by Northsage

Created on: May 30, 2008   Last Updated: May 31, 2008

I think that life today will be looked at as the apex of human existence by those who follow us. Our level of comfort, leisure, diverse employment opportunity, medical care, housing, education, disposable income, entertainment, etc. will slowly erode as our burgeoning worldwide population consumes diminishing resources, land, food, water and necessities of today's life.

There will certainly be advances made in many things now part of our accepted norm and new inventive answers to some problems that come up in the future. I'm talking about gradual degradation of quality or availability of many things we take for granted now. Most people may not even notice it as it happens, but social scientists and statisticians will be aware of the changes.

In 1965 SAT scores began a long slow slide that I think just recently reached the 1965 numbers after forty years of collective diminished abilities. A forty-year slump is more than a glitch; it's a warning sign of a general downward trend in quality of life.

I suspect that the only answer to the approaching troubles I foresee is a drastic reduction in human population. Will war or pandemic or famine remove billions of us, allowing the survivors to thrive? In the last few years the price of staple foods, such as rice, corn, wheat, and soy products has jumped more than 300%.

Recent price increases in oil and coal products, plastics, dyes, fertilizers, chemicals, fabrics, etc. show us that fossil fuels are becoming increasingly scarce, while developing countries are increasing their use of them, exponentially. Humanity has stuck its collective head in the sand for far too long, and it is possible that the tipping point in catastrophic global warming has already been passed. If humankind had looked to the source of all energy on earth, (sunlight) for the answer to our energy shortfall, years ago, this threat to humanity could have been averted.

We humans are too self absorbed and self-indulgent to deny ourselves anything for future gain. Inflation and interest rates will affect quality of life with a new economic recession or depression, but these are transitory, cyclic and expected inconveniences compared to the big picture.

I'm certainly not content with my life, living in luxury, free of worries about anything, don't get me wrong. What I'm saying is that regardless of how bad we feel about the status quo, things will probably only get worse for most of humanity. The standard of living humanity now experiences are among the best in the history of the world, comparative opulence.

This may be as good as it gets, and I fear that mankind is now speeding towards the edge of a very deadly cliff. How sad for us all.

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