Convergence of Catastrophes, page 23
It is necessary to present an optimistic façade and encourage people to believe that the situation can be miraculously restored with ‘good will’, ‘cooperation’, and ‘rationality’. In reality, however, this planet that has been globalised, where a global civilisation reigns for the first time, has been and is incapable of governing itself, even in the middle term. Everything is based on the short term, especially in an economy which rests only on the imperatives of ‘growth’, ‘development’, and, naturally, on the maximisation of profits, that is, on a generalised myopia.
Who is going to persuade the Chinese that it is ecologically impossible and suicidal, when we take into account the terrestrial ecosystem, that their 1.3 billion inhabitants reach a standard of living equivalent to that of the West in the 1960s, which is, however, their official objective, and India’s as well? Who has been able to persuade the Americans to ratify the Kyoto Protocol on limiting greenhouse gas emissions? Nobody. Their own immediate interests — industrial, financial and political — are too strong. Forests are chopped down, marine and fishing reserves are pillaged, petroleum (the key to the world economy) is pumped as if the reserves were inexhaustible, fresh water is wasted . . . The list is a long one. Even Parisian environmentalists who deplore the overconsumption of energy cannot do without their 4 X 4s, daily shower and electrical household appliances.
No one takes global catastrophe seriously, because, just like the Sunday driver who thinks, ‘Accidents happen to other people’, this worldwide civilisation has too much confidence in itself. It believes that it is immortal. It is still permeated by Western myths of progress (which by definition will never come to an end). These myths are very active in Third World countries as they were in Nineteenth-century Europe. Confidence in the omnipotence of techno-science, which will solve all problems, never leaves us and blinds us. We are victims of a linear and ascending vision of history, while the law of life is cyclical, with a phase of ascent, then of maturity and finally of decline, at first slow and then violent. The present world civilisation is in the same state as an old man, who believes he is in good health, but who feels all the same disturbing signs and alarming aches and pains, but who refuses to draw the natural conclusions from them; or of a tree that appears strong, but which is eaten away from within and suddenly falls.
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It is impossible to stop the headlong race of contemporary planetary civilisation to the abyss, because there exists no power with the decisive will to do so. How to change the direction of six billion people? The world state is only a mischievous myth. Humanity is, in fact, globalised, without having learned how to govern itself, since enormous masses cannot be governed. Only a limited number of people can be. International institutions are completely powerless to stop the linked sequence of the lines of catastrophe.
There is no reason to be surprised, since it is not in man’s nature to anticipate. This instinctive tendency was accentuated by the exaggerated individualism of contemporary civilisation. ‘Wisdom’ is not a characteristic of human beings, except, in the best situation, for self-conscious elites who, in any event, do not practice it. The name of Homo sapiens sapiens applied to our species is inappropriate. Mankind is handicapped by its hybris, its aggressive lack of moderation, and one can even ask whether our species is not an evolutionary dead end.
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We must not ignore the phenomenon of premonitions. For forty years in literature, comic books, movies, and so forth, some authors have foreseen an end of our civilisation and an enormous regression. Let us be careful never to despise the intuition of poets.
It is quite certain that it is not possible to predict in detail how the planetary system of the present world civilisation is going to collapse, nor the precise date of the catastrophe — which in any event will take place over several years. We can be sure, however, that the event will take place and will strike us dumb. All of a sudden everything will stop and the magic will end. The TVs will stop working. The cell phones will not respond. The police will not be there to stop the pillaging. The whole fragile system of our civilisation will fall down like a row of dominoes — and perhaps from one end of the Earth to the other.
Quite unlike the scenarios of the 1960s and 1970s, which were based on the Cold War and the spectre of a nuclear confrontation between East and West, it is not at all generalised nuclear war that is to be feared and that will overthrow our civilisation, but a piling up of crises that are already at work today. Global nuclear conflict will not take place (for example, between China and the USA). A limited nuclear conflict between two middling powers (for example, India and Pakistan) is not very likely and, if it did take place, it would not be enough by itself to bring chaos over the entire Earth. On the contrary, it is very probable that we shall see nuclear attacks against big cities, which will entail tens of thousands of deaths and which will contribute to the general destabilisation.
Catastrophe Scenarios
Here is what I foresee. These prognostications could turn out to be correct, at least approximately so. Let us suggest three scenarios, a first ‘soft’ one, a second ‘hard’, and a third ‘very hard’. Let us start with the probable assumption that the great crisis that issues from the convergence of the lines of catastrophe will take place between 2010 and 2020. These dates seem near, but we are currently experiencing a considerable acceleration of historical events and changes.
1. The ‘Soft’ Scenario
In two or three years the European economy collapses and enters a severe recession. It is undermined by the following factors: colossal state debt (the ‘Argentina’ situation); the considerable burden of retirements and welfare payments for unemployment and sickness that prevents investment; the flight of young, educated people out of the continent; unsupportable tax burdens; the lower quality of the workforce; accelerating deindustrialisation and outsourcing. France is the country most affected by these trends. Real unemployment reaches 20 per cent and the general standard of living sinks in two years by 30 per cent. The crisis in Europe surpasses in extent that of 1929.
To this situation is added the pressure of increasingly high immigration, which the European Union is incapable of halting; a crime wave that can no longer be controlled; and the explosion of ghettoes and refugee zones for the well-off classes. The overwhelmed forces of order face a ‘low-key civil war’. Islamist attacks become common, but no ‘giga-terrorism’ takes place. Everywhere Muslim voters start voting for their own ‘ethnic’ lists that elect an increasingly large number of representatives with growing communitarian demands. Islam has become the most practiced religion. Faced with this, native nationalist parties and parties of the ‘extreme Right’ grow inexorably.
The entry of new members — including Turkey — into the European Union has made it unworkable and unmanageable, and the EU is on the edge of splitting apart. Although the situation is dramatic, it never reaches the breaking point, however. The system lasts and adapts to the new situation.
In a word, the European Union has simply become a Third World country, in which hopes for a moderate life slowly begin to vanish, where the shrinking of the GDP and the standard of living become larger year after year; where the political crisis is permanent and insecurity is worse than today. Catastrophe, or collapse of the situation into chaos, has not (yet) taken place.
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This weakening of Europe and its economy obviously has a very negative impact on the rest of the world economy, which, however, does not enter into recession, but continues to grow.
The situation of the planet is not good, however, since other crises get worse and their effects reverberate, each affecting the others:
1) Climate catastrophes accelerate dramatically starting from 2010, affecting especially the countries of the South to which are added recurrent famines and the progression of epidemics, especially AIDS, which continues to ravage the Third World.
2) Islamic fundamentalism is established in a growing number of countries. The Middle East is on fire and enters into a state of total war, poisoning all international relations. Murderous attacks (like what happened at Madrid)[235] occur several times a year, striking the USA, Europe and certain Muslim countries that are in a state of civil war.
3) Black Africa sinks into anarchy, wars and economic recessions while the UN is increasingly powerless.
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On the world level and in France and Europe, however, the rope does not break. The situation, although very serious, remains under control. A situation of generalised continuing crisis is established. The present civilisation maintains itself painfully, but it resists. Collapse is feared, but put off to the Greek calends.[236] The Twenty-first century follows its happy trail. The demographic growth of the planetary population slows down noticeably, however, because of the generalised rise in mortality rates.
The fragility of this immense banking system is not so great that it can cause its fall. In 2020 the worst is avoided, for the moment . . . No serious measure is taken, however; no lesson is learned. Destiny grants the tragedy one more act . . .
2. The ‘Hard’ Scenario
The same elements and the same causes as those evoked in the previous scenario are at work, but they happen more suddenly and their linking and concomitance have much more severe consequences.
Here are some examples: the European economic recession is much more severe than before; the standard of living falls in a few years by half. The threshold attained by ethnic civil war in several countries is no longer low-key, but frank and open. All over the world, conflicts involving Islam reach a dramatic intensity. Shortages of petroleum and the exhaustion of agricultural and food reserves begin to be seriously felt. All the parameters remain the same as in the previous scenario, but they are getting worse. The conflagration in the Middle East takes on dramatic proportions. Localised nuclear wars break out. Giga-terrorist attacks have nuclear episodes. Epidemics, famines and climate episodes are linked to one another.
We witness a psychological destabilisation of humanity, which has devastating effects, all the way to the collective unconsciousness. Mankind, in a state of torpor, gives up. No voluntary change takes place and a sort of ‘low-key chaos’ is established, but controlled chaos.
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The global system of world civilisation is holding up, but a radical metamorphosis happens, without a real fractal break. After a few years the following situation occurs:
The European Union disappears, pure and simple, because it has become completely unmanageable. Europe is organised as a sort of neo-medieval kaleidoscope, extremely fluid, although in theory the juridical existence of nation-states still subsists. Some Islamic areas become autonomous republics and there are hyper-protected areas reserved for rich Europeans. Conflicts are incessant, but never go beyond a tolerable threshold. The standard of living of the population of Europe continues to sink slowly, but a small wealthy class maintains itself.
The global system manages to survive. The stock market is still functioning. The law of adaptation is in play. People live in the ruins or semi-ruins of the old world, but after all they are still living. The techno-scientific level regresses, although not in a drastic manner. There is, however, no more talk of technological ‘progress’.
Poverty on the planetary scale reaches astronomical levels, especially in the Third World. The human population regresses rather rapidly, as do polluting emissions (but it is too late), because of massive economic regression. On the international scale, local wars, macro-attacks, incessant encounters with Islam follow one another without respite. The movement toward the democratisation of the world is halted.
3. The ‘Very Hard’ Scenario
This is the scenario that, in my opinion, is the most likely and perhaps the most desirable.
The fractal break happens, the rope breaks. The edifice of world civilisation can no longer resist. The factors discussed in the previous two scenarios undergo a still more heightened intensity, especially in the area of climate change, where a cataclysmic break intervenes around 2015. Everything collapses like a row of dominoes. The collapse happens between 2010 and 2015, but the shipwreck takes ten years to finish. In 2030 the state of the planet has nothing in common with what the ‘experts’ and today’s authorised savants had foreseen.
1) The world’s population shrinks drastically. It shrinks from more than six billion to a billion and continues to decline very rapidly. The causes are simple: the collapse of the supply systems of food and drinking water, as well as the end of access to medicine due to the disappearance of the pharmaceutical industries and medical facilities. By the middle of the Twenty-first century, the human species stabilises at a little less than 300 million inhabitants. Everything happens as if humanity had served as an adjustable variant to pass from one non-viable system to a viable one. Africa is the continent most affected by depopulation. The level of population in Africa recovers at a pre-colonisation level.
Humanity (by the law of cycles) finds itself propelled into the ‘equilibrium situation’ that it knew countless centuries ago.
2) The survivors flee towns and metropolises en masse. Urban buildings, invaded by vegetation, begin to degrade. Only gangs survive in the deserted cities, from which they make raids into the country. In the country, where the remnants of the population have taken refuge, people live on subsistence farming and arts and crafts.
3) In effect, all industry is finished. A fantastic and violent technological regression begins, that only gets worse since the transmission of knowledge is no longer possible.
Three types of ‘levels of civilisation’ are noticed: first of all, some areas (essentially in the present Third World) where life has returned to the Neolithic Age, with a primitive agricultural economy; second, other areas — for example, in Europe and the old developed countries — where life returns to the situation of the early Middle Ages (from the Sixth to the Tenth century); finally subsistence islands (it is not possible to predict their location decades before the catastrophe) that preserve behind barricades part of the technology acquired from the old civilisation. The islands are founded in part on the recycled materials of gigantic cast-offs left by the old culture. Since these machines need petroleum, however, it is not unthinkable that they are established near current extraction points.
These subsistence islands maintain a highly variable technological level, which only rarely (and not in all matters) surpasses the level of the beginning of the Twentieth century. It is possible, however, that, using the most recent technologies of the Twentieth century, in use just before the collapse, a super-technological ‘micro-civilisation’ will subsist somewhere in the world. These separate areas resemble ‘city-states’ and will probably be run by military dictatorships.
4) On the political level, all nation-states have collapsed as well as international institutions. Humanity knows — or rediscovers — a situation at once medieval and tribal.
The imperatives of subsistence, protection and hunting are the general law, and therefore war becomes commonplace. These incessant struggles no longer put the Earth in peril. The weapons of mass destruction — nuclear, biological, and chemical — no longer exist. In zone A (Neolithic), there is the kingdom of tribes and the return to what mankind has known for millennia. In zones B and C (see above) the situation is more complicated. Feudal societies are formed and new political relationships are established, rather similar to what was seen at the beginning of the Middle Ages. In some sense, it is a repetition of the past, but according to a different modality, since history is an ‘approximate’ eternal return.
5) In the religious and spiritual domain, we witness a true explosion. Writing remains. The great religions of the old civilisation continue to be handed down, but they are modified and return to their sources. The collapse, over the entire Earth, of the individualist society of consumption marks the end of materialism and the development of spiritualism. New cults and syncretisms are born, including resurgences of ancient pagan cults. To the collapse of the material domain of the old world corresponds the development of the spiritual domain of the new world, not contrived (as in our days), since it corresponds to extremely difficult conditions of life, especially because of the severe climate conditions.
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A new humanity is in the process of being born everywhere, founded on radically new bases. Slowly the law of life is re-established. The Earth breathes. Pollution has ceased — the Kyoto Protocol is respected, painfully, at the price of a gigantic human hecatomb.[237] It is the victory of Gaïa, the Earth. Of course, the effects of the terrible pollution of the Nineteenth and Twentieth centuries, and the beginning of the Twenty-first century, continue to be felt. But the Earth absorbs it and becomes healthy once again. A new cycle begins. Are the people who have survived less happy or happier than their parents and ancestors? Probably happier.
The End of Contemporary Humanity, Predicted by Tradition
The convergence of catastrophes and the violent end of the present civilisation can be deduced from the observation of different phenomena, as we have just done. It would be dishonest, however, not to mention that several traditions, from the Druids to the Tibetans, and including India, seem to have predicted a similar collapse that will affect all humanity and which has already been seen in the past without being mentioned in official history. In all the ancient traditions, the idea returns that mankind knows successive ages, punctuated by catastrophes, but the one we are about to experience will be the greatest.
