The Challenges Facing Spaceship Earth

Many of history’s great scientists, Einstein in particular, remarked on our fragile position on Earth, and cautioned us to be kind to one another. Carl Sagan was another vocal proponent of the unity of humankind.  At left is what the 20th Century intellectual giant Buckminster Fuller had to say on the subject.

It’s worth noting that,  in contrast, none of our most intelligent ancestors said, “Ya know what?  Screw other people. If they can’t fend for themselves and make a success of themselves under capitalism, let them starve, or at least, suffer.”

A friend of mine has a huge client in Helsinki, and he asked me the other day if I was aware that Finland was perennially at the top or near of the World Happiness Rankings.  I smiled, and replied that I happen to write about this frequently on 2GreenEnergy.com.  I went on to explain that there are several key differences between that region of the world and the U.S., but that two of them are major.  Scandinavians pay higher taxes, but:

1) They derive huge benefits in terms of free college education and healthcare.  They don’t have people who live without education simply because they can’t afford tuition, and they don’t have people dying of treatable diseases because they don’t have health insurance.

2) They live with a sense of community that is extremely rare in the United States.  Sure, we have the Amish and ethic communities like our Chinatowns and Little Italys.  But in the main, as a Swede I met recently told me, Americans caring about the welfare of others are almost completely nonexistent.