The five fold stupidity of the human race

There are so many things that I could be talking about, so what do I chose as the first list of 5? Well, something provocative of course! There's a reason for it, as I'll try to explain in the following.

Let's start with a fact: Did you know that the world's richest 1% have the same amount of wealth as the poorest 50%? In the USA, and plenty other states dominated by capitalism, the top 10% own 90% of the wealth and the other 90% of people own the remaining 10%. And these people in charge are not doing a good job in preserving the Earth, as I will elaborate in the following 5 points and we're stupid for letting them.

While reading the 5 points, ask yourselves: why not reach out to as many people as possible, stand together as the human race, and avoid destroying ourselves?

5. Exponential stupidity (Historical and evolution's views)

I'll begin this with some historical facts (excuse my ignorance if there are any updates on the matter):
- The structure of our brains hasn't changed (didn't evolve) in the past 50.000 years
- The agricultural revolution is dated around 8000-5000 BCE
- The first settlements that evolved into civilizations began around 4000 - 3000 BCE
- After the humble beginnings, the civilizations grew and expanded more and more
- This trend has been especially pronounced after the second world war (in other words, the past 60 years no less), the population exploded upwards, over the billion and almost reaching up to 8 now

I could go on with writing other significant events, exponentially more frequent with the passing of time, but I don't plan spending all night finding out exact dates. The best way to really understand  the exponential quality of our history is to go play Sid Meier's Civilization series if you haven't already. From the first settlements to flourishing empires, or usually monarchies in single-player games, the Civ saga strives to convey what it means to control the fate of a civilization through the passing of time.

If you're not keen on games, you can look at how all the sciences developed for example. Physics derives, quite directly, from the teachings of Plato (5th or 4th century BCE) - with his idea that there is a world out there (math, abstract) of which we perceive only the shadows (physics, real world), and don't realize it. The first to formulate the idea of a controlled measurement in physics was Galileo Galilei almost 2 millenia after (1564-1642) and look at where physics and science has brought us since, especially with the invention of the computer and the internet!

I daresay we've come to a point where we almost surpassed the evolution, and will begin to enhance our brains beyond control. Even science should have a temporary limit, as if to say: "Nope, sadly humanity isn't ready for this technology. Go play with it in your garage and don't harm anyone." I know it's not possible to limit certain things and on most we shouldn't put limits anyway. Having said that, I think it's problematic when we start to tackle technologies we don't fully comprehend - I can easily envision a future where people will start meddling with our brains in a direct way, before we fully understand all of the intricate details. And those same details will be our downfall.

You know why I think so? Because we clearly haven't understood anything if, after 50.000 years of same brain capabilities, we still wage war and destroy each other. Competition is good, but not in the sense of harming each other or even killing over it. And with the number of people in the world ever growing, more people today are dying of abuse, starvation, depression and other similar cases, than they ever did during an "epic" history battle. 

4. Sociopaths stupidity (psychological / sociological / neuroscience view)

I'm not an expert in any of these fields, so I don't plan to point any fingers as to which person that I might know is a sociopath. Fact is, there are people whose brains, for some reason or another, are wired in such a way that they don't have emotions at all. Depending on the turnout of events, they might be extremely violent, sadist, or - quite often as studies show - they achieve high positions in societies, like CEOs of companies and such.

These people need to be identified and dealt with. I'm not saying they're bad people, or that they're subhuman or whatever - that would be simply ignorant. My point is that they are undeniably different from the rest and don't realize that bringing pain to others is what the vast majority of people don't consider pleasant. These people need to be set limits in order to understand how to function with everybody else.

If not, if these people remain unattended, then several other people, perhaps even thousands or millions depending on the influence of the sociopath individual, suffer. Sometimes for no reason other than it was more convenient this way. Imagine a typical job office example, depicted comically on various internet sites, where the boss exploits the workers and doesn't give a damn about the workers personal needs. Another example would be where an attention-seeking sociopath plays around with various insecure people, exploiting their weakness and then discarding them like thrash when uninterested.

Morals, codes, ethics and such are there for a reason. No matter how you turn it, for most humans violence isn't the answer, because it brings only negative feelings, post-traumatic stress disorder in case of killing and other negative consequences. We, as a society, are somehow prepared to dealing with obvious psychopaths, but what about this other category of people, these sociopaths, devoid of emotions? Why do we let them thrive and put others through hell? Because we are - you guessed it - collectively stupid.

3. Destructive stupidity (anthropological and physics views)

Sometimes, I end up discussing my bad mood with people and when I tell them that I'm angry about how stupid we are and that we're racing towards self-destruction, they frequently ask me:"Why are you so grim in predicting our future? There have been naysayers in the past too, you know, what makes you so sure we're so close to it now?"

My answer to that is:"Because anthropology tells us that the Western civilization is nearing its end if nothing changes. And we're following the exact steps of the Romans, the Aztecs and other great Civilizations that have long fallen."

We've proven throughout history that we're extremely good at destroying everything and trying anew, new civilizations, new customs, new culture. And every time we're following patterns, which have emerged during anthropological studies (although, common sense and strategy games should have told you that already). Now imagine for a second that I am right, even if you personally don't believe that everything will collapse in the near future (5-10 years). If I am indeed right, what will happen next? What are our options?

A violent transition is never a good one, and yet there will be no other choice, because we're destroying the Earth we live on. So even in the unlikely scenario that the downfall of the Western civilization will come to peacefully, there's still Nature to be taken into account. Action-reaction principle, right? We fuck with nature (truly, there are no "nicer" words to describe our impact on the Earth) and the nature fucks with us back. And that's because our bodies are made (or rather, evolved) specifically to fit the Earth's living conditions. If we keep changing the Earth, who knows if we'll be able to stay alive and not forced to flee? Stephen Hawking says we should leave Earth as soon as possible, because the leading elite is going to destroy it. Are we, the humanity as a whole, really so stupid to allow it?

There's another point to be aware of: the exponential advances in technology made us obtain incredible power. Power that no single person, or even all of us together could obtain by natural means. Which has the unfortunate consequence that even a single crazy individual could, with enough money, instantly decide to destroy a certain portion of the population or the Earth. We have too much power for our own good.

2. Communication stupidity (linguistics / politics / personal views)

People today can't talk. I don't know how it was in different eras, but in today's age and time, with social networks, internet avatars, personal problems and various grudges, sometimes we refuse to talk about important matters. There are exceptions where avoiding someone is for a good reason - like too little common interests. Sadly, more often than not, the reality is that we can't get over something, perhaps some self-made promise or irrational belief. And we're so convinced of what we're doing that we're not even doubting it anymore, let alone prepared to openly talk about it.

Taking this to a much higher level, in terms of politics and our leaders, or rather, our representatives can't seem to be able to talk to each other and solve everything out merely by talking. With all the different means of translation, we don't have any excuse for not understanding or misinterpreting things. These morons are paid large sums of money to stand there as a cover for the people who truly hold the power - those with money. If the politicians talked to each other with the intent to understand, they could have settled all the matters already. I do realize that with too much corruption it's hard to do anything by yourself - having said that, there are quite some people in every country (a lot more than one person for sure), paid to sit on their assess and pretend like they're discussing for hours while at the same time concluding exactly nothing.

I don't like politics exactly because of this reason. Because everywhere I go people tell me that if I become politically active, I'll be eaten alive by the shit that politics has become. So instead, I share my opinions online. They might not get a whole lot of attention for the moment, but we'll see. I say what I have to say in hopes that people will talk about this, discuss it and that everyone will come to realize that there's a solution for everyone to be happy.

In fact, most people don't desire riches over imagination. I personally hope for a home as close to the sea as possible and a boat. After that I'd only need enough to live a decent lifestyle where I'll be able to support artists and products that I do enjoy. And I, as I think many others, would gladly let someone else have extra money if they deserve it and perhaps even need it for whatever reason. You know, all the problems should be solved by discussing. That would be a perfect victory that Sun Tzu himself would be proud of if still alive.

1. Timeless stupidity (philosophical / mindfulness / rational view)

Last point I will discuss here is a question of time. We tend to put everything to the future, to the point where we have offspring and wish upon them things we didn't manage to do during our "prime". Fuck that shit. Everyone should be fully responsible and aware of the consequences of his or hers actions during all of adulthood. So instead on wishing on your kids to play the guitar, go pick it up yourself! Or instead of hoping that your kids will change the system, start by doing it yourself, now, in this very moment!

There will never be a better moment than the present one. That's the whole point, the mortality of people, the beauty of every living moment regardless of how long or short a life is. So take action now, this very second, tell me why I'm wrong or agree with me and explain to others that we need to change everything. Want more proof? The global warming everyone seems to be so keen on talking now: It's been floating around for quite a few years already, yet not enough people took it seriously until there was solid evidence from NASA. And now we have it. Simulations and data analysis: we're going to fuck up Earth properly and there's even a CHANCE WE'RE ALREADY TOO LATE.

So there really isn't any more time to lose and wait it out. We have to radically and non violently change things, such as the 64% of world CO2 emission by USA and China, the wealth distribution and so on and so forth. There's a few of really big issues that need instant attention and quite a lot of lesser ones that should be changed in the following years.

Don't believe me it's possible? Science shows that it's enough for an idea to reach about 2% of the population in order to spread to the whole. This means that simply by reading this, and perhaps talking to others about it, you're already helping spread the idea that we have to change things and do it now, regardless of our laws, traditions, convictions or other useless crap that might blind us in face of really important dangers that humanity as a whole is facing.

The alternative is to think that we won't be able to change anything. Well, in that case, if the vast majority of people can't unite and change the fate of our world, then we are done for. And we'll prove, once and for all, that humanity has been, for the duration of its existence, timelessly stupid.

Here I am again

Well, since I've quit using Facebook, with my account being permanently deleted after February the 10th (although they will still retain my data, for another 2 years as it's stated in their terms of use), I decided that I'm going to (again) try to keep this blog updated on a daily basis. I think the most common type of post will be a list of 5, because I really like being concise, to the point and organized.

Of course trying to sum up everything on a given topic with 5 mere points can come across as simplifying too much. However, if you think about it, it's the same with the world we live in: the more you try to get to the building blocks of nature as we understand them today (particle physics, maybe string theory or something else in the future), the simpler and more trivial they are. What is quantum mechanics in its extreme if not the flip of a coin? One quantum state or another. As a side remark, this doesn't make it easy - Studying it from a mathematical perspective is both interesting to me and difficult (impossible?) to fully understand.

And if you turn the process around - from micro to macro, it all makes sense. Flipping six coins, where you sum only the heads (or only tails), will give you the equivalent of a 6-sided die roll. Take an infinite number of coins and you've got the randomness of the universe. Or, as it is suggested in Bioshock Infinite, take an extreme theoretical version of quantum mechanics and you've got an infinite number of universes at your hands. Will it be heads or tails? The bird or the cage?

Before I get too philosophical, I'd like to say that I've given precedence to this writing instead of the book, because I started reading "Be your own CBT Therapist" by Windy Dryden (google if interested, I'll speak more about it shortly). It was out of sheer curiosity I bought this book and I didn't think I'd really need it, as I've sorted everything out in my head. And then, the reality struck me as there is, in Rational Emotive Behavior Therapy (REBT), a great difference between intellectual and emotive understanding. In practice, the difference between knowing what I want to do (I do know how I should live on a daily basis to enjoy the most out of every moment), and actually "feeling" that I know it, or rather, converting it into actions. I know I have OVER 9000 (8000 in manga) excuses I'm able to give myself and I need to challenge my understanding on a deeper level in order to go past them.

By analyzing situations in which I could've acted differently from a standpoint of rational behavior, I'll first deal with implementing everything I want to do in a single day and start living and acting in accordance to what's already stored somewhere in my brains. This is exactly the kind of book I needed in order to fully embrace my adulthood.

I still haven't posted the 4th and 5th chapter of the book, because I don't feel like they're ready to be posted online. And thanks to the beginning few chapters of Windy's book I've finally realized why, as the author puts it:"Thus, if a person is faced with a general dissatisfying life experience which cannot be compartmentalized and also wants to explore his writing ambitions, he should address the former first - unless this life dissatisfaction will help him write a better book!"

In my own words it would be: "I don't think that by feeling down I'll write properly. I need to get a hold of my emotions."

So yeah, my book likely won't be finished by March as I wanted to, although I'm fairly optimistic that I'll finish it by the end of 2016 (btw it's a wonderful year for people loving mathematics as the number 2016 has quite a few interesting properties). In the meantime, I'll write posts like this one, or a list of 5 things as mentioned in the beginning, or the most striking thought of a day and I'll always prepare it a day in advance. If you, my dear reader, have any suggestions as to what I could be writing about, I'd gladly accept them. Same goes for criticism of what I write and suggestions on what to change, you can write any of these things in the comments section below (or write me an email or something).

In essence: I can write short posts without problems, because they can be unrelated, while I want to write a book that's deeply intertwined. And for that, I need focus and therefore I need to analyze myself thoroughly with the help of the aforementioned book "Be your own CBT Therapist". An alternative to this would be finding the right girl to share my life story with. In that case I'm pretty confident she'd help me solve my issues, as I would help her solve hers and finally my burning love wouldn't go wasted, or turned into a self-deprecating emotion.

Since, however, I have no idea when (and even if) I'll meet such a companion and I'm currently working a 40-hour workweek, it's hard to find the time to do a whole lot, and therefore my first priority is self-improvement. In the meantime I'll keep my writing skills sharpened with these posts. I hope you enjoy reading these as much as I do writing them! Cheers!

-Tomo Umer