To the extent that almost all of humanity is affected by technological “progress,” the effects of that progress are being felt all over the world. But to properly appreciate the unparalleled extent to which the implications of these effects are now affecting the political sphere in the New Atlantis West, political philosophers and policymakers in the Eurasian East and the Global South must take into account the much longer duration and much greater depth of the “technological nirvana” in the West: Much of the West has lived much longer and much deeper than most other parts of the world in the “bubble reality,” supported by technology.
In this respect, the indescribable deprivation and despair that countries like Russia and China suffered sporadically during the 20th century (some of these experiences are at the limits of the memory of still living people) continue to “immunize” them against the worst distortions of perception and delusions (caused by Western denial, brought on by long-term exposure to the “bubble life” of science fiction).
Just as during the 20th century the Second and Third Worlds desired the “Three A’s” (Automobile, Airplane, Air Conditioning) of the First World’s technological nirvana, their relatively late “encounter” with them now seems to provide the Eurasian East and the Global South with a psychosocial as well as a political advantage: They know how to get by without them, but also to live in the real world.
1. The Automobile, a fast magical machine, once associated with masculine daring, futuristic adventure, and individual freedom, has been reduced to a typical “household object,” associated with feminine comfort, the monotony of traffic jams, and mass conformity. Now the Automobile isolates the bored passenger from the physical realities of geographical distance, terrain, and seasonal weather, even as its ubiquitous use by billions of unwitting “consumers” drives the most “well-off” of them into the “bubble life” of the wealthy suburbs. At the same time, this use also contributes to the “oil wars” over depleted fossil fuel resources (not to mention global climate change).
2. The Airplane, a wondrous flying machine, once associated with masculine playfulness, high-risk heroism, and escape from earthly bonds, has been reduced to a mass transportation tool associated with plebeian vacations and seasonal “escape,” the convenience of “erotically combustible” girls, and globalization. The Airplane now allows homo aeronauticus (“airport man”) to transcend previously cherished realities of physical separation, cultural-historical incompatibility, and sacred geographical confinement1, even as its reckless mass use by billions of “businessmen,” “expatriates,” and tourists exacerbates global climate change.
3. The use of mechanical Air Conditioning, also known as “Air condition”, essential in specific laboratory and factory conditions and suitable for the protection of vulnerable groups, such as infants, the elderly and hospital patients, has expanded exponentially, invading homes, offices, shops, restaurants, and even… outdoor courtyards and terraces.
During the 20th century, the use of air conditioning was largely confined to the “bubble life” of the bourgeoisie, allowing it to ignore physical reality in favor of dress codes and social distinctions. But during the 21st century, its use has come to facilitate the “bubble life” of the plebeians as well, allowing the stupid masses of the “Golden Billion”2 to express their various “choices of ‘luxury lifestyle’”, as tourists or transients in the countries of the Global South.
Ironically, we have reached the point where the Three A’s of technological nirvana, now irrevocably harnessed in the “bubble life” of the stupid masses of the “Golden Billion”, are about to undo the “bubble life” itself: They are not only straining the world’s energy resources and infrastructure networks (their sustainability issues already very serious in some places), but are also causing a “runaway”, with a consequent homeostatically self-reinforcing loop of global climate change, ultimately imposing conditions of “global overheating” (which in some places have already reached the stage of “global boiling”). These conditions are simply incompatible with the ordinary, with ordinary activities and, ultimately, with human life itself.
Climate change could well be the ultimate nemesis of the Golden Billion people: As nature meets human folly, the “Three A’s” (which currently shield the consumer masses from reality) will ultimately fail, bringing an end to many “comfort zones” and the “bubble lives” they live in. According to a growing number of increasingly concerned climate experts, it is now clear and understandable that civilization, humanity, and life itself will come to an abrupt end, proving that nature has the final say. 3
NOTES
1. For the author’s summary regarding the Traditional concept of Sacred Geography, see his work, “A Traditionalist History of the Great War, Book II.” The Former Earth” (“A Traditionalist History of the Great War, Book II. The Former Earth”, 2021), page 33 et seq., where it is written:
“Before the Fall, every river was the Ganges and every mountain was Kailash (abode of God Shiva, who resided there with his wife, Goddess Parvati), for Creation was still “inner”, the knowledge of good and evil had not yet been “externalised” or “realised” and likewise: for the wise, every river is a river of Paradise – Frithjof Schuon (1907-1998, leading traditionalist, German-born Swiss metaphysician, poet and author)
“Former World” refers to the Traditional concept of Sacred Space to clarify its spatial context. In the same way that traditional man experienced a different temporal reality from modern man, so he experienced a different spatial reality. … the difference concerns the experiential possibilities that each one has and… the fundamental relationship between Ego and non-Ego.
For Traditional man, space, time and causality had a very different character from what they have in the experience of modern man. (Evola “Revolt against the Modern World” 143-5) Thus, … if Traditional man had an experience of time essentially different from that of modern man, it follows that analogous thoughts must be made concerning the experience of space. …On the one hand, Modern space is homogeneous:… the fact that a thing is located or that an event can take place at one point in space and not at another does not confer any particular quality on the narrow nature of that thing or that event.
…On the other hand, traditional space is alive and saturated with all kinds of qualities and tensions (“Revolt against the Modern World”, 148-9) …Just as one moment of traditional time did not correspond to another, so there was no point, region or place of traditional space that corresponded to another. … There was indeed a true Sacred Geography, which inspired belief in “sacred” lands and cities, in traditional centers of spiritual influence on earth, as well as in environments consecrated to “animate” any action oriented towards Transcendence that took place within them. (“Revolt against the Modern World”, 150).
Essentially, Traditional humanity experienced this Sacred Geography as a continuous quest to locate, set aside and sanctify those locations, within its natural habitat, which served to maintain ties with the Transcendental realm. Traditional humanity – in all its forms, from the most primitive tribes to the most advanced civilizations – has always deliberately dedicated all its infrastructure and architecture, from the most primitive totems to the most advanced urban complexes. In all Traditional civilizations, all natural terrestrial space, whether organized naturally or anthropogenically, is considered to reflect a higher and sacred order and hierarchy. The ultimate points of reference of this sacred order and hierarchy are the celestial spheres. In the hierarchy of the Traditional Harmony of the Spheres, the highest visible of these celestial spheres was the “stellar sphere” of the fixed stars, equivalent to the very distant but still visible universe studied by the modern science of astronomy: This is the second highest sphere, located just below the invisible and inaccessible Transcendental Empyrean” [see “The Sunset of Tradition and the Origin of the Great War”, 2018, p. 347].
Traditional Sacred Geography views the physical and human geography of the Earth as fully integrated into the larger scheme of this Harmony of the Spheres, and its ultimate goal was to trace (microcosmic) earthly analogies to the (macrocosmic) cosmological order of the larger universe. This is why in Traditional cultures the fields of astronomy, geography, mathematics, and physics, which have been separated in modern science, were essentially unified: Ancient scholars pursued all branches of knowledge relating to space in a unified manner, because they sought as their sole goal to establish earthly (microcosmic) analogies to the larger (macrocosmic) order of the universe.
2. The term “Golden Billion” (“Золотой Милиард – золотой милиард”) refers to a theory according to which a group of global elites pulls the strings to accumulate wealth for the richest billion people in the world, at the expense of the rest of humanity. It is a particularly popular term in the Russian-speaking world. The term was coined by Anatoly Chikunov (who wrote as Anatoly Kuzmich) and used in his articles in the late 1980s and early 1990s. They were collected in 1994 in the book “The Plot of World Government: Russia and the Golden Billion”. The term was popularized by Russian nationalist writer Sergei Kara-Murza. According to Kara-Murza, the majority of all resources on the planet are consumed by the “top” billion people, referred to as the “Golden Billion”. He claims that the “Golden Billion” is a term used by Western elites, which results from a synthesis of the Western concept of a “Golden Age” of progress and prosperity with a pessimistic recognition of the Earth’s limited resources and the impossibility of extending this prosperity to the entire current population of the planet (more than eight billion).
Kara-Murza argues that the “Earth Summit” [also known as the “United Nations Conference on Environment and Development (UNCED)” and the Rio de Janeiro Conference, and ECO92, Portuguese for “Cúpula da Terra”, in Rio, Brazil from 3 to 14 June 1992] concluded that resources will only suffice for the short-term needs of the Western population, while claiming that the expert community is well aware of the conclusion and never questions it, but rather tacitly adheres to it. Among other sources that Kara-Murza used to prove that Western elites are very concerned about the available planetary resources was the book “The Limits to Growth”. [This was an extensive 1972 report, commissioned by the plutocratic-supranational “Club of Rome”, (analogous to the shadowy “Tripartite”), which used computer simulations to analyze the possibility of rapidly increasing economic and population growth, with finite support from available resources]. He also used several articles by David Pimentel on biomass energy. [David Pimentel, (1925 –2019) was a famous American entomologist. He was a professor of Entomological Ecology and Agricultural Sciences at Cornell University. He made significant contributions to ecology, entomology, agriculture, biotechnology, and environmental policy. He was recognized as an international authority on a variety of human-environment interactions.]
In the article that popularized the term, (“The Concept of the “Golden Billion” and the New World Order” – “Концепция “золотого миллиарда” и Новый мировой порядок”), Kara-Murza refers to the concept of the New World Order. In addition, the term “мировой елиты”, which translates as “world elite”, is used. According to Kara-Murza, in Russia it was Chikunov who formulated the main idea of the “Golden Billion”: Developed countries maintain high levels of consumption for their citizens and support political, military and economic measures designed to keep the rest of the world in an undeveloped state, as a dumping ground and a source of cheap labor.
In his articles in the 1990s, Chikunov argued that there were resources for only one billion people, which is why Western countries want to control Russia’s resources due to the lack of their own. For people outside the privileged – viable population of 2 billion, according to Chikunov, there were plans by Western elites for artificial population reduction, while people outside the viable population in developing countries would be limited in their use of resources to survival levels, while only Westerners would be able to enjoy full material well-being. In his opinion, towards the end of the USSR, reforms were imposed by Western elites to limit the use of resources in Russia, with the ultimate goal of creating a centralized totalitarian World Government. To support his theory, he used numerous references to documents from the UN, the International Monetary Fund, and the World Bank.
Kara-Murza, following Chikunov, in turn claims that the West is waging a “hot and cold war” against Russia for planetary resources. He argues that due to policies supposedly imposed by Western elites, Russia’s population would eventually decline by two-thirds. He says: “In the last post-Cold War years, there has been a conspiracy against Russia, with the wealthy Western elite realizing that ecological change and global catastrophe will cause further competition for planetary resources, ultimately making the world uninhabitable for all but a privileged billion. This elite rightly considers Russia, with its natural resources, vast size, and northern location, to be exceptional, and must therefore be brought under the control of the International Sovereigns by any means necessary for their own survival.”
Chikunov died under unclear circumstances a year after the publication of his book, thus adding to the “mystery.” Two decades later, his theory is ubiquitous in the Russian government: High-ranking Russian officials such as former President Dmitry Medvedev and Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov have repeated it extensively in public rallies.
During a press conference on July 18, 2022, in Moscow, President Putin stated in this regard: “Of course, this “golden billion” became gold for a reason. It has achieved a lot. But it did not take such positions only thanks to some pre-existing ideas that were implemented. To a large extent, it shaped its positions, robbing other peoples: in Asia and Africa. Indeed, that is how it happened. Look at how India has been plundered. The model of “total domination” of the so-called golden billion is unjust. Why should this golden billion from the entire world population dominate everyone and impose its own rules of behavior?”
3. For the author’s Traditional analysis of the phenomenon of climate change, see his book “Globus Horribilis”, pages 434-44, Chapter 9 – “Nature Bats Last: The End of Nature”, where he states: “The War on the World”
“With the process of gradual degradation of man and the simultaneous extermination of the noblest animals and the destruction of forests, the process of desecration and disfigurement of the Earth continues. It cannot be otherwise, given the mental attitude of those now in power.” — [From the book (written under the shadow of the Acropolis and published in New Delhi in 1976), by our compatriot Maximiani Porta / Savitri Devi Mukherjee, “Souvenirs, et reflexions d’une aryenne”, page 318].
As in human warfare, past and present, the strategy of “scorched earth” – the flooding, burning and poisoning of the land and water – is of great importance in the context of the total war of modern man against the World. As the elements of “human development” of Modernity – overpopulation, industrialization, urbanization, pollution – combine in an ever-faster and more hallucinogenic transformation of the Earth itself, modern man is increasingly revealed for what he truly is: ‘An alien invader who has subjugated and replaced traditional man and has now turned against the Earth itself, destroying man’s natural habitat.
This suggests that the so-called “human development” of modernity is driven by a non-human and anti-human force that tends to destroy humanity’s cosmic home. From this perspective, and bearing in mind the Latin maxim “bellum se ipsum alet” – “war feeds itself” (attributed to the Roman politician and historian Marcus Porcius Cato the Elder), the systematic pollution of the air, land and sea, as well as the systematic destruction of the natural environment, with all its various consequences (including the loss of animal species, soil degradation, desertification and climate change), begin to make sense. Now, humanity is subject to a systematic and progressive strategy of “area exclusion” (a term familiar to military professionals and particularly useful since an entire population is designated as the enemy). In this case, it is clear that the ultimately sought “target area” includes the entire Earth. Unfortunately, despite the romanticism of fantastical “science fiction” scenarios and supposed “doomsday-prepared” survivors, humanity has no alternative cosmic abode — nor does it deserve one after its long, voluntary servitude to a demonic power.
Those modern humans who hope to survive by faithfully serving this power in some way and who continue to revel in the short-lived material rewards for betraying their fellow humans – all those industrialists, bankers, politicians, and academics who live out their days in oases of peace and prosperity – would do well to remember that they serve a power that owes them no goodwill beyond their present, fleeting usefulness. They resemble the members of the “Special Units” (Sonderkommando) of the extermination camps — they live a few days of fleeting privilege in the service of the enemy, but it is certain that they will follow their betrayed comrades to the crematoriums).
[Nature has the last word: From the title of the said 9th Chapter “Nature bats last” – “Nature bats last” = A reference to baseball, in which the home team has the advantage of hitting the ball last with the bat. This means that the home team always has a chance to win, even if the away team is ahead. Conversely, once the home team takes the lead in the 9th period or in a tie in an extra round, the game is over and the visitors have no chance to recover. In this analogy, nature is the “home team,” so even if some overachievers think they’ve been fooled, nature has the last few strokes.]
