I'm sure you are familiar with this Marvel movie which directed by Anthony Russo and Joe Russo. It is a spectacular spectacle, full with action from start to finish. But besides that, there's not much to talk about. The plot is pretty straightforward, our beloved superhero characters try to stop this big, bad guy whose presence has been haunted our superheroes since the first time Avengers were assembled. So this time, i want to talk about the philosophy of our main antagonist, Thanos, and its implication in our real world situation.
Thanos is very determined to annihilate half of the universe population, including human. So, he must be bad, right? I mean, merely killing one people is cruel, let alone half of humanity. For the reason why he do it, he keeps talking about bring balance to the universe. What does he mean? To answer that, let's go back to 1347, to the city of Kaffa (modern day Crimea).
In that year, this city was sieged by Mongol army, led by Jani Beg. Mongol army itself had been plagued by a disease now known as the Black Death, caused by Yersinia pestis. Many Mongol army had been died because of this disease that first spread from Central Asia or East Asia. As a last resort, they catapulted the bodies of their comrades passed through the city walls, brought along the disease with them.
The siege finally ended, but the disease continued its rampage, as the city was now overrun by it. Dead people were everywhere, those who still lived run to the nearby cities, spread the disease along with them. This disease finally reached Constantinople, and from there spread to the whole of Middle East. Meanwhile, Genoese soldiers that had helped Kaffa people, brought the disease back to Italy, and from there it spread to the whole of Europe.
The virulence of the disease, aided by bad hygiene, poor understanding about germ theory, and health status that had been weakened by war, famine, and other epidemics, made the disease practically unstoppable. It is said that during that time, a third to half of population of the world had died. Not so different with Thanos' plan, right?
What happened after that? Collapse of society? The end of the world? To the contrary, the life of those who survived were practically better. With many peasants died, and labor became scarce, those who survived were now able to ask nobles and landowners wages triple times than before. Meanwhile, because many land didn't have its owners anymore, land price became so cheap. This caused many peasants and farmers that deemed as a low-class before, can now became rich enough to buy their own land. And now they became middle-class, a social class that didn't exist before. On the contrary, with labor getting more expensive and land rent getting cheaper, many nobles and landowners simply couldn't afford labor to work their land, and they must work their land themselves. This would lead to the end of feudalism.
At the same time, religion started to lose its grip. Hospital didn't exist at that time, and medicine were still based on ancient philosophy and astronomy. So, sick people usually turned to priest to ask for prayer, repentance, and miracle. During the plague, people noticed that priests and the Church couldn't do anything to stop the disease. So, they tried to find better explanation about what's going on, and in the process they started questioning God and began to rely on their own logic and observation. This would lead to the rise of science, Renaissance, and finally Age of Reason. To cover up for the loss of people, people started to innovate and create labor-saving devices, from mill, water pump, new salting and storage technique, to Gutenberg printing press. This would be the predecessor of Industrial Revolution.
As you can see, less people in the world, combined with human extraordinary ability to recover, led to a better life for those who survived. What's that have to do with our life now, you may ask. Well, COVID-19 has rampaged our world for a while now, and it has taken a huge number of victims along its path. But of course, we have gone a long way since 1347, and we're not gonna let this disease freely claims its victims. One of our effort is doing lock down to stop, or at least slow down its spread.
Already we can see the effects of this lock down, especially to nature. Pollution and greenhouse gases are declining all around the world. Water is clearer and the air is fresher. It's all due to reduction in industrial, transportation, and business activity. I hope this can make us realize how we have treated mother nature so wrongfully all this time, and still remember it long after this lock down is over.
Another things that become noticeable is our reliance to internet and how we will maximize its usage in the future. For example, schools and universities can keep running by doing their lessons and lectures online. Church can still give their sermons every Sunday online. Some work, especially office work, can be done online and if they want to do meeting, they can do it through apps like Zoom. Some people give courses or tutorials about certain subject, while some artists or musicians can perform their art through social media.
If you think about it, it can still be useful even after the lock down has passed. Now, the number of your students, congregations, and audiences aren't limited by how many seats you have, how big your audience room, or how large your parking lot is. You and your audiences aren't restricted by physical boundaries anymore. As many people as possible can be your audiences from the comfort of their houses. The limit is now your own lessons, preaches, or performance. The better they are, the more audiences you'll have. It will benefit you and your audiences by not having to spend hours in traffic, and it will benefit nature by reducing pollution from transportation.
With all my respect and condolences to all the COVID-19 victims, maybe we need this kind of catastrophe once in a while. To remind us how insignificance we are, and all this time we pretend that we are not. To remind us how far we are from the center of the universe. To remind us that this universe is finite, its resources finite, and if life is left unchecked, life will cease to exist. Nature corrects us when we've gone far astray, before we create even bigger damage. And for those who survive, true to Nietzschean philosophy, what doesn't kill you makes you stronger. And maybe, just maybe, Thanos is the good guy all this time.
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