Will this peaceful state of human society last forever? If not, when will it end?

Five years later, we can finally discuss the rise and fall of the world and the fate of mankind with confidence, on the media platform created by ourselves. Although there will still be countless laughs.

I don't know when people in China can't discuss human propositions. I don't know. Geometrically, public opinion is increasingly focused on money, pornography and drugs. Money is crazy about online games, and the myth of getting rich overnight stimulates wave after wave of spiritual opium makers, but few people care about the wandering souls of young people addicted to the internet; A male shadow promiscuously exceeds 10 actress, and photos of "Xiang Yan" are overwhelming on the Internet, and countless glasses are madly chasing; A director, after gathering people to take drugs, came out in a few days, became a star among stars, and then had a tearful shot of his daughter holding his father to forgive his loved ones, which was more red, purple and famous than before!

All this, as Mrs. Daosheng wrote at the beginning of the book "Living Law": We are living in an "uneasy era" with chaos and uncertain future. We are well-fed but rude, fully enjoy our freedom and sometimes feel isolated. Society is filled with decadent and pessimistic atmosphere, and some people are even willing to be the protagonists of scandals and even commit crimes.

Were we like this before? I don't think so. At that time, we were naked, hungry and didn't have our own room, but we simply sang "We are the successors of * * * *", and we sang "In the Field of Hope" with good wishes for the future. We also sang "You asked me where I was going, and I pointed to the direction of the sea" with deep nostalgia and boldness. Nowadays, people have delicacies, drive private cars and live in big houses, but their souls are more and more turbid like air. Which is happier? At that time, our stomachs were flat, and we discussed whether "2 1 century is the century of China people". Nowadays, "elites" often have big bellies and glance at gentler mistresses with ambiguous eyes. Which is more like a real person than a beast in a suit and tie?

Toynbee: Indulging in material desires can only lead to the demise of mankind.

We have long forgotten our dreams and pursuits.

1In the late 1980s, an exciting emotional dream stirred up among the intellectual elites in China, because an asteroid of ideas crashed into China, which caused layers of repercussions among the intellectual class. This asteroid is Outlook 2 1 century, published in 1985-this is a book that guides human beings out of their devastating fate.

After more than 20 years, it has already disappeared from the vision of the intellectual elite. The "elites" are busy all day speaking for the rich and "doing things" for the poor, and they have long since stopped treating people as the same. It can't be found in the well-known humanities bookstore and Dangdang in Shanghai. Only Taobao has the only one that provides copies.

This book is a top-level dialogue between East and West masters. The time is 1974. On the one hand, he is the great historian and the last thinker in the west? Toynbee, the last few years when he was 85; On the other hand, Daisaku Ikeda, a talented Japanese thinker, talked about 10 days in London in his prime, and Bo Gu talked about today, from east to west, from human nature to heaven, from politics, economy, currency to religion. This is the last great ideological collision of mankind.

In this dialogue, Toynbee said clearly and without any objection: "It is probably not the western European countries or westernized countries, but China that will unify the world in the future.". As a Japanese, Ikeda is a little uncomfortable in his heart, but he also clearly understands Toynbee's idea-"When talking about the process of unification of the world under a government, Dr. Ikeda repeatedly talked about the ruling principle of China or China as the driving force and the core possibility; It is also envisaged that in the process of achieving this goal, outstanding dictators may be needed to play a role. You also look forward to the emergence of a new world religion as a spiritual bond for people all over the world. "

"2 1 century is the century of China people", and the intellectual elites in China at that time condensed this dialogue into such a slogan. However, in retrospect, we didn't really understand much at that time. If we read it again today, we may have a deeper understanding, but we left it in a corner that we couldn't even sweep the end of our eyes, covered with thick dust.

"For today's crisis, the immoral impact of (our) shameful weakness will undoubtedly make the younger generation's mind barren. Young people feel that they have no chance to live and abandon themselves or rebel against society. Destroy life in various forms. Young people can't do anything about the broken situation that their predecessors can't solve various social problems, so they have to bear it themselves. " -In sharp contrast to the increasingly low salaries of China university graduates and the astonishingly high housing prices, we cannot but marvel at the foresight of the masters.

"For example, the problem of car life, companies are promoting product updates, promoting new cars every year, and even plausibly promoting the identity of modern people not taking the latest cars. Affected by these propaganda and information, if you can't be independent and just live according to your own material desires, the result will only lead to the demise of yourself and mankind. " -Ikeda this passage is a thorough portrayal of more and more "car slaves" in China today.

Although claiming to be pessimistic, the old man Toynbee, who tried to point out the last hope for mankind, said: In the lifestyle of the so-called western developed countries, greed is regarded as a virtue. But I think there is no hope for the future in a society where greed is rampant. Greed without self-control will lead to self-destruction. He predicted: "These countries may be richer than developing countries at present, but they may actually be poorer in the end."

Toynbee's prediction of western developed countries has actually been laughed at in the past 30 years, at least the mainstream western elites are laughing at him with greedy actions. Then, more than 30 years is just a flash in history, and a great crisis of no less than 1929 has come. Is this God's revenge or the punishment of history?

Patnoy: The richest bastard is also an asshole.

"Imagine that you earn $500,000 a year. The only drawback of this job is that it makes you an asshole. Will you quit this job? "

Yes, at 1974, when the two masters were anxiously discussing the future of mankind, the greed of the elites in developed countries just broke out. Because 197 1 years ago, the United States announced the cancellation of the dollar's peg to gold. The United States has become a super privileged country. As long as it starts printing dollars, it can buy the material wealth of the world. When more and more dollars are printed, someone needs to sell these green books without any intrinsic value mortgage to people all over the world. This has led to the rapid expansion of Wall Street investment banks such as Morgan Stanley. A large number of financial elites broke out on Wall Street. Frank. Patenoy is one of them. He began to ask himself such a question at 1995. Later, he couldn't stand the condemnation of his conscience and wrote a sensational book, Clay Dove Target.

At this point, he has believed that the role he has played in recent years is a liar. He wrote in clay pigeon target: "I am convinced that everything is a scam, and I have every reason to think so." Derivatives are scams, investment banks are scams, the financial systems in Mexico and Japan are scams, and even the Imperial Hotel in Tokyo is a scam. This is really frustrating. "

Patnoy's trip to Tokyo really satisfied the material desire of the empire. A first-class ticket of $7,500; Monthly housing allowance of 65,438 Canadian dollars+0,000 pounds; Unlimited meals and hospitality, some colleagues exaggerated that it costs $65,438+0,000 per week, and the price of six slices of sashimi is $65,438+0,000. The company booked a suite on the top floor for him at the Imperial Hotel in Tokyo for three weeks. This hotel is one of the most expensive hotels in the world, overlooking the palace of the Japanese emperor directly. In his eyes, Tokyo is a luxurious place. To his shock, Tokyo also has a dark side. For $30,000, you can hit a girl with a belt with nails. Of course, the transaction commission far exceeds this cost.

The Patnoye family went to Tokyo, not to save the sinking Japan. Instead, they want to destroy the booming Japanese economy. They brought a kind of financial nuclear bomb, called "stock index futures" (which is now being vigorously promoted to China). They sold these nuclear bombs to Japanese financial institutions and enterprises that didn't know the truth, and then detonated them at the peak of Japan's financial bubble in 1990. The consequences are well known. Japan's share price fell by 66%, house prices fell by 85%, and countless Japanese families, enterprises and financial institutions went bankrupt. The only one who made a lot of money was the Wall Street investment bank that made this "short derivative".

The derivatives department is the most enviable department of Morgan, but in fact, this department does not create any real wealth. It wins and others lose. In Patnoy's view, what the derivatives department does is to make contracts that customers can't understand, invite customers to the urn, and let customers lose money to themselves. Their clients include banks, governments and pension funds. Two years ago, this scene seemed far away to China people, but after the financial crisis, thousands of enterprises and rich people in China became similar victims.

This kind of obvious fraud is inevitably disturbing. However, the leaders of investment banks have a way-since they are uneasy, they will completely crush their conscience. Senior director organized a luxurious public travel-to Paraguay to shoot pigeons, and after paying farmers, he could kill thousands of pigeons symbolizing peace and kindness at will. "Dove hunting is an excellent training to prepare people for a more enjoyable killing. In real life, the "shrapnel" of complex derivatives will pierce the chest of the rich and unquestionable "human pigeon". In order to promote this slaughter method more conveniently, Morgan Stanley organizes clay sculpture "pigeon" shooting competition every year. In the flying mud pigeon stump, the wolf blood lurking in human nature is boiling. It is these crazy people who earned $ 654.38+0993-654.38+0995, with an average of $654.38+0500 per person. Of course, this is nothing compared with the last madness of financial derivatives ten years later.

However, all this has not completely transformed Patnoy into an animal. Instead, he is getting more and more depressed-"Even if we are the richest bastards in the world, we can't change the fact that we are bastards." He finally chose to resign and left the building in 9 years? Buildings that collapsed in the 1 1 incident and revealed the truth to the world.

Another penitent is John, the author of Confessions of Economic Black Boy. Perkins. He wrote: "Economic killers refer to top professionals with high salaries who grab hundreds of billions of dollars from countries all over the world. The money, through some international aid agencies, has entered the coffers of large American corporations and the pockets of a few prominent families who control the global natural resources. Economic killers use various ingenious means: falsifying financial reports, manipulating elections, bribery, extortion, seduction and even murder. In the era of economic globalization, their scale is unprecedented and frightening. I know all this! Because I used to be an economic killer! "

Perkins proved Toynbee's worry with his own personal experience and painful introspection: the manipulator (this terrorist attack system) is not a person, but an idea that they regard as truth-economic growth will benefit mankind, and the faster the growth, the wider the scope of this benefit. Under the manipulation of this view, the result must be: those who are best at playing with economic means will benefit from it; And the poor are destined to be poorer. They use their own financial and political power to ensure that our schools, enterprises and media support this fallacy and its inference at the same time-the current global civilization is a huge machine, which needs constant refueling and maintenance, and the machine will become bigger and bigger, so big that even our naked eyes can't distinguish it, and the final result is only self-destruction. "

Fu: The difference between heaven and hell lies in "goodness"

Repentance is the beginning of returning to spiritual happiness. Compared with Patino, Kazuo Dawson almost entered the Japanese underworld when he was young, but he was close to the ultimate sacred spiritual happiness.

Dawson and Kazuo admit: I also had a disgraceful experience. I graduated from college during the difficult employment period. Because it doesn't matter, I took many recruitment exams and failed, so my employment has never been settled. So the idea of being a "knowledge ronin" came into being. Instead of living in an unreasonable society where the law of the jungle prevails, I might as well mix in a kind underworld.

He reviewed and summarized his original decision in this way: if he really chose that road and made a fortune in a hurry, he might have become the leader of a small group. However, no matter how the world progresses, the fundamental way of thinking is negative, distorted and evil. Therefore, you will never be happy, and you will never live a rich life.

Now no one can deny that Dawson and Kazuo have a rich and happy life. After he chose the road of scientific and technological entrepreneurship, he devoted himself to creation. He has glimpsed the "laws of the universe" many times and founded two Fortune 500 companies, which are called "the God of Management" in Japan.

At the age of 65, he finally realized, reconsidered the meaning of life, and wanted to have real faith, so he decided to become a monk and convert to Buddhism.

When someone asked' why did people come to this world', Dawson and Dave wrote:' I will answer without hesitation or boasting:' I made a little progress than when I was born, or I will die with a better and more noble soul.' Even a little. In the gap between life and death, accumulate virtue to do good and cultivate sentiment, so that compared with the starting point of birth, the soul character of the end point should at least be improved. I think this is the purpose that nature or the universe gives us life. "

100 years ago, the German philosopher Nietzsche declared that "God is dead", and Dawson and Kazuo rebuilt their inner beliefs and paradise.

"God is dead" is the root of all greed and debauchery in the West. Those talented elites have no hope of going to "heaven", so they don't care about going to "hell". When they are alive, they will definitely try their best to possess money and indulge in material pleasures. This is the root of the greedy and greedy culture represented by Wall Street. However, it is precisely because of this bottomless deprivation of human beings and nature that the way of human existence has expanded rapidly around the world, and the material needs of human beings have doubled, and the material resources that the global village can supply have reached the limit. In this way, under the reverse mechanism of the global village, the conflicts between people and countries will inevitably become more intense. In the nuclear warring States period, this means that human beings may encounter extinction at any time-this result is exactly what Ikeda warned: "The civilization created by human power betrayed human beings and is also sending this civilization to the grave."

Where is the vitality and outlet? Toynbee pointed out: as long as we strive to overcome egoism in spirit, we obviously have the ability to save ourselves, but we just don't do it, which is even more shameful.

Toynbee believes that the only way for human beings to save themselves lies in faith and religion. Japanese Ikeda also agreed-"I need a religion or philosophy that integrates all ethnic groups in the world. This is my firm belief. For the sake of religious or conceptual unity, a person with strong leadership skills may be needed. This should be a leader of religious or philosophical thoughts. "

Self-restraint is the essence of religion. Daosheng and Kazuo are practicing Toynbee's conjecture with their own actions-meditation, charity and discipline after conversion. He is convinced that there is a "true self" in our hearts, surrounded by a "soul", and "(animal) instinct" is covered outside the "soul". The happiness in people's hearts comes from the true self. Only by restraining greed and perfecting the soul can the flower of the true self bloom happily.

If the above statement is hard to understand, then Mr. Daosheng Kazuo also relayed a story from China in the Living Law, letting us know what heaven and hell on earth are:

"Hell and heaven each have a cauldron with delicious noodles. However, eating noodles is very hard, because only one meter long chopsticks can be used. People living in hell are scrambling to eat first, scrambling to put chopsticks in the pot and noodles in it. But the chopsticks are too long, and the noodles can't reach your mouth. Finally, they grabbed the noodles from others' hands and splashed them everywhere, and no one could eat the noodles in front of them. In the end, everyone was miserable because of hunger. In heaven, once someone picks up noodles with their own long chopsticks, they send them to the mouth of the person opposite the pot, and everyone takes turns to help each other pick up noodles. So people in the sky can eat noodles calmly, and everyone is satisfied. "

In fact, for Toynbee, Daisaku Ikeda, and Kazuo Daosheng, it is such a simple multiple-choice question about how to go in the future. Choosing the former is a real hell, and the future is the destruction of the world; Choosing the latter is a paradise on earth and the future is the rebirth of civilization.

If there is heaven, Toynbee will look at the East there and look at us with hopeful eyes.