"I don’t think the previous Dark Age that followed the collapse of Rome was quite the same as what we’re facing. That involved a profound and incremental series of losses in knowledge, technique, and the ability to do things, everything from making good pottery and concrete to ways of organizing work. Our situation now has much more potential for cultural damage, because our conditioning in technological progress is so extreme. The letdown may be awful when it becomes evident we’re not going to solve our energy problems with algae secretions, solar, wind, or other alternative fuel schemes–that we’re not going to run [high-energy things like] , the , , and the military on any combination of other energy systems. […] This has enormous potential for disrupting our sense of reality. It’s hard to predict the kinds of reaction[s] that this may generate, but I think you will have a society so profoundly disappointed by science and technology that it could propel us into a new dark age of superstition."
Quote Details
Added by wikiquote-import-bot
Unverified quote
0 likes
Novelists from the United StatesNon-fiction authors from the United StatesBloggers from the United StatesCritics from the United StatesSocial critics
Original Language: English
Available Languages (1)
Sources
Ibid.
https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/James_Howard_Kunstler
Revision History
No revisions have been submitted for this quote.
Categories
James Howard Kunstler
19 quotes on TrueQuotesView all quotes by James Howard Kunstler →
Related Quotes
"Western Civ[ilization]’s most infamous encounter with pandemic disease, so far, was the big first wave of the Black D…"
"I’ve said many times that we can expect delusional beliefs to rise in proportion to the economic hardships we experie…"
"The last 150 years have amounted to such a cavalcade of wonders and technological marvels that we’ve literally progra…"
"…we were becoming very delusional about the set of predicaments that we’re facing. I’m a little shocked at the qualit…"
"Paper money is bad enough, as France learned under the tutelage of the rascal John Law in the early 1700s. The nation…"
"Monetary inflation became a thing for the first time since Roman days — a much easier trick with printed paper bankno…"
"We're living in environments that are punishing us, the immersive ugliness of North American cities can be described …"
"Somehow I doubt that this Christmas will win the Bing Crosby star of approval. Rather, we see the financial markets b…"
"Peak [living] human population will… lag… peak [extraction of] oil and peak [extraction of other] mineral resources u…"
"The Industrial Revolution still cannot be considered an unqualified success, for all the comfort and convenience enjo…"