I would hope you would give me a time machine as well with the button, but I guess that's a luxury we don't have in this instance.
As aoi said, humans would seek a way to differentiate themselves. However pre-supposing that this does not impede on our harmony that it created, which is something the original post implied, I don't think this would cause problems. While I'm dissapointed in what the world is today, I do think that at their heart humans all want good to prevail, we just have different ideas of what good is.
If there were someway to unite that good in people, to somehow start everyone at the same point, and pointed in the same direction, I would hope that humanity would be able allow deviances from the path, without disrupting the order of things. There will always be disagreements, but if both sides feel that it is for the best not to fight, or to hate, and can reconcile that, I don't beleive they would cause nearly the problem that differences have caused today.
In the matter of destroying or great individuality, I think perhaps you can gain some perspective on it to imagine going the opposite way. Making people even more different from each other. Imagine if you will that a large number of animals, dogs, cats, etc... were all "people". Capable of the same intellectual and physical things as 'our' world's humans, and living amongst people of the real world. Now if you could take every one of those 'people animals', and transfer them into a person as we see it today, thus cutting off much of the individuality, would that be a bad thing. Suppose it's a decision you made, in retrospect, was it a good one...or more importantly, was it a bad one? Is there anything fundamentally missing from the world because of it?
Admittedly there are some large problems that arise due to the obvious unknowns in this example, such as "what was the level of hate and fighting prior to the change?". These make it pretty much impossible to use the example to it's full potential, however they can be somewhat offset by asking the question "would humanity have benefittted in ANY way had I not pushed that button". I'll leave this for you to decide, but for it strains me to try and think of one.
I would have no problem dissolving ratial barriers. If it turned everyone green in the process that's okay with me, as I feel that racial differences...focusing PURELY on skin tone, really serve no good purpose in life(ie: ignoring the cultural aspects that come with race...which are, to me, not connected at a direct level to skin color). That's not to say that they're necessarily bad, I don't any problem, per se, with other races, but I feel that the only really strong affect that comes from it is that it gives the more ignorant people (unjust) grounds from which to hate others. Removing this I feel would really cut that problem off at the knees, and I have a hard time seeing a negative effect from that.
As far as religion goes, I should preface this by saying I'm not religious in any way, but I would still have a hard time abolishing all religion in the way your button proposes. For many people, their religion litterally defines their outlook on life, and that is where I would have a hard time breaking down differences. From ones outlook on life comes a large part of their feelings of how life should be, and it's THIS individuality that would be so hard for me to destroy. One could make the argument that if it were abolished, there would be no dissenting opinions, and everyone would be happy with the status quo, but perhaps that's not such a good thing. It's people that are unhappy with the status quo that cause important, and positive, revolutions. Martin Luther King would be a good example. Granted we've, at this point, eliminated race as a factor of anything, however that doesn't eliminate the need for change. If you take away that ability, then you set humanity on a path which, for better or worse, can't be stopped. One would like to think it would be for the better, but unless you can guarantee it to turn out the best possible way(thereby eliminating the freedom of the people to do anything to change it), then that is simply not a bet I would be willing to take.
So no, I would not push the button.
Great thread by the way, even if it's bound to get lots of pointless replies. But hey...wouldn't the point of the thread be somewhat less effective if it didn't?
