[Wednesday]

Wow. Look what Yahoo Travel has to say about Houston. Pretty negative.

http://travel.yahoo.com/p-travelguide-8 ... I5nk3AFmoL

"HOUSTON is an ungainly beast of a city, confused by overdevelopment during the oil boom and then traumatized by the sudden slump of the early 1980s. It's a suffocating place, choking with traffic and high on humidity, yet for all this, its sheer energy, its relentless Texan pride, and above all its refusal to take itself totally seriously, give it a perverse appeal, while its well-endowed museums and rich nightlife mean there is always something to do. That Howard Hughes came from Houston makes absolute sense; eccentric, domineering and sordid, the millionaire typified all that makes the city intriguing.

There is no good reason why Houston exists at all; it was founded on a muddy mire in 1837 by two brothers from New York who hoped it would become the capital of the new Republic of Texas. For all their wild claims about its potential as a port, and its (imaginary) urban attractions, the more promising site of Austin was made capital in 1839. However, by then Houston had somehow established itself as a commercial center. Oil – discovered in 1901, and, like the city itself, unpredictable and heading for obsolescence – became the foundation, along with cotton and real estate, of vast private fortunes. Among the most famous of the philanthropists responsible for the development of downtown Houston was the cruelly named Ima Hogg. Her city improvement projects were largely cosmetic, however, and the contradictions of urban life are still writ large here, where abject poverty (not least among the blacks who migrated here from the rural South in the 1960s) coexists with ostentatious wealth."

[J-Rod]

http://theviewfromthepeak.blogspot.com/

[rwwff]

energy, relentless, pride, eccentric, domineering, sordid...


Yep. Sounds like home.

[KrellEnergySource]

Which products, used by few today, will be essential in five years?

I received an ad from Yahoo today for this question-and-answer forum. They post one specific question each day, but all users are able to post questions on any allowed topic. Today's question definitely can be answerable in terms of peak oil.

I was going to post an answer in the line of "bicycles, fans, window screens, gardening tools, etc...." but quite a few people already have. The replies to today's question definitely show that many people see energy affordability and availability affecting the way we will live five years from now. People are beginning to understand, or at least sense, that the age of cheap energy is coming to an end. Yes, some people are posting things like 3-D TV's....but not as many as I thought would be.

Brian

[emersonbiggins]

Maybe the practical stuff was answered earlier, because most of the latest replies are in the mold of "affordable hybrids" and "electric cars," proving once again that technofixes are expected to continue our business-as-usual.

I have my doubts.

[smiley]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('apimaniac', 'G')eiger counters

[KrellEnergySource]

You're right. There are a lot of answers in the line of "solar powered cars". But even a pipe dream technofix reply can be seen as an awareness that we have a problem. And that level of awareness is pretty high. And, as here, the gloom and doom attitude is pretty well represented. For example, gasmasks and sunscreen.

My own answer I settled on was "Window screens and clotheslines. Any simple, affordable way to reduce the amount of energy we use."

Brian

[emersonbiggins]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('KrellEnergySource', 'Y')ou're right. There are a lot of answers in the line of "solar powered cars". But even a pipe dream technofix reply can be seen as an awareness that we have a problem. And that level of awareness is pretty high.

[Novus]

I said public transportation and then posted a link to lifeaftertheoilcrash.net

That should raise a few eyebrows.

[mekrob]

I would say intelligence, but that probably won't be true and it's not a product. *Sigh*

[catbox]

I said Rain barrels, garden hoe, and bike trailor.
I'll be using these no matter what happens in 5 years.

[Golgo13]

Flint.

[Todric]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Novus', 'I') said public transportation and then posted a link to lifeaftertheoilcrash.net

That should raise a few eyebrows.

[perdition79]

cutlery set, firewood, chili powder, shovel, quicklime.

If they don't get that it's a joke, my answer should make some people throw up.

[blukatzen]

Yo! Heathens on PeakOil,

Heathen Preparedness is a new list created by a few of us that have knocked around for a bit on the various Heathen forum community on yahoo, and were PeakOil and Resource depletion-aware.

If you are Heathen, and want a link between PeakOil and the Heathen community, stop on by. It is not meant to replace the valuable education one can get here, or discussions, but to get a *heathen-specific* perspective, and to see the Heathen communities forming..

Here is the link for the group.

I am a moderator there..hope to see you.

Blukatzen/Patricia

[Newsseeker]

Heathens are very eco-friendly and aware. Stephen McNallen's Asatru Folk Assembly participated in linking up computers to study global warming and I have met many heathens that are concerned about PO. Thanks for posting this.

[Loki]

Blukatzen, can you say something about the heathen belief system? I've wondered what role the gods play. Do practicing heathens believe that gods are actual individual entities with power over nature and people, entities that can be persuaded to act in our favor? Or are there more esoteric understandings of the gods? Also, how about codified ethical systems? What are the guiding ethical principles of heathen religions?

Sorry for the questions, but I'm interested in pagan revival religions, especially Germanic traditions. I don't much about the subject other than what I learned from dating a Wiccan and taking a course in Northern European mythology (Loki was my favorite, of course). Any links to good sources will be appreciated, too.

[blukatzen]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Loki', 'B')lukatzen, can you say something about the heathen belief system?$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', '
')
What can I say but it is basically the folk-faith of a people. It is akin to what is indigenous about a people, so it belongs to them. It is no different than speaking about Shinto for the Japanese, Amerindian Spirituality in all it's differing permutations for each of it's Nations, Aboriginal religion in Australia, or the Native faith of any peoples. Look up the World Congress of Ethnic Religion. Here's a link. This group is for basically most of the Native faiths of Europe. Hellenismos is one for Greece, there are several for Italy, (there are differences between the North and South, different peoples, the North is more Germanic). The Germanic and Norse nations have different ways to call it, in some countries it's called "Asatru", in others "Den Forn Sed". The Slavic countries have one basically called "Rodna Vira" which is "Our Way", the Baltic peoples have one called Romuva, from where their last altar was before forced conversions. The Latvians one is called "Dievturi".
There is Celtic Reconstructionism (which we call the nature of this "reawakening") or "Traditional faith" as they sometimes call it.
So, as you can see, this is bigger than Asatru alone, which is more commonly known in this country.


$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'I')'ve wondered what role the gods play. Do practicing heathens believe that gods are actual individual entities with power over nature and people, entities that can be persuaded to act in our favor? Or are there more esoteric understandings of the gods?

[Loki]

Blukatzen, thanks for the lengthy response and the links. I've read your post and will read it again. I believe you may be the one who also turned me onto the Havamal. I've dipped into it a few times, but haven't sat down and read the whole thing and really given it sustained consideration. I will do that. If there's a translation you can recommend, that would be appreciated. I've already downloaded a few.

Re. Loki, my mythology course approached the Norse and Celtic texts from a literary perspective, not as practioners of a faith. You can't deny that Loki is one of the most interesting characters in the western European pantheon. I've always been partial to tricksters, perhaps because some of the first myths I studied were Northwest Coast Indian stories about Raven and Coyote. Raven and Coyote are not bad guys at all, though they may sometimes do 'bad' things. Despite their glaring flaws, they taught the People how to live, as you say, in an 'upright way.' Speaking of which, I seem to recall that the word 'right' has an interesting etymology that sheds some light on pre-Christian Germanic ethics, though the specifics escape me at the moment. I'm thinking it may be related to the concept of 'duty.' Does 'duty' play much of a role in heathen traditions?

Re. Wicca, I know that it's a New Age amalgam. My ex-g was primarily Celtic-oriented. I didn't want to belittle her beliefs so I didn't bring it up much, but between you and me (and whoever has access to the Internet), I mostly thought it was silly. I read her Starhawk books and they struck me as garbage. And the magic thing doesn't fit into my worldview.

Re. the gods. This is definitely my sticking point, hence my questions. I'm a scientific rationalist at heart. I am certainly willing to entertain other explanations of the world, but I've found that science explains the world far better than any religion I've studied. And that's not for lack of studying various sundry religions and philosophies. I just find it exceptionally difficult to accept the hypothesis that there are gods of any kind, though your explanation of the role of the gods (as well as ancestors) in heathenism is interesting. Haven't come across that particular view of the role of the gods.

The Buddhist explanation of the gods is the only one that has ever made much sense to me, and Buddhists as a rule don't bother much with the gods. That's perhaps why I took Loki so lightly. He's not an actual entity to me, just a character in some historically significant stories. He may very well be representative of certain psychological urges in mankind (Jung?), but I just can't accept him or any other god(s) as an actual entity existing 'out there.'

I think my stubborn adherence to western science pretty much precludes me from accepting the fundamental tenets of any religion, but I'm certainly open to learning what I can from various traditions, especially in the realm of ethics. Ethics is where the rubber meets the road, and it's also the area in which there seems to be the most common ground among the various religious and philosophical traditions.

[blukatzen]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Loki', 'B')lukatzen, thanks for the lengthy response and the links. I've read your post and will read it again.$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', '
')
Thank you. Please do read it again. Because most people living in North America do not live in a traditional lifestyle, the way general society is set up almost precludes it. That is one of the comments I see most often on this board, almost a wistfulness to live in a place that has some "meaning". Something to give some meat to the soul.