Examining the Dark Side of Progress
Is progress always beneficial? In this episode, I delve into the Cuban Missile Crisis, a time considered by many to be the most perilous 13 days in human history. While the arms race between global powers led to the development of a necessary parallel spying industry for global security, this crisis highlighted a critical question: is progress always beneficial? The potential for destruction brought on by this crisis demonstrated that progress may not always lead to positive outcomes.
Tune in as I explore the unanswerable questions about the future that the Cuban Missile Crisis brought up, and ask some of the most critical questions we face today: Despite our technological advancement, why has our common sense failed to keep pace? With so much logic at our disposal, why do we often choose paths that lead to suffering? And what implications does this have for the future?
And as with everything I share on the podcast, this is what I believe based on what I’ve read and researched. But please don’t take my word for it. Keep what sticks, discard the rest and for goodness sakes, go out and test drive it!
What You’ll Learn In Today’s Episode:
How the Cuban Missile Crisis nearly led to the destruction of the world.
The birth of a spying industry as a result of the crisis for global security.
How technological advancement has outpaced our common sense.
The unanswerable questions about the future raised by the crisis.
The paradox of choosing paths that lead to suffering despite the abundance of logic available.
The potential implications of progress on our future.
What Was Mentioned:
The Soviet Role in World War II: Realities and Myths by Mark Kramer
The Atomic Bomb That Never Was: Germany’s Atomic Bomb Project by Matt Easley
Historical Dictionary of the Cold War by Joseph Smith
The Open Letter to Stop ‘Dangerous’ AI Race Is a Huge Mess by Chloe Xiang
How technological progress is making it likelier than ever that humans will destroy ourselves by Kelsey Piper
The Vulnerable World Hypothesis by Nick Bostrom
Making Sense of Existential Threat & Nuclear War – The Essentials of Sam Harris
Pale Blue Dot: A Vision of the Human Future in Space by Carl Sagan
Ozymandias by Percy Bysshe Shelley
Ideas Worth Sharing:
“I must confess that it was tough to hold any kind of scientific wonder for more than a moment or two before a much larger, and chilling reality set in making me wonder, just what in the hell were we thinking?” – Christina Sestan
“Perhaps by now, you have a better understanding and appreciation for how, when the two world powers play at an arms race, there was a very, very good and necessary case for developing a parallel spying industry.” – Christina Sestan
“With each new step one side took, the other had to at least match if not better. If a move was not matched, the resulting vulnerability would have been untenable for the other side.” – Christina Sestan
“When I reflect on the Cuban Missile Crisis, the end of ww2 and the push for a new kind of “super” weapon, when I think about the nature of the term ‘arms race,’ what I see is a sort of damn the torpedo’s push forward. We ask, “can we split the atom?” not “should we?”” – Christina Sestan
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