200 years of reflection on the future of humanity

In an immense desert, under the merciless gaze of the Sun, a traveler comes across the remains of a colossal statue. From the ruined pedestal, two truncated legs and a disfigured face emerge from the sand, silent witnesses to a great past.

The inscription at the base of the statue proclaims: “My name is Ozymandias, king of kings: Behold my works, ye mighty ones, and despair!” But all around, only sand and ruins stretch to the horizon. This is the setting of the poem “Ozymandias”, written by Percy Shelley in 1818, a reflection on the ephemerality of human glories in the face of the relentless march of time.

But what does a 200-year-old poem have to say about the future of humanity? Perhaps more than we can imagine. Just like Ozymandias, modern humanity seems to build its monuments of iron and concrete, blinded by arrogance and the incessant search for economic growth, without worrying about the consequences of its actions for the planet and for itself. Imagine a future, with the scraps of our satellites cluttering the space near Earth, our skyscrapers and megacities in ruins, our desertified forests and the most beautiful luxury resorts submerged by the oceans of a sick planet. All of this will be like the inscriptions in the desert, communicating the pride of the extinct human civilization to the first extraterrestrial travelers to visit this planet.

Our ruins can even be found on the Moon or Mars, showing the audacity of a species that dared to colonize other worlds before even learning to take care of its own planet.

Interestingly, the history of this civilization began to fall apart around the time Percy Shelley wrote his poem. In 1818 the world was going through a major change in its production methods. Manual production gave way to mechanized methods, new processes for manufacturing chemical and metallurgical products. The world was experiencing the Industrial Revolution. The problem is that the energy that powered most of those machines came from the burning of coal, a process that releases carbon dioxide into the atmosphere, mainly responsible for the greenhouse effect, which has increased temperatures on the planet. We are paying a very high price for development. We are paying with our own atmosphere.

The initial inspiration for Shelley's poem was the fragment of the imposing statue of Ramesses II found in Thebes, Egypt. Ramesses II was one of the great pharaohs of Egypt, who reigned more than 3200 years ago and was also called Ozymandias. Historical data and scientific surveys show that the planet's average temperature remained stable from Ramesses II to Percy Shelley. But since the poet wrote Ozymandias until today, they have already risen by 1.5 degrees and have been breaking record after record, approaching a mark where there will be no return.

The search for infinite economic growth, driven by the unbridled exploitation of natural resources, is a dangerous trap. The cycle of consumption, which leads us to extract, produce, consume and discard at an ever-increasing speed, is depleting the planet's resources and degrading the environment at an alarming rate. Fossil fuel exploitation, deforestation and pollution are the result of our insatiable thirst for growth, a thirst that can lead us to ruin, just like Ozymandias.

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We live in a golden age of Science. From the atom to the black hole, we know more and more about the Cosmos and the processes that move the Universe. We learned to travel through space and look to the past to see our future. But what good is all our knowledge if we are not able to use it to make the right decisions at the right time. We all know what will happen if we continue on this path, but, like the king of kings, our greed and pride prevent us from changing the course of humanity, and ensuring a sustainable future for the next generations.

The effects of climate change are increasingly evident and more extreme. The torrential rains that ravaged Rio Grande do Sul, Spain, the Middle East and even the Sahara Desert, the temperature records recorded around the world, the melting of the polar ice caps and the historic droughts that threaten the water supply and food production in different regions.

All of these are signs that, perhaps, our empire is already turning to dust, just like the imposing statue of Ozymandias and all his works swallowed by the desert. And we know what we need to do to avoid this. We just need to decide what kind of legacy we want to leave for the future. The ruins of a superb civilization, which sacrificed its own existence in exchange for momentary glory, or the wisdom of those who knew how to reconcile their demand for development with sustainable practices, guaranteeing a lasting and healthy future for future generations.

True human greatness lies not in our monuments that honor our glorious past, but in our ability to build a sustainable future, a legacy of respect for the planet's limits and harmony with nature. We need to invest in renewable energy, create a development model that prioritizes the preservation of natural resources and rethink our relationship with the environment.

Percy Shelley's poem “Ozymandias” reminds us that time and nature are relentless, and that no matter how glorious our empire is and how imposing our works are. Our pride will always be swallowed by the sands of time. Carl Sagan said that astronomy is a humbling and character-building experience. In fact, understanding the immensity of the Universe and the grandeur of the forces that move it shows us how fragile and precious the thin layer of life that covers our planet is. There is no way not to fight for a world where we can thrive in harmony with nature, with conscience and responsibility, so that Ozymandias remains just an inspiring poem, and not a bleak harbinger of the future of humanity.