A preview of the unpublished book A CIVILIZATION WITHOUT A VISION WILL PERISH: AN INDEPENDENT SEARCH FOR THE TRUTH by David Willis
LESSONS LEARNED BY THE AUTHOR (Part 2)
World peace has become one of my most cherished visions
World War II, occurring as it did while I was very young, was my first life-transforming experience. Europe worked very hard to make sure that we would never go to war again against our neighbors and we have enjoyed 70 years of peace and prosperity. World peace has become one of my most cherished visions. How to achieve lasting peace on a global scale is the theme of the chapter on Peace.
We will not win the peace until we redefine the war
In his speech delivered on March 6, 2002 James D. Wolfenson, President of the World Bank Group, said: “Our challenge, as we go forward to the Monterrey Conference and beyond, is to persuade political leaders that marginalization must end; why justice must be done to others if it is to be done to us; why all peoples are partners in this interest. We will not create that better and safer world with bombs or brigades alone. We will not win the peace until we have the foresight, the courage, and the political will to redefine the war. We must recognize that – while there is social injustice on a global scale, both between states and within them; while the fight against poverty is barely begun in too many parts of the world; while the link between progress in development and progress toward peace is not recognized – we may win a battle against terror but we will not conclude a war that will yield enduring peace.”
Poverty is our greatest long-term challenge
“Poverty is our greatest long-term challenge. Grueling, mind-numbing poverty – which snatches hope and opportunity away from young hearts and dreams just when they should take flight and soar. Poverty – which takes the promise of a whole life ahead and stunts it into a struggle for day-to-day survival. Poverty – which together with its handmaiden, hopelessness, can lead to exclusion, anger, and even conflict. Poverty – which does not itself necessarily lead to violence but which can provide a breeding ground for the ideas of those who promote conflict and terror.”
Military spending
Bono in his foreword to The End of Poverty said: “The $450 billion that the United States will spend this year on the military will never buy peace if it continues to spend around 1/30th of that, just $15 billion, to address the plight of the world’s poorest of the poor, whose societies are destabilized by extreme poverty and thereby become havens of unrest, violence, and even global terrorism. The share of U.S. GNP devoted to helping the poor has declined for decades, and is a tiny fraction of what the United States has repeatedly promised, and failed, to give.” The chapter on Indifference explores how our civilization has been indifferent to the plight of the poor and how we can win the battle against poverty.
Not having enough food has remained a great fear
For many years after the war we could only buy food with ration cards and not having enough food to eat has remained a great fear. In Our Next Frontier: A Personal Guide for Tomorrow’s Lifestyle, written by Robert Rodale in 1981, we learn that “organic gardening practices may make even more sense in the future than they do now if certain long-range weather predictions turn out to be accurate. Studies of weather records going back far into the past reveal a rather startling picture of the stability and favorable nature of the weather we’ve enjoyed for the past 40 to 50 years. On average, during our lifetimes we have enjoyed some of the best weather for farming, gardening, and all kinds of food production that is likely to occur in any but a totally utopian world. Take a look at historical weather records that go back more than 50 years and you begin to see what real climate variations can be like. There have been two fine weather decades leading up to current times, and they have bred dangerous complacency with new agricultural technology that is ill-equipped to cope with weather that won’t conform to the expected ‘norm’.” The chapters on Global Warming, Climate Change, and Weather Extremes and on Food explore how we may be affected by changes that are already upon us and the solutions put forward by leading minds.