Another Day in the Country

Ruining civilization

By PAT WICK

© Another Day in the Country

Because I’m always looking for a good book to read, my son-in-law recommended Paul Cooper’s book “Fall of Civilizations: Stories of Greatness and Decline,” which reads somewhat like the evening news.

The author begins by describing his visit to a palace built by Saddam Hussein, rising on an artificial hill outside the town of Hillah on the Euphrates River.

Having grown up hearing Bible stories, the setting sounds biblical. It could be the story of any number of rulers deposed in one way or another — their dreams and accomplishments reduced to rubble and ruins.

“A ruin is a paradox,” the author writes, illustrating the “fearsome power of time, while standing in defiance of it.”

He sees every ruin as a challenge to take nothing for granted and “resist those who have mortgaged our future for their greed.”

“Keep fighting with every inch of our being to build a better world,” the author admonishes.

Throughout history, what often survived an invader’s destruction were the rather magnificent structures dedicated to the unknown power (gods) we ourselves created and attempted to control for our survival.

In the end, all the things humanity conjured up to bring great wealth and prosperity to a select group proves to be their downfall — either because another group wants to take it for themselves or some natural phenomenon like climate change, earthquakes, floods, or volcanoes spewing fire destroyed the inhabitants.

I’m not sure which is more devastating — being murdered and pillaged by other human beings or destroyed by a force of nature.

Maybe the destruction wreaked on one culture by another is the worst, with accompanying hatred, anger, and thirst for revenge perpetuating evil and, we all know, solving nothing.

As I read, I had difficulty remembering what year things were happening because 2028 BCE sounded very similar to what’s happening in 2026 CE with so many more methods of destruction invented.

So far, “we have managed to keep the planets nuclear arsenal in its silos,” Cooper says, “ but the challenge of the next century will be defined by the threat of global warming,” which I feel most of us pretty much ignore.

Our modern age has transformed the world in my lifetime and lifted millions out of poverty, but Cooper reminds us “what we’ve built is changing our planet in alarming and extremely rapid ways.”

I agree with Sven Lindquist, who wrote a U.N. report: “You already know enough. It is not knowledge we lack. What is missing is the courage to understand what we know and to draw conclusions.”

In other words, if we want to give our children a chance to spend their days in the country, we need to change our ways.