Is it possible?

[eyeresist]

Yes, ISIS is so much less brutal now than, say, the Incas were.

You keep forgetting that theses sorts of things were COMMON FARE back then. Not extremisms, COMMON! You can see them in every culture, not just in one in several hundreds.

That's what evolution does. It turns the exceptional into the normative and vice versa.

I wouldn't call it evolution, as that implies a physical change, but the unprecedented peace and prosperity of modern democratic capitalism (for all its flaws) shows no sign of degrading significantly. Imagine talking to someone even in the 1990s and telling them that pretty soon states will be legalising gay marriage and marijuana. It's not a guaranteed utopia, but if tolerance and open-mindedness continue to grow in our culture, I'm not sure what could turn the clock back, except a disaster that destroys civilisation. The Islamist threat is certainly testing us now, but unlike the religious wars in the middle ages, we're not reacting by killing all the people in our country who happen to have the wrong religion.

 

[kirkfan]

Yes, ISIS is so much less brutal now than, say, the Incas were.

You keep forgetting that theses sorts of things were COMMON FARE back then. Not extremisms, COMMON! You can see them in every culture, not just in one in several hundreds.

That's what evolution does. It turns the exceptional into the normative and vice versa.

I wouldn't call it evolution, as that implies a physical change, but the unprecedented peace and prosperity of modern democratic capitalism (for all its flaws) shows no sign of degrading significantly. Imagine talking to someone even in the 1990s and telling them that pretty soon states will be legalising gay marriage and marijuana. It's not a guaranteed utopia, but if tolerance and open-mindedness continue to grow in our culture, I'm not sure what could turn the clock back, except a disaster that destroys civilisation. The Islamist threat is certainly testing us now, but unlike the religious wars in the middle ages, we're not reacting by killing all the people in our country who happen to have the wrong religion.

I am talking about evolution of society, if you want to quibble over minutia; the least you could do is take every detail into account. The rest of your post is pretty much what I was saying on the subject. The occident is undergoing an unprecedented move toward civilization, in spite of elements trying to pull it toward the dark ages.

 

[eyeresist]

I am talking about evolution of society, if you want to quibble over minutia; the least you could do is take every detail into account.

I didn't think you meant Darwinian evolution. I just wanted to be clear, to avoiding possible confusion over the meanings of the word.

 

[BigJake]

Unified planetary states in SF are mostly narrative cheats, meant to skip over the complexities of real life and real politics. I tend to take Star Trek and the Federation in that spirit. It doesn't really pay to look at it all too closely, much less to try to map an actual route from here to there.

Having said that: yes, planetary civilization will probably reach a considerably more unified place than it is now, in much the same way and with many of the same caveats with which real-life entities like the European Union (which would surely have looked like science-fiction to the world of Napoleon) have come into existence. The catch is that at no stage and to nobody participating will it ever look like a perfect utopia; vigilance against injustice, cycles of folly and dysfunction, will always be part and parcel of it no matter how much better the world gets on average and by strictly material measures. The world in which we live now is in many ways vastly more peaceful and more prosperous than prior eras, even taking into account the dysfunctions of Africa and Middle East; but subjectively, it doesn't feel that way, because it's hard to weigh those things from historical moment to moment.

I'd say a genuinely global state is possible and even likely, though it will contain contradictions and problems we can't even predict now. Indeed the building blocks of intercontinental interconnection and major powers with massive interests vested in each others' future are already present (China, Europe, America in some form although with very different dynamics than the United States-centric vision that originally animated Star Trek). A future where humanity colonizes the galaxy is somewhat less likely, because that's a vastly more difficult enterprise than skiffy would have us believe. (Cf. that "Mars One" nonsense.) The really major struggle on the near horizon, an existential struggle even, is the struggle to overcome plutocracy and the short-sighted tendencies thereof. If that struggle is won, humanity in some configuration or other will thrive; if not the results will be apocalyptic. It's actually a salutary feature of Trek futurism that it tended to predict unity coming after some kind of Malthusian apocalypse, which doesn't seem a very unlikely outcome given our current trajectory.

 

[Nightdiamond]

No. Humans are too hardwired to a strong degree of savagery/territoriality. ... Eventually, given enough time, our animal selves will win out.

I think it's a bit of a logical fallacy to say that because the aggressive instinct is there, inevitably it WILL be acted on. That's like saying that, in their lifetime, every person WILL commit murder.

Vandervecken has a point though. If we don't believe we were made in the image of a divine being, we have to consider where our nature comes from.

Otherwise it is denial. Besides, in order to advance, we have to beware of the behavior that we're advancing from.


But I still think we still have to be careful with these ideas though. They tend to border on the crazy.

Like the reason why modern women like pink so much is because it made our female ancestors better at gathering berries
This one got laughed out of the park.

There are a few more of these wacked out ideas around - by some scientists.

It's so easy to get the wrong idea from this, and start placing limitations on what we can or can't do, when we might be totally wrong.

Phlox's interpretation of how an alien culture having a genetic disorder was sign that they were meant to die out and be replaced by another culture, is good reason to take some of these ideas with a grain of salt.

He most certainly was a humanist, and is highly regarded by humanist academics and associations around the world.

Moreover, it is obvious that the entire foundational, underpinning philosophy of Star Trek is that of humanism.

I feel very strongly that it could be an adherence to the principles of this branch of philosophy that brings us to and beyond the next step in our maturation as a species and global society.

I am talking about evolution of society, if you want to quibble over minutia; the least you could do is take every detail into account.

I didn't think you meant Darwinian evolution. I just wanted to be clear, to avoiding possible confusion over the meanings of the word.

TNG in some places implied humans naturally evolved out their primitive behavior.

Some of the behaviors in early TNG seem pretty utopian;

Humans don't fear death.
Humans aren't affected by insults; they're just words. (TOS)
Humans have no addictions at all.
Humans don't judge by appearance at all
Are not sexist whatsoever

There might be some more example you find in the early episodes-- they had an 80's style sci fi Utopian vibe to it.

Some of them make sense, others seem to hard to believe, like when they're claiming that most of humanity, like maybe 95%-- are like this.

 

[kirkfan]

I think either a global state or our near extinction will happen in the next couple of centuries. There are problems that you just can't deal with at the (current) state level. Pollution definitely is one of them. We need a global state if only to control our level of pollution. The problem is will that state happen soon enough to prevent us from poisoning ourselves to death? It's anybody's guess.

 

[HIjol]

I do not believe it is our destiny that we fade out of existence due to neglect or ignorance or lack of Unity. Vandervecken and eyeresist are both correct, mostly, above. And kirkfan is correct when he says, "It's anybody's guess."

However, IMHO, it may be anybody's guess, but it is our conscious, intentional, informed will and surety that we survive, and survive well.

Global State, indeed. And, if there is any justice, and if my instincts about just how long Star Trek will be a worldwide cultural influence, we will eventually be able to call ourselves:

United Earth
Coalition of Planets
United Federation of Planets

 

[Horizons96]

Global State, indeed. And, if there is any justice, and if my instincts about just how long Star Trek will be a worldwide cultural influence, we will eventually be able to call ourselves:

United Earth
Coalition of Planets
United Federation of Planets

Yes I think you are spot on with your instincts! The effects of Star Trek on our progress scientifically are already clearly demonstrable (first Shuttle name, Alcubierre's work, medical tricorders in the works etc etc)...

But I think the onus is on all of us, both as a society and as individuals to make sure we take part in and uphold the philosophical, moral and ethical progress also. What does it mean to represent humanity? What are some of the wonderful, positive characteristics of our species (our acts of compassion etc) that we think we might be able to offer and constructively add to some larger picture out there, if indeed there is one? We obviously have a long way to go before we 'get there', but there is no time like the present to lay the groundwork.

A unified, world government is actually almost upon us, and the efforts to get there, made by prominent people and interest groups over the last century or so have been huge. We had the League of Nations as a result of WWI, the United Nations after WWII and ...
"We are on the verge of global transformation. All we need is the right major crisis and the nations will accept the new world order".
"...the work is now much more sophisticated and prepared to march towards a world government. The supranational sovereignty of an intellectual elite and world bankers is surely preferable to the national auto-determination practiced in past centuries."
- David Rockefeller

There simply is no place for a nation-state centered mentality when we start talking about humanity becoming interstellar. We need to have a sense of identity associated with the world as a whole, not the name given to a particular piece of land we live or were born on.

 

[kirkfan]

Well, let's hope someday the global state will happen, we won't be there to see it, though, and likely neither will our children or our grandchildren. The road ahead is still very long.

 

[HIjol]

With many a winding turn

 

[kirkfan]

With many a winding turn

And I hate that.

 

[T'Girl]

A unified, world government is actually almost upon us, and the efforts to get there, made by prominent people and interest groups over the last century or so have been huge. We had the League of Nations as a result of WWI, the United Nations after WWII and ...

With all respect, what we've actually seen over the last half century isn't a on-gong consolidation into a eventual one world state, but an gradual increase in the number of sovereign nations across the globe.

In the future, the numbering of Humanities sovereign nations might be in the thousands. In many cases the population will be in the hundreds of thousands, or several million. More Andorra, less China and India.

One good politica coup or energy crisis and the People's Republic of China becomes how many countries? Twenty, maybe thirty? India, if split along cultural and ethic lines, could easily form into five countries. The Soviet Union became fifteen countries. Yugoslavia broke into seven countries.

Impossible to say if the EU becomes a nation.

 

[kirkfan]

A unified, world government is actually almost upon us, and the efforts to get there, made by prominent people and interest groups over the last century or so have been huge. We had the League of Nations as a result of WWI, the United Nations after WWII and ...

With all respect, what we've actually seen over the last half century isn't a on-gong consolidation into a eventual one world state, but an gradual increase in the number of sovereign nations across the globe.

In the future, the numbering of Humanities sovereign nations might be in the thousands. In many cases the population will be in the hundreds of thousands, or several million. More Andorra, less China and India.

One good politica coup or energy crisis and the People's Republic of China becomes how many countries? Twenty, maybe thirty? India, if split along cultural and ethic lines, could easily form into five countries. The Soviet Union became fifteen countries. Yugoslavia broke into seven countries.

Impossible to say if the EU becomes a nation.

You're ignoring that nations are regrouping into larger entities like Europe or Nafta.

I think your extrapolation about the number of nations being in the thousands is a bit fantasist.

It's like saying that since people are jumping higher and higher then someday someone will jump over the empire state building.

 

[HIjol]

<checking Risk board> ...isn't "Europe" Europe? And I am not finding "Nafta" but I have been living away from the States and in the Middle East for 6 years now, so I could have missed it...God, I hope we have offered this Nafta country an Economic Stimulus Package or reduced Tariffs or something.,

 

[Horizons96]

<checking Risk board> ...isn't "Europe" Europe? And I am not finding "Nafta" but I have been living away from the States and in the Middle East for 6 years now, so I could have missed it...God, I hope we have offered this Nafta country an Economic Stimulus Package or reduced Tariffs or something.,

NAFTA is the North American Free Trade Agreement.

It is often discussed in the same breath as a potentially impending North American Union.

 

[HIjol]

Ha! That is what I get for trying to be funny! Of course I knew what "NAFTA" is, but I was tweaking kirkfan for his words, implying NAFTA was a country...I did not know there was potential for an impending transformation into an actual country! Thank you and I read often positively of your country. I will get there soon!

 

[kirkfan]

Ha! That is what I get for trying to be funny! Of course I knew what "NAFTA" is, but I was tweaking kirkfan for his words, implying NAFTA was a country...I did not know there was potential for an impending transformation into an actual country! Thank you and I read often positively of your country. I will get there soon!

So much for reading accuracy... I never said that either Europe or Nafta were countries. Check my previous statement if you don't believe me.

 

[T'Girl]

You're ignoring that nations are regrouping into larger entities like Europe or Nafta.

As I posted, that the EU might take the steps required to become a single nation is impossible to say.

Or did you mean something else by " larger entities?"
And if so, what did you mean?

I think your extrapolation about the number of nations being in the thousands is a bit fantasist.

Again, our world is gradually dividing into more countries, not fewer.

... as a potentially impending North American Union.

Canada is far more likely to lose Quebec, than to gain Mexico.

 

[HIjol]

Ha! That is what I get for trying to be funny! Of course I knew what "NAFTA" is, but I was tweaking kirkfan for his words, implying NAFTA was a country...I did not know there was potential for an impending transformation into an actual country! Thank you and I read often positively of your country. I will get there soon!

So much for reading accuracy... I never said that either Europe or Nafta were countries. Check my previous statement if you don't believe me.

I was a bit confused, but fear not, I get the meaning now, and I do enjoy your posts and thought processes!

 

[kirkfan]

Ha! That is what I get for trying to be funny! Of course I knew what "NAFTA" is, but I was tweaking kirkfan for his words, implying NAFTA was a country...I did not know there was potential for an impending transformation into an actual country! Thank you and I read often positively of your country. I will get there soon!

So much for reading accuracy... I never said that either Europe or Nafta were countries. Check my previous statement if you don't believe me.

I was a bit confused, but fear not, I get the meaning now, and I do enjoy your posts and thought processes!

Thank you.