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Peak Oil Therapy

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Peak Oil Therapy

Unread postby Graeme » Fri 26 Jun 2009, 23:43:19

Peak Oil Therapy

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'W')orried that peak oil is about to put a sudden end to cheap kiwis and civilization as we know it? Kathy McMahon is a clinical psychiatrist who wants to help. She runs a website for people with peak-oil panic, which pledges to help you separate “what’s ‘mental preparation’ from what’s just ‘acting mental.’”


nytimes
Human history becomes more and more a race between education and catastrophe. H. G. Wells.
Fatih Birol's motto: leave oil before it leaves us.
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Re: Peak Oil Therapy

Unread postby Sixstrings » Sat 27 Jun 2009, 02:59:12

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Graeme', '[')b]Peak Oil Therapy

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'W')orried that peak oil is about to put a sudden end to cheap kiwis and civilization as we know it? Kathy McMahon is a clinical psychiatrist who wants to help. She runs a website for people with peak-oil panic, which pledges to help you separate “what’s ‘mental preparation’ from what’s just ‘acting mental.’”


nytimes


Ok first of all, she is a "licensed clinical psychologist," not a psychiatrist. Big difference there.

And if anyone's interested, the website is http://www.peakoilblues.com

EDIT: pretty good content there, she sounds right on the money
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Re: Peak Oil Therapy

Unread postby mos6507 » Sat 27 Jun 2009, 11:01:42

Does the NYT just let anyone start a blog? Lots of doom showing up there.

I wonder how many hits these pages get...
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Re: Peak Oil Therapy

Unread postby Graeme » Sun 28 Jun 2009, 00:46:25

Check out definition of Panglossian Disorder, Doomer and the jokes.
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Re: Peak Oil Therapy

Unread postby hardtootell-2 » Sun 28 Jun 2009, 01:23:15

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Graeme', 'C')heck out definition of Panglossian Disorder, Doomer and the jokes.


Wow! Her descriptions of the Panglossian disorder subtypes blew my mind!
I could see all sorts of people from my past :(

She has these brave words:

Being “sane” is not enough. Your actions are what matters now. Imagine yourself like Herr Shindler in Shindler’s List, looking at your watch and saying “I could have sold this. I could have saved more.” (Thank you, DRS, for that powerful metaphor.) You are living in an insane time, and you can’t use the thinking of those around you to guide you in what to do. You have to start thinking and acting for yourself. You have to start looking around you for like-minded souls, and to be able to accurately identify those who are wrong-thinking, not to pathologize them, but to recognize them as living in a dream-world created for them by psychopathological corporate forces.
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Re: Peak Oil Therapy

Unread postby Sixstrings » Sun 28 Jun 2009, 02:19:18

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('hardtootell-2', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Graeme', 'C')heck out definition of Panglossian Disorder, Doomer and the jokes.


Wow! Her descriptions of the Panglossian disorder subtypes blew my mind!
I could see all sorts of people from my past :(

She has these brave words:

Being “sane” is not enough. Your actions are what matters now. Imagine yourself like Herr Shindler in Shindler’s List, looking at your watch and saying “I could have sold this. I could have saved more.” (Thank you, DRS, for that powerful metaphor.) You are living in an insane time, and you can’t use the thinking of those around you to guide you in what to do. You have to start thinking and acting for yourself. You have to start looking around you for like-minded souls, and to be able to accurately identify those who are wrong-thinking, not to pathologize them, but to recognize them as living in a dream-world created for them by psychopathological corporate forces.


But on the other hand.. if a person gets obsessed over *very real* and likely future medical conditions (cancer, heart disease) then a psychologist labels them a neurotic hypochondriac.

So here we have a psychologist claiming those who don't focus on Doom are neurotic. See, this grand game of clinical psychology -- there's a disorder for everything, and anyone can be pegged whereever you are on the spectrum.

So really, fundamentally, what is the difference between peak oil obsession and sickness obsession? If anything, the latter is more definite. Statistically, most folks on this forum WILL either get cancer or heart disease one day. And yet a therapist would tell you it's unhealthy to get depressed over that in the present, while the feared event is still in the future.

Good stuff, though. She has some real zingers:
$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'W')e get married hoping to find someone who will “really know us,” and we divorce when they actually start to, and have the nerve to tell us what they see.


But I take issue with this line of thinking:
$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'T')hey shake, they grieve, they feel the shock. Gradually, then, they wake up to realize that they are still standing on the same wounded planet.


Folks, I hate to burst your Disney eco-fantasy bubble, but the earth is NOT wounded. I forget the word, what is it, when you apply human characteristics to animals? This is what the tree huggers do with the planet. Earth is inanimate, it does not feel, it does not cry, it cannot be wounded. Earth would be just as happy if she looked like Venus -- honestly, she doesn't care. Earth has seen extinction events come and go, and one day will be swallowed up whole by our expanding sun.

The cause for concern is not a fictional Earth godess being wounded, it's that we're wrecking our our own habitat. It's a small point I'm making, but just a pet peeve of mine. We need to keep it in perspective that the current ecology of Earth only matters because of its usefulness to us -- humanity needs to remain our primary concern. If you go off the deep end with Earth worship, then it's easy to forget that it's PEOPLE we need to be caring about. Our ecology is part of the equation, but not an end in itself.

Okay, one last quote. I'm going overboard here I know, but this is fascinating stuff:

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', '')But please,” we beg our therapists, “Don’t wake us up. Don’t tax us in confronting the real world around us. We are too overwrought to look outside ourselves. We are too worn out. And besides, none of what you say is on the television, so how can it be true? Help us, instead, to manage this anxiety we feel, that has no name. It floats all around us, depresses us, and depresses our children.

She's right on there. So many people, most of which not even peak oil aware, have this existential anxiety about something just not being right with the world. I can't precisely put my finger on it.. it can't just be that modern consumer culture is a sham, since historically we humans have *always* suffered inequity, suffering, and unfairness. Though I'm an agnostic, I think I have to put it down to the loss of real spiritual faith.

There must have been an evolutionary reason for our species to develop god concepts so early in our development. In the last few centuries, we've thrown God out and replaced him with science. And now we have this existential hole that can't be filled.. sadly, though, the damage is done. How can you believe in Santa Claus after you've discovered the truth?

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'W')e, as therapists, do not need to be heavy-handed in our approach to our Panglossian clients, but neither must we remain silent about what we know and predict is coming.
Goodness, half her stuff I agree with 100%, and half I disagree with 100%. This part is utter nonsense, and IMHO malpractice! A therapist has absolutely NO BUSINESS bringing global doom stuff up of their own accord, in a session with a client.
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Re: Peak Oil Therapy

Unread postby Graeme » Sun 28 Jun 2009, 21:22:11

I think it's meant to be tongue-in-cheek.
Human history becomes more and more a race between education and catastrophe. H. G. Wells.
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Re: Peak Oil Therapy

Unread postby jupiters_release » Tue 30 Jun 2009, 05:43:51

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Sixstrings', '
')
She's right on there. So many people, most of which not even peak oil aware, have this existential anxiety about something just not being right with the world. I can't precisely put my finger on it.. it can't just be that modern consumer culture is a sham, since historically we humans have *always* suffered inequity, suffering, and unfairness. Though I'm an agnostic, I think I have to put it down to the loss of real spiritual faith.



Faith by definition is the lack of religion. Ideation and desire for God wouldn't exist unless one felt completely abandoned by God. Biological pain and suffering is a healthy part of life, what you refer to is the distress caused by the pervasive global mono-culture that separates people from the source of creation. When one is entirely caused, and a greater percentage of people today are than any point in history to no fault of their own, one is literally disconnected from Reality.

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', '
')
There must have been an evolutionary reason for our species to develop god concepts so early in our development. In the last few centuries, we've thrown God out and replaced him with science. And now we have this existential hole that can't be filled.. sadly, though, the damage is done. How can you believe in Santa Claus after you've discovered the truth?



Ironically, the most advanced science today is in accord with the religious nature of Reality. What kids should start learning by middle school, many, perhaps most never even learn in high school or college.

'Your' assertion that people are more important than the earth's ecology is pure contradictory hubris, a failure of intelligence.
Do not seek the truth, only cease to cherish opinions.
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Re: Peak Oil Therapy

Unread postby Sixstrings » Tue 30 Jun 2009, 06:36:35

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('jupiters_release', '[')b]what you refer to is the distress caused by the pervasive global mono-culture that separates people from the source of creation. When one is entirely caused, and a greater percentage of people today are than any point in history to no fault of their own, one is literally disconnected from Reality.


Interesting, please elborate. What is the "global mono-culture"? Western-style consumerism? And, what in your view is the "source of creation" from which we are being separated?

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', ''')Your' assertion that people are more important than the earth's ecology is pure contradictory hubris, a failure of intelligence.


The Earth is a rock in space. It didn't weep for the dinosaurs, nor will it weep after we are gone. It won't cry for us any more than Mars cries over its long-gone oceans.

So that was my point there, that the Earth doesn't care if we drive ourselves and most of the planet to extinction.. other species will just arise to take our place, just as us mammals rose to dominance in the wake of the dinosaurs.

What irks me is the green cult of earth-worship -- why do we need to place the planet above ourselves like that? Let's just keep it in perspective, that it's PEOPLE that we care about here.

The planet only has value because we, sentient beings, think it does. It has no value independant of organism capable of making such a value judgement.
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Re: Peak Oil Therapy

Unread postby jupiters_release » Tue 30 Jun 2009, 12:58:16

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Sixstrings', '
')What irks me is the green cult of earth-worship -- why do we need to place the planet above ourselves like that? Let's just keep it in perspective, that it's PEOPLE that we care about here.


There is no separation. We're living in this mess because we thought otherwise. It's sad that we don't see the infinite intelligence and beauty of nature as well as ourselves. You say you care about PEOPLE, but what you really mean is you don't identify with the rest of the world. Why would you? You were raised in a culture that likewise has little or no understanding, on a fundamental level, of what Reality is.
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Re: Peak Oil Therapy

Unread postby Caffeine » Tue 30 Jun 2009, 13:11:31

Even if they don't value it for itself, one would think that a sentient species would value its own ecosphere out of material self-interest.
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Re: Peak Oil Therapy

Unread postby rangerone314 » Tue 30 Jun 2009, 13:16:50

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Graeme', '[')b]Peak Oil Therapy

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'W')orried that peak oil is about to put a sudden end to cheap kiwis and civilization as we know it? Kathy McMahon is a clinical psychiatrist who wants to help. She runs a website for people with peak-oil panic, which pledges to help you separate “what’s ‘mental preparation’ from what’s just ‘acting mental.’”


nytimes


Its funny that that link mentioned fearing the "end of cheap kiwis" since I'm actually growing cold-tolerant kiwis, so I guess I am prepared and not acting mental. I'm already mental-acting, I don't need peak oil for that! :twisted:
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Re: Peak Oil Therapy

Unread postby Caffeine » Tue 30 Jun 2009, 13:18:11

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('rangerone314', '
')Its funny that that link mentioned fearing the "end of cheap kiwis" since I'm actually growing cold-tolerant kiwis, so I guess I am prepared and not acting mental. I'm already mental-acting, I don't need peak oil for that! :twisted:


I didn't know that there was such a thing as a cold-tolerant kiwi. Neat. :mrgreen:
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Re: Peak Oil Therapy

Unread postby rangerone314 » Tue 30 Jun 2009, 13:23:32

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Caffeine', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('rangerone314', '
')Its funny that that link mentioned fearing the "end of cheap kiwis" since I'm actually growing cold-tolerant kiwis, so I guess I am prepared and not acting mental. I'm already mental-acting, I don't need peak oil for that! :twisted:


I didn't know that there was such a thing as a cold-tolerant kiwi. Neat. :mrgreen:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hardy_Kiwi

They are native to Siberia... the fruit are smaller, more like grape sized.
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