‘Self-termination is most likely’: the history and future of societal collapse

Submitted ⁨⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago⁩ by ⁨hanrahan@slrpnk.net⁩ to ⁨australia@aussie.zone⁩

https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2025/aug/02/self-termination-history-and-future-of-societal-collapse

The work is scholarly, but the straight-talking Australian can also be direct, such as when setting out how a global collapse could be avoided. “Don’t be a dick” is one of the solutions proposed,

Well, we do keep electing those that would make it worse, so perhaps we’re as “guilty” as they are ?

The lessons he has drawn are often striking: people are fundamentally egalitarian but are led to collapses by enriched, status-obsessed elites, while past collapses often improved the lives of ordinary citizens.

Today’s global civilisation, however, is deeply interconnected and unequal and could lead to the worst societal collapse yet, he says. The threat is from leaders who are “walking versions of the dark triad” – narcissism, psychopathy and Machiavellianism – in a world menaced by the climate crisis, nuclear weapons, artificial intelligence and killer robots.

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BlueSquid0741@lemmy.sdf.org ⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago
We’re not going to make, are we? ‘People’, I mean.

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- No1@aussie.zone ⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago
  There is no fate but the one we make.
  
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- mcbenavides85@piefed.social ⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago
  [deleted]
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  - Doorknob@lemmy.world ⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago
    Yeah. Major drag, huh
    
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- Boxscape@lemmy.sdf.org ⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago
  
  We’re not going to make, are we? ‘People’, I mean.
  
  Image
  
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melbaboutown@aussie.zone ⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago
I agree. Unfortunately the people who benefit from the current power structure have the most power in order to maintain it. I don’t see these people accepting juries or caps on their assets.

There are also often violent repercussions to protesting, and coups tend to just destabilise a region and set up the next dictatorship.

Humans just can’t seem to stop being dicks

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- AbNormalHumanBeing@piefed.world ⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago
  
  Humans just can’t seem to stop being dicks
  
  It's interesting, because the work itself seems to have the exact opposite thesis: Humans on average aren't dicks, but inequality and the interests of a few elites with essentially personality disorders the way he frames it, amplify our worst tendencies. For many thousands of years of pre-history, archaeological evidence and anthropological observations clearly show humanity in much more egalitarian societies. The example he uses is of the Khoisan people:
  
  All Goliaths, however, contain the seeds of their own demise, he says: “They are cursed and this is because of inequality.” Inequality does not arise because all people are greedy. They are not, he says. The Khoisan peoples in southern Africa, for example, shared and preserved common lands for thousands of years despite the temptation to grab more.
  
  Instead, it is the few people high in the dark triad who fall into races for resources, arms and status, he says. “Then as elites extract more wealth from the people and the land, they make societies more fragile, leading to infighting, corruption, immiseration of the masses, less healthy people, overexpansion, environmental degradation and poor decision making by a small oligarchy. The hollowed-out shell of a society is eventually cracked asunder by shocks such as disease, war or climate change.”
  
  In general, it's not a very controversial take, that the current (i.e. of the past ~5k years) inequality did not arise as a natural state but became only possible through surplus.
  
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  - melbaboutown@aussie.zone ⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago
    Agreed. It’s the people with dickish traits that seem to be able to crawl to the top and subjugate the rest of us, is what I meant
    
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