The theory of the survival of the fittest, upon which our contemporary societies are founded, can be better understood when one considers that the ability to survive has less to do with mental abilities than with the proper development of a nervous system and sensory organs perfectly attuned to a given environment.

Creatures such as insects are not known for their intellectual prowess, yet they are master survivors … so are weeds and viruses.

A civilization at once motivated and validated in its most extreme behaviors by such theory essentially acts as an insect, a virus, even as a cancer cell, because it's characterized by a single-mindedness which is the hallmark of all lower organisms, inexorably driven, as all creatures who lack imagination and vision, and as if possessed, to blindly overtake, consume and discard all it encounters regardless of consequences.

Our now worldwide civilization has sought new territories, new people, new resources to exploit and consume from its inception, seeing its victims as weak because vulnerable to aggression, and perceiving itself to be superior because driven by aggression, not as the natural predator that rests when fed and satisfied, but as the bacteria that is never satisfied and never rests, or perhaps as the proverbial damned.

Indeed scientists hope to, some day, be able to extract resources from nearby planets, so we can all perpetuate our extravagant lifestyles, lifestyles that are obviously not sustainable within the limits of the earth resources, not to mention lifestyles that poison the air, the water, the land and will sooner or later make life on earth impossible for humanity, when the planet reaches its threshold of tolerance to such stress.

The idea of endless growth, the ideology of the cancer cell, is indeed a dangerous and destructive myth that has no parallel in nature … except when nature is out of balance, such as when a river floods, when an epidemic overtakes a species.

Within the natural order, the predator does not annihilate the prey to extinction, winter does not overcome summer, trees do not grow until they become too tall and too heavy and fall down … natural growth is limited within the natural order by balance, for indeed only that which is in balance with natural laws survives, and what is out of balance, such as possibly were dinosaurs, is made to disappear.

The concept of an endless growth founded on the survival of the fittest is as profoundly unintelligent as a fisherman would be who would load his boat with fish to the point of sinking under the weight.

This is what our civilization is presently doing, being so out of sync with the so-called environment as to no longer understand the consequences of its actions, looking at environmental disasters, species extinctions, climate change and other problems as separate events having separate causes, unwilling and unable to connect the dots, to point to the origin of this global mess.

Such however is not civilization but technologically advanced barbarism … which many years ago propelled Einstein to say, “It has become appallingly obvious that our technology has exceeded our humanity,” as well as “technological progress is as an axe in the hands of a pathological criminal.”

It will be easier to understand the depth and truth of Einstein's statements if we remember that all we do today, in the name of technology and materialism, of endless growth and greed, will affect the future generations in a way that will, then, most probably be assessed to be criminal.

Raphael Montoliu lives in Lakeport, Calif.