Well, the end of our lives, yes.

But your point is well taken. I’m mostly talking about maintaining some kind of contiguous global society, one where we’re not all scurrying around in caves and forgetting everything we’ve learned since the Ice Age.

I have an issue with your #1. You are equating the death of human civilization with the death of the Earth. That in itself is (probably) true; without the Earth there won’t be any humans, or human civilization. But it would take an awful lot of effort, more than we can muster, to “kill” the Earth. We have the ability to obliterate the current human society with a massive war or far-reaching climate effects, and the attendant die-off, but I doubt we have the ability to cause our species to go extinct. That is the realm of a stellar incursion such as a large metorite/comet impact or gamma ray pulse or supernova or the like.

Whatever we do, I’m sure that there will be humans left for quite a while. Whether or not there are 6 billion of us around and operating a cohesive global society is quite a different question, and I think what you are really driving at.

Good as far as it goes. I would add that we need cheap access to space and the rest of it will take care of itself, but CATS is my hobby horse not yours.

Basically, there has to be a middle ground where it is worth being successful but where you don’t jack most of the country to do it.

Look at the situation where many many graduates from even middle class families are $50,000 or $100,000 in debt by the time they get their Bachelor’s degree (which is a requirement for most “professional” career paths). I managed to avoid this by timing and luck (and how long ago I went to undergraduate school) but imagine being 22, looking to start a career, and having that level of debt. That’s day to day life for many people that I know.

Then there are the people who don’t have a corporate job or simply are between jobs who go bankrupt because they have a heart attack or catch a nasty disease (or get a tumor) and their bills wind up going sky high. “Well, you had a successful career and a home but you got that lung tumor in between work or while starting your business and now you have to sell your home and declare bankruptcy.”

Think about what the cost of health care and education does to those with even normal means. Now, the wealthiest Americans don’t have to worry about this, just like they don’t have to worry that homes in most major cities cost more than $500,000.

(I agree with you on the taxation issue, btw. It’s gotten way out of hand.)

Sure, you are successful and rich because of your work. You should pay back the society that enables your wealth in proportion to your success. This allows the working class of society (and lower middle class) to have things like equitable wages, social programs to help them, health care, and education. You know that we use to give students grants for college? Now we give them loans, thanks to the work of Reagan. More money in the hands of the upper class and the reducing of their tax load…