What Is Our Eventual History?
By David Anderson
20 January, 2012
Countercurrents.org
“longue durée”
an expression used by the French Annales School of historical writing to designate their approach to the study of history; one that gives priority to civilization’s long-term historical socio-economic and technological structures and describes how changes in them over long periods of time play out; expressed as “histoire événementielle.” (eventual history) This view of history is in contrast to the short term time-scale that is the domain of the chronicler and the journalist.
The popular surge that began with the Green Revolution has continued to gain momentum and is now spread around the globe, bolstered by scientific observation of the ecological problems facing human civilization. In fact, we are now in near information overload. Professionals from a wide range of scientific disciplines have joined in and are spelling out our ecological problems with precision. They point to the dire consequences if no action is taken. Very few basic questions remain unanswered. There are doubters; however, they are slowly fading from the conversation, leaving behind only shreds of doubtful misinformation.
Yet, our institutional response on a national and global level has been largely ineffective. It can even be described as apathetic. More often than not; governmental measures being taken are piece-meal and half-hearted. Given the seriousness of the scientific forecasts, we are left with the question; why? Could it be that the reason, as the French Annales School of historical writing described it, is that our thought processes are locked into past socio-economic and technological structures, from which there is no escape?
The question then becomes; if this is true, could our insouciance soon drag us into a tragic period of human history referred to by those same French historians as a period of “histoire événementielle”, translated into English; “eventual history”, a period that could lead to the eventuality of a series of irreversible ecological tipping points leading to human survival in some meager form of existence or even the possibility of extinction?
David began his writing career after 9/11 with the publication of his first book, Holy War the Blood of Abraham. In that book he turned his focus to Abrahamic religious belief as an underlying force driving world conflict. The Infidels, a second book centering on Islam, was published two years later. Three years ago his interest turned to the images incorporated in Abrahamic belief that are now acting as an impediment to human species survival. He wrote his third book; Q Will Human Species Survive? It shows how Judeo/Christian/Islamic thought in its archaic biblical/Koranic form has been a powerful element working against solutions to the world’s social and ecological problems. While being a harsh critic of present day orthodoxy in Judaism, Christianity and Islam, David nevertheless remains a follower of the teaching of Jesus as revealed in the Gospel of Thomas, discovered in 1945 near the monastery at Nag Hammadi, Egypt. There is evidence that this gospel predates the fourth century Roman canonical ones. It remains declared heretical by the Roman Catholic Church today. It contradicts much of present day Judeo/Christian/Islamic doctrinal canonical thought as to the image of God and as to Jesus himself. The eastern mysticism expressed by Jesus in the Gospel of Thomas (Go to "Essay Series" Tab above, read Essay # 3 Parts I, II and III) www.InquiryAbraham.com dominates David's argument that unless Jews, Christians and Muslims are able to rethink their religions in that form; our species may only have a few centuries before it will face self imposed extinction.
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