Civilizations don’t last forever. Just ask the Aztecs. Or the Maya. Or fans of the original Roman Empire.
From the ancient Myceneans in the Mediterranean to the Anasazi in Arizona, societies throughout history have often gone the way of the dinosaurs and the dodo. Wars, or disease, or altered weather patterns, or natural disasters, or famine have repeatedly tipped complex regional societies past the point of stability, initiating chaos, ruin and ultimately total demise.
In his original unabridged dictionary, published in 1828, Noah Webster defined civilization as “the state of being refined in manners, from the grossness of savage life, and improved in arts and learning.”
Today civilization is a lot more complicated. Now civilization connotes global complexity and technological sophistication beyond anything Webster would have recognized. Civilization has become a state “marked by urbanization, advanced techniques (as of agriculture and industry), expanded population, and complex social organization,” as the most recent unabridged Webster’s dictionary describes it.
Civilization’s current stability depends on a vast global interdependence of countless connected components. Food and fuel, materials for manufacturing, clothing and housing — all require the cooperation of individuals, corporations and nations. Transportation, communication, economic activity anywhere affect everything everywhere (sometimes, all at once).
So far, the economic and social structures, governmental agencies and relevant public policies have managed to maintain something resembling Webster’s recent definition. But all that is under threat. Civilization is on the brink of breakdown. There’s no guarantee that 21st century civilization will last till the 22nd.
In fact, humankind now faces a multitude of credible existential threats of which everybody ought to be aware. Lack of space, though, requires that immediate warnings herein be…
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