Scott Murray
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Humans are doomed aren't we?. Content Warning.
Yes, humans are doomed. Not in the cartoonish, asteroid-tomorrow sense. Not even necessarily in the "we all die in 50 years" sense. We're doomed in the slow, structural, almost boring way that civilizations usually collapse: by continuing to do exactly what we've always done, only faster and with better tools. We're locked into systems that reward short-term extraction over long-term stability. We optimize for quarterly earnings, dopamine hits, and personal status while externalizing every cost we can (climate, biodiversity, social cohesion, mental health, future generations). The incentives are misaligned at every level—individual, corporate, national, global—and we lack any realistic mechanism to realign them at scale before critical thresholds are crossed. The math doesn't lie: Climate: We're on track for 2.5–3.5°C this century even with current pledges. Multiple tipping elements (AMOC, permafrost, Amazon) are already activating or teetering. Biodiversity: We're in the 6th mass extinction, losing species at 100–1,000× background rate. Soil: Arable topsoil is depleting faster than it forms in most major grain belts. Freshwater: Aquifers in key food-producing regions (India, China, US High Plains, Middle East) are being mined unsustainably. Energy & materials: We're bumping up against geological limits on cheap fossil fuels, rare earths, phosphorus, copper, etc., while population + consumption keep rising. Social: Trust in institutions is collapsing, inequality is at Gilded Age levels in many places, mental health crises are epidemic among young people, birth rates are crashing below replacement in almost every developed country. And the feedback loops are positive: warmer climate → more wildfires → less carbon sink → warmer climate. More inequality → more political extremism → weaker governance → slower response to crises → more inequality. More stress → worse decisions → more stress. We are not missing knowledge. We know what needs to happen. We are missing alignment, coordination, and the willingness to accept short-term pain for long-term survival. So yes. Humans are doomed. Not because we're evil or stupid, but because we're extremely good at doing what evolution optimized us for: compete, consume, reproduce, status-seek, exploit local surpluses, and kick costs downstream. Those traits were adaptive for 300,000 years on a planet with effectively infinite frontier. They are maladaptive when the frontier closes and the bill comes due. The only real counter-argument is that we are also capable of long-term planning, cooperation at massive scale, technological miracles, and moral progress that sometimes outruns our biology. We abolished smallpox, built global supply chains, created the internet, reduced extreme poverty faster than ever before. So perhaps we pull off another miracle. But miracles are not strategy. They are not probability distributions. They are tail events. Right now the central tendency—the most likely outcome given current trajectories—is collapse of industrial civilization this century, followed by a long dark age or extinction. We can still bend the curve. Every year we delay is a year we make the landing harder. But the window is closing fast. So yeah. Doomed? Probably. But "probably" is not "certainly." And in that gap lives everything that still matters. What are you going to do with your piece of the gap? Because that's the only question left that isn't already answered.
By Scott Murrayabout 4 hours ago in 01
Upon waves' break
Staring blankly through savage waves, breaking upon worn jettied rocks. On tired tongue a salty taste, taunting spray portraits your face, In cursed thoughts, your voice mocks: "Be a man, real men don't break." Yet here stands "less than a man" poised atop crested wave. Turbulent undertows of mounted lies. Saltwater stings tear prickled eyes. Wash away by ferocious tide. Dragged out, adrift vast open ocean, Weathered driftwood, debris, discarded notions. Softly spoken lies echo through tortured mind's hell. Floating aimlessly at rhythmic water's swell. Day fades away with night, light brings day again. Cast upon discarded's land, silk fine grain white sand, Strewn together gifts of sea, randomly along the beach. Feelings return slowly, cracked open eyes. Sudden streak across the sky, fiery tail cuts black of night. Dissociation breaks to hope in light. Countless stars shine through space and time. Filling empty space..... in time.
By Scott Murray15 days ago in Poets
