[jane]

Well I must admit after reading reactions to my post, "Is it that bad?" I am very pleased with peoples attitude thus far. It seems like I am off to a great start! But I think for future clarification I should probably state that although I don't believe in the Peak Oil problem entirely, I’d like to share where I came up with my ideas similar to Peak Oil. I have been known to "rub" people the wrong way if I do not explain myself. Nothing I say is meant to offend or cause any problems. Please address anything I say if it offends you and I will explain in further detail.
That being said, I initially became interested in this website after reading an article a few days ago about the measures some people go to prepare for this crisis. The article poked fun of them and said that some are stacking guns in preparation for when things begin to decline. Well I will address that by saying guns may be a necessary evil but I doubt it will seriously have an impact on whether people will get to your provisions (I use "your" as a general term). Trust me, to all you gun toting Peak Oilers, you are the minority and if its your food the majority wants they will eventually get it. If anything you shooting at them will make people more violent in their bid to steal your provisions.
My initial look on the Peak Oil problem (POP, as a pun for the oil bubble bursting, hehe ) was that I hold of vegans, which was "are you serious?!"
Reading more, I am beginning to notice I do share many of your views. But it wasn’t POP that made me want a simpler lifestyle, there were many factors. It began with my disgust for many contemporary American customs, as well as what I perceived to be a steady decline of its society and its values since wayyy before POP became a factor. My opinions are largely based on a few observations I made over the years.
First is my belief that humans emulate nature, as we are a species, of this earth, just like any. But we should live more of a natural life, just as many of you have come to believe. But to more of an extreme than most of you are going, I’ll come back to that later.
My view that humans are animals just like any other species on this earth flows very strong with all my observations. It is one of the reasons I consider us a species and apply my observations as a naturalist might. I do not believe in any religious denomination and believe religion is part of the entropic system like oil, and will lead to our inevitable demise. I am spiritual, however, and do respect others religious views.
My view of a natural lifestyle also coincided with my love for all tribal cultures and their respect for nature and understanding of the world around them, how they live in harmony on earth and with themselves. When I first thought about it I thought to myself, “that is the real way we should be living in life, like the tribal cultures.” Every aspect of their cultures describe a harmony with nature and because we are from nature I saw this as the best way to live. Even frequent tribal warfare played a role in population control, a form of natural selection.
I came to this conclusion in my early teens. And the more I thought about it, the more sense it made. Then I started thinking about where the departure came from, why we don't live like this? For that I looked at American history.
I am not racist and this may rock some boats, but tracing back to the founding “fathers” and then their origins I discovered when I did my history studies the human species decline really began to proliferate in Europe. Europeans, and do a little history study before you take offense, took the step away from nature that began in the Middle East and really spread this disharmony like a disease in their bid to own the world.
This isn’t about European or anyone of European ethnicity bashing, its about looking back to where it all began and how it ties into where we are now and how I decided that beyond POP we need to live simpler more natural lives as tribal people once did. History is a great teacher because it already happened.
I have traveled extensively and its funny how now Europeans scramble to save the environment, and look down on America for not being like them. They were the ones who started this whole mess! I guess what I learned is that a “western” way of thinking is not the way to go, it will eventually lead us back where we are now. To truly live a sound and harmonious life with nature and not be dependent on machines, I believe we should look to gain knowledge and live like the tribal cultures of the world, and forget the “western school of thought.”
Besides this the only critique I have is that when the “poop” hit the fan, long long ago, NOW is when people are beginning to wake up and it all seems for selfish reasons. But then again that’s what any species would do!

[Colorado-Valley]

Some people say it all started to go bad when humans adopted agriculture and turned away from hunter-gatherer tribes.

The ag surpluses allowed armies to be formed, and insane leaders began attacking tribal peoples, killing them with ever-increasing technologies and taking their resources.

Discovering fossil fuels just magnified the imperial drive to dominate tribal people and nature.

That's pretty much the history of the world, imo.

[btu2012]

jane>Indeed Europe started many of these things during the Enlightenment. But it's not very important now who is responsible.

You seem to have good intuition of some societal problems in the US, however the problem of PO/resource constraints is global.

You are kidding yourself if you think that the problem hasn't been considered and analyzed by strategic planners. It has been considered in quite some detail by many groups over the past 40 years. For some reason however most of that wasn't shared with the population and not even with all politicians.

One possible explanation of this is that the solutions some envision do not require that the population be aware, and in fact might even rely on the public being mislead.

[jdumars]

Jane, welcome to the board.

I'm going to address some of your points here, because I think you have started down the path, but can't bear to understand where it really leads.

First though, peak oil is not a theory you can buy into or not. It is an undeniable physical, geological truth. There is no debate to be had. Oil is a finite resource, and as such there is a maximum level, a minimum level and the point halfway between. You simply can't make a convincing argument that oil just "appears" -- even if you try and do it through the faulty science of the abiotic oil folks.

Now, on to the main points of your post.

The problems we're up against really originate in the roots of civilization and not "western civilization." You are almost understanding this because you refer to all native populations as though they are interchangeable. They are not. A native population can exist in perpetuity in a location because they have the following relationship:

They promote the survival, continuance and thriving of that which they need to live.

Simple as that. It's the most basic philosophy of survival. If you need something to live, you don't destroy it. Unless....

Civilization concentrates populations in a way that is unsustainable because this fundamental law of survival is violated. Civilized people do not understand the systems and resources on which they live because they rely on others to provide it. Resources must be extracted from places over which the individual has no domain. Native populations know their land as well as the other living things that occupy it. They have to. If they misjudge or exploit, they will die because their underlying support systems will fail.

So if you look at the fundamental problems of civilization, you see they are not a western invention. They have been in play since the first city sprung up. Here's a great definition of civilization from author Derrick Jensen:

"as a culture­ - that is, a complex of stories, institutions, and artifacts­ - that both leads to and emerges from the growth of cities (civilization, see civil: from civis, meaning citizen, from latin civitatis, meaning city-state), with cities being defined ­so as to distinguish them from camps, villages, and so on ­as people living more or less permanently in one place in densities high enough to require the routine importation of food and other necessities of life."

Once you digest this, you realize how serious the problem is. Our current planetary population is a meta-example of the problem. As a species we now inhabit the entire planet in a civilized way instead of localized areas. It used to be regional illness. Now it is planetary.

[Aaron]

Welcome to PO.com.

Throw out the baby with the bathwater eh?

Not a single redeeming feature of western civilization?

It's all gotta go?

Seems harsh... even a bit irrational IMO.

Perhaps some middle ground between these opposites is more desirable?

Or something entirely new...

[jdumars]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Aaron', 'W')elcome to PO.com.
Throw out the baby with the bathwater eh?
Not a single redeeming feature of western civilization?
It's all gotta go?
Seems harsh... even a bit irrational IMO.
Perhaps some middle ground between these opposites is more desirable?
Or something entirely new...

[Aaron]

Extinct species don't appreciate Beethoven, so it's useless crap without a single virtue?

hmmm...

[jdumars]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Aaron', 'E')xtinct species don't appreciate Beethoven, so it's useless crap without a single virtue?
hmmm...

[btu2012]

jdumars,

You certainly have some good points but it's a bit simplistic to hold to such a sweeping theory of the past 10,000 years. In my experience grand theories of history are largely based on wishful thinking (think about Marxism, Hegel etc).

[mos6507]

I think the bigger problem than "civilization" is the idea of infinite growth. Some people think that the two go hand in hand, that you can't have civilization without buying into the infinite growth paradigm. It's understandable, since that's how it's been in the past. That's not how it has to be forever, should humanity collectively learn a very hard lesson in limits to growth.

[jdumars]

Btu, if something is inherently unsustainable, there's no grand theory about it. Continuing to live unsustainably is a form of cultural suicide, is it not? Everything that is a product of civilization, good or bad becomes meaningless if the human beings that practiced it are dead. And in the case of civilization, it's actually more like a murder-suicide where we kill everything around us then kill ourselves.

This has nothing to do with philosophy, any more than peak oil has anything to do with supply being magically conjured by economics. This is an issue of carrying capacity, ecological balance, etc.

Civilization is unsustainable. Prove to me otherwise. Explain how we can continue consuming more resources than are renewed. Explain to me how we can continue paving over farm land, cutting down forests, acidifying the oceans, extirpating species, degrading top soil, polluting everything. What does any of this have to do with philosophy?

[btu2012]

jdumars,

you are assuming that "civilization", whatever that means, is inherently unsustainable. But really you have no way of knowing that for sure, it's little more than one possible interpretation of history.

[jdumars]

btu, I defined exactly what I mean by civilization above. In fact, I will re-quote it here:

"as a culture­ - that is, a complex of stories, institutions, and artifacts­ - that both leads to and emerges from the growth of cities (civilization, see civil: from civis, meaning citizen, from latin civitatis, meaning city-state), with cities being defined ­so as to distinguish them from camps, villages, and so on ­as people living more or less permanently in one place in densities high enough to require the routine importation of food and other necessities of life."

History has two very long, highly-indicative trails of evidence that support my assertions:

1. There are histories of peoples such as the Tolowa, Urok, Quillayute, etc. that lived in one regional area for over 12,500 years with an extremely minimal ecological footprint.

2. There are histories of civilizations that have collapsed because they were unsustainable.

So where exactly is your logic coming from? I am misinformed because it's never happened before? That's a problem on two fronts... yes, it has happened before, many times, and, my arguments are based on simple laws of resource consumption/ecological stability required for living organisms. Are you saying that nothing can be deducted unless it happens?

Someone please come up with a good argument for their point other than I am wrong and you are right. Read Collapse by Jared Diamond. Read Endgame by Derrick Jensen. Walk out your front door and look around.

If there were suddenly no electricity, no fossil fuels, no running water. How long would you and everyone around you be able to survive? What about the people in densely-populated cities?

Peak oil is simply another puzzle piece in the greater picture. Limits to growth. Carrying capacity. Ecological tipping points. The arguments for civilization are academic. The arguments against it are endemic.

[btu2012]

jdumars,

I just don't believe in grand sweeping theories of history. Our understanding of the past and of human society is too poor for us to rely on such theories.

What you believe is possible, but in my opinion it is just a belief. Sorry that I have no interest to argue that in depth.

Again I appreciate your point of view and I did read some of the "primitivist" critiques of civilization, but I am just skeptical of all grand theories of history in general. I have nothing particular against your arguments...

[Aaron]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('jdumars', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Aaron', 'E')xtinct species don't appreciate Beethoven, so it's useless crap without a single virtue?
hmmm...

[jdumars]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Aaron', 'S')o Rembrandt can't happen without raping nature & future generations?
You seem certain about that.
?

[firestarter]

jdumars,

I'm on board with ya.

[coinsky]

Hi All,
I'm new here but i would just like to say that i whole heartedly agree with jdumars, civilisation is unsustainable simply because it uses up finite natural resources. If i have 100 pebbles in a bucket and every day i take one out, eventually i AM going to run out. There can be no other outcome..
$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', ' ')So Rembrandt can't happen without raping nature & future generations?
You seem certain about that.

[firestarter]

Ringing in my ears and Beethoven:



Tonality and Totality

[firestarter]

Pollack and AE left Rembrandt and his ilk in the dust.