by Roger Bourke White Jr., copyright October 2015
"Repent! It's End of the World Time!" again. [sigh]
The deep curiosity this thinking style brought up in me for years and years is "Why does this come up so repeatedly?" and related, "Why do so many people take this even a little seriously?"
And some people take it deadly seriously. Their actions in response to this belief can range from individualistic, such a becoming a Prepper, to becoming part of an enthusiastic group such as ISIS.
Why people make, and pay attention to, end of the world pronouncements is the topic of this section.
End of World (EOW) pronouncements get made in many ways by many different kinds of people. The most notorious are those made by religious leaders, but other authority figures and opinion leaders can make them as well.
These pronouncements are made constantly. Ninety-nine percent of them are ignored. But that last one percent can generate a lot of attention and a lot of action.
The actions taken fall into two broad categories:
o Highly publicized doom-and-gloom related activities. Most are of a precautionary sort, but some are celebrations of some kind.
o Not nearly so publicized investing activities. Savers get excited, too, and try to capitalize on the event by making what turn out to be too-risky investments.
Then the big day comes... and passes... and the event is quickly pretty much forgotten about. Thinking about it is replaced with a new prediction.
A textbook example of the gloom-and-doom was the worry about Y2K (year 2000) and the havoc it would cause among computers. A textbook example of the risky investments going sour was the Asian Flu Crash of 1998 which followed the EOW mania surrounding Hong Kong going back to China in 1997.
The instinctive thinking at the root of EOW thinking is semi-nomadism. In the Neolithic Village environment the villagers must move the village periodically when something vital runs out in the current location. That vital thing can be sufficient food, good weather, or succumbing to some natural disaster. For whatever reason, the village must move on.
When it does, what comes with the villagers is only what they can haul on their backs to the next location. Everything else either gets consumed in some sort of leaving party or gets left behind.
Fast forward into the Industrial Age, and this leaving the village behind instinctive thinking can show up as End of World thinking.
As with all instinctive thinking that no longer matches the circumstances well, "It's crazy, but it's comfortable."
Semi-nomadism is completely out of touch with the sedentary lifestyle of farmers in the Agricultural Age. It is a bit less out of touch with people who migrate for work in the Industrial Age, but still not a great match.
As a result, like many instincts, it will show up in crazy forms. In this case the crazy form is End of World pronouncements, and the activities undertaken by those who take the pronouncements seriously.
--The End--