The invincible present as a fool's paradise
The invincible present as a fool's paradise
We are caught up in what we mistakenly see as the invincible present. We refuse to acknowledge the past, present, and future are inextricably linked.
We like to think we can bluff our way through an invincible present only to ensure a dismal future. Our societies simply become echo chambers of former wars. The is Humankind’s third world war in just over a hundred years, alarm bells should be ringing.
Blogatorial
I am reading a lot of American history these days written by their best and brightest and nobody wants to hear from them. They have a story to tell of horrors happening now seeded decades ago left to ferment and now blow up into the present global crisis. It is not about to end any time soon and the reverberations will be with us for decades to come. We simply fail to comprehend the horror before us.
We like to see history as a convenient linear continuum of times dates and political personalities, rogues, heroes, statesmen and everybody in between. We like to think the past is in the past and no cause for concern. Except that we are now victims of past historical truths ignored and swept under too many carpets on too many occasions. We like to think we can’t predict the future, but it is entirely predictable. Historians, economists and philosophers are much like medical doctors, they follow the symptoms and diagnose the disease (the chain of evidence). Medical doctors save lives with their diagnoses. When historians deliver their diagnoses we claim immunity as if it is some alien mythology of no consequence. We hate to have our preset notions interrupted by inconvenient truths, common sense and rationality.
History is who are, where we have been and where we are going. It is our story! If we abandon it, allow it be stolen, or corrupted out of exist we go back to being cave persons, ragged dancers in the gardens our self-inflicted ruins.
We are caught up in what we see as the invincible present. We refuse to acknowledge the past, present, and future are inextricably linked. They are the matrix in which live. The present is only a brief moment in time where the past is very present and the future is entirely predictable-- especially when we are slaves to the dogma of perpetual wars.
In this day and age there are powerful forces who want to keep us captive in their invincible present as it serves their diabolical tyrannies. The want to erase history rationality and any concern for the future which they are determined to control and exploit to their narrow advantage. They attempt to sell the idea they have a permanent lease on what is right, when their every word and action is steeped in criminal hypocrisy and violence against others.
It is a brutal irony that as warfare and industrial production becomes more and more robotic and artificial intelligence (AI) is in vogue, human intelligence is in sharp decline. Never in history has more unaccountable power resided in so few hands. Never has human intelligence been so vulnerable to perception management and naked propaganda. Part of the tragedy of the present war is that whole populations are indifferent to the truths of this war, and so available for vicious infantile propaganda delivered by vacuous false prophets. The piranha’s of war are on a feeding frenzy stripping the flesh our societies down to the bone.
War is a piss poor way of preparing for a challenging future.
In the year 1900 the population of the whole world was 1.6 billion people. In today’s terms that is equivalent to India’s present population with a bit left over. Today there are 8 billion people sharing the same space and effect of wars are magnified at least eight times given the concentration of population, the increased complexity of our societies and economic integration of a globalized world. It is forecast world population will be over 9 billion by 2043. That number alone tells us it is time to rearrange our priorities.
We are at a time in history when the consequences of war travel as fast around the world as the lies and treachery utilized to provoke them.
We are at a time when the whole planet can become victim to the treachery of war mongers— the lily pad safe havens of the world are becoming more extinct. It has come about that the very rich are building bunkers and booking space travel to escape the disaster of their own making.
We are firmly stuck in the present and willing victims for the propagandist and jingoists to implant the psychosis of war.
History tells us time and again of the fragility of empires as they rise and fall as the clockwork of history. Yet we allow ourselves to be slaves to an empire in decline holding the world hostage to its delusional and self-destructive ambitions.
It is time to get down to seeing the world as it is, sanction the war mongers out of existence, quit worrying about Artificial Intelligence and start using our human intelligence— most importantly our common sense.
