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Earth, 1946: World War II is over and the Cold War looms. The result, at least for the victorious industrialized nations, is a combination of euphoria with an undercurrent of growing existential dread. And yet, in the long run these seemingly-conflicting emotions lead to the same end, economically: spend freely.

The key to this paradox is the nature of the new threat, largely unprecedented in human history: nuclear annihilation. Humanity lives under imminent threat of destruction, as often before, except now destruction is for practical purposes likely to be over in an instant. As Albert Camus wrote, in The Fall:

I could better understand that friend who had made up his mind to stop smoking and through sheer will power had succeeded. One morning he opened the paper, read that the first H-Bomb had been exploded, learned about its wonderful effects, and hastened to a tobacco shop.

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