[Ibon]

Just back in town to e-mail access and looked over all the comments to my original post. Just to follow up on a few points made. By no means is Nepal living a utopic fossil free existance and I wasn't trying to say that. I was more focussed on the theme of the entitlement modern humans feel they have vs. people like the Nepalese who live more in harmony with the uncertainties and impermanence of their existance. With all the problems Nepal has the people here are more prepared spiritually to deal with them as a result of not feeling this entitlement.

Deforestation is a big problem at certain elevations and heavily populated areas, especially where many trekkers go like the Anapurna Conservation Area where the government tries to get locals to cookwith Kerosene with limited success. Nepal will never end up like Ethiopia since this country has another climate that is very fertile. Also the hardships of survival inthe mountains would never result in a population explosion quite like what you see in Haiti that aggravated their deforestation. Having said that Nepal's population is growing beyond their means of sustainability.

All dung is used to fertilize their fields so it is too valuable to burn. Since Donkeys and yaks are the main transport you see usually women with huge baskets walking the trails collecting Dung that is then piled onto the field before planting of rice in the monsoon season or wheat during the dry season. The higher elevations are not sustainable at current populations but Nepal has a quite large flat area called the Terai in the south which is very fertile and there is where you see the most successful permaculture going on.

Peak Oil will put a strain on this country but they do have the legacy still intact for a large part of their population to continue to live as they have for centuries in a fossil free world.

There is a political crisis and maosist insurgency here that has been going on for quite some time and may anyday explode. In spite of all of this and being far from a utopia people live day to day still with plenty of laughter in their hearts and a presence free of any sence that they feel entitled to something more than what they have.

Thanks for all your comments.

Ibon

[MrBill]

Just for my two cents I also have just gotten back from Nepal, so I would like to follow up on Iban's thread.

I found the mainly Buddhist areas of Khumba and Everest much nicer than the more densely populated Hindu areas such as around Kathmandu. In my own humble opinion the mountain peoples will respond to post peak oil conditions better as they are more self-sufficient and rely less on commerce such as seen on the streets of the major city. I cannot speak to the rural, agricultural areas that I have not yet visited?

As we speak the Maoists have been drawn into a 7-party power sharing agreement with the official government. This should ease tensions, but there is no guarantee that this will last? On a positive note. The USA carries very little weight in Nepal. Nepal is sandwhiched between China and India. Neither China nor India want destability in Nepal overflowing onto their own borders. Therefore, China does not officially or unofficially support the Maoists in Nepal and has warned the USA and India not to interfer in Nepali politics. And India, a democratic country, with communist parties of its own, does not want a Maoist government in Nepal either. Hopefully this means more dialogue and less guerilla activity. Of course, minority groups like Muslims linked to Kashmiri can always cause problems if they use Nepal as a base of operations, but they do not enjoy wide spread support at any level.

Far from idyllic, Nepal suffers from the politics of exclusion and the tyranny of the majority. There are fault lines in society along ethnic, religious, caste and gender lines. The under classes that work the hardest for the least may do so only so long as they remain under strong influence of social and religious norms that support the status quo. Those bonds can be severely strained by external events such as seperatist groups in Tibet or India spreading discontent or by internal events such as Maoists that are neither Hindu or Buddhist per se, but ironically most of their leaders have been drawn from the upper castes such as the Bahuns who have controlled most all political activity for hundreds of years. In other words even under the Maoists for many it is the same sheet different pile.

A fast growing India and China along with opening of year round transport routes through Nepal may raise expectations amoung the Nepali that may prove unsustainable in the long run. That is always a recipe for trouble. Especially given Nepal's challenging geography and lack of natural resources.

So the bottom line is that I agree with many of Iban's comments above. I think the people are well placed to deal with post peak oil on an infrastructure level and psychologically. However, in the meantime, development may be leading them in the wrong direction like in so many other developing countries.

[kam30en]

I have been to Nepal and I never saw these solar panels your talking about. In fact, the roads were full of giant polluting trucks. Nepal is ridiculously overpopulated, and I saw a dead dog on the side of the road almost every day I was there. I also saw a human corpse floating down a river in Kathmandu. Oh, and the homeless street kids were adorable. If you want to romanticize feudal life, go ahead, but god forbid you had to live that kind of lifestyle. Most of these people are a few days away from starvation.

[MrBill]

Some people travel with an open mind.... others do not.

Standards of living in Nepal are lower than in the developed world. No one disputes that. But under the lens of peak oil awareness it is both interesting and instrumental to see how some poorer countries manage to get by using less fossil fuels per capita. That is the take away.

No romance involved. I was quite happy to land in Cyprus again after my visit. However, given my choice of power down scenarios I would sooner have a Nepal like one than a Zimbabwe.

Of course, if you feel that America or wherever you are from can go on living the way they do in the face of global resource depletion then I wish you good luck. Sorry, I see you have a machine gun in your photo. I guess you do not need good luck? ; - )

[cube]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Ibon', '.')...Somehow after 2 or 3 generations living in this fossil fuel rich society we have come to believe that we are somehow entitled to live a life free of all these uncertainties.
...

[MrBill]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('cube', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Ibon', '.')...Somehow after 2 or 3 generations living in this fossil fuel rich society we have come to believe that we are somehow entitled to live a life free of all these uncertainties.
...

[cube]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('MrBill', '.')...
However, it is my contention that the current pay as you go system is not self-supporting with declining natural resources and petroleum depletion.
....

[MrBill]

Not really off topic as well, C^3, as my take away from my visit to Nepal and from Ibon's comments, as he spent much more time there than I did, so saw other areas I did not, was that it is a poor country. But there is societal order and very low levels of crime compared to other places I have been that were wealthier at least on paper. This runs contrary to many opinions expressed here that falling levels of wealth are directly correlated with rising crime and post peak oil chaos. It may happen, but it is not pre-ordained.

Also, at the end of the day, who has more security? The person who lives day to day earning a subsistance, but knowing this and therefore taking steps to deal with their reality, or the person who relies on a 401k to fund their retirement, that has very few other assets that are paid for and debt free, and not knowing if that 401k will be worth anything when they need it? In my opinion it is the illusion of security.

But also despite what many say or think I would sooner earn an average salary in a rich world country, and live within my means, than be forced to live on an average daily wage in the developing world. Anyone who finds it impossible to make ends meet on $40k a year, for example, should try making it on $1-2 a day with less state provided infrastructure. What is the official level of poverty in the USA? $19.000 for a family of four? Okay, that ignores purchasing power parity, but also other official statistics ignore how many dependents a worker in the developing world may be supporting. So direct comparisons are always dangerous.

Never the less, far from being idealic or utopian, I found the grinding poverty and class divides in the cities quite depressing, but less crime than I would have expected. Certainly less than in some African and Latin American countries with similar income levels. And even though poor there was a sense of order brought about by religious, ethnic, caste and gender roles that are deeply ingrained in their culture. Plus I did not find the rural people unhappy. Quite the opposite. They excepted their situation for what it was. Also a lesson to be learned from that.

Does it carry? Probably not as those conditions do not exist in a mainly secular society where a breakdown of law & order is not offset by some other communal norms to control individual and group behavior. We tend to forget that many customs, traditions and religious practices were at their heart about day to day routines that allowed groups to live together without killing one another! ; - )

[gg3]

Mr. Bill, logic error alert: "But there is societal order and very low levels of crime compared to other places I have been that were wealthier at least on paper. This runs contrary to many opinions expressed here that falling levels of wealth are directly correlated with rising crime and post peak oil chaos. It may happen, but it is not pre-ordained."

FallING vs. fallEN.

A low material standard of living that is stable, does not produce an increase in crime. What produces an increase in crime is a perceptible and involuntary decline in one's material standard of living.

Static input conditions do not generally produce changing outputs. Changing input conditions do.

Thus we can't extrapolate from Nepal to say that a low material standard of living elsewhere will not produce an increase in crime. It most certainly will if it represents a perceptible unwilling change from a higher material standard of living.

And of course a voluntary decline in material SOL does not produce crime either, the key point here being voluntary. Thus one of the tasks we face is to "sell" voluntary simplicity to the vast majority of the public, so it will be adopted freely and willingly.

[Ibon]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('gg3', 'S')tatic input conditions do not generally produce changing outputs. Changing input conditions do.

Thus we can't extrapolate from Nepal to say that a low material standard of living elsewhere will not produce an increase in crime. It most certainly will if it represents a perceptible unwilling change from a higher material standard of living.

And of course a voluntary decline in material SOL does not produce crime either, the key point here being voluntary. Thus one of the tasks we face is to "sell" voluntary simplicity to the vast majority of the public, so it will be adopted freely and willingly.

[MrBill]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('gg3', 'M')r. Bill, logic error alert: "But there is societal order and very low levels of crime compared to other places I have been that were wealthier at least on paper. This runs contrary to many opinions expressed here that falling levels of wealth are directly correlated with rising crime and post peak oil chaos. It may happen, but it is not pre-ordained."

FallING vs. fallEN.

A low material standard of living that is stable, does not produce an increase in crime. What produces an increase in crime is a perceptible and involuntary decline in one's material standard of living.

Static input conditions do not generally produce changing outputs. Changing input conditions do.

Thus we can't extrapolate from Nepal to say that a low material standard of living elsewhere will not produce an increase in crime. It most certainly will if it represents a perceptible unwilling change from a higher material standard of living.

And of course a voluntary decline in material SOL does not produce crime either, the key point here being voluntary. Thus one of the tasks we face is to "sell" voluntary simplicity to the vast majority of the public, so it will be adopted freely and willingly.

[gg3]

Ibon, I'm frankly not optimistic. Humans will have to overcome two ape-level reflexes: reproduction and consumption. The desire for sex and for "shiny new things" is so hardwired that it will take an evolutionary shift to overcome it.

Also humans (and other animals) exhibit a behavior that I refer to as "conservation of mass and energy" in an ironic nod to thermodynamics: the desire to obtain gratification of whatever type in exchange for as little expenditure of effort or its equivalents as possible. In social terms this is what we call laziness. It produces slavery, caste systems, and machines. Of these the first two are obviously immoral; machines are morally neutral.

To the extent that Nepal has a caste system, it has no greater claim on moral standing than Western industrial societies. The only difference morally is that the caste system imposes its human misery on presently-living generations rather than deferring it cumulatively to future generations who inherit the impact of overshoot.

As for convincing people to voluntarily simpllify, I have to agree it's going to take "trigger events" in peoples' lives before they even consider it. Problem is, waiting for trigger events is like waiting for an accident to occur before putting on the brakes: too little too late. And yet owe must.

[MrBill]

Very succinct gg3. A good insight. Thanks.

[Doly]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('gg3', 'H')umans will have to overcome two ape-level reflexes: reproduction and consumption. The desire for sex and for "shiny new things" is so hardwired that it will take an evolutionary shift to overcome it.

[Ibon]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('gg3', 'T')o the extent that Nepal has a caste system, it has no greater claim on moral standing than Western industrial societies. The only difference morally is that the caste system imposes its human misery on presently-living generations rather than deferring it cumulatively to future generations who inherit the impact of overshoot.

[Ibon]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('gg3', ' ') Humans will have to overcome two ape-level reflexes: reproduction and consumption. The desire for sex and for "shiny new things" is so hardwired that it will take an evolutionary shift to overcome it.

Also humans (and other animals) exhibit a behavior that I refer to as "conservation of mass and energy" in an ironic nod to thermodynamics: the desire to obtain gratification of whatever type in exchange for as little expenditure of effort or its equivalents as possible.

[Ibon]

We often underestimate the potential of cultural adaptation when it comes to sustainability based on observations made on our own culture during the past 100 years during the ascencion of available energy. We haven't even started the real descent yet and modern humans, with the assets of science, reason and knowledge will apply alot more processing to their dilema on the energy descent than did any of the ancient civilizations that collapsed (ie. Mayans / Eastern Islanders). My intuition tells me we will be surprised by the cultural adaptations that will take place. I also predict that ideals of freedom and democracy that were advanced in the 20th century when we had lower populations will not be sustainable in the 21st century.I can't remember who said it and the exact wording but I'm recalling that analogy of the difference in the freedom and democracy of using a single bathroom when it is 2 people sharing an apartment vs. when there is 15 people.

[MrBill]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'W')e haven't even started the real descent yet and modern humans, with the assets of science, reason and knowledge will apply alot more processing to their dilemma on the energy descent than did any of the ancient civilizations that collapsed (ie. Mayans / Eastern Islanders). My intuition tells me we will be surprised by the cultural adaptations that will take place.

[Ibon]

That made me smile. I have always resisted dogmatic doomerism.

Maybe some of that buddhist concept of impermanence rubbed off on me while in Nepal and makes me suspicious that our future is far more unknown than what we think.

[caliginousface]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Ibon', 'T')hat made me smile. I have always resisted dogmatic doomerism.

Maybe some of that buddhist concept of impermanence rubbed off on me while in Nepal and makes me suspicious that our future is far more unknown than what we think.