Humanity is in charge of it’s own future
Discuss statement.
While humanity may shape and form it’s own future it lacks the foresight to actually control it or alter it accordingly.
Oxford Dictionary describes future as:
“A period of time following the moment of speaking or writing; time regarded as still to come”
So the future is time starting from now. The rest of everything. In the the title statement however we’re just referring to humanity’s future which is different to the future of everything.
I believe that everything we do right now has lasting effect in the future, kind of like the butterfly effect, all actions have results that we can not possible conceive at the current time. So while everything we do alters our future we are not in charge. We can control certain aspects perhaps but to say we are in charge would be inaccurate.
We lack the knowledge/understanding to actively take charge of our distant future. Imagine if in the 60’s we had known global warming/climate change would go on to become an issue. We would have taken measures to avoid it. Yet it wasn’t until the late 90’s it even became a political issue and currently many consider too late to make the required difference. Had we known would we not have taken charge of our future.
Similar situation with Hitler. At the start of Hitler’s political rise to power in the 30’s had everyone been able to guess how that would pan out surely something would have been done.
We can’t predict what’s going to happen next, so how can we possibly take charge. We are undoubtedly very innovative and make rapid advancements is technology and other areas of our existence so in way can guide ourselves but to take charge is a different matter entirely.
Speaking of rapid advancements in technology and not being able to predict our own future… there is currently an Apocalypse Think-Tank trying to predict our future in relation technology
http://www.scientificamerican.com/article/meet-the-co-founder-of-an-apocalypse-think-tank/
Apparently Steven Hawking is part of it, that’s pretty cool.
