We vilify the desire for greatness. We call it a bad thing, and preach a vague sort of “return to the basics” as the goal to look toward. It’s everywhere, even in stories I like, such as the mention of a grid-based road structure as imposing itself upon the free-flowing curves of nature. Perhaps grid-style roads are not a good avatar for “greatness” (indeed I would not expend myself to argue otherwise), but the point illustrates the thoroughness with which we subscribe to the concept that our civilization has somehow turned evil.
This is a point at which the slippage occurs that influences people to the point that they mistake intelligence for evil. A great part of the modern era has been in making nature legible, something that we can understand from a far off administrative perspective. For just one example of this, go take a look at counties in the U.S.:
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/d/dc/USA_Counties.svgNotice how on the east coast the counties are largely haphazard. The sizes and shapes differ. Move towards the center and things become more regimented. The northern part of Texas is a wonderful example of this. However, you will also notice that the counties don't actually line up in a perfect grid: everything is more or less the same size, but many are off the grid by a few miles. The reason for this is simple: squares don't map onto a globe in a nice, orderly fashion. This isn't modernization at its worst, by any means, but it is an example of how the old modernization process ignored fundamental realities in order to achieve the goal of legibility. To be fair, odd county lines aren't going to make most people dystopian in their mindset, but this is an example of the trend that, when you look elsewhere, is more capable of promoting this perspective.
Germany's efforts to make forests legible in the first half of the last century is another manifestation of this trend: rip up natural forests, plant only the trees you want in nice orderly rows, and harvest them when they are fully grown. Greatly increase lumber output for about a single harvest-worth, then things plummeted dramatically because the necessary process of nutrient retention and protection against diseases have been removed. Health is another area where this has been the case. Because of our efforts to make people healthy, autoimmune diseases are on the rise. Our bodies, having evolved to be constantly fighting off infection, are now left with nothing to do but attack themselves.
The trend away from utopian thinking has coincided with society realizing that the world is more complex than we had originally thought: we thought we knew how to reach the heavens, but we then found out that our foundation could not support that. This, unfortunately, has in some people promoted apocalyptical mindset. Oil is going to run out, the ice-caps will melt, a new pandemic will arise, and we can't even stop hunger in the United States. The problems that face us now are largely problems of our own making. Having reached a point of development that the world has not seen before, it seems more likely that we'll fall rather than continuing to rise, especially since what allowed us to rise is coming back to torment us. This is a short-sighted perspective, but my intent has not been to legitimize the perspective but rather to help illuminate one reason why it developed (it would be cliché to say that the problem is multifaceted, but that does not make it any less true).
Despite the above, I am actually optimistic about the near future. Yes, the modern era caused problems that we are now facing, but we are also overcoming those problems, slowly but surely. We are creating ways to prevent pollution from happening in the first place, we are creating ways to undo the damage we have already done, we are creating balanced approaches to health to help prevent the rise of autoimmune disorders and to treat them when they are present. Our social advancements may be further behind, but the fact that discrimination is formalized indicates that it is already losing its grip on society (worry more about those forms of discrimination which are so accepted that no one feels the need to make a law). Right now people only see the problems that came with our past successes. I am confident that new successes will in turn change their mind again.
Within our lifetimes we will see a better society, a better culture, a better civilization. This is, indeed, a wonderful time to be alive. Yes, there are problems with face us, problems which if we do not address have the potential to ruin us. But this is not the apocalypse, this is the ragnarok, the end that brings new and more glorious continuations. It is during this era, when people despair, that we can affect a change for the better. When our civilization is at full speed, it is impossible to alter its course substantially. But now the winds are slacking, we can trim the sails, and we can change direction for the better.
