(This is Part 12 of a series. Go back to Part 11.)
3. The coming external decline
From the human point of view, in my opinion, the external world is about to undergo a decline of epic proportions. We'll take a look at the probable reasons for this development below.
Meanwhile, we could summarize this Section 3 by saying that this decline in the external world appears to be already happening and about to become much more prominent. This external decline, in turn, will in my opinion fuel an amazing inner development among humanity—achieving a human unity of heart that could not be achieved otherwise. More about that in Part 4 of this series, The rise of the inner world.
Later on, we'll discuss the inner development among humanity that this external decline will facilitate and that, in my opinion, will lead directly to a doorway that fulfills our human destiny.
My guess is that the intelligent life on a planet, beyond a certain point of technology, takes one of two paths. Carl Sagan talked about this. Global society on a given planet either achieves some sort of steady-state existence, where its population, economic activity, energy use, effect on the biosphere and so on has stabilized—or it doesn't achieve that and basicallly extinguishes itself.
In other words, the intelligent life on a planet at a certain point of technology must pass through "the eye of the needle" and stabilize its own survival—primarily through its inner growth—or that particular intelligent life passes out of existence.
Beyond a certain point of technology development, technology itself begins to threaten the very existence of an intelligent species. To cite a few quick examples on this planet, any of which could, if taken beyond a certain point or in certain combinations, lead to human extinction:
The decline of forest coverage and soils;
The extinction of animal and plant species;
Pathogens immune to overused antibiotics;
Small groups having catastrophic weaponry;
Heating of the planet, rising dessertification;
Regional conflict that spirals into world war;
Genetic modification becoming uncontrolled:
The rise of self-replicating nanotechnologies;
The rise of transcendent machine intelligence;
A shift in dominance from humans to machines.
My intention is not to be pessimisstic here, simply open-eyed. Could some of these developments, in some combination, lead to a runaway phenomenon that becomes lethal to us? Yes, in my opinion. Doesn't mean it'll happen, but I believe the potential is there. And in any case, many of them seem to be "heating up."
Indeed, in many areas things have reached the kind of extreme that usually presages a crash of one sort or another. The current situation reminds me very much of the Titanic. Like the dancers waltzing on the main deck, we go blithely about our lives—everything seems fairly normal, what's the problem? Why rave on about things that may not happen? Yet in my opinion, the iceberg, in one form or another, lies dead ahead. Let's see why:
(This is the end of Part 12. Go to Part 13.)
—jim sloman, for 1.8.07
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