Seeing Through the Eyes of God
Early in July, pictures from the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) took our breath away. The image distracted us — at least temporarily — from the war in Europe, oppression in Asia, the threat of global famine, rampant inflation, and a looming recession, all as COVID persists. We saw what God sees: the entire history of the universe at once: the formation of galaxies, the birth of stars, and the creation of planets from nothing but cosmic dust. We were awed by not only the enormity of the universe but also the audacity of the human spirit that made seeing it possible.
This was technology at its most inspiring, destined to attract a new generation of young people to science and engineering, just as the moon landing had done half a century earlier. Only the United States of America has the innovation culture and economic power to pull off JWST or seed the discovery of mRNA-based COVID vaccines that, commercialized by private companies Moderna and Pfizer, have saved millions of lives worldwide. Yet only 30% of Americans — and the figure is lower among Republicans — are satisfied with their system of government and/or its size and power, according to a recent Gallup poll. That figure is down from 70% satisfaction in 2002, after 9/11, and only slightly below the 40% approval in 2019, before COVID. Our confidence in our government has steadily declined over the last two decades, according to the Gallup polls taken every January since 2001. The pace of decline accelerated through the 2010s, even as the economy boomed, unemployment fell to its lowest in decades, inflation stayed low, and the stock market exploded.
We don’t trust other public institutions either: only one in four of us believes the government would keep us safe from criminals, despite the crime rate being lower than it was in the 1990s. (https://www.macrotrends.net/countries/USA/united-states/crime-rate-statistics). No wonder people are buying guns at record numbers.
But why? We in the US enjoy a high standard of living compared with much of the world, employ the most advanced medical facilities, drink clean water, breathe clean air (for the most part), and have ample food (and would have plenty for everyone if it were more evenly distributed). The most powerful military on Earth protects us from foreign invaders. And none of this has changed drastically over the last two decades.
Losing trust
One number in the Gallup poll points to the root cause: Americans’ view of the morality and ethics climate. Less than 30% of us see this climate as benign. How can we trust our institutions if we don’t believe in the honesty of the individuals who staff them? This lack of trust extends to the media: a recent Reuters survey shows that only 42% of Americans trust in “most news most of the time.” Is it just a coincidence that the decline of trust in our fellow citizens and public institutions corresponds to the explosion in the use of social media?
Why we need a trusted community
Humans are social animals. We need a trusted social circle to shelter us, allowing us to repair our wounds and rejuvenate. Study after study has shown that being surrounded by trustworthy family and friends improves physical and mental health and extends the life expectancy. For most of our history, blood relatives and their kinship networks formed our circles of trust. This was where we sought assistance and advice, looked for a job, found a mate, and asked for a loan. It was where we got information and formed our worldview. Tribes of extended families maintained a hierarchy and adhered to a code of conduct to ensure the survival of the clan. Outsiders were shunned, offenders banished.
Some two centuries ago, technology-enabled large numbers of people to move away in search of a better life or escape the confinement of tribal rules. They formed new communities to replace the old ones. The transition was neither smooth nor painless. It took years and caused clashes, riots, crime waves, and many feelings of alienation, even leading to suicides. This process, which started in Europe, eventually expanded globally, taking different trajectories in other places. Eventually, neighbors and friends replaced blood relatives, while theaters (and movies), taverns, restaurants, and dance halls substituted for family storytellers, gatherings, and festivals. The mass media — first newspapers, then radio and TV — provided information and entertainment. Laws, enforced by the police and courts, protected people within communities. Social etiquette and norms dictated interpersonal relationships. We rewarded reputable merchants with our loyalty and developed ways to vet new acquaintances before inviting them over or sharing our darkest secrets.
Another Era?
Today, we face another technology-enabled upheaval, as virtual communities replace physical ones. With work and play increasingly remote, we are becoming isolated islands, connected to others via bits and bytes. The virtual world, however, is filled with unscrupulous characters, some of them not even human but generated by computers. Can these virtual bonds ensure our survival and that of our species?
Increasingly we rely on social media for communication, information, entertainment, commerce, and companionship. But there are no police or courts on the web to protect us against scams and shoddy products. No one is liable for spreading false information. We strike up connections with total strangers without thinking twice, so long as they agree with our point of view. We resist engaging in healthy debate with our friends and family but will bully and shout on the web — or tolerate others’ misbehavior — to get our views across. Even before COVID, more and more people were eschewing real relationships in favor of virtual ones. Is it any wonder that we’ve lost our trust in others’ ethics and morality?
Can we live like this? Not easily and not happily, as the numbers suggest.
Deaths of despair — suicides, and overdoses — are soaring. Fatal overdoses exceeded 91,000 in 2020, compared with 17,500 in 2000; the figure nearly doubled between 2015 and 2020 alone, according to the National Institute on Drug Abuse. Meanwhile, the population-adjusted suicide rate increased from 10.4 per 100,000 in 2000 to 13.5 per 100,000 in 2020. Combined, these deaths of despair killed more Americans in 2020 than Alzheimer’s did, and at a younger age.
As for happiness: a UN report ranks the US as the nineteenth happiest country in the world, well below not only developed countries such as Finland and Denmark, but also Costa Rica and the Czech Republic, and even Israel, a country living under constant threat of terrorism.
The way forward
How do we change that? Would frequently expressing our gratitude for what we have — as the latest online fad suggests — be sufficient to bring us solace?I suspect that for most of us, that tactic would be like taking an aspirin when you have cancer. Alternatively, we could wait for the government — the same one that we don’t trust — to come up with solutions in the form of regulations and laws. Or we could rebuild our circles of trust, brick by brick, person by person.
But how?
First, let’s admit that it’s not the technology per se that’s at fault, but how it’s used and abused. A hammer can build a house, but also kill a man. Facebook is a wonderful tool to post a picture on, but not a reliable source of information or a good medium to exchange ideas. If we want a real relationship, we need to nurture it. As the anthropologist Robin Dunbar states, we need to invest time and effort to deepen our relationships. We reap what we sow. We can reach out to those we’ve neglected, or, in some cases seek new friends or even nurture some of our virtual friendships so that they can blossom offline. This will require us to accept our differences. No two people are alike in every aspect of life. It’s crucial to find points of agreement and understand the point of view of those who think differently. We don’t need to forgo social media, just use it for what it was intended to do: broadcasting.
Next, we must build our communities around common interests. The Gallup poll shows areas of surprising agreement. Most of us do not like the way our nation deals with poverty, inequality, race relations, the environment, and energy. Why not congregate around one issue with those who do not share your ideology, and devise a solution that mitigates the problem in a small but meaningful way? (Writing to your congressman is too easy!). For instance, if you care about the environment, why not help your neighbor–who may have voted for a different candidate for office–plant a tree?
Technology can work miracles, as JWST demonstrates. It instantly connects us to friends and family across the globe and places a library’s worth of knowledge in the palm of our hand. But it also can lead us astray. As we marvel at the JWST pictures, let’s imagine this Earth as a ship sailing through the dark vastness with us onboard. This small planet is our common destiny. We are in it together. Let’s do all we can to make the journey a happy one.
