January 15, 1929
Martin Luther King Jr. is born. Though his work for civil rights and peace will become widely known, he will also deliver an important warning on the perils of technological amorality.
King delivered a lecture at the University of Oslo, Norway, on Dec. 11, 1964, the day after receiving the Nobel Peace Prize. He argued that progress in science and technology has not been equaled by “moral progress” — instead, humanity is suffering from a “moral and spiritual lag.”
At 35, King was then the youngest recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize. He was recognized for using nonviolent methods, including civil disobedience and the boycott (as well as the power of his oratory), to fight racial segregation and advance the civil rights movement in the United States.
King, a Baptist minister who was the son of a Baptist minister, preached that material advancement was meaningless without an accompanying moral structure. A visit with Mahatma Gandhi’s family on a trip to India only reinforced this conviction, while at the same time strengthening King’s commitment to nonviolence as an instrument of change.
In his Oslo lecture, King acknowledged the advances made by science and technology, but said that growing abundance was undermining the human spirit.
“The richer we have become materially, the poorer we become morally and spiritually,” he said. “We have learned to fly in the air like birds and swim in the sea like fish, but we have not learned the simple art of living together as brothers.”
Placing too much value on material advantage while ignoring what he called the “spiritual lag” was a path fraught with peril, King said.
“Enlarged material powers spell enlarged peril if there is not proportionate growth of the soul. When the ‘without’ of man’s nature subjugates the ‘within,’ dark storm clouds begin to form in the world.”
King was killed by a sniper’s bullet on April 4, 1968, as he stood on a motel balcony in Memphis, Tennessee. He had gone there to lend support to striking city garbage workers.