Is the Deadly Crash of Our Civilization Inevitable? (Terrence McNally)

  Thomas Homer-Dixon compares our current situation to driving too fast along a country road in a dense fog

  Feb. 13, 2007 -- Humankind is doing more things, faster, across a greater space than ever before, producing changes of a size and speed never seen before.

  In 1870, the average income in the world's richest country was about nine times greater than that in the world's poorest country. By 1990 it was forty-five times greater.

  In 2006, the world's 793 billionaires held combined wealth of $2.6 trillion. (If liquidated in 2006), this wealth could have hired the poorest half of the world's workers -- the 1.4 billion workers who earn a few dollars a day -- for almost two years.

  Between 1977 and 1996, the weight of the average American cheeseburger grew over 25 percent, and the volume of the average soft drink grew more than 50 percent. About 40 percent of the world's population now lacks sufficient water for basic sanitation and hygiene, and nearly one out of every five people does not have enough to drink.

  Between 2000 and the beginning of 2005, China's daily oil imports soared 140 percent. Saudi Arabia, has pumped a total of 46 billion barrels of oil in the past 17 years, without admitting to any decrease in its stated reserve figure of about 260 billion barrels.

  Since 1950, industrialized fishing has reduced the total mass of large fish in the world's oceans by 90 percent. The atmosphere's level of carbon dioxide is the highest in 650,000 years.

  Is a deadly crash inevitable?

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