“That's stupid!” I said it
indignantly. It had come out so quickly and with such feeling that it
even surprised me that it was my first reaction to the information.
“Stupid?” Saya repeated, laughing
at my outburst.
“Stupid long,” I elaborated a
little.
“Why is it stupid?”
“Just think of what we could build
today, given 1,000 years,” I said, feeling the absurdity, no, the
magnitude of the idea.
They finished 1,100 years ago. They
built this in 1,000 years, back then? We were standing among the most
impressive ruins I'd ever seen.
“Saya, imagine what we could do, if
we did anything for 1,000 years with a single purpose.” I was going
to rant and rave a little now, and Saya knows well enough to let me
get it out before she talks any sense to me.
I continued, “Saya, we built the
International Space Station in, what, 20 years?
“We built a satellite that exited the
solar system after only 30 years.
1,000 years!
If any group of people could work
together for that long, think about it! We could build Elysium; a
space city. We could build it in space, bigger than one thing that
could be launched from earth.”
“Yeah, but we can't even decide on a
direction for our country from one year to the next,” Saya pointed
out.
I had to concede the point. There
wasn't anything I could think of that everyone agrees on.
“Yeah, you're right, but that's what
makes this so amazing; no matter what their differences were, they
spent a millennium building these temples, and that went on, no
matter what they disagreed about, no matter who died or who held
power. This was a continuous effort over generations,” we figured
it to be about 50 generations for 1,000 years.
“I know people these days can't
decide on anything to do together, but if we did, humanity could do
something truly great.” I continued.
“We could build a spaceship for 700
years, and in the other 300 years we could be far outside the solar
system.
We could colonize another planet,” I
was frantic at the thought, at the idea of how much potential lay in
the combined efforts of humanity working as a whole for over a
thousand years.
It seemed perfectly clear to me, the
moment I heard it, that we'd been wasting our potential, we humans,
for most of our time on this earth.
Why didn't others see the same point
before me, I wondered to myself.
Indeed, after reflecting, it seems that
the only thing we've done in concerted effort is to strip the earth
of natural beauty, and to build strife among ourselves.
Later, I was to made to understand that
I had misunderstood the meaning of the information. The map of Tikal
from which Saya had read that the temples had taken 1,000 years to
build did not mention that one temple was built upon another, as a
sign of the succeeding ruler's power and wealth, since it was built
on the foundation of his predecessor.
In that sense, many of our cities are
very old, and by the same principle, marvels of humanity's
achievement.
However, the idea has already struck
me, and it seems to me the more important idea.
It coincides with a growing idealogy of
concerted effort toward solutions and improvements, rather than
lingering in disagreement or blame throwing.
We are capable of the extraordinary, as
a race. We can accomplish things together that no individual could
ever do in a lifetime. It's our ability to cooperate that gives us
unprecedented potential.
Unprecedented; no prior precedent has
been set so high as what we can achieve. It is there for us to
discover: our full potential. We need only to work together in order
to glimpse it.
Our greatest collective efforts seem to
be wars, as far as I can see. World War II being the greatest example
of our cooperation. For even in war, enemies must be cooperative and
fight and kill one another, lest you have an aggressor-victim
dynamic. So only there, in the destruction of ourselves, do we
cooperate so highly.
Everyone got together and helped each
other have a war. We killed millions. What if we had collected to
build something instead? A body of knowledge, a city, a
technology—anything besides weapons that ultimately will only be
used against ourselves, speaking as a race.
The idea that we could leave this
planet, or repair it, or inhabit another planet, that idea does not
leave me. I know it to be a distinct possibility, not fiction. I know
that it's only humanity as a whole that stands in the way of a better
future for itself and this planet.
So I challenge myself this: the next
time I witness a disagreement—the next time I'm faced with a
disagreement—to look for the solution, the thing that will suit all
parties to the disagreement, rather than chasing the blame, or
seeking revenge.
I say this is the better way. I believe
that we can achieve something unprecedented—and something good—if
we work toward solutions for everyone instead of solutions for one.
Call it pie-in-the-sky thinking, but I'd rather have been born into a world where 70 years ago we had begun work on the building a city in space, than a world where millions of people died.
And I know that seems naive, but I know I've caught the thread of a good idea, one that's better than the better formed and more familiar one that it seems to contradict. I'm happy being thought on the fringe if my idea means a better world, and the prevailing ideas mean the world we live in.
