04-01-2014, 06:53 PM
There's a term for those folks who think that chaos will soon come upon us, and are living their lives accordingly. (No, I don't mean going out drinking, having crazy sex, etc.) They're stockpiling food, ammunition, etc. Maybe chaos will descend, and their foresight will be rewarded. Who knows?
A few years back I was in Lancaster, PA, and it took all of my will power not to giggle when a young Mennonite man was talking to me about it and his preparation. "Dude," I wanted to say, "you practically live off the grid already. What are YOU worried about?" Whether WW III is imminent or not, I don't know. Criminals already use the Internet for their acts, so it isn't any stretch to think that enemies will use it to fight. In some ways, future wars will be easier to start and more damage may be done because of computers, the Internet, and our dependence on them. We'll see.
When I was a child in the '60s, the newscasts about the war in Viet Nam, the protesters, etc. used to scare me. When I learned to read and read the newspapers, I worried about the Cold War and if MAD didn't work. Then I worried about some crazy individual or government getting setting off a nuke here, or engaging in chemical or biological warfare. You know what? None of it has happened (yet?!) Now? I'm more worried about the slow destruction of our planet. As an agnostic, I think that this is it. No heaven. No hell. Earth. That's all we've got. Sometimes I think that we're like the aliens in the movie, Independence Day. We're sucking the life out of this planet, and think that there's another place (or planet) where we can go. We'll see. (The powers that be have always fought over resources, and our demands are making the possibility of fighting over them more likely.)
Finally, one of the things I used to worry about was the Sun burning out. (Silly, I know, but there you go.) Even though I knew it was going to be a long time off, I worried. Then, I heard a joke. An astronomer was lecturing about how long it would be until the Sun destroyed all life on earth. An audience member raised his hand, and asked the astronomer to repeat what he had just said. The astronomer repeated that in 3.5 billion years Earth would be uninhabitable because of the Sun. "Whew," the audience member said. I thought you said 2.5 billion years." For some reason, I'm worrying less about the Sun.
What will come, will come. In the mean time, I'll try to be more loving toward my friends and family, be kinder to strangers, and nicer to the earth. These are things I can control. When my end comes, however it comes, I hope that I will have lived a life that should a heaven exist, will get me a shot at it. If this is all that we have, then I hope that I will have done what I can to make this existence better for others.
A few years back I was in Lancaster, PA, and it took all of my will power not to giggle when a young Mennonite man was talking to me about it and his preparation. "Dude," I wanted to say, "you practically live off the grid already. What are YOU worried about?" Whether WW III is imminent or not, I don't know. Criminals already use the Internet for their acts, so it isn't any stretch to think that enemies will use it to fight. In some ways, future wars will be easier to start and more damage may be done because of computers, the Internet, and our dependence on them. We'll see.
When I was a child in the '60s, the newscasts about the war in Viet Nam, the protesters, etc. used to scare me. When I learned to read and read the newspapers, I worried about the Cold War and if MAD didn't work. Then I worried about some crazy individual or government getting setting off a nuke here, or engaging in chemical or biological warfare. You know what? None of it has happened (yet?!) Now? I'm more worried about the slow destruction of our planet. As an agnostic, I think that this is it. No heaven. No hell. Earth. That's all we've got. Sometimes I think that we're like the aliens in the movie, Independence Day. We're sucking the life out of this planet, and think that there's another place (or planet) where we can go. We'll see. (The powers that be have always fought over resources, and our demands are making the possibility of fighting over them more likely.)
Finally, one of the things I used to worry about was the Sun burning out. (Silly, I know, but there you go.) Even though I knew it was going to be a long time off, I worried. Then, I heard a joke. An astronomer was lecturing about how long it would be until the Sun destroyed all life on earth. An audience member raised his hand, and asked the astronomer to repeat what he had just said. The astronomer repeated that in 3.5 billion years Earth would be uninhabitable because of the Sun. "Whew," the audience member said. I thought you said 2.5 billion years." For some reason, I'm worrying less about the Sun.
What will come, will come. In the mean time, I'll try to be more loving toward my friends and family, be kinder to strangers, and nicer to the earth. These are things I can control. When my end comes, however it comes, I hope that I will have lived a life that should a heaven exist, will get me a shot at it. If this is all that we have, then I hope that I will have done what I can to make this existence better for others.
TESU BSBA - GM, September 2015
"Never give up on a dream just because of the time it will take to accomplish it. The time will pass anyway." -- Earl Nightingale, radio personality and motivational speaker
"Never give up on a dream just because of the time it will take to accomplish it. The time will pass anyway." -- Earl Nightingale, radio personality and motivational speaker
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