De-evolution Defined

On October 14, 1978 an avant-garde pop band appeared on SNL to perform their version of the Rolling Stones “Satisfaction”.  The group was clad in hazmat suits and their robotic, herky-jerky movements were eye-catching, to say the least.  I learned the band’s name, Devo, was short for de-evolution.

I found the concept interesting; that mankind had reached its pinnacle and then began to regress, back down the slope it’d taken us millions of years to climb.  Initially, I was skeptical.  The moon landings and other scientific and engineering feats were still somewhat fresh in my mind.  At the same time, I wondered if this musical group from Ohio was on to something; that we had, at least from a societal viewpoint, peaked, and that it was all downhill from there.

In the years that have passed since that day, I have become convinced that we are in fact de-evolving.  The only question remaining is: when did it begin?  And so, in the immortal words of Rod Serling, the following stabs at the genesis of de-evolution are submitted for your approval:

July 16, 1945: The first atomic bomb detonation

At that moment, as a 20 kiloton explosion mushroomed into the New Mexico atmosphere, mankind unknowingly took a giant step backward.  True, nuclear physics have resulted in power production independent of fossil fuels, and opened the door to nuclear medicine, but it also handed Man the ability to utterly destroy himself and his environment in a matter of hours.  To paraphrase Genesis 3:22, Man had become (a God), to know good and evil.

1977: Disco takes over

Described by one music critic as “Muzak for a dry hump”, the symphonic demon of disco succeeded in choking every ounce of soul, style and melody from music.  While many differ on exactly when this crime against art first emerged, the cultural brain freeze reached its peak with the release of “Saturday Night Fever”, in which our hero is a blue collar worker by day and dances at night.  He dances.  At discos.  At night.  Many at the time thought disco was a sign of the apocalypse, myself included.

May 21, 1992: MTV unleashes “Real World”

Many people believe this was the first “reality” TV show, and it is, if you define reality TV as I do: It’s real in the sense that it’s unscripted, but not really real because the participants knew they were being filmed.  Had this been a reality show in the strictest sense, the cameras would had to have been hidden, but that would have resulted in a lot less showboating and incendiary drama, and therefore, sold a lot less zit cream and Jolt cola.

1999: World population reaches six billion

Not only had our numbers increased by a billion (a hefty 20% jump) in the span of 12 years, it happened at a time when a significant portion of us had to have been aware that fossils fuels, potable water, and arable land were dwindling.  Yet we pro-created our behinds off.  Congratulations, it’s a billion.

September 1, 2006: “Idiocracy” is released

This “satirical science fiction comedy” tells the story of two people who are kept in suspended animation for 500 years, and awake to a world populated by idiots. One may wonder why this particular movie (which is satire after all) made the list, and the answer is simple: Anyone who’s seen the movie has seen our future.  It’s easy to connect the dots; we as a species are in fact becoming dumber by the minute, and we’ve done little to change course.   I will forever be haunted by the scene of the skyscraper with a huge digital clock flashing “12:00”.

June 2009: The Forever Lazy is born

The fact that even one of these was actually sold is sufficient evidence for me that humankind has chosen to throw off the survivalist spirit which brought him up from the great primordial soup bowl, preferring instead to vegetate on the sofa wrapped in a “onesie for adults”.  I’m surprised they haven’t introduced a matching feedbag.

What is Man’s fate?  Are we destined to slide down the slippery slope of evolution, back into that primordial soup bowl?  Will we ever create the utopian paradise we claim to want?  Or will we all wind up enshrouded in a onesie, flopped down on a sofa, clutching a remote or iPad, just waiting to die?  Where there is ebb, there must be flow; where there is hope there must be change.

Be that change.

Hurtling Towards Disaster

Here’s today’s question: What has more than doubled over the past 50 years? Yes, the average split-level ranch, and just about any out-patient surgery you could name has more than doubled in price in that span. But, that’s not what I’m referring to. I’m talking about world population - or, the sum and total of us.

In 1960 - before most of you were born, and way before the internet, the microwave oven, or Real Housewives of Fill in the Blank - the world’s population was just over three billion. Today, the world’s population stands at around 6,880,000,000. That’s six billion, eight hundred and eighty million. It took us however many centuries it was to get to three billion, and we’ve more than doubled that in 50 years. The rate of growth is staggering.

Back in the Seventies, the acronym Z.P.G. was rather popular; pretty much everyone knew that it stood for Zero Population Growth. It was an idea that never really gained “traction”. Although some people seemed to take the threat of uncontrolled growth seriously, for the most part we’ve bred like rabbits doing tequila shots. And, if you do the math, we’re hurtling towards disaster, at a rate just barely within the realm of comprehension.

It doesn‘t take a genius to see the outlook is both dismal and dire. Suffice to say, our eco-system cannot hope to sustain many more of us. It has been suggested that a world population of 10 Billion will be the tipping point; beyond which an ever-increasing percentage of humankind will live in virtual squalor, literally imprisoned within a refrigerator sized plot of their own excrement.

It has also been conjectured that in the not-too-distant future, potable water will cost more than sweet crude oil, only the ultra-rich will be able to afford a 1,000 square foot single-family dwelling, and a vine-ripened tomato will be worth it’s weight in gold. Demand up, supply down, bad news all around.

Yes, we may colonize the moon sometime this century. We may even find a few other rocks floating around in space on which to plant our flag. But, right now the Earth is all we have. And we’re all getting an ever-dwindling slice of that.

I’m not suggesting that we stop reproducing, or that we could - any more so than we could stop polluting, killing each other, or Tweeting. I’m suggesting that we stop and think about what we’re doing. Before we do it.