Maheswari Ramesh's Final Blog Post (H02)

Is This the End of the World as We Know It?!

Question Everything, Part XI 

    Hello everyone! Let's start with a beautiful song from Billie Eilish, "The End of the World," which is worth listening to!

    Now, I want you all to close your eyes and stop thinking about everything for a second! Make your mind as empty as a black hole, and pay closer attention! Imagine the memories and flashbacks of World War 2, where 1000s of soldiers were killed/injured, the crisis of women and children in hunger and poverty with cries and curses echoing in your hearts, the state of animals either getting displaced/killed, millions of trees being cut down, grasslands and croplands being uprooted, and the world burning as a whole! Gradually open your eyes...

If this scenario doesn't make you emotional, I don't know what else would! 

    Ladies and gentlemen, this thing you imagined might happen again in a few years! I didn't mean a World War 3, but a war due to greed, jealousy, dishonesty, aggression, cruelty, lust, avarice, unjust, disloyalty, and hatred toward other fellow beings due to barriers in nationality, religion, politics, thoughts, creed, race, and other factors that separate us all and kill us off!!

In Hinduism, we call this era of civilization "Kaliyug,"

where "Kali" refers to all these bad qualities I mentioned! The exciting part is that our forefathers and ancestors, billions and billions of years ago, gave this name and predicted humanity exactly the way it is today in ancient scriptures, as archeologists have found! 

    There's also this film called "Kalki" that was released in Bollywood last year, where they depict a futuristic view of 2898 AD and how the end is approaching due to destructive human qualities. Here in the film, there resides a supreme evil who tries to suck the barely remaining world resources and concentrates them in a single location due to greed. Ordinary people, on the other hand, are forced to fight with each other and starve in poverty. 

    This film perfectly describes the question: "If acts such as ours (even the simplest wrongs that we do) continue to increase, is this the end of the world as we know it?" 

    This is (as you already saw in the title) exactly what my topic is! "Is this the end of the world as we know it?" Since this is a question-everything topic, I have a couple of essays from three authors with different viewpoints on how the world would end!    

    First, Ms. Alison McQueen, in her essay "How to be a prophet of Doom?" explores the historical context and psychological impact of nuclear threat, mainly focusing on the works of Hans. J. Morgenthau. Morgenthau is a prominent figure in international relations who wrote "Death in the Nuclear Age" to emphasize the existential threat posed by nuclear weapons and to instill a sense of fear and urgency in the public. So, through Morgenthau's work, Ms. McQueen tries to claim that the end of the world could be due to the usage of nuclear weapons. (Probably in the hypothetical World War 3).  

He mainly did this because, during the 1960s, despite the prevailing fear of nuclear war, there was also a strong culture of nuclear denial. This denial was fueled by optimistic views from figures like Herman Kahn, who argued that the US could survive and even thrive after a nuclear war! This optimism was reflected in popular media, which often depicted post-nuclear scenarios in a positive light (which, according to me, is foolish bravery because nobody, including the Presidents of nations, could survive and definitely not thrive after a nuclear war). 

Hence, Morgenthau believed that such optimism made the unthinkable more likely, as it downplayed the catastrophic consequences of nuclear war. He argued that nuclear annihilation would render traditional ways of transcending death, such as heroism and leaving behind a legacy, meaningless. The destruction of human civilization and its cultural artifacts would eliminate the possibility of remembrance and commemoration. So, Ms. Mc Queen draws a parallel between Morgenthau's warnings and contemporary nuclear threats, highlighting the ongoing risks posed by the world's nuclear arsenals. She emphasized the importance of acknowledging these threats and taking them seriously to prevent a potential nuclear catastrophe. 

    Now, talking about another essay by Dr. Simon Critchley named "To Philosophize is to learn how to Die," which was published during the COVID-19 pandemic, he dwells into the pervasive anxiety and fear experienced during the pandemic, highlighting feelings of powerlessness, isolation and the constant threat from illness and death. 

He explored how philosophers like Socrates, Descartes, and Montaigne have historically dealt with isolation and mortality, suggesting that philosophy can offer insights and consolation during such times. Critchley distinguishes between fear (which is a reason for a specific threat) and anxiety (which is a more persuasive, objectless feeling), arguing that the pandemic has heightened our anxiety. He emphasizes the importance of accepting our mortality as a path to true freedom, drawing inspiration from Montaigne's idea that learning to die frees us from the fear of death. He, ultimately, suggests that by embracing our anxiety and mortality, we can find forms of liberation and courage. 

From this essay, we learn that any time could be the end of the world, considering factors beyond our control like COVID-19. So, overcoming fear to live happily in the present is everything that matters.

BUT! But, at the same time, since the COVID-19 mystery remains unresolved, whether it was a natural calamity or an actual bio war, I feel that this essay somewhat suggests concepts of a bio war, unlike the previous nuclear war. Here, I also remember a film from south India named "Yealaam Arivu," translated as "Human's Seventh Sense," where a Chinese man comes to purposefully experiment and play with Indians' lives by injecting a virus into a dog that spreads a weird disease to other dogs. Then, people and the whole of India get affected by this virus within two weeks. The scenes and situations shown in this film, released in 2011 (I repeat 2011), were 99.99 % similar to what happened to the whole world from China during COVID-19. Then, in the film, China creates a situation where India depends on them for treatment to cunningly increase their economic income and world status to prove their superiority. So, I personally interpreted this essay in a way where the world could end due to either "human uncontrollable consequences" or "bio war."

(Disclaimer: I gave this example because of how closely everything happened to explain the similarities in these situations and not to directly or indirectly target anyone/any nation.)

    Moving forward with the third essay that I got, named "Our Pursuit of Happiness- Is Killing the Planet" by James Traub, we see that his essay explores the tensions between "Individual liberty" and "Collective Responsibility" in the context of climate change. Traub talks about climate change, suggesting that sacrifices such as adjusting the thermostats or reducing meat consumption may be necessary to reduce carbon footprint. He highlights the principles of classical liberalism as articulated by John Stuart Mill, which assets that individuals should be free to act as they wish as long as they do not harm others.

Traub reflects on a conversation that he had with a college student who advocated for two-thirds of a vegan diet to combat climate change, illustrating the challenges of personal behavior change. 

He acknowledges that sweeping legislative proposals like the Green New Deal place most of the burden on the utilities and industries but argues that achieving net-zero emissions will also require changes in personal behavior. He talks about President Franklin D Roosevelt, who restricted some liberties to advance larger ones during the Great Depression. He also argues that liberal societies have always faced this problem of "second-handed smoke," where one person's action can harm others. He then concludes by questioning whether societies can find new equilibrium before the effects of climate change become catastrophic. 

His essay basically calls for a balance between individual liberty and collective responsibility and warns us that if we do not take action to stop the harm that we have caused to this planet, then we will be killing the planet and ultimately killing ourselves. I remember one of my favorite quotes here, which goes as, 

"Money is yours, but the resources belong to all" 

And yeah! They say we cannot buy our beautiful planet after destroying it because you cannot get back those wonderful natural non-renewable resources with your money! 

    Finally, apart from these, there are specific theories that scientists claim that in about 5 billion years, the Sun will exhaust its hydrogen fuel and expand into a red giant, engulfing the inner planets, including Earth. Before this happens, the Sun's increasing luminosity will make Earth uninhabitable by boiling away the oceans and stripping the atmosphere. 

Check out this article here- 

The sun won’t die for 5 billion years, so why do humans have only 1 billion years left on Earth?

    There is also another belief where scientists predict that over an extremely long timescale, Earth's orbit could decay due to gravitational radiation, causing it to spiral into the Sun or another massive object.

Check out this article here-

Life on Earth, and the entire planet, will meet its ultimate end - Big Think

    So, in conclusion, I wish to ask you all these discussion questions-

"How exactly do you think that world will end? Will it be due to a nuclear war, bio war, human uncontrollable natural occurrence, climate change, scientific reasoning, or those bad qualities like hatred, greed, jealousy, etc."

(I personally feel that end could be due to us because we reap what we sow! Whether it may be climate change, a nuclear threat, or a bio war, humans are ultimately responsible for EVERYTHING! So, if we don't stop all the minor/major mistakes in the context of humanity and the environment we are doing, we will never save our planet!) 

This discussion question is a HUGE one! So, take your time to think about some really important stuff and start analyzing yourself in this regard because remember, "Droplets make up an ocean!"

Thank you!

Maheswari Ramesh