WORLD PEACE IS A TERRIBLY DIFFICULT PROBLEM

Here is why.

THE MOON WAS AN ANCIENT GOAL

For a huge long time - ever since the world began billions of years ago, there was no knowledge of the nature of the World. The Moon was always a goal, because living organisms were moved back and forth, toward the Moon and away from the Moon, in the seas by the Moon's gravity.


THE MOON IS NO LONGER A FUNDAMENTAL GOAL, NOT NOW.



TWO ANCIENT EFFORTS

The several thousand years of constructions involved several different approaches. Two stand out as by far the most significant. Others exist which have economic importance but essentially resigned their own form of adaptation.


ONE: NATURE MIGHT REACH THE MOON

Birds must have tried. Sensing the rising Moon's gravity for the first time and mistaking it for a distant mountain range, young and inexperienced birds could easily have chosen on occasion to fly that way. Maybe some animals have long necks or hop a lot in nature's dim-witted attempts to conquer by reproduction.

Among human efforts leading toward success, one was an attempt to progress toward the Moon by generally adhering to nature and studying the world more carefully and systematically by using recorded information and a particular, stable procedure for minimizing statistical variance through the use of random selection from written works.

That place was China, and the tools were written works and the casting of lots to identify selections among a work called the Book of Changes. India's polytheism attempted to solve something too, possibly the multiplicity of species, but that is less clear.

China was surprisingly advanced in mathematics and the 64 hexagrams of I Ching much to do with binary logic and the modern computer-especially the 64-bit processor. International Business Machines was persuaded to sell its entire small computer line to China, possibly as a result of China's historical preeminence in that logic.

USE COMPREHENSION

All three of the Sun's 200 million year orbit around the Milky Way Galaxy, planet Earth's annual orbit around the Sun, and the world's daily 24-hour turning on its axis must be in correct order to comprehend history well. That includes the highly stable exterior galaxies, which easily comprise theology's sophisticated concept of the 'firmament'.

Ancient literary works and much of philosophy seem to take on new meaning if one has the temporal order in good ephemeral and celestial order. Ancient ideas seem much less dangerous and more like the early, exploratory thought they are.


TWO: BUILD STRUCTURES DURABLE TO LAST

Reaching the point where living organisms could begin construction for the purpose may continued until early mound builders began and their work had culminated in stone pyramids. These markers were clearly beyond nature's instincts alone, and they endured, lasting through many generations.

The other of the two began in several places around the world with earth mounds, and emerged most clearly in the Nile Delta region of what is now known as Egypt. Because of its importance, it is very well known. After the first enduring, visible pyramids were constructed, patterns of rule began to emerge that were increasingly recognized as having much in common with previous patterns that had existed, yet collapsed.


REMEMBER THE GOAL

The Moon and Sun were quickly recorded as goals through many paintings of bird-headed men standing in winged boats sailing across waters toward a disk in the sky. These images quickly recalled to those in each new dynasty, at least one of the purposes which the great pyramids and other structures were dedicated.

Later, with experience, both goals and their representations improved in clarity and quality. The Moon and Sun were recorded as goals of voyages and journeys through many paintings of bird-headed men standing in winged boats sailing across waters toward a disk in the sky.


TRANSCEND

Existence of the pyramids began to transcend all time. By three thousand years they had existed longer than any known living organism, and mankind was clearly on its own in new territory.

Designed architecture, art, implements, memorials, and many other antiques from previous dynasties essentially welcomed each new civilization into an inheritance not only of power, but of knowledge, purpose and direction.


CREATE RENEWABLE LEADERSHIP

The patterns of rule turned out to be through the leadership of most powerful families. They were not necessarily enduring themselves, particularly in the Old Kingdom. Rule by the most powerful family is now known as dynastic.

Even powerful concurrent families were known to be of only temporal endurance, but in each case the re-emergence of the resurrected lineage took place in the presence of the durable and highly visible pyramids.


ATTAINMENT OF THE MOON

Attainment of the Moon then became only a matter of time, and it was on the order of thousands of years before the grand attainment that spanned only a century, most of which was unnecessary war since the only thing the wars did was practice designing rockets. The entire project took only ten years to prepare, and the several flights, each lasting only a few days, spanned only five years.


THE FUTURE IS DIFFERENT IN KIND

The future of human destiny is no longer a struggle to reach the Moon. Now the Moon has footprints on it in several places. The image of the Earth from the Moon and other places in space was recognizable everywhere in the world instantly. The entire population of the world knows what the Earth is.


THE FUTURE IS LONG

Conceptual changes in which adaptation accommodates the new and clearer understanding of the world will naturally span thousands of years and cannot be foreseen.


THE FUTURE IS BETTER

The increasing times of peace will be much happier than the preceding strife. THE CONFLICT OF THE PAST MUST BE ABANDONED. Communications shows a capacity for rational thought and self-government in every country in the world.

THE WORLD IS CONNECTED

Transportation and communication suddenly made the world a very much smaller place, and most people most everywhere are busy making the peace, healing wounds, reconstructing or designing anew habitations, cultivating and gardening the planet, and conserving its resources and other living beings including whole species.


THE ATTAINMENT IS NOW

The Moon was attained only fifty years ago and by now the entire planet is connected with transportation and communications systems of many kinds. It will never go back to totally isolated regions or peoples again, and the communication will never be through arduous foot or animal transport.

Machine driven transportation and electric communication are recognizably of such fundamental nature and vital importance that their total loss for any time at all cannot be even faintly foreseen, although it seems clear the world will become much quieter and more moderate with time, self-knowledge, seasoning and experience.


THERE ARE PROBLEMS IN BELIEVING IT

Distinct though few, problems remain, particularly dynastic or imperial aggression. Those institutions were so successful in the past exactly because they were slow, strong, patient, did not back down, forget their goals, and were not quick to be intimidated or deceived. It requires thirty years, the orbital period of the slowest visible planet Saturn, to catch the attention of a dynasty or an empire.


DYNASTIES AND EMPIRES: TOUGH, SLOW AND THICK

Dynastic and imperial institutions are a bit thick about niceties. The Apollo project to the Moon was a nicety. Spanning only ten years in the preparation and five years in the attainment, it hardly exceeded the ten year periods of menarche and Jupiter. to the Moon.

In short, traditional forms of dynasty and empire and some other less well defined forms of human groups have not really comprehended yet that the Moon was attained, that the Moon has footsteps on it, and in clear principle the Moon can be attained again if there is any good reason to go there. There are not very many good reasons to send human beings to the Moon right now.


THE MOON WAS NOT INVITING

No compelling reason to return to the Moon exists, because the Moon has no air, no water, no ice, no campfires, no plants, no trees, no animals, no birds, no fish, no people, no temperate locations, and is too far to go without idiotically great expenditures. Cost is an object in these times when so many important factors on Earth are in distressed need for attention.

Plague, starvation, brutal random violence, organized war, sectarian conflicts over religion, grossly extravagant human population, pollution, rapacious overkill of earth's wildlife, mechanized slaughter harvests of sentient beings on the land and in the waters of the sea as if they are so much dirt, and digitized but vague tendencies to create a tyrannical world holocaust seem hopelessly dangerous in the face of the pitifully small funding that international cooperation is given.


THE MOON IS STILL NOT INVITING

Even though a return to the Moon is inevitable, it is not likely to happen in time to be figurative in forming an enduring worldwide, global peace unless China plays a strong hand in that, and it looks like that is not happening because China is playing a defensive role. Pity. There are some ancient reasons for China's delay.

China's history was a much more timid approach to the Moon, and hardly began that kind of progress. It was loathe to violate any engendered patterns of nature, a pattern that was enforced by Taoist principles which still exist even in the post-Apollo era.

That timidity is why China's first astronaut, justifiably happy and exuberant at his triumphant return alive, was feeling bruised. China's people were playing ping pong for exercise in space flight, which Americans were playing football, Canadians were playing ice hockey, and Europeans were playing soccer.


WORLD PEACE IS STILL A TERRIBLY DIFFICULT PROBLEM