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SamBee wrote:
I believe Western Civilization is in terminal decline, and has been all my lifetime. In fact, I think WWI may have been the beginning of the end…American power has been taking longer to fall, but I believe it has been occurring since the 1970s. I believe Vietnam was the turning point, but that the decline of the Soviet bloc gave it a powerful second wind. However, by around 2000 or so, I believe America’s decline in power resumed in earnest Terminal decline? Personally I don’t see any way that Western civilization will ever die on its own. There is no need for specific empires to remain at their peak in order for their remnants or replacements to survive quite well, possibly indefinitely. At this rate it looks like Western civilization/culture could survive a full-scale nuclear war, climate change melting the polar ice caps and flooding major cities at sea level, and running out of fossil fuels without a viable replacement for all the energy currently consumed. In other words, as long as there is any remaining civilization whatsoever to speak of then I would expect Western civilization to remain as at least one of the primary competing alternatives.
In fact, I don’t believe it is fair to even call it an overall decline in the first place and I think a better description would simply be that cultures and civilizations evolve over time and people adjust to whatever environment they find themselves in, no matter how good or bad. But just because cultures and civilizations change over time that doesn’t mean most of these changes have been for the worse. I look at things like slavery, racism, relative ignorance, etc. and there’s no question that at least some things are easily better now than they were just 50-200 years ago. Is it any worse now overall than the Wild West? Basically if some people think they can get away with highway robbery, murder, etc. then they will try to do so and this is really nothing new. And even in the most moral of all societies that have ever existed all it takes is a few narcissists, sociopaths, etc. that think the rules don’t apply to them to really throw a wrench in things and do a lot of damage regardless of what the majority think and do.
I’m not actually convinced humans could survive a full scale nuclear war in the long run. They could bunker up for centuries, but it would remove most, maybe all higher lifeforms. Nuclear winter could destroy everything from plankton to rainforests. I’m also not completely convinced about fossil fuels. We’ve had decades to prepare but have done so too slowly. Maybe, but it could cause massive social disturbance. We saw a precursor to this in the seventies.
As for the rest… I don’t see the decline purely in terms of morality and human rights. It is also about *power*.
The Soviet Union actually went into decline when it became nicer to its citizens! Likewise, I think the USA was going into decline in the 1970s precisely when African Americans started to get a better deal. Britain and France went downhill after losing most of their colonies.
As for relative ignorance, that is all around us.
SamBee wrote:
I believe Western Civilization is in terminal decline, and has been all my lifetime. In fact, I think WWI may have been the beginning of the end…American power has been taking longer to fall, but I believe it has been occurring since the 1970s. I believe Vietnam was the turning point, but that the decline of the Soviet bloc gave it a powerful second wind. However, by around 2000 or so, I believe America’s decline in power resumed in earnest SamBee wrote:
I’m not actually convinced humans could survive a full scale nuclear war in the long run. They could bunker up for centuries,but it would remove most, maybe all higher lifeforms. Nuclear winter could destroy everything from plankton to rainforests…I’m also not completely convinced about fossil fuels. We’ve had decades to prepare but have done so too slowly. Maybe, but it could cause massive social disturbance. We saw a precursor to this in the seventies…As for the rest… I don’t see the decline purely in terms of morality and human rights. It is also about *power*…The Soviet Union actually went into decline when it became nicer to its citizens!Likewise, I think the USA was going into decline in the 1970s precisely when African Americans started to get a better deal. Britain and France went downhill after losing most of their colonies.
Nuclear winter sounds more like science fiction than a very realistic scenario to me because it is based on questionable assumptions about a certain number of large “firestorms” at the same time as well as what the overall impact of them would be. I think a much more likely scenario would be that some major cities and strategic military targets would be hit but eventually there wouldn’t be many worthwhile fixed targets left to aim for and then there would be some kind of cease fire and rebuilding. In any case, I’m not sure that the relative power of nations is necessarily that much of a factor in the overall quality of life of their average citizens. For example, Canada has never been a world superpower but I would rather live there than China or Russia any day.
I would actually call the fall of the USSR a victory for Western civilization because at this point Western civilization is largely about ideals like freedom and democracy and the USSR looked like the antithesis of that with all the heavy-handed control and fear it produced. And as far as the United States, maybe giving up on the Vietnam conflict was a blow to American pride compared to defeating Nazi Germany and Japan in WWII but I’m not sure the lives of average Americans are any worse now because of this development. In fact this could actually be one of the main reasons we don’t now have young men being involuntarily drafted to go to Iraq or Afghanistan; so in a way it could actually be considered more of a growing pain than any sign of terminal decline. Likewise if the economies of China, Japan, South Korea, Taiwan, etc. have grown compared to the way it used to be in America I’m not sure that is necessarily such a bad thing for the average American.
As long as I can afford to buy stuff at Wal-mart, IKEA, etc. then as far as I’m concerned it is just as well if it wasn’t made in America. To me it looks like the Great Depression, World War II, and the Cold War were relative low points in terms of worldwide stability and things have mostly improved since then so that there aren’t as many truly scary threats to our current way of life. Sure there are still plenty of things that are less than ideal like crime, terrorism, poverty, substance abuse, mental illness, etc. but I doubt having the Church talking about how evil and wrong the world supposedly is will help do much to improve anything by itself. It’s almost as if they like having something or someone “bad” to point at because it is a way for Church leaders and members to tell themselves that they are better, more blessed, etc. than others. So same-sex attraction and porn are easy targets to scapegoat and complain about without really doing anything substantial to at least try to make much of a positive difference in the world.
There’s a couple of books out by a fellow named Peter Zeihan (The Accidental Superpower and The Absent Superpower) that claim that the world is going to hell, except the United States and that the best days of the United States are ahead of us, courtesy of super good geography, OK demographics and energy independence via the shale revolution. Mr Zeihan says that we are witnessing the end of an artificial bubble put into place by the US at the end of WWII (at Bretton-Woods), in which the US ensured the establishment of open markets and free trade, enforced by US military might, mainly the navy. Now that the Soviet Union has fallen, and the US is energy independent, we are about to lose interest in the rest of the world and enjoy a relatively comfortable self sufficiency, away from the troubles of the rest of the world. As far as moral quandaries in the general populace, don’t we always seem to have a sufficiency of those? I can’t really see the USA becoming isolationist again… there are issues such as rampant immigration – legal and illegal, the drugs trade which afflict the USA but are an international issue, the huge reliance of much of the economy on the military (which has a big presence overseas), even international industries such as entertainment which rely heavily on foreign markets. That plus the internet. There are a number of countries represented on here. At least half a dozen I can think of including the Netherlands, Canada, Australia etc.
Personally I think shale oil is endgame stuff. And fracking, well let’s say it is controversial.
SamBee, You may very well be correct. After all, Peter Zeihan is denoted as a contrarian in at least one internet source. Regardless of how they unfold, the next 10-20 years are going to be something to watch!
Willhewonder wrote:
SamBee,You may very well be correct. After all, Peter Zeihan is denoted as a contrarian in at least one internet source. Regardless of how they unfold, the next 10-20 years are going to be something to watch!
I suspect we will still be round in 20 years, but 200 years is another matter.
SamBee wrote:
I suspect we will still be round in 20 years, but 200 years is another matter.
Here’s where we’ll be: Dead. Tombstone unkept. Chances are, no one will remember our names.
dande48 wrote:
SamBee wrote:
I suspect we will still be round in 20 years, but 200 years is another matter.
Here’s where we’ll be: Dead. Tombstone unkept. Chances are, no one will remember our names.
I meant the human race.
Although strangely I wouldn’t bet on everyone today being dead then either. Technology may have a few surprises in that direction too.
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