Societal Fragility Quotes

Everybody thinks that this civilization has lasted a very long time but it really does take very few grandfathers’ granddaughters to take us back to the dark ages.

Every civilization that has ever existed has ultimately collapsed.

It has been said that civilization is twenty-four hours and two meals away from barbarism.

Over-civilization and barbarism are within an inch of each other. And a mark of both is the power of medicine-men.

Civilization sails prettily like a child's rubber balloon until it hits a sharp object; then it is likely to collapse like the balloon.

History shows that nations are more fragile than their citizens think. No nation in history has survived the ravages of time.

...nuclear warfare is not necessary to cause a breakdown of our society. You take a large city like Los Angeles, New York, Chicago-their water supply comes from hundreds of miles away and any interruption of that, or food, or power for any period of time, you're going to have riots in the streets. Our society is so fragile, so dependent on the interworking of things to provide us with goods and services, that you don't need nuclear warfare to fragment us anymore than the Romans needed it to cause their eventual downfall.

Human civilization has been no more than a strange luminescence growing more intense by the hour, of which no one can say when it will begin to wane and when it will fade away.

I think everybody must be aware that this society is a whole lot shakier now than it was before the war. I was trying to examine, in 'Dog Soldiers,' the process of that blow falling on America.

The common man, finding himself in a world so excellent, technically and socially, believes it has been produced by nature, and never thinks of the personal efforts of highly endowed individuals which the creation of this new world presupposed. Still less will he admit the notion that all these facilities still require the support of certain difficult human virtues, the least failure of which would cause the rapid disappearance of the whole magnificent edifice.

Our society is dependent on some precarious mechanisms, and they are very dicey. They can easily collapse.

The more populous the world and the more intricate its structure, the greater must be its fundamental insecurity. A world-structure too elaborately scientific, if once disrupted by war, revolution, natural cataclysm or epidemic, might collapse into a chaos not easily rebuilt.