[Ibon]

That was a great post Tanada. I was thinking about rural one room country schools in the age of Mark Twain where students learned the classics in literature and geography, mathematics and sometimes even Latin. Compare that today with all the digital gadgets at your disposal, the ability to google instantly information, and yet we have a population deeply superficial when you compare the average citizen of today with those in Mark Twains generation.

I pretty much agree with your summary. I want to come back to Pstarr's comment about how people are increasingly devoting their time and self sacrifice trying to keep their heads above water and how the prospect for many is becoming increasingly hopeless.

As much as everything you posted is correct that we are currently stubbornly devoting our energies and self sacrificing to keep BAU strong, there is this undeniable rise of hopelessness as what Pstarr alluded to. It is like an erosion from within the collective denial. This will collapse one day and out of the failure something has to replace this devotion to the status quo. For increasing millions it has already failed to sustain well being.

So this opens up an opportunity for culture to begin to re orient their values.

If we take the Roman example working through this is clearly multi generational.

[Ibon]

On a personal note anybody who deeply understands these dynamics and the conundrum our modern society finds itself in has the ability to put their own personal hardships and frame them in the context of these macro dynamics. This is really really helpful for your personal well being and survival moving forward.

That is if you galvanize this macro truth and allow this to re orient your personal values. You will be ahead of the curve.

The doomer sentiment unfortunately often sees the macro phenomenon as an opportunity to surrender, whine and then use it as an excuse of their own shortcomings. That is toxic and actually kind of related to the folly of the political right that wants Donald Trump for example to bring back the great times again, something impossible. A doomed nostalgia.

A snake knows when to shed its skin. Do you?

[Cog]

Doomers pray for a crash, because they think that somehow they will achieve the egalitarian society that neither the ballot box has yet given them, nor do the vast majority want.

A crash gives you something alright but it won't be sharing and kumbaya.

[Tanada]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Ibon', 'I') want to come back to Pstarr's comment about how people are increasingly devoting their time and self sacrifice trying to keep their heads above water and how the prospect for many is becoming increasingly hopeless.

As much as everything you posted is correct that we are currently stubbornly devoting our energies and self sacrificing to keep BAU strong, there is this undeniable rise of hopelessness as what Pstarr alluded to. It is like an erosion from within the collective denial. This will collapse one day and out of the failure something has to replace this devotion to the status quo. For increasing millions it has already failed to sustain well being.

So this opens up an opportunity for culture to begin to re orient their values.

If we take the Roman example working through this is clearly multi generational.

[Lore]

Non sequitur, there is nothing egalitarian about doom. Just the opposite, it's a meme trotted out by those who generally believe in human exceptionalism.

[Cog]

Humans are exceptional.

[Lore]

Spoken from a human's point of view.

[Newfie]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Cog', 'H')umans are exceptional.

[Newfie]

Ibon,

Your use of the word "doomer" annoys me a bit. You use it as a pejorative in some sense that is not entirely clear.

Rest assured that you fit comfortably into my definition of "doomer" as someone who thinks it likely there will be a massive decrease in human population.

I don't get what you think set you apart?

Perhaps if you expanded more on your thoughts, your gripe, rather than just used a shortcut it would be more clear. Applying labels can lead to poor outcomes.

Thanks.

[ralfy]

If "going forward" for a secular global capitalist system means technofixes to enable business as usual, then in the long term we will probably be forced to go backward due to limits to growth.

[Ibon]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Newfie', '
')
Perhaps if you expanded more on your thoughts, your gripe, rather than just used a shortcut it would be more clear. Applying labels can lead to poor outcomes.

Thanks.

[Timo]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Ibon', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Newfie', '
')
Perhaps if you expanded more on your thoughts, your gripe, rather than just used a shortcut it would be more clear. Applying labels can lead to poor outcomes.

Thanks.

[Plantagenet]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Newfie', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Cog', 'H')umans are exceptional.

[ennui2]

Most of us here are on the doomer spectrum.

Having a particular attitude about doom is not what makes you a doomer. It's simply a negative view of the future due to some combination of limits to growth. You can bemoan doom or welcome it or express "ennui" about it, but it's simply that sense of foreboding that makes you a doomer.

When I use it as a pejorative it's when I define it as chronic bad short-term fast-crash predictions. Doomers tend to think their powers of prediction are better than the average bear, and they have a hard time acknowledging that they can suffer from cognitive biases just like cornies do. They might be on the right side of the argument when you extend the timeline wide enough, but wrong in the day-to-day sport of calling out doomy events on the world stage (wars, economic collapses, fukushima radiation poisoning, supervolcanoes, virus outbreaks, etc...).

If you spend too much time in a doomer mindset it leads to a serious killjoy syndrome. For instance, if I were to mention the fact that SpaceX just spiked the landing on the floating barge, I'm sure someone would chime in to say it is meaningless and our looming mass-extinction continues apace. Well, okay, maybe. But going through life that joyless, where the only semblance of joy comes in kicking sand-castles, is pretty pathetic.

[Cog]

It was a pretty awesome landing in what I estimate was 8 foot seas. A moving target and they nailed it with a first stage booster that was at the edge of space. Not too shabby for us unexceptional humans.

[Tanada]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Cog', 'I')t was a pretty awesome landing in what I estimate was 8 foot seas. A moving target and they nailed it with a first stage booster that was at the edge of space. Not too shabby for us unexceptional humans.

[Newfie]

Ibon
$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'A') doomer is someone who washes their hands of humanity. It usually reflects a weakness of character. It often also represents someone who has been emotionally wounded by the ugliness of the status quo. Where as I do have compassion for this I have no patience. I see this type of doomer as suffering from the same indulgence as one who wants to preserve the status quo.

[onlooker]

Some fascinating discourse. As per Ibon's original post, I would have to say that this question has entertained my mind for quite some time. The question of the inherent goodness or not goodness of people. The duality of selfishness and unselfishness. I do believe that our history as a guide shows that mankind has been very altruistic within "their" group but not so much outside of it. I would say that we have a great chance of re-establishing a society after the consequences that is predicated on things such as devotion, self-sacrifice etc. We can only hope that Nature will allow future humans this opportunity considering the rapidly deteriorating state of the planet. As for the final comment on what is or what is not a doomer and the doomer attitude, I will say that to me the bifurcating of it can be pinpointed as those who reach a doomer outlook from a defeatist/hopeless mentality and those who reach it from studying the long list of injuries and affronts to Nature we are committing as well as our own limitations as humans to correct our behavior. Having said that, the latter group of doomers may or may not have lost hope. Cid seems to have lost hope. Others of us have not. I have not lost hope because I do not believe in losing hope, I think hope is outside the purview of cognitive reasoning and is simply an expression of the willingness to accept that nothing is certain in this existence.

[Lore]

If we were exceptional we'd collectively realize the wrong path we're taking. There would be an explosion of biodiversity, not the opposite.

[ralfy]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Ibon', '
')I am not a doomer. I do not see the contraction coming as doomsday, I see it as part of a continuum and I therefore engage in the process envisioning that our species will work through this. In this way I attempt to be a mentor for those who will follow. In other words I do not consider extinction as an option knowing well that of course it is a possibility. Let me be clear because this might be tricky for some to understand. Even if extinction was 99% certain we owe it to those who follow to frame the upcoming events in a way that offers hope. Our generation and those before us have been directly responsible for the consequences that are coming, on top of this culpability to then take the position that we will go extinct and that there is no hope for our species only reinforces the irresponsibility that got us into this mess in the first place. A doomer is someone who washes their hands of humanity. It usually reflects a weakness of character. It often also represents someone who has been emotionally wounded by the ugliness of the status quo. Where as I do have compassion for this I have no patience. I see this type of doomer as suffering from the same indulgence as one who wants to preserve the status quo. Then there are the doomers who are bitter that things are changing for the worse and their bitterness makes them negative and hopeless. Again I have no patience for this.

You asked me and I am trying to be honest and direct. I do not attack directly doomers with whom I have this opinion. Maybe Cid sometimes because his absolute statement being sure we will go extinct invites me to challenge him on this. I do see him as a doomer who offers no mentorship. I don't really care because I know anyone of a younger generation would tune him out in a heartbeat because his position has nothing to offer.....

I hope I am making myself clear.