Bob Butler wrote: ↑Fri Mar 29, 2024 7:56 pm
Besides, if there is no nuclear exchange I expect a new birth of freedom. The US and its government will thrive. I anticipate the familiar predictions of violence and collapse won't manifest. Instead, the high will be a high, the conservative values collapse, and infrastructure will be built. Starship and space this time?
When almost everyone is looking up, down we go.
Introduction
I was driving on the motorway north of
London. It was mid-morning, one weekday in
January 1999. I was making good progress. Ahead
of me the traffic was strung out, going up the hill. It
was a cold day with the sun embedded in high
cloud. Everything had a washed out appearance.
The fields were lost in a bright haze. The salt that
had been scattered on the roads overnight covered
every vehicle with a dirty spray. I felt that I was
witnessing the last years of an era that failed some
time ago. All these trucks, vans and private cars
seemed to me as though they were already ghosts.
They pressed on up the hill, preoccupied with their
mysterious business. I foresaw that their destination
was oblivion.
This book is about the catastrophe that is going
to overtake today’s world civilisation. Many people
may regard this as a preposterous notion, and
certainly a morbid one. Nevertheless, when I first
set out to research past catastrophes and dark ages,
I soon discovered that this was to research five
thousand years of history across every inhabited
continent. No theme in human experience is more
pervasive or consistent. Time and time again,
people have built up societies of outstanding
power, wealth and morality, only to see them
degenerate into weakness, poverty and dissipation.
Those at the apogee of their success have
invariably believed themselves to be the chosen
ones, immune from the accidents that befell their
predecessors, ensconced in glory for all time.
Invariably they have been proved wrong. There is
something going on here that commands our
attention. Humility and common sense suggest we
take seriously the prospect of our future downfall.
The topic is not as pessimistic as it seems.
While some people live quite well, and a few live
very well, the present world order has many
casualties – failed countries and, within successful
countries, failed people. The overturning of
existing arrangements will not be a misfortune to
all. A dark age is a time of great turmoil, suffering
and insecurity. It is also a time of great creativity.
A dark age is a melting pot when old, corrupt and
exhausted institutions are finally broken down and
destroyed. Something new and better suited to
human needs can then be built up in their place. For
the beneficiaries of the old institutions, this is
certainly a painful process. For the rest, who are far
more numerous, it is also a hopeful one.
The detailed characteristics of a dark age will
become clear in the chapters that follow. By way of
preview, it may be described as a time without
government, without trade, and without any sense
of community. It is a time of everyone for him or
herself. During the dark age, mere survival is the
only concern. No one has the leisure for any higher
activity, including keeping records. That is why a
dark age is dark. Its principal feature is that we
know nothing of what took place in it. The collapse
that precipitates the dark age is abrupt and
unexpected. The dark age itself is surprisingly
brief. The recovery is slow and uneven, but
eventually civilisation ascends to heights never
before seen.
The book is divided into four parts. The first
part reviews the history of social collapse and
subsequent dark ages, in order to draw out the
common themes and characteristics. The second
part presents a theory of human sociality and shows
how it can account for this evidence. The third part
applies this theory to our present situation, and
demonstrates that we fit the pattern of a civilisation
in decline, our potential being rapidly used up, our
progress increasingly hindered by impasses.
Finally, the fourth part discusses the timing of the
coming dark age, what it will be like, by what route
we will arrive there, and what might come
afterwards.
The purpose of this book is not really to make
precise forecasts. It is rather to present a set of
theoretical ideas. Everything else is more or less an
exercise and a demonstration of these ideas. Above
all, I have sought to pursue this investigation with
rigour. It is not a complaint about declining
standards. I take no moral positions. I make no
criticisms or recommendations. I offer only
analysis. I wish to help my readers be like
anthropologists from Mars, fascinated by humans,
sometimes despairing of them, often charmed, but
able to judge dispassionately, their eyes unclouded
by their own involvement.
The approach to a dark age is paradoxically a
time when things seem to be getting better in many
respects. Political authorities seem less oppressive.
Economic activity is more elaborate than ever.
Social attitudes become more enlightened. On the
surface, everything can appear to be excellent.
Behind the scenes, though, the contradictions are
growing and they threaten all this wondrous
achievement. It is not when you think you have a
problem that you actually have one – for having
identified it you can do something about it. The
real worry is when things seem to be going
swimmingly well. Let those who say
‘preposterous!’ and ‘how pessimistic!’ reflect on
that.
MARC WIDDOWSON
Bedford, 2001
While the periphery breaks down rather slowly at first, the capital cities of the hegemon should collapse suddenly and violently.
