Cutting to the chase: No matter how much we wish it were different we are fundamentally divided as a species.
This division offers us enormous potential but also robs us of direction. Clearly, I have no desire to live on a world where the entire body of humanity is enslaved by the will of a tiny élite. We did that throughout recorded history and such hierarchies never last.
So let's see if we can find a way to better harness the immense energy we possess without sacrificing the truly mind blowing variety and range of cultures we have developed over the history of civilisation.
The first challenge I see looming over the next five years is the same challenge that we have been struggling with for the last thirty years, namely the violent struggle to control fossil fuels. This struggle to have exclusive command over necessary resources is the base motive power to each regional conflict on our planet's surface. Yes, we disguise this fact with tribal, sectarian or political explanations but, at the core, we are killing one another for resources.
This is the tragedy of humanity: We are still fighting over the fresh kill and the clean water stream as if we never left the caves.
Therefore, if we are to come up with a system that doesn't degrade back to injustice, conflict and warfare we need to understand how we are compelled into violence in the first place. Human beings are, first and foremost, predators. Unlike other predators, humans have a separate awareness of self or 'Ego' as we put it. This separate consciousness allows us to step back from any given situation, to analyse the possible short term outcomes and to anticipate scarcity in the near future. Scarcity creates a panic within the human being.
We humans anticipate, we have efficient, long-term memories that fixate upon the 'bad times',we have a sensitivity and an empathy for those of our 'kin' who will inevitably suffer from want and hunger and so we do what is necessary to ensure the safety of 'our people'. Worrying about the threat against our kin is the primary instinct of young females and staving off the threat against our kin is the primary instinct of young males. We are hard wired to fight our way out of a tight spot by aeons of continued existence on this planet.
We have only lived in a world devoid of other predators for less than one milennium. In the sub-continents of India and South America as well as the entire continent of Africa this relative protection from natural enemies has existed for less than five hundred years. The Sahara desert was once an enormous river valley that would dwarf the mighty Nile. We have been driven by desertification and failing river beds since before we even thought of leaving a record of our existence.
Understanding this helps us to appreciate that atrocities and outrages aren't simply the product of 'evil monsters' but a very natural instinct that resides within us all. The militias and terrorist groups of the world exist fundamentally due to this principle of "protecting the herd" from want and attack. Our world conspires in this tragedy by constantly changing the conditions of our existence over time. It is not beyond the realms of possibility that within a few short decades, we could cause the Amazon river to become a desert area too.
There are people who are already gearing themselves up for a world of scarce fresh water and preparing their war machines to grab whatever water they can get by whatever means. The fossil fuel necessary to keep our factories, auto mobiles and aeroplanes operating is also dwindling on a global scale given that the emerging economies have already hit maturity and will soon be followed by even more emergent economies.
The hegemony of BRIC (Brazil, Russia, India, China) will be followed very quickly by Indonesia, Western and Southern Africa, The Thai / Malay Peninsula and the Hispanic States of Mesoamerica and Southern America. These countries have shaken off their naïve foreign policies and will begin to work in tandem with one another to ensure the better distribution of their continental assets amongst themselves. This is especially true of the Southern American states who now eye the Traditional West (US, UK & EU) as no longer the only game in town.
What BRIC has done is to introduce peaceful competition into the vast distribution of world goods and resources. It is now incumbent upon the Traditional West to set aside its naïve foreign policy of "divide and conquer", of propping up a minority dictator over all the other people to control the assets of the country. To continue to engage in this unjust and aggressive behaviour will result only in the dwindling of friendly markets for trade. By dealing 'fairly' with their trading partners using its vast monetary wealth, China has effectively placed its flag on the majority of Sub-Saharan resources and not one bullet was discharged.
Every power base on the surface of this world has taken its model from the model of scarcity and exclusive control of resources. Inevitably this will lead to a war of self interest which will slice the world's population in two at least. That is, unless an alternative model can be found. It is in the Traditional West's interest to reveal this model before the barbarians actually storm the walls of Rome.
That system needs to be available to everyone and needs to be more attractive than enjoying exclusive control over resources which, I imagine, must be like trying to sleep in a semi detached house stuffed with treasure and jewels and everyone in your neighbourhood knows about it.
"Divide and Conquer" no longer works because there are no new worlds to conquer for the foreseeable future. Our universe is stuffed full of energy and once we control this energy, water can be made drinkable, food can be raised with respect for the soil it is grown upon and the diet of continents can become more balanced and healthy.
A new model needs to be developed around the reality of abundance and not the fear of scarcity. I have some of the basic tenets of that model. I am not alone, 2012 has seen a quiet revolution begin, a revolution which will change the world as surely as the Industrial Revolution changed the 18th and 19th Century worlds. The Energy Revolution has begun. The work of Nicolai Tesla is now the most searched for scientific subject on Google. I predict the world's first anti gravity drive, using our planet's own gravitational signal as it's motive power within the next five years (Even if I have to build it myself!). This will remove the last barrier between us and the asteroid belt namely how devilishly hard it is to escape the gravitational pull of our world.
In ten years we will stand on Mars. Fact.
So be at peace.....the answer is so simple and profound that no human created problem can possibly confound it. We are Zodi. This was always going to happen.
