With change becoming the natural cliché, the world is transitioning into burgeoning uncertain turmoil. Since the first civilizations gained existence, humans have always strived for a better tomorrow. Humans have honed their military might for safety, their political hegemonies for inner strength and their temerity in intellectual research. In the process of technological proliferation, myopia has become endemic in humans. The strife for a better tomorrow still prevails while the acknowledgment of the bleak chances of there being a tomorrow remains nebulous.
Look around. You will see your closest friends and relatives fervently working towards a higher position. You will realize that you know people who dream of achieving the coveted sumptuous living space. You might introspect and feel the visceral guilt of being a partisan to the norm of the day. I say guilt because a better tomorrow can come at the cost of tomorrow itself. Our existence today is despotic in itself. We have displayed such callous behavior towards our environment and its inhabitants that their very existence has been compromised.
A look at the statistics depicting the degradation of our environment leads us into denial instead of making us poignant. Every year, an estimated 2.2 billion tons of waste is dumped into the oceans. We took only 55 years to wipe out 90% of the ocean’s predators. In the last 30-35 years, we have added 1.15 trillion tons of carbon dioxide in our atmosphere. What do you feel when you read these statistics: denial or regret? Well, your answer does not matter. In the tech-savvy world of the present, your identity is becoming increasingly irrelevant.
The truth is that we have managed to bury ourselves alive in the screens we carry from place to place. Most of us embrace the illusion of connectivity that the screens emanate, but do we acknowledge the cost of using them. The opportunity cost is the time that could have been spent constructing relationships with the people living around us. The cost is only exacerbated by the potential health problems (literal myopia) that can arise from the use of screens. Look at the cost from another perspective. When humans interact with others from the other side of the world, their identity is reduced to a technological identity that can be morphed to show a façade. The ‘others’ would never be able to discover the true identity let alone the idiosyncrasies of the person which lay the foundation of a strong relationship.
There are myriads of ethical questions that arise when human conduct is evaluated.
Given that the environment is on the verge of collapse, is it right to have a child? Should the governments change their focus from curbing poverty to curbing the seemingly inexorable degradation of the environment? Will a spate of mass killings serve as the panacea for our current situation? To be honest, there does not exist a single solution for the present cataclysm with which all humans will benefit. Someone needs to pay the overdue stipend to nature. The question is who will? The answer is all of us. Sooner or later, we will meet our impending fate. If the knell is about to ring, why shouldn’t we enjoy what is left of the world and our time here? We need not go anywhere. Making the most out of the present and enjoying every moment of our time should be the underpinning mantra. The human story will always remain the most dramatic tragicomic story of all time.
Source:
https://www.datanami.com/2016/09/23/past-present-future-finance/
https://www.theworldcounts.com/stories/Facts-About-Environmental-Issues
