A Short History of Progress (The CBC Massey Lectures)

by Ronald Wright

The Australian biologist Tim Flannery has called human beings the “future-eaters.” Each extermination is a death of possibility.24

Patriotism may indeed be, as Dr. Johnson said, “the last refuge of a scoundrel,” but it’s also the tyrant’s first resort. People afraid of outsiders are easily manipulated. The warrior caste, supposedly society’s protectors, often become protection racketeers. In times of war or crisis, power is easily stolen from the many by the few on a promise of security. The more elusive or imaginary the foe, the better for manufacturing consent.

Natural regeneration and human migration are part of the answer. Ancient civilizations were local, feeding on particular ecologies. As one fell, another would be rising elsewhere. Large tracts of the planet were still very lightly settled. A fast film of the earth from space would show civilizations breaking out like forest fires in one region after another. Some were isolated and spontaneous; others were carried from place to place across the centuries, sparks on the cultural wind. A few flared a second time in a good place after a long fallow, rekindling from old coals.

terrorism cannot be stopped by addressing symptoms and not the cause. Violence is bred by injustice, poverty, inequality, and other violence.