Skip to footer

Readers write: Seeing the future

Letters to the editor for the Jan. 27, 2020 weekly magazine. Readers discuss science fiction writers’ predictions for the future.

  • By Monitor readers

Seeing the future

The Dec. 30, 2019 & Jan. 6, 2020 cover story, “The world in 2050,” was an interesting article. I’d like to provide another perspective and perhaps a longer view.

The Earth is 4.5 billion years old. There have been five mass extinction events during that time. In one, more than 80% of all life on Earth died – yet here we are today. Homo sapiens is between 200,000 and 300,000 years old. We went from the wilderness to the moon in that time. It really takes just an eye blink to develop advanced technology and civilization. The last mass extinction event was about 66 million years ago: the Chicxulub impact that wiped out the dinosaurs. That’s easily enough time for 150 civilizations like ours to have developed and then gone extinct.

It seems to me that for Earth, life itself seems to be the goal – it doesn’t have to be humans. We like to think we are special, but we may not be. We might want to ponder that for a while as we make our plans.

Bruce Higgins
San Diego

Technology improvements 

As a devoted Monitor reader for many decades, the Dec. 30, 2019 & Jan. 6, 2020 cover story, “The world in 2050,” has me swinging from the rafters for joy. Is it controversial? Yes. Is it fair? Yes. What’s more than fascinating to me is how the Monitor reporters go about their coverage. And I have friends to whom I’ve introduced it who agree that it is the best newspaper around.

We have a choice. We don’t have to be a part of all that technology will offer in the years to come, but it’s still prudent to be aware of it. So thank you to each and every person on staff and involved in production for making it possible to have the Monitor in my life.

Carolyn Hill
Portland, Oregon

You've read  of  free articles. Subscribe to continue.
Real news can be honest, hopeful, credible, constructive.
What is the Monitor difference? Tackling the tough headlines – with humanity. Listening to sources – with respect. Seeing the story that others are missing by reporting what so often gets overlooked: the values that connect us. That’s Monitor reporting – news that changes how you see the world.
editor@csmonitor.com
Subscribe
Mark Sappenfield
Editor

Dear Reader,

About a year ago, I happened upon this statement about the Monitor in the Harvard Business Review – under the charming heading of “do things that don’t interest you”:

“Many things that end up” being meaningful, writes social scientist Joseph Grenny, “have come from conference workshops, articles, or online videos that began as a chore and ended with an insight. My work in Kenya, for example, was heavily influenced by a Christian Science Monitor article I had forced myself to read 10 years earlier. Sometimes, we call things ‘boring’ simply because they lie outside the box we are currently in.”

If you were to come up with a punchline to a joke about the Monitor, that would probably be it. We’re seen as being global, fair, insightful, and perhaps a bit too earnest. We’re the bran muffin of journalism.

But you know what? We change lives. And I’m going to argue that we change lives precisely because we force open that too-small box that most human beings think they live in.

The Monitor is a peculiar little publication that’s hard for the world to figure out. We’re run by a church, but we’re not only for church members and we’re not about converting people. We’re known as being fair even as the world becomes as polarized as at any time since the newspaper’s founding in 1908.

We have a mission beyond circulation, we want to bridge divides. We’re about kicking down the door of thought everywhere and saying, “You are bigger and more capable than you realize. And we can prove it.”

If you’re looking for bran muffin journalism, you can subscribe to the Monitor for $15. You’ll get the Monitor Weekly magazine, the Monitor Daily email, and unlimited access to CSMonitor.com.

Subscribe to insightful journalism

QR Code to Readers write: Seeing the future
Read this article in
https://www.csmonitor.com/Commentary/Readers-Respond/2020/0125/Readers-write-Seeing-the-future
QR Code to Subscription page
Start your subscription today
https://www.csmonitor.com/subscribe