To answer this question, I think we need to examine what exactly our definition of "Civilization" is..?
Cities? The ability to produce currency? Art? Architecture? Infrastructure? Class systems? Agriculture? It's hard to imagine any of these factors completely disappearing all together as the result of one crisis or another.
Civilization, as has been stated, is generally the rise of dense centralized populations (urbanization, cities) dependent upon intensive agriculture. All those things you mentioned are culture, and have existed in some form or another since probably the dawn of man, but the extreme complexity and variation of modern culture can only be developed by a population which does not have to play a direct role in securing the means of their nourishment and survival, ie, division of labor, specialization, etc.
Something tells me even the self-righteous, tree-bark eating, dreadie mud-hut village of Earth Firsters would be guilty of displaying traits of the civilization they so villainize. No matter what they decide to rename it all. Human progress, and the need to advance/better understand/control our surroundings (via technology) really has no where to go but forward. It's how it's been since day one, it's how it will always be.
Despite how magically hippie awesome primitive societies look, we're going to pick antibiotics, nanotechnology and air conditioning over positive vibes and waiting for nature to provide.
As human animals, our main means of survival is the use of our intellect to manipulate resources from our environment to fulfill our
needs. The main underlying problem is whether we recognize ourselves as an integral part of a localized ecosytstem, and whose influence now reaches out into the entire biosphere, and live life aware and in balance with that, or that we are exceptional beings, exempt from the laws of nature, here to dominate and control our environments, and technology may have gotten us in this mess, but if we keep trying, it will also solve all the problems. (I know, it's an oversimplified false dichotomy heavily influenced by personal bias, but you get my point).
We've been agrarian for about 10,000 years, only a couple hundred industrial, and only a few decades highly technological. It's absurd to think that our modern way of life is the single, inevitable, natural result of the progression of collective human thought since the first monkey used a stone to break open a nut. I don't think our species existed on this planet for millions of years sitting around with their thumbs up their asses "waiting for nature to provide." We did just fine before all this.
Alot of people have romanticized notions of hunter/gatherer societies, but it's a difficult life, and many societies did strip resources and had to move on because they made their environment uninhabitable. Unfortunately, our modern system of industiral agriculture is toxifying the total environment, destroying top soil and is thus entirely dependent upon petroleum based fertilizers, pesticides, fungicides, etc., mechanized production and transportation, etc. all dependent on a finite resource. (and no, I'm not into the peak oil "movement" nor a paranoid sheep. even many anti-peak oil folks concede that oil is a finite resource that will
eventually peak). I wont even start on consumer products.
So this is what you consider "forward", "progress"? Does the pursuit of novelties and artificial comforts, and of "high" technology justify the consequences? Modern medicine mostly treats problems that are caused by industrial civilization, cancer rates keep going up, all kinds of crazy diseases are popping up, people are obese, everyone and their mother is on anti-depressants, etc. Of course people are going to "pick" these things, but we also live in a culture where advertising agencies have psychologists on staff to exploit the developmental vulnerabilities of children, where people's identity and self worth are defined by their consumer behavior. Can we really trust their "choices"?
Also: 2012 is bullshit. Stop being afraid of ancient man's esoteric understanding of a complex Universe they simply lacked the tools to fully understand. Just because a calendar ends doesn't mean MAGIC is going to suddenly swoop in and replace common sense.
Can't disagree with you there.
I think we've strayed off the original intent of this thread, if you want to continue we should move this to one of the other threads about civilization.
As a counter to the original topic, what do people think of "transitional" people, "cultural creatives" etc.? There are alot of people out there doing alot of good things, movements for supporting local agriculture (CSAs, etc.), sustainable agriculture, DIY culture, people moving towards more localized and sustainable economies and ways of living. Do you think it's possible for civilization not to collapse at all, but to have people shift towards a better way of living, and possibly preserving the "good" technologies, and discarding the "bad"? Bringing back some of the old time way of living, like our grand parents and great grand parents, but with modern twists? I'm just curious about what people think about it, I've been meeting some really optimistic people lately who are doing things like this, and they think they can save the world.