To Be Alive

Some time ago, in years not-that-long passed, and also very, very recently, I have seen a response to the world's problems that has, on some level, unsettled something within me, deeply - a response that seems noble, and yet, upon closer inspection and examination, bears the same type of problematic marks and signs of dangerous weakness that the world's greatest and most grim current travesties bear.  I want to talk about this proposed response, and denounce it, and illustrate, and articulate, why I feel compelled to denounce it...before explaining what I think must generally happen instead  That is the reason for this writing.

The problems are numerous, and we all know a great many of them.  From human-against-human grief and corruption, to human-against-nature savagery and destruction, there are more problems on the face of the Earth than I will ever count.

And while they are tragic and grave, this specific, recurring, proposed solution I keep seeing is not one I have confidence in.

That 'proposed solution' that I feel a need to address is the concept of human extinction, as a way of preventing the life on the Earth from going extinct, and the world from being torn apart.

...Let's ask ourselves the hard questions here, though:

• Is this really about making a selfless act of human devotion to the world, and to life upon it?
• Is this really an action that can be seen as any last-ditch effort to aid the Earth, or life on it, that is more likely to be effective than other efforts?
• Is this really an ethical solution?
• Is this really a safe solution, given the nature of many of the problems that we have created?
• Is this really a world we can abandon and expect to fully recover from what we've done to it, without us helping in the recovery effort?
• Is this really, if it is to be carried out, intended as an act of bravery and sacrifice on the part of humanity - rather than an act of selfishness and fear?

My friends and fellow humans...while the reality is harsh, we still need to face it; we have already lost any good reason to use 'self-extinction' as if it is an 'out' for us to excuse yourself from cleaning up our messes, and healing the wounds we've done to others...and I cannot conscientiously stand the idea, at all, of us dying and leaving most life gone in our wake. Even though I know that the origin of the idea is one that is intended to mean well for the 'greater good' in theory, that idea is one that, I'm convinced, would see -beyond- deplorable results in practice.  Let's look at some more questions, to get across why this likely isn't a proper solution:

• Who cleans up the plastic?
• Who studies the science to resolve the problems of buried nuclear waste?
• Who revitalizes the oceans?
  
• Who uses the technology and systems that exist - from wildlife refuges to  DNA samples - to bring species that are nearly-extinct, or even truly gone, back from the brink or their current, fully-realized absence?
• Who, because their life relies on it, and they as a whole species, recognize it, keeps the planet's atmosphere from becoming 'Venus 2.0' - in which clouds formed from dried up and evaporated oceans may very well ultimately kill the Earth by baking it to extreme temperatures, in a long-term event triggered by our use of fossil fuels? In other words, who expedites the re-planting of the forests, the re-creation of Great Plains and Savannahs, and the rejuvenation of the tropical jungles to turn the tide in our atmosphere against the damage we've thus far done?  Will the plants actually proliferate fast enough, given the ecosystem disruptions, devastations, and new forms of (often involving invasive) species competitions that we've created?
• And, if none of that ends up an issue, by some miracle...in terms of purpose for life to exceed its existence beyond always being here, and helping it to go beyond the Earth, which animal (or, heck life form period), thousands upon thousands of years, if not millions, in the future, in the name of spreading life across the universe and bringing it to the planets that are thus far dead, pioneers a method of actually populating - and thereby diversifying the kaleidoscope - the other potentially viable places for life that the Milky Way contains...?

All of these questions do, currently, have a potential answer - in the living, breathing, thinking, and feeling people of humanity across the world.  It may take revolutionizing the societies and cultures throughout the world to get there - but shouldn't that happen, anyway?  If we are to survive, does survival not sometimes demand drastic changes and actions on our part - perhaps including the discarding of lifestyles that no longer serve the sustenance of our future generations, our food, water, shelter and warmth sources, and perhaps even the greater picture of life?

One human death is unique as it is already - and a microcosm of extinction of a species.  We are not prepared to get rid of ourselves 'for' the world, nor would us attempting to do so go well for the world.

And, besides,  if I am wrong, and we are ready to give up as people, then I am not as human as I thought...but if we're ready to challenge this 'dark, cold, terrifying night' in spite of how the odds -currently- look, then consider me very, very human. I don't give up on the good in humanity, regardless of the logic and nihilism that our terrible problems, glaring flaws, and very real travesties invoke...and, as cliche as it is often assumed to be and taken as being, if it takes a lot of suffering to get humanity to develop to the point where we undo all of this damage, somehow -- as long as it does, in fact, work, I do, honestly and earnestly feel that that is better than us dying out, and acting as if our deaths have helped 'avert catastrophe.'

If anything should shame the human species, it must be that the very best we could do in our darkest of hours is avoid our own responsibilities and upmost ethical callings by killing our selves and each other, because we were too desperate, and terror-stricken, and angry, and ashamed, to turn and face our own demons and drive them out of existence.

Conversely, if anything should empower it, it is that we can and do have the power and potential to permanently drive out such demons, and to help bring about, help usher in, and help humbly welcome "a new heaven, and a new Earth."

My greatest aspiration and deepest goal for myself is to be a person who seeks, always, to prevent the first of these at all costs, unless it is the ---only--- way to achieve the second...and to help seek out and make the second a reality, always. And I can't do that alone, so...

Who, of us, in this world, with mind, heart, soul, and emotion ready to be purposed for this idea, will take it up? How consistently? This isn't an easy thing to do, by any measure. The most worthwhile paths to simplicity are rarely ever easy. Yet, somehow, the journey, the action, the perseverance, and the addressing of the challenge in a way that embodies a purpose beyond one's self, yields an experience, and a better reality, that is even more than 'worth it.'

Make of your fears for the future an unwavering - but intelligent, and expanding, and even malleable - determination to empower those who will see the world to a better place...and, if you, and I, and others do well enough, we, as one, will one day look back upon it to see that it will have indeed become more than that place was imagined to be by all of us.

So it was, I absolutely believe, in the moment of creation at the start - and so, too, it was, when life sprung from the clay of the Earth and the souls first began to dwell upon it...so, too, revelations and miracles can, and should, and - if I have any say in it - will happen.That, and more, is why, while reality is harsh, we still must face it.

We owe it to reality, to ourselves, to life, and to even more than that more, to do no less...

...We must do no less than survive, and thrive, and go beyond thriving until we can say that, because of our work and because of the motivation that drives it - one that is beyond our very concept of a central 'self' - that we are truly, fully, undeniably alive.