It’s all too much. The world. The people. The noise. The chaos. The complexity.

Can it be measured? This overwhelming scale? We know many facts, at least approximately: the area of the Earth’s surface; the number of humans; the biomass of wild versus domesticated animals; the energy expenditure of human activity; the dollar value of (legal) global transactions; the logistical quantities (in mass or volume, if not both) of all the raw materials, commodities, and consumer goods moving around the globe, by all the various modes of transport. But what do these numbers truly tell us?

In short, that it is too much for any one mind—any human mind—to comprehend. And by “comprehend”, I mean to infer the significance, to understand the implications.

Then again, we do know some things. We know the rate at which various natural systems replenish themselves, and also the related rates at which humans are depleting them. And in virtually all cases, the latter exceeds the former, sometimes by orders of magnitude. We raze forests faster than they regrow. We deplete fish stocks faster than the fish can breed. We dump out carbon dioxide faster than the plants and other organisms can consume them, leaving them to collect in the atmosphere and oceans. We dump countless other substances as pollutants into the air, soil and water, faster than ecosystems can absord, redistribute, or sequester them safely away.

We know that human wealth can only become so unequal, before the normal systems which govern our societies cease to function. At the end, if people cannot afford to buy food—or housing or medical care or education—and no one in power will give it to them, then they will cease to live, let alone provide economic productivity in the workplace. Perhaps the end point is a GINI coefficient of zero, a return to absolute monarchy, with a single immortal being, who expends only the bare minimum to support a workforce of slaves, most of which will be machines.

Are we doomed to endless suffering? Was not the promise of technological civilization that it would free us from the misery of our past poverty and ignorance?

Do we want such freedom? Do we want the responsibility that such freedom brings? Some of us, surely, but what about the majority? How can one be responsible if one is ignorant? How can one be anything other than ignorant, in a world of such incomprehensible complexity?

What is the bare minimum of knowlege to effectively participate in—to make meaningful and adequate decisions—in an environment that beggars the imagination? Even if such knowledge was possible—even if such knowledge existed, in a readily apprehensible form—would the majority of people spend the time and effort to learn it well enough to understand its import? Can people translate information into well-reasoned and effective action?

It seems to me that we are all too readily seduced by dreams—promises—of eating our cake and having it, too. We have, most of us, relinquished most of our responsibility to understand and provide oversight. We have delegated it, mostly to scoundrels.

So what am I to do with this knowledge? It fills me with dread about the future. A dread caused as much by uncertainty, doubt, and incomprehension, combined with a growing—and already deep—mistrust of people. A mistrust based on a belief that the majority—or, let’s be clear, the participating minority—do not understand, either. They do not know who to trust, or who to entrust, with the authority to maintain any semblance of order, let alone justice; or to prioritize the long-term sustainability and prosperity of either human civilization or a healthy natural biosphere.

It’s the same old complaint, of course: too much power, too little responsibility. Can anything but catastrophe result from giving short-sighted, self-serving apes the power of speech, let alone access to the incredible reserves of energy stored within the Earth’s very crust? We are a ticking time bomb. In fact, the explosion has been ongoing for thousands of years. It merely grows larger and faster. It is out of control. Eventually, it will consume us all. Because who will contain it?

My dread is based on fragments of knowledge, as with everyone else. No one truly knows—or can know—the fate of humanity or life on Earth. We all imagine different trends. Though some see what is undoubtedly not there, is there any tangible difference from believing that we are subject to supernatural forces, or simply to inscrutible natural forces, which only seem to favour us, or hold us in disdain? Does it matter if one believes that the spirits have minds and interest in our fate, or work mindlessly and randomly, and cannot care?

How does one best live with fragmentary and inadequate knowledge? Is it a burden or a relief? Is there a rational means of living with the unknown and unknowable? A happy attitude? Some would argue that faith is the right attitude. At the very least, simply assume things will work out in the end, if one has no power to influence the outcome, if only to spare oneself the agony of worry. I used to carry such an empty optimism, even as I expected the worst from people, I assumed that the mob of idiots had no real power, and those with power knew enough to at least not destroy all the things upon which they themselves depend. Until I learned that we are all idiots.