Our Need for a Metanarrative

In the later part of this lecture, Chuck talks about how we don't have a really powerful story that grabs everyone's attention these days. We have no underlying struggle or aim to our culture nowadays. The Cold War is over, too many people think the war on terror is bullshit to really take that seriously and the environmental movement has yet to gain enough strength to inspire that many people. Things may get more interesting if global warming starts to really have some impact, but until a few more major cities are flooded and there are heat waves in Scandinavia, global warming isn't going to get people out of their chairs.

In all likelihood, things will remain painfully boring unless the Singularity hits.