Leto FregarThought from a group chat:
"It feels like we are living in the prequel to several sci-fi movies/stories, but not the ones I would like to live in"
I wonder what it would take to change that? My world view was shaped a lot by a few fictional characters (all quotes from memory, so details might be wrong):
- Gandalf, talking to Frodo: "Some of those living deserve to die, and some of the dead deserve to live. Can you give them their life back? Then don't be so eager for a death sentence."
- Obi Wan Kenobi: "You will learn that a lot of truths depend on our personal perspective." "Who is the greater fool, the fool, or the fool that follows him?"
- Captain Jean-Luc Picard, in almost every scene.
And many more. The world view I built for myself was maybe this:
Hardships can be overcome, bad times come to an end and will be replaced by better times. Listen to all sides before making a decision, and avoid absolutes, as it is difficult to correct those.
Later, during university, these thoughts were deepened, still looking optimistically to the future. Technology was opening up endless new possibilities, and a scientific approach meant to see the world as "as far as we know now ".
These days I see politicians in direct opposition to scientific facts. Not a discussion about how to deal with the facts, or how to balance different aspects, but denying the facts themselves. And not only regarding details, but basic facts which - by all available data - have to be considered the reality we live in.
But even worse, I see developments that go directly against the warnings of those old stories:
- autonomous ai killing machines, controlled by ai networks: #skynet in the making, and not even as a hidden purpose.
- exploitative mega corporations, reminding me of basically every cyberpunk story I ever read.
- levels of environmental destruction that project to a Mad Max style future.
- Levels of surveillance that far exceed Orwell's nightmares.
- "predictive policing", aiming for a minority report style future. Without the happy end that had been added to the movie.
I want to maintain my optimism. I want to maintain my balanced world views. Every day it gets harder...
How do we get out of this nightmare?
Julien G. (Julienweb.fr)
DoomsdaysCW
Shouting into the void
yuenbrascubas
𝓒𝓱𝓻𝓲𝓼𝓽𝓸𝓯 𝓓𝓸𝓷𝓪𝓽
Dr. Michael Blume
WolfSmutje
Laurent Chambon
Younger Bro