Posted by jkm822 at michigan.mgmt.rpi.edu on June 10, 2003 at 14:56:14:
In Reply to: Okay...I'll discuss. posted by Kev Hoffman on June 10, 2003 at 14:38:03:
: I could never, ever, ever think that any of those wouldn't be gone. It's just NOT POSSIBLE. Disease will always mutate. While white men are in power (actually, just men in general), war will be rampant, and death...death is inevitable...no changing that. To even think that any of those would ever disappear, well that's having too much faith in a lost cause. I'd love to see them gone, if given the highly unlikely opportunity too.
Just saying I still have hope.
I agree that as long as human beings (OK, mostly the masculine half thereof) exist, there will still be war. It's part of human nature to say "Hey! That's mine!" and fight over it. Or even more frighteningly, "Hey! My God says that's mine! And he should be your God, too! Here, let me show you this pointy thing that says so... oops, I slipped! Sorry!" Sad, but true, at least now. This can change in one of two ways:
1. We all die.
This is an entirely possible option, and seems very likely, given the power of the weapons at our disposal. Just imagine the kind of improvements that will be made to such weapons in the future!
2. MOST of us die, and steps are taken to prevent such a thing happening again.
What kind of steps? I don't know. It hasn't happened yet. But... and I know this is going to sound stupid, but I think it's true... a big part of that would be having the world run by women. 'Cause most of the time, we're not big on the war and violence. I'm not saying we're not CAPABLE of it; of coure we are, we're still human. But we tend not to jump at the chance to blow people up the way that testosterone seems to cause many men to do. Broad generalization, of course, but you know what I mean.
Disease... I don't know about that one. I just don't know. Part of me thinks we might just be able to beat that one, some day. Not completely, but things like cancer and AIDS? I think we might be able to beat that kind of thing. Even when it comes down to mutations, if we've gotten the biggie taken care of, it shouldn't be too hard to adapt, should we? Also, take into account that even as diseases mutate, so do we. We adapt. And if we don't, we die. So, again, it goes one way or the other.
Death is absolute, tho. No getting around it.