The train rushes downhill too fast. The gift of intelligence deserves a more responsible and sensitive deployment than human beings have given it. We might have had the bigger picture, the longer view. To be sure, some groups of human beings have related well to the earth, have developed a consciousness worthy of our intellectual gifts. But, precisely because they refused technology, they became vulnerable to those who didn't.
Technology leads to powe r, domination, control.
Our failed consciousness in our relationship to the planet will inevitably, alas, prevail. The one rotten apple spoils the barrel. We have used our consciousness not to harmonize with nature but to change and conquer it. The earth seems now to be giving unmistakable signals that it can no longer bear the weight, either of our numbers or of our arrogance. Nor, apparently, can we cha nge our consciousness or stop the pell-mell rush to planetary destruction.