[Doly]

My two pennies here: I think the strategy of getting ready for PO at individual level is fundamentally good. There is only one thing missing to make it a winning strategy: the approval by authority.

Our political authorities aren't really going for that strategy (especially in the USA, one could imagine Europe favoring it if the pressure mounts). There isn't a whole lot one can do about that directly. (Don't tell me that it's a democracy and people vote. People vote once every 4 years. That may be too far in the future.) There are a number of indirect approaches, all worth trying, but as a general rule they aren't terribly effective. (Not many anti-war demonstrations have achieved their goal).

But it's good to remember that the president, prime minister, or whoever has the highest political position in your country, is definitely not the only authority. There are many kinds of people that others respect: religious leaders, important businessmen, celebrities, etc. I suggest that we try to approach figures with authority of any kind, and we try to convince them that preparation for PO is important.

[gg3]

Back to page 1 here: Social Darwinism:

Is neither social science nor Darwinian, but a psuedoscientific bastadization of both in the name of the abdication of all moral standards by individuals who believe they'll beat the statistical odds in a manner similar to winning the lottery.

Psuedoscience because its central claim is a post-hoc / ergo propter-hoc logical fallacy that whatever "happens" was "meant to be." It is inherently untestable (technically, unfalsifyable): incapable of making testable predictions, and, like any popular psuedoscientific BS, it takes whatever "happens" as "proof" that it is "correct."

---

Humans have an interesting characteristic known as projection. They often attribute to others, characteristics that are part and parcel of their own personalities.

So here we see the proud proclamations that humans are inherently selfish, greedy, lazy, violent, mean, bad, cruel, hell-bent on killing each other any time they want to grab something, incapable of cooperating honestly or competing fairly, but rather, exist in a perpetual Hobbesian nightmare of the war of each against each and all against all, held in check only by abject fear or the rationalized versions thereof.

I say, speak for yourselves, all ye who espouse such bullshit.

Better yet, find some love in your lives, and hopefully it will grow some synapses where they're needed most.

---

Grayzone, did you ever stop to think what it takes to get off a planet and into space? Minimally, it takes an absence of random violence for a lengthy period of time in order to enable the necessary science & technology to develop; and it takes freedom of scientific inquiry. These characteristics are incompatible with a species that is predatory upon itself.

The very characteristics you extol are those that will keep us confined on our dust-mote in a corner of a single galaxy. EdF called you on this BS too. Your social darwinism is incompatible with the evolution of our species.

---

Aaron, your blogfull of mean-spirited nastiness is a pretty poor defense mechanism for your abject terror. Here's me giving you a great big wakeup slap in the face (but a loving and kind slap in the face!) and saying deal with it or you're doomed.

Mean people do suck. You can do better than put up a blog that makes you sound like one of 'em. And you're too smart to believe in psuedoscience.

---

There is plenty to be scared of, and no point living in denial. Healthy fear is sometimes difficult to distinguish from unhealthy fear. But we do ourselves a major disservice by compounding the two together into a toxic soup whose consumption leads to projectile-vomiting of language espousing values & behavior more suited to Nazis and Stalinists, or at best, cave-men.

More later...

[Aaron]

Feel the love brother...



$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'H')umans have an interesting characteristic known as projection. They often attribute to others, characteristics that are part and parcel of their own personalities.

[gg3]

page 2 & 3...

Aaron, the reason we enjoy prosperity at the expense of the millions whose resources we steal, is that *we* ourselves are not *directly and personally* engaged in the stealing. The stealing, raping, looting, pillaging, slave-driving, and murder, is all cleverly camouflaged. The responsiblity is diffused enough that it seems to evaporate. This is not an accident.

We vote for candidates who claim that our "way of life" is non-negotiable, and then their captive media simply don't show us what's going on at the other end.

We shop for "low low prices" at stores that go to great pains to disguise the fact that their goods are coming from conditions not much different from slave labor.

We live in ignorant little monkey-cages, with a pressbutton wired both to our pleasure-centers on one hand and to a gun pointed at innocent passersby on the other hand. We press the button and it gives us pleasure, and we don't see the bloody carnage outside our cages.

And we can barely connect the dots, for example between the SUV and the woman stoned to death for "adultery" in the village square in Saudi. The picture of the shiny luxury vehicle does not mix with the picture of the Saudi woman's brains splattered on the pavement.

Why do you think the Bush Regime goes to such great lengths to block the release of photos of Iraqi torture victims, or the flag-draped coffins of America's warriors coming home to their final resting place? Why do you think the major broadcast networks systematically refuse to air advertisements that speak for a less consumptive lifestyle?

Most sane people, if they truly understood the connections and the consequences, would change their behavior. They don't because they're addicted to The Lifestyle, as surely as anyone with alcoholism or a needle in their arms.

---

Wildwell, the way you have to deal with those proponents of relentlessly selfish development, is to call out their BS in the most vigorous terms you can manage; give them no quarter; do not let them weasel out of it.

In any public forum you can find, tear their arguements to shreds. Try to avoid ad-hominems if possible, while using the strongest language you can find.

And then pour on the lawsuits and everything else needed to stop them.

There will probably come a time when it's necessary to fight the good fight on a more physical level.

By the way, a five-pound bag of sugar (or better yet the equivalent quantity of sugar syrup) tossed into the loading hopper of a truckload of concrete (the funnel-shaped hopper at the top rear of the mixer) will cause it to go out of spec sufficiently that it can't be used in a structure. Or if it is used, and the fact of the sugar comes to light, the structure will need expensive re-work. Keep this in mind next time someone tries to build a WalMart in your neighborhood.

Cooperation and a good gun collection are not mutually exclusive. A civilized society -whether macro or micro scale- always needs the means and willingness to defend itself against barbarian incursions.

---

Kunstler also predicted that Y2K would be armageddon. Instead what happened is all the geeks toiled away long into the wee hours to fix every damn stinking piece of the infrastructure. And then after the big day came & went, rather than getting a pat on the back for preventing a disaster, what we got was a dotcom crash that left a good many of us unemployed. Fortunately I avoided that fate, which I suppose means I'm a good survivor (ha!) (and good survivor that I am, I have not been seduced by social darwinist psuedoscientific nonsense). And then the retrospectives claimed that Y2K was bunk because the disaster did not come. Just as people pooh-pooh vaccinations because there's no polio or whatnot going around.

---

Dwelling on fear can lead to anxiety disorders. Fear and anxiety cloud the mind and impair judgement.

More later (tomorrow or the next day)...

[Aaron]

As if on cue...

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'R')ising fuel prices are stoking popular anger around the world, throwing politicians on the defensive and forcing governments to resort to price freezes, tax cuts and other measures to soothe voter resentment.

[gnm]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('gg3', '
')Kunstler also predicted that Y2K would be armageddon. Instead what happened is all the geeks toiled away long into the wee hours to fix every damn stinking piece of the infrastructure. And then after the big day came & went, rather than getting a pat on the back for preventing a disaster, what we got was a dotcom crash that left a good many of us unemployed. Fortunately I avoided that fate, which I suppose means I'm a good survivor (ha!) (and good survivor that I am, I have not been seduced by social darwinist psuedoscientific nonsense). And then the retrospectives claimed that Y2K was bunk because the disaster did not come. Just as people pooh-pooh vaccinations because there's no polio or whatnot going around.

[Macsporan]

The technology, the time and the resources exist to enable a soft landing from PO.

What we need is the political will to do it.

Individually and collectively it is our task to make sure we get it.

If we don't, we have we to blame but ourselves, and no claim to anybody's sympathy either now or in the future.

If we do, we get a chance at a liveable future for our grandchildren.

If we don't it might take civilisation a few centuries to recover.

It will be a very different civilisation of course, as different as the Middle Ages were from the Roman Empire; and much will be forgotten that might have been saved, and the chances of our decendents being part of it will be very remote.

It is entirely your choice if you want to preserve something from the civilisaton that gave you birth; so join the political party of your choice and start the Long March to power and the salvation of the Human Race.

Sitting at home drooling over your guns won't save you.

Agonising over the Internet won't save you.

Politic like your life depends on it.

Because it does.

[gnm]

Enlighten me Mac, what technology or resource is going to replace fossil fuel within 50 years? For sake of argument lets say you only have to produce 50% of what we are currently using. Oh and you have to account for growth - lets be generous and say only 8 Billion by 2020 instead of 9... And how will that be implemented?


-G

[Andrew_S]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('gnm', 'E')nlighten me Mac, what technology or resource is going to replace fossil fuel within 50 years? For sake of argument lets say you only have to produce 50% of what we are currently using. Oh and you have to account for growth - lets be generous and say only 8 Billion by 2020 instead of 9... And how will that be implemented?


-G

[gnm]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Andrew_S', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('gnm', 'E')nlighten me Mac, what technology or resource is going to replace fossil fuel within 50 years? For sake of argument lets say you only have to produce 50% of what we are currently using. Oh and you have to account for growth - lets be generous and say only 8 Billion by 2020 instead of 9... And how will that be implemented?


-G

[Ludi]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('gg3', 'M')ost sane people, if they truly understood the connections and the consequences, would change their behavior. They don't because they're addicted to The Lifestyle, as surely as anyone with alcoholism or a needle in their arms..

[Andrew_S]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('gnm', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Andrew_S', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('gnm', 'E')nlighten me Mac, what technology or resource is going to replace fossil fuel within 50 years? For sake of argument lets say you only have to produce 50% of what we are currently using. Oh and you have to account for growth - lets be generous and say only 8 Billion by 2020 instead of 9... And how will that be implemented?


-G

[Ayoob]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Ludi', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('gg3', 'M')ost sane people, if they truly understood the connections and the consequences, would change their behavior. They don't because they're addicted to The Lifestyle, as surely as anyone with alcoholism or a needle in their arms..

[oowolf]

When the present death-culture has consumed all it can it will then consume itself just as the western Roman Empire did. Only our downfall will be much more rapid and catastrophic. I'm a junior college dropout and I realized this by the age of 23. So I escaped the wage-slave, detritovore, pretentious, unsustainable "lifestyle" I was born into and have spent the last 30+ years tending my organic garden and sipping lager by a year-round trout stream in Montana. It was either that---or the insanity of an existentially inauthentic existence. I can live on $1000/year, and I feel that I live very well, thank you.
I am only responsible for my own beahvior--the rest of humanity may persue the coming Fool's Armageddon. I choose not to.
When the bombs fall or the zombie hordes arrive, or the asteroid, or supervolcano, or H5N1, or climate crash, etc, etc THEN I can die--as Black Elk said--knowing I have lived a "good life"--having lived "in the moment" always knowing that life is but a "temporary confusion"(A. Bierce).
Why do so many of you remain "dangerous children".
No fear.

[some_guy282]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('gnm', ' ')Seriously - tell me what technology or resource?

I do believe in politicing and informing! And in conservation. I'm doing my part. I still don't think it will end well. As usual it will probably result in economic depressions which do not get better and endless resource wars...

-G

[gg3]

Catching up to current...

Aaron, I hope you know that I don't have any personal negs toward you, in fact on many things we generally agree.

However I have a duty to kill off the social darwinist meme wherever it pops up, not just because it's evil, but because it's false. A seductive falsehood that lulls people into opium-dreams of personal superiority.

Like "master race" theories, social darwinism is psuedoscience that plays to peoples' insecurities, by tearing at the fabric of civilized behavior in favor of barbarianism justified ex-post-facto. It also fans the flames of fear at the expense of reason.

That is not good for our species' ability to survive the coming crises.

The only thing that makes social Darwinism seem "realistic" is that it matches certain emotional templates such as fear, insecurity, the desire for superiority, and so on. A person who feels crappy about life is more receptive to theories that suggest life is even crappier.

It is one thing to recognize fear and talk it out. It's another to fan the flames and reinforce it. Engineers and warriors alike, are at their best when detached and rational.

Global statements to the effect that "all humans are..." are generally false.

For any measurable characteristic of humans, reality is a normal-curve, with some individuals high, some low, and most in the middle.

[Aaron]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'A')aron, I hope you know that I don't have any personal negs toward you, in fact on many things we generally agree.

[Aaron]

Here's an example of what I mean...

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'J')apan, as a relatively small island, and with no oil industry to speak of, had to look elsewhere for its oil, and this was the reason for the proposed embargo. It was thought that this action would provoke Japan into an incident. Ex-President Herbert Hoover also saw the manipulations leading to war and he warned the United States in August, 1941: "The American people should insistently demand that Congress put a stop to step-by-step projection of the United States into undeclared war... ."

[backstop]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Aaron', '
')Without oil, Japan was forced into a decision.

Time to choose... cut bait or fish?

They chose to fish.

What will the world's nations choose today?

A power-down into poverty?

or

Will they choose to "fish"?

[Aaron]

Let's try this...

If anybody understands the need for a unified effort around the world to confront the challenges of hydrocarbon depletion, it's the folks in here.

So let's see what the educated think about your idea of evolution thru cooperation.

Poll