A Time To Take Stock


Dear Reader,

A Buddhist-created public garden in the middle of England
that no-one now visits because of COVID-19
The impact of COVID-19  is, clearly, enormous. Not only the unexpected loss of so many loved ones but also the economic impact, and also - I suggest - the psychological impact. I just wonder, therefore, how much more the psychological impact was when the 'flu pandemic of 100 years ago hit, and when millions were erased from the planet. Or the Black Death of 1348-49.

 We have grown very much accustomed to thinking the over-comfortable thought that we humans had become virtually untouchable. We thought that science - medicine - had pretty well all health issues under control. Experts had thought over recent decades that a large pandemic could easily come our way, but we did not listen to that properly, just as we did not listen to the warnings about Climate Change and our over-dependence on fossil fuels.

 The western world, in particular, has been on a trajectory of seemingly never-ending technological development and consequential economic growth. My own lifetime (since World War 2) has seen huge increases in our ease of living and freedom of living that could never have been predicted. But I have to say a good percentage of that 'benefit' has been useless with respect to its effect: it has given too many people a false idea of what human beings are about. And thanks to the form of brain-washing that our educational system has brought, the great spiritual masters and people of true wisdom are effectively looked at as being 'weirdos'. Until that is, people in the 'rat race' start to wonder what it's all about and look for ways to escape.

 And now we contemplate the bigger cost - the cost to planet Earth.

 Whilst we live under the cloud of COVID-19, the first four months in this year has already seen a remarkable showcase for existential and catastrophic risk. A severe drought, devastating bushfires, hazardous smoke, towns running dry – these events all demonstrate the consequences of human-induced Climate Change.

A Science Alert has isolated ten potentially catastrophic threats to human survival. Not prioritised over one another, these risks are:

  1. the decline of natural resources, particularly water 
  2. the collapse of ecosystems and loss of biodiversity
  3. human population growth beyond Earth's carrying capacity
  4. global warming and human-induced climate change
  5. chemical pollution of the Earth system, including the atmosphere and oceans
  6. rising food insecurity and failing nutritional quality
  7. nuclear weapons and other weapons of mass destruction
  8. pandemics of new and untreatable disease
  9. the advent of powerful, uncontrolled new technology
  10. the national and global failure to understand and act preventatively on these risks.
On top of all this, there are indicators to suggest that COVID-19 (and any future virus of this nature) thrives on the unhealthy atmosphere that has been generated. COVID-19 has been detected on particles of air pollution by scientists looking into whether the illness could be carried this way over long distances and potentially increase the infection rate.

It's most interesting though that, while lockdown has been going on, nature has been quick to respond - even the Venetian waterways have been cleansed as a result and are showing plenty of life: dolphins and jellyfish have made an appearance. Pollution levels in major cities have been halved in some cases.

Now - surely - is the time to take stock ... and then plan to live differently. Let us collectively say "No" to the government: "No" to any "return to normal". 

The government - all governments - are not telling us the total truth anyway. While our government talks of the economy being returned into great shape, the food chain is being rapidly altered by Climate Change. Who will buy our goods if they have no foodstuffs to sell us? Let alone the state of the oceans.

For our children's sake - and, more importantly, the sake of the planet and the life on it - there cannot be a "return to normal" if we are to tackle Climate Change and its effect! There cannot be a "return to normal" anyway, so we might as well look to do what real wisdom (not worldly wisdom) should tell us to do.

Thank you for reading this!

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

The Failure Of Universities In A Disunited World - And What To Do

Image
Dear Reader, Hello! It has been a very long time since I wrote on this blog. There have been circumstances that have prevented this of late, but, at the same time, there did not seem to be much else of any importance that needed to be said that was different from what I had already posted over the preceding years. A sabbatical was appropriate. Truth transcends opinion? Some may say my posts are only my point of view anyhow, and that other opinions exist. The question arising therefore is whether that is a valid view, or is that a view that we have been educated and/or feel obliged by society to accept? Perhaps we need to study whether there is a Truth that transcends opinion. Perhaps we need to study ourselves thoroughly to understand the world. As Socrates once said: "The unexamined life is not worth living." I try to relate only what certain ancient teachings say about the application of wisdom in our lives, knowing that is what the future is to bring about. Materialism, s
Read more

Are World Events Bringing About The Biblical Armageddon?

Image
Dear Reader, I emerged out of World War Two as a one-year-old and what I encountered in the aftermath, as I grew up in a reasonably happy family in the UK, was a note of positivity. No one wanted any more wars after 10 years of extreme suffering spread over 30 years; 10 years in which many millions were killed or maimed. These wars had been too close to home. The UK was set back on its heels having been virtually bankrupted by a war effort to - ostensibly - retain a free world. What the UK populace called for in 1945 was peace based on social justice and opportunity for all. A General Election brought a sea change in the kind of national government wanted, a government that was committed to much-improved education open to all and a healthcare system to replace the unaffordable to most system that was previously in place. These things happened, or were initiated, but not without experiencing severe austerity to help pay for it. But the fact that these changes happened created improvemen
Read more

National Growrh - But Any Kind Of Growth?

Image
Dear Reader, Today's world is virtually indescribable. The UK's new government thought they would be welcomed as heroes with their planned American-style race for growth, but have been pulled down by both members of their own party and the business market, both of which are supposed to support this flavour of government. Yet it is we voters - in a roundabout way -  that   put them there. A number would say it was the Tory membership that put them there, but that is not so. A chain of events got them there since the 2019 election. Does that say something about the electorate's muddled thinking? Just what sense of life values do we possess to make this possible? These politicians are only a reflection of our own attitudes as a society that became more and more relentlessly attached to individuality and our possessions and worship of material success and glitz rather than the nation's good, socially and environmentally. And we cannot seem to see a practical alternative. Li
Read more