MODERN PROGRESS.

Auckland Star, Volume LXVIII, Issue 23, 28 January 1937, Page 6

MODERN PROGRESS.

WHERE DOES IT LEAD?

(To the Editor.l

"The best laid schemes o' mice and men iran" aft aglev," said the Scottish poet Burns. That, of course, was before the time of Karl Marx, Henry George or Major Douglas, and the last Science Congress in Auckland. It is somewhat disturbing t> reflect that modern progress is not conducive to happiness, and large families, but quite the reserve. Even our progressive Minister of Marketing may find the eccentricity of our climate jeopardise his bilateral agreements and planned barter exchangee. Cautiously Sir David Rivett. the president of the recent Science Congress, though cognisant of the danger of the increase in human knowledge being directed toward human destruction, excused his coadjutator3 from indicating any scientific solution. In tlie meantime, aerial and marine transport are -.conveying disease germs and bringing new problems fiom other countries. "Sit down" strikes spread from France and America to Australia and New Zealand. Modern farmers want to live in the city, keep shiny boots and use umbrellas while sitting at the wheel of the agricultural tractor and return home in the evening in an automobile with incubator hatched chickens. With all this luxury and softening of fibre, we in New Zealand now face a falling birth rate, accomnanied bv an exaggerated opinion of the value of partypolitics—instead of self-direction. Thus witu all our boasted education, we may be living in a fool's paradise, and not know the A, B, C of 'happiness. Surely that speed king. Sir Malcolm Campbell, may be right in having a gas-proof bomb shelter ready for his retreat when tlie "new era"' dawns. I wonder what Zane Grev thinks about our modern progress* E.N.D.