Yesterday, I read how the global financial system has turned into a casino grift for the wealthy, companies rebuying their stock, hedge-fund super-trading in nanoseconds, private equity overborrowing and bankrupting industries, the cryptocurrency mirage, banks hyper-selling the same dubious instruments that led to financial meltdown in 2008.

I also read how some techie thought it was a good idea to create an AI social network exclusively for Artificial Intelligence agents (no humans allowed) and was surprised that a stream of thought from these AI bots was to eliminate humanity. “Dude? Did you never watch Terminator?”

Then I turned on the news and learned that the US and Russia’s New Start treaty, the last limit on nuclear arsenals, expired yesterday,  and that 2025 was the hottest year on record. Sea level rises are causing residents of the Maldives to abandon their island homes, while members of the US government claim that the recent cold snap disproves climate change.

There was more in the news about forever wars, rise of autocracy, increasingly ferocious weather disasters, powerful men engaging in teenage sex trafficking, and the murderous repression of dissent.

My wife and I felt a little overwhelmed, so we settled down to an evening watching post-apocalyptic drama on Netflix. It is one of the things we have in common, books movies, TV shows about ordinary people trying to survive in a post-apocalyptic world. We’ve learned how to fight zombies with Joel and Ellie (Pedro Pascal and Bella Ramsey) in “The Last of Us,” and made tough choices of a nuclear attack in “The House of Dynamite,” with Idris Elba as a US president in a tough spot.

At the moment, we are watching “Falling Skies” a 2011 series, originally broadcast on TNT, described by one reviewer as a “family drama with aliens.” The action centers on the Mason family, led by Tom played by Noah Wyle (of “The Pitt” fame), and Tom’s second wife, Anne Glass, played by Moon Bloodgood, and the three Mason boys. There are multiple life forms of aliens some good, most very bad.

We watched three episodes last night, enough to distract from our distress about the real world.

As I said, we read and watch a lot of this kind of story, sometimes terrified, sometimes pointing out plot holes: “Yeah, where did the grenade launcher with the alien tech come from?”

Today, the world is back.

I wondered if there might be something we can learn from post-apocalypse survival that might help make a better world. Let’s look at a structure of these dramas.

Apocalyptic Origins

Science fiction often extends a problem that exists today:

Stephen King’s The Stand begins with a government biolab worker dropping a vial of lethal virus, panicking, running outside, and spreading “Captain Trips” around the world.  There’s a lot of loose virus movies and books, but we’ve shied away from them since Covid.

The movie The Day After Tomorrow begins with climate change reversing the flow of the Gulf Stream and starting a new Ice Age. Scientists create the Snowpiercer  ice world by shooting sulfate grains into the atmosphere (yes, they are experimenting with that in India) – a few particles good  ̶  too many  ̶  Brrrrrrrr!

We grew up with the threat of nuclear war. As Billy Joel sang “Cold War kids were hard to kill, under our desks in an air raid drill.” So post-atomic holocaust books, The Road, Planet of the Apes, Mad Max, On the Beach etc., are old hat to us.

Then there are the alien invasion movies. Some aliens come to save us from ourselves: “The Day the Earth Stood Still” – come on Klaatu, and Arthur C. Clarke’s Childhood’s End. And there are some where we live together with the new species. James Caan in “Alien Nation” and Harrison Ford in Ridley Scott’s “Bladerunner” try to teach us to get along with those who are different from us.

Cinematic aliens are terrifying. Occasionally, they “come in peace” and we stupidly start a war, but mostly, carnivorous insects, reptiles and robots just drop in, and use their much superior technology to destroy the landscape and most of the people.

Now What? Actions in an Apocalyptic World.

Depending on the story’s arc, there are some times risk prevention lessons in the set-up. “Yeah, maybe, if the aliens say they ‘come in peace,’ don’t shoot first and ask questions later.” Or maybe “have some special safety procedures around” artificial intelligence like a kill switch that the program can’t override, like Terminator’s SkyNet. Or maybe have multiple levels of containment on deadly viruses, The Stand, or don’t let computers make decisions about nuclear weapons, War Games.

Usually though, humans are just dropped into the apocalyptic scene and have to survive. What can we learn from the survivors?

1. You can run, but you cannot hide. Sometimes the hero thinks he is safe high in the mountains or on far-flung Tatooine, but ultimately the Apocalypse finds you and you must, save a child from zombies, or take a stand against the Evil Empire.
2. Get yourself together first. You can’t fight aliens, zombies, a deadly virus, a new ice age, or nuclear winter if you are wrestling with low self-esteem, anger issues, sibling rivalry, or are so out of shape you can’t do a pull up (ask Linda Hamilton’s character Sarah Connor in Terminator). And, as Colonel Dan Weaver says in “Falling Skies” – “take your hate and put it to one side. It eats you alive and makes you a poor soldier.”
3. Not every human is your friend. Evidently Apocalypse brings out the worst in some people. They steal your shelter, food, fuel, and weapons, ride in flame-shooting makeshift armored vehicles, and rape and kill for fun. If you were a power-crazed sicko pre-Apocalypse, you are likely to be worse in the post world.
4. Find your people. A common tragic flaw is the lone wolf. Nobody succeeds in this life alone and evidently a team is required post-Apocalypse too. In these stories, heroes emerge from the most unlikely places.
5. Acquire some new skills. You can learn on your own or use your team. Who knows how to build a fire without matches or a lighter? Who can weld? Who can wire up a radio? Oh yeah, and who has fired a 50mm machine gun?
6. Get innovative. You’ll need to find the alien’s or zombie’s weakness, or create a special frequency laser that melts and sterilizes ice for drinking water. There is always a scientist, handyman, or former Girl Scout leader who saves the day in these tales.
7. Figure out communications. In most of these stories the protagonists are clustered in small groups around the country and the world, and there are no cell phone towers or electricity left. In The Postman Kevin Costner restarts the postal service and magically the US is back. In “Falling Skies,” they wire a crystal set and then the good aliens help out.
8. Get organized. There is first foraging to be done; later someone will have to grow food. There is military strategy and if you have few generals, a history professor might do in a pinch. Some people have to fight aliens, bandits, the weather, viruses, and some have to care for the wounded, the children, or people who descend into helplessness.
9. Keep fighting. In these stories, whenever you think you’ve won, the virus mutates, the aliens overcome their weakness, or the zombies regenerate and regroup. Or as Dan Weaver says “The battle is not over till it’s over.”

Stories like these have been around for a long time. In the ancient world, the protagonists were gods, demigods, or heroes of myths. They tell us how to survive when the world turns upside down.

Our world has many problems. Watching science fiction and fantasy can be viewed as escapism, avoiding taking action on problems in the real world. but inspiration to act can come from many sources. Perhaps the wisdom contained in them is a recipe for leading positive change.

Let’s go kick some zombie butt.