Hostname: page-component-78c5997874-fbnjt Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-20T05:40:00.949Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Is Humanity Destined to Self-Destruct?

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  17 May 2016

Lynton Keith Caldwell
Lynton Keith Caldwell*
Affiliation:
Indiana University, USA
Get access

Abstract

As the twentieth century ends, we may identify both constructive and destructive trends that will influence the future of humanity. Which set of trends will dominate the future is uncertain. Attitudes, beliefs, and behaviors all interact to direct the flow of change over time. However, the options and constraints of human life are ultimately fixed by those cosmic elements of the environment over which humans have no control. The modern assumption of a world without end or limits risks collision with that obdurate reality. Facing threats to its long-term survival, humanity is challenged to learn how to build a sustainable future. A successful effort will require a concerted and cooperative effort among all fields of knowledge. This article identifies some of the trends that threaten humanity's future and suggests four lines of action that should be pursued in order to reduce the likelihood that humanity will destroy itself.

Type
Articles
Information
Politics and the Life Sciences , Volume 18 , Issue 1 , March 1999 , pp. 3 - 14
Copyright
Copyright © Association for Politics and the Life Sciences 

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Aikin, W. (1977). Technocracy and the American Dream, 1900–1941. Berkeley, CA: University of California Press.Google Scholar
Alden, R.M. (1917). Readings in English Prose of the Nineteenth Century Part II. Cambridge, MA: Riverside Press (Houghton Mifflin).Google Scholar
Andrews, R.N.L. (1999). Managing Environment, Managing Ourselves: A History of American Environmental Policy. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press.Google Scholar
Aron, R. (1963). World Technology and Human Destiny. Ann Arbor, MI: University of Michigan Press.Google Scholar
Ashby, E. (1978). Reconciling Man with the Environment Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press.Google Scholar
Baden, J.A., ed. (1994). Environmental Gore: A Constructive Response to Earth in Balance. San Francisco, CA: Pacific Research Institute for Public Policy.Google Scholar
Bandura, A. (1977). Social Learning Theory. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice Hall.Google Scholar
Bazerman, M.H., Moore, D.A., and Gillespie, J. (1998). The Human Mind as a Barrier to Wiser Environmental Agreements. Evanston, IL: Northwestern University Institute for Policy Research, Working Papers-98-#16.Google Scholar
Berdyaev, N. (1935). The Fate of Man in the Modern World. New York: Morehouse.Google Scholar
Boulding, K. (1985). The World as a Total System. Beverly Hills, CA: Sage.Google Scholar
Brown, L.R. (1975). “The Discontinuities before Us.” The Futurist 9 (June):122–33.Google Scholar
Burhenne, W.E., ed. (1993). International Environmental Soft Law. Dordrecht/Boston/London: Martinus Nijhoff.Google Scholar
Burton, I., Kates, R., and White, G.F. (1978). The Environment as Hazard. New York: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Caldwell, L.K. (1963). “Environment: A New Focus for Public Policy?” Public Administration Review 23 (3): 132–33.Google Scholar
Caldwell, L.K. (1971). “Environmental Policy in a Hypertrophic Society.” Natural Resources Journal 11 (July):417–22.Google Scholar
Caldwell, L.K. (1978). “The Urban System as a Socio-Ecological Experiment.” In Davis, C.B. and Sacks, A., (eds.), Current Issues in Environmental Education IV. Columbus, OH: Eric Clearing House for Science, Mathematics, and Environmental Education.Google Scholar
Calhoun, J.B. (1963). The Ecology and Sociology of the Norway Rat. Bethesda, MD: National Institute of Mental Health.Google Scholar
Carson, R. (1963). Silent Spring. London: Hamish Hamilton.Google Scholar
Catton, W.R. Jr. (1980). Overshoot: The Ecological Basis of Revolutionary Change. Urbana, IL: University of Illinois Press.Google Scholar
Chen, K. and Lagler, K. F., eds. (1974). Growth Policy: Population Environment and Beyond. Ann Arbor, MI: University of Michigan Press.Google Scholar
Coates, J.F. (1991). “The Sixteen Sources of Environmental Problems in the 21st Century.” Technological Forecasting and Social Change 40:87–91.Google Scholar
Colborn, T., Dumanaski, D., and Myers, J.P. (1996). Our Stolen Future. New York: Dutton.Google Scholar
Commission on Population Growth and the American Future (1972). Population and the American Future. New York: New American Library.Google Scholar
Corning, P.A. (1983). The Synergism Hypothesis: A Theory of Progressive Evolution. New York: McGraw-Hill.Google Scholar
Cotgrove, S. (1982). Catastrophe or Cornucopia: Environment, Politics, and the Future. New York: John Wiley.Google Scholar
Coward, H., ed. (1995). Population, Consumption, and the Environment; Religious and Secular Responses. Albany, NY: State University of New York Press.Google Scholar
Dorsey, G.A. (1925). Why We Behave Like Human Beings. New York: Harper and Brothers.Google Scholar
Doxiadis, C.A. (1967). “The Coming Era of Ecumenoplis.” Saturday Review (March 18): 11–14.Google Scholar
Dubos, R. (1965). Man Adapting. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press.Google Scholar
Ehrlich, P. (1969). The Population Bomb. New York: Ballantine.Google Scholar
Ellul, J. (1964). The Technological Society. New York: A.A. Knopf.Google Scholar
Forrester, J.W. (1947). World Dynamics. Cambridge, MA: Wright.Google Scholar
Forrester, J.W. (1971). “Counterintuitive Behavior of Social Systems.” Technology Review 73 (January):53.Google Scholar
Gardner, G.T. and Stern, P. (1996). Environmental Problems and Human Behavior. Boston: Allyn and Bacon.Google Scholar
Giedion, S. (1948). Mechanization Takes Command: Contribution to Anonymous History. New York: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Global 2000 Report to the President: Entering the Twenty-First Century (1980). Washington, DC: U.S. Government Printing Office.Google Scholar
Gore, A. (1992). Earth in Balance: Ecology and the Human Spirit. Boston: Houghton Mifflin.Google Scholar
Hammond, A. (1998). Which World? Scenarios for the 21st Century: Global Destinies, Regional Choices. Washington, DC: Island Press.Google Scholar
Heilbroner, R.L. (1974). An Inquiry Into the Human Prospect. New York: WW Norton.Google Scholar
Heilbroner, R.L. (1980). An Inquiry Into the Human Prospect: Updated and Reconsidered for the 1980s. New York: W.W. Norton.Google Scholar
Heilbroner, R.L. (1995). Visions of the Future: The Distant Past, Yesterday, Today and Tomorrow. New York: The New York Public Library, Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Hirsch, S. (1976). Social Limits to Growth. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.Google Scholar
Huxley, A. (1932). Brave New World. New York: Modern Library.Google Scholar
Jeffers, R. (1987). “The Beaks of Eagles.” In The Selected Poetry of Robinson Jeffers. New York: Random House.Google Scholar
Kagan, D. (1991). Pericles of Athens and the Birth of Democracy. New York: Free Press.Google Scholar
King, A. and Schneider, B. (1991). First Global Revolution: A Report by the Council of the Club of Rome. New York: Pantheon.Google Scholar
Laszlo, E. (1972). The System View of the World. New York: Braziller.Google Scholar
Linden, E. (1998). The Future in Plain Sight: Nine Clues to the Coming Instability. New York: Simon & Schuster.Google Scholar
Lovelock, J.E. (1979). Gaia: A New Look at Life on Earth. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Lubchenco, J. (1998). “Entering the Century of the Environment A New Social Contract for Science.” Science 279 (January 23):496.Google Scholar
Maddox, J.R. (1972). The Doomsday Syndrome. New York: McGraw-Hill.Google Scholar
Marsh, G.P. (1864). Man and Nature: Or, Physical Geography Modified by Human Action. New York: C Scribner.Google Scholar
McGinn, B., Collins, J.J., and Stein, S.J., eds. (1998). Encyclopedia of Apocalypticism. New York: Continuum Publishing Group.Google Scholar
Meadows, D.H. (1992). Beyond the Limits: Confronting Global Collapse, Envisioning a Sustainable Future. Post Mills, VT: Chelsea Green.Google Scholar
Meadows, D.H. et al. (1972). The Limits to Growth: A Report for the Club of Rome's Project on the Predicament of Mankind. New York: Universe Books.Google Scholar
Mesarovic, M.D. and Pestel, E. (1974). Mankind at the Turning Point: The Second Report to the Club of Rome. New York: Dutton.Google Scholar
Michael, D.N. (1968). The Unprepared Society. New York: Basic Books.Google Scholar
Michael, D.N. (1973). On Learning to Plan and Planning to Learn. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass. Republished by Miles River Press, Alexandria, VA (1997).Google Scholar
Michael, D.N. (1984). “Too Much of a Good Thing: Dilemmas of an Information Society.” Technology Forecasting and Social Change 25:347–55.Google Scholar
Milbrath, L.W. (1989). Envisioning a Sustainable Society: Learning Our Way Out. Albany, NY: State University of New York Press.Google Scholar
Milgram, S. (1970). “The Experience of Living in Cities.” Science 167 (March 13): 1461–68.Google Scholar
Monod, J. (1972, 1980). Chance and Necessity. New York: Vintage Books.Google Scholar
Moos, R.H. (1976). The Human Context: Environmental Determinants of Behavior. New York: John Wiley.Google Scholar
Mumford, L. (1934). Technics and Civilization. New York: Harcourt, Brace.Google Scholar
National Commission on Materials Policy (1973). Material Needs and the Environment: Final Report of the National Commission on Materials Policy. Washington, DC: U.S. Government Printing Office.Google Scholar
de Noüy, L. (1947). Human Destiny. London: Longmans.Google Scholar
Osborn, F. (1948). Our Plundered Planet. Boston: Little, Brown & Co.Google Scholar
Paddock, W. and Paddock, P. (1967). Famine, 1975! Boston: Little, Brown & Co.Google Scholar
Perrow, C. (1984). Normal Accidents: Living with High Risk Technologies. New York: Basic Books.Google Scholar
Platt, J. (1969). “What We Must Do.” Science 166 (November 28):1115–21.Google Scholar
Recent Social Trends in the United States: Report of the President's Research Committee on Social Trends (1933). New York: McGraw-Hill.Google Scholar
Sears, P.B. (1935). Deserts on the March. Norman, OK: University of Oklahoma Press.Google Scholar
Seidenberg, R. (1950). Posthistoric Man: An Inquiry. Chapel Hill, NC: University of North Carolina Press.Google Scholar
Simon, J.L. (1980). “Resources, Population, Environment: An Over-supply of False Bad News” Science 108 (June 17): 1431–36.Google Scholar
Stewart, G. (1949). Earth Abides. New York: Random House.Google Scholar
Teilhard de Chardin, P. (1959). The Phenomenon of Man. New York: Harper.Google Scholar
Toffler, A. (1970). Future Shock. New York: Random House.Google Scholar
Turner, B.A. (1978). Man-Made Disasters. London: Wyeham Publications.Google Scholar
Vogt, W. (1948). The Road to Survival. New York: W Sloane.Google Scholar
Watt, K.E.F. (1974). The Titanic Effect: Planning for the Unthinkable. New York: Dutton.Google Scholar
Weiskel, T.C. and Gray, R.A. (1992). Environmental Decline and Public Policy: Pattern, Trend and Prospect. Ann Arbor, MI: Perian Press.Google Scholar
White, G.F. (1974). Natural Hazards: Local, National, Global. New York: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
White, G.F. and Haas, J.E. (1975). Assessment of Research on Natural Disasters. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.Google Scholar
Wilson, E.O. (1998). Consilience: The Unity of Knowledge. New York: Knopf.Google Scholar
World Scientists' Warning to Humanity (1992). Cambridge, MA: Union of Concerned Scientists, November 18.Google Scholar