We WILL survive. We've survived much worse: WWII, Civil Rights Movement; assassinations of JFK, MLK, & RFK, the Vietnam War.
I was almost killed in Peoples' Park Riot (1st day in CA!). Ex-husband was standing next to girl murdered by National Guard at Kent State. He tried to give her CPR & watched her die before his eyes.
Motto of Civil Rights Movement: "Eyes on the Prize,": no matter how long the battle, KEEP ON fighting (non-violently). Worked for Gandhi, & MLK.
I have great hopes for younger generation--most idealistic & politically engaged since the Civil Rights Movement. ONWARD!
"Keep your hand on that plow, Hold on!"
12
we knew that , we crossed the rubicon. no crying. My advice to humanity. Go away, one way or another. built your space ship and perish in space but take risk or wait here ans see what happens?
Michelle, I have a candle.
1
Ms. Goldberg states genetic engineering is a source of horror and fails to admit it is the source of multiple life saving drugs and food millions.
2
As a long-time reader of Science Fiction (my 1974 BA in “contemporary literature” was basically a bachelors in Sci-Fi), and an inveterate political observer, this opinion piece (in my opinion) hits the bull’s-eye!
1
Ms Goldberg, you are spending too much time in your brain.
Human beings are an amazing species, but we are only a species. If we turn out to have been too smart, or too dumb, by half, so to speak, and self-destruct, the ecosystem will be the winner. Nature wins again. Progress, its so easy to see in hindsight, was completely blind to the risks of incessantly changing the world, and ourselves, we thought, to make our own lives physically easier, less painful, and longer. We did not know evolution drove us to reproduce, much less that we could overshoot, overpopulate, and destroy that which made us possible. Progress, so to speak, will most likely destroy civilization, such as it is. Good riddance. We have trashed the ecosystem, oblivious to the fact that we depend on it. If there are 1,00000,000 of us on the planet, each little community can sing, dance, love, and suffer. and feel the wonder of who we are, children of nature. The city has blinded us to the beauty of what nature was, is, and will be, before and after us, lost in the urban jungle.
2
There isn't going to be any future unless we stop driving verhicles that emit fossil fuels.
2
What is the Chief Justice doing? He admonishes impeachment bad behavior and then Does Nothing? The bad actors leave, read a book, play with fidgets but then Nothing. On one hand We have a sham non trial and a handful of honest sheriffs trying to show the perfidy of senators and the crimes of the president. It’s awful to watch - and then Adam Schiff tells us what’s at stake and who to blame.
7
“In order to retain a certain respect for sausages and laws, one must not see them being made.”
--- Otto von Bismarck
Rep. Schiff’s stirring call for “moral courage” among Republican Senators clearly fell on deaf ears last night.
But all is not lost.
American voters by and large recognize moral sausage when they see it, and McConnell and Company and the Trump Defense Team are about to serve us up another heaping bowlful of it in the next few days.
Anybody but a Republican in 2020.
9
The problem is mass ignorance - of the basic science underlying the world; the technology being used by dictatorships and leaders who would be dictators to control us; and a desire to move not forwards, but backwards, blaming increased rights of individuals not to face discrimination for appearance or things they do which harm no one, and laws against those who commit slow mass murder for our problems.
They want to eliminate or control “others”, those Americans who got here after their families did, or have sexual desires they find personally offensive, or who either believe in no god or gods other than theirs for the nation’s problems; while approving more unbridled power for those who already control them, Trump the prime example.
His decision to allow the discharge of raw sewage doesn’t benefit anyone but the extremely wealthy, for human waste dumped in the water is a minor nuisance ... compared to what General Electric did to the Hudson River, discharging tons of PCBs, the most carcinogenic family of chemicals known, from its plants near the headwaters of the river.
Despite decades of cleanup, costing far more than it would have cost not to pollute in the first place, I still wouldn’t eat fish from that river.
But lots of states ban even teaching accurate accounts of history, and high school science courses go right after the arts because they’re too expensive.
Incidentally, comparing Gibson’s 13 books to a bad movie points out a failure to grasp what he’s been saying.
7
Oh let the darkness come. The entire world is nothing but a billionaires' playground. Who has most to lose? Me? I don't think so. It is billionaires and the corporate indenturing.
3
"from artificial intelligence to genetic engineering to mass surveillance, they are frequently sources of horror."
And I would add nuclear energy.
3
"1984", "Lord of the flies", "Brave New World", etc. When you've read one story about a society in the future that has become a dystopian nightmare, you've read 'em all. I was 13 when I saw "Soylent Green". I turn 60 in May. Still waiting for the scoops to take away protest marchers.
2
Overheard in Venice Beach Today:
"I'm totally ready for the 'End Times'..."
"Tell me about it..."
"If this is the end, then it can't happen soon enough."
1
Yes. Interesting times. I have been reading the archives of William H. Seward.
https://www.history.com/topics/american-civil-war/william-seward.
Though he was acknowledged for his operations in Europe during the great war of freedom, the domestic actions were just if not more important. Great background ground and perspective / context for these times interesting times. Did not understand the importance of Fort Lafayette in New York harbor during his tenure till recently.
Wow, what a coincidence! I’m currently in the middle of reading Gibson’s The Peripheral for the first time.
maybe humanity is doomed, maybe not. it's up to us. start small, plant a tiny garden, donate to an environmental organization (Sea Shepard is my favorite), be kind to yourself and those around you.
5
"The dearth of optimistic visions of the future, at least in the United States, is central to the psychic atmosphere of this bleak era."
This is a "bleak era" in America, how so?
We are the richest, most privileged, most powerful (and most dangerous) country in the world, by far and yet it is postulated here that we live in a "bleak era"... hardly.
In fact, the world in general has never been so wealthy and rich in opportunity for billions of people. According to the World Bank, Global poverty has fallen to a record low. Poverty has dropped everywhere but the Middle East and North Africa.
And yet, it says here, that "Our problem is not just that new technologies regularly fail to thrill. It’s that, from artificial intelligence to genetic engineering to mass surveillance, they are frequently sources of horror."
We've been here before and its instructive. Fritz Haber, a Nobel prize winner for the development of synthesized Ammonia, used in making fertilizer, also led Germany's efforts in the development of poison gas, and is known as the "father of chemical warfare"
I'm guessing that this another one of those things that's limited to the extremely online set.
1
Michelle Goldberg of NYTimes writes:
I suspect that one reason Pete Buttigieg, the 38-year-old
former mayor of a Midwestern city, has vaulted into the
top tier of presidential candidates is that he speaks so
confidently about the future. He asks voters to picture
the day after the last day of Trump’s presidency and
discusses how the world might be when he’s nearly
as old as his septuagenarian competitors.
We boomers have seen it on TV already. It’s called “The Day After”. Summary notes:
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Day_After
I think the last day of Trump’s presidency may be sooner than we think.
The sense of awe and wonder are not dead. Trump just put them on hold until he replaced in 2020 by a Democratic president.
4
Black swans. Once-in-a-century fires, floods, hurricanes and tornadoes that occur multiple times each and every year. From Nietzsche to Orwell to the Sex Pistols to Trump, things have to get worse before they get better. Question: How much longer must we wait? Answer: November.
“This is a work of fiction. Any similarity to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events, is purely coincidental.”
You and I have seen this legal disclaimer or some version of it in movies thousands of times over the course of our lives.
It is probably more familiar to us now then prayers like “Now I lay me down to sleep.”
Today as Republican begin their defense of Trump is a good day for remembering it.
2
One word Robots, a no hold’s barred future that will surpass even our wildest ideas. Scientists can pinpoint when chimpanzees spun off of the humanoid strand through evolution and will be able to mark the next spin off of man to this new being which will be able to survive all the destructiveness that we humans have left behind. We will become the alien and the interloper.
The absence of honor, courage and patriotism in the Republican Party resulted from a toxic blend of long standing rivalries in what constitutes "America", the fear of what many see a threat to their fundamental principles by the increase of a dark skinned immigrant population. Fox News and social media platforms promulgated this sense of "victimhood" which fueled the extreme right wing fanatisism giving rise to Trump's base.
What appears to have thrown gasoline onto this tinderbox was the birth of the acceptance of alternate facts. This was initiated, in large part, from Kelly Ann Conway and Fox News. By legitimizing "alternative facts", the far right wing has adopted and reinforced the establishment of fake news that is now weaponized as a Republican tool to deny truth, facts has metastasized like a virulent malignancy.
Trump, who rose to positions of power by his ability to con anyone susceptible to his lies, have adopted the playbook of deny, defect, repeat, which in fact he adopted from Putin's playbook. This technique is nothing new in giving rise to autocracies and dictatorships throughout history, but what feels surreal is that here we are.
4
WITH APOLOGIES TO OGDEN NASH
Utopian, dystopian,
The difference is droll.
The utopian sees the donut,
The dystopian sees the hole.
1
This is so superficial it is embarrassing. It refuses to contend with the profound critique of techno-optimism, or with the fact that capitalism generates losers, social costs, and negative externalities - all of which our society refuses to come to terms with.
3
One thing I can thank Trump for is making me glad I am old. To be selfish for a moment, I will have the good fortune to not be around to face the dystopia he is working so hard to create. It's a shame he won't be around to see it, either.
3
In the eyes of many Americans, Donald Trump's presidency has brightened the future and enhanced its possibilities.
There will never be a world that seems perfect to everyone, or for that matter, anyone.
Americans in 1776 were not united in their desire for an independent country. Some actively supported and cheered the British during the revolution. When it was over, we moved on.
Life is a constant struggle, whether in our personal lives or that of our nation. Those who are not willing to fight for their cause and accept the outcome, and move on, are like Ms. Goldberg. They are so self-centered that they can see nothing but darkness ahead...very egocentric.
2
In the eyes of many Americans, Donald Trump's presidency has brightened the future and enhanced its possibilities.
There will never be a world that seems perfect to everyone, or for that matter, anyone.
Americans in 1776 were not united in their desire for an independent country. Some actively supported and cheered the British during the revolution. When it was over, we moved on.
Life is a constant struggle, whether in our personal lives or that of our nation. Those who are not willing to fight for their cause and accept the outcome, and move on, are like Ms. Goldberg. They are so self-centered that they can see nothing but darkness ahead...very egocentric.
1
This sort of sky-is-falling-in despair reminds of the final story in Ray Bradbury's "The Illustrated Man". In that story, the population believes that a terrible end is going to occur the next day, so they give their children poison on the evening before so they won't have to experience it. But the world doesn't end, except it sort of does, because they have killed their own future in an exaggerated fear. This is what is going on with the likes of Gibson and the author. The world will go on, changed climate or not, and those who inherit it will be those who have children and teach them how to adapt and make the best of whatever situation they find themselves in. Human beings are enormously adaptable, they have learned to live in the Arctic and the Amazon basin and the deserts of Arabia, they will survive a changed climate and whatever it brings. Except, those who kill their children with despair or don't have them, they in fact won't have a future, worried as they are about the end which isn't actually coming, living in fright instead of courage.
3
Where is the vision for America's future? We're in a structural, economic and social competition with China, India, and EU. Despite the strength of our economy, our failing infrastructure, income disparity, eroding public education system, and high healthcare costs are catching up with us. We may not see it yet, but we are falling behind.
6
I can no longer imagine any future but collapse. The science is bleak - we are very far down the road, past innumerable tipping points - and there is literally no record of human beings ever mobilizing, changing habits and beliefs and sacrificing on the scale required. Many people are trying and will continue to, but power, greed, distrust, and fear are not going to vanish. When leaders say, give up this, do that, will those immediately negatively affected all agree? Have you ever seen that? Some people feed the homeless; others support policies to ban them from cities. The change we called the enlightenment was slow, partial, and initiated or worsened many problems. Incremental improvement, with many setbacks and new issues arising, is all we've ever been able to do. Now, that is nowhere near enough, especially as multiplying disasters threaten community and global bonds. People say to me, "So we should just give up?" I say do what you can, what you must, what you love. Everything ends.
9
One of the finest, most profoundly well-encapsulated pieces I’ve read in the Times in the past year. If cosmic despair and fear seems somehow so unavoidable, as this piece suggest, finding the means to describe its arc so (seemingly) accurately is I think something to take courage from. I used to feel strongly that our future is being kidnapped, and while I still do, at least knowing the qualities of the perpetrators makes It all feel more manageable, lesson dislocating. So thanks Michelle for an oddly encouraging piece.
3
The really big, inexorable trend, that didn't start with trump but has quickened through his only substantial legislative win, the top-heavy tax cut, is inequality.
That, and bought and paid for judges.
There is much to be said for keeping busy in a fulfilling (financially or otherwise) pursuit of a career.
Taking that away causes all the rest, IMO.
3
A daunting, dark future? This is what courage is for. We need to stop telling ourselves stories of fear and despair, but rather stories of heroes, courage and hope. I know it's contrary to what the media is about, but the media needs to find solutions, not just problems, as well.
7
@bounce33 - There are plenty of solutions that are talked about all the time, all over the media (except maybe Fox and their ilk.) The problem is getting them enacted, past the wall of those who “stand athwart history, yelling Stop.”
1
My 18 year old, just graduating high school this year, regularly questions why he should bother going to college when he doesn't think the world will be around when he is 40, destroyed by climate cataclysm and greed-driven corruption. I find myself stuttering when trying to convince him otherwise because I have similar fears.
13
Well Michelle dystopian futures are nothing new at all in recent U.S. history. Mr. Gibson must have a selective memory. There were all of those dark movies about atomic holocausts in the 1950s. In fact, in the 50s and 60s the idea of the end of the world from nuclear weapons was a constant and one might say actually real vision of Armageddon. Planet of the Apes references in the end the destruction of the world by atomic weapons. A Clockwork Orange was another deadly dystopia that takes place England. Fahrenheit 451 was Ray Bradbury's novel and later movie about a totalitarian future where books are banned and only kept alive by a few brave people who memorise them. Star Trek had plenty of dystopian themes. The Matrix of course is very classic movie about a deadly future where the world is now a videogame controlled by a supercomputer. There are the Terminator movies that promise horrific robots that can't be destroyed. The list is endless.
One thing that is a little different about the present is that we are so much more informed than earlier generations. We have very sophisticated ideas about just what is going to destroy us. But, one has to wonder if any of the imagined dystopia will actually come into being. It's complicated.
3
This discussion about the future can move anywhere from computers to healthcare to even our political future with
Donald John Trump. But one branch of scholarship has always had this on it's mind is Philosophy--the problem of future contingent possibilities--starting at least with Aristotle,
"Will there be a "Sea fight tomorrow"
The new generations of Americans are well aware of what the system is and have zero illusions it will change. They support progressive candidates that are always derided by the media and blocked from nomination. A lot of them have just given up because they see clearly that a prosperous future is only open to those that already have money. The only ones that still believe in the American dream are those coming from other places and eventually they too will realize that they have walked into a nightmare.
7
Such a gifted writer! But wow. We are all in the same maelstrom of fear and despair and we come to you seeking insight and hope. The impeachment we all craved was satisfying in that at least the truth came out for three days. We could all listen to the flawless logic and the factual presentation of the evidence. Now I cannot watch as the President's lawyers present innuendo, lies, and assertions about Putin's disinformation campaign as though it is evidence of innocence. (I think their best argument would be to say, yes, the President did it, but he was being manipulated by Vladimir Putin and is sorry and won't let it happen again. But no. They continue to try to manipulate all of us to believe Trump's story. )
Anyway. We have to reach down inside ourselves to find hope now. This is hard for us. But we are facing nothing compared to what the world faced in WWII. We will get through this. Stop mourning for the past. The future is still possible. Let's try to shine some light there!
2
All generations in the US are now downwardly mobile, including the tail end of the baby boomers.
Remember, half the voters did NOT vote for Trump or his henchmen. The problem as I see it, is that there is insufficient leadership or vision to shift the downward and really dangerous trajectory we are on. Chile manages to mobilize, why can't we, in an election year? Something is serious amiss among the so-called political class in this country.
6
The things are going badly shouldn't come as a surprise.
It took mankind until somewhere in the first half of the 19th century to reach the "one billion people simultaneously alive" mark. By the late 60-ies of the 20th century, and despite the culling of the young in 2 world wars, we had reached the three billion people mark and since then we have sailed past the eight billion mark with barely a mention.
But we still only have the one Earth. And, yes, technology and medicine have progressed, as has agronomy, but the number of atoms available to be recombined into useful molecules hasn't changed. Every thing we make locks in resources that are unavailable for other uses. Indeed, the very processes by which we do and make things consume resources (and pollute and enhance climate change and stoke envy and ...).
Moreover, we have created a system that depends on consumption to drive the economy. And all those untold millions and billions in China, India and elsewhere are conditioned to want stuff... So we look for more sources of energy, fracking away merrily, building solar panels in Guangzhou and shipping them across oceans in ships belching greenhouse gases...
The list goes on, and there is no end in sight. No wonder the future looks bleak. It is. But Nature will find a solution. It always does, and it's usually unpleasant. The corona virus in Wuhan is but a taste of what's in store.
4
We are in crisis now, but we have struggled with this since "Man in the Gray Flannel Suit" (published 1955), since "1984" (published 1949) and maybe since the Industrial Revolution (began ~1776).
Anomie is unavoidable in a capitalist society that disassociates individuals from community. For humans, who are social beings, loneliness is an unnatural way to exist.
The explosive rise of social media showed how hungry we are for interaction. When we get home from a meaningless job where computers constantly measure our performance in real time, at least we can reach out and interact with other humans. But social media, too, exists in cyberspace, and is full of predators who only pretend to be our friend. It does not fill the need. Being part of the cheering crowd at a MAGA rally does a better job.
So here we are.
3
Hey Alexa, Make me another nuclear device. Obviously (I hope) this is impossible without blowing several fuses in our national grid but making a really lethal virus will probably be within our grasp.
1
Today's "progressives" (especially regarding climate change) and the Trumpistas (along with the zeitgeist itself) have one thing in common: it's all about fear, especially fear of the future!
Bruce Sterling is another prophetic voice whose wide view of our technological world has covered topics such as weather change, longevity insurance policies and multitasking.
How this effected William Gibson resonates with me. On election night 2016 my life-long, best friend Patrick M attended a Democratic gathering in Oakland, Ca. The result blindsided him, along with everyone else.
We exchanged emails afterward. He was very distraught and I was worried about him. 6 days after the election, he died suddenly of a massive heart attack at age 67. There were no prior symptoms or warnings. Yes, elections can have consequences
8
Thank you Michelle for the link to the Bernie Sanders campaign video. I’m a 68 year old Vietnam-era Marine Corps vet and this brought me to tears. It is amazingly moving. I dread a future without Bernie Sanders as our president.
5
I really enjoy the Bloomberg political ads that say "first we get rid of him."
The darkness of current American discussions reacts to the behavior of polarized citizens, and with any shred of hope, in November we can make a change for a better future. The 'soul' of America has always been inclusive, inventive, and intense---we'll get there again to that brightness.
1
We are here because we lacked progressive voices in Congress that is why it is imperitive to defeat Conservatives and status quo Democrats. For decades we have heard promises or programs to enhance our lives and alliviate stress are impossible to achieve. Every person who does not vote for witnesses or removal of Trump during the impeachment process is a vote against the Constitution and will be an act of total disregard for every American citizen. Today we learn cities will be permitted to dump sewage into rivers, last week wetlands protection, months ago fertilizer and runoffs. The systematic destruction of clean water is here and now, this is a basic need for humanity to survive. Despite environmental destruction the global chaos, the brink of wars and the thought of the emboldened Administration and an illegitmate second term spells doom, a dark oppressive doom for our country. It belongs to 320 million people not 100 Senators.
9
@rhdelp "Today we learn cities will be permitted to dump sewage into rivers, last week wetlands protection, months ago fertilizer and runoffs"?
Ain't necessarily so!...
https://www.commentarymagazine.com/politics-ideas/cry-me-a-river-epa
These days, both sides manipulate our fears (and lie) to promote themselves.
During my life , there have been several disappointing developments , or lack thereof.
Wars to end wars tglobal trade regulators and international peace guarantors solved nothing
Space exploration was more mundane than expected and has yielded little .
Nuclear power did not lead to an era of plenty and ease for working people.
Fantastic improvements in communication did not yield happiness.
Awareness of corruption in all institutions , media, corporations and governments is now universal.
AI looks likely to pose problems for working people and increase wealth gaps.
War is now accepted as continual and the country with the biggest guns rules the world
Othet than that, I am positive.
2
Excellent column.
In 1962, when I was a 9-year-old playing one bright summer day in my backyard, I stopped at one point to literally thank God that I had been born an American, inspired in part by thoughts of the vast world of wonder and astonishment that the future was about to bestow.
My daughter, now 22, has never had a day like that.
10
There is a new initiative called FORESIGHT, led by philanthropies from across the country to re-envision the future of health. FORESIGHT worked with futurists to identify 9 Game Changers for health and we’re now using these to build scenarios of the future in 2030. These scenarios, or stories, will help people across the nation imagine the Game Changers' potential impact on health and well-being.
The Game Changers do indeed reveal some bleak developments like environmental degradation and the rise of authoritarianism. But they also point to potentially positive developments like powerful new citizen movements. Some Game Changers have shown us that there are two sides to many developments. For example, 3D printing can inexpensively spread both medical advances and unlicensed guns.
The idea is that if we see the future, and all it has the potential to be (for better and for worse), then we can all be more aware of how to steer it for the better and how to have conversations about what “better” is! Too often those with decision-making power are relying on thinking about the next best step in the same old agenda, or to your point today, they’re avoidant because they are afraid. They’re also much too reliant on analyzing the potential implications through privileged perspectives. We can be proactive if we commit to equitable processes for understanding all the possibilities.
Check out FORESIGHT and be part of designing a new future for health. www.foresightforhealth.org
1
Trump, in not so subtle terms, is trying to remind his Republican Senators that their states are against abortion. If they vote to impeach and remove him from office, Trump will wage a war against those Republican Senators like no tomorrow. The Republican Senators have to decide between losing the support of their constituents and being labeled as pro-choice or looking the other way and let the president (and themselves) to keep their jobs. The not-so-subtle strategy of the president constitutes, in my mind, an unbridled obstruction of justice. No, Virginia, there is no future.
2
I find that the biggest problem in my life is worrying about stuff I can do nothing about. What was it Shakespeare said:"Sound and Fury signifying nothing"?
2
The apocalyptic can be countered only by the discovery of the extraordinary in the ordinary. It’s at the heart of what’s called American pragmatism.
What we need to limit is a society of the manufactured spectacle. Manufactured spectacle degrades life. Ordinary life is itself spectacular, yet, as a culture, we’re being told that it isn’t.
This ain’t philosophical. It’s just common sense—good old American pragmatism.
5
Speaking of a sensitivity to the zeitgeist.
"It’s an ad that speaks to the desperate longing for kindness and solidarity to replace the cruelties of a society devouring itself, but also a grief-stricken apprehension of what’s in store if they don’t."
Well done Ms. Goldberg. I couldn't have said it better myself.
Buttigieg fails with younger voters because, although he understands the problem, Buttigieg operates under a timeline younger voters don't find realistic. To Alyssa Battistoni's point, typical political machinations cease to function when witnessing rapid climactic collapse. Buttigieg isn't aggressive enough.
Sanders is obviously manipulating the age old human sense of urgency. "You must buy now," and so forth. However, Sanders isn't wrong. The sense of impending doom is scientifically corroborated.
You're not crazy to fear climate change when even Trump's climate denialists are allocating billions for climate mitigation in vulnerable Republican states. To echo Gibson, change is coming but it ain't good.
For the young parent, the times more closely resemble the jaded realism of the post-WWI era.
"April is the cruellest month, breeding
Lilacs out of the dead land..."
Sorry. You're not convincing millennials or anyone younger everything is hunky dory. Youth always has an impetuous for change. However, this is another moment where they're actually right. If you want your sons, daughters, grandchildren to experience mass extinction, by all means vote conservative.
6
How do you think they felt in Warsaw in 1970?
How about living in Copenhagen in 1942?
What about Sao Paulo in 1975?
Yes our problems are big, but the game isn't over yet.
Don't any of you have an engineer friend? How about a philosopher? An artist? A dreamer? It can be all fixed.
We just have to try.
On the other side of trying is a new future. We can do it.
5
In the fall of 1945, my grandfather was stationed in Tokyo as part of the Occupation Government. During a day off, he traveled with his driver/translator to Kamakura, where he was awestruck by the giant figure of the Buddha. Later, he wrote his sister about his experience, saying "it makes you feel that an individual is rather small, and he has a long way to go before he will be perfect. So all that one can do is try and make it just a little bit easier and better for the next generation."
I heard that same sentiment--that we should try to make things better for the next generation--almost thirty years later during one of my kitchen-table conversations with grandfather before we headed outside to mow the lawn. It was a consistent belief--the belief of an immigrant who came to the United States as a boy--that he carried with him for much of his life.
I don't think this belief was unusual for his generation. It's a belief--the idea that we're working not just for ourselves but for those who come after us--that we sorely need to rekindle.
8
We’re a culture that is very selective about the types of progress that we feel are truly awesome and amazing. I work in the healthcare industry and am amazed everyday about how certain diseases that were very deadly just a few years ago (many types of cancer, certain viral infections, etc) are now very manageable. Some new amazing development happens almost daily. It just doesn’t get most people excited, but there’s a lot to feel good about for now and for the future.
4
I wonder how much of our inability to think big and positively about progress and the future is as a result of the tremendous growth in the last 20-30 years of the belief that the end truly is nigh. If the world is ending any minute, with Christ's return and the faithful raptured, wouldn't the prudent thing, in fact, be to not bother with long range plans?
1
Yes, not all things are rosy, not all change is for the better, but the press is doing its job of alerting us to the current dangers, and the possibility of future dangers. As a designer and implementer of new systems, I know well that people hate change (myself included), but after the initial shock we learn to cope - we pride ourselves over the non-human flora and fauna for that reason. When the economy sours we are used to doing something to fix it (the "we" being the Treasury or the Federal Reserve), unfortunately climate change falls outside that arena, the fix looks to be prohibitive, but clearly we have awoken to the need, at least the Democrats have. As the worst of the effects of climate change ensue, let's go down fighting.
3
I need to reread this essay in a few hours and then think on it! Very well done, Ms. G. I hope all the dem candidates read this piece and fold some hope for the future into their campaigns, aside from Yang, of course.
3
The Earth is so far beyond it's ecological "carrying capacity" that, agriculture not withstanding, Gibson's prediction of a 'jackpot' event (perfect storm of negative factors) sounds entirely plausible, if not actually likely.
An 80% die-off of humans, while horrible to contemplate, would be a tremendous positive boon to the Earth, allowing ecosystems to begin to recover.
If our worldwide population isn't reduced one way or another, a global ecological collapse is entirely possible, perhaps even probable.
And yet, people refuse to wake up and change in any significant way! Hence, we seal our fate and possible doom.
9
"Kindness and solidarity" is indeed something we desperately need. But when our present in increasingly controlled by fabulously wealthy people and/or politicians who appear to have little of either hope is hard to come by.
4
The ageless notion "If we can just get through this, we'll be okay" is, well,.. ageless. And here we are, again. And always someone will say "But this feels different." And yes, of course, it does feel different but only because it's kind of required. It's the 'next thing' in the process of nurturing doom and gloom and it helps define the moment as special in its portent and worthy of your attention. It's always different, and the same,
We can and will get through this. The 'okay' part, as always, will be redefined.
@Barry Moyer This doesn't feel different. It IS different.
Our obsession with money is exacerbated by forty years of extraordinary income and wealth inequality. It is the root cause of all the ills that plagues society. Intemperate greed and a lack of basic decency and morality have led us to where we are today.
In the wealthiest country in the world nearly half of us scramble and fight over crumbs. Nearly one in four children are born into poverty. Over 25 million Americans aged 60+ are economically insecure. More than a half-million people are homeless. Most of the youth today face a dire future as the result of higher educational requirements and diminishing job opportunities that pay a livable wage. And if we're honest, we know that most of the rest of us got a break somehow, someway but still stress over not having enough when the next recession hits.
All of our institutions, including government, education, and religion have been subordinated by the wealthy to serve their best interests. Most of our politicians hold office as the result of the largesse of wealthy (quid pro quo) donors.
Trump is merely a symptom of a far greater ailment that plagues society. You get rid of Trump you still have Republican nihilists, and if you get rid of them, you still have a huge segment of the population who seethe with anger and jealousy born from four decades trying to survive in an oppressive system created to sustain an obscene level of income and wealth inequality.
No indeed, the future does not look bright!
14
In the eyes of many Americans, Donald Trump's presidency has brightened the future and enhanced its possibilities.
There will never be a world that seems perfect to everyone, or for that matter, anyone.
Americans in 1776 were not united in their desire for an independent country. Some actively supported and cheered the British during the revolution. When it was over, we moved on.
Life is a constant struggle, whether in our personal lives or that of our nation. Those who are not willing to fight for their cause and accept the outcome, and move on, are like Ms. Goldberg. They are so self-centered that they can see nothing but darkness ahead...very egocentric.
5
This is not the first time world is facing the challenges of climate change, technology and social evil forces - the long chronological history of Indian subcontinent is the record of how human society tackled those challenges. 500 meter rise of sea level submerged major cities, catastrophic volcanic eruption covered most subcontinent with deep ashes and killed most of the people, the battle field technologies killed most of the warriors in the battle, and degenerated social culture allowed de-robbing of a queen in the parliament. That was the deep level of down fall of human culture and nature’s revenge. From that low level the society has come to modern aspiring society. There is no arrow of time - the reality is the cosmic cycle and human progress and degenaration - the concept of four phases of degradation and regeneration of Indian thoughts.
1
In my long 70 something years, I've always been an optimist.
But for the sake of our children and theirs, we should be telling them, based on almost univesally accepted science:
"IT'S TOO LATE, ALREADY"
4
"for all its digital wonders has lost the experience of awe-inspiring technological progress"
Because the Radio, TV & the File cabinet is being re marketed every couple years as the wonders of all time. Oh my - it is so wondrous ! Isn't our "Tech" glorious. Right. And any real progress is always used against all of us.
1
"Civilizational Predicament?"
It's the "civil" part we have lost.
Civility, too, has engendered a focused hate like no other.
Worth a read is, "A Canticle for Leibowitz," by Walter M. Miller Jr. and a 4.5 star rating on Amazon.
The sci-fi book also tells us why square root is our key to our collective betterment!
4
@Lake woebegoner
I loved that book when I read it in high school. Even managed to include it in my senior thesis.
I need to find it and read it again given how much everything has changed in the decades since.
2
@Nancy Moon, I reread it too....a compelling story like no other. Thanks!
I enjoy Gibson’s work, but it is too bad the young do not read him or, for that matter, Ezra Pound:
There died a myriad,
And of the best, among them,
For an old bitch gone in the teeth,
For a botched civilization,
Charm, smiling at the good mouth,
Quick eyes gone under earth's lid,
For two gross of broken statues,
For a few thousand battered books.
I do not think we have a future unless we get serious, each and every one of us. America? It is broken now, a plutocracy. A shock may fix it, and the brute in the White House may be that shock. If he is not gone in a year, we are much closer to civilizational collapse.
6
For hours each day most all of us tie ourselves tightly to digital interfaces. Those digital ties are becoming ever tighter and ever more interconnected. Already, faint digital versions of our lives live forever on Facebook. By the end of the decade our digital selves will be empowered by vast reams of collected personal data coupled to algorithms and AI and they will be able to carry on real conversations with our meat-space selves and with our friends and relatives, even when we're dead in real life.
But there will be little reason to have those conversations because, in digital reality, everyone instantly knows what others are thinking and can carry on essentially infinite conversations at the same time.
What happens when algorithms for preferences and emotions are added to digital entities? C3PO and R2D2 and Hal and yes, the Terminator. Our grandkids will be friends with robots.
Meanwhile, as the new hyperconnected digital world rises, as the Singularity approaches, flesh and blood people and critters will feel more kinship. And that could lead to good things. I hope.
1
Having spent several days at JPMorgan's Healthcare conference which brings in companies and investors from all over the world, this skeptical, jaded New Yorker came away inspired and hopeful of the future. DT will not be president forever and there are good people working on climate change, amazing medical advances, etc. The problem is that money needs to be going into these pockets not stupid, wasteful lobbying for things that are going to kill us. The US is not perfect, was never perfect but no where else in the world do a majority of technological advances flourish then in this country. Don't wallow or worry, do something about it. If you dont have money to invest to support innovation then use your voice in person, social media, etc to support smart innovators who need funding and positive attention for their companies and inventions that can save us and our planet.
63
When asked about this recently, the writer Annie Proulx replied; "I'm nostalgic for "the future." Ouch.
5
Thus the cliche...The future isn't what it used to be. But neither is the past.
2
Ok there is no way around it- we are going to have discover new sources of strength and inspiration to turn bad this black tide.
Circumstance the mother of invention. Indeed the mother of evolution.
We have been living in a sort of stupor created by our affluence, or self satisfaction, indifference.
We have what we need to jolt ourselves awake a real crisis. We might benefit from it if we are lucky and or worthy of it.
Only everything is riding on it.
Trumpism is the apotheosis of "movement conservatism". It, and the Republican Party are an intellectual supermassive black hole, the gravity of which we certainly will not escape unaffected. It is a "stub" of Putin's Russia. This is a very astute article.
7
A lot of right wing comments claiming that pessimism about the future in America is limited to liberals and progressives. The Trump-supporting working class white males, meanwhile, are shortening their life expectancy through suicide and substance abuse. The opioid crisis is not a liberal phenomenon. It would seem many more Americans are pessimistic about their future than Ms. Goldberg.
5
You talk about a Gibson novel set in the next century where the majority of people have been wiped out. For the people of the Americas during the first century of the European conquest this was reality, not a novel. They lost 70% of the population to disease, murder, and hunger. We should be more afraid of the Climate Criminals that run the world's major governments then robots.
7
well if the future did not look so awful and dark thanks to the republicans then perhaps our society would have a brighter outlook on the future.
1
One major cause of today’s pessimism is the disappearance of simple mortality and decency in the American government and so much of the country’s population.
4
I meant to say morality and decency, obviously.
As a Trump supporter I ask you to reconsider him. Watch his latest campaign ads with an open mind. I know I will be voting Trump-Pence in November, along with virtually everyone I know.
But, I take it, you yourself have no plans to so much as consider that you might be completely—even dangerously—wrong, or to so much as consider any other candidate.
That’s a bad sign, you know. It’s also not good to make up your mind based on campaign ads.
14
From Niagara Fall? Interesting
Fwiw liberals consider everything with an open mind. It’s not a great way to live, but it does mean we are more likely to see the truth.
3
@CJT Watch what he actually says and does, not his ads. Geez, we are doomed.
great column--Gibson is right to be troubled--we are approaching a time when we will see our future disappearing under us. A large part of the hopelessness is that many of our current leaders are anti-science and refuse to accept that climate change is real.
Im very doubtful that mankind can survive to 2060
The good question is: what will evolution replace us with in a few 100k years?
1
Have a look at Bernie’s ad, linked in this piece. If you aren’t one of his fans, this may help you to understand his appeal. He sees the big picture. A stark choice faces us, which we don’t even make in a fair or lawful context. It’s between the ongoing brutality and ruin caused by the same economy that has given so many of us this brief historical moment of fantastic wealth and luxury, and a commitment to sharing the wealth, caring for each other, and facing loss and hardship together. The fact is, loss and hardship are inevitable now.
I have been supporting Warren, who also understands our crisis. But if Bernie has the momentum, if he’s the one who’s put together the strongest coalition, we have to join to support him so he won’t face a brokered convention. We have to unite under this banner of love and generosity. This is the requirement now and for the rest of our days.
1
I’ll support St. B if he’s the nominee, but I really get tired of Sanders supporters responding to EVERYTHING by reeling off talking points.
And no, I don’t just see “love and generosity,” in his campaign. I see a lot of anger, closed-mindedness, and contempt.
9
You are right! I support Sanders and I do have a lot of contempt for wealthy people, corporations and republican politicians who have run roughshod over the environment, economy and healthcare system for their own personal gain. That’s simply not right.
So yes, I’m very angry about that. And, yes I’m very happy that Sanders and Warren are a finger in the the eye to conservatives and the wealthy. I hope they succeed. I know a lot of other people do to.
1
Given the current partisan divide, it’s hard to be optimistic when both sides seem to hate one another and refuse even to contemplate the idea of compromise. For me, at least, optimism grows when I see our leaders doing good things for our country. I see very little of that today and thus have no sense that things are getting better. We are so divided on social issues like race and abortion that it’s hard to see how we ever come together again. And over the years, we have moved toward a regressive tax system that hurts the poor and middle class. Far too many of our leaders take our tax money and spend it in ways that are wasteful (such as huge tax subsidies for profitable fossil fuel corporations and enormous waste by the military industrial complex) instead of investing it in infrastructure, better health care, alternative energy, cybersecurity, and many more. It’s also hard to be optimistic when we see the most corrupt administration in our history being enabled by the Republican Party to just continue doing whatever it wants, no matter how damaging to the country or how illegal. We are seeing the real time installation of an imperial president who cannot be indicted or impeached for any crime. There is no reason to be optimistic about a future with such a president.
8
No doubt people universally share a sense of creeping doom for whatever reasons and have foreboding sense of doom be it changing demographics and gender roles and helpless inability to speculate about the future of the world terrified about it.
The feeling of foreboding and helplessness seems logical considering the world is under the throes of The fourth industrial revolution (4IR) throwing the humanity to deal with a truly global society emerging out of breathtaking advances in robotics, AI, nanotechnology, quantum computing, biotechnology, connected sensors, 3D printing, and autonomous vehicles, combined with the communications infrastructure necessary to connect all of humanity to these breakthroughs.
Ongoing 4IR “rising with the mental-energy-saving inventions of the mid-20th century and continuing through today. Much as the industrial revolution dehumanized biological strength with machines, the displacement of biological intelligence with computers represents the dehumanization of intellectual labour. Projecting current techniques a few years forward suggests that autonomous systems will eventually be capable of out competing humans in every area where intelligence is the key component of production”.
4IR indeed requires a “significant shift in the structure of society. We may need to radically rethink of our assumptions about how to live a meaningful life. Is dedicating your life to “making a living” really the ultimate good of human existence?”
3
Haunting. Thanks.
3
“The future is already here...it’s just not well distributed” is one of my favorite quotes by William Gibson. I have always found it hopeful, believing tomorrow’s tools will dwarf today’s problems. I still believe that to be true. The technology is there (or nearly here) for energy to be clean, water and air to be pure, and mankind to live in sustainable harmony with Mother Earth. More uncertain is our organizational capacity to deal with tomorrow’s societal problems. Time or time travel will tell.
3
The resource devouring ethos permeating patriarchy, capitalism, ethnonationalism and colonization (Crimea, Western China, Tibet, Cashmere) is a juggernaut the globe cannot abide forever. Unless reproductive rights are universally granted to women, women become equal members of the human family, a strong social safety net finally triumphs over the divisive nature of racial politics, people realize that we are all in this together and also recognize that war to acquire more riches ends in self destruction, we are all doomed.
4
The young people I work with (in a low paying assembly job) are intelligent, well meaning, have little hope for a better financial tomorrow and once again are not planning to vote. They see ‘the system’ as being so stacked against them that it’s pointless. The ideals I was taught about the ‘idea’ of America are nonexistent in them and thus they have no reason to fight for it. America may already be dead, we just haven’t figured it out yet.
12
"the new book, “Agency,” takes place in a stub where Hillary Clinton won the election"
He treats that as a good thing.
The real horror is that it would have been even worse than this: worse wars and more of them, worse economics of worse inequality and even less hope for most, worse in every way for everyone except the wealthy elite.
We had a choice of nightmares, and some pretend it was good vs evil with evil winning. Worse. It was evil vs evil, and it is not at all clear that lesser evil lost.
There is much to fix. There is vast resistance to fixing it, coming from those who pretend the potential evils were just fine, a wonderful future if only.
2
In the 1950s and early 1960s, Americans faced the threat of nuclear annihilation every day. Each day was a stress test.
Young children cowered under school desks and were told that their chances of survival would be grim. The entire world thought the apocalypse was upon them.
I dislike Trump with a passion, but nothing happening right now compares to the national psychological stress and global darkness of "the era of mutually assured destruction."
1
You watched Adam Schiff and can say that things were worse back then? Better sit down and catch up on U Tube. This time it’s real, not Cold War generated and in part propaganda. I also lived back then. This is much deeper, populist and irreversible. We’re missing the scare tactics like hiding under desks, and thus it does not feel as immediate. And the population is armed.
Michelle, you're a wonderful writer. Thank you for paying attention in school.
6
George Bush Sr. used to talk about a "kinder, gentler America" and a "kinder, gentler conservatism." What we have today is the theater of cruelty in operation. These two visions of America are polar opposites. Neither one arises from an outside force over which we have little or no control. Each vision is a choice. We have the power to chose kindness or cruelty as our modus operandi. That's the human condition. What we chose is not a product of God's will or some random accident. It's a responsibility to do the right thing for humanity. The only thing I'm hoping for is that common sense and a sense of human self-preservation kicks in before it's too late. It's truly humanity's collective choice.
7
Fear politics is of the FOX Opinion set, so it cannot exist in the rest of society. Trump will leave the office at some point and we will work for a better America. Trump's election was a shock to the system but it also meant that the extreme right is very scared of the reality of a progressive future. If it wasn't for the Electoral College, we would have a progressive president. Let's not forget that.
2
@Anthony " If it wasn't for the Electoral College, we would have a progressive president."
Not so sure about that Anthony. The Clinton history is to go along and get along to achieve incremental changes on the left, often trading away significant left value positions to the right. Add that a Citizens United fueled Republican establishment with controls built into the institutions of Congress and the courts, and Hillary by all accounts would not be too far afield of where Trump is, minus the insane lies and ignorance of everything.
Have you heard the music of the day? My grandson put on the Top 50 yesterday —talk about a depressing beat? And the words? And sad? Sorry, but my parents grew up in the ‘40’s where music lifted the spirit, not the other way around.
In the post WW2 Europe there was angst, pessimism and a dread of future untill the generation of 1968 forced their parents to confront the past and take responsibility for what happened. That's when the real reconstruction became possible. Maybe our children will have to force our hand and show the way before it's too late for the planet. The US must look forward and take the lead on climate change. Going backwards is not an option, has never been for your great country.
8
There's one thing we can do to get us all on the same optimistic page: for God's sakes, someone invent that flying car we dreamed we would be driving in the future.
It won't solve all our problems, but it will make a lot of us believe that the new good times are just around the corner.
Stop wasting time on building driverless cars. Nobody wants that.
Flying cars is what we want. Please. Now.
5
we dont need to fix it all we just to make a start
we need to get him out
we need to get the gop out of control of congress
if we can get that far then we can maybe do more
let the word be spread- there is something foul and
vile that grows there and they are not ''with us''
we can rise and meet this challenge or not
choose hope and defiance for now
later if need be consider the options
3
Americans don’t want to work. It’s as simple as that. Work to educate yourself. Work to adjust to change before it happens. Work to provide your community with a safe a nurturing environment for children. Work to improve. Work to learn about and respect others.
Americans of the Trump era are content to sit back, point fingers of blame and wait for good things to be provided by others. In the conservative states, this is a way of life.
4
@Practical Thoughts
Funny, I see it the other way - we are over worked. I take care of the grandchildren and between keeping food on the table, the dishes clean, the “spills & crumbs” at bay, the craft projects glued, the cards shuffled, the sibling rivalry in check, ya no, sorry, we are in two different worlds.
8
Practical Thoughts and Rebecca 1048 - each right, both wrong.
You two totally capture the current American dilemma in that exchange.
2
Exactly - the red states receive billions of our liberal state tax dollars, especially since Trump’s “tax cut” raised net federal taxes on those of us living in places like NY. Ever visit some of these red states? There’s nothing going on. Nothing. They don’t work, collect welfare, and have a raging opioid epidemic. And they’re wearing MAGA hats. But some of them are very fine people.
It is a very hopeless time.
I have had the good fortune to have seen the beauty of this world, the animals, trees and plants; I'm so glad for that. It makes it twice as hard to see their needless demise.
If Trump wins, I don't think that I want to hang around to watch it all go.
9
Novelists who explore the so-called "Darkness" are not necessarily who we want to view as prophets, although it is certainly nice to appreciate their literary efforts, talent, and to be well read across all literary genres.
Adults choose to be capable of awe and wonder -- and so while I thought this column was creative, it didn't diminish my perspective on still being positive about the future. Being well educated helps a lot, too. That's why DeVos was and is such Bad News.
The only reason that Donald Trump is president is because he cheated to win by dealing with Russia as well as by being controlled by Russia's oligarchical philosophy. In short, Trump sold America out very early on because that's the kind of hustler Trump has always been. His handlers are far worse.
The second reason Donald Trump is president is because he capitalized on luring the Lost Americans over to his side with cheap rallies and his particular brand of Snake Oil. He and his ilk utilized certain available technologies to read how to manipulate very real discontent among the Lost but also they tapped into White Nationalism in an equally sinister way.
The third reason Donald Trump is president has to do with stories and Deals we won't learn about until long after he is removed. Donald Trump is gone. It is just a case of January or via the 2020 elections. He has been the worse Darkness.
The future is not just about removing Trump, of course.
4
As a philosopher having spent decades developing a philosophy and “a story about how we use our heads and why we are all rich and favored in the future,” I can identify with William Gibson’s predicament. In the education fantasy I bring to life in words, I observe that “words rule the world” at a time when things are “breaking bad.” This tragedy continues for decades in the story I tell, and we are terrified by the serious challenges that threaten our survival. Indeed, it is our recognition of "the extinction probability” for humans together with new media technologies embodied in the supercomputing television that save us from ourselves as we, together, push the best news organizations — specifically The New York Times — to tell us the story of the best within us: #ourtopstory. As a result of excellent coverage of excellence and Mother Nature’s insistence that we face our fears in the decades ahead, my grandchildren and their peers around the world begin to turn it around. Hijinks ensue, and we become a species of writers in the next century as our little world becomes a place of universally excellent universal education. And we become a species of very well educated, very well compensated creatures who engage in the practice of philosophy with the aid of teammates and technologies that enable us to live the lives of our dreams simply because of the thought invested in them. Human action is a testament to faith. For now, I and we operate on the basis of it.
3
Bernie's frightful new campaign video stands in stark contrast to his 2016 video set to Simon & Garfunkel's "America." The vision of community, joy, and togetherness is now overlayed with terror.
Politically, this may be counterproductive -- even if it speaks to the darkening, rancorous spirit of the time.
I personally feel we may have passed the tipping point regarding climate change decades ago but won't be aware of the fact until decades from now. Perhaps in 2050, people will look back and say "we now know the point of no return was 1992."
But today hope still springs eternal with news stories along the lines of, "We still have 12 years to act before it's too late," etc. How comforting. And yet I see just as many stories reporting that climate scientists are surprised to find the rate of climate change to be far greater than their models projected 5-10 years ago. How discomforting.
And meanwhile, with every passing day there are more humans, more pollution of all manner, more environmental degradation, more deforestation, more species going extinct, etc. It's death by a thousand cuts. Sorry to be such a buzzkill.
15
"“I think it took me about three months to come out of the shock of his actually having been elected,” "
Trump was not elected. Hillary Clinton was. But Trump's Ministry of Truth has been deluging the country with the lie that Trump was elected. Gibson should read Orwell's "1984".
9
In her collection of essays and meditations "The Source of Self-Regard." Toni Morrison also comments at length on our increasing inability to see into the future or to imagine the future more than about 40 years ahead. Do you think Toni Morison's observations about our views of the future are right?What do you, reader of this post, imagine or forecast or believe will happen in the 22nd Century?
1
Kindly, just forgive me. When in college some sixty years ago, when it was so new to all in my sorority that there was a pill to take to prevent an unwanted pregnancy; we all were alerted.
It seemed OK then to talk not only about birth control, which was relatively new then, but also about the earth and its population.
I don't hear much about that these days.
Does this fit into any equation?
What this administration has done is not to be forgiven.
11
Just wait til the U.S. dollar loses its status as a reserve currency. The instability of another Trump term increases that likelihood.
7
Ever since 1984, and then 2001: A Space Odysssey, and then Blade Runner and so many others, we have overshot the predictions of what the future looks like.
Most of the time, it looks like we've made precious little progress at all. Why is this?
Perhaps the 80's English pop band Devo was right. The zenith of civilization was 1972. Since then, we have been de-evolving in many ways.
But I don't buy that. Movies I watch now from that era seem pretty slow and rather dim-witted. Is that progress?
I think that one thing that works against us is our failure to understand that different magnitudes of quantity respond differently.
Glaciation, the melting of ice packs, and other massive climate changes progress logarithmically from their tipping points.
Quantum particles, which may be the space where our next frontier technologies are staged are so small and unpredictable they disappear sometimes.
In fact, we still really don't understand time very well, although we've had a century to digest Einstein's ideas.
What is clear is that we need to act decisively soon, and make big changes, or the Earth may just take action to dump us from its surface and restart itself without humans and other large mammals. Can you blame it?
Like so many sci fi movies have had someone say, often a destroyer robot, humanity is the scourge of this planet.
So, what can we do now? One action comes readily to mind....Vote straight Democratic this November to rid ourselves of Republicans.
14
@Dennis
Soylent Green - seemingly so extreme when it came out - seems to be on track.
Elites in their gated towers, the rest fighting for scraps. Air Bad, Oceans dead.
It was set in 2022. I suspect it accurately portrays life in many 3rd world cities now. Give it a decade or so for places like NY and SF. The next financial crash is going to be a real mess for most.
14
People on this thread seem to think that if the Dems win in 2020, then that will make all the difference. But Trump is not going to leave.
Then what?
I read about the strikes in France and how in the past workers organize general strikes.
It seems protest in America is dead, and that is in the end will destroy us.
13
I'm totally at a loss what there is to be so pessimistic about the future.
In almost every area of life, certainly in the West, we've never had it so good, and there's nothing to suggest it will get worse. It may get different, always happens. Humanity makes mistakes, the good news is we're pretty good at fixing those mistakes.
I'd love to be young again for the 21st Century. And then the 22nd.
Dystopia is best left for SciFi writers.
2
Climate change. The wildfires aren’t enough of an indication of things getting worse?
17
Gibson is easily one of the best authors of the contemporary age, so it is distressing to hear him run into a brick wall of imagination--the proverbial television tuned to a dead channel, to quote Neuroromancer's opening--that's definitely a bad sign, in an age replete with them, sadly. Hopefully, he sees a way forward--if anyone can, it would be him. I'm optimistic he'll find a way.
4
I'm 70 and have loved sci-fi and dystopian fiction since I was a teen. I've lived through the Cold War, Cuban Missile Crisis (which at the age of 12 sparked my interest in politics when I realized these guys could kill me) and came close to being drafted during the Vietnam War. I've still managed to believe that human beings can continue to survive has we have always done.
It's simply a matter of "eternal vigilance is the price of liberty".
9
@John
And what we're seeing now is the price being paid for lack of said vigilance.
5
Over 200 years ago Lord Byron offered his observations on society back then, and though I tend to be optimistic, I think he was on to something.
"The infinite variety of lives conduct but to death, and the infinity of wishes lead but to disappointment. All the discoveries which have yet been made have multiplied little but existence"
10
My father who was a life long Democrat and optimist would say that the American people had a moral center and could be counted on to do the right thing. He was of the "Greatest Generation." In my own mid-sixties, looking on at my own "Boomer" generation, I don't think his assessment holds true anymore. That's why the future looks so bleak as we commiserate which each other in the age of Trump. One only has to talk to a relative, a friend, a mere acquaintance, hear them spout regurgitated Republican talking points. If that doesn't depress you about the future nothing will.
36
Excepting high profile buildings that get proper architectural design treatment, you can add staggeringly scaled, soul crushing but brutally efficient commercial and residential developments to the list of sci-fi horrors.
The long game may be useless but if we cultivate awe in people instead of snuffing it, it would go a long way to making things right even in the short term.
6
The motto of the Science Fiction Writers of America is "The Future Isn't What It Used to Be."
One big reason is what we have ended up spending the last 5 decades doing: making fewer and fewer people richer and richer. Corporations have gotten bigger and meaner. The idea of government as a vital element in making America work got tossed on the trash heap; now it's a poor handmaiden to the oligarchs. The thousand points of light are the embers of a dying fire.
We're seeing a mind shift from a world where anything seemed possible to one where it's a scramble to extract what value is left.
29
This article resonates with me. I’ve just begun my 7th decade. My tongue-in-cheek answer to questions like “How long do you expect/want to live” used to be: I’m going to live forever, and so far I’m on schedule.
In the last five years or so, circumstances have changed my feelings. If I knew I wouldn’t see my 90s, I wouldn’t regret it as I once did.
Sadly, the only advice I can give my much younger friends when they ask, is “make money”. Not that money will forestall the planetary climate disaster, but it may make their and their families’ lives a bit less bleak in the period between now and catastrophe.
17
When I watched the moon landing as a 13-year old, and then became an avid science-fiction reader, I thought things would turn out OK. But it seems like our society has steadfastly turned itself in the direction of greed and avarice instead of growth and development. We are told it is all "progress", but most everything that gets defined as "progress" is a way for someone to amass a fortune, by 'any means they can'. And, we're told, that's OK. Every once in a while I find myself thinking about the people who -didn't- go for "the big score" when they developed something that really benefited mankind. What if Jonas Salk had gone for maximum shareholder return on the polio vaccine, like any modern Big Pharma company would now do? What happens when some scientist breaks the code for curing cancer... how much should they cash out? As I've grown older, I've become increasingly cynical. For a while I considered if I had become -too- cynical... but in the Age of Trump, no matter how cynical I think I am, it seems I underestimate the venality, corruption, and greed which our society's "leaders" are capable of achiving. I hope we have some altruistic people in the pipeline, too, but I'm not optimistic about it... cynical seems more likely to be right.
17
After the first atom bombs fell, the world fell into a state of constant anxiety. However, the human race rose to the occasion and created safeguards to prevent nuclear war. Let's take our forebears example: instead of sitting around fearing climate change and all the other ills of the 21st century, let's rise to the occasion and defeat them.
It's easy to cry in the corner and be scared - misery loves company, and it will generate lots of article shares. However, there will also be those among us who will face the future with courage and will put their human ingenuity to work. Never underestimate the human will to survive.
9
In the eyes of many Americans, Donald Trump's presidency has brightened the future and enhanced its possibilities.
There will never be a world that seems perfect to everyone, or for that matter, anyone.
Americans in 1776 were not united in their desire for an independent country. Some actively supported and cheered the British during the revolution. When it was over, we moved on.
Life is a constant struggle, whether in our personal lives or that of our nation. Those who are not willing to fight for their cause and accept the outcome, and move on, are like Ms. Goldberg. They are so self-centered that they can see nothing but darkness ahead...very egocentric.
4
@Raz : roughly 40% of the country is perfectly delighted with Mr. Trump and supports him whole heartedly -- they see their wishes and desires reflected in his policies.
Another 40% is totally apathetic, and wouldn't care if Ronald McDonald was the President.
That leaves roughly 20% who are hard-left liberals in Big Blue Coastal cities and they are unhappy to the point of hysteria that they lost an easy cakewalk of an election and to a TV reality show host. It seemed impossible until it happened, and now they seek "vengeance" because they didn't get their way.
Nobody is more petulant and whiny about this than Michelle Goldberg.
I don't know how this next election will play out, but I don't think science fiction or 71 year old novelists will have anything to do with it.
NOTE: I am a sci fi fan from back in my elementary school days -- not just Star Trek, but all the classic authors like Bradbury and Asimov. Sci fi has always been pretty dystopian. You can count the cheery, optimistic stuff on the fingers of one hand.
3
@Concerned Citizen
I was almost 13 when we landed on the moon.
Remember what ended our push out into space? It was a general public complaint that we should be spending our money on problems here on Earth, rather than wasting it on space exploration.
I was so disappointed in the short-sightedness of our people, even at that young age, but we moved on and have accomplished some great things since. The fact that we can even feed 8 billion people is a credit to our race.
I still read Asimov. :)
4
Not so very long ago the immediate past was the Great Depression, the Nazis, and The War. We lived on the brink of global extinction, a new horror, and regularly hid under our desks while fighting one hopeless war after another. Of course, the past was a nightmare, the present an iron fist in a kid glove, so the fascination was for the sparkling possibilities of the future, should we achieve the impossible and make it. Star Trek and modern architecture were popular because they were optimistic.
Today, we are still teetering on the brink, the kid gloves have worn thin and developed holes, and the future promises more of the same trends, only worse. So we don’t dare look ahead but backwards to an imaginary time few recall accurately, something like Disneyland Main Street. We have better, or at least fonder, recollections of television confections than of real life, we favor dark and pessimistic “new” works (usually retreads with plenty of nostalgia and preawareness built in), and built in simulacra of antique styles, preferably suggested by building so old not a single living person can recall when they were new.
Dead end.
5
How do people like Michelle Goldberg survive when they apparently live in unending fear and paranoia about the world around them coming to the end? I'm not constantly engaged with the 24-hour mass media news cycle, so I'm not perpetually terrified about an impending apocalypse or societal collapse.
6
@Sawyer : I suspect that Michelle cheers herself up, by imagining the violent retribution she will wreak -- once her kind is back in power -- on not just Trump, but everyone who voted for him.
The future looks dark *for the U.S.*
Millions of people in China, India, sub-Saharan Africa and elsewhere are thrilled by their recent upward mobility. And many countries, big and small, are making serious headway on climate change. China is way ahead of us on that front.
The U.S. may be deranged in many ways right now, causing a loss of influence in the world and collective identity. Maybe we'll recover, maybe not. But if the U.S. can't lead on climate change, it deserves to fall behind and dwindle.
9
@Chris
China is way ahead of us on climate change?
I guess you mean they are responsible for it an a much grander scale than us.
Their emissions are almost double of ours.
1
@Chris
Like some stats re China.
Based on cutting emissions the US seems well ahead.
Together with climate change and geopolitical worries, the world should be concerned by the apparent weakening of something which is central to American identity: a unique brand of optimism, strongly buttressed by a healthy pragmatism and a "can do" approach to problem resolution. It is the first time that "declinism" has made inroads in American public discourse, while it has been lurking in old Europe for a few decades. The question is then: Is America getting prematurely old and fearful of the future, or is it just temporarily confused by the information explosion and the accompanying rise of propaganda, fake news and social media manipulation, all of which especially affect the young and saps their vitality - another word for optimism? Americans running for office should stress more often the immense strengths and potentials of their country, which didn't suddenly disappear because of Trump's consistent attacks on its immune system (science, knowledge, the Constitution and the Rule of Law, honest and dedicated civil servants, innovative entrepreneurs, great musicians and writers, a vibrant free press).
3
Ms. Goldberg's assertion that genetic engineering is a source of horror ignores the millions of lives that have been saved by drugs and improved foods from genetic engineering.
12
Older generations used to make personal sacrifices for the sake of their children's future. Boomers sacrificed their children's future for the sake of present-day personal gain. Darkness replaced a bright future the moment the inter-generational contract was broken.
12
A couple of ways to feel a little less angst: ditch social media and focus on our neighborhoods and communities, real people. It's snowing here today, and one of my neighbors cleared my driveway and sidewalks. It mattered to me.
25
Sorry you're having a down day, Michelle. If it helps, you actually give me hope every week on "The Argument." I love listening to you, Ross and David argue civilly, with mutual respect, but most of all I can feel the personal support, friendship, and love between you all. At the end of the show I feel uplifted—like the much-maligned Gen X can show us a way forward.
3
As the mother of a 25-year old who has always veered toward over-thinking and cynicism, this really hits me hard. I used to be able to honestly convey a sense of optimism to her believing that, contrary to her belief that most people are “bad”, most people will do the right thing and that humanity will save our future. I can no longer do that for her. I still try to instill a sense of hope in her, but what can I honestly tell her?? That I believe our environment will survive the merciless attacks from the current ruling class? I can’t. That she will thrive and find success in her chosen field as long as she tries her best and does everything “right”? I can’t...her chosen field is history education and anyone who is paying attention knows what is happening there. Can I tell her not to fear random gun violence? I can’t...2 hours from where she lives, white supremacists marched while carrying assault rifles. Can I encourage her to become pregnant and have children someday? I can no longer do that in good conscience as I am terrified about the world that will be here for her and any future progeny once I’m gone. It isn’t hard to understand why millennials are terrified about the future. It IS difficult to understand how so many people seem oblivious to the path we are on.
45
The chronic disease of humankind is the struggle for wealth. Until humanity finds common purpose in a desire to cure itself of its addiction to the possession and protection of personal and national wealth, and instead insist on achieving well-being, we will continue on the current path of destruction. This can only be successfully accomplished on a global scale.
17
The problem is the GOP doesn't believe in "society" as that term is traditionally defined. They don't believe in equality, shared sacrifice, the common good, or the Social Contract. They believe in, "Best of luck! 'Cause you're on your own!"
Their concept of "society" is a group of people who's sole function is to do all the work and reap none of the benefits. A group of people that is there to be "used" for the benefit of the few. Their only real concern being how to move all resources, financial or otherwise, up into the hands of the 0.01%.
Ask anyone, "Which party caters to the rich?". The answer, invariably, will be, "The GOP". Even Republicans will admit to this. The problem is, they've been able to convince a large group of people, for whom their only aim is usury, that they have their best interests at heart. And that, of course, is the GOP's "Big Lie". One which they have been shoveling non-stop since the advent of Ronald Reagan.
The most amazing thing, is how successful they've been in convincing people they couldn't care less about, that they are their, "Champions in the Halls of Power", because they stand against things like gender-neutral bathrooms.
The idea that Donald Trump actually cares about anyone but himself is as patently untrue, as it is ludicrously unbelievable.
The modern GOP would be dismissively pathetic, if it wasn't so dangerous and destructive, and ultimately, for the vast majority of us, one giant and needless misery machine.
37
Once we return to serfdom with a thin over crust of nobility... they will still not be satisfied until they can come in the night and drink our very blood.
Trump is the dream President of the Conservative Movement (Big Money) because he's for moving money upward faster and faster at the expense of the middle Class and workers. They put the cut-corporation-and-1%-taxes in front of him and he signed it. Soon they'll put the Omygod-the-debt bill in front of him to take billions from Social Security and Medicare and he'll sign it, then set about conning the new batch of angry voters, which would be funny if it wasn't dreadful. FDR's New Deal regulated the financial sector and empowered Labor by legalizing Unions and offering higher education with the GI Bill. A big pool of talent got Opportunity and made America Great and we got 70 years of prosperity before the New Deal was thrown out. Trump is today's chief minimizer of Opportunity for ordinary people. If he stays in place it will be left to the voters to fix because the Republican Senate seems indifferent to the Constitution. Voters don't favor killing the American Dream for their own children. But do they see Trump as doing that and what do they know about the Constitution? Shiff and Nadler have the job of educating the public.
More angry people suffering more under a bigger set of richer elites could lead to an FDR type New New Deal or the loss of our Constitutional Republic replaced by an oligarchy, the way Rome lost their Republic and then lost their Empire. We are losing allies day by day. What I want most is to be dead wrong about the Republican Senate.
6
The seeds of sorrow are now sown, our children will reap the fruit of our misdeeds to our Mother Earth for the next 12,000 generations.
4
I thought the most recent reboot of Blade Runner captured what the future will look like. Bleak, erratic weather. No trees, high seas. Trash piled everywhere. Capitalism taken to its logical conclusion.
8
You mean, "What happens when political progressives lose hope"? Maybe some reality sets in for the progressives. Maybe other groups get a little room to breath. Maybe other people get a little more hope.
This is independent of Trump. He should be impeached and removed. He's a disgrace.
But we need to recognize that not everyone wants the future that many progressives want.
5
On the plus side there are more brew pubs than ever.
8
zeitgeist - the defining spirit or mood of a particular period of history as shown by the ideas and beliefs of the time.
"Gibson is famed for his sensitivity to the zeitgeist..."
'Donald Trump’s victory threw him off balance. “I think it took me about three months to come out of the shock of his actually having been elected,” Gibson told me.'
Doesn't really seem like Gibson was that sensitive to the spirit or mood of our times, nor does it seem like Ms. Goldberg put much thought into her article.
In the eyes of many Americans, Donald Trump's presidency has brightened the future and enhanced its possibilities.
4
@Raz - I see you've adopted Trump's "many are saying" move. Sharp!
My family in the U.S dating back to the late 1800's has been either poor or just barely middle class. We never looked beyond the next pay day, let alone a bright and shining future. That was something for mainstream Americans to ponder.
My adult children are fourth-generation American citizens and Latinos have just inched into the solid middle class.
They hold to their perch through ungodly hard work and sacrifice. Contemplating the future unsettles them.
Two generations back my kids would not have even had a shot at landing in the middle class. So their current status is easy to view as entirely tenuous.
80
I remember Jacob Bronoski writing, perhaps a decade after World War II ended, something to the effect that "We are not afraid of the future because of the Bomb; we are afraid of the Bomb because we have no faith in the future."
And just yesterday the symbolic Doomsday Clock was moved to just 100 seconds from Midnight -- the closest it's ever been. Faith in the future seems to be at a low ebb. Tarnished idols loom left and right: the federal government; both major political parties; Boeing Aircraft; General Electric Company; Wells Fargo Bank; Amazon; Facebook; Google. The list goes on.
Only in mavericks like Elon Musk does optimism about technology reside, and in his case it is decidedly mixed. We could certainly do with some newsworthy successes.
7
The solution for avoiding what is a very likely dark future is to act together to change our leadership. It won't happen soon unfortunately, because the people still haven't suffered enough to wake from the cult induced stupor. Which is why being disturbed about future horrors is a perfectly reasonable thing to be. It's a response to real information.
It's actually the best time to be a human, here at nearly peak technology, with threats from nature essentially destroyed, comfort and ease of life abound and even the effects of climate change are only minor at this point. Sure, things aren't perfect but way better than in the past. So, we will live the best while watching whether humans can survive into the future to any extent.
There will be a point of no return with respect to climate change. A point where the feedbacks from increased global temperature overwhelm even man made greenhouse gas production. Feedbacks such as methane hydrate thawing due to permafrost loss, increased drought and thus fires, loss of ice and thus reflectivity and desertification and thus loss of sequestration by plants. We are getting close to that point and we will likely certainly know this in our life times.
So here we are getting the best and also knowing in our life times whether humans will make it, yet, never having to suffer the worst affects of climate change. We'll be dead before the worst comes, and also being dead, we won't care that we gave future people a nightmare existence.
7
Not awed by technological wonders? That a private citizen sent one of his cars to orbit in the vicinity of Mars is a marvel. Scientists have to ability to monitor the nova star Betelgeuse which my explode in our lifetime by measuring cosmic neutrinos which is a incredibly feat.
Too much of our optimism or lack of it is based on whether our leadership is left or right., depending on what side of the same bus we're all on.
1
I have had similar thoughts and recollections about the future of the future from my past. It is good and existentially comforting to know that I am not alone.
In 1971, I built a globe made of Hot Wheels tracks around my school Current Events Notebook. It wasn't a virtual model globe; it was real, physical. The Apollo Missions were hot as were premonitions of a future world free from strife and fear and loaded with technology.
We got the technology, all right. And in service of strife and fear, holding us back from other lofty utopian idylls, we remain trapped in the past with no discernible way out.
Evidently, there were certain realities of the then present world that lay hidden in the fog of a bright futurism. Today's kids seem resolute in their focus on the present and its many failings hoping, working to change their future world.
3
The future's so bright.....I gotta wear shades.
...
1968(circa) ... A sci-fi writer named John Brunner wrote a book titled....Stand on Zanzibar.
The Future.
Overpopulated planet.
Everyone connected electronically by ever present electronic media.
The USA is led by a "black" president.....in a world of humans that can biologically change their identities.
Pot is mixed with tobacco and heavily mass marketed.
The bloodiest conflicts have returned to SE Asia and feature China in conflict with USA.
Crowd control is accomplished with gassing the mob with various hypnotic and sleep inducing drugs.
Sound familiar?
7
Well, one thing that happens : most don't notice and/or don't care about complete fails in daily leadership and planning
https://mobile.twitter.com/SinaToossi/status/1220070442389688320
1
Bunk. Up your medication. Plant some trees. Do something positive. Stop being a cynic for an hour a day. Exercise.
6
You, like, many other readers of this opinion piece, miss the point. The article is not about Michelle’s own angst. It is about the worry and pessimism that tens of millions of people feel, its causes and potential effects.
19
And this is Trump's fault???
2
She never lists Trump as a cause of this pessimism and mentions him only once in reference to a quote from Buttigieg, so not sure what you are basing your comment on.
Kafka's Metamorphosys is upon us. We America woke up on an early November 2016 upside down revealing a verminous underbelly. The family of civilized nations looked incredulous, not recognizing us and yet they somehow tolerated us; providing that they do as little as possible with us, ridiculing us for good measure, best shown by Boris joining in the the shunning of the vermin...!
6
To see the future you have to look back. Where is Trump and the Republicans going? Read William L. Shirer's "The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich."
17
@John Galuszka - Yes, but they wrecked the place before they were tossed out.
You shouldn't let any occupant in the white house run your life.
While the Senate fidgetspins.
7
Whoa!
1
Someone call the Times! Debbie Downer has hacked into Michelle's computer!
1
You and so many other readers utterly miss the point of this opinion piece. It is not about Michelle’s angst. It is about the fear and pessimism that tens of millions of people around the world feel. That’s fact. She is discussing its causes, effects and possible solutions.
Trump who does not read will continue his anti science agenda and his war on truth. Do not believe your eyes and ears I will tweet reality to you and have FOX STATE TV confirm it. The Trump family will rule for decades supported by the Russian oligarchs who had sanctions removed by Trump. What comes next book burning ala nazis attacking facts and creating violence and hate as the new normal. All hail TRump or face internment camp if he gets his way.
6
Imagine having so much privilege that you can can lay your entire world view at the feet of Donald Trump and the outcome of the 2016 election.
Imagine thinking Donald Trump is the pinnacle of unbeatable nightmares, when a man named Adolf Hitler was mass murdering hundreds of thousands of people less than 100 years ago.
Imagine getting paid handsomely to pontificate poetically and profusely about the apparent visceral fear of a man who has marginally changed some aspects of American life by enacting relatively common conservative values.
2
@John Holding young children in camps without adequate medical care? Removing protection from pollution from the nation's waterways and air and selling off mining rights in the national parks? Taking undocumented meetings with Russian government officials in the Oval Office? These are "relatively common conservative values"? Well, if you say so.
20
Perhaps a miracle will save us from the conservative values that will otherwise surely destroy us.
Have a blessed day.
"Hope Dies Last."
--origin unknown
1
Don’t worry Michelle. It gets worse.
8
Ms. Goldberg, your read seems to suggest depression. Are you taking your meds? The only dark future America need concern itself with is the possible, but unlikely, situation where one of the Democratic candidates gets elected president come November.
Now, that would be a dark future.
5
When your air conditioner or microwave stops working you put it out on the sidewalk, wait for the city to take it away and order another one from Amazon.com.
Amazon.com does not stock a new and improved U.S. Constitution.
I just checked.
Fixing an old, broken one is close to impossible.
The one your President breaks and busts apart is the one you will be stuck with.
17
Sorry, no. The author needs to get out of the sad pessimistic bubble of the NYC cool crowd. Turn off your drastically narrow feed for a month, and you will feel a breathe of fresh air and hope that isn’t tied down by the noise immediately pummeling your brain every second of every day.
6
Today’s harbinger of the apocalypse? Conservative Boomers driving Ford F-150s while being thoroughly jacked on Starbucks. They are the modern day Berserkers/ resource gobblers without historical peer. Rollin’ coal, buying bottled water in bulk, not retiring while somehow simultaneously plowing through that Social Security Trust Fund...one generation’s jackpot is another’s “Jackpot”.
5
@Dudesworth - Most of the dudes I see rolling coal are between 18 and 40.
5
It's not society duh. It's you who lost wonder at things to come. Why? You're a socialist, and socialism is always a dead end. Not looking forward to the future is what happens to everyone who complains about society and doesn't try to fix themselves.
4
I guess this piece would be case in point then.
1
For a more optimistic view of the future: “not me. us.”
https://theintercept.com/2020/01/22/bernie-sanders-movement-solidarity/
Minor quibble: The Sex Pistols never sang "There is no future," they sang "There's no future" and they meant it, man. No Queen's English for Mr. Rotten and the boys.
3
Great column. However, the Sex Pistols never wrote or sang
the line "there is no future." This band didn't attend to grammar:
the song "No Future" goes "no future, no future, no future," etc.
A negligible error? Facts count.
5
What a topsy turvy day. Hope from Brooks, doom from Goldberg. My head is spinning.
48
In 1989, the Berlin Wall fell. In 1991, the Soviet Union dissolved. Historian Francis Fukuyama optimistically speculated we'd possibly reached "the end of History," that we'd perhaps stepped past the threat of existential wars and similar political crises, that we could now attend to large problems rationally, under a "pax Americana." (Ironically "pax" and "pox" are homonyms.) 30 years later, we have come to contemplate a very different "end of History."
We seemed optimistic. But perhaps, we were, in retrospect, dangerously hubristic. Realizing our all too human capacity for poor, even delusional, forecasting -- no one who was supposed to know had forecast the dissolution of the Soviet Union -- perhaps humans will once again, in our present, seemingly all too rational pessimism, prove to be the poor prognosticators we've all too often been.
I would also observe that our most recent poor predictions about the future have come during an era of unprecedented access to news, to data. We should perhaps stop to consider that our computer scientists are also training their Artificial Intelligence programs on ever larger data sets. Are we right to assume that Artificial Intelligence will learn better, become better at forecasting, with large amounts of information than mere Human Intelligence can learn and forecast with large amounts of information?
1
The Atomic Scientists are worried about our future, too. They just set the Doomsday Clock at 100 seconds before midnight, the closest it has ever been to that time since its inception in 1947, at the beginning of the Cold War.
The statement issued on Thursday read: "Humanity continues to face two simultaneous existential dangers—nuclear war and climate change—that are compounded by a threat multiplier, cyber-enabled information warfare, that undercuts society's ability to respond. The international security situation is dire, not just because these threats exist, but because world leaders have allowed the international political infrastructure for managing them to erode."
We clearly are facing grave existential dangers. It is imperative that we unite and act together in an effort to pull ourselves back from the brink.
It very well may be now or never.
7
@Blue Moon
Nuclear war, climate change - I would add pollution, ecosystem collapse and overpopulation as existential threats. Climate change, pollution, ecosystem collapse together with overpopulation will lead to conflict over increasingly scarce resources.
16
The term is hauntology, loosely defined as nostalgia for a future that never materialized.
8
@VoiceofAmerica - Indeed. RIP Mark Fisher. I often wonder what he would have to say about these Trumpist doldrums.
2
What is with you folks and all this end of the world hysterics? Jeez, no wonder all you Leftists are so suicidal if you believe this garbage. People alive today are the luckiest in human history, longest life span, highest standard of living, best medical care, highest literacy rates, virtually no war. And yet the doomsday leftists have you being scared of your own shadow. How pathetic.
5
@Thor
"People alive today"..
What about our kids who will be alive in 20, 30, 40 years. That's the point here. It's not all about 'US' right now.
Think beyond yourself and today and maybe you'd get it.
"Our problem is not just that new technologies regularly fail to thrill. It’s that, from artificial intelligence to genetic engineering to mass surveillance, they are frequently sources of horror."
Particularly in the wrong hands. Most likely, most of our "future terror"is grounded in the political, where the unthinkable is now happening right before our eyes.
Not only are we seeing significant abuse of our Constitution, we're also confronting the insane fact that the abuser will get away with it.
If you spent your entire life believing in a certain governmental reality--the struggles and victories of a two party system but under the umbrella of prescribed order-- and watch that order blown up, trampled and spit on, it's disorienting.
There are days I feel like I'm seeing double, triple, even quadruple. "The future is ours" rings hollow, if it's coopted by a malevolent leader hell bent on punishing nonbelievers.
8
This column should be regarded as seminal.
Ms Goldberg captures exactly why Bernie’s dire end-times you-are-screwed message resonates with millennials and Buttigieg’s message of unified forward progress is still possible does not.
Social Media and Technology have pulled out the worst impulses of human group behavior. We are all now in our ideological camps, arming ourselves against ‘the other’ who is solely responsible for all bad things.
We can sit around and blame Trump et al for all bad things - that is easy and solves nothing. In the past it has taken near catastrophic events, Civil War, Depression, World Wars, to forge a consensus on what it is to be American.
The last potentially bad but unifying event was 9/11. The consensus now arrived at from that experience and response is that all wars are bad and endless and the only model going forward is withdrawal and isolation. The Bernie model and the Trump model converge on this point. The only ‘wars’ worth fighting are against each other.
By no means am I calling or hoping for another war or depression to bring us together. But when I listen to Buttigieg, he is the only one articulating a positive future state that seems plausible and yes, American.
2
Of course, no matter how much some dread it or paint dark, dystopian even, views of the future, the world and society have only one direction - forward.
Trump & the right-wing world wide currently succeed because we have hit a time of heightened anxiety. In such times, a longing for the mythical past, a time and society which actually never existed in reality, is a powerful pull. In the same way a child moving from toddlerhood to pre-school, then on to grade school, still wants to crawl into mommy's lap, suck her thumb, and regress to a 'safer,' less complicated time, the anxious, fearful society wants to crawl into the lovely, patriotically proud, stable time of the 1950s (or before!).
Still, the only choice is forward. I am too old to go too far into that era. Though I could still be alive in 2050, I'd be 101. Still, I have faith that things will again settle down. I have faith in the fortitude, creativeness, and courage of people, especially the American people. We, as a nation have come through very dark, very grim times before. We will come out the other side of this dark tunnel. What that brighter period looks like no one can know, which is always scary. Still, we will get there and it will be better than we thought.
109
@Anne-Marie Hislop
Things don't always move forward. Our society is repeating patterns set many years ago.
Each of us individually moves forward. But our society often loops back and repeats history. And we don't always get better results in every area.
Still, I acknowledge that over the long term the helix advances.
13
@Anne-Marie Hislop
I might be able to relate to this point of view if it weren't for our losing the race against climate change. We don't have the luxury of settling back in our chairs and philosophize and wait until things sort themselves out. That's why Trump and others like him are so dangerous. They are setting the tone that might is right. The Amazon is burning? So what? I tell you what - we need the Amazon to stop burning right now. We need the Amazon. We need the oceans. We need clean air. What's not to understand about this?
This is an existential crisis, not just a sociological/political dilemma that will be solved with a subsequent election if he wins again this year.
It's time for people to be alarmed, 24/7.
61
@Margaret It is time to build consensus. To do so doesn't require alarm, it requires winning elections by electing leaders who are closer to your position than those who support positions that promise to work towards moving backwards.
As Ann Marie Hislop says, humans sometimes go in loops backwards on their path forward.
We must recognize these loops backwards are aided by those who use their votes as a protest and understand this portion of our human nature is under our personal control.
Be alarmed that protest votes or non votes is how Trump is President.
The Republicans like to say 63 million voters brought us Trump.
We must remember Clinton got nearly 3 million more votes.
What we don't talk about is 74 million presidential Voters voted for someone other than Trump.
Sitting out elections, voting for candidates who you wish had a chance but are really a protest vote have resulted in Donald Trump and George W Bush.
Change in technology can be very fast, changes in human nature are far slower.
When people who desire immediate change use their vote to protest or do not vote at all are actually displaying the side of human nature that has delayed change throughout the ages.
Most all voters eligible to vote in 2020 only have to remember 2016 to understand what I am saying.
Remember how you felt on Wednesday November 9th 2016.
Promise yourself not to feel that way this November 4th.
13
When my daughter was about a year and a half old, she managed to lock me out of the house, while locking herself (along with my phone, wallet, keys, and jacket) inside with her. Unfortunately I was the only person with a house key at the time, as my husband had given his to the dog-walker. My daughter had no understanding of how to open doors, much less unlock them. Once I realized every door and every window to the house was well-secured (thanks husband!) both she and I sat there, looking at each other through the wind and crying in desperation for about 10 seconds. She continued, because she was only a year and a half old, but I quickly realized that crying in despair accomplished not a damn thing.
So I ran to my neighbors, beat furiously on their door (freaking them out) and asked to use their phone. I called my husband and told him to call the dog walker to immediately to come over. While we waited for the dog walker, the sun set and my husband (who was home by then) and I tried, in the cold, to cajole our daughter through the dimming windows to keep her from going towards anything potentially dangerous.
The point of all this being: sitting around in despair won't do anyone a damn bit of good. Get off the internet and take action: get involved, donate you time and money to causes you believe in, and teach your children empathy and critical thinking. The future is what we will make of it.
8
One aspect of not thinking there's a future, or at least not a nice one, is that, with developed nations' current demographics, a much bigger fraction of us do indeed have a short time left. The mood that comes with this, summed over the population , leans reactionary and gloomy. This is the TMG phenomenon - Too Many Geezers. (I am one).
But if humanity is to survive long term we're going to have to get through this demographic transition to a smaller population. We oldsters might as well do our part to make it happen as cheerfully as we can. Come on fellow Geezers, stop voting for hucksters like Trump!
6
A wise elder once advised me, back in the '70's, when air and water were getting dirtier but the Clean Air and Water Acts were just beginning to take hold, when Nixon supported such bright spots while also being despicable about Vietnam . . . , that one has essentially one of two choices to make: (1) act as if one has a future; or (2) act as if one does not.
He suggested, rightly as it has turned out, one will be happier if one chooses (1). Even if were are all "toast" ("dust in the wind . . . .") in the end, we'll be happier, between now and the inevitable, by acting better now. And, by so doing, we might just help, even a little, to make the future better when we're no longer around.
If one chooses (2), not only will one be less happy during the time between now and then but also one might be more likely to cause that grim future.
Listen to survivors of the Great Depression, World War II, the holocaust (and subsequent genocides), and you just might not want to "curl up in a fetal position."
And, as those wise elders have advised, don't worry if you sometimes lose your patience, get short-tempered, frustrated, or angry. No one needs to be naive or become a Pollyanna. We humans ain't perfect, but we are capable of solving lots of problems.
5
We must have a leader who brings sanity and unity back to our country in order for our republic to survive. We must have a leader with moral authority - not an amoral one like Donald Trump - who has no conscience - and exhibits this fact daily. And we must have Congressional leadership who does not enable such an amoral president who is incapable of changing because he thinks everything is about him and not our democracy or the Constitution he vowed to protect and defend.
4
The reason opinions of the future are bad is because of people like Ms. Goldberg who write pieces like this. The world is a much better place than it was ever before. Indeed, we are in the golden age of world history as we know it. Take any metric. In 1950 a good percentage of people in the United States didn't have electricity, let alone internet access. This is just one example, more can be found in the book Factfullness, endorsed by Bill Gates and Obama. The world is getting better and our future is bright. If only our "best" thinkers would tell the truth, more people would be of the opinion that all of the hard work we do everyday is paying off and we are leaving this world better than how we found it. Yes, life is tough and being good is hard, and making things better is harder. Instead of predicting doom, predict and place your bets on man's ability to adapt. We all know that doesn't generate enough "clicks" for Ms. Goldberg though...
3
@CR
I can only speak for myself, but if I had to choose between the life I have now (as discussed by Goldberg and Gibson) and a simple, hard life with no electricity (back to wood stoves, candles, oil lamps, etc.) but no threat of nuclear war, I'd take the latter. But only if everyone is about the same. Alas, unless we are *forced* to go without the things we take for granted (like our energy sources), due to solar flares or whatever, no one is going to side with me. Once you have a comfort, it's hard to give it up - even for all the peace in heaven. Especially if war is only a threat and not an inevitability.
Maybe that's one of the reasons we're collectively in the political and environmental pickle we're in. We hold onto what we have and minimize possible costs.
5
As a child of six, the most life-altering event I’d thus far encountered was a trip to the futuristic New York World’s Fair in 1965, with my folks from our hometown in south central Pennsylvania. I was agog, not just because I had never been, well, anywhere, but because it felt like the fair was so much about me. The can-do confidence that seemed so assured, so natural. An ever more wonderful world would be mine as I turned into a grownup. Nothing that American know-how could not surmount, not to worry.
But as I grew I did worry. I was terrified to be drafted and go to Vietnam – to an extent I stopped thinking about the future at all, really, because I assumed I’d turn 18 and be shot.
The hippies gave me hope. They spoke of love. The dawning of the age of Aquarius and all that.
But then, free love led to the hedonism of the ‘70s. And just as I was coming out, the AIDS crisis hit and put a damper on my sex life almost before it began.
Technology did not bring a better existence, its biggest impact, so far as I can tell, has been to infuse society with the smart phone. For those of us who remember life without them, to see the world now populated with persons head bowed and fixated on their glowing handheld devices … so lifeless. So cut-off no matter what the users of these phones may think. I have never owned one.
Life already seems too dark. I drink too much. I just turned 61.
Forget the future. The present was never supposed to be like this.
8
Love this piece and Gibson's work. I've read most of it and I don't always understand it, but it's great to read someone who isn't afraid to imagine detailed futures.
I've thought for most of my years, that there are historical cycles and the pendulum swings back and forth, back and forth. We've had many dark times in our past, and then something comes along that snaps us out of those cycles, deus ex machina style.
I've been hoping that happens soon, but the brutish, Meaning Of Life vibe the GOP is plodding for is truly harshing my future mellow. Like Gibson, I am searching for the way out of this current dsytopian nightmare.
2
When George W. Bush was re-elected in 2004 after the nonsense and lies and war for false reasons of his first term, I got a gut feeling that America has no future. Obama made the feeling somewhat dissipate, but Trump brings it back. The only thing that would make me feel positive and confident about the future is Trump and his cronies and party being thrown out of power, unceremoniously booted, for once and for all time. That would be "Happy Days Again."
7
What happens to a society that depletes its environment so it's stripped bare by mad men like the one in the White House? When he is done, we will have a bleak world that may no longer be restored. His latest and prior land grab(s) may not be able to be salvaged. His ignorance is monumental.
10
Maybe as the world we live in gets more abstract, the less we are able to define ourselves as a working part of it.
The first abstraction might have been the making of an axe out of a rock, a branch and some vines. Now Artificial Humanity (AH) seems to be the ultimate goal of whatever entities are in control. Ai is a start, but A_sincerity, A_empathy, A_integrity, A_humor, A_comradery, A_sensuality, A_ . . . .(fill in the blanks) are probably in the coding room.
But who knows, maybe unhindered global warming will give rocks, branches, and vines a new start. Our grand-kids and great grand-kids could be witnesses to the transition.
Entropy is our final state, and we have always moved towards it. Get over yourself.
Too many people on a too small planet but rather than opening their eyes and minds our male leaders, political and religious, want to control women by tacitly excusing rape while criminalizing abortion.
I can only trust women will turn out in overwhelming numbers to replace all of the mental fops who are now in control.
We better wake up to the fact that the gutless "holier than thou" politicians now running the show are strangling our existing society and smothering any chance our kids and theirs might have.
8
The Bulletin of Atomic Scientists just advanced the Doomsday Clock to 100 seconds before midnight. One of the most frightening things is the development of hypersonic missiles, which not only would be difficult to defend against by hardware, but the loss of reaction time means cool heads would have almost no time to deliberate. The Russians claim to have a hypersonic missile, “Zircon”, that can travel 186 miles in 109 seconds. They have a new stealth submarine that can rain 72 nuclear warheads, each ten times more destructive than the bomb dropped on Hiroshima, on cities and military bases over 5,800 miles away. Imagine Iran, North Korea, Pakistan, India, etc. with that capability. WWII, as long and ugly as it was, couldn’t destroy the earth. Now, missile launch to mass destruction could be a matter of a few minutes. Living with the Sword of Damocles over your head is not fun. I’m old and have had a good life. If I was 20, I would think long and hard about bringing a child into this world.
167
@Scratch
I cannot pin down when the marches or even discussions about Nuclear War petered out.
Was it after Perestroika?
Gorbachev recently pleaded for the West to disarm before catastrophe strikes.
Silence.
Now the wealthy have newly updated shelters, upgraded from the barren cellars. All mod cons.
Thank you for mentioning the doomsday clock and your concerns.
It is good to know someone else is thinking out it as it seems a taboo subject, beyond just a quick reference to the words.
I ended up spending an afternoon in Rikers Island after the last big demonstration 35 odd years ago. I came away thinking it was futile to to object. I went to have a cup of soup in a deli hoping for come comfort. The proprietor shouted 'Nuke em All"
Hatred is the annihilation of the other. It's very popular at the moment. Someday we may all will be annihilated. I cannot bring myself to use the word will.
26
@Florence I think "will" is increasingly likely. In my seventies now, I will pass soon enough. Our grandson won't. He is our guilty pleasure, our happy pill we see almost daily. But I wish he had not been born, for I fear his future will be ugly and bleak, even with our overwhelming love and support. I would not bring a child into this world were I young. I would not want to be born into this world.
2016 was a watershed for me, playing no small role in my turn to religion as the only real basis for hope. Not in this life, but in a better hereafter. If I am wrong, I will still spend my remaining years trying to better the world and be the kind of person my newfound faith, Greek Orthodoxy, expects of me. I cling to it as to a piece of driftwood in raging rapids. It took a lot for an atheist of five decades to make that move of faith, and a big part of that was my total loss of belief in the ability or willingness of humans in general to do the right thing. Whether I will enjoy a blissful hereafter or mere oblivion, when I die at least the physical pain and psychological revulsion I feel every day will end. It won't for our children and grandson.
27
@Scratch: Enrico Fermi probably correctly calculated that evolved technological civilizations destroy their whole planets within 200 years of exploding their first nuclear bombs.
7
Perhaps it's time to acknowledge the elephant in the room. As psychology teaches, it's the unacknowledged and unspoken about that feeds darkness. As we sense that America is sinking, the truth is that China is rising, and the shadow grows longer. As our Republic seems to be seriously stumbling, the autocratic power in the east appears to have a smooth handle on things. As our workers feel more hopeless, Chinese workers seem to have plenty to do. And the real root of the problem is that the wealthiest Americans are running to put their money not where their supposed values lie, but where they see their pot of gold. The political leaders in this country had better wake up and realize that the people they coddle don't care about this government, they only care about themselves.
5
And now we have a new arm of the military, the Space Force, to guarantee there will always be an enemy to fear and non definable dangers to consume all our wealth and prevent the government from improving the people's lot. We can't spend money on health care, because we don't know when or how, but we'll have to fight Martians, etc
3
There is always a way to get to hope by being realistic about where you are. All the lessons that we need to prosper in the future are laid out in our history books, we have faced challenges worse than this in he past and found a way to come through them. The feeling that creates the darkness of the future does not come from our objective problems but from the recognition that our societies have lost the ability to think. That we live in a period where our government is guided by raw emotion rather than reason and our representatives are guided by fear rather than principle. History tells us that our problems were created by us and so they can be solved by us, yet the collective whole seems content to wallow in some kind of nearsighted paralysis as our opportunities to act slip away. In this kind of mental numbness the world is going back to mythical answers, to comfortable lies, and to cruelty.
There are so many ways to solve the problems of the future that they cannot be counted and the option of doing nothing, and waiting, is one of them. But the null option produces a solution that will not work for the majority of human kind and this "solution" is indistinguishable from a global catastrophe for most. It is "us" that is the problem and our personal understanding of the flaws in ourselves is the basis of the cynicism and hopelessness that is becoming the default approach to life. There will be a solution, but which one will we pick?
1
I live in Quebec a little north of the border and we are optimistic and our birth rate is rising. We guard our secular humanism with a passion that existed in the USA shortly after it became the first nation of the Enlightenment in the late 18th century.
God has not blessed America lately which is quite understandable in a nation that was founded by scientists, writers , philosophers and humanists who understood the Creator created and then moved on.
America was the nation where the people took responsibility for the future. It was never to be a nation under God whether you believe in Her with all you heart and soul or believe She is a product of myth and superstition.
4
Pessimism is the default position these days. The dark cloud of a (“I have become death, the destroyer of worlds.”) weaponized nuclear energy driven Cold War standoff has been replaced by another equally dark cloud. The once considered benign fossil fuel energy source (that essentially created our modern civilization) is turning out to be an even more difficult threat to manage. We have discovered that our entire global economy is built on and now depends on an energy source that is irreparably damaging our biosphere. And as we know even if we had the collective wisdom and wise leadership to begin to turn the Titanic away from the iceberg, so much damage to the finite ecosystem variables have been done that much more ecological havoc is now unavoidable. It will take a full court press by global leaders to even begin to mitigate it. But that existential crisis is perpetually demoted to back burner status due to other geopolitical concerns. The global capitalist edifice must be nurtured or it will not grow. Yet that very obsession with global economic growth leads to ever more damage to the already compromised global ecosystem. To make matters worse perpetual economic discontent due to runaway inequality continues to lead to the allure of demagogues and anti-democratic political models.
All of that said, we have no choice but to fight back, to resist even as we feel it is probably an end game. What else we can we do?
4
Climate change and Trump are undoubtedly very challenging problems we need to deal with. However, I believe the anxiety and depression people are feeling is vastly out of proportion to the current circumstances. An overall bleak outlook is being shared on social media and spread by depressed journalists and authors.
It's almost as if people are now relating to each other based on how anxious they feel about current events.
3
In 1995, I did not envisioned that there exists Senators like Mitch McConnell who would operate against the long term interests of the majority of the American population. Now I am terrifying of all that I am valued are being Mitchified. Darkness follows evils makes me scare for our children future.
7
As has been pointed out, in America we have the “other party” namely the GOP who seem to look at a mythical past in a blind direction, which seems to prevent them looking into the future with open eyes and recognizing the dangers before us.
3
A sci-fi author & sci-fi politicians don't really make for a match.The vaunted tech sector, heralded as growing exponentially in less than a decade, employs much less than 10% of the populace. The 'icebox elitists' & oven oligarchs see this as inevitable with little concern for those left behind other than to recommend either ever increasing levels of education or induction into the burgeoning service sector.
The only politician capable of putting the breaks on societal breakdown is the one the internationalist corporate titans & the sci-fi political panderers see as the enemy- Bernie Sanders.
2
If the next election gives the Democrats the White House, control of the Senate and retains control of House, our country, warts and all, may again be the house on the hill. We may still succeed in fighting and defeating climate change, gun control, and restoring respect by our friends and adversaries in the international community. This is not a complete listing of what we may accomplish.
If the current administration wins re-election, we will have lost truth and justice. We will have lost our soul.
11
Human development describes the passages from selfish adolescent pre-occupation with one's self as the center of existence to a mature awareness of one's inter-dependence in a collective whole of humanity. Such passages from relative light to full enlightenment seem built into the human experience with age and development. Life becomes more obviously deeper, rewarding, and satisfying living cooperatively than selfishly.
If this is the course of development for the individual, why would it not also be the course of development for the collective society?
Universal acceptance of such a progressive view of human development has been hindered by a geographically-based environment of materiality characterized by the Industrial Revolution. But digital reality has now created a cyberspace of human communication that transcends national boundaries and connects people globally around ideas. Human collective consciousness has evolved from a nationstate mentality to a more ethereally spiritual Earth as the home of humanity. We are shaking hands with ourself now all over the planet, but remain rebellious teenagers in the transition.
If our life experience on Earth is an example, our future is the collective coming-of-age of a cooperative and productive humanity.
2
Once we reduce human global population by two-thirds we will again be able to conceive of a future that isn't mired in pollution, traffic, overcrowding, resource depletion and bio-extinction. This reduction may take a century or it may just take a few decades.
6
Actually despite what many people think, studies have shown that the human world is a better place than it was in the past. There is less war, less disease, overall longer life-spans, less malnutrition and actually people are better of economically over all than they were in the past. Look at the great advances in the quality of life for its citizens that our most populated country China has made. Climate change is a serious business but people are mistaken in thinking it means the end of our world. No, it means a changed world, which I'm sure we can deal with as needed. We simply need to work hard to protect the environment and at risk species, and we will. My metaphor is the great battle of the Army of the Chicken Littles against the Army of the Polyannas. I'm with the Army of the Polyannas. The sky is not going to fall in. Genetic science is going to help us. Technology will help us. Americans do a lot of complaining but don't konw how good they have it!
1
The future is only dark if the world's people don't wake up to the fact that they are faced with a radical civilizational change that will be brought about by a crumbling gobal capitalism incapable of solving problems caused by climate change. We have within our grasp enough techical knowledge and know how to solve these problem. Our problem is the current global political economy is not only the cause of climate change but also the greatest brake on doing anything about it. If the world's people wake the future will be bright though the road ahead will be very, very hard.
1
As always, there a people who see the glass as half-empty, others see it as half-full. Reading your pieces over the past couple of years, I must conclude you are of the former persuasion.
The glass is twice as big as it needs to be.
"What happens to a society that loses its capacity for awe and wonder at things to come?"
We wind up with Donald Trump, Pence and all of the corrupt cronies of both of them. We wind up with despair and hopelessness. We find ourselves filled with people who fear immigrants, homosexuals, queers, transsexuals, the poor, minorities, and who believe, wrongly, that the answer to these fears is persecution, jailing and further impoverishment of everyone else.
What happens is we become a segregated, fearful, repressive, bigoted and biased society that is always looking for victims to blame for all problems real and imagined. We become a nation of white nationalists and white supremacists. And we became a nation isolated from other nations including our former friends and allies.
We become a nation that withholds health care, can't provide decent housing and denies access to higher education and better jobs.
That is what we are becoming....unless we defeat Donald Trump.
I recall the excitement of the late 1950s and throughout the 1960s as America reached for the stars and became the greatest technological and economic power the world has ever seen.
We had hope. We had a vision of a better future. We knew our children and grandchildren would do far better than us. And we let that dream slip away for the likes of Trump and Pence and the rest of the ultra-conservative rightwing extremists and leftwing elitists. We can once again be a nation with a vision. All we need to do is vote.
12
I worry for my 21-year-old son's generation. We've elevated a strutting ignorant narcissist to the highest office in the land, suicide rates are up, bullying thugs have risen to power all over the world, and the doomsday clock has just been set closer to the hour of dread than it has ever been. What can we say to young people to keep them from giving in to despair?
12
This perceived darkness feeds on itself for those who feel they live in a world defined by our five senses. This world, however, turns out to be an elaborate illusion. The illusion has become clear to those who follow quantum field theory. *Everything* is made up of interflowing fields. It has also become clear to those throughout history who have found ways to access the spiritual senses. They can see and feel this light within everyone and everything, that it's beautiful and nurturing in the deepest sense and that there's nothing to fear.
The whole article talks about the scientific and political when the root of our current crisis is spiritual. When the physical progress we are used to becomes counterproductive, a wave now crashing on the shore of the planet's limits, we can take it as a golden opportunity to go within. The true vision of our future is one where the implications of our latest science are explored in very personal terms for the good of all.
3
@Werner John
“The light you are seeking has always been within.” (Anonymous) As for the individual, so also for the collective.
1
The Sex Pistols weren't the only ones sounding the alarm in the Sixties and Seventies. Without even thinking too hard, I can recall three early Seventies songs that dealt - specifically - with the environment and, by extension, climate change: "Mercy, Mercy Me" by Marvin Gaye; "Save Our Planet" by Edgar Winter; and "Nature's Way" by Spirit. All three we blunt in their appraisal of the situation. And all three were in addition to the thousands of songs devoted to raising awareness of everything from the possibility of nuclear war to the need for equal rights and - dare I say it - love for ones fellow human beings.
Unfortunately, we were too busy, materialistic, selfish, infantile and just plain stupid to listen.
3
Our discontent is fueled by the algorithms. The manipulation required to mine the veins of our monetized attention demands content that appeals to and feeds our deepest, darkest existential fears. And they have very effectively figured out how to segment our psychology and target content that appeals to the triggers therein. This is an excellent article on the rise of the affluent white woke voting bloc but this article could also easily be written about the newly radicalized poor white right wing bloc. https://www.tabletmag.com/jewish-news-and-politics/284875/americas-white-saviors
37
'Darkness' indeed. Although part of the current Trumpian mayhem may be due to our cluelessness and lack of education, even some indifference (a 'killler'), we must admit that Trump, within his deep ignorance, has been, and remains, a shrewd demagogue that promised heaven on earth and even utopia. All false promises, and he knows it. But have we considered that something more nepharious is occurring now that Trump is totally unhinged and irresponsible? And that may be ANOMIE. Awful prospect, if true.
2
One only needs to look back at history to know things could be much, much worse. Shame on those on both the left and the right who wallow in fear of the future. Get off your bottoms, band together, and do something. Donald Trump, bless his heart (if he has one), is a pathetic little man with less power than we give him credit for. You and I, however, each have the ability every day to plant a tree, help a neighbor, feed a child, walk instead of drive. Some of us have the means to cover our roofs in solar panels rather than buy a new TV. Some of us have the means to buy a Prius or electric car rather than an SUV. And some of us have the means to contribute to political candidates who share your view. Even little Greta, too young to vote, has made her voice heard. Stop emoting people and get to work.
3
From my perspective in Flyover Country, this op-ed is overwrought; however, it may be the philosophy du jour in NYC, whose views, of course, are valid, also.
We all, I think, strongly believe and trust that life will go on, sometimes up, often down. It's just life. And part of the fun -- can I say that? -- is not knowing; no detailed future is certain, good or bad. It's always the best and worst of times. Our imaginations can't help but glom on to one or the other. Michelle's was snagged by a downdraft. But a zephyr may catch her tomorrow.
2
Pessimism about the future is the only rational response to living in a country ruled by racists, liars, and sociopaths who deny science, think decency and honesty are for "sissies," and have decided the Constitution isn't worth the paper it's written on.
My daughter has already moved to another country because she doesn't want to live in ours. If I could join her, I would. The United States is, in my opinion, completely broken and unfixable. Will I campaign for the Democratic nominee? Yep! Will I vote? Yep! Will it matter? Nope.
The GOP will not give up power when they lose because they know that they can stay in power as long as they keep on cheating, lying, and stealing. Who's going to stop them? The SCOTUS? Don't make me laugh.
23
We have a new puppy. Full of energy and exploring everything. Plenty of mishaps as he learns about himself.
But we are enjoying being dragged along with this exploration. The world seems like an adventure again when you observe it happening within someone else.
4
I would strongly suspect that 2 days after Trump’s election you were in the “ not my president” club and since then have not effected one positive thing for the future of this country except his downfall.
DOW 30,000..
3
I just want to say that Michelle Goldberg is, IMO, the best NYT columnist. Her ability to tie in all of these inter-connected ideas to illuminate our current moment is nothing short of genius. And I love how she looks outside the punditocracy to get quotes for her columns.
9
Two weeks ago Michelle Goldberg was warning of imminent war with Iran. But the future doesn't always turn out as we expect. Readers might want to take the longer-term prognostications with a grain of salt also.
2
Gloom and Doom sells-
5
"...his (Buttigieg) forward-looking technocratic pitch has mostly failed to resonate with his own generation. Instead, it appears that the people most soothed by Buttigieg’s ideas about what America might look like decades hence are those who won’t be here to experience it."
Pete has attracted a lot of older supporters....because thats when most people start to think about what they are passing down. Personal and public legacies.
While "Pete's generation" are self centered and wholly worried about what they can get in the now! Which is not necessarily a bad thing, but its a narrow, short-term POV. And it too often results in support for wild-eyed craziness and the crazy people selling them! Aka; Sanders.
A few of my friends and I, now in our late 50's, recently sat around talking about the general future, and I took notice that we never had these discussions in our 20's, 30's and most of our 40's. We were self-centered and worried about what we were not getting in the now.
Sanders attracts the "kids", because he's offering what they believe are some wins for them in the now. Free this and free that and relief for X, or Y. Mention tuition relief and it garners cheers. While the older and more sensible, thinking thru things more type of folks see that sales-pitch for the lies they are! What does that system pass down in the long run, and what are the spin-offs into the larger society and economy, etc...?
The kids dont care. The "adults" do.
3
Weird. I look at the same data and I couldn’t be happier.
Trump is looking more and more likely to win, and Trump’s are sprouting up from India to the U.K. Immigration is down, wages are up, and my 401K and pay have never been higher.
Better yet, the myths of the left seem to be collapsing all around us. No - Islam is not a religion of peace, and yes - it can be effectively countered with power like that exercised by Trump, China, and India. No - we don’t need to all come together into some absurd rainbow coalition - racial gaps or disparities continue to widen, while the genetics that explains them gets clearer and clearer. Let India be India. Let Europe be Europe. And let Africans and Muslims stay where they are.
It’s all so reasonable! It’s all so nice! We make more money, and we keep more of it. And as far as the tech goes - I guess it’s a good thing too and that the left had better work harder at “criminal justice reform.” Because when there’s a camera and a scanner on every corner, porch, and driveway - you better believe life is going to be harder for the thieves, muggers, burglars and thugs who the Dems seem to count as a major constituency.
And that’s a point of optimism too! NYC’s no bail/no enforcement regime is already catching flack for putting decent citizens in harms way. I’m guessing another Giuliani or Bloomberg type is in the Big Apple’s future.
So again, from my vantage point the world is looking a lot more alt right! And that’s wonderful!
2
alt right Ben...and history proves that your world POV always collapses. and they do tend to eventually eat their own...enjoy....
7
Who cares what the future is? You don't need to "know" the world is going to be a better place to be positive. You never know that to begin with. You have zero control over it anyway. If the human race is doomed to do some horrible self inflicted wound it will happen. If not, not. All that matters is how you live your life. And I think the best way to live your life now is to be positive enough to outweigh all the negativity/ignorance/worse going on in the world and lead towards a better way. Leaders don't grumble about how prospects have gotten worse. They don't recruit to their side by fear mongering. They overshadow the bad news with leadership. Leadership at all levels is...unimpressive these days. The trolls, losers, and ignorant fools have been allowed to take over. What does that say of the rest of us? If you understand that you should realize personality and vision, not practicality and 'electability', are important for the Democrats. More will and less whining.
“Capitalism cannot reform itself; it is doomed to self-destruction.” — W. E. B. Du Bois
In other words, we need a better way if we all want to survive and thrive. Democratic socialism may be the answer.
Bernie 2020
6
One democracy-destroying, culture-crushing techno-horror not mentioned in this chillingly insightful piece is the forced collection of DNA from all immigrants and the publication of that DNA in the FBI criminal database, CODIS.
The Trump administration began that horrific destruction of everyone’s privacy on January 6, 2020.
5
"Our problem is not just that new technologies regularly fail to thrill. It’s that, from artificial intelligence to genetic engineering to mass surveillance, they are frequently sources of horror."
No, they fail to fix or otherwise elevate humanity - as they always promise to do! All these Apps, and the tech they exist on are sold as fixes to our human problems. They are supposed to help us be more creatively experiential, be more of who we are...and at times elevate us economically.
Have they? No! What has Uber done? Created yet another class of mistreated quasi-employees, in need of legal protections. Causing us to fight over what the phrase "to work for" means.
What are we creating? Stupid videos about make-up, fashion, opinions on celebrity, etc - mostly filmed in our bathrooms! Is that us being more of ourselves? Is that who we are at our core...bathroom based entertainers? Or a nation committed to filming fake couple fights in a car? Or making every other photo of ourselves, not taken in a bathroom, of ourselves in a car? What? Is that evolution?
Meanwhile due to Facebook's Corporate apathy and Zuckerberg's lack of empathy and cold-hearted greed - that platform is wholly involved in the genocides being committed in India, Kashmir, Myanmar...and that's the extreme short list!
Because as a nation we're sold on this idea that social media is protecting our free-speech! Pack of lies is what that is!
Reality; all the tech fixed nothing! And no one can admit it.
2
Starting at least with Mary Shelly's Frankenstein and working through The Twilight Zone, Philip K. Dick, and then the Terminator movies there's always been a strain of healthy skepticism of technology and an awareness of the dangers that science can unleash.
1
Not hard to imagine our future, just really hard to be happy about it. The audacity of hope seems to have died.
3
With every technological revolution we see the same pattern repeat itself: technologies created for good are co-opted for bad. Sailing ships were created for trade, but were turned into weapons of conquest. Germ theory made it possible to save people from infectious disease, but also brought about biological weapons. Aviation, pioneered for the wonderment of flight, became weapons of war, culminating in the ultimate perversion, turning civilian aircraft into missiles on 9/11. It was only a matter of time before Facebook evolved from showing your friends what you had for lunch into the most powerful thought control device ever created. If you are looking to technology to create your bright future, you will be sadly disappointed because unless people change, nothing changes. There will always be someone who wants more power, money, control, or resources. The real challenge is to build and maintain institutions that can endure and evolve, not matter the technology. Maybe this generation needs to spend more time watching Star Trek than Phillip K. Dick. The original series tackled subjects like racism, inequality, war, disease, and technological progress by presenting characters and ideals that were aspirational to a better future.
2
And now we have Trump and his genuflectors at Fox referring to Greta Thurnberg and anyone else concerned about the climate disasters already befalling us as climate hysterics. I envision the Fox Five sitting in their studio interviewing Trump on the phone about all those silly scaredy cats who worry about climate change, mocking a 16 year old girl who cries out for a livable future, while lava flows around their desks.
8
I watched the Sanders video. Well done. Tugs at the emotions - like it should. Had the, "We deserve a future" banner not been mentioned, I would have missed it, so Ms. Goldbergs overwrought meaning behind it annoys me.
I fully support and feel the power behind this Sander's message of caring for and sacrificing for others, in order to benefit all and even myself. I get that belief. Do for others as you would have them do for you. Ages old, and wholly sage.
Trouble is...there is this niggling problem with humans in an organized group such as ours. All Politics are local. We want from our politicians that which will fulfill our selfish needs, and/or desires. And if such things benefit others, okay. "But make sure I win first! I have debt, relieve it first, don't give something free to others first! Take away free from others, to relieve me!"
Sure I want to contribute to the system that helps the homeless...just don't do it by putting my home at risk and threatening to make me one of them! Which is what this current system is doing to many, and what under Sanders (if he could even get 5% of his ideas enacted) would very much cause to happen! I cant have much more taken from me, in this alleged democratic pursuit of leveling the whole playing field. A field that can never be leveled in the way Sanders, or Warren claim.
After my emotions settle, and my love of that song gets out of my way, I start thinking again, and see right thru the Sanders shtick. But the "kids" dont.
Societies that are in awe of their perceived future are often very dangerous societies. Stalin, Mao, Hitler.... All were able to maintain power by whipping their respective societies into a frenzy about the just and equitable world that was supposedly just around the corner and their's for the taking.
The American newspaper "The New Masses" wrote of the Soviet Union in 1926 "Where else is there hope in the world?" Soon there were Gulags, forced famine, slave labor, summary executions, purges.... All in the name of "the future".
If these examples seem too exotic, consider our own American "Manifest Destiny" and the crimes that resulted from the settler's awe of the future.
I happen to be quite optimistic about the future, but just fine with living in a society that is just "meh" about its chances.
2
The retrospectroscope of history tells us one thing for sure: we have overcome challenges when we have seen these challenges as an external threat. This echoes through actual history and science fiction in equal manner. WWII found us staring at the Holocaust which grew from the immiseration of the German people. The Star Wars epic gave us The Force resonating with its modern day progeny such as Avatar.
Once we understand ceaseless extraction without replenishment can only lead to human collapse, I remain hopeful we will pull ourselves out of this abyss. We cannot continue to sequester energy as plastics incapable of degradation or reuse in almost any form; an ocean with more plastic than fish is capitulation to a dying planet. Estrogenic compounds in plastics may defuse our population bomb all too well if we become sterile.
The earth will still spin for eons but it may be without humans. The dolphins and octopi may thank us in their own way but I would rather have human life carrying on.
I pray it will.
1
I’m seeing small acts of kindness in places where there were very little if none. I’m also seeing profound stupidity all around but that would be another topic.
4
I find the inexperienced and arrogant former small town Mayor Pete's thinking about those who will not be here in 2050 to be deeply flawed.....as he has no children, and most likely will not have any children unless he pays a surrogate, he does not seem to be aware that those older people(and at close to 40 he is considered to be middle aged and NOT a young person as he like to ID as) all have children and even grand children...which means that they are in the genetic pool, which from a biological POV is the really big deal, so yes indeed they will be here in 2050 and that is their concern, to protect the future of their DNA....something that the ambitious overreaching career driven Mayor Pete is totally unaware of.....he just does not grasp that and he has no skin/DNA at stake in the future. He lacks respect for those who know far more and have experienced far more then he ever will. I see his candidacy as absurd and he is just another corp DNC status quo white guy who does not know what he does not know.
2
"For those on the left, a primary source of foreboding is climate change"
No, not even a close second to a far more likely and closer existential threat: a new fascist era.
6
Contemporary despair has many roots, but the gulf between what we know to be true and the unreality of how we live is the most damaging. We know climate change threatens our future. We live under a government that is supposed to be reasonable, to act on behalf of its citizens, and to care about our children's futures, but we know is irrational, beholden to sociopathic interests, and unwilling to look beyond the present. Our children know that their president is a corrupt liar, and that nothing can be done to stop him because the system is broken. They know they live in a world where lies, not truth, are determining policy and damning their future. Today's Moms and Dads don't dread telling their kids that Santa isn't real. They dread telling them that their futures will be filled with wars, extinctions, untold human suffering, and mass starvation.
Things won't get better until we're honest about climate change and starts taking serious steps as a society to confront it. Taking those difficult steps will ground us in the real world, and relieve the awful tension of trying to live the threadbare lie that everything is fine.
6
Ya gotta love this!
''Eighty percent of the population has died, and many of the survivors live under the authority of a hereditary oligarchy descended from Russian kleptocrats.''
So, we're talking New York City under fake Mayor de Blasio where all the east-west streets in Manhattan were being repaired at once?
Okay, we can imagine that easily enough.
This also sounds like the Washington, D.C. bureaucracy when political activists wear military uniforms while spending much of their time attacking elected officials. Political Activist Vindaman, perhaps?
1
We live in an age when one of the leading religions - Scientific Materialism ... all is matter, there is no spirit - dominates our understanding of ourselves and of the world. Understanding the kinds of phenomena which we call: "climate change", alters radically if we see through the main confusion ...
... that confusion is the belief that only human beings have an interior reflective self-consciousness (are sentient).
It turns out the Nature is a living Being, that is not only sentient, She is a planetary super-consciousness, known directly to all the ancient earth religions as "the Mother".
The implications of this are wondrous and staggering at the same time. There is no weather that is not directed by Her. The legendary Four Horseman are Her's, and as captured in the Pieta, it is She who catches us when we die.
Western Civilization is dying into a new becoming, a process generating a lot of social chaos as it unfolds.
Nobody has to believe this, for the events will themselves include the simultaneous rejection of Scientific Materialism. This descent in and through social chaos will not be pretty, yet at the same time it is lived one day, one vote, one tweet, at a time.
I wrote of this, and its broader perspectives, here: https://thecollectiveimagination.com/the-great-unsettling-the-3rd-millennium/
Still, human appetites are demanding, and our Freedom was known to the ancients, and also to us via the Book of Revelations, as the Beast from the Abyss.
At the consumer level, our technology has become so advanced, it can be mastered illiterates. Religious fanatics, ignorant bigots and demagogues use social media and other tech tools to further their agendas without a shred of irony.
Our technology has outpaced the wisdom of our species. We are children playing with matches.
4
There is a green politics of the left that looks to the past-- anarcho-primitivism.
1
"But Donald Trump’s victory threw him off balance. “I think it took me about three months to come out of the shock of his actually having been elected,” Gibson told me. And when he finally did come out of it, Gibson still wasn’t quite sure what to do with the manuscript he’d been working on, about a young woman in modern-day San Francisco, since the world he’d situated her in seemed to have suddenly disappeared."
Oh good grief. You wacky TDS sufferers have flipped your lids. How many more months will you desperately cry into your pillows if (when) he wins reelection? Get a grip.
3
To add a bit to the abyss, the BBC website has an article this morning about the fact that The Base - a right wing extremist organization is run out of Russia.
https://www.bbc.com/news/world-51236915
1
“Pessimism is everywhere” and nowhere more so than in NYT opinion columnists. The Darkness where the Future Should be? Sheesh! Lighten up. The world is better off now than ever before. Pessimistic begets pessimism. It’s a social contagion, so why feed the beast with headlines like that?
1
There are people with positive visions for the future. They mostly aren't being promoted by the NY Times. But they exist.
2
The trajectory of American politics since 1980 has been tilted in one direction, the end of the middle class, the transfer of wealth to the plutocrats, Clinton and Obama not only supported this trend, they made it worse.
Obama said, there is no blue or red America, there is US of America as he blindly rejected his own Mantra of hope and change by promoting Hilary Clinton, the ultimate machine politician which brought us Trump. We are witnessing an epic failure of the Democratic elites, and Obama would do everything in his power to stop Bernie and help Trump get re-elected.
2
I used to live in a hurricane corridor. There was a mix of disappointment and relief when the storm turned elsewhere. The thrill of being in the hurricane (and preparing for it, bottled water and beer) was more thrilling than the relief of being exempted, power goes out, it's dark, the wind rips out trees and street signs, sheets of rain terrorizing doors and windows, we lived in a real life horror story.
The 'thrill' of flashy (soon dull) electronics cannot compare to the thrill of potential dystopia. Conveniently, it's always someone else that drowns, or whose house collapses on top of them.
On an unrelated note, I have a confession. I cannot read a Gibson novel, there's so much going on and not going on I get lost in the word tsunami. Not a knock on Gibson, I assume he's smart, everyone says so.
1
I used to live in a hurricane corridor. There was a mix of disappointment and relief when the storm turned elsewhere. The thrill of being in the hurricane (and preparing for it, bottled water and beer) was more thrilling than the relief of being exempted, power goes out, it's dark, the wind rips out trees and street signs, sheets of rain terrorizing doors and windows, we lived in a real life horror story.
The 'thrill' of flashy (soon dull) electronics cannot compare to the thrill of potential dystopia. Conveniently, it's always someone else that drowns, or whose house collapses on top of them.
On an unrelated note, I have a confession. I cannot read a Gibson novel, there's so much going on and not going on I get lost in the word tsunami. Not a knock on Gibson, I assume he's smart, everyone says so.
Things do seem to be getting darker - don't know if it's my age (59), or just the fact that I see little wonder left in the world - in the late 60's-mid 70's, I played with space toys and watched "Lost In Space", "The Jetsons", and "Wild Kingdom"....now it seems the very thing that amazed me as a child (technology & the natural world), I find unsettling. This beautiful planet that we inhabit is in serious danger, and it's largely due to human carelessness and greed. It also seems that Trump emanates the gloomy vibe that we all live under now - selfish, hateful, negative and dystopian. I have hope that we can collectively stop this disaster and look to a brighter future, but not a lot of confidence in the human race to actually commit to the sacrifices that would be necessary. I want to be wrong about that.
9
The progressive political agenda has taken on new meaning in a world cluttered with technological consumer toys and gadgets that belie the late 20th century promise that technology would transform our lives by making work schedules more flexible and less demanding on our time, news and information more reliable and accessible, healthcare procedures less invasive and drugs more effective. We’ve turned to progressives because where these promises do hold, and they truly are a mixed bag, they largely benefit a minority of privileged citizens. For example, the claim that we have the most advanced medical technologies in the world may be born out by the number of wealthy foreigners who come here for treatment, but of what value is that to millions of Americans who would be wiped out by the deductibles on their healthcare insurance and who can’t afford the medications they need to treat chronic illnesses? If the future looks bleak, it may be because it’s been a lot easier to sell the latest gadget, than it has been to sell the need for a more robust social contract.
4
When we foresee problems, we analyse.
If analysis suggests that behavior has been appropriate,
then we have a bigger problem: we don't know what has caused the problems.
The US largely stopped paying for maintenance and infrastructure about 1980. Prez Carter's 'Malaise' speech was prophetic. It may work out that we skimped for long, IFF we come up with outstanding new engineered solutions for physical plant, but deficient spending (and outcomes) for education is a bad plan, particularly for such a 'diverse' population.
Rethinking our foreign policies and focusing R,D&D on new energy supply, distribution, and storage/transformation is long overdue.
3
I just finished reading The Five by Hallie Rubenhold. It's about the lives of the victims of Jack the Ripper. I knew poverty and homelessness where bad in Victorian London, but never realized just how many people lived on the streets, had nothing to eat and no medical care.
For all our technology, things haven't changed that much since 1888. Thousands live on the streets. Even people with health insurance avoid doctors and hospitals because the deductions and co-pays are so high. The president and other politicians want to make the air, water, and land more polluted. There are still mass murderers walking the streets only now they carry guns and kill 20, 40, 58 people at a time instead of five over a period of months.
It's hard to look forward to the future when you can't visit a doctor, you're one paycheck away from destitution, and you can't go to an outdoor festival without being afraid of being shot.
9
What a depressing take on the world today. I do not share the sense of doom and gloom. For one, consider who it's coming (mainly) from: boomers. They're all old now and, let's be frank, not many old people think things are getting better (it's not young people telling others, "back in the good old days."). My fear is that people buy into this negative storyline and go negative in every other way, too. After all, if things are going to hell, it's quite natural for people to look for someone to blame. You can see where this leads. And it is also incredibly draining, it basically robs us of the energy it takes to actually solve the problems we face. We're finished before we've even started. I would never bet against America - the evidence just isn't there to take that bet. As Churchill said, "I am an optimist. It does not seem too much use being anything else."
2
Indeed, what are democrats promising beyond free stuff? Maybe they should try and paint the image of a more prosperous future with more opportunity. We need long-term goals beyond health care
1
I was - was - a huge Sci-Fi fan in its heyday...when Sci-Fi wasn't all about a dystopian future, where we're crawling from the wreckage of the time when we humans screwed things up. And that time is always about the now. We keep aiming that moment of wreckage at the now! We're the ones at fault. Right now!
As a culture, right now, we're obsessed with the belief that we're the most important people of all human time, and as such will be the death of all human time. We're the doom, sticking us in this Doom Loop!
We present most of our obstacles, if not immediately fixed, as causes of imminent doom. So much so, we have no sense of perspective, and the results are; 1/4 deliberates on the issue, or throwing up our hands by 1/4, dismissing it by 1/4, and hysterics by the last 1/4.
Regretfully, at this moment in time, from the small to big obstacles we face, we too often start at hysteria, instead of deliberation. Hysteria is our first reaction, which is not a sustainable place to fix stuff. So by the time we get to the deliberations, many people have been exhausted and either throw up their hands, or dismiss them. Leaving only 1/4 paying real attention. Who waste time cajoling others to care without hysteria.
Look, Trump is worth a little hysteria, no doubt. He's a real threat to the Republic, but its those hiding behind him, living in his shadows, riding his coat-tails who are the real and longer-term threats.
The Progressive Dems are hooked on hysteria. Its not tenable.
Somebody ought to do a book called You Cant Get There From Here.
Trump sold a boatload of spam to people longing for the 1950s and they bought the whole rancid batch. They are eating it and saying how great it tastes. But Hope comes from doing your own work, not glomming onto some fearful group with a fear monger like Trump - why? He is a liar - you can't get anywhere great from his lies.
I heard on the news that 63% of American men say they are lonely. Doubling down on the same will bring them: The Same.
I like what Joseph Campbell said - that the next frontier is the inner one of human beings. Learning our own stuff. We have a president who for all his ironic bullying while being old and fat himself, has zero powers of introspection. He is like a specimen of pure ignorance given power. No wonder people are depressed- change is not going to come from that.
The fact that some Swedish kid can come out of nowhere and frankly address the self-elected powers of the world is where hope is coming from- I think the younger generation will have to be the leaders on this one.
14
Crossroads here is really talking about a ...revolution. An American one?!
Doubtful, even with as spirited leader as Bernie, I’m afraid. Why ? Just re read the dark passages of this article, and especially watch that EXCELLENT Bernie video to drive home the enormity and vast extent of the “darkness” gibson refers to. Then, pick just one area requiring change, improvement, progress.
Progress, one may recall, is the exact opposite of conservatism... need I say more?...
Arguably the most difficult area to effect a change is to bridge over philosophical attitudes,
Over political approaches to life as we know it.
Just listen to trump’s defenders - to them, nothing wrong was done by trump.
It’s equivalent to saying:” it’s midnight now- while in reality is high noon”. How do you bridge over such extreme approaches, with Bernies rhetoric?! Or Bidens’, or any of them ?!
So yes, a peaceful revolution sounds good, even hopeful.
Let’s hope one comes, having overcome the numerous electoral hurdles awaiting us in November.
1
Americans tend to take their cue from their president, just as children take their cue from their parents.
So when we have a president who lies, cheats, retaliates vindictively, and thinks only of himself, it’s no wonder that America is living with a form of post traumatic stress syndrome .
When you have people in Trump’s administration telling us that the truth isn’t truth,and behaving like characters from a bad mafia movie, it’s understandable that we’ve lost our sense of wonder, trust, and hope. And while there is some comfort taken in Gandhi’s belief that all tyrants fall regardless of how powerful they appear to be at the time, enormous damage is being done to the country on a daily basis because of Donald Trump and his mission to dismantle the American rule of law.
Something has to be done about ridding ourselves of this miserable excuse of a man by ANY legal means possible.
9
One of the root causes of this frightening future is that we have mostly lost our collective grasp of the important distinctions between pride, and self respect.
Genuine hard earned self respect comes from honest introspection revealing the good we do for our selves, loved ones, community, nation, world, environment, and all that jazz. Self respect is fulfillment. Without having earned ones self respect, a person is incapable of truly respecting anyone or anything else.
Pride has it's own value, but unless bolstered with self respect it is emptiness, meaningless and destructive.
Want a brighter future? Develop some self respect, so you can learn to respect the rest.
1
I'm still blinking at my computer screen, astonished that Michelle has read Neuromancer. What's next, Neil Stephenson's Snow Crash? I'm kidding, of course.
The focus of any newspaper has always been bad news. And the Times is a newspaper after all. Thus you have your weekly the-internet-is-evil article, video games - particularly online games - corrupt young minds, personal data harvesting is the coming of the human apocalypse, and so on.
Thirty years ago I abandoned a career on the Hill, a dream my entire life had been focused on, to work on the first massively multiplayer online game.
I beheld a little box at a tiny company in Charlottesville, VA in which remarkable after-hours lives were being lived. In it, people were judged based on their conduct alone. Had to be as you couldn't see other people in physical form. And the narrative was being told by the audience. The consensual conflict that made the game compelling also served to strip away all postures and pretenses. It's unavoidable and it also accelerated genuine bonds among people.
Yes, technically brilliant but culturally illiterate fools rushed in and created the vast misnomer we call social media. But it's early days still. Think, '80s pop music or television in the days of nothing but westerns.
That little box is now racks filled with servers in data centers around the world. Billions of people "live" in them and it's a bit of a mess. But this is just act one of cyberspace.
I remain in awe.
2
@jonathan_baron I’m with you!!!
One very good definition of pessimism is an inability to imagine a better future. That pessimism has been evident in our culture for some time.
In the sixties and seventies, during the moon race and beyond, we imagined that science would solve all of our problems. We had science fiction movies, books and TV shows that provided a vision of that future. Shows like Star Trek portrayed a future where people and beings of all races and origins worked together to solve problems (as a bi-racial person, I always felt an affinity for Spock).
But soon, burdened by Reaganism, pollution, climate change, and a certain level of reality about the progress of science, our literature turned dark.
It takes more work, and greater strength, to imagine a better future under these circumstances. But it's work that must be done. So come on, Gibson--give us a good one.
BTW--with every article she writes, I become a bigger Michelle fan.
8
Star Trek is still a good template for a hopeful future. Racial harmony, world peace, status based on merit. But the most radical idea out of Star Trek is the abolition of money. Scarcity and poverty finally vanquished - that’s a future worth striving for. I believe John Lennon wrote a song on the subject. Achievement begins with imagination. I have a certain amount of faith in the younger generation, and I don’t hear that Dylan song as mournful. I hear courage. There are many more Grettas out there ready to lead. Fear not the future.
3
@John Grannis Thank you, John.
As a boomer with a millineal daughter, I too have faith in the younger generation. They know that they have big problems to solve--and they know that their future depends upon solving those problems.
Our message to them must always be a message of empowerment, of our faith in their ability to solve those problems, and our dedication to supporting them in finding those solutions.
2
What we need is a Democratic nominee who will look beyond the malaise and rally us to again affirm that ‘Yes, we can.’
105
@NM Yes, that. A doc I knew once talked about some of his older patients that way. They had no critical health issues, just "the dwindles." Pop in a give them a hello. Pop out again. They're fading away.
What I desperately hope is that the person who gets the Democratic nomination will be up to the task on inspiring. It's perhaps not our last hope, but if we don't get some hope here and how, hope will dwindle.
16
@NM
Obama affirmed that, and look at what he actually did and where we are now.
10
Actually we need fewer slogans like, “make America great again” or “hope and change” and more concrete, defensible, well thought out, fact based proposals for how we are going to address the many huge problems we face.
25
So to people on the left, the future is lost because climate change will destroy cities, force relocations, increase competition for resources, destroy nature, etc. And to people on the right, the future is lost because they might be among fewer white people, or be confused about a stranger’s gender. How are these two concerns ever presented on equal footing?
8
Michelle Goldberg writes,
"The right and the left share a sense of creeping doom, though for different reasons. For people on the right, it’s sparked by horror at changing demographics and gender roles. For those on the left, a primary source of foreboding is climate change...."
Actually the fears are justified on both left and right.
The reason for climate change is population growth, which we refuse to do anything about. When Thomas Malthus wrote his essay in 1798 decrying population growth world population was under a billion. In 1968, Paul Ehrlich published "the Population Bomb" which argued that continued exponential population growth was unsustainable. It would be brought to an end by something: famine (as now afflicts Zimbabwe, social unrest (like in Syria) or through environmental degradation.
We now know that it is global warming that will respond to too many people by lowering the carrying capacity of planet earth.
Yet people don't think for themselves. if they did they would immediately conclude that we need to use birth control to bring the population down to sustainable levels.
It is population growth (particularly in Central America) that is responsible for the high levels of illegal immigration.
Republicans deny global warming, while Democrats deny the costs of continued immigration.
Both parties deny the impact of population growth. So we recycle which is ineffective and do nothing about stopping overpopulation which is essential to any solution.
4
I don't see the relevance of Gibson's books here as they are based on the tenuous many world theory or multiverses, where any decision on one of multiple outcomes creates a new universe that coexists with all prior universes, but cannot communicate between them to verify the existence of the others. Furthermore, there is no time reversal to go backwards, as the case is in Gibson's books. Are readers suppose to be inspired that there may be a future technology for humankind to be saved from calamity, which Gibson calls "The Jackpot". Spare us....!
Our problems are solvable, but they require commitment, enlightenment through education, and perseverance, which together raise optimism and the will to charge ahead. We saw this after the onset of the Great Depression, as well as during and after WWII. In my community of physical scientists and technologists a sense of depression and desperation is foreign. On the contrary, among young scientists I see great talent and commitments to make a better world. Among older scientists frustration of the present status quo is clearly evident, but we are positive that things will change for the better.
3
American do need break away from the Republican Party/zombies a party of power and money just for the rich at heart billionaires/Wall Street control the narrative of the day. A party that lost his way from the American people since Abraham Lincoln. If all Americans could see destruction of this President Donald Trump is a great when speaking but does he speak the truth New York Times been calculating since his presidency 15,000 and more today.
A party of doom self-serving from climate change, from pollution, investing they do is still from the American people deficits it would blame the Democrats for that problem because her liberal but in fact be it known just looked less 50 years by the Republicans $15 trillion. They still try to blame Pres. Obama from the air President George Bush Jr.
If you see this last weekend's on Saturday Davos a young Actavis Greta Thunberg to save the world from climate change with her sword and shield to stop the polluting nations of the world and save it for the young generations to come in the future.
But one of Pres. Donald Trump henchmen Steve Mucnhin and his predecessor calling her names like a bully but she can see through President Donald Trump Knight of doom.
If we stay on the path of destruction with the Republican Party it will be the future of the Abyss.
1
The first time Trump called a fellow American or group of Americans his enemy, he should have been barred from holding any public office anywhere in the US. He and his boss, Putin, have been terroristically effective in slicing the American citizenry into finer and finer bits of intra-national enemies.
The Democratic candidate who is addressing this now in the Senate and in my preferred future as president, is Elizabeth Warren. She has a plan to begin to halt the destruction of government on day one (first stop digging the hole), to expose all of the hidden Trump corruption evidence, hold those people accountable, and to repopulate government with highly skilled, qualified and dedicated appointees and employees.
Because of her consumer advocacy and financial chops, she's aware of how to use the levers of power in government, and she is committed to serving the entire American citizenry.
This is the only thing that keeps me alive at this point. Otherwise, I do not envision a future of anything other than unfettered violence, hate and ruin here and around the world.
8
I will share what a medium in communication with spirit shared with me. ......... Trump was permitted to win because the election of Hillary would have meant more of the same: cynicism, disengagement, the usual corruption. .......... Trump was permitted to show how bad "bad" can be, and to wake people up and engage the best and brightest once again to become involved and make a better future happen -- rather than accepting miserable drift.
1
If you want to turn around the mess our nation has become, there is something you can do. Find a cause that speaks to you, volunteer; being of service to others will not only make you feel better it will improve your community. That my friends, will change the world.
"Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world: indeed, it’s the only thing that ever has."
— Margaret Mead
4
Lighten up. Nothing and no one lasts forever. Forget about your kids, grandkids and the wellbeing of humanity and the future. The future will take care of itself. But, since you seem to need it, here is something to help cheer you up. Just think how wonderful it was to have lived in post WW2 United States at the best time it was to be alive here. And, if after a couple of billion years during which we progressed to being humans, if we were to soon war and end all human existence, what a unique and privileged event to see- the end of days, or at least the end of human days.There, feel better now?
3
I get what you're say, Michelle, but I think the "abyss" appeared the day we dropped the bomb on Hiroshima. We've just had to wait this long for the full effect to come to fruition. Most of us seniors have lived with nuclear fear for such a long time that the future, short as it is for us, doesn't scare us. We know that our country could have handled the breakup of the Soviet Union in a productive way, instead of just letting nature take its course, without positive input from us. Huge mistake. We were just too busy raping treasuries, abusing our citizens, and making war on innocents. That's when our leadership began to diminish. We seniors know we will handle whatever comes. Our youth will handle it better than we do. We will not be led, quietly, into the world of 1984, or the world of Ayn Rand, and we will never be insensitive to it, never stop resisting.
6
Thanks for this article. Was nice to hear from Gibson.
1
When you have done everything you can to take away the awe and wonder about the past, and you are doing everything you can to remove awe and wonder from the present, is it any surprise that it is impossible to muster awe and wonder about the future?
2
Idealism has died. The cynicism of our digital world has suffocated our ability to imagine anything but negativity. The USA has selected a POTUS who looks at the proverbial 1/2 full/empty glass and looks for somebody to blame this missing half on.
I have tried to explain to my adult kids what it was once like to be inspired by the soaring ideals of The Kennedy's, MLK Jr. Those better angels now seem so out of reach that nothing positive seems possible.
5
I've been thinking about this a long time. In fact, the abyss has been getting wider and deeper for years...long before our current White House occupant made it seem as if all hope was lost. I grew up seeing Apollo 11 launch from Cape Canaveral and believing that a Star Trek future would once be ours. Now we don't even have a space shuttle anymore. I entered the television and media business over 30 years ago with stars in my eyes and seemingly endless possibilities. Today, after 4 economic downsizing episodes have depleted my 401K, the scariest corner of the abyss is the certain knowledge that I can never retire, and will most likely end my days working at a Wal*Mart because media and tech don't hire "old" people. I cling to my iPhone. It's the only part of the future I can still grasp.
8
Really!? Can we not see what smacks us in the face? This Op is a perfect example...negative and fear-mongering journalism sells! 7x24. And it hides the real truth. More amazing things are happening that are awe-inspiring on a daily basis than most people realize!! And so much of it is positive towards climate change.
The space race is more real than it ever was...the things that dreams are made-of. We will have a global network that is 100% powered by solar energy within a couple years (it will be in space). Battery technology is revolutionizing our lives and will soon make solar and wind energy truly viable at the grid level...and power our cars. People are finally beginning to map and visit, repeatedly the depths of our oceans.
Medical science is making breakthroughs on Cancer...yes, Cancer. The list is endless.
But you will not find it in the mainstream media. Because positivity and hope doesn't sell. And, by gosh, they have to find advertisers for a 24 hour news cycle.
1
Excellent article, but one thing left unsaid is that for many of us, the world is increasingly being run by evil people. The GOP is now a blatant criminal enterprise, conspiring with our enemies to transfer wealth to the 1%, purposefully undermining public education and bombing the undereducated with sophisticated propaganda to effectively bamboozle them into supporting their 1% agenda. They separate families, they gleefully advance global climate annihilation.
There is no pretense of good faith on the right--they champion their own bad faith and their willingness to ignore the constitution and the rule of law to achieve their anti-American, anti-human agenda. Our progressive allies are stymied; our most hateful enemies perhaps stronger than they have ever been before.
The killer is in the house; the Grand Old Party is now the party that Gotta Obey Putin. These are bleak, bleak times, and the forces of evil have never been stronger. It's beyond depressing.
16
When I wake my hope is that we are living the "stub" where Trump lost the election and Brexit lost the referendum.
Then I read the NYT and realize when and where we we are.
2
This column is Exhibit A as to why I always look forward to every Michelle Goldberg column. She's reading our mood. She's reading our times. She's seeing the future. And she may be the only mainstream writer who is.
The new field of cyber philosophy notes that for the first time in human history, we have lost our utopian vision of a better future. That's because we can't see ourselves in it. Humanity may be obsolete.
The only possible purpose I can see for Vladimir Putin and his henchman Donald Trump is to purge the world of its population. They are telling us that, unless we are rich, that we might as well die. There is a virus from Wuhan, China, that just landed in the U.S. If it threatens to wipe us out, Trump will do nothing. We're all alone in a godless universe.
How ironic that the possibility of living forever should come at a time when we don't want to live at all.
5
Technology has taken away the curtain. The curtain is like the one in the Wizard of Oz that hid the supposed "Great and Terrible" man behind it. The wizard wasn't close to being what he made himself out to be. The USA has been great and terrible since it's inception, but until technology came along and pulled back the curtain we didn't have direct evidence of it.
We were sold mom, apple pie, baseball, streets lined with gold where every "man" could rise up by pulling on their bootstraps, the flag, eagles, Ozzie and Harriet and a host of other icons that showed us and the rest of the world we were SUPERIOR!!!
Technology has changed all of that. We have come to understand that the military is often times just a dumping ground for those who can't or won't make it through college and have no other option. In the past it was all about patriotism and honor! Now we sell it to young people so it looks like a video game where people get shot, blown up, and obliterated but nobody really dies. Then young people sign up, and the horrors of real battle leave them with PTSD and injuries from which they will never recover. Most of these young folks knew their lot in life when they joined because the curtain was being pulled away every decade as the "real" world was exposed, and it ain't what we were told it was.
Trumps behavior isn't a one off anomaly...it's been here all along and his enablers in the Republican party have been here as well. The only difference is it's all out in the open.
3
Just because Goldberg is permanently in a state of despair doesn't mean the rest of us have to be.
3
This is one of your most disturbing opinion pieces you have ever written but not for the reason you may think. You have inadvertently put your finger on the starkest problem facing humanity: the collapse of humanism inspired by a higher power. I think it is a matter that unites the right and left. It may point to what was troubling William Buckley over 60 years ago when Europe and America were busy making a brave new world where technology became revered as the be all and end all of society. You quote Ross Douthat’s vision of creating the “technologically sublime.” Conjoining these two words is a gross insult to anyone who believes human progress has many measures but surely the term has been most abused by technology and science. To use “sublime” in this manner says all we need to fear about our future.
"Recently Sanders backers released one of the more moving campaign videos of this cycle."
One of the moving videos released by Sanders himself. It was edited to blatantly misrepresent what someone had said, so Sanders and his staff could repeatedly lie about what they said, so that Sanders could win based upon lies. It’s no different than using a doctored video to do the same thing.
Sanders with his staff edited the video to make it appear that a Democrat said the opposite of what he said, and when caught Sanders doubled down on the lie, attacking the truth. Where have we heard this before?
Before technology permitted audio and video it to be easily doctored, Stalin's KGB black propaganda department created dezinformatsiya using this technique.
"The candidate who polls show has the most support among young people is Bernie Sanders, the oldest person in the race. Clearly, Sanders fills his followers with hope and makes them feel that a transformed world is possible, but he also speaks to their terrors."
The reality is that Sanders is exploiting those terrors, just as Trump exploits the terrors of the political right. (I say this as someone who voted for Sanders in 2016).
There's nothing inspirational about this; it is calculated to stoke terror, view the world as apocalyptic, and see everyone who is different than you as an existential threat. It guarantees cultist will treat Sanders, like Trump, as lone savior, and attack anyone who dares disagree with them as heretics.
1
All our big problems are being driven by gross overpopulation of the planet with humans, a subject that is taboo when discussing the future. We are incapable as a species of collectively managing our population so perhaps it is just as well to ignore it and hope you are not here when the collapse comes.
6
There is at least a sliver of hope that some people, our “leaders” excepted, have acknowledged this basic fact. All we can do is to keep repeating the facts and hope others are at least open to the possibility of looking at reality.
This column is Exhibit A as to why I always look forward to every Michelle Goldberg column. She's reading our mood. She's reading our times. She's seeing the future. And she may be the only mainstream writer who is.
The new field of cyber philosophy notes that for the first time in human history, we have lost our utopian vision of a better future. That's because we can't see ourselves in it. Humanity may be obsolete.
The only possible purpose I can see for Vladimir Putin and his henchman Donald Trump is to purge the world of its population. They are telling us that, unless we are rich, that we might as well die. There is a virus from Wuhan, China, that just landed in the U.S. If it threatens to wipe us out, Trump will do nothing. We're all alone in a godless universe.
How ironic that the possibility of living forever should come at a time when we don't want to live at all.
1
Re “ What happens to a society that loses its capacity for awe and wonder at things to come?”
Answer: The same thing as when truth becomes relative and right goes undifferentiated from wrong.
1
Amazing piece, Michelle. And great job on the Argumnent discussing the editorial board’s tone deaf Bernie animus. The editorial board seems happy that it is so smug and institutional; that seems like a strange thing to be happy about. I think the youth will recover a sense of optimism again when money—and therefore cynicism—is no longer king. And when the truth is finally recognized that there are, and always have been, higher motives than the profit motive. Capitalism was created to serve humanity; but, as with communism and fascism, we humans are increasingly serving an utterly inflexible version of free-market capitalism (well, free market for everyone but the extremely wealthy, who make their wealth not through labor but through interest-compounded capital stored away in the Cayman Islands).
Keep it up and thank you for preventing me from unsubscribing from the Times.
2
America was once a young, optimistic country. It is now a mature democracy on a downward slide towards a more autocratic state. It no longer leads the world in most areas relating to the standard of living. Money in politics has destroyed real democracy; partisan gridlock (for which the win-at-all-costs GOP is largely to blame) has hobbled good governance. The technology industry is destroying truth and privacy and has been allowed to run amok without any controls whatsoever. Unbridled consumerism has led to a world awash in plastics and garbage.
Finally, and worst of all, climate change is literally destroying the world and our species may not survive. It is hard not to give in to utter despair when you have a charlatan like Donald Trump denying the threat of climate change and doing everything he can to increase fossil fuel consumption.
Trump was right about one thing. We are really are facing American carnage.
4
"It’s an ad that speaks to the desperate longing for kindness and solidarity to replace the cruelties of a society devouring itself, but also a grief-stricken apprehension of what’s in store if they don’t."
I wholly disagree. Everything that has brought us to the precipice of doom is exactly what will ensure our survival beyond the coming ELE. The progressive feel-good politics of inclusion and tolerance have no use when everyone is spending all of their time holed up in fortified structures tending to cricket farms (yummy protein!) and fending off hordes of starving climate migrants (fun time with guns!). Thankfully our leaders have seen this looming threat and are now dismantling the nation in order to bring us the fascist dictatorship that we need to impose the order and discipline necessary to not only survive the coming dystopia but also guarantee and perpetuate it.
This is what we chose when, instead of protesting the debacle of the stolen 2000 elections, we shrugged and got through it and went along with our daily routines (until 9/11 which taught us that we could also shrug at our government's use of torture, mass surveillance, and the suspension of all humanitarian values which was easy to do when the order of the day for the peasant class was remembering to ask for "freedom fries"). It was excellent practice and prepared us to shrug off the stolen elections of 2016 and we'll be total pros at shrugging when the cover up is over.
¯\_(ツ)_/¯
1
"For people on the right, it’s sparked by horror at changing demographics and gender roles. " -MG
I submit that this right-side "fear" is largely a fabrication of the left. It's repeated so often, it becomes conventional wisdom to the left.
This is what I fear for the United States' future:
Fabricated [Dark] Zeitgeist spread wide.
It's insidious.
There is no reason to feel hopeless. All the political leaders of the day including US, UK, Russia and India to name a few think and act stupidly. But great progress is there to be seen all over the earth. A.I., autonomous vehicles driving with electric batteries or hydrogen will definitely change the world and the politicians of the will simply disappear. So let’s not despair.
Care not for this world. It is merely a brief way station to a glorious future in the afterlife.
I do not believe this, but far too many do.
2
I first knew your name when I read "Kingdom Coming" quite some time ago, your book about the rise of the religious right, so when you started writing for the op-ed page I was sure to follow you. The Kingdom seems to have come.
1
Gibson's dark future already has arrived:
Historians will write that Donald Trump, Mitchell McConnell, and John Roberts were the three assassins of American democracy.
The "social contract" that is the only authority for the creation and continued existence of American government has been materially breached by our ruling elites.
The United States is in the iron grip of a constitutionally illegitimate tyranny to which no American owes any ethical or legal duty of loyalty or obedience.
America has been dragged back into a lawless state of nature. The American republic has passed into history.
"Hello Darkness, my old friend... "
4
Trump's futurists want no future. Just the Second Coming. And they will do everything they can to make it happen. So, you know, Jesus is coming, get busy. In the meantime the world burns and the rest of us know that religion provides both the delusion and the consolation that get the ignorant through their day. So it goes. End times are coming. Who doubts that as scientific fact? Is being honest pessimistic?
6
The dystopian future many of us fear is not the one of FB and internet surveillance but one of a planet overrun with billions of people and little to no nature left. The oceans filled with trash, filthy air and a grim struggle for survival where we plod toward the extinction our excesses have forced on most other species because we couldn’t get past the fact that the planet couldn’t support an unlimited number of humans. And the worst part? It was all easily avoidable. All we had to do was live within our means and leave something for the other creatures we “shared” the planet with.
7
Could it be that, without wondering about intriguing possibilities and chasing pipe dreams like living in space colonies, we will concentrate more on improving our immediate surroundings and world?
2
omg. complaining about people no longer being conned by techno-babble promising impossible rewards. oy.
how ever will we live without such emotional lying?
2
I’ve always feared the future. But despite my mind’s tired insistence that my future is ever going to be hopelessly dark and always a little worse, sometimes a little or a lot of light can creep into my life at the moments I least expect. Welcome yet unexpected change.
As for the future of earth... well, it will recover from us eventually. We’re all made out of the same mysterious quantum field, whether it be people, rocks or Republicans. I like the image of each of us being a wave in the ocean, seemingly seperate but actually functioning in total harmony and relationship with our environment.
It’s something Alan Watts used to say in smoky workshops in Sausalito many years ago, that you are something the whole universe is doing in the same way that a wave is something the whole ocean is doing. Once you understand that human beings are, in a sense, branches on the tree of this planet, it’s a no brainer to try to protect and nourish the environment for yourself, your fellow creatures and those who will follow us. I’m baffled by those who proudly destroy it instead.
Of course for all we know careless life forms have been destroying beautiful planets for Millenia. Humans are not a seperate force from nature, rather an aspect of it. If we are carelessly destroying eco systems, that’s still nature at work in all her wonder and horror destroying herself, transforming endlessly in this timeless moment.
1
Well, you can always turn up the music on your I phone and
adjust your headphones even tighter. The society you write about is already here.
3
How many more years before our sun burns out? Billions?
Enough time for us to overpopulate, die off, and provide some history if there is a better evolution next time.
Perhaps we will leave enough evidence behind and serve as a cautionary tale for the next planetary caretakers. Most of ours certainly ignored science; maybe the next iteration of humans will be more civilized and the message will stick.
Those talented souls who write, draw, photograph and paint do provide that hope, so don't give up, William Gibson. Write!
4
In 1972 "The Limits To Growth" was published.
Today's world is what the movie adaptation looks like.
6
Michelle Goldberg shocks the conscious in this well conceived opinion piece. Reading it brought back memories of a novel written by P.K. Dick many years ago. Entitled, "The Man in The High Castle", the book explores an alternative history in which the Axis Powers won WWII, conquering the United States, then dividing the nation between Germany and Japan. Amazon Studios presented a movie series based on the book. The point here is, the nation seems to be in a struggle for one of two possible realities.
In one reality the United States will continue to evolve as an inclusive democratic nation,representative of a constitutional republic. In the other reality, contrary to what one might prefer,conditions are being created for the emergence of a neo-fascist state.
4
I can't get far away from 1968 and this piece brought it back to mind. It was hard to be young and hopeful when tragedy snowballed from one minute to the next. A lot of different events were happening one after the other. Horrors, actually.
Most young people were not sure who to believe or how to handle the world. They drew close to one another and offered solace, whiskey, sex, crying, dancing and screaming. The world did melt away into something else and hope returned. It took a long time. Now I don't have a long time and my fear is for grandchildren who need to safe, secure world to be happy. Is it there?
126
@Betsy Herring I appreciate your musing about the shock the assassinations and other "horrors" of the 1960's had on our collective thinking, and I think, at a subconscious / unconscious level, the horror sent many into a place of despair and loss of hope for real change.
In a way Bobby's and Martin's assassinations were even more shocking than JFK's because the latter assassinations were a blow against progressive hopes for a just and civil society that would be advanced by a real "movement" of mobilized people.
JKF was assassinated because he bucked the power of the Military Industrial Complex, an abstraction few people really understand even today.
I feel the sadness, and struggle to feel hope, but I have not fallen into despair (not sure what I would do if I did).
I think we need to channel our rage because all that has happened over my lifetime, the denial for a socially just and environmentally sustainable society, the lies told about the safety of chemicals and overuse of fossil fuels, is soiling the nest we call earth, our home.
29
Last night I had a dream that I washed a bunch of ants down a drain. Odd for me because I have great respect for ants. One tiny ant is more complex that the most advanced computers and robots we have ever made. When we look at the night sky we can no longer see the sea of stars that gave millenia of humans a sense of place in the universe. These are not trivial things. The spiritual life of humanity is connected by these things, something this article completely failed to talk about because people have come to think that means the same thing as religion.
What this whole article is really describing, without naming it, is spiritual emptiness. If you can't find awe in Gibson's future world it's probably because he expects the wrong things to create it. I don't hate his work but he bangs away at tech and politics as if he had never looked closely at an ant.
It's interesting that you chose Buttigeig because he happens to be the only candidate running on a platform standing unapologetically on faith. I'm not religious but there is more to life than economics, politics, and technological proficiency. Our cultural lack of practice in areas of awe and spirit is the root cause of our sickness.
My gloom is more about immorality. My fellow Americans are not as moral as I believed. It's not just that 60 million Americans voted for Trump, an utter fraud in all aspects of his life. It's things like students going to college and getting degrees yet they are unable to do math and write at even the high school level. It's things like my trusty mechanic suddenly recommending additional services that my car does not need. Like my doctor forcing me to come back every 90 days to renew my blood pressure medication that I've been taking for 15 years with no issues. (All his nurse does is take my blood pressure; then I leave.)
Somehow everything is a fraud. And it is exulted. Trump is exulted for getting away with his illegal power plays and for his crude Twitter attacks. Businesses are exulted for immoral practices that increase earnings. Graduation rates go up but education rates go down. It's all a sham. We do not deserve the country we live in, and it is slowly disappearing. So be it.
8
Dystopias? Utopias? Whatever the world looks like fifty years from now, or in one hundred years, will be what we (humans) make of it. I for one will vote for the continued emergence of liberal democracy. We will, each generation in its turn, continue to resist tyrannies of whatever stripe, and be motivated by a consensus that collective human survival on a sustainable planet means international cooperation vs. mindless and self-destructive conflict. Anyone want to project human destiny further into the future, say a thousand years hence? Is there any answer other than liberal democracy?
1
Perhaps this is more of a Western dilemma? In contrast, polls in China indicate great optimism and excitement about the future and an enthusiastic embrace of technology. Most of the despair mentioned seems to stem from excesses in capitalism and a disregard for communal welfare.
Rugged individualism has likely run its course leaving whole populations isolated in lonely despair. It probably is not mere chance that the most happy countries are the most socialistic and community-minded.
6
Fretting over the endless permutations of the future is a waste of time. While the world's organizers hold all their symposiums, the future, as Mort Sahl delighted to remind us, always lies ahead. Out of our infinitely small individual lives, trends, dangers and opportunities constantly reveal themselves. We all ride the same endless train whose engines are only visible when we are going around the corner.
1
We are overdue for several paradigm shifts: how we have to look at human psychology as the foundation for human endeavors (wake up Humanities Departments), media manipulation and propaganda (I'm looking at you Fox News), rolling back corporate control of everything even including health care now, and eliminating the Libertarian "biggest bully on the block always wins" Dystopia we have deteriorated under for 40 years and counting.
This will require prolonged effort and determination, not exactly the current skill sets of modern America, who just can't wait for the next comic book movie sequel to come out.
4
It's staggering, by itself, how many American so-called adults
who have lost homes and businesses this century to wildfires,
floods, rogue tornadoes, and massive hurricanes, have No Clue
that the cause of their catastrophic losses is fellow humans.
Tragic.
13
@Ken Caused by what actions or inactions ??
@john
Caused by sitting back as humans went from 2 billion in less than one century to over 7 billion. As we learned more about how our lifestyle and numbers were destroying the planet and the systems we and all life depend on and wrung our hands while we continued calling for more of the same activities that got us in this mess. Caused by continuing to embrace superstitious fundamentalism and rejecting science because we didn’t want to offend anybody.
2
john -- first, a question from me to you: Do you ever read about Climate Change -- you know, that phenomenon also known as Global Warming? I ask, because, if you do keep up with the science of Climate Change, you didn't need to ask me your question.
And now, the answer to your question:
Millions of tons DAILY of carbon dioxide, carbon monoxide, methane, vaporized herbicides; massive overdevelopment (billions of square miles of pavement and concrete, which increase the earth's temperature); etc., etc. -- all the doing of human beings.
Taken together, John, these unnatural excesses are causing increased prevalence of wildfires, floods, tornadoes, hurricanes, draught, erosion, rising shorelines, etc., etc.
Hint, john: Read and learn....
4
As far as politics go, I still hold out hope for the future based on clear and confirmed data from the past. We who have been non-Republicans (those Republicans of the ravenous kind--any other?) and "never Trumpers" must keep in mind that we have clearly been in the majority here. It was the technicality of the Electoral College that made the difference in 2016, where basically the tail wagged the dog. Here is the main reason for Trump's obsession with "corruption" in the 2016 election, as he is such a poor winner that he cannot accept that the popular majority never wanted him. (Typically, he projects his own agenda in condemning the impeachment process, as he himself would bizarrely "reverse the outcome of an election [vote]" by applying corruption to what happened in 2016.) So, it is vitally important that we check our voter registrations and go to vote again in immense numbers (to overwhelm the Republican voter suppression efforts) and elect candidates who clearly demonstrate sincerity about promoting the common good. That common good is one way to help provide some light in an otherwise dark future.
6
The future is dark?
One big reason I see to be pessimistic about the future is that the human race has made astounding advances in technology/science but it seems everyone is invested for one reason or another in not ensuring a quality humanity inherits all the advances which are made.
With all the technological/scientific advances made there should be a corresponding process of ensuring that power especially falls into hands of the most psychologically stable, intellectually profound, and most full of character human beings or all these advances by falling into hands of the less worthy among us just reinforce the more unpleasant political/economic structures of the past to detriment of all.
But of course the idea of ensuring a quality humanity is extremely controversial, unpleasant in itself. It means profound discrimination, a constant process of ensuring an elite humanity always holds reins of power, and this by necessity is a minority of the human race. But the alternative is seen in today's love for superhero films: A world where spread of science/technology leads to a type of inflation, a bubble, where everybody is equal and super empowered, every person their own hero or villain or both, a type of vast increase of vanity by material advance, which obviously and going by the films of today leads to conflict on grand scale.
Scientific/technological advance must be strictly regulated like money/economy to prevent inflation/devaluation, but this is quality face.
1
And yet, we need a hopeful vision of the future to feel good. If we don’t feel good, we reduce the chance that we will fight hard for a carbon price, ending deforestation, ridding ourselves of Trump, and electing a progressive Democrat.
Imagining the world the way one wants it is not a waste of time.
3
No society can survive if it's populated by a majority of people who think only of themselves. Which is what almost all modern Republicans suggest we do. After all, selfishness has been the GOP's biggest selling point since the advent of Ronald Reagan.
"We're all in this together!", is a democratic ideal.
"You're on your own!", is the mantra of the modern GOP.
What kind of society is ruled by people who's only concern is for themselves? Monarchies. Dictatorships. Police States. Authoritarian Regimes. (i.e. The end games of the current GOP.)
And these kinds of societies aren't really societies as much as they are organizations of people who sole function is to serve the will and enrichment of the few. The 1% or less.
So, if you think that caring, compassion, fairness, basic human decency, understanding, open-mindedness, charity, equality of education, equality of opportunity, and equality under the law, are a waste of time and resources because most people don't deserve them anyway, then you should right at home in the modern GOP.
However, you have no place in civilized society what-so-ever.
13
In Kubrick's 1968 movie 2001: A Space Odyssey there is an image that that symbolizes the stark differences between 1960's and 2020's America. The woman walking in the space station is the forward future looking America, the Pan Am logo represents what America has now evolved into.
1
The future has collided with the past, giving rise to the present. Hereditary oligarchy, descending from kleptocracy, is not from some imaginary future world; it reigns now, as it has in one form or another at various periods in human history. Neither Trump nor McConnell are the cause of it, although they and their Republican colleagues are the servants and the beneficiaries of it. Freedom and democracy are born of struggle and must be renewed and sustained through struggle. For the moment, the dream of America has fallen under the malevolent power of Mammon, but hope still burns for a more just world. We can begin by renewing our love for each other and for our communities, not as two-dimensional political caricatures, but in the round, as living and breathing souls, with fears and hopes and dreams of our own.
4
It's certainly soothing to think that humans as a species have not collectively shrunk the sweet spot that watched their numbers increase seven-fold in two decades. And at least for the countries in the Global North, that meant longer lives, and better living, for the most part. Until scientists began to realize what the era of industrialization was doing to the planet's living systems.
Historically, the organizing principles underlying collective societies were pretty basic: reciprocity, redistribution, sensitive to nature's feedback--which could be cruel and swift--and (though not consciously perhaps) small scale.
That isn't to suggest a bucolic world where all was well and warfare unheard of. But if humans don't get back to the idea of reciprocity, of caring about consequences of consumption, of insulating their societies from the welfare of others', this winter may continue to darken on us. The Trump era seems like a last gasp at human exemptionalism, along with Trump's sickening nativism and white nationalism.
And that such an example of a lack of humanity would ascend to the presidency suggests, hopefully, an apex of celebration of the self from which we can descend. Technological innovation, undergirded by principles that have real world consequences (such as biomimicry) might save humanity. The fossil record is not reassuring, though.
1
@omartraore
Yeah, um. Two centuries.
Superb. The most humane and balanced discussion of America's trajectory I have read in the NYT.
As my astute, late good friend David said: "I weep for America."
7
So many well-educated and highly literate people today have no understanding of basic science, and think they have enough understanding of technology because they are able to interface with it, but only because some engineer designed an effective user interface. No, without a solid foundation in basic science you will forever be adrift on the foamy waves of technology's virtual reality—one day in wonder, another in despair.
Anchor your perceptions and analyses in basic understandings of thermodynamics, chemistry, evolution, geologic cycles. Understand that the quantum world is inherently ephemeral and statistical. Approach all statistics with a skeptical mindset. Always ground conclusions in basic science.
Climate change (and many other changes in the bio/geosphere) has momentum—we can only adjust on a social evolutionary scale. We have the base of knowledge on which to proceed. Human productive capacity has exceeded the capacity of pre-human processes to absorb and cycle. We can consciously control the flow of energy through our societies and cycle the massive amounts of matter that we consume if we just have the will to do so, and make those goals central. We could evolve together if we all understood some basic science.
2
The US has had periods of ugliness, but never a wholesale assault on our constitution. Other than the Civil War, there were some limits on how far people would go to demonstrate hatreds of groups, colors, ethnicities, and religions.
The reason why I find this current era so disorienting is because truth itself has been transformed, forcing us to look at fellow citizens who simply are speaking a different language, ascribing to a different set of facts, and pretty much never questioning what leaders tell them.
This last point, in a country where authority has always been challenged, makes one lose one's bearings, feel dizzy, and question if they are living reality or in a dream.
In a nutshell, the US is not used to authoritariansim and group think because a little less than half the country has subscribed to it.
Where is our former rugged individualism?
8
Thanks to Michelle Goldberg for putting words to what I've been feeling the last few years. I don't have her eloquence or expressivism and it's been difficult to articulate what the darkness consists of. So thanks for the emotional effort and time spent on this article. Oddly, it makes me feel better to have some words to put to the feeling now, as dark as the words are.
5
I'm reminded of the film "Fahrenheit 451," in which an authoritarian leadership burned books to keep the people from learning the values and culture of the past - to keep them tuned in to only what was being fed to them on television by their leaders. This is not the time for those of us who remember what life was like before the internet - and some old enough to remember when TV was new - to sit back and leave the young without a compass. It is the young who are the real victims of what is happening. It is the young who are left too build the future as they are systematically being cut off from the tools they need to defend and nurture their own humanity and to re-humanize society.
In "Fahrenheit 451," hope rested with individuals who committed books to memory - became, in effect, living books. A kind of "contemporaneous notes."
5
Thank you for linking to that particular video. It gives me a bit of hope just to know that more people are seeing it who otherwise might not have.
This is our chance to revive and hold on to those nearly vanquished positive forces : American Optimism and Youthful Idealism.
Though, as a Gen X supporter of the elder candidate who is also the choice of youth voters, it also seems important to note that morals and ideals and faith in one another can indeed survive beyond one's 20s...
3
It’s true, the future looks horrific. It will take a new kind of revolutionary initiative to wrest profit and power away from the elite; every idea of how that would look has made it to Hollywood or Netflix in one form or another. We have created a for-profit world that feeds on perpetual growth and the consumption of every possible resource. It works fine until we discovered the very nature of our prosperity is equally ruinous to the health of the planet.
Do you really believe, in your heart, that we will give our comfortable lives, such as they are for each person, in order for someone else to do better, or to protect the earth? There’s absolutely no way humans will collectively agree to it, until, that is, it’s too late to turn it around.
5
As Freud noted, it’s the eternal conflict between Eros and Thanatos—the life force and the death wish. As a nation we’ve been there before—in 1860 and the Civil War and more recently in 1930 and The Great Depression. Fortunately, we were blessed with two great, optimistic leaders in Republican Abraham Lincoln and Democrat Franklin Delano Roosevelt. Our despair at this pivotal moment in history is that we have yet to find that inspirational voice of Eros to lead us through the Trump Thanatos. Let us try to put aside the despair despite the darkness that is descending and hope a modern hero or heroine will step forward.
5
@Paul Wortman
"Somebody has to do something, and it's just incredibly pathetic that it has to be us." - Jerry Garcia
Unless it's little Greta--whose exhortations have, sadly, had no effect on the powerful so far--I don't think a hero is coming to save us this time. We're going to have to save ourselves. Work with local groups on specific projects, grow vegetables and stop eating meat, plant trees, sell your car and buy a bicycle, write a prophetic novel. At the very least, your life will be more fulfilling until the end comes.
2
If only the climate crisis were the only problem. The loss of topsoil and destruction of species are equally threatening, and while they are exacerbated by climate change they exist independently of it.
Writers of dystopian fiction have so many dark avenues to explore, I don't know why anyone bothers with zombies anymore. Maybe it's because it's a lot easier to whack a zombie than to persuade a politician to stop taking money from oil and gas companies.
11
I have a question that's prompted by all the misgoverning everywhere, or at least my opinion. Is there an enlightened country on this planet?
The USA has a Constitution and Bill of Rights like no where else. However it's subverted by the current leadership and growing reactionary undercurrent that's more of a riptide sweeping clear thinking out to sea.
China is repressive end of that story.
England is stepping up facial recognition and has convoluted laws regarding freedom of the press as do many European countries.
These are a few examples. What's going on out there? Is the planet earth the titanic heading for some unseen iceberg and we're just shuffling chairs on a soon to be sinking ship? I'm confused.
2
"What happens to a society that loses its capacity for awe and wonder at things to come?"
Well, it has two choices:
1) Continue down the path of future unsustainability.
2) Vote out every politician that contributes to it. In this case the Republicans.
There is no third option.
9
Perhaps it's time to pass the microphone to those who have a compelling vision for the future that we would all want to live in.
There are over 7.8 billion people in the world, even if 0.0001% (10,000 people) can summon the inner strength, and belief in humanity's potential, pretty optimistic we'll be able to chart a way forward. This applies to scientists, artists, teachers, and more.
We also know that pessimism can be contagious, especially amongst stagnant networks of people. Maybe we can shed the notion that pessimism is for the erudite, and see it for the failure of imagination that it is.
2
Be careful. In his excellent piece in today’s NYT, Ezra Klein points out that the political map and math still protects the GOP.
3
What's really unsettling is not our inability to assume awe and wonder for future technological advancements, but our inability to discover within outselves awe and wonder for the here and now, the simple fact of existence.
6
There's certainly a wipeout in the somewhat distant future. We're at the point where the concept of being at the peak is being annihilated, decimated and destroyed. When wealth is God, the crash is sure.
Immediately after the peak is the fall. We hold on. We are fearful. The concept of rules and structure are molested and exploited. Eventually, the new age is also mocked and released. Everything we have held as sacred - except what is actually sacred (the whole, the truth, one's path) will be gone.
Then we start again with a better understanding of the nature of the pieces within the whole. It's a new start with a new consciousness. There's a consensus on a system of orderly expression that relishes the natural cycle. Everyone is accepted for their role. People will be driven by appreciation and agape for what we do have.
Almost every sophisticated individual has a role in accepting change and envisioning/making/praying for, etc., a new world. Michelle despairs. But she has her role and is working it. Greta does her thing so well. People come in service are doing their caring thing. If your thing is to worry, embrace that. We want to "do something". My breakthrough came when I realized that living in faith is also doing something, and an answer for those who practice love consciousness.
First comes the consciousness and then the thing. The two work together, to create awe, which is a wonderful (self) reflection and drives better results.
4
I don't think there is darkness.
Young men and women world over are diligently pursuing their passions in the arts and the sciences and inventing wonderful things that will make life on earth sustainable and a delight.
The darkness is Maya. It is a generation of people, mostly in the affluent West, that is trying to adjust to a changing world where the norms they are used to are no longer valid.
Unfortunately, in the United States, the generation that is trying to adjust is making decisions that are harmful to its children and grandchildren.
1
In the reality world of wildlife management, biologists face the task of trying to maintain populations of critters within the "carrying capacity" of their habitat. It's not high math. Less habitat means fewer critters.
So, what's the carrying capacity of this planet's human habitat? We probably reached it years ago and have since been living off of our "winter fat." Likely we are the emaciated polar bear, but just don't know it. Otherwise, how is it our political "leaders" continue to talk about the need for a 3.2% annual GDP growth?
"Growth" means more consumers, which means more people, which means more pressure on what's left of our habitat. Are we really the most intelligent species if we can't act in unison to save ourselves?
13
I came of age during the Cold War. And while I lament the erosion of the bright, shiny, streamlined tomorrows envisioned by Walt Disney, Gene Roddenberry, and (later) Donald Fagen, that brand of Utopian wonderment has always had a dystopian dark side. For every Star Trek or "2001" there’s a "Dr. Strangelove" or a "Planet of the Apes." Indeed, to me the most surprising (and perhaps alarming) thing about Ms. Goldberg's article is that it never mentions The Bomb. I guess she's learned to stop worrying.
6
@Carson Dyle Your Donald Fagen reference made my day! Brilliant!
what happens to a society who loses its capacity for awe and wonder at the things to come? perhaps they will find peace and contentment in the miracle of just being alive in the present moment.
7
Malthus and the tragedy of the commons may be finally catching up with us. We, the people, are not the owners of the sheep on the common -- we are the sheep. And since we keep on consuming our resources (economic growth! more is better! 'sustainable' economies!) instead of retreating from our destructive behaviors and living more simply, we are in for a really hard time, regardless of who our leaders are. Yes, good leaders would help, but unless we are 'good' citizens, prepared to give up our materialist lifestyles to conserve our common home, we probably won't make it through the next few decades without a lot of horrible stuff happening. The future may be largely determined by whether we can change our own natures.
5
And here we are, at a Rubicon moment. Trump has defied all Constitutional norms, in effect crossing the Rubicon, and our republic hangs in the balance.
They don't necessarily need to remove him, but they do need to vote across party lines, either way. If it splits on party lines, the ability of Congress to impeach and remove a president is gone, and an important part of our republic is gone with it.
The world can probably survive a diminished republic, but the people who will have taken over are the same people preventing any effort to secure an environmentally stable future.
4
Just as has been long predicted by the science fiction genre, our technologies are reaching the point where we cannot contain them, accelerating us into a dystopian future. Next election cycle, the technology will exist to make fake video and audio recordings that are indistinguishable from real ones. It will be possible to put any words into any persons mouth and depict anyone doing anything. Many people have already been duped into believing alternative facts without the use of such technologies. What will it be like in the very near future when no one has a basis for distinguishing between reality and falsehood?
I wish I knew what to tell my teenage children. I do fear for the futures. Maybe the best advise I can give them is to stick together and help each other.
3
This column resonated deeply with me. I love that Mr. Gibson is walking us through his struggle to imagine a less tragic future in a post-Trump universe.
2
Sounds great (am I Gibson fan? most def). So just go the route of "Ada" by Nabokov, William, it'll totally work. Better than reality, which I suppose is always the elusive goal. You might actually have a shot at it in this particular case, though.
1
The most chilling thing here is the quote from the investor in facial recognition technology. The US defines freedom, in part, as the ability to pursue individual gain. Our judicial and legal systems have set up structures to safeguard that right that appear to be outlasting efforts to temper that right based on negative consequences for society; climate being a prime example. The challenge facing progressives when and if it regains political power will be how to impose the good of the whole over the unfettered pursuit of individual profit. Society should be able to, in the words of Nancy Reagan, just say no.
3
From Theodore Parker, a Unitarian Minister, 1853 --
We cannot understand the moral Universe. The arc is a long one, and our eyes reach but a little way; we cannot calculate the curve and complete the figure by the experience of sight; but we can divine it by conscience, and we surely know that it bends toward justice. Justice will not fail, though wickedness appears strong, and has on its side the armies and thrones of power, the riches and the glory of the world, and though poor men crouch down in despair. Justice will not fail and perish out from the world of men, nor will what is really wrong and contrary to God’s real law of justice continually endure.
5
Something I heard from news coverage of the gun control protest in Virginia startled me last week. A woman stated something to effect that the protest was to protect against liberal "tyranny."
Tyranny? That's insanely strong language. I do think that all of those very heavily armed people believe that democrats in office would be Tyranny.
I can't help but wonder how any newly elected Democrat could unite the country with this extremist view of partisanship among the population. I'm even concerned that riots are going to break out if a democrat is elected. A riot with lots of guns and a group of people who have been put into a feverish spell by Trump.
2
I need to comment about those guys on the News at the Virginia protests. Not a GUN GUY, but an American that happens to own a few guns. BUT, I am NOT like those guys in the photos. My father was a 27 year Veteran of WWII, Korea and Viet Nam. He brought home a lot of guns and taught my brother and I, first, Gun Safety. How to handle them, how to shoot them, how to work on them and how to store them. They weren't toys. They weren't fetishes. They weren't to scare or impress people with. They were tools. The people the news show, are Yahoos. I guess when they dress like mercenaries, have their bandoliers, got all the accessories on their AR15s, got 3 handguns hanging from their SWAT rigs, leg holsters, or dressed like Dog, The Bounty Hunter, they are maybe impressing their buddies. And showing the authorities what they have. I'm not going to recite the "Tyranny" reasons, or 2nd Amendment Rights. And unlike those guys, I don't think about guns 24 hours a day. I might target practice at a range once a year, maybe every 2 years. I'm just more comfortable having a form of self defense against anyone coming into my house uninvited. For that reason, I will not vote for any anti gun people. That reason alone.
Just curious. Do you consider a proponent of reasonable gun legislation ( background checks, some magazine limitations, etc) an “anti-gun person?”
Yes, the left is about believing in progress for a better future but perhaps it is a delusion to believe that a growing population, a growing economy, and continual technological change will ultimately lead to a better world. This planet has limited resources so how can human civilization keep growing without eventually hitting a wall? The most obvious wall we now see as being climate change. This planet does experience climate change naturally, the most severe type during the last several million years being ice ages where the global average temperature dips to -5C. Presumably we are between ice ages right now and the next one could be delayed by global warming. But that is of little consolation if civilization cannot survive climate change. In addition to climate change it appears we are in the 6th great extinction mostly due to habitat loss up to this point but more and more climate change is contributing. The only the way the left can find optimism is to fight for the reduction of greenhouse gas emissions and to protect sufficient natural environments from development. It may seem futile at times but the consequences of failure are becoming more and mare clear.
6
@Bob
"Fighting for reduction of greenhouse gases" does not move the human spirit.
1
@Big Text
Zing!
Everyone go on as you were, don't bother reducing greenhouse gasses until someone comes up with an inspirational slogan at least as potent as "Meat: it's what's for dinner."
2
Any problems humans create, they can solve. We will all get to the mountain top. It is our turn to fight for what we know to be right and just. We have come to far to give up now. We can make goals and we can achieve them. Remembering the words of JFK and MLK.
4
There is no MLK or JFK on the horizon. There is only Trump.
1
Everyone I know feels exactly like this. We're all exhausted and depressed. It's hard to envision a future for ourselves when we're constantly bombarded by this negative horror show of an impeachment and the daily dementia shown by our president.
I want to live in positivity and I can see a way out of this quagmire, but it involves both parties working together for the common good. Yes! The common good. What has happened to that concept?
When one party, or person, controls the Senate and can do absolutely anything they choose to, we've crossed the Rubicon into uncharted territory and this is precisely where we find ourselves.
When this horror show ends and we're left with the clean-up, many, many Republicans will lose their jobs and laws will be changed to ensure this kind of manipulation, avarice and power is never allowed to be used as a weapon again.
I'm looking forward to the clean-up and divestment of any shred of 45, a man whose memory will live in infamy.
8
That's an interesting piece about how we are looking at ourselves.
I think a good deal of the pessimism is related to the degradation of social relationships and sense of belonging to communities.
Lot of the relationships are transactional in the first place but it seems like all of them are becoming that. It is sad and depressing and lonely. If we all become more cynical and less generous and hopeful, obviously we become more self centered … but the center becomes hollow (is that a song?).
So, it is mostly a cultural thing of seeing people through a mercantile (commodity) framework. It is not as prevalent outside of the US.
Fantastic technology is still being created. We just realized that physical safety (basic creature confort) that technology can provide is not enough.
We need culture, a common purpose, love.
We are smarter than this, we should not believe the lie that we are not.
The ultimate disenfranchisement tool is to deprive people of hope and communities to build political power. The current dystopian president is good at that, the last president was a lot better at hope and vision.
2
I am an academic, with a PhD and most of my time is spent during this time of year in working with students who are due to submit their thesis in late April and May. Reading opinion pieces is a special joy, in that I do not have to parse each sentence to ensure there is a source or logic to an underlying assumption (I wont do that with this piece, but there are many science fiction style holes in the piece e.g., suicide rates have actually fallen dramatically since gay marriage was made legal in the UK).
Unless you are planning to remove all the children and young adults from society, I can assure you that that part of society has far from lost its capacity for awe and wonder at things to come.
It is perhaps where there is this "OK boomer" thread that the Tik Tok genration has embraced and Gen Xer's such as myself are not particularly inclined to stop.
Beyond this futurism worship, people are far more like organisms, seeking out food and energy sources than we care to admit, our species will find a way - we had no great future plan to orchestrate the existence of billions of humans, yet here we are, going about our day to day business.
Fret not Michelle Goldberg, it is always darkest before the dawn, and most of this American style depression is driven primarily from election angst. I hope Bernie makes it, or Buttigieg, or anyone else but Trump.
I am buoyed today by no matter how bad things are over here, at least we don't live in virus generating China.
6
Reading this article's comments, I agree with those who say a bright future is possible. Only if:
We can take the money out of politics and allow a truer expression of Democracy and free market Capitalism show what is possible when the best ideas are allowed to flourish.
And not the survival tactics of "Party" or greed of the "1%".
6
Gibson's words from "Pattern Recognition" (2003), released 17 years ago seem almost prophetic now, as as do so many of his works.
“Of course,” he says, “we have no idea, now, of who or what the inhabitants of our future might be. In that sense, we have no future. Not in the sense that our grandparents had a future, or thought they did. Fully imagined cultural futures were the luxury of another day, one in which ‘now’ was of some greater duration. For us, of course, things can change so abruptly, so violently, so profoundly, that futures like our grandparents’ have insufficient ‘now’ to stand on. We have no future because our present is too volatile.”
4
If only we could develop a new, worldwide “religion”: environmentalism. All nations and all people could surely agree that saving our planet is our common, moral imperative. The founding fathers of the United States were Deists. Fossil fuel corporations and the politicians everywhere, that they and the ruling Oligarchs hold in their pockets, will paint this as atheism. So what! We’re way beyond that argument. We’re at the point of no return. It would take the right leadership in our country to set the tone. Think about that when you vote in 2020. And it could create meaningful, sustainable employment opportunities for the transition away from fossil fuels. Technology has always been a double edged sword: it’s negative impact on society is equal to its positive impact. In the meantime, take the time to appreciate the natural world we still have. Take a walk in the woods.
5
When Nixon resigned and McGovern was vindicated I was in graduate school and felt that the wind was at our back. The country was going to move forward. But, then it got yanked by Reagan and I've never felt a sense of optimism ever since. Carter, Clinton, Obama...they are all squandered their opportunities. Clinton was the worst of them. And, I say this as a centrist.The dark hole was dug deeper and deeper.
If an elderly Lamar Alexander, legacy and bank account intact, allows himself to feel the pressure
of a con man, how can anyone feel any optimism other than through a catastrophic spiral that makes civilization hit bottom? I'm in the camp of Babylon Five...the ancient elders that created us are having a good laugh as they bet on whether or not we can make it. The various tribes on planet earth can not get beyond "me first" rather than mutual interest first.
4
Without life the universe has no meaning. Life is the universe sensing itself, permitting a consensual reality that transcends the mere fact of existence in the present tense. Humanity is that form of life energy which our universe has evolved permitting its own self-awareness. Insofar as we currently know we humans are the only and best designers granted power by the universe to craft our own futures.
This circular verity forms the basis of a hopeful view of existence—providing we are intelligent and patient enough to discover and embrace the best path leading into a tolerable future, one in which we are still permitted to exist in current form. Ultimately, humanity is inessential, inconsequential really, to a universe of energy endlessly recycling itself, that universe we were lucky enough to have been born into. Make errant choices; follow the wrong path and humanity will cease to exist in recognizable form.
Human life can remain on this planet if and only if it we refocus on what it is that has made our species successful to whatever level it is that we have achieved. We must reinvigorate a deep respect for human life based on an honest intention to keep perfecting it one generation at a time. Place too much faith in the tools we have invented—the powers that we control—and we will interrupt our own evolution, ultimately ceasing to exist at all.
But life will go on without humans. The universe recycling its energy will make sure something better replaces us.
5
Thank you Michelle! I hadn't heard about Gibson (a true visionary) in a long time; just loved your article.
I'm a self-confessed 'relentless optimist';over-focus on the negatives of our future (to me) is clearly no way to live. It's a guarantee of feeling dark and pessimistic with the short time we have...
2
News flash: Most Americans are optimistic about the future, and with good reason. Poverty is falling, and technological advances are opening up new possibilities for humans to live rich, fulfilling lives.
I invite Michelle Goldberg (and the commentators on this message board who, like her, seem mired in neurotic gloom) to readjust their outlook.
1
I was waiting for a comment like yours. You miss the point of the article. It isn’t about Michelle’s personal pessimism. It’s about a pervasive pessimism in the United States and around the World. I’m glad you feel optimistic but millions don’t. That’s a fact.
3
Much of the gloom about facial recognition and data breach and privacy worries seem media worries rather than what people really worry about everyday. Most people are accepting the terms of agreement while enjoying their noise canceling Bluetooth headphones...
...as they step over the homeless camp outside their big tech downtown skyscraper.
Perhaps the biggest gloomy element of the future is how this awesome tech will separate, insulate, numb the rich from the poor. And how the gap between the rich and poor will only grow if oligarchs and trickle-downers the world over are not taken out of power and replaced with more socialist leaders.
4
my parents subscribed to life magazine and national geographic and their full color spreads on the space program from early flights to the moon landings were enthralling.
there was also the whole huddling under the desks in case of nuclear destruction.
my child has no such visions for tomorrow, hopeful or instantly catastrophic, she fears the slow and unstoppable disaster of climate change and the destruction of habitats and an economic downturn that will leave doors closed for the future of her generation.
10
@No name
There is more cause for hope about the future than there is for gloom and doom.
Please share with your daughter the great news about falls in poverty, growing world life expectancy, and exciting medical advances. And please fill her life with the joys of family, friends, community, nature, art, music, and literature.
1
Nice thoughts but...poverty might be falling but economic inequality is increasing which can lead to instability and even violence. Life expectancy in the United States is falling as is upward mobility. The Trump Administration is cutting back funding for medical research and healthcare in the US is becoming more expensive and less accessible. And you didn’t say anything about climate change, a president and GOP that don’t even believe it’s happening and a world filled with people who actually mock and even threaten young people who march for action regarding climate change.
3
@Blue Ridge
I notice you don't mention climate change, the Sixth Extinction, ecosystem collapse or human overpopulation. Do you not see these as crises?
Well-argued, but unconvincing. The pessimism of young people doesn’t come from Trump or global warming. It comes from being raised in a culture that has lost its religious and cultural moorings and with them its capacity for awe. People of Faith, by and large, do not share this sense of impending doom. It is to a large degree a self-inflicted problem.
2
Perhaps that's because for many people of faith, the end of the world - the rapture, in their parlance - is considered a good thing. Fundamentalists such as Pompeo dont necessarily fear a nuclear or climate-related cataclysm. Those of us who accept science however, do.
7
When did religion ever exalt science? In fact it disparages it.
1
@Michael Livingston’s
It's hard to have much faith in "Faith" when its "guardians" are so often greedy, abusive, hypocritical, con artist predators.
1
Maybe the answer is not technology. We've surrendered so much of our lives to technology, maybe we've gone to far. It started with technologies that made our lives safer and more productive. It wasn't just easy to let them in, it was empowering. Then technologies gave us more leisure. That freed us for creative and fulfilling activities. And what did we do with it? We started watching TV. Now technologies are making us almost unessential in our own lives. We don't need to stop technology, we need to not surrender to it.
It's impossible to be optimistic about the future when we are negative about our past and tell ourselves that our present society is therefore illegitimate. How can we rouse ourselves to take action when we no longer believe in ourselves as a nation- when we honor every culture but our own? How can we have a coherent vision for the future when we don't permit ourselves to have a consensus point of view? This, I believe, is at the heart of the deeply felt opposition to the progressivism that has become dominant in both social media and the main stream media.
4
“Honor every culture but our own”? You mean that the pessimism is due to failing to honor white Christian culture above all others? What do you mean by “our culture”?
1
"But that would seem to require political and scientific leaps that are hard to envision right now, much less stake one’s faith in."
The political leap is not happening. Donald Trump got 46.1% of the popular vote in 2016. 99%+ of those 46.1% will vote for him in 2020, giving him 46%. All he needs is another 3% and not only will he easily win the electoral college, but he will win the popular vote (1% each to the Greens and the Libertarians).
And where does that 3% who voted for Hillary, Johnson or Stein come from? A combination of those who dislike the Democratic nominee more than they dislike Trump, and those are thrilled with the booming economy.
It's a slam dunk, folks. Wishful thinking if you think a Democrat can win.
1
Michelle, a very important piece of work. Our dystopian future is much bigger than our current political situation. That is just a part of what is happening to us, and, in fact, to people all over the world. The long term consequences of advanced technologies used by both governmental and nongovernmental institutions along with the destruction of our planet by greedy people (most of whom will be dead by 2050) will either be defining moments for mankind or, if we’re lucky, we will be saved by the younger generations in time.
Me, I’ll be one of the dead ones, but while I’m on this earth, I will always have this in mind and fight for it.
4
Ms. Goldberg's most perceptive literary descriptor of where things stand in America:
"...a society devouring itself."
Brilliant.
10
Yesterday, as I listened to Jerrold Nadler's overview of the Constitution's impeachment fundamentals, I was transported back to about age 8 (almost 60 years) and one of my first exposures to American history. It occurred to me as I listened--and I made a note of it to myself--that we have lost the capacity for awe we once had.
I can remember feeling awe and reverence as I learned how my country had been formed, of the brilliance of the founders, and of the sense of honor and security our Constitution promised. I recall thinking that we desperately need the Republicans to have the epiphany of an eight year old--to remember within themselves the value of our democracy, truth, and honor and ignite within them a renewal of authentic patriotism. If they could tap into that awe, they might be willing to remove a very, very dark bully from our midst.
3
@Leslie - Let's be honest. How much of the awe comes from the fact that you were 8 years old and everything is eye opening at that age. Case in point. When I was around that age, I watched Star Trek for the first time and was in complete awe. Last night at age 61, I watched the premiere of Picard and was less than awed:)
1
@tom harrison So true! The main quality required for the crafting of a good myth [which, like making sausage, it's best to not look to deeply at how it really works) is for it to be awe-inspring. Our civics teachers back in the day were basically performing the same role as the Hollywood publicists.
Great insights. I'd only add that a lot of us still find awe, wonder and a sense of the sublime, yes, in church. There's less dread about what might come "next," when we believe in something better coming "after next."
1
That's because we're not honest about our past. There is no future without a reckoning about the bad behavior of the past.
4
With due respect, Ms. Goldberg, you are part of the problem.
Media, and politicians, religious leaders, and others who want attention and power, have long promoted pessimism to sway opinion and influence behavior. If many people now see only a bleak if not apocalyptic future, it is because a lifetime serving of industrial pessimism has conditioned us to hopeless anxiety and depression.
So why reinforce this trend? Why not challenge the doomsayers with modern data (cf. Steven Pinker) or with some historical context? How about a summary of the past crises that foretold the end of the world, as published in the Times in each past decade for the past century? Can we recognize and counter behaviors that make us feel unrealistically vulnerable (cf. Lukianoff and Haidt)?
We face challenges and even serious problems. Through history, people always have, and most of the time we not just meet the challenges but excel. The only sure way to fail is to choose to fail.
3
What a pessimistic comment!
The world has had its dystopian events. Hiking in Europe this past Fall, I stumbled on several WWI graveyards of young Canadians or Kiwis. now kept meticulously groomed for 100 years by local folks. Prior to the discovery of penicillin, wounds alone often meant death.
Both my parents served in WWII combat. My mother was a combat unit nurse with front line troops transiting across North Africa, into Italy, then France, and eventually Germany, and witnessed the first day entrance into Dachau. My father was a Gunnery Officer on convoy duty in the Atlantic, then was shipped to the Pacific, landing with the Marines to direct Navy ships’ guns in support of our troops. Two of my sons served in Iraq and Afghanistan in combat. Viet Nam, Korea, the Iraq-Iran War - what’s the threshold to qualify as dystopia?
Last year I read Orwell’s 1984, the dystopian bible which should frighten any curious US citizen after three years of a Trump administration. It is a world of haves and have-nots, where even historical records are destroyed and replaced with fictitious documents, where no one is allowed to question the government. There are plenty of parallels to the current administration and of citizens who haven’t noticed the gap between what the government promises and delivers.
1984 was supposed to be a grim fictitious novel and a warning, not a blueprint for our democracy.
16
Really wonderful op-ed this morning. Every era has its nihilist and dystopian aspects. Maybe it's not technology per se that seems to obliterate any sense of wonder, but a further removal from the natural world into artificial worlds on an everyday basis creates a false reality of sorts. Couple that with bad actors, and negative news cycles, with a constantly in-motion life for most people, no wonder there is burn out and a lack of magic in people's lives.
3
This year I will turn seventy-five years old. For all these years I have thought of myself as an optimist, donating to scholarships for the next generation, seeing air and water improve from the early dismal days of the 1960s and 1970s when the EPA was created. There were other improvements as well as darker periods like the misbegotten Vietnam War, but with some ups and downs we have seen foolish things, but many good advances thanks to advocacy groups like voter initiatives, the sierra Club and so many more local and national activism efforts.
In recent years we have seen backsliding with rollbacks of environmental rules designed to help more than profit margins; we have seen dark clouds gather as education has become more for the wealthy and future debtors, tax cuts for the rich, lies so commonplace in the presidency that they are laughed off by millions of people, we are mired in wars which should not have been started to begin with. We have a Congress which seems to be so polarized that only solid majorities of a single party will either make progress or further ennoble groveling to money interests. There are occasional bright spots, and I hope to see them turn into bright stars in our American constellation, where we can again be leaders in the world, and respected for our values, but that can not happen until after the next election cycle, at the soonest. either there will be a change of heart or change of office holders.
4
Brilliant column as usual Ms. Goldberg. It seems as if you and Mr. Gibson are channeling my inner thoughts.
3
Just maybe then it'll be ready to face the reality of how bad things are and grow the backbone required to fix them... then feel free to be awed. I will be.
1
Unless we throw off the yoke of global corporate influence and the divisive nationalisms promoted by it, we have no future. Even in doing so, the odds may be stacked against us but at least we might have the chance to address the threats to a livable world we have created and to adapt to changes.
3
When and why did we become afraid of the future? I agree with Gibson. Fear of the future is fear of the present.
When and why did we become afraid of the present? My theory: 9/11 and climate change.
9/11 made people afraid and was also an inspiration to demagogues and those two things "clicked".
Climate change exacerbates existing tensions and problems, which in turn encourage and feed demagogues.
4
I agree. I think 9/11 has deeply traumatized us.
1
@Cary Fleisher - 9/11 didn't phase me at all. I grew up with Duck and Cover in grade school. The older I get, the less afraid I become.
Right now, everyone is freaking out over the Chinese virus. I had measles as a kid, lost my first bf to AIDS back in S.F. in the early 80's, and have now had HIV for about 20 years. The first American case is sitting 10 miles from me. It doesn't phase me at all. Its just another virus.
Climate change? I once lived in Orlando in a tiny trailer with no A/C. Then I moved to the west coast where I have gone through more quakes than I can remember. And I grew up in the midwest with constant threat of tornadoes. Mother Earth and I are cool.
@tom harrison, I'm with you. I'm excited about the future and I don't live in fear. But a lot of other people aren't and do.
The importance of Awe and Wonder:
The Winter my husband was dying he said to me: “I hope I die in Spring. When flowers are blooming and leaves are coming out. And that will cheer you up.”
That was last Winter. He died in April. And indeed flowers were blooming and leaves were budding and coming out.
What a gift!
For many decades he had quoted to me his favorite poem - in Spanish (by Juan Ramon Jimenez). It’s first and last lines are the same (his English translation): “And I will go... And the birds will remain. Singing.”
He was not afraid to die. He had that capacity for awe and wonder. You might enjoy the poem:
https://lyricstranslate.com/en/el-viaje-definitivo-final-journey.html
12
Power, has been consolidated, certinly in the U.S. and Russia and China. With that, literally most of the money/wealth is in the hands of just few people. The system is rigged, obviously.
When Sanders says there should be free healthcare and free college, what does everyone say? How, will you pay for it? They automatically assume the money will come from the the very people that are just getting by, the middle and lower classes. American citizens with more money then all of the lower middle classes combined aren’t even figured in the equation. There needs to be revolutionary change to election rules corporate monopolies and tax policies. Society, has lost it’s optimism.
7
It’s difficult to feel optimistic about the future when large percentages of the world’s people seem willing to abandon the commitment to tolerant, open, just societies in order to serve personal greed and ambition.
Looking at many countries including China, Russia and increasingly the United States, the formula for modern tyrannies seems to be:
(1) concentrate wealth and power in political, judicial and economic elites who serve each other,
(2) offer basic material comfort, entertainment and pleasurable distractions to those who agree to serve the elites without question,
(3) target, kill, punish and/or marginalize truth-tellers, dissenters, the poor and the weak, and
(4) use social media and propaganda networks to fuel tribal identities and rivalries and create “enemies” - distract and divide.
Trump, his GOP and their ultra wealthy backers including propaganda king Rupert Murdoch understand and practice the above, with increasing brazenness and lawlessness. Putin’s KGB-incubated dream to make America as corrupt and miserable as Russia is is coming true.
2020 is a make or break year for our Republic if we still seek to be a society of, by and for the people in which elections are free and fair and lawbreaking and corruption are punished.
Many of us will work hard to push back on the
current march toward corrupt authoritarianism. We haven’t given up.
24
In my youth, I never could have imagined that in my twilight years I'd be thanking my lucky stars for being old and childless. But there you have it.
23
Michelle Goldberg column rang so true for me. I’m 76 and worry so much about my children and grandchildren. I keep looking for signs of a better future. Elizabeth Warren seems to offer me hope for ordinary people like me and my family. Keep Democracy. Fix climate change. Put money in a person bank account. Fingers crossed.
12
I work in the creative sector and I can't help but feel a resonance between this piece and the work being created by artists and designers today. Take popular film, for example - it seems that most movies being made today are reboots or retreads of old tropes - nostalgia films. Even when done well they show no capacity for envisioning a future or telling a new story. Fashion also seems to be retreading the past where every collection is a take or a commentary on fashions of the past. It's been a long time since I saw something new come from creative communities, and I mention that because when the visionaries (prophets?) can't envision a future, then we are certainly doomed.
9
A century ago, science-fiction emerged – peeking into a future when humanity would realize and leverage all the furthest-out notions of the most forward-thinking authors, on information, energy, and transport technologies…
To level-set, the time of Einstein – but before the time of Schrödinger…
Global-scale chemical industry in full bloom – an increasing number of humanity’s essential molecules being synthesized, along with some discretionary ones…
But ideas and souls remained mysterious, Sigmund notwithstanding – more edict from the presbyterate, than ineptitude from the laboratory…
Fast-forward back to now – let’s see how things turned out:
> For info tech, what’s commonplace far outstrips what authors imagined. As recently as Star Trek, communicators more car-key fob than even a sad excuse for smartphone
> For energy tech – polar opposite. Once we lit up a big one (1/1/52) and glued a big-enough gas tank onto a semi to haul us to the moon (7/16/69) and back – if anything, we’ve gone backward
Coal has been a constant
> For transport, still seeking wormholes and hyperdrives. I’d settle for a pair of class 6 rapids a few time zones apart, where I capsize going down into one, and right myself coming up into the other
> Industrial chemistry. If you have to ask how much – you can’t afford it
Which leaves us our ideals and souls, as the only way ahead…
And stubs, of course – the linearity of crowd-sourced narrative suddenly seems so brutal and arid…
If nothing much new were invented for 100 years and all efforts were to bring society up to the best levels now possible, why would you despair? Although medicine would suffer stagnation with current drugs and treatments, it would be available throughout the world. Everyone would live in nice homes, eat healthy foods, commute in non polluting ways, have access to the best technology available today and enjoy a world where climate change had been arrested.
4
Ms. Goldberg's column is a good indicator of the Progressive mindset of the moment. Today, she writes of the darkness of the future (or at least her vision of the political future), which is an indicator that she thinks the impeachment trial isn't going well. If it were going well, her column would be devoted to a triumphant shout of success. And, if Bernie or Joe or Mike were to somehow win in 2020, her fear of the future would be banished.
She said nothing of impeachment. Your comment is baseless. Also, this isn’t an article about her pessimism. It’s an article about the pessimism overtaking many around the World. That’s not opinion. It’s fact.
1
My hope is that our very real fears can become transformative. "The Future" was often packaged with a giddy and childlike optimism that blinded people to the downside of out-of-control industrial and technological expansion. Past generations were told that unfettered global industrialization would eliminate poverty and even work itself, to create a permanently affluent leisure class. In my own time, social media was widely marketed as the tool that would finally knit all the peoples of the world together into one big happy family. None of this was true. Hopelessness is destructive, but fantasy, magical thinking and marketing spin are equally catastrophic in a crisis. Maybe we'll all be better off if people start thinking about the future with their eyes wide open, not clouded by rosy visions and fogs of wonder.
3
Will this shrinking world ever be able to work together to solve common problems? We are the richest and the most powerful nation in the world, but trump tells us how mistreated we are. We are told how we are taken advantage of and how the outside world is trying to rob and steal from us. America has been blessed with the most productive piece of real estate in the world, but when the natural world quits working like it used to we will have the most to lose. Young people should be worried about the future as they will be left to solve the problems we are now creating and ignoring.
1
The future exists where people choose to find it. For example, a very popular novel series, The Expanse, exists in a world where climate change risks are realized, wealth inequality gets worse, and authoritarian governments with huge power. Yet, the novel series still has a hopeful tone simply because humans are still alive. Just from current technological trends, there are colonies on the moon, Mars, major asteroids, and throughout the solar system. There are opportunities for upward mobility and high culture. When push comes to shove, people pull together. That is the hopeful but realistic future that you can find if you look outside any but the most basic sources.
2
Great column. I grew up in the 1960s and 70s and the scale of change between Americans' sense of the future then and now is indescribable. The ugliness and existential threat of corporate capitalism run amok is now clear, as is the need for international institutions with power and a commitment to benign action.
13
It took me about three months to recover from the shock of Trump’s election and three years thereafter to realize that what happened had been in the making since the founding of our country. What happened? Pretty simple. Our constitution has certain inherent structural deficiencies that can only manifest themselves under cultural conditions that involve high levels of political polarization; I.e., polarization on a national level in which the country is divided into roughly two groups that are politically and culturally opposed to each other. When this level of polarization arises, we move beyond gridlock into the realm of anti-democracy because our constitution is biased in that it give greater weight to the will of rural Americans than urban America. I won’t spend the time detailing these differences but I will call your attention to one simple fact that reflects this situation; namely, 52 of 100 United States senators are controlled by 18 percent of the population.
16
Yes, depression and anxiety are rising, but I'm not sure Michelle Goldberg points to the right reasons.
Depression and anxiety among young people started rising dramatically in 2011 -- when smartphones started becoming ubiquitous. Social pressures on middle school and high school kids skyrocketed as their lives moved from the real world to Instagram. Now, they can be "cancelled" for saying the wrong thing!
We live in a much less tolerant and forgiving world. Social justice warriors crusade against the "white supremacist patriarchy" (i.e. white men). Anything someone says or does, even as a naive kid, can be regarded as a character-defining moment for the rest of their life. Digital history never forgets the smallest detail or misstep.
Forgiveness, one of the oldest of human values, is essentially outmoded by the Culture of Outrage.
Meanwhile, capitalism and income inequality run amok and wreak havoc on the young and the poor.
Good news is we can fix this. Let's start by electing Bernie, the one candidate who isn't beholden to capitalist forces like Goldman Sachs. Let's protect human beings from AI, and the surveillance state. Let's foster human relationships, and ancient values like forgiveness and tolerance. Let's support, as the Europeans have, the right to be digitally forgotten.
We can have a bright future.
6
"It’s a bigger problem for the left, which by definition needs to believe in progress."
The issue is, correctly managing the progress not progress in itself. The right has a view of stopping progress which ultimately results in societal regression but for the wealthy who can control their own progress quite handily. It is a battle between a managed reality or control. It is a battle between the good of all humanity or the good of the few.
2
There was a big storm the other night and I sat out on my porch to watch it. As loose brush was blowing up hill, I wondered what kind of world my son and his (potential) children will live in. We're well-off, so perhaps we will be in some kind of storm-proof, raised bunker. Perhaps my neighborhood will be abandoned, with the less fortunate squatting in my former home.
And this wasn't a moment's fancy; it was just a more vivid version of the fears I have for the future. I feel like we are enjoying the last gasp of a decadent world that is collapsing around us.
6
I remember the 1964-5 World’s Fair, where the visions of the future were exciting and optimistic...Kubrick’s depictions a few years later both utopian and dystopian. Todd Rundgren’s song “Future”, declaims, “ We’re supposed to all drive flying cars, we’re supposed to all have homes on Mars, we’re supposed to live 200 years, we’re supposed to live, we’re supposed to live in the future, (is now).
Ok, we have minicomputers in our pockets and telescreens on the wall, but the future indeed looks more terrifying than awe inspiring. Things took a turn in the 80’s when greed and money took over from spiritual and scientific aspirations for human development. I hope the pendulum will swing again.
3
I think the exact opposite is true, that we are living in a time where the curtain of winters limited light is being lifted, that we have turned this corner of time and are now headed in a different direction. To a place which is already reestablishing our communication capabilities, creating changes at a pace we struggle to keep up with. An awakening on this planet unprecedented in its scope through its own progression into this new light.
Yet the headline reads: The Darkness Where The Future Should Be.
Just what darkness are you talking about. Paint it black all you want except that we are already standing in the light, which at one time may have appeared to be at the end of that heavily wall papered tunnel. Not any more, we are already standing in the light, it's high time we started reading about it.
1
Practically all the great technological improvements in last 75 years have just been refinements of past achievements. We have much faster computers and made them smaller, but they just do more of the same things. Alan Turing, the 1945 computer whiz, could understand in a few hours, everything tech has accomplished. Our rocket ships and planes do not go any faster. Physics just pokes around the edges what real geniuses found in the 1920’s. While we have some great medical treatments, we really do not understand cancer or heart disease that much more. Tech simply has realized most of the devices described at 1960 World’s Fair, but not created any new paths to really new things. With huge leaps in tech understanding, we are left with ourselves to improve the world and we have changed little. Someone from the Dark Ages, given a few days orientation, could navigate our world unnoticed. For all the phrases of about the universe having almost infinite potential for life, we see increasing reasons why we may it for this one.
The concern for future we have could be growing sense that we are hitting the wall and that nothing ahead is going to rescue us. That means we have a long, slow slog ahead for improvements. It is not a bad thing, but it is quite a change from our expectations that we have had almost from birth.
2
There are glimmers of hope. I recently saw the uplifting movie, "Fantastic Fungi." It may seem remarkable that a film about fungi would provide hope, but it did, including some nature-based solutions to environmental degradation. That this little-known science-filled film is filling theaters when it is shown and that it has 100% on Rotten Tomatoes says something about hope. (and fantastic fungi have everything to do with rotten tomatoes!)
Although technology has provided hope in the past, we may be looking in the wrong direction. It has turned out, in many ways, a false hope. The natural world is where our future hope lies, along with science.
8
Having watched the Vice show about the wealthy plutocrats who are investing heavily in luxury "end of days" survival shelters in New Zealand or South Dakota to survive the upcoming apocalypse, it seems that they have information that ordinary people aren't privy to. In fact, there are rumors of underground tunnel in Manhattan for the super wealthy to escape either a bloody revolution, horrific climate event or a terrorist attack reminiscent of 9/11. They have already pre-arranged for speed boats to whisk them out & helicopter them to wherever their alternative underground shelter awaits complete with underground pools, rock climbing walls, game rooms & other entertainment.
There are very few futuristic spiritual seers or experts in pinpointing the zeitgeist that imagine a rosy future given the trajectory of events facing mankind ranging from rising income inequality, civil unrest, cataclysmic climate change events ranging from total devastation like Australia is facing or destruction of habitat which the Caribbean islands are increasingly experiencing. Just in San Juan the combination of hurricanes, flooding, earthquakes & the human misery & corruption that follows is a bell weather caution to the rest of us on the mainland.
Perhaps we live in a computer simulation like the Matrix when machines, through AI or other futuristic constructs, control the world. Humans are used as mere energy to power their world and if we only took the red pill we would wake up to see the truth.
5
@Dunca
I'm surprised you didn't mention the island of Lanai in Hawai, one of the most remote landmasses on earth. A few years ago, the founder of Oracle, billionaire Larry Ellison ($70 billion and counting) bought over 97% of the island, the very same island where just a few decades ago Bill married Melinda (Gates).
Back in the mid-90s, I lived in Honolulu, and one night my husband's best friend took us out to dinner. He
was the construction manager for a hush-hush project on Lanai and after a few drinks, he proceeded to spill the beans.
The goal was to create a self-contained, sustainable community where the ultra-rich could flee to when all hell broke loose -- be it from atomic attack, plague or some other global catastrophe. The uneducated population of locals on Lanai would provide all the labor needed to grow food and keep all the fat cat refugees in the luxurious manner to which they'd become accustomed.
3
“The future is dark, which is the best thing the future can be, I think.” (Virginia Woolf)
This is a wonderful and insightful piece, but it also touches upon a phenomenon wonderfully researched by several historians, especially the collapse of our relation to time as shown by François Hartog (cf. Régimes d'historicité. Présentisme et expérience du temps, 2003; English translation: Regimes of Historicity Presentism and Experiences of Time: Columbia University Press, 2016) and Reinhart Koselleck among others. Hartmut Rosa (Beschleunigung. Die Veränderung der Zeitstrukturen in der Moderne, 2005; English translation: Social Acceleration: A New Theory of Modernity: Columbia University Press, 2015) is another standard reference point. And then, of course, there are such wonderful writers as Ms. Woolf looking ahead in the interwar period as well.
The main reason why we lost the capacity to imagine a future has nothing to do with technology. It is that utopia has been murdered by its own supporters. In Ms Goldberg’s interesting analysis, one date is conspicuously absent: 1991. Remember it? That was the year utopia died. Gibson’s “Neuromancer” was published in 1985, and white its future is dark, there is still alternative in the world: socialism. Already tarnished but still alive and kicking. When it collapsed, so ignominiously; when its people avidly embraced capitalism, nationalism and religion, the utopian left fell into disarray. The American left now is just as hopelessly mired in nostalgia as the right, trying to resurrect the zombie utopia of socialism, as the right as trying to go back to the 1950s that never existed. But utopia is not dead. If you want to see it, read Chinese science fiction. It embraces everything the West fears: technology, space flight, genetic engineering. It retains the forward-looking view of socialism, while ditching the economic foundations of the ideology itself. I lived in China.its
@Mor Socialist utopia never existed and never will. Even the Dutch have abandoned that fantasy.
We've had exponential technology advancements the past three decades; amazing advances in science bringing science fiction fantasies into today's reality.
Unfortunately, humans have not been able to advance and move beyond tribalism, nationalism, racism, and all around general bigotry.
Humans create their own darkness and right now our planet seems shrouded in darkness.
5
It's true, the future used to be inspirational, exciting. As a 60 year old, I remember the awe I felt attending the 1965 World's Fair in NYC, the marvels of nuclear energy, automation, SST's, and visions of future cities under climate controlled bubbles. Hotels on the moon and under the sea! And then the cultural shocks of the 60's came; Vietnam, riots, and later Watergate and the OPEC oil crises. Things were looking kinda bleak by the mid 70's. But then came visions of a more sustainable future; renewable energy, organic food, solar panels on the White House roof, Ecotopia! The 80's killed most of that future, with selfish, runaway capitalism, lower taxes and cheap gas prices being the main focus of a good life. Reagan took the solar panels off the White House roof! I'm glad I grew up when I did, when things seemed so bright and cheery for the future. The 21st century has been pretty nightmarish so far, and I really feel for my kids and their generation.
10
The philosophers have long agreed that time is essentially right now, this moment. We can't go back, but we remember. We can't go forward, but we imagine.
When culminating and current events preclude an image of the future, darkness sets in and we are certainly amidst despair. But there remain pockets of hope and while we may stumble upon them we can also work to create such in whatever milieu we find ourselves.
In the clear language of the day a sense of humor shared is but medicine.
So how are you contending in these times?
4
The planet has likely passed the tipping point. Catastrophic escalation of climate change can be slowed, not avoided. The dark money permitted under Citizens United assures that misinformation and greed will drive the messaging of fear. Fox Propaganda will keep much of the citizenry misdirecting their ire. The polluters will ring every last dime out of fossil fuels and they will not be stopped, even as the ice caps fall, the oceans warm, and once in a century violent weather events become the norm.
For the US, the slim chance to turn things around rests on massive voter turnout in 2020. Citizens must vote in unprecedented numbers to overcome radical gerrymandering, voter suppression, Putin-backed interference, and misinformation. There is no comfort to be had in watching the GOP destroy itself, for it is taking the country with it.
Vote!
13
It's a strange, sad thing to realize that human civilization peaked in 1969. We haven't done anything remarkable since and it looks like we won't do anything remarkable again.
There's a phenomenon called "pessimistic realism", whereby people who are pessimistic tend to be better at predicting the outcome of events than optimists. Jerry Brown said it really well yesterday at the Doomsday Clock unveiling (which most people either ignored or derided, giving further evidence that we are done for): prophets aren't people who predict the future, they're people who warn us when things are getting dangerous.
And nobody wants to listen to that. So we're done.
9
My father, who was born in 1906, said of the Great Depression that times were tough, but at least we had hope. That hope carried America forward.
It's hard to see that hope now. At least without feeling somewhat like Pollyanna.
11
I think it’s cyclical. Millennials are the generation of doom and gloom that future generations will see all too well for their false predictions that the sky is falling. Trust me Chicken Little, the sun will come up tomorrow.
2
@John
I do try to remember that there have been a lot of times when human history seemed bleak and we couldn't imagine a better future: the Cold War, the Industrial Revolution, the Black Death. The thing is, just because things came out okay doesn't mean it was inevitable. Also, "okay" is a relative term.
1
Once, everyone looked up to astronauts. But later, lawyers were all the rage. Then the 'mergers and acquisitions' guys. We turned out attention from space exploration to rapacious hedge funds. Naturally, we have no jet packs in the 21st century.
3
Despite the desperate attempts to push the narrative that Trump changed the way things are basic facts and history tell a different story. Both the political parties and their supporters in the media sold the working class out long ago. The mainstream Democrats ignored that reality in 2016 and they still do today. Still pushing the establishment candidates. Still undermining and dismissing Sanders and blaming Trump's victory on everything but their own failures. Still trying to erase the election and beat Trump. Get ready for a repeat.
4
@Daphne
When the Democrats tried to expand the New Deal and civil rights to include people of color, many of the white working class moved to the Republicans. The Southern Solution sealed the deal.
So who sold who out?
1
While in (one of) the richest, most privileged countries in the world, we have the latitude to harbor emotional and mental pessimism and gloom -- there are hundreds of millions in other locations far, far worse off in about every way.
Somehow our economic boom doesn't seem to boost our collective morale. Maybe we've over-spent, over-consumed, and over-thought our condition, to say nothing of over-neglected the environment, the poor, and the rest of the world.
We're not alone in our hopelessness -- we're in a long, slow, post-war slump perhaps, despite the cheery Fifties boomlet. But we're paying a price for our materialistic obsessions.
John Updike's 1997 novel "Toward the End of Time" also offers a dispirited, dystopian look at America, a time when a war with China destroyed things as we know it, leaving government ruined and thugs in control of neighborhoods -- a truly hopeless situation. The dystopian time Updike posits for his future: 2020. Ouch.
1
I am content. I ran for office, won and am organizing 2020 GOTV and Women’s March. I pour my energy into my community and the resistance. (The media prefers to fetishize Trumpers, not the resistance who build waves) We are a minority-led country and the right is drunk with power. I think you will feel anxiety as long as you have unrealistic expectations of saviors or any nostalgia for the past. Replace your hours of social media & media consumption and with face to face interactions and organizing and you can go to bed night tired and wake up ready to do this.
55
Back in the 60's my good friend Alex wrote in one of his published science fiction short stories that some day soon we would be voting from home via our TV screens. Remotes were wired to the sets back in the day.
We haven't gotten to Alex's' vision of the future due to lack of technology, but, because human's worst instincts and behaviors of cheating, deception and lust for power. A trust that existed then has been destroyed and is viewed as quaint. At every turn, a sci-fi Utopian world view has been replaced by threats to liberty and the pursuit of happiness.
1
After all those fine young men were gassed in the trenches post WWI, the poems written, the shock truly of what had happened left similar views of the future as dark. As well it should have. Then of course was WWII. Even worse. The word genocide becomes a reality, plus destruction, death, mayhem. That was the end of life as viewed and known many said and wrote. End of communism, part one, leads to yet more tough times for many. Look at the Middle East. I don't want to hear about Gibson and his darkness, rather critical writing applied to the realities we face.
2
It’s striking how much attention is focused on the future. What’s going to happen? seems to be a daily obsession for wonder if not a way to channel anxiety. For example, who’s going to be the Dem nominee? Will that person be able to defeat Trump? Who’s going to make the playoff? Who’s going to win the Super Bowl? What’s the weather going to be tomorrow as well as for the next 10 days after that? Yet, the one and only thing that’s available to live is the now ... the present. And though it happens, it’s not being lived! In fact, it hardly seems recognized except in the past by looking back ... and at that, often complaining about what happened in various uncertain and arguable ways for valid understanding. As to the important matter of choosing a president to preside and facilitate American living under the Constitution, it would seem that such a person would exemplify that, in the ways of their regular daily lives. “Promises,” as we should realize now, don’t have much meaning. For example, there’s the “con” we should now realize very, very well. But then there’s also a change in context not anticipated at the time of promise-making. For the next president, which truly is a gamble about the future: Taking a close look of what a candidate to be favored is doing in the now of the everyday may be worth doing.
1
Science is often our foundation for imagining the future; science fiction presents a vision of possibilities based on where current and new science will lead. Speaking as a scientist, I would suggest that the corruption of science itself has clouded that vision.
Merck, the founder of the pharmaceutical company that bears his name, famously said 'We will make medicines to cure human disease - the money will take care of itself'. Now the money is all that matters. We have incredibly expensive biologics aimed at small patient populations (think any therapy with a name ending in 'mab'), while the pipeline of new antibiotics that could save millions in a future pandemic is EMPTY. There are no major efforts anywhere.
NASA used to be the dream destination for young scientists and engineers. Now that our society has ceded space exploration to Elon Musk, it is a shadow of its former self. We have no common goal of adventure and exploration.
Don't be fooled by the blather about STEM education. The only science that anyone cares about at the moment is 'data science'. Our best minds are being funneled to serve not a broad vision of human progress, but the piggish vision of the investor class.
Self-driving cars pose a fascinating scientific and engineering challenge, but they are not a HUMAN priority - except to the investors who stand to make their fortunes by displacing millions of workers. And right now, that is what science is mainly about.
9
Many hopeful signs abound: Dire, "extreme" poverty is on the wane worldwide; technology makes communication possible across continents,increasing global opportunities for educational advancement, friendship and understanding;spirituality, rather than hardened religious identity, is at least emerging if not blossoming; green industries are emerging; birth control is available in the developed world and can become increasingly available in less advanced societies; women's educational attainments are on the rise. The problems are complex, daunting, and frightening enough to keep us awake at night, but we should not give in to despair.Traditional religious authorities warn us against greed and hopelessness - their wisdom is an antidote for fear and an encouragement to meet the needs of the time. Not least, the free press and the much maligned news media have done a great job thus far in at least stemming Trumpery - that is something to give thanks for today.
8
Conflating current political trends with what the next century will bring is not a useful parlor game. Doomsayers have been common in every epoch and have been as wrong in their future predictions as nearly everyone else. Anyway, things aren't so bleak.
3
This column shook me to my core, as many of Michelle’s columns do. But I wonder, is there really no hope for the future? My daughter is in her 30’s, her friends and he kids of my friends continue to have babies, move forward in their careers, get more education. My daughter is about to embark on her PhD and I know she will have great impact on many people in her profession. I wonder, is this hopelessness partly due to the perspective of being older, and having a more rosy (but flawed) memory of the old days? I know Michelle is relatively young, but her profession forces her to be immersed in the political life. As for the young people in y orbit, I don’t see the dread that I feel.
4
As human nature freshly reveals at the center of its soul that dark nihilism many people still refuse to acknowledge--as it displays the early intimations of horrid propensities both undeniable and familiar to anyone with eyes, ears, and a sense of history--the clear eyed and observant among us most undergo a spiritual reset, an interlude, during which we recalibrate our expectations and instincts.
To remind ourselves that real human evil never goes away forever, even when you wish it would.
But the war for the future of the human soul will be rejoined. Of that, you should have no worry.
3
After reading this insightful column, for some reason a quote from St. Augustine came to mind: "Thou hast made us for thyself, O Lord, and our heart is restless until it finds its rest in thee." Personally, I think this might explain some of Buttigieg's appeal -- his acknowledgement of the transcendent and his emphasis on being better people and a better country. I also look forward to reading the new books by Gibson and Douthat.
2
"Ross Douthat mourns the death of the “technological sublime,” writing that our era 'for all its digital wonders has lost the experience of awe-inspiring technological progress that prior modern generations came to take for granted.' "
Years ago, my father and I went to see 2001: A Space Odyssey when it first came out (in Cinerama no less!). As we left, he claimed not to have understood it, but fast forward a few decades. He mused about our ventures into outer space, "I don't think they're going to find what they're looking for out there." Which is to say, he understood what Kubrick was trying to say very well indeed.
Amazon is a wondrous thing until you learn about how Amazon works. A USB stick that holds a terabyte of information is a wondrous thing until you realize that most of what you're holding on it are pictures of your dog, or you read about how lithium is mined.
The problem with the future is that we now know what it takes to make it work and aren't so sure whether the trade offs are worth it.
4
Marx covered this ground a long time ago. Widespread, enigmatic despair is the very predictable symptom of the capitalist hegemony. Time to address the elephant in the room Michelle.
6
To get to 2050 we need serious politicians, acknowleging facts, to deal with serious problems. We don't need someone showing up in the Senate with a snowball to diecredit climate change. And we don't need an electorate who take that performance as proof that a serious problem doesn't exist.
12
This is the darkness and sense of futility presidential candidate Andrew Yang reflects on in his book, "War on Normal People" He connects the dots between the mindset of scarcity, AI, and automation and their effect on normal people. He has some interesting answers.
He is the only candidate addressing the issues and their impact on humanity.
8
@Stephie I agree and wish that he could make it but think not. Still, he's made an impression on us and others and surely will continue to use his brains and thoughts in some public capacity. Look forward, he says, not backward. His ideas in particular on automation and the future workplace as well as his application to humanity overall.
2
@Stephie Part of the story with candidacy is to bring forth important views that have been invisible to most people. Though some decry having so many candidates, some may celebrate it for this reason. There's a lot do consider. This is certainly the Democrats' strength.
2
Tried to comment on another article, but missed the deadline. With a little tinkering, it can apply here by picking up on “…but he can’t imagine his way out,” and from the sub-title: “loses its capacity for awe and wonder at things to come.”
I’d add to the latter: or imagination for what could be, in this case transformation towards a green economy.
Two columns yesterday gave us guidance.
Kara Swisher uncommonly extended green tech to food ecosystems (assuming she actually means critters) and fashion. She added ideas not usually seen in the mainstream: the circular economy and carbon neutrality—and from big companies.
There are more ideas out there, such as green design (which includes biomimicry); social entrepreneurship; corporate social responsibility (at its best; not its evil twin, corporate irresponsibility), something missing from the Green New Deal; and ideas from Tim Wu about a new capitalism. And, as Wu says, companies have to show their sustainability pledges are more than virtue signaling.
We need to get past the mindset barriers.
When I’ve tried to tell this to policy makers, enviros, academics, reporters, they do not respond. We ignore this opportunity, maybe because it doesn’t fit either the left’s or right’s narratives about capitalism, as well as that lack of imagination.
Even if skeptical, wouldn’t you want a redefined business on this side of this ultimate challenge?
I’m not against the gloom theme in this piece, but this could be a part of the way out.
2
This article makes it all seem so monumental. It is more simple but requires something from NYT and other responsible news sources. The US, Australia and the UK are all being driven into decline. The common denominator is Fox News which has monetized ugly identity based propaganda. It is designed to grind the wheels of any progress to a halt because that is the strategy of the fossil fuel industry to maintain their position and profit. Responsible news outlets must begin to call Fox out and drive it away.
28
I am more concerned about the Trump America in the near future. He has turned our society into an angry mob of fact deniers and bullies.
The behavior of Republicans in Congress is outrageous and dangerous for all Americans.
13
The current “times they are a-changing” video is the bookend to 2016’s “They've all come to look for America”. In both, Bernie’s people seem to have a finger on the emotional heartstrings of what motivates Americans. Four years ago, it was that America is the destination of hope for millions of desperate people around the world who yearn for a better, safer life. This time it is that America must remake itself to become what we always wanted it to be. In both, there is unbridled confidence that we can be the hope for the world and that we can accomplish what we set out to do. And more than anything, these videos serve as an antidote to the cynicism of Trumpian ideas that “we are full” and can’t help those who need us, or that we have to go back to a past that never was.
2
A rare Michelle Goldberg column not wed to the immediate political issues of the day. Good to take a step back and be more overarching and reflective sometimes. Gives David Brooks a run for his money.
3
We’re just living too long. That’s what happens in a graying society. People look to the past rather than to the future. I know we’re overpopulated but we need more babies and fewer old folks. How to make that happen without a massive atrocity, I have no idea.
3
@Agarre The attack on "old folks" is misguided. There is a lot of wisdom and history in them. Most of the elderly I know don't look at the past, are concerned for the future beyond their own lifetimes.
There has been research on "the grandmother gene" that explores how humans are unlike other species in that women live beyond reproductive age for a reason. It had to do with the survival of the young in the tribe. Both elderly women and men have a lot to offer but if they are just warehoused in facilities for the old, this does not happen.
The attack on the elderly relies on stereotypes, just like the attack on any other group. I'm always shocked to see it coming from people on the left who would object loudly if we stereotyped any other group. And even the hint of "how do we solve this problem" is beyond the pale. There is no problem with too many of this group.
On the other hand, when the elderly are in agony and wish to die, we need a humane solution like some other countries have for end-of-life exit. The key here is that they themselves want it.
5
@Agarre the bulge of us Boomers has already begun to die out...and, yes, "we're overpopulated", but do not need more babies per person (and fewer in some countries)...
2
@Agarre
So which team are you on, team Logan's Run or team Soylent Green?
Looking forward, beyond the feedlot to the slaughterhouse. We have better communication than we used to.
2
It is easy to succumb to the bleakness that seems to permeate everything these days. To counter it, I repeat to myself my favorite mantra: "It is better to light a single candle than to curse the darkness". We must try to make things better, but if we can't do it on a grand scale, then at least do what little we can to stay sane and happy. Don't give in!
11
What an appropriate opinion column for the first Friday in the impeachment trial. If there has ever been a week that signals that America does not have a future, this has been it. When Donald Trump took office three years ago this month, almost half of America was still in shock. After his first few months in office, I knew that we were right to fear the worst. Since then Trump with the total approval and support of the Republican Party and almost half the country, has proceeded to destroy and corrupt almost every area of our government and culture from education to immigration to religion to foreign policy to morality. Distopian is a word that I would use to describe the America in which I now life. There is no appreciation for facts, truth, education, the arts, science. You name it and all of our finer qualities and senses have been ridiculed as elitist and unpatriotic by Trump, his administration and his political party. We stand on the cusp of the destruction of America and its three co-equal branches of government. Our GOP Senators literally hold the future of our country in their votes in the next few days. Yes, indeed, your column reflects my mood--and the mood of many Americans who are fearful of what the next days and weeks will bring after the verdict in Donald Trump's impeachment trial in the Senate.
4
“ Freedoms just another word for nothing left to lose “.
The REAL meaning of MAGA.
November.
7
Hope is preferable to the alternative. Not saying it's easy to stay hopeful. (I have apocalyptic nightmares regularly.) But from personal tragedies (terrible losses of loved ones, much too young) when I did not know how we (those affected) could go on, I was reminded that the human race is still here because we are survivors. (Cave(wo)man life was hard! So was pioneer life, and life during the Civil War or Great Depression.)
Yes, there are huge challenges. As others have said, if only WE can work together, and WE (everyone) can bring forth our COMMON humanity, decency and kindness, we can do it. This is not being Pollyanna, this is possible.
3
Hillary won and Brexit never happened? Might have to go back to a young kid called Monica, and electing Gore instead. Then, there would be no war in Iraq, no refugees in the middle east, no ISIS, no fascist Europe, no Brexit, and no Donald.
Regarding the loss of wonder from tech advances. Movies spoiled us; made far off tech seem all to real and accessible. I think a real light sabre will now evoke a yawn. Who needs tech to evoke wonder? We have all that from our leaders. Trump evokes giddy joy; his promise of removing immigrants and producing Valhalla has his peeps ready to embrace Russia in their enrapture. Who needs tech? Bernie similarly triggers wonder. Young kids can all but sink their teeth into free college, forgiven loans, no worries about healthcare, and a free life in parents' basements for ever. I am sure he will then give them free cars and pay their rents - taking money from millionaires and billionaires.
1
Just wait for Tinderillow to come out: point it a prospect at a bar and, based on his or her, rental or ownership status, optimize your dating choices.
Oh good ... more ways to be depressed ... thanks!
2
The dystopia began in November 2016, and can be repaired in Nov. 2020.
4
Ah, yes, the Winter of our Discontent. The good news is that the darkness we see is solvable and the solutions are related.
First, climate change can be solved. We have the technology, but it's going to take leadership and money to make the transition to a green future. Imagine, though, a future where the air and water are clean, where plastic doesn't clog up our waterways, where wildfires aren't raging year around.
Second, economic inequality can be solved, too. Instead of allowing billionaires and corporations to horde money, we need to find ways to cycle it back into the lives of everyone. Imagine a world in which people can afford food and housing, where schools are fully funded, where capitalism allows innovation rather than protecting the wealthy.
These problems have the same source: The shameful greed of the elite. If we want everyone to look forward to a bright future, we need to break the wealthy's grip on our common resources. It's been done before. If the elite were wise, they would look back on history to see that those revolutionary periods tend not to be kind to them.
I'm actually optimistic about the future. It's a better future within our grasp, just beyond the darkness.
762
Bravo! As I said to R.P. in a comment above, we do have the technology to solve the challenges ahead. Possibly we also have the fortitude to persist and persevere towards success and the future you describe. I am guardedly optimistic and in the mean time I’ll have two of whatever your drinking!
71
Thank you for this ray of hope, really. So, which candidate are you backing in the primaries? I would like vote for someone with such a positive outlook.
40
Yes, Crossroads, solutions are within our grasp. Those solutions are incompatible with current business plans, but business is starting to recognize two new truths. First, people can make money on green investments. Second, people can lose money on carbon investments. See Blackrock. Microsoft. Global investors.
When the people with money place it on the green economy (sustainability as a primary growth factor) then the leaders will follow with policy that will align with those green priorities.
Can this happen fast enough to avoid catastrophe? Unknown, Captain.
60
Technology (including “defense” technologies and the 70 year old suicide pill of nuclear weapons waiting to be used) probably casts more of a pall on the future than climate change, because it undercuts the foundation of democracy & freedom of thought that would empower us to change. Because we’ve already convinced ourselves, or rather, technology has convinced us by making us dependent, that technology & its takeover of society are inevitable, immune to democratic control or regulation. We’ve convinced ourselves that it’s something we have no right or ability to control. If climate change is killing us, the algorithms can just keep us training our anger and our hope in impotent ways.
3
This is a very important piece by Ms Goldberg, honestly reporting what many of us feel deep within our souls. Thank you, Ms Goldberg, for your bravery in writing it!
However, I will quibble with one of her key passages:
"It’s still possible, of course, that someday people will look back on the dawn of the 2020s as a menacing moment after which the world’s potential opened up once again. But that would seem to require political and scientific leaps that are hard to envision right now, much less stake one’s faith in."
Ms Goldberg mentions "scientific" and "political" leaps, but I argue that only the "political" leap is necessary. There is hope here: Science still has the power to save us all, but the problem seems to be that it is only possible for a young scientist, these days, to find work at a defense company, or else selling their souls to the corporate empire where they might streamline business processes and surveil potential customers. There are not many opportunities for young people with technical talent to apply their talents to the greater good.
Here's a rough road map of the "political leap" we all need:
1) take back our government from the fossil fuel barons, military industrial types, and healthcare racketeers;
2) invest in public education;
3) redirect the efforts of our scientists from building bombs to addressing climate change.
This political leap may be difficult, but our salvation is scientifically possible. It's not too late.
6
I think the answer is in this piece: The dread is due to "desperate longing for kindness and solidarity to replace the cruelties of a society devouring itself, but also a grief-stricken apprehension of what’s in store if [we] don’t."
I grow more exhausted each day at the overall unkindness of politics, human interaction and how our priorities are ordered.
If we want a future that isn't dreadful, it means working together to get there. An overall effort to address climate change, an overall effort to listen to rather than dismiss views of others and an overall effort to give everyone a stake in a shared future.
We've missed the boat so far. If we keep devouring the planet and each other, we're done for. And the despair is that whether we admit it or not, the constant battle of views, absolutism, demonizing of other is simply exhausting and depressing.
It's "we". Not "they". And that's missing entirely from all current political discourse and most interaction with others at this point.
845
@KKW
To find the underpinnings of "a society devouring itself," look to the founder of modern capitalism, Adam Smith, to whom unchecked selfishness was the engine of progress, and his pernicious influence on Darwin.
These two have helped return us to a pre-civilised Hobbesian "war of all against all" - a pretty good description of today's capitalism, which has infected so much else in contemporary life. Me first, later for everything else, this is both our natural state and history's best - and natural - course.
Some of the consequences: Climate tragedy, toxic politics, hyper-partisanship, social shattering, you know the roll call.
Of course, there are other visions, put forth by figures with names like Buddha, Jesus, Gandhi, ML King, Wendell Berry, etc., etc.
A good place to find the "kindness and solidarity" you seek is anywhere above the bottom line.
82
@KKW Unfortunately, “they” don’t think that way or care about compromise.
23
@arty
agree with everything you say but it's unfortunate adding the snark at the end about "book" - keep writing about your more accurate take on Smith and Darwin - we need it (nice phrase; "transcendent spiritual understanding of our existence")
You write well, Please use your gift to inspire. Maybe you might think of starting a blog (or better still, a vlog) on this? Presenting inspiring visions of possibilities for fostering a widespread more "transcendent" understanding of our existence?
14
"Folks are usually about as happy as they make up their minds to be."
Abraham Lincoln
A thoughtful piece by Michelle.
I wonder to what extent mainstream media profits by painting a gloomy picture of the future, at least during this administration. If Jan 2021 were to see the inauguration of Klobuchar or Warren, would the NYT paint an overly rosy view of the future?
I like Gibson's work - a lot - but I think he and Michelle and others are a few years behind blue collar midwesterners in arriving at a gloomy outlook. Also, I suggest that an autoworker from Michigan or a farmer from Iowa might not be feeling quite as hopeless as Michelle or Gibson seems to feel now.
Over dramatizing the impact of the Trump presidency appears to be more virulent on the coasts and in university settings than the Wuhan virus is in SE China. Would an HRC presidency have substantively changed climate issues? Would Clinton have somehow put the tech surveillance/intrusion genii back in the bottle?
In Neuromancer, the main character, a flawed and limited data nerd, refuses to get caught up in the petty corruption and politics of his day and instead goes on to accomplish something remarkable. A lesson for us all.
Well put, but I wonder if Michelle read a Times article about the
possibility of a new democracy wave to come, by Lee Drutman:
"Trump’s Election May Have Been the Shock We Needed
American political history suggests that an age of renewal lies ahead."
www.nytimes.com/2019/11/25/opinion/trump-politics.html?searchResultPosition=1
I sense that 2020 could be the time for a new democracy wave.
The insanity and evil of Trump may inspire the US to improve.
See the prophetic "Democracy" song of Leonard Cohen (1992)
"Democracy is coming to the USA"
Can the Times write about a new democracy wave and the song?
"Democracy is coming to the USA"
1
I've always loved your writing Michelle, and this is a very poignant one. What worries me most is not even the possibility of a deeply challenging future, but rather the kind of people who will have the most sway in it. Should it be the Trumps, then I really see no salvation for the world. Trump wants to hawk the American military as a security force for hire throughout the globe. That's the "brilliant" future he offers. Talk about a "very stable genius."
1
My question is, what does “society” mean?
Only 56 years ago, police in the American South were committing crimes against humanity in order to try to crush the Civil Rights Movement.
Only 42 years ago, the US government was taking Native American children and forcing them into schools that were designed to strip them of all of their identity. The boarding schools may have stopped, but the government continues to try to destroy indigenous communities every day. Just look at what happened to the Standing Rock Sioux. And that happened under Obama’s tenure. He could’ve stopped that.
In the early 1990’s Americans defended George Bush and the air strikes on the highways of death. Yes, highways. As in, there were multiple highways of death.
In 2002, Americans were defending and even demanding the invasion of Iraq, even though the rest of the planet knew there was no justification. That war cost hundreds of thousands of Iraqi lives, and thousands of American lives and $3 Trillion to the United States.
“Society” was never forward thinking. It’s an incredibly privileged idea that it ever was. The truth is, Trump’s policies aren’t really any different from any other administration. The only real difference between Trump and previous administrations is that Trump says the quiet part out loud instead of hiding it.
6
This is such a sad piece - as a fan of Mr. Gibson, I think he does speak for so many of us - because so many of us are walking around saying, "I can't believe it IS happening here." As a Jewish American, I grew up thinking exactly the reverse, "well something like the Holocaust could never happen again or here." I wish I could believe Mayor Pete - but of course I'm more afraid that trump will win a 2nd term (Lord knows he's not going to be removed from office) - so he'll be even more unrestrained. Let the oligarchy begin. So sad for our country.
7
When a human being of any age loses HOPE and some idea of a bright future of choices they die in many tangible ways and sometimes succumb to earthly existence from inconsolable grief of the collective consciousness.
Our primal screams and original sin of slavery are locked into our collective DNA. Unless we lance the wound and remove the pus then let the wound heal slowly with packing daily and irrigation’s to cleanse out the exudate of granulation which ultimately will heal the gaping wound with a keloid scar ..... perhaps then our slavery past and racialized present will be irradiated from an inclination toward hating each other because trump directs a bunch of unhappy infectious miscreants in public office.
Yes Michelle .... do weep for the kids. I weep for you. In the 1960’s we students had no idea our public school curriculum was designed to proselytize and propagandize our love of the country our immigrant families settled in years before or as WW 2 refugees in classrooms across America.
Some had opportunities to attend private schools where the messages were different.
I attended both. In one i should serve ;in the other I should receive. So wealth improves our chances at success.
It isn’t altruism and luck that started America.
I just found out during our American Revolution the Tory sympathizers in southern mid Atlantic colonies escaped fighting the Brits by relocating to Florida. Florida was a diehard Tory area. Explains a lot related to corruption . Today.
2
“Our problem is not just that new technologies regularly fail to thrill. It’s that, from artificial intelligence to genetic engineering to mass surveillance, they are frequently sources of horror”.
After reading this Op-Ed, I realized the turning point in my 21st century life happened when my iWatch fell off my arm without my notice. My reaction was relief, not panic. I was tired of all the beeping, pinging, and phone ringing on my wrist. I was frustrated with my wrist watch telling me to stand up while I was driving the car; and to breathe, when I had never stopped breathing. So, I replaced it with a beautiful 20th century time piece. Now, every time I get an online message for an Upgrade or and Update on my computer and iPad, I respond in dread. Now what? What are they taking away from me now? What will I need to master now? And, NOW when I read the NYT, the pop-up ads are a real distraction with movement right in the middle of a good article ... targeting me by my online searches, age group and gender. When will this end? I consider myself to be an OPTIMIST, but life seems to be living me, not me living my life; though my mantra continues to be “I am the positive creative force of my own life”! I took a recent 5-day sabbatical from all my devices just to remind myself of that mantra. Time away from being manipulated by the outside world helped a lot.
5
@JAY
Yeah I understand.
At 69 I spent a lot of my life without a cell phone, voice controlled appliances etc.
I had a cell phone and got rid of it, I became annoyed with the marketing calls, the messages telling me I need to buy auto repair insurance, I need to update this and that. I don't own a car as I have a neurological condition that causes spasms I do not feel. My Doctors advised me to stop driving. At first I informed the cell phone callers of this requesting they leave me alone the calls did not stop. Then there were the other calls disgusted I got rid of the phone.
I cover the cameras on my tablets and stopped using my notebook computer even with the camera covered due to the demand to install "updates".
By mistake I hooked up a Bul-Ray to my router and less than a week later it stopped working. I unplugged it and when reconnecting the power it worked again.
So I completely understand your frustration and your not alone there are quite a few of us.
Just an old white man's opinion...
Brilliant, provocative piece, Ms. Goldberg, one of your best in my estimation. Yes, the era of Trump has savaged the optimism I now realize i used to be cloaked in. Republican cyborgs surround me, parroting not so much a clean, defensible rationale for the politics of self-gain as an underlying hatred for the "old" politics of caring for the poor and having a heart. I pray for the soul of America, and pray I'm continually given the strength to walk the narrow path of clear perception. You have helped me sort my own feelings.
6
When Reagan was president, I attended a discussion on the plight of poverty and racism in the US. One white audience member suggested that perhaps persistent urban poverty, primarily of African-Americans, was not soluble and that white America—he meant liberals—might as well give up.
An African-American pastor, one of the panelists, responded with great gravitas and emotion that these problems did have solutions if only white people helped advocate for and apply them. He spoke of the hope of people who by objective measures should have none.
The point was to listen to the least of us, those on the outside. White liberals can get wound up in their fear of the future while sipping lattes. Those who make the lattes are busy not just working to survive, but keep things moving forward.
There is never one event or development that makes everything good or bad. It’s a continuing struggle that we all face, but those who can no longer rely on institutional privileges are the ones spinning these tales of future woe.
All this is not to say that the future does not look dark, but what it means is that as Teddy Roosevelt once said, the solutions involve getting right down into the mire to clean things up. And as every housekeeper can tell you, they never stay clean. It’s work and it always continues.
6
Leaders come and go. But climate change will not be stopped until its calamitous effects reduce the human population to such a degree that carbon emissions fall drastically.
3
I'm not at all religious, and I haven't read Mr. Gibson's work (I shall fix that), but I think everyone knows what I mean when I say: God love anyone who can wring art from this this disturbing moment.
8
The former Republican party, now the trump party, and its supporters and elected representation paint a vision that even Buckley would find bewildering. They have gone from “stands athwart history, yelling Stop.” to full reverse without looking at the rear view mirror. Whether women's rights, minority rights, the environment, voting rights, it is full reversal. I have yet to talk to a trump supporter here in red state flyover country that actually contemplates a future other than some 1950's utopia that never existed.
6
Plutocrats have won. Technology has allowed consolidation of the world. Now we just have to hope they don't start fighting each other instead of bleeding us.
1
If you watch and listen to Trump's 2017 Inauguration Speech you get a bleak picture of how everything is wreck in this country (Obama is to blame) and Only He Can Fix It. That speech did nothing to console or to give hope for the future. I have been depressed ever since, because He and Putin have endeavored to make his speech true.
2
You write that technologies are frequently sources of horror, from mass surveillance and snarky anti-social media to robocalls, hacking and trolling. Even baseball, a sport we once escaped to for pastoral relief, has succumbed to, and been tainted by, “tactical tanking” and technological trickery and cheating. It is hardly coincidental that Trump’s manic, cynical twitter bombardments not only parallel, but seem to have ushered in and accelerated and exacerbated, this onslaught of negativity and pessimism. Of course, contrast Colonel Alexander Vindman’s assertion that “here [in America] right matters” with Trump’s recent nihilistic claim that nothing really matters. As Adam Schiff so eloquently remarked yesterday, if right and truth no longer matter in our nation, we are truly lost. I often say that anticipating, looking forward to, events and occasions is as much fun as the activity itself. If we no longer have a future to look forward to, and are thus lost, perhaps this is the winning Trump said awaited us, you know, the kind we would do so much of, it would make us all sick.
2
Good morning to you too, Michelle.
Nothing like a fog of despair with your cup of coffee.
I choose to pass through the fog and start my day. I will have breakfast with my wife, ride my mountain bike and look at the distant Rockies and then pick my granddaughter up after school. We will play a game of Clue and laugh. We'll have fruit and cookies.
Then I will drink heavily, curse at Mitch McConnell and sleep.
Tomorrow will be sunny here in Colorado.
I've had a good life, earned a living without doing harm, and now all I can do is love well every day.
Love well every day.
14
Two things:
1. William Gibson is almost 72. What role do you suppose that plays in his thinking?
2. Michelle Goldberg basically says there is no future to think about because of climate change. Dare we think about the possibility that climate change isn’t the death sentence so many think it is?
@KJ McNichols
Climate change and ecosystem collapse (mass extinctions on land and in the seas, dwindling acquifers, diminishing arable land, pollution) will likely lead to wars over the increasingly scarce resources and a death sentence for many.
The fear that this article so graphically expresses is in the lies that so many of us tell ourselves and the lies that the GOP and Trump have expressed. Denialism is rampant because it is easier to deny that to do something about it and a lie is only another way to not face the truth. To 'Make America Great Again' was always a way not to live here and now, but to hand our fate over to the greatest liar of them all.
So we must face the ultimate truth of change, our own deaths, the internet, the technology revolution, climate change which is warping the planet not only for ourselves, but our fellow beings and the planet itself. Perhaps fear and lying to ourselves is a natural reaction to changes, but somehow we must all take a deep breath, come together not in denial, but in humility and courage to face the things before us. Survival was always an iffy thing, and as each of us and our society ages facing our future and our now is all we can do. I would say with hope, but sometimes hope while necessary is only a dream.
We'll have the future for which we vote. End of.
1
Men in power, with their winner take all and unmitigated greed, have done us in. Perhaps our women, with dual agenda that includes taking good care of our children and tribes, sometimes at the expense of financial gain, can save us.
4
A: There is no future left. The Jackpot, to coin a term by William Gibson, will be here soon.
1
Think Rome or Greece. It's known as a fall and failure.
3
For a really dark look at the future, you should read Adam Nevill's "Lost Girl." On one level it is a fairly simple tale of a man looking for his infant daughter 2 years after she has been kidnapped. That search, however, takes place against a vivid backdrop of environmental and societal collapse combined with a raging epidemic that makes the Black Death look like the 90 pound weakling. The .01% is richer than ever and allied with even richer religio-criminal gangs far removed from the Soprano family or those envisioned by Martin Scorsese. Australia, Spain, and Portugal are on fire. India and Pakistan are finally unleashing The Bomb. The immigration crisis fueled by the increasing heat makes what we have today look quaint.
The novel is set in the 2050s. Nevill recently said that he thought he had set it too far in the future: maybe the 2030s would have been more accurate.
1
Yes, there's a future--beyond Trump, into some sense of normalcy, where big issues like climate change can be tackled. We're stepping toward the future every day, and when we look back, I'm hopeful that we'll see this dystopian, corrupt Trump era as a turning point of sorts--our wakeup call that we cannot waste any more time. (And btw, Bernie is unelectable. Mayor Pete, a little less so, but still not a winning Democratic presidential candidate.)
1
Imagine, imagine a world where the people live their lives in peace.
You can't, right? You can't imagine it.
So, let's imagine that world in the 22nd century.
How did we get there?
Astonishing new forms of renewable energy?
A massive, world-wide change in our economic structures which easily allowed more than enough food, shelter and clothing for all?
Universal (no, not just one country, the whole planet) healthcare?
Free (or minimally expensive) education for all, from birth throughout life, to the point that all cities are "universe-cities"?
No.
People just one day shifted the way they felt and thought about, well, everything.
It's like suddenly, a tipping point was reached, and enough "butterflies" flapped their wings to great such a "tsunami" of change, that, well, the whole world changed.
Of course, you know, right, that this could never happen. Not in the 22nd century, and not in the 222nd century.
Impossible.
Forget about it - fugget about it.......
No. Absolutely not.
But wait...
What if you're wrong
What if we're all wrong?
How could such a thing be possible, whether in 100 years or 1000 years?
What if we just had the confidence, the trust, if we dared to imagine such a thing?
How might that change things, right, here, right now?
Could this be that moment, the moment we dared to imagine?
www.remember-to-breathe.org
2
What happens to a society that becomes so unequal in wealth, income, property and power that the ties of 'community' unravel? Well, just look around. The fundamental needs of people are not being met, while others bathe in billions of dollars. I 'wonder' about all of these crimes around us. Trump uses this against us; taking advantage of those in need by giving them 'other' folks to hate, and maybe feel better about themselves. What nationalistic dictator hasn't done the same? Our economics are wrecking this place. Our greed and self-centered lives destroy the sacred bonds. Really, who are we?
1
Although I am not at all surprised at the ability of Ms. Goldberg to drum up speculative journalism, I am utterly drop-jawed at her intimation that the interview quotes with William Gibson was with her doing the interviewing. I can assure you it wasn't. That would have been Sam Lieth over at the Guardian, and published several weeks ago. She should made this clear. Give cred where cred is due.
1
Not optimistic. ~40% of my neighbors and relatives look into the abyss and see wonderland. Power addicts are like bad bacteria eating away at the planet with those on the fringes clinging to misbeliefs in the hope of getting a scrap.
2
A good deal of responsibility for the stake in the heart of hope lies at the feet of the Obamas. After campaigning as the Hope and Change savior and given the opportunity to govern in the mold of a modern day FDR, his efforts were less than stellar. Who but the most cynical of offerings should come along to carry on his “legacy” but the most reviled candidate imaginable, a Washington insider awaiting her turn at the trough.
2
Any failure of accomplishment by Obama lies squarely at the feet of Mitch McConnell and the GOP, who thwarted any progress from the get-go. The ACA was only possible because Democrats were in control of Congress briefly. Whatever negatives you wish to ascribe to the very decent Obama, compared to the miserable piece of human garbage that is trump, he was a Saint.
1
Whether it’s “the mule” in Isaac Asimov’s “Foundation Series” the wearable tech in Vernor Vinge’s “Rainbows End” or the surveillance state including facial recognition in several Phillip K. Dick books most of the things mentioned in this story represent well-worn Sci-fi territory. Many sci-fi writers recognized that trading our humanity for the promises of technology would result in a dystopian future where our lives, thoughts and eventually our consciousness are manipulated and controlled by a corporation/governmentally mediated experience of reality.
4
Nonsense.
Trump didn't run a covert stealthy subtle campaign. Every American knew who Donald Trump was and was not and voted accordingly.
Among the 63 million Americans who voted for Trump was 58% of the white European American voting majority including 62% of white men and 54% of white women.
While 66 million Americans voted for Hillary Clinton including 92% of the black African American voting minority made-up of 88% of black men and 95% of black women.
Because our black lives and livelihoods depend upon knowing what white people really think and feel by their actions and inactions we don't pay any attention what white people say and write.
From our humanity denying enslavement to our equality defying separate and unequal tribulations we have survived and thrived much worse than this. And we were nor surprised by Trump.
'Our minds are made-up and we are on the way up' as we ' Lift every voice and sing' because ' Precious Lord take my hand lead me on " and ' I don' t believe that He brought me this far to leave me' and ' that a change gonna come' to make our black lives matter.
5
Wow that was inspiring thank you.
@Blackmamba
Yours and all human lives matter.
I respect your comments if I see your name I read it.
I find what you feel is more in line with many other folk.
I truly hope and pray things will get better.
Just an old man's opinion...
@Blackmamba
Lift every voice and sing
Till earth and heaven ring
Ring with the harmonies of Liberty
Let our rejoicing rise
High as the list'ning skies, let it resound loud as the rolling sea
Sing a song full of faith that the dark past has tought us
Sing a song full of the hope that the present has brought us
Facing the rising sun of our new day begun
Let us march on till victory is won
Stony the road we trod
Bitter the chast'ning rod
Felt in the day that hope unborn had died
Yet with a steady beat
Have not our weary feet
Come to the place on witch our fathers sighed
We have come over a way that with tears has been watered
We have come, treading our path through the blood of the slaughtered
Out from the gloomy past, till now we stand at last
Where the white gleam of our star is cast
God of our weary years
God of our silent tears
Thou who has brought us thus far on the way
Thou who has by thy might
Led us into the light
Keep us forever in the path, we pray
Lest our feet stray from the places, our God, where we met thee
Lest our hearts, drunk with the wine of the world, we forget thee
Shadowed beneath the hand
May we forever stand
True to our God
True to our native land
1
Oh my goodness, Michelle! You’ve fallen into the same wallow as the MAGA folk, I’m afraid, misremembering what you believe was a comfortable past. For MAGA folk, they believe it was a time of their dominance and your submission. For you, you believe it was a time of hope and a bright future. And yet somehow you both still shared the same reality back then.
The future is simply the future. No one - no one - knows what it will bring. There will be challenges and joys, darkness and light, and Earth will circle the sun. And the only power that each of us has is to choose how to perceive what comes next and work for that perception of it. Choosing hope may not always work, but choosing despair always gives the power to determine what comes next to others.
1
"Gibson is famed for his sensitivity to the zeitgeist"
That is not always a good thing in a novel. This is another way of stating that it is a period novel. Some work like War and Peace and Little Women, but most become totally irrelevant after a short shelf life.
"In his forthcoming book, “The Decadent Society,” my colleague Ross Douthat mourns the death of the “technological sublime,” writing that our era “for all its digital wonders has lost the experience of awe-inspiring technological progress that prior modern generations came to take for granted.” This is true, but doesn’t go nearly far enough."
It really depends on what you read. If you look at professional scientific literature or literature on technology, there is plenty to get excited about and plenty that inspires awe. Perhaps this type of literature is not common or popular, even in the NYT, or among its columnists, but that does not mean that it is not there or that there is not reason for awe.
3
“For people on the right, it’s sparked by horror at changing demographics and gender roles.”
As a minority and a Trump supporter, I don’t agree with this at all. I think you are confused by Trump’s view, which is targeted mainly against illegal immigrants, most of whom are low skill and don’t bring much to our tech based economy.
I also think we have a bright future. I work at SpaceX and every day, I see a bright future with us landing rockets and literally aiming for the moon and Mars. At high tech companies that are driving the economy forward, I don’t see many illegals making contributions.
1
@Jay Peters This administration is targeting all immigrants and refugees. I work at a university in a technical college. The Trump administration is making it harder to obtain student visa's. And if they are lucky enough to get one, keeping up with the requirements is difficult for both the student and the university. By denying student visa's, the Trump administration is denying the United State the expertise and contributions of people like our students. I have been faced with students who cannot return to complete their degree, students who are desperate for help who want to stay here to finish their learning and live their dreams and I am powerless to help them. I have to watch the waning light in the eyes of those with bright futures. These people want to make contributions to our country. The Trump administration won't let them.
43
@Rita Rousseau
Immigration and population control is not about discrimination or xenophobia.
To many people, controlling immigration is a matter of numbers and common sense.
The world population has increased from about 3 billion in 1960 to almost 8 billion today (a doubling time of a little over 40 years, assuming exponential growth). US population has increased over the same time frame from about 179 million to almost 330 million (a doubling time of just over 60 years). Both India and China are getting close to 1.4 billion inhabitants, right now.
Population control is not a matter of race or racism, just mathematics.
If we were to divide all of the land area of the Earth (including Antarctica, Greenland, all the deserts and mountains...), equally, amongst all the people of the Earth, each one of us would get about five acres (an acre is slightly smaller than an NFL football field, not counting the end zones).
About 14% of that five acres would be arable, suitable for growing crops. Now, imagine trying to get all your needs for subsistence from that five acres (food, clothing, shelter & materials, fuel and energy, mining...).
If U.S. lands were divided equally amongst its citizens, each would get about 7.4 acres. In India, the number would be about 0.3 acres per person, 1.7 acres for each Chinese.
6
@Rita Rousseau
I support your views. It is my opinion, based on actual observation and general supposition, is that those who make it to this country are generally more ambitious and, in many cases, have more native intelligence than a huge portion of our own population. Many people born here are discouraged:
"I don't have a college degree."
"I have no idea how to start a business of my own."
"My credit rating has been ruined."
Whereas those who come here see opportunity and are willing to sacrifice to achieve something better.
A huge percentage of independent motels across America are owned by immigrants from Asia, especially India. How can this be? What percentage are owned by minorities born in our own country? Of course, one reason might be that hospitality comes more naturally to some people born elsewhere but that is no excuse for Americans not seizing abundant opportunity.
10
For those who don’t know, Gibson is not a cold, distant hard sci-fi writer but rather is a sensitive humanist - no matter how bleak he gets he is a believer in humanity.
1
Terrific piece on the dark future. Spiritual traditions--not to dismiss the possible dark terrors--have always had a path through great darkness. Think of Psalm 137. There is a tunnel. There is faith in light, one way or another. The spiritual life of Abraham Lincoln--my new book--points to his way. Duncan Newcomer
2
My x called me the eternal predictor of doom. So I try to step back from my thoughts and question the darkness of my vision. Is what I see really real? In the past I was able to see some light. That was before climate change changed from being a prediction to being the heat that sparks perpetual and explosive fires in Australia and elsewhere. It was before Republicans became so extreme in their solidarity to refuse to see what is so obvious to the rest of us. It was before the phenomenon of Mitch McConnell and his henchmen in support of the absurd in the White House. I can’t even fathom the alternative facts, the alternative reality they claim to see. When so many in seats of overwhelming power and control refuse to admit what is real, it’s hard to see any light at all.
11
"The dearth of optimistic visions of the future, at least in the United States..."
This stuff doesn't just happen. We create it intentionally, we force the birth and we insist it dominates all alternative futures.
"We", of course being the very wealthy and the political and, these days, the Justices.
We're getting the future Gibson worries about, the future we fight for, defend against all comers.
Its good you singled out America because, except where American business has made hideous inroads, there remain pockets of hope and relatively good behavior.
Once we're gone its reasonable to expect those lucky people will revert to civilized, sustainable ways.
Easy as it is to blame the rich and the endlessly corrupt political, save some spite for the almost poor, the insecure, The Base.
These people just heard their President brag to his best buds how easy its going to be to lay waste to Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid; how nobody will miss the losers who can't get by without handouts; that these are the primary goals of his second term.
Soon Trump will return to America and claim he never said it or, if he did, it was a clever ruse to find some new magic way to give old, poor, unhealthy guys free stuff because, of course, he would never hurt lovable them.
The Base knows how it feels to be a DACA kid, except they're white, they have Red Hats, they seriously think they have nothing to worry about. And they're desperate to believe.
205
@oogada "...how nobody will miss the losers who can't get by without handouts" You mean Trump and the 'Corporate Welfare Kings' whose wealth is based on handouts and the funneling of trillions of dollars to them through tax policies and outright gifts, right?
11
Desperate to believe. That’s really desperate. Smart comments .
5
@oogada
Its obviously time to start over. This broken jalopy of a government is going nowhere fast.
1
We are always in an era of propaganda, though that propaganda changes and there are many players in many facets of life. In the post war period, the space race filled our minds with visions of wonderous technological advancements. The moon shot was largely taken for bragging rights in the face of the USSR. Now, media companies for no other reason than advertising sales, stoke fear.
The stories we tell; religious, political and otherwise, usually serve the interest of a narrow few. The exceptional stories that seek the betterment of mankind like climate change, face cooption and a propaganda war from narrow interests. We should be wary of politicians who seek to divide by appealing to a specific group rather than unite the country and the world against common challenges.
2
The only way this nation can go forward is evict Trump and his Grand Old Phonies from public office.
Their Russian-Republican oligarchic socio-political-economic model is failing the non-oligarchic-class.
Their systematic war on worker wages, regulation, the environment, voter rights, facts, candor, science, healthcare, representative government, free and fair elections, women and 'others' is what has destroyed a level playing field since 1980 when the radical right mastered the dark arts of voter manipulation and Reverse Robin Hoodism.
D to go forward; R for reverse.
It's not complicated.
November 3 2020
302
@Socrates
But there is a fly in the soup of your solution. Some Democrats are as bad as Trump. Clinton passed NAFTA and repealed Glass Steagall, something no Republican had the power to do. Obama passed on Medicare for All when it was within reach, jailed more reporters and whistle blowers, and killed more people with drones, than any Republican president. Biden (the Democrat most likely) has waged a lifetime war on social security that makes Republican efforts pale in comparison. The problem is that the mass of voters have no more patience with standard Republicans or Democrats because both are liars with a history of destroying the middle class. Biden will do just as much damage as Trump, he will just do it a different way. So the choice in November is very complicated if one is thinking in the long term. The problem is really how to change both political parties from representing the rich to representing the average person in a system where only two political parties are allowed and the rich already own both of them. The solution to this problem does not go through the voting booth this November, it comes from revolution.
7
@Socrates Too little, too late. Trump will continue to destroy the USA for another 4 years as nothing has happened to stop fixing the election again. The entire game will be over when the Senate votes to refuse to hear any witnesses next week. Thereafter, I afraid that civil disobedience will be the only option for many. Perhaps we should remember the original Tea Party and the adage NO TAXATION WITHOUT REPRESENTATION. That might get some attention.
2
Re 'our society losing its capacity for awe and wonder at future events', Ms Goldberg: we're in awe and fear and concerned right now about the specter of the viral plague from China pruning Earth's population.1918's Spanish flu and Black Plague redux? Our planet's population has always been pruned by disease, famine and war. Pessimism is the rule of the day, this third day in the Impeachment Trial of President Donald John Trump. The awful message we're receiving in America is that fear is reigning, optimism is dead, and that our existential catastrophe hasn't yet arrived. It is slouching toward us like The Second Coming (HT/ W.B.Yeats1919).
1
There's no problem, big or small, Americans won't ignore. We don't want to be bothered.
5
I've been obsessed with and thoroughly convinced of Gibson's concept of "The Jackpot" since I read The Peripheral when it first came out. Ultimately chilling. I am afraid the Gibson got it almost completely right, except that nanotech will not be there to salvage what's left of the world out.
No reservations required for the express to New Venus. It's comin' at you right now!
1
Frankly the only thing reassuring me at this point is that I won’t be here to see the complete annihilation of everything precious on this fragile planet, including our civil discourse and humanity. I’m hoping to go faster than the imminent destruction. Im glad I’m nearly 73.
5
@Chris Bunz
Amen. I'm a bit younger but will be gone by the time everything hits the fan. And child-free too - thank goodness.
2
Thanks to Ms Goldberg for another highly worthwhile piece. To Mr Gibson in his effort to imagine his way out of the gloom, I offer condolence as well as some hope, slim though it might be. At 70, I still feel young and excited about having fun and being active for many years to come - self-delusion being one of my stronger traits. I have children and grand-children and insist that they have a future in which I can play with them. My delusion has to overcome a mountain of evidence - climate change, nuclear winter, authoritarian governments. It's that last item that ironically gives me hope, short term as it is. If Trump and his gang can be defeated in 2020, there is a chance we can avoid dystopia. If he succeeds, all bets are off. His re-election will be followed by a full and fast effort to dismantle democracy in the US, and continued risks to the climate and humanity. Without a democratic US, there is little hope. So that's it. Get busy and defeat this threat. Gloom is treatable; one needs a plan and to be actively fighting back. I hope Mr. Gibson can find his plan.
7
There used to be a show on TV called Beyond 2000. It was a showcase for technology that were future products.
It was fun but also pretty stupid...in it there were no social improvements. It is still the case ...new tech is some list of products and services for sale and the public is invisible and silent.
A new phone is seen not as a better phone but the Second Coming of Christ.
AI and facial recognition as some form of control mechanism not a helpful aid
It says a lot about the darkness where the good future should be.
The missing element is us and our positive desires.
4
This year marks the 70th anniversary of the George Orwell’s novel “1984” and when one sees the Uighur “re-education camps” in China, the growing potential for the reckless misuse of facial recognition technology, the spread of the most egregious lies and conspiracy theories on Social Media, our politicians and elections drowning in money from Corporations and lobbies, and of course our science/fact rejecting president, it seems clear that as far as the future is concerned we’re sure a lot closer to George Orwell’s dystopian vision than we are to “The Jetsons.”
358
@Susan
You're late; that was last year. From Wikipedia:
"Nineteen Eighty-Four: A Novel, often published as 1984, is a dystopian novel by English novelist George Orwell. It was published in June 1949 by Secker & Warburg as Orwell's ninth and final book completed in his lifetime."
Orwell (pen name for Eric Arthur Blair) is said to have chosen "1984" as a title because he wrote much of the book in 1947 and 1948, and he swapped the last two digits of the year he completed it.
1
@Susan You, second person plural, and the author, are ignoring incontrovertible facts.First, we cannot undo the mistreatment of the Uighur minority. China has too much at stake to allow civil liberties and a free society. That may not be your way of thinking, but it is theirs. Nor can one stop the advance of facial recognition technology,and whether the government @10 Downing Street is Liberal, Conservative or Labour, once a bureaucracy finds a new way of controlling the populace,it will never abandon it!Third, corporations will have an ever greater control over our lives and our politics. Macron, who, while I respect his kindness for abandoned animals,is a product of the "grande bourgeoisie"who have taken over the cities of France, relegated "classes moyennes" and "classes laborieuses" to dreary suburban h.l.m.'s and he follows orders."On ne peut pas faire un pas en arriere!"What each of you can do is , rather than wring your hands in desperation, "faites un beau geste,"like writing to Brigitte Bardot, "la conscience nationale"who is concerned with the well being of helpless 4 legged sentient beings, and adopt 1 or 2, make their lives better.Pebble thrown in a pond will cause ripples, and your altruistic gesture may lead others to do likewise!
1
Only one major disagreement: falling birth rates are not solely due to despair or worry about the future. Birth rates have been falling sharply in every place where women are given economic opportunities, education, and civil rights. The rates starting falling long before the problems discussed in this piece. Economic uncertainty may add to the effect; however falling birth rates are the best hope for the future, and a partial indicator of progress for women.
25
Geez, as if knowing that the next few days will consist of the GOP basically saying they full-throttle support corruption and they can because they have a boot to the neck of the majority of Americans hadn’t already bummed me out, you hit me with this!
Thanks, Michelle. Well, I guess it’s only 6:31 am so things might improve! See, not all pessimism.
16
Remember the "freedom is not free" slogan? These words started anxiety and dread of what is to come among some that experienced true loss of freedom living under authoritarian regimes. It was and still is an incredible strong phrase for people unaware of the consequences resulting in losing the power of change in a democracy.
The Obama era was a small break into the inevitable downward spiral starting with reganomics and the slow but systematic disolution of the American education and heathcare system; two basic pillars for developing and sustaining viable and active citizenry in a functioning democracy.
It takes thought and conscious effort to minimize unwilling participation in social media and resist the artificially imposed "need" to accumulate, consume, waste and destroy the finite resources this planet has.
The continuous message we all get in every possible way is to be the perfect consumers, focused on our individual pleasure, constantly seeking for thrills hoping for the high we so desperately need to feel "unique", "irreplaceable" and just as good as the rich folks feel every day...that is the promise.
5
This is more of the articulable dread and hopelessness my liberal friends have shared since Trump was elected.
No different than the dread my conservative friends had over Obama.
Toss in whatever world malady is current, mix it up and you have BLEAK FUTURE!
I don't fret Climate Change, like overpopulation, no food, global cooling, no oil, acid rain before, we'll figure it out.
So take a deep breath, enjoy your friends and family, listen to music, have a non-political conversation with someone you don't know.
Or just hold a baby.
And magically, you may find yourself seeing a brighter tomorrow. [Or let your Trump hate leave you in a darkened corner, scared of the future.]
2
@profwilliams
Which "migrant center" should I go to in order to get hold of one of these babies you're talking about and who do I talk to about the best way to monetize that baby? I just think that trafficking in climate refugees is the best way for me to restore my hope in the future.
@profwilliams Shhhh. You're threatening to disturb their dystopian fantasy. :-)
When the greater ideas of good are represented by the few, it becomes the drudgery of the masses. Additionally, through some degree of technology, we have "demassified" and disconnected ourselves into tiny, unfeeling orbits unable or unwilling to see the greater good/issues of my fellow man. This is exacerbated currently by feelings of economic & climatic stagnation and lack of hope for our future world. But the human spirit will prevail either through calamity or reform.
1
From Wikipedia
“World War II was the deadliest military conflict in history. An estimated total of 70–85 million people perished, which was about 3% of the 1940 world population (est. 2.3 billion).”
If I was 20 years old in 1939 I would call that a bleak future.
1
After reading Michelle Goldberg's essay, I turned off the computer, went back to bed, and pulled the covers up over my head.
327
@Rosarox
I understand how Rosarox feels, because it is a feeling that is universal in these times. The current of despair is strong. And it grows stronger as each of us succumbs to it. Another writer wrote of our "desperate longing for kindness and solidarity." We can find kindness and solidarity (and love and hope) by offering kindness and solidarity and love and hope. Volunteer in a school or a hospital or a food shelf. Make eye contact when you wish the clerk or the barista that serves you a good day. Write to members of Congress, but don't wait for them to act. Yield to the driver who needs to squeeze into your lane. Look at the homeless person and say hello; give him a dollar and a smile and respect. We can step back from despair, one human interaction at a time. We can save our own lives, and in doing so, save others. And vote.
45
@Marc Burgett Yes, especially VOTE! The majority of voters in this country never wanted Trump in the first place. We MUST keep that in mind to maintain a very realistic hope.
21
@Rosarox
A sensible reaction to all that bad news. The problem is, we can't stay there and when we emerge from underneath the covers the world still needs our help. Find a cause, I like "Indivisible", and support their efforts to vote the rascals into oblivion. View Bernie's latest campaign video with the old Bob Dylan soundtrack and rejoice in how social media can move the mind and the masses. Act up, act out, but act...
10
Well in the HC led world the US would be in a nuclear war with Russia and a ground war with Iran. The streets would flow with blood and there would be no thoughts of the future.
@Daphne
I see that you've been reading Voltaire. Best of all possible worlds! Excellent!
The 1% has captured our government. They played the long game since Reagan and won. The have the tax code. They have the courts.They own our elected officials. Our children are enslaved with dept just for the sin of getting a higher education. A education we told them they needed just to have a good life. Now the chances of that life are evaporating. The rich will take everything humanly possible then when society breaks down it will move to their bunkers in New Zealand. If we let the rich take everything without a fight then we dont deserve a future.This class war will not only decide the working class future but the future of humanity.
21
Just before reading this I read that the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists had moved its Doomsday Clock to within 100 seconds of midnight, a reflection of the existential threats posed by the escalating tensions in various trouble spots around the world and by climate change. Trump and his minions in the GOP force us to recognize how easily and quickly our democracy can give way to evil, cheered on by mobs that include our neighbors and members of our families. Meanwhile the boy geniuses of Silicon Valley have unleashed a swarm of seemingly unstoppable contagions and the oligarchs of Wall Street flaunt their unimaginable greed while tens of thousands of their fellow citizens beg for food on the street. Years ago Leonard Cohen was asked in an interview what he thought was the wisest way we could prepare for the future. "Duck," he said.
25
There is one certainty: Of the future, we know naught.
No one a few decades ago would've predicted where we are today, for better and for worse. Predicting ahead in a state of future-shock promises diminishing returns.
It doesn't mean we don't have problems, and shouldn't try to solve them. But for all the doom and gloom—you just never know.
2