Civilization has passed the environmental point of no return, as the apocalypse may soon be taking over the globe. Based on the Mayan calendar misinterpretation, the apocalypse could happen anytime soon. Researches have estimated that the massive drop in the human population and collapse of socioeconomic order can occur depending on the prediction of an a40-year-old computer program. Therefore, the research paper will analyze whether the world has undergone an environmental apocalypse of ecologism and will be the solution to environmental degradation.

Is global civilization facing an environmental apocalypse?

The future is uncertain as we have limited knowledge of the future’s synergistic consequences, depending on the prevailing forces. Consequently, our ideas in shaping the eventual outcome of the environmental apocalypse face enormous differences. Civilizations are mortal, and eventually, they will end, although it is unproductive. Jorgen Randers is one of the World3 modelers, and he argued that the second half of the 21st century would bring global to close apocalypse due to severe global warming (Jung, 2014). Global warming has increased due to civilization that led to the global industrial revolution.

 According to predictions by Dennis Meadows, a professor at the University of New Hampshire, there is an exponential increase in the human population. Humans struggle to manage population and production to live within planetary limits. Additionally, Dennis has argued that people have failed to maintain sustainable paradigm pathways that are not within our reach. Global data statistics revealed alarming scenarios whereby variables are almost reaching the peak and will suddenly drop by a process called collapse. Randers noted groundwater depletion, energy scarcity, and food per capita decline (Mukerjee, 2012).

Randers associated the changes with the greenhouse gas effect, which results in climatic change through global warming. For example, in 1972, people utilized only 85% of the biosphere’s regenerative capacity that supported economic activities, including assimilating pollutants, producing goods, and growing food (Fava, 2013). The biosphere’s underutilization regenerative capacity has surpassed 1972 to 150%. Randers’ estimates show that renewable energy and energy efficiency are the most affected due to the exhaustion of natural resources.   

Civilization passes stages of growth and decline as human beings. Currently, civilization has passed the growth stage, and it is in the declining phase, eventually resulting in a breakdown. Although it is a natural process and occurs similarly to summer into autumn, it is painful and devastating because the natural resources will be unable to meet the needs of its population (Mukerjee, 2012). The entry of civilization discourse has led to erosion of the economy, overwhelming bureaucratic challenges, a decline in social cohesion, a decline in compelling social interests, and a decline in political models that promote public interests.

Empirical evidence shows that western industrial civilization has gone its autumn of initial decline, which can be best understood by analyzing civilization growth stages. Although negligible, wealthy economies will continue to prosper because investments will be channeled to alleviate environmental and resource constraints. Eventually, there will be limited capital to create consumption goods (Morrell, 2012). Nevertheless, there will be improved food production; increased carbon dioxide will lead to plants’ blooming, opening the warming of new regions such as Siberia for food production.

Consequently, there will be a population increase, albeit slowly, reaching eight billion by 2040. Desertification and floods will reduce farmland, resulting in the availability of grain. Devastating moments are coming whereby global warming will be reinforced through forest fires, depleting carbon sinks that absorb carbon dioxide (Fava, 2013). Additionally, there will be massive migration from uninhabitable areas that will result in localized armed conflicts. Therefore, the world is undergoing an environmental apocalypse.

Stage of environmental apocalypse

According to the lifecycle of industrial civilization in association with environmental status, we are in stage III, which is the initial decline and represents the era of cynicism due to weak consensus, increased demand of interest groups currently evident in the USA, and increased bureaucratic complexities (Jung, 2014). United States has undergone critical global challenges that are empirical evidence that the world is in stage III. They include:

1. Billions of people worldwide live in abject poverty, and they cannot sustain a decent living. For example, over 15 million children die annually due to starvation aged below five years.  
2. The ozone layer is exponentially depleted, causing great harm to people, animals, and plants.
3. Pollution, desertification, and overharvesting of natural resources are increasing drastically, destroying the natural habitats of living things.
4. Rapid exhaustion of cheap renewable resources results in severe and chronic energy shortages.
5. Eminent challenges from visionless leaders, enormous fiscal challenges, increased worker dissatisfaction, low public participation, ageism, increased crime, over-tranguilized society, and terrorism are increasing rapidly.

Is there a possible new worldview development for the news cycle?

According to the civilization revitalization graph in scenario II, there is minimal development because we have to pass stage IV and start a new cycle. However, revitalizing an already degraded environment to its original state is difficult since it is an environmental apocalypse. The best thing to focus on is strategies to control stage III factors and prevent further civilization effects. For example, psychological responses, grass-root organizations, cultural consensus, and mass media can play a vital role in controlling factors dominating stage III to a better level and reach near stage II failure (Jung, 2014). The world will enter stage IV, the breakdown stage, and the apocalypse will happen.

Is ecologism a solution to the apocalypse?

I agree that ecologism can solve the environmental apocalypse because it will develop new political ideologies that will be formed based on green economics, green views on politics, and incorporation of human nature, such as liberalism (Morrell, 2012). Doing so will revert the apocalypse experience, and everything will be considered.

Is there a possibility of worldview development? If so, how fast?

There is a possibility of developing a sustainable worldview if ecologism is integrated. However, despite being too late, the process can be fruitful, although it will be slow to revert civilization cycles (Jung, 2014). Once ecologism is embraced globally, gradual recovery from the negative impacts of civilization cycles and the world will develop green economies, politics, and social cohesion for the public’s interests.

Possibility of coming apocalypse

According to an analysis of the looming environmental apocalypse escalated and the evaluation of stage III of civilization, the apocalypse is inevitable. If we fail to embrace the paradigm of civilization revitalization, the apocalypse will come to pass, and it will be a devastating period as it will be an era of breakdown.

The environmental apocalypse is inevitable, and it will come to pass according to the graph of civilization in stage III. However, civilization revitalization and ecologism might be a new paradigm to prevent apocalypse. Eventually, the development of a paradigm will result, and a new life will be realistic.

References #

Fava, S. (2013). Environmental Apocalypse in Science and Art: Designing Nightmares. Abingdon: Routledge.

Jung, C. G. (2014). Civilization in Transition. Abingdon: Routledge.

Morrell, J. J. (2012). The Dialectic of Climate Change: Apocalypse, Utopia and the Environmental Imagination. Nashville: Vanderbilt University.

Mukerjee, M. (2012, May). Apocalypse Soon: Has Civilization Passed the Environmental Point of No Return? Retrieved from Scientific American: https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/apocalypse-soon-has-civilization-passed-the-environmental-point-of-no-return/