THE NEXT THOUSAND YEARS OR SO. A forecast by mathematician, Chandler Davis
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| Chandler Davis-Science for Peace |
In addict lingo,
society has some monkeys on its back. To survive, we’ll have to get rid of
them.
First of all, I'm assuming we'll somehow get the military monkey off our back. In recent history, but especially since the 1970s when the Pentagon escaped from civilian restraint, weapons have exceeded any possible use by eve the most bloodthirsty armies. These huge oversupplies, though they benefit military contractors, are irrelevant to strategy. Having ten thousand weapons does not make an army more fearsome if a hundred of them could annihilate the enemy, but the autonomous power of the military contractors dictated that the weapons go on accumulating. These rows on rows of nuclear weapons, nerve gas bombs, and the like, and these thousands of military bases on hilltop and atolls around the worlds -- when the world's rich country, and especially the United States, dispense with them, they will suddenly have enormous reserves of materials and personnel available for more constructive uses.
First of all, I'm assuming we'll somehow get the military monkey off our back. In recent history, but especially since the 1970s when the Pentagon escaped from civilian restraint, weapons have exceeded any possible use by eve the most bloodthirsty armies. These huge oversupplies, though they benefit military contractors, are irrelevant to strategy. Having ten thousand weapons does not make an army more fearsome if a hundred of them could annihilate the enemy, but the autonomous power of the military contractors dictated that the weapons go on accumulating. These rows on rows of nuclear weapons, nerve gas bombs, and the like, and these thousands of military bases on hilltop and atolls around the worlds -- when the world's rich country, and especially the United States, dispense with them, they will suddenly have enormous reserves of materials and personnel available for more constructive uses.
Second, I'm assuming we’ll somehow get the profit monkey
off our
back. You may not want to call it the capitalist system,
because you can
see the Communist Party of China pursuing African copper
and rare earths
as destructively as Barrick Gold does… Whether we call it
capitalism or not, the insensate competitive scramble for growth is threatening
our survival…We know that the oil barons must abandon the race to extract and
burn more hydrocarbon fuels than the next guy (even Mark Carney knows this
now), and that means that
Gazprom must abandon it along with Exxon Mobil.
Davis predicts that
there will be less mining in future centuries and that the richest mines in the future will be our scrap heaps.
Other predictions:
--Population will
decrease
--Languages
will continue to disappear…and we will
create new languages.
--Human
beings will still look like human beings do now.
--We
may search for new habitats in the universe or stick to one planet and make our garden grow.
Whatever
the future, Davis says: I have great
confidence in the resourcefulness of our descendants.
(For
the full text of Davis’ talk, check forthcoming bulletins of
www.scienceforpeace).
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