What Does The Future Hold?

Have you ever stopped to wonder what it would be like to lose all of the benefits of modern civilization? It’s only through virtually new technological achievements that we’re now able to have medical procedures from anything to fungus toenail laser treatment to having dandruff problems fixed. The idea of going back to live closer to nature in a place like Long Island sounds nice, but what if you needed Long Island fungus toenail treatment and lacked the resources to have it done? Chances are, it wouldn’t be pretty!

Yet this may be our future reality. While few think many of the conspiracy theories currently going around about 2012 and the denying global warming being a real danger are becoming less and less. Even if you deny that this climate change is happening, you still have to think about things like peak oil, and the unsustainable aspect of the way we currently exist.

“Unsustainable” means that our current way of life cannot go on forever. This is obviously the case, as our society is run on what are mostly non-renewable minerals such as coal and oil. It’s been guessed that planet Earth may now be half way through all available oil stocks, while the level of customer demand for oil continues to skyrocket. This is due to the economic booms of densely populated countries such as China and India.

So what happens when all the oil runs out? The hope is that scientists will by that time have discovered a way that we can run wholly on solar and wind as fuels, since they’re one hundred percent renewable. But how long have we got left?

Some, such as the writer of “Endgame” Derrick Jensen, have put forth the idea that reverting to a Stone Age way of life may actually be the best thing for humanity. It sounds ridiculous at first, but what Jensen is advocating is a lifestyle that is far closer to nature, and pays respects to what it takes from the natural world. It’s been stated by American Indians that if one takes a fish from the ocean to eat, that person now has a responsibility to that family of fish, to make sure that it survives. Such an idea seems ridiculously quaint to modern people, yet this way of living is far more environmentally friendly, and ultimately better for us, than the way we are currently living.

Demand for non-renewable minerals will continue to rise as the resources themselves are more and more depleted. What will it seem like when we realize we’re out of oil? Not many individuals want to be around to find out how it will be. One of the reasons many Western leaders, even liberals, are so set on creating stability in the Middle East is that this region contains large amounts of oil that may be needed to keep civilization from falling apart.

Whatever the result of our current lifestyle will be, there’s a large chance that it will be event that the youth of today will witness within their lifetimes. We’ll just have to wait and see.