"What was it like before the world ended?" That's what the little kids, born after that event, are always asking. The way things are now--well, that's their world. For those of us who survived it, the world we find ourselves living in will never be as completely our world as it already is for the youngsters. There will always be a sense of loss, a wish that things had remained the same, or had not gone as they did. Our children are content with their lot; we are not. From Mandy Abbott's "The Last Generation of the Ice Age: A Memoir" ________________________________________________ Mandy Abbott might well be speaking of an event that we may well live to experience. There is geological evidence and computer models that suggest that the switch from an ice age to a warm (think hot!) can be extremely fast--not thousands of years but maybe just a few decades--or less. We tend to think of the Ice Age as something that ended maybe 10,000 years ago. The truth is that we are still in that same ice age. Although melting incredibly fast these days, we still have the remnants of the ice cap that once covered much of the Earth in Greenland and Antarctica. What will it be like, when even these remnants have melted? Most of the most fertile agricultural land and most of the world's most illustrious cities will sink beneath the rising ocean. It will be hotter, much more arid land that we have left to raise our crops. Millions, if not billions of people will be displaced. With less food and territory to go around, it will be a brutal age; if starvation doesn't get you, sickness and warfare will. Think the oil wars are going to be something? Wait until you experience the Food Wars! At first, we will fight with the sophisticated technology that we now possess and warfare will continue until people reduced to using bows and arrows, spears, axes, clubs, maybe even stones in our hands. It isn't going to be pretty, Boys and Girls. It will be brutal. All our present cultures and values will sink into a growing darkness; and the plunge into darkness will be fast. There won't be lot of survivors. Human remnants will be scattered over the Earth. New tribes and nations will appear. New rules, laws, and beliefs will come into practice. Few of the old rules will remain; and they won't be the ones we'd like to see survive: Might makes right. I worry that my children and grandchildren may be the ones who have to make the perilous transition into this new, different, dangerous world. ________________________________________________ CREDITS: Poser 6.0, Bryce 6.1, PSP 5.0 Figure: DAZ's Aiko 3 realistic. Clothing: "Rudi for Aiko 3" by MAB and Will Dupr? (DAZ). Vehicle: DM's Trike. Background: photo from www.cepolina.com/ enhanced by Bo Hammarberg for cyclomrama.