Speculation#1 - Eternal Progress or The End of the World? - A collective perception of where we´re heading
Urbanization as a catalyst for Myths
The more I think about the "current state of the world" I think of past times facing the same phenomena - the feeling of a sudden arising apocalypse, soon we´re all goona die, we´re going in the wrong direction, this must be the end of the world etc.
We´re sure not the first to think that human life on earth is coming to an end, or that we´re going in the wrong "direction". The history of the apocalypse has an important roll in our culture. Its visible allmost everywhere - in belief systems, in folklore stories and myths, it express itself as doomsdays cults and its a recurrent theme in movies and sci-fi litterature.
It´s allmost like the idea of an end is deeply rooted in the human psyche and that is has been so more or less (with different amplitude) since the day we settled and started to farm the land. As soon as urbanization began myths started to grow at the same speed as the wheat. The process of urbanization can very much be seen as the process of building a physical form of www, allowing pre-internet civilizations to share ideas and values - to grow myths (a basic human need, waiting to be fulfilled).
The Eternal Wave of Collective Perception
There has off course been more "happy" and optimistic periods between the darker ages. Certain times of human history when the belief in eternal progress was strong (so even today in some parts of the world). The relation between these two extrems can be illustrated over time as a wave of collective perception of "where we´re heading" - on one hand a strong belief in eternal development and progress, and on the other hand the dark apocalyptic ages. Sometimes optimism goes up and sometimes it goes down.
Making predictions of the future is hard. All we acually know is that the collective perception of where we´re heading has been shifting over history and that it much likley may do so even in the future.
The eternal wave of collective perception (as shown in the diagram above) consists of two parts - one "real" and one "fantasy" part. The real part is based on actual measured data - such as rising CO2 emissions, the arctic ice that melts, the increasing number of people suffering from stress related diseases, democracy failing etc. The fantasy part of the wave is based on the brains interpretation of the "real" data. It points out a forecast, a direction of either up or down. The two waves coexists and emphasize each other. Together they form an overall collective perception of "where we´re heading". A some points in history (and also in the future) the Real and the Fantasy intersect - this can be described as the very nice border of Real-Fantasy. This happens when the big collective dream comes true and all space becomes equally good (A rare phenomena).
The Next Wave of De-urbanization
As humans very much seems to enjoy growing myths in the past they may much likely keep doing it in the future. An interesting thing about our present time though is that we no longer need urban structures to grow myths. We can now easily grow them (even faster and with stronger impact) on the internet. Its therefore possbile that we - in a not to distant future - will see the start of a new wave of de-urbanization, with smaller human habitats placing themselfs physically in more rural areas. Out among the bushes and bees - not only growing carrots seams more easy - but also myths on the web. The de-urbanization process will most likley increase as other basic human needs then growing myths becomes harder and harder to fulfill within the (not so safe) haven of the city - A new collective hideout is to be found.
