(02-01-2020, 08:05 AM)The Real Marty Wrote: I look at all the threats to our way of life and I wonder if we are at the high point of our civilization and it's all downhill from here.   Nuclear proliferation, terrorism, climate change, US government bankruptcy, oceans filling up with plastic, political polarization...   What does the future hold?  An economic crash and depression caused by exploding federal debt?  Rising seas flooding major coastal areas around the world?  Some rogue state or terrorist organization setting off a nuclear weapon in a major city?  Liberals and conservatives literally shooting at each other, in a civil war with no front lines or boundaries?  A pandemic racing through and eliminating a billion or so people and causing a severe economic decline?  

Are we the lucky ones who are living at peak civilization on earth?  And in 10 or 20 years it all rolls over and either declines or crashes and we enter a new dark age, with disease, depression, pollution, and chaos?  

People like to look up at the sky and wonder if anyone else is out there.  But isn't it possible, or even probable, that if the beings on another planet are smart enough, they will eventually destroy themselves, by raping their environment, by borrowing themselves into bankruptcy, by allowing their arguments to get out of control, just like we are doing?    

Maybe we should just enjoy it while it lasts.  We're the lucky ones who live at the peak of history.  We have everything.