Thing is, most people in Europe have deluded themselves into thinking this current era of prolonged peace, despite the clustertfucks in Eastern Europe during the 90's, is the norm and not just an abnormal period.
Thing is, most people in Europe have deluded themselves into thinking this current era of prolonged peace, despite the clustertfucks in Eastern Europe during the 90's, is the norm and not just an abnormal period.
Even up until the early 20th, we were at each others' throats for one reason or another every few decades -- it's just the scale of WW1 and WW2 caused a shift.
With the Russian Invasion of Ukraine, we're starting to see the old pattern trying to reestablish itself, I think.
Welfare state, immigration destination or military power. Pick one. That's the choice that Europe is being offered right now. There isn't money for more then one of those and trying to.split the difference ends up rounding down.Thing is, most people in Europe have deluded themselves into thinking this current era of prolonged peace, despite the clustertfucks in Eastern Europe during the 90's, is the norm and not just an abnormal period.
Even up until the early 20th, we were at each others' throats for one reason or another every few decades -- it's just the scale of WW1 and WW2 caused a shift.
With the Russian Invasion of Ukraine, we're starting to see the old pattern trying to reestablish itself, I think.
Welfare state, immigration destination or military power. Pick one. That's the choice that Europe is being offered right now. There isn't money for more then one of those and trying to.split the difference ends up rounding down.
Pick any one?
Then the logical choice is military power. Any other option means the choices will sooner or later be made by others.
There's a lot of reasons I want an epic sci-fi universe where there is no world government. Perhaps you can have small colonies that effectively control an entire planet, such as Mars, but realistically it would only have around 2-3 million people in a few hundred years assuming a steady rate of immigration and procreation from the 2050s-2060s on, also other factors like sustenance, economics, environment and etc all going rather smoothly. But Earth? The Moon? They'll probably never be under a unified government. I could see attempts to form world-states/governments on Earth/Luna between now and 200 years in the future, but will they succeed? I highly doubt it. For all of its praise as the "Sci-Fi Game of Thrones" there is really no comparison between George R.R. Martin's world-building and understanding of politics and those of the writers of The Expanse (which I like well enough, I just think it's overrated). Like, the UN still exists in the 2300s (or whenever it was it takes place, can't remember)?Lots of things in this current era are Not The Historical Norm.
Lots of things in this current era are Not The Historical Norm.
Pick any one?
Then the logical choice is military power. Any other option means the choices will sooner or later be made by others.
There's a lot of reasons I want an epic sci-fi universe where there is no world government. Perhaps you can have small colonies that effectively control an entire planet, such as Mars, but realistically it would only have around 2-3 million people in a few hundred years assuming a steady rate of immigration and procreation from the 2050s-2060s on, also other factors like sustenance, economics, environment and etc all going rather smoothly. But Earth? The Moon? They'll probably never be under a unified government. I could see attempts to form world-states/governments on Earth/Luna between now and 200 years in the future, but will they succeed? I highly doubt it. For all of its praise as the "Sci-Fi Game of Thrones" there is really no comparison between George R.R. Martin's world-building and understanding of politics and those of the writers of The Expanse (which I like well enough, I just think it's overrated). Like, the UN still exists in the 2300s (or whenever it was it takes place, can't remember)?
ok thats metal as fuck.
Also fucking terrifying, if you think about it.
Ammonites were early squids, never moved on land.Also fucking terrifying, if you think about it.
In Earth's ancient past, when oxygen levels in the atmosphere were basically at high enough toxic levels for any life now, insects like these were real and roaming around eating other giant insects.
This was after Earth had already had at least one or two evolutions of life and extinction events (IIRC one when the Earth was purple; another when it was basically a lifeless, frozen rock after being aforementioned liquid purple, et cetera).
Who knows what fucking crazy, completely alien (to us now) life existed?
There were earlier forms of life than the Ammonites, from Earth's numerous cycles of evolution and extinction.Ammonites were early squids, never moved on land.
Oil drillers find their fossils, usually made of Fool's Gold, in the drilling mud fairly often.
Oh yes, ammonites were early, but not even close to the beginning of life.There were earlier forms of life than the Ammonites, from Earth's numerous cycles of evolution and extinction.
It makes me wonder what were swimming around in Earth's purple period...
I mean, if some of the weird shit still alive today (in our cycle/survivors from the last cycle) looks pretty much alien to us, imagine what life back then could've been like. It's frightening yet intriguing.Oh yes, ammonites were early, but not even close to the beginning of life.
When Earth had purple oceans, we had tons of weird things living in them; when the 'oxygen catastrophe' occurred, a lot of previous sea and land life simply died out.
Likely quite literally; by the people they have so thoroughly condemned to suffer through their hubris.They wont pick that though, europe was in a pretty fundamental sense broken by the world wars, and their leadership has deluded themselves into thinking they escaped history and are no enlightened when that delusion breaks it will break them too and on a pretty fundamental level.
Macron seems to be setting out to unbreak Europe, in typical French fashion, though this time with most of Eastern Europe and Scandinavia on their side.They wont pick that though, europe was in a pretty fundamental sense broken by the world wars, and their leadership has deluded themselves into thinking they escaped history and are no enlightened when that delusion breaks it will break them too and on a pretty fundamental level.