(Leveaux has several back issues of Popular Mechanics or Popular Science which he shows as he recites the cover topics:)
Mankind has been around for one million years. Recorded history, and hence, technology as we know it, goes back 20,000 years. All our technology, all of this, has been developed in 20,000 years. We've gone from stone wheels to space travel in that amount of time.
Now, let's look at another factor. We call it "the bomb". We have the power to destroy our planet. And to some extent we've started to do that: Air pollution, Water pollution, Radiation leaks, Acid rain, clear cutting the rain forests. Depleting the ozone layer. All this environmental destruction, plus the possibility of an atomic apocalypse looming on the horizon. The future looks bleak.
But, we're not stupid! We've come a long way since the grunting retarded half apes who came out of the trees to invent real estate. We recognize that we're ruining our environment, and we're working on it. Emission restrictions, bans on fluorocarbons and nuclear testing, recycling, composting, everything is biodegradable, phasing out the use of plastics, biodegradable plastics. In fact, the only environmentally hazardous thing that we insist on keeping around is the atomic bomb.
Okay, we always talk about "where will our technology be" in 10 or 20 years, or in a century. But I wanna ask you, where will our technology be in a thousand years or ten thousand years. Remember, all of our technology is only 20,000 years old. The computer is only 50 years old. From a calculator the size of a small factory to a semi-intelligent cockroach in 50 years! Where will our technology be in another 20,000 years? How about a million years? How about a HUNDRED million years, where will our technology be? I'll tell you. Tiny minuscule supercomputers inscribed on silicon atoms. Machines capable of doing anything we 20th Century Neanderthals could even imagine in the blink of an eye. Faster than that. Tiny invisible uber-brains capable of fulfilling our slightest whim before we even think it. Go anywhere. Do anything. Be anyone.
And... AND... All of it Biodegradable. All of it completely environmentally, globally compatible.
...Except for the atomic bomb.
(significant pause)
The Dinosaurs walked the Earth for 180 million years.
If they had language, culture, you're not gonna find a fossil of it.
If they developed biodegradable computers the size of an ants eggs, you're not gonna find a fossil of it.
If, after struggling to preserve their environment for 180 million years, they finally wiped themselves out in a nuclear holocaust because none of them had the courage to live without the "security" of the bomb, you're not gonna find a fossil of it.
But you might find dead bodies.
And a whole lot of sand.
You tell me what happened to the dinosaurs.
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