Recently, I've had some deep discussions with Republicans and find that their worldview is the polar opposite of my own. The concept of saying, "everything is alright" and then cherrypicking data to support that view is troubling. I am trying to understand, but my gut feeling is that the conservative mindset is a built-in trigger mechanism that snuffs out a civilization once it reaches a certain technological level.
Now, there are plenty of things that can end us. Some of the top threats include an asteroid hit, nuclear war, artificial intelligence, or a pandemic. But what's hitting home now is climate change. At a time when we are tripling and re-tripling the world's population, the effects of climate change may make agriculture exceedingly difficult. Starvation is a horrible way to die, and even though population growth has hit a near standstill in Japan, Germany, and Italy, it is still exploding on the African continent. Universal access to family planning services and giving women 100 percent parity with men are two ways to quickly create a healthy and sustainable society, but political and religious conservatives fight these logical initiatives. Their mindset provides the catalyst for our self-destruction.
Pilbara
Allow me to digress. The Earth is 4.6 billion years old. It's impossible to know what occurred in those early days because plate tectonics and other forces have destroyed the earliest geological records. But there is a place in northwestern Australia called Pilbara, which is believed to be 3.5 billion years old. At this site geologists and biologists have learned a lot.
At about 2.5 billion years ago bacteria ruled our planet and emitted oxygen, and eventually oxygenated our world. The free oxygen then allowed more complex life to evolve and also created the ozone layer, which protected life from ultraviolet radiation. Today, you can travel to Australia and see the giant formations of dead bacteria, which form into stromatolites. Studying the fossilized stromatolites provides clues about life on ancient Earth.
With oxygen in the atmosphere the fossil record begins showing increasingly complex life and the history of humans is only a small spec on this roadmap — we've only been around a few hundred thousand years.
The irony is that now that humans are industrialized, several billion years of delicate and complex coevolution is going down the shit hole. In a most bizarre twist in our evolution, we are digging up the fossilized lifeforms that once created oxygen, and we are burning it and now creating carbon. And we are burning it to the point where we are actually changing our climate and triggering a mass extinction. And for a political conservative to be so flippant, passive, and nonchalant about this human tragedy makes me think twice about my volunteerism. I mean, if advanced societies are meant to extinguish themselves as part of the natural cycle, should I even TRY to save my planet and species? People tell me not to worry and that the Earth can handle it, but our ecosystem is delicate and making our planet lifeless is a real possibility.
Signals from Space
I need to make a small correction from a recent post. I said that radio telescopes have only picked up crickets and a few natural anomalies since they began scanning the skies in the 1930s. But, actually, there have been a handful of unexplained signals coming from distant solar systems. These signals are short and do not repeat. Are they distress signals from dying civilizations? Are they trying to warn us? What they hell are they trying to say?
Okay, I will pull myself together and get over the fact that the ignorance and indifference I see with so many people is not part of a species self-destruct mechanism. Maybe by setting an example I can get a few people to join me in my lifelong struggle to save the environment. It's not that I care about a legacy, it's just that I want to follow the example set by George Washington, who always believed in "doing the right thing," and Jesus who said "Do unto others as you would have them do unto you." Where I differ from others is that I believe the Golden Rule should also be applied to the Earth. Treat your home planet the way you would want to be treated. This is what gives me my morality.
The Stock Market Scam
Getting back to my initial point, in addition to playing down or denying climate change the second thing conservatives like to do is use the stock market as the metric for Trump's "great job performance." The stock market is not a good metric for gauging the economy. For one thing, if wages remain stagnant and the stock market goes up that just means the wealth is moving to the top, as usual. The middle class benefits some because 401k's are doing well, but that will reverse when the next recession hits. It's as if people are desperate to find one solid metric to justify their support for Trump, who, in reality, has accomplished almost nothing in his first three years.
Furthermore, I believe there is a conspiracy to keep the stock market strong to help Trump get reelected. The corporate tax cuts helped, but now our country is sinking deeper into deficit spending. But no worries, the stupid stock market only responds to the present and immediate future. Then there is the dark secret of quantitative easing, which is ultimately about printing more money, but it's done in a complex way. The quantitative easing helps to boost the stock market and lower interest rates.
In reality, the stock market has fared well under many Democratic presidents. In fact, it was doing slightly better at the same period in Obama's presidency.
Conclusion
The world is full of religious, political, and economic story packages. If anything, the conservatives are better at picking the packages that support their worldview, which is usually the view that was drilled into them during childhood. A conservative mind is static and locked in the present. At this point in our species evolution we need creative and "out of the box" thinking because the side effects of our affluent lifestyle are closing in on us. Are we the one-in-a-trillion species that will end it all in 50 years or is there a future beyond 2070? I don't know and I won't be here, but my grandchildren might still be surviving. Do I live in excess now at their expense?
Source:
This Ancient Rock Is Changing Our Theory on the Origin of Life, Tara Djokic, TED.com
Hey Trumpists, Stock Market Better Under Obama, David Pakman, David Pakman Show
Photo: Markus Spiske
