ReWriting the Human Story: How Our Story Determines Our Future
an alternative thought experiment by Nikola Danaylov
Part I: Story
People always find it easier to be a result of the past rather than a cause of the future. Unknown
Are we just billiard balls in a predetermined cosmic game of pool?
Or are we free to choose our future?
My thesis in this book is that our future is indeed determined. But not by some unbreakable and deterministic law of nature. No. Our future is determined by a story that we have created. Because ours is a civilization of story. And we are Homo Narrative – a species of story. So much so that today humanity lives and dies not by facts but by and for our stories. And this has gone so far that at present the fate of actual, non-fictional entities – such as animals, rivers, trees, mountains, oceans, and even our planet, is determined by stories – such as money, religion, law, corporations, nations, and international organizations.
In other words, in our civilization, what is real and we can touch, see, feel and smell, is ruled by what is fictional and doesn’t necessarily exist outside of the shared human imagination. All future possibilities – what is and what is not possible, are not determined by past events or facts on the ground. They are determined by the stories we attach to those because we are story-telling animals. And that is true for us individually – as persons, or collectively – as organizations, businesses, nations, and even for our civilization. We all build our future upon the story we tell ourselves about the past.
You can read the rest of the piece here: https://www.singularityweblog.com/part-i-story/
