Internal Dialogue

I am someone that doesn’t mind talking about or even believing in bleak outcomes when it comes to the future of humanity. In my all-time favorite movie the main character is asked “If you were to meet these [aliens], and were permitted only one question to ask of them, what would it be?”. She answers: “Well, I suppose it would be, how did you do it? How did you evolve, how did you survive this technological adolescence without destroying yourself?”.

It can be talked about, argued, discussed and whatever people want to do, but I am not alone in thinking that if we continue on this current path, we will eventually destroy ourselves.

Yet for all the times I’ve talked, thought or read about this, I never feared the future. But now, for the first time, I fear for mankind’s future. It sounds strange, it’s not up to me to carry the weight of the world. But I have to admit: I am a dreamer. In my sci-fi, I like a utopian future as much as a dystopian one. I loved the 90’s Star Trek not only because of the sci-fi, but also the idea it puts forward. That we can overcome our destructive nature, that we can work towards a shared goal, that we can continually try to better ourselves for the future of humanity, instead of being consumed by the petty needs that drive our current society.

But alas, I am part of this society. I want things, I buy things, I crave things. But I still have my dreams. They will never come true, that’s for sure. But I guess that’s why I like sci-fi so much: it gives my mind the opportunity to live inside a different world. A world in which we might be heading for world war three, or one in which we’ve conquered our destructive nature and are working towards a better future. Obviously a story in a true utopia would be boring; the reader still needs things to which he can relate. Modern sci-fi is pretty good at extrapolating our current situation and creating a new world around a mixture of negative and positive effects of a technologically advanced civilization.

But because of these dreams, and because of my love for the ‘things that might be’, I am now for the first timed worried about our future. There are many opinions about where this economic crisis is headed, and because of this, it is very difficult to know what’s really ahead. I guess the bottom line is that nobody really knows. It could turn out okay in the end, but we could also be heading for a major recession, or even a depression. If the latter occurs, I’m not so sure that everyone alive today will live through it.

This might all sound very pessimistic. Perhaps I’ve read too many sci-fi stories in which humanity has endured countless (interplanetary) wars. Perhaps I’ve seen too many movies in which a third world war is fought. I don’t know why exactly, but stories like that intrigue me. Simply because the past is the past: it has already happened. I like knowing things about the past (history was one of my favorite subjects in high school), yet I like the future more because we don’t know what’s going to happen. You look at the past and try to extrapolate what will happen if certain things occur. And if this depression happens, I think the world will soon be a very, very different place.

People often underestimate how much wealth we’ve accumulated in the past century. The 1930’s were bad, sure. But the west now has such a high standard of living, that I doubt most of us are ready for a depression. I think that a depression today would be many times worse than what happened back then. And because of that, it is my believe that some, but not all, countries or leaders will fight to preserve their way of life. When the shit really hits the fan, people (=countries) will do anything to safeguard the things they find most precious. And in a depression, this will probably be resources. Food. Maybe even oil.

Even if this recession or depression turns out to be a mild one, and the west manages to ’stay alive’, third world countries will still suffer. International aid to these countries will certainly diminish greatly, or maybe even come to a complete halt. It’s every country for himself. If the west has to choose between feeding Africa or itself, it will certainly pick itself.

It’s really not that I want any of these things to happen. Like I said, I am a dreamer. I dream about radical changes to the world we live in. Changes that will almost certainly never happen, at least not in my lifetime. And because of this, I probably shouldn’t even be thinking about bleak outcomes like these. But dreamers have nightmares, too. And that’s what this is, a nightmare. I really don’t think about this every day. This is just something that recently occured to me. I don’t even know if what I just wrote makes sense to anyone besides me. Perhaps I’m overreacting, and perhaps I have too little faith in our society. Perhaps we’ll manage to stave off disaster, or manage to avoid death and destruction even if disaster strikes.

In any case, I really hope he’s right. And even if he is, 200 years is a long, long time. I just hope we’ll stay alive just a little bit longer. Just long enough for his vision to come true.