"... there's trouble in the World. So they called us. And we're going over there... bringing the most lethal killing machine ever devised. We're capable of launching more firepower... than has ever been released in the history of war. For one purpose alone: To keep our country safe. We constitute the front line... and the last line of defense."
Yes. We borrowed those words from the movie Crimson Tide. We felt they were appropriate as in some parts of the world an old year ends and a new one begins. Time does not stand still, but we, as humans, do mark its passage and do wonder what the future will bring. Those words are appropriate because they represent the current thinking in the world. Every country. Every government. Every military. And yes, most people in those countries too.
Many of us see our fellow humans as threats, as enemies. Welcome to the human race. Welcome to your own biology. Welcome to reality. But it does not have to be this way. It can be different. It can be distinct. It can be better. And the strange thing of it all is that all we have to do is to change it. We. The people… because if we don't do it, nobody will. Who can you trust? Your country? Your government? Your military? Your fellow humans? Of course not! Only you! The only person in the whole world that you can trust is you. That's it and it feels pretty lonely in here. That's OK. You are in good company. There are many more like you. Out there. Thinking. Not enough. Not sufficient. But growing. Thinking. Evolving. Eventually, we will be a majority. That much has never been in doubt. No. What is in doubt is that if we will be so in time. In time?
In time.
We are on a threshold and this threshold is unique in the history of humanity. And yes, we are aware that these words have been spoken before. Many times. But this time is different. This time is true as the singularity is near.
In a few words, we are a technological race. We depend on technology. Without technology will be extinct. All of us. We either grow technology or cease to exist. But there is a problem. Technology is a tool and can be used to support obsolete concepts, concepts and ideas represented by our opening statement. Or, technology can be used to further our human interests. All our interests.
Nuclear weapons have been heralded as the guardians of the threshold we mentioned before. Alas, this is not true. Although it is true that we could, potentially, all be dead because of a nuclear war; the reality is that MAD (Mutual Assured Destruction) works. It works because behind any nuclear button is a human mind which do not want to die. Whatever we are, however we are, whatever we may believe, we share the same biology and it is this biology that is telling us, no, scratch that, screaming at us: We Don't Want To Die!
It is for this reason that nuclear weapons were never the determinants of a human holocaust.
But we are passed that point now. What happens when we replace human decisions with machine thinking? Machines that are not bound by a common biology, by a common will to live? Machines that are weapons and are distributed among us? Machines whose objectives are not to fear our enemies but to wage a war against them. Then what?
Then war.
A war that we, humans, cannot possibly win.
In ultimate instance, we are at the very threshold of human genocide because we, as a species, are facing an enemy which we cannot destroy. An enemy against we cannot win. And this enemy is war itself.
This is so because soon, very soon, we won't control war. War will control our destiny. The weapons we will create, that are being created as we type, will determine our destiny. And since we are all the enemies of some faction or other, we will all be destroyed. This much is unavoidable. MAD does not work any longer.
Welcome to the new year!
But then what? How do we, the people, solve this puzzle? How do we survive? We have to remove the one thing that enables wars to be: governments. Without governments there is no military. Without governments, there is no enemy. Without governments, there is no need to defend our way of life. Without government the means to our destruction as species simply do not exist.
This is the one choice that we have.
And being scientists and engineers, we have to wonder if any other civilization in the universe has to go through this very same threshold. Perhaps it is for this very reason that we have not been contacted yet. They don't have any proof that we will survive. Perhaps other -most- civilizations "out there" never make it passed this point and there are very few and sparse species out there as to find each other. Who knows. But what we do know with certainty is that we are in a race, and it is a race that as a species we cannot afford to lose.
The choice is simple; we either prevent the creation of the weapons that will ultimately destroy us or we don't. And they destroy us. And we die.
It is not a matter of convincing other governments to become pacifists.
It is not a matter of signing treaties and agreements.
It is not a matter of enacting laws and regulations.
All that has been done and it is getting worse. And for a very good reason. Governments, by their own priorities, by their own definitions, by their own reason to exist carry with them the seeds of our own destruction. It is simply not possible to survive as a species and keep governments in place. It is one or the other but never both.
The next 30 years or so will be critical. The next 30 years or so will determine if we, the human people, live or die as a species. The next 30 years or so may be our last ones. The future of humanity is in your hands. The future of all of us is in your hands. The future of you, your future, is in your hands.
And the clock starts ticking now!
Happy new year!
Note: please see the Glossary if you are unfamiliar with certain words.
PS.: and the movie? Good one… if you are into those sort of things…
