Towards Universal Values for World Peace

No species knowingly destroys its home - its habitats, its niche. Humans may prove to be an exception to this rule. We worry about our daily needs- food, clothing, and shelter and we worry about our children’s and grandchildren’s future; we want to live in peace. But we rarely worry about our home, the big home, our physical and biotic requirements or our species’ niche, on the planet. With their superior intelligence, their drive to make a better living and their ability to invent supported by science and technology, combined with their unfortunate fear of the future and the resulting drive to accumulate resources and wealth, Humans have been consuming the biotic and non-biotic resources of the planet at an alarmingly unsustainable rate and have brought the life on the planet to the brink of potential extinction, including their own. All the big animals are gone, forests are being clean-cut, and the earth is being devoured of its minerals as if there is no future. The side effects of denuding the earth of its resources particularly the burning of fossil fuels are making the planet too hot to sustain life. Even the supply of clean water and air, the first food of life, is being threatened. This is all the result of human civilization. In this book, Dr. Rama Shankar Singh, an eminent evolutionary biologist, examines the causes of this life-threatening human failure by taking a dispassionate look at the last 12000-year history of our species, the Homo sapiens. He identifies 12 major causes that he thinks have acted in a domino fashion and that have acted together in an ever-accelerating manner and have brought humanity to the brink of extinction. And the solution? The solution is simple: It lies in simple and comfortable but sustainable living such that, as Gandhi said, the earth can provide for everybody’s needs but not for everybody’s greed. This simple wisdom cannot be assumed to come to people all by itself.…