we cannot find the common human core to make our lives relevant on this planet, we will simply disappear as a species who were given all the tools to sustain themselves, but only seemed capable of choosing self-indulgence, conflict, competition and violence.
(Article changed on Jan 20, 2023 at 2:14 PM EST)
