Page 150 - JOURNAL OF THE KRISHNAMURTI SCHOOLS

the journal of the krishnamurti schools no.25

The great Roman poet, Ovid, expressed his concerns about
progress 2,000 years ahead of Jared Diamond in this poem:

Long ago Earth had better things to
offer—crops without cultivators,
fruit on the bough,
honey in the hollow oak.
No one tore the ground with ploughshares
Or parcelled out the land
Or swept the sea with dipping oars—
The shore was the world’s end.
Clever human nature, victim of your inventions,
Disastrously creative, why cordon cities with
towered walls?
Why arm for war?
From Amores, Book 3

In Asia, Africa and South America—even on the edges of Europe—
you can still find communities living a life that would be familiar to
people from the Middle Ages. Familiar not just with the demands of
daily life but also with the beliefs and superstitions that arise as tech-
nology develops. If you can imagine making a plough, you can also
imagine those awful people on the other side of the valley. And you
can imagine your death, a disturbing and scary thought if ever there
was one. Fear of death is surely the foundation of religion and belief.
It is counter-intuitive to acknowledge that superstition and tech-
nology share the same common trait, but both require the capacity
to make vivid, mental images. You need to be able to imagine a
piece of wood being pulled across soil in order to make a plough. If
you can do that you can also imagine your own death. Imagination
is one of homo sapiens defining capacities—only a few animal spe-
cies have this capability, and only to a very small degree.
The third age, the Industrial Revolution, developed as the world
turned to fossil fuels to power a new economy. The steam-engine

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