[SKRIVA] Aldiss, and nightmares too!

(Skrev nedanstående på engelska för utländsk publik. Men jag fick veta om artikeln genom DN:s notis. --AE)
Brian Aldiss wrote in The Guardian Nov 19th that the dystopian sf future is now here. Everything is going down the drain. Wars and suicide bombers. The polar bear is doomed. We just pollute Mother Earth and multiply beyond all bounds. Mankind is so arrogant and stupid. The end is nigh! The Guardian has always been the willing platform for that kind of talk; so has the cultural section of Swedish Dagens Nyheter which had a comment (Nov 22) to the article. (To read "Our Science Fiction Fate", go to e g http://freeinternetpress.com/story.php?sid=14353 .) I'd like to present a more optimistic view. Even if I have always liked Brian Aldiss and his often brilliant mind, he has always also been a pessimist and a cynic. His novel Greybeard is one of the classic after-the-disaster stories in the genre. So we get what we can expect from Nightmare Brian. 
  Some of my points, however:
* You all know my view on the climate speculations (astronomical factors dominate, and our clumsy computer models with their huge data deficit make the hysterical climate claims highly speculative), but if we turn to the environment in general, it has never been in better shape in the last century than now. Air pollution has dropped drastically through non-lead car fuels with exhaust cleaning, cleaner fossil fuel power plants, with much less sulphur; water qaulity constantly improves through water purification plants. Poaching is getting under increasing control, and there's a 20 year old ban on trade with rare animals. The idea of desertification has shown to be a statistical error. The chopping down of forests has decreased (but we should remember forestry is often necessary for economical development), and forests even show a tendency to increase. Many harmful chemicals are banned or extremely limited in use, like mercury (a twentyfold drop in use), DDT (but it has a limited use to fight malaria), CFCs, lead, and so on. "Can you not hear the ecosystems crashing down?" Aldiss asks. Actually - I can't.
* He says: "We have been so self-indulgent, so foolish, we of the self-promoting homo sapiens species. We have multiplied beyond our means, just as SF always said. No one took much notice. Except, that is, for Gaia. As James Lovelock has said, Gaia stands for Earth with its rocks, seas and atmosphere, together with all living things: Mother Earth. And mothers won't stand for too much abuse. Mothers can get nasty." This is environmentalism as masochistic religion (blame ourselves - stupid, stupid, stupid Man!). There is no "Gaia". Earth is a non-sentient, arbitrary system, except for us people living there, who of course have the right to use Earth's resources. We are sentient beings and can feel pain and disease and suffering and should use and commandeer the resources available to improve our life. Earth itself is tough and dynamic with huge built-in buffers, and can take comet hits, the regular astronomic climate variation, huge forest fires or volcanic eruptions, earthquakes, draughts, floods, hurricanes - you name it. And we haven't "multiplied beyond our means". The population explosion is cancelled. Latest projections say the population will top 9-10 billions around 2050, and then decrease, and meanwhile the accelerating urbanisation and the agricultural revolution mean plants and trees and animals actually get more available space.
* What about wars and terrorism then? Despite Iraq, Darfur and other serious conflicts (and they are worth taken seriously) the numbers killed in armed conflicts have decreased significantly. Thinktanker Johan Norberg notes in his latest book: "According to Human Security Centre at University of British Columbia fewer people died in armed conflicts 2005 than any year after the Second World War. The numbers killed in all conflicts are today almost only one tenth than during the Cold War of the 1980s." The end of the Cold War is important, and also that more people than ever live in democracies (or near-democracies). Terrorism is a pest, but tend to kill only a few at a time. What the fear of terrorism does to our minds is perhaps the most serious.
* Poverty is decreasing fast, due to increased trade, with movement of goods, investments, tehnology, people and information - what we in short call globalisation. World GNP has doubled since the 1970s (according to Norberg's book) and the developing countries grow faster. One clear indication of this is that life expectancy has increased, especially in the developing countries where it in four decades increased from 45 years to 65 years.
* Aldiss writes: "For a while after the second world war, a spirit of optimism prevailed in SF magazines. It was a time of great projects, when rockets reached Mars, or we held what wars were available on Pluto, or we even dreamed of fleets of ships reaching far into the galaxy. ... All was stimulating and hopeful. But then the future went the other way - a duller, yet more dangerous way. The cold war began to blow instead. The lights went out in Cybernetics City." Aldiss is right about that post-war optimism, but it was a bit naive, in the shadow of the Korean War, McCartyism, hydrogen bombs vaporising Pacific and Arctic islands, the absolutely horrible death tolls on the roads, etc. (In 1951, twice as many were killed on Swedish roads as in 2006, with just one tenth the number of cars!) There has since happened much with would warrant a New Optimism! Look here: - The computer revolution. Instant info available everywhere. We couldn't even dream of it in the 1950's. Computers solve a lot of problems and make us more prosperous. - The fall of the Soviet Empire. It has made many people happier and more free. Without the Cold War we have a politically more dynamic and constructive and democratic world. Armageddon is further away. - Developments in medicine and biotech. It is - together with shrinking poverty - responsible for the increased lifespan. It gives us better crops and more food. With DNA technology we can map the genes and solve many problems. The DNA spiral wasn't even known in 1950. - Globalisation, as mentioned before. People and resources can move more freely, which increases economic efficiency and make people happier. In Europe, for instance, a common currency, freedom from passports, a European Parliament, and a European Commission (somewhat - but in a smaller scale - like that World Government some sf authors dreamt about in the 1950's). - Stunning developments in the Arts. That old rock'n'roll music was only the start. In the 1950's there was Cinemascope and tiny black/white TV sets and vinyls had just arrived. Now: computer generated 3D graphics, virtual reality societies on the Net, MP3 music in a huge variety, stunning computer games, a publishing revolution with cheap technology also creating room for small-press operations - any art form you can imagine is suddently possible. (True, 1950's sf was often better written and more interesting, but you can't get everything!) The only major thing better in the 1950s was space. That drive into space they wrote about and had every reason to expect, has been painfully slow. Otherwise, it is just like The Beatles sang: I've got to admit it's getting better, a little better all the time. 

--Ahrvid

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ahrvid@xxxxxxxxxxxx/ahrvid@xxxxxxxxxxx/tel 073-68622[53+mercersdag]
Pangram för 29 sv bokstäver: Yxskaftbud, ge vår wczonmö iqhjälp!
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--
ahrvid@xxxxxxxxxxxx/ahrvid@xxxxxxxxxxx/tel 073-68622[53+mercersdag]
Pangram för 29 sv bokstäver: Yxskaftbud, ge vår wczonmö iqhjälp!
Gå med på SKRIVA! http://www.skriva.bravewriting.com
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