Type 0.5 and Empathy

All around the world people are begging for change. Some people want more food, others want more education, or a safer place to live, or they want other people to change. I challenge you to think of literally anything and I know that someone, somewhere, wants that something to change.

We are divided.

In the all of the desires across the world there is no unity, even though empathy lets us feel the pain of others. We are capable of knowing some of what a total stranger feels because of our ability to empathize and we don’t help each other. We all have our struggles and most of us deal with them alone. Eventually we will collapse from this weight. Author and social thinker Jeremy Rifkin asks if global empathy can be achieved. Empathy was originally only felt towards the people in your tribe, then people of the same faith as you, and then it was felt towards ones countrymen. The next step must be empathy felt on a global scale. One of the few examples of global empathy is when the earthquake razed Haiti to the ground. The world rushed to give aid in only a few hours. Other than that global empathy has not happened very often.

Can global empathy be achieved? What will happen if it isn’t?

Unity is required for advancement, without advancement humanity will die. Michio kaku has theorized that that there are 4 types of civilization. Type 0 is a lack of global unity, with war and violence. Type 1 is total global unity. Type 2 is a civilization spread out over multiple solar systems, at this level, civilization is immortal. Type 3 is a civilization across a whole galaxy and beyond. Humans are at type 0.5, we still fight and kill. However there is hope, a singular thing connecting the world that grows every day, the internet and electronic communication. We feel empathy on a global scale more and more. We embrace technology and science, through that unity is created. Fundamentalists that embrace theology want us to remain the way we are.

Will we remain stationary?

I hope not. I hope we can move on and accept this opportunity to end such violence. The more we connect and communicate with others. The larger we build our web the greater our unity and empathy will be. We will go beyond a type 0.5 civilization.

Humanity > 0.5