The virus has continued to spread.
I am underground, waiting for whatever comes next.
It has been 10 days since my last human contact.
Who knows what is happening above me, in the world.
Actually, I am underground. I am in my basement office, bored. I actually haven't seen any friends, in person, in over a week. It's called isolation and we are using isolation to combat a deadly virus. I am writing this on Easter Sunday and the United States is still grappling with an outbreak of COVID-19. This is life in quarantine.
But, it is actually not so bad! I've got my family. We go for hikes, play board games, watch movies. You know what? It is actually quite nice! As strange as it is to say, I have sort of enjoyed this whole experience so far.
I am one of the lucky ones.
People in health care are struggling to keep up with an outbreak that preys on the lungs and kills indiscriminately. They are forced to give help to people without the resources they need and they are fearful about their capabilities. That fear is real.
First responders all over the world go to emergencies, fearful of what horrors they may breathing while rendering aid. That fear is real.
People are frightened all over this planet, praying for the pandemic to end, hoping that they and their loved ones will survive. That fear is real.
There are a lot of people who are scared of something all together different: the Apocalypse. Is that fear real? Is there reason to believe that this current crisis will bring the world, as we know it, to a halt?
While I'm quarantined for the next few weeks, I will be trying to sketch out some of the ideas behind this belief. Mostly, I will be focusing on Christian ideas of End Times, but we will also touch on futurology and some secular beliefs about the fate of our species.
I think that we will find that there is something within our human condition that is weirdly drawn to doomsday scenarios. When that draw is combined with religious fervor and spiritual schematics, it can be an intoxicating poison.
I should say that there are genuine existential threats to the world. There are wrongs that we should be actively trying to right. There are messes of our own creation that we need to clean up. There are problems in this world that can end it.
The question is, how can we think about these things with sober clarity, instead of paranoid hysteria? I think the best answer is to get our history straight, which I will be trying to do, with your help.
So, where is this world headed? What do people believe and project about the End of the World?
I hope you can spare some of your isolation time to explore this topic with me.
BUNKER BLOG 1 Reasonable
BUNKER BLOG 2 - Unreasonable
BUNKER BLOG 3 - Religious
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