#327 / Map Of Doom

I am told by some that I have an entirely too negative view of the world. According to these friends, I am always looking for "gloom and doom." There is some truth to that, I will have to admit. My interaction with the online universe, for instance, usually spotlights resource tragedies, not playful kittens. Fracking is featured. Comely comestibles are hardly ever pictured. 

For any readers of a similar mind, here is a resource library designed for you. It's called "Doom For Dummies," or "Universal Map of Doom." It also goes by the name "The Apocalypsi Library at the End of the World."

Doom For Dummies has a concise list of major impending disasters, plus a brief commentary that is worthy of note: 

7 major scourges of Doom (and why their adherents squabble over the scraps rather than accomplish anything useful together whatsoever).

• Peak Oil (rarely recognizes peak anything else, generally fixated on doomsteading) 

• Ecosystem Collapse (an ecological perspective about pollution, whole systems destruction) 

• Climate Change (yes, it's real, it's caused by humans, and it's an existential threat) 

• Overpopulation (no, the world doesn't need your offspring because you're "special") 

• Habitat Destruction (deforestation, mining, fracking, drilling, paving, etc) 

• Economic - (includes debt Ponzi schemes and inequality, social justice issues) 

• The death of the Oceans (from agricultural runoff, warming, overfishing and acidification)

Here's why none of the activists, scientists, and followers of these disparate but interconnected sources of potential doom can work together - Everyone who discovers that we are on an unstoppable trend towards global collapse becomes instantly enamored of two overpowering, egotistical (and often remunerative) convictions...first, they are sure they have defined the precise problem (which usually has to do with how they came about to notice) and second, they are sure they, and they alone, know the solution (ditto). Nobody will ever cooperate to fix the problems, because their ego won't let them.

Despite my propensity for "gloom and doom" thinking, I would like to believe that I am not one who puts myself forward as having a unique understanding of just how doomed we are, and I am certainly not advertising myself as someone who knows the solution!

I do have this to offer, by way of a commentary on the Universal Map of Doom. None of the incipient dooms listed above are inevitable. In every case, human activities are causing the problem. Our "doom," if doom it's going to be, is not coming by way of an asteroid from outer space that we can do nothing to avoid. 

Our dooms are avoidable.

The way I see it, that's actually pretty good news!

Image Credit:
http://www.minecraftforum.net/forums/mapping-and-modding/maps/1522346-adv-surv-temple-of-doom