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Wow. A thoughtful and organized dirge.
Regrettably, "their beliefs in something that could not ever happen — that happy days would come again" is all too prevalent in the eloquence economics, financial and business crowd (and in society in general), the expectation of return to BAU.
The evolution towards greater sapience is something that may proceed at a brisk pace, but whether it will be swift enough to stay apace of the changing milieu. It was perhaps two million years ago that
Homo erectus showed up on the scene. Homo neanderthalis had been around for 400,000 years before going extinct 30,000 years ago. Homo sapiens has been around only 200,000 years: a spring chicken when compared to any and every species we see around us. Yet on a scale of 200,000 years evolutionary change may not stay apace of the alterations in our lot that may play out over a millennium or so.
The Situation Now
What It Looks Like From Here It might be a good time to pause and take stock of humanity's situation. Or, at least, what it seems to me the situation is from my perspective. I must confess the current fiasco going on in the Gulf of Mexico (the oil leak from a former deep water well) may be infl...
Ray Kroc was acknowledging the role of others in helping him. But a point of difference was that he provided food for stomach rather than food for thought.
A Heartfelt Thank You
To All Readers/Commentators/E-mailers I wanted to take a bit of time to express my gratitude to everyone who has been following these posts and have taken their time to write comments and e-mails. In the last few weeks the blog has gotten really good comments and I have received a number of pri...
As Ray Kroc (the founder of the McDonald's restaurant chain) said:
"None of Us is as Good as All of Us."
Thanks for being a "Ray Kroc".
A Heartfelt Thank You
To All Readers/Commentators/E-mailers I wanted to take a bit of time to express my gratitude to everyone who has been following these posts and have taken their time to write comments and e-mails. In the last few weeks the blog has gotten really good comments and I have received a number of pri...
Yes indeed, a feasible living situation of the future would include both appropriate primary economy (nature) and the secondary economy (labor), to borrow the ArchDruid's terms. The golden rule, "He who owns the gold makes the rules" (as I had once heard) has been applicable ever since we have had tertiary economies.
Depending on its robustness (if such a term can even be applied to a faith-based system of promises as is the tertiary economy), the tertiary economy may continue to sustain that golden rule.
Regrettably with that golden rule the rules that are made are designed to facilitate the further accumulation of gold.
Toward a Better Understanding of a Feasible Living Situation
For Future Humanity See these posts for background: What is a feasible living situation for future humans?, A feasible living situation continued., What should we fight to save?, More on aesthetics and humanity [A small side comment: I have been listening to Brandi Carlile's album (see the...
There was mention on the PBS series online on the origins of humans that our species may have passed through a bottleneck as narrow as 600 breeding pairs. If true, we almost missed extinction once.
What (if anything) will come out on the other side of the forthcoming bottleneck is a matter of speculation. If wetware is the basis of wisdom there is a chance that it could thus contribute to a transition to a better society. But first, ofcourse the bottleneck. It is interesting to speculate on what it will select for....
It is my presumption (hope?) that it will select for community/societal values.
Homo sapiens, I'm glad I knew ye
All Species Go Extinct or, S**t Happens It is a law of nature. Why would you think it any different for the only extant species of humans? We are headed for extinction, like it or not. What is particularly ironic about our case is that we are the prime instrumental force pushing us to extinct...
Regrettably all too many of the wise men of economy and finance do not grok the idea that the world of their domain is disintegrating because of something that has this far been outside their ken - the energy flows that are an essential basis of well-being and prosperity. And they continue to delude the rest of the sheeple - including the CEOs of major organizations - into expecting a return to BAU.
Energy and Value
This is an abbreviated version of something I have been working on for a while. Bits and pieces of the ideas have shown up here in Question Everything from time to time in the past. Longtime readers will, no doubt, recognize some of these from days gone by. I am certainly not the first person...
Thank you for the work you are doing for humanity. Voices of wisdom have cried out in the past. Those included Malthus, Hubbert, Meadows and even those with authority (Jimmy Carter, in the "Moral Equivalent of War" speech). They had been ignored. The time to pay the Piper is perilously close.
The opening that you have gained is to be commended.
Report from The Institute for the Future - Ten-Year Forecast Retreat
The Retreat [27 April, 2010] I've spent the last two days at the Institute for the Future's Ten-Year Forecast retreat in Sausalito, CA. The attendance list for the retreat reads like a who's who of corporations (and a number of vice presidents from those companies), but includes governmental of...
The "further levels beyond human cognition" refers to the possibility of dimensions beyond those which we cognize; if there are such dimensions, we exist in them even if we do not cogsize them.
Is Brodmann Area 10 the Key to Human Evolution?
[Note to readers: I have been working on some diagrams for this post but they are not coming along as desired. If I finish them any time soon, I will edit this post and add them in! Meanwhile, let your mind's eye do the imaging. George] Judgment and the Prefrontal Cortex A little over a decade a...
Human cognition is a significant emergent epiphenomenon that rests on a hierarchy of multiple levels of epiphenomena for which we have constructed coherent presumptive explanations. Matters beyond our ken cannot and do not have to be so accommodated. We have no basis to posit or reject further levels beyond human cognition.
Perhaps however, understanding human cognition may require operating from such levels.
Is Brodmann Area 10 the Key to Human Evolution?
[Note to readers: I have been working on some diagrams for this post but they are not coming along as desired. If I finish them any time soon, I will edit this post and add them in! Meanwhile, let your mind's eye do the imaging. George] Judgment and the Prefrontal Cortex A little over a decade a...
A deeply insightful post.
"The proper response to the reality of diminishing energy flows from fossil fuels would be to greatly reduce the flow
budgeted to growth"
If we delay too much in doing there will be none left to
"redirect it toward investment in alternative energy capture/conversion capital"
and
"to preserving the valuable artistic treasures of the past as well as support current humanities".
"Unfortunately, the majority of the population, and especially the economists and politicians, don't get it."
The Future of Capitalism - Profits and Growth
Growth is only possible when energy flow is increasing. It is pretty simple really. When energy flow is increasing in each subsequent time period it is possible to increase the amount of work devoted to increasing the asset base of society. Alternatively, if the energy flow is decreasing... ...
In a longer perspective, say five or ten millennia the languages derived from English may be as different from today's English as is today's language from the Old English of two to three millennia ago. Their recent music may be as different from today's as tofay's is from that of fifty or a hundred years ago.
And the lyrics of today, in a sapient future society might be comparable to the musings of their children.
If we are to consider what might survive many millinnia, we could start by looking at what has survived a few centuries.
More on Aesthetics and Humanity
This is actually a bit of an update and amplification of my post on What Should We Fight to Save in which I argue that much of our humanity is defined by our aesthetic values — our ability to appreciate the arts, music, poetry, literature, and all of the various artifacts that move us emotional...
The POTUS's veneer cracked when he said "Go for it!" (in reference to those who are considering running on the issue of repealing ObamaCare.
His panic (two words) if any, is engendered not by the long term outlook, but by the desire to keep the whole contraption from falling apart before the next election. A politician's horizon is the next election.
Unfortunately, "Drill, bro', Drill" won't produce results for a decade or two, and then at $100-$200 (in today's dollars) per barrel. I read somewhere that $85 a barrel is about the most the uS economy can tolerate without crashing again.
Ofcourse, if the prognostication about "my last vote in a national election" are right, there is no need for that panic.
Opening Up The East Coast for Drilling - Is Obama Crazy?
Not in the least! But he is in panic mode. There are smart people in the administration. OK, maybe not many wise (sapient) people, but definitely clever people. They know about peak oil. They know that it is here. They know the standard neoclassical economics explanation of what happens when ...
Some might consider saving a few luthiers
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Luthier
so that others can draw beauty out of their creations
http://www.ted.com/talks/robert_gupta.html
And then ofcourse there is the extensive accumulated creations of the past.
What Should We Fight to Save?
Fighting to Preserve Our Humanity — But What Is Humanity? Saturday I went to see the live performance of "A Prairie Home Companion", their March 27th show. I'm a long time fan of the show. We've seen a few live performances of the summer tour in Marymoor Park, in Redmond, WA but this was the fi...
Thanks for a synopsis of what is now burgeoning field of study, of which general public ignorance is slowly waning.
The impression that I had got from The Oil Drum, the Energy Bulletin, etc. has been that the EROEI needed to sustain anything close to BAU is in at a minimum in the high teens.
Yet it would seem that efforts to point the way have not (yet) persuaded us to turn away from the present course: passing SNAFU on the way to FUBAR.
Energy Return on Energy Invested (EROEI)
Or, How I Learned to Stop Fearing the Future and Learned to Love "Green" Basics An interesting discussion regarding energy return on energy invested (EROEI) has developed in response to an article posted on The Oil Drum by Charles Hall and David Murphy called "What is the Minimum EROI that a Sus...
Please go through the information at The Fully Informed Juror Association:
http://fija.org/
Know that you have the power of jury nullification, and make sure that the bench is aware of your knowledge.
The complications of life!
I have to apologize to regular readers for the lull in the action. Currently I am on jury duty. I haven't been selected for a jury yet, but it does make getting any work done nearly impossible, waiting to be called. I started out with my laptop, getting it out and getting connected, only for the...
The key to the whole essay is in the line
"This education would not be viewed as the end-all of learning, but just the beginning."
And another significant concept would be that education would be everyone's responsibility. When one sees someone fumbling around for lack of certain information that one has, one should be expected to transmit that information. And someone comes upon a new process, method or fact, one should share that with others (some already do, after communication with the patent office).
Some elements of the knowledge and technology already acquired will be applicable to a low energy society, in an ecologically sustainable way. These will be the basis of The Ecotechnic Fucure.
The fascination with fire and tools is something that Hominid males have been selected for over more than a million and a half years (for tools) and about half that time (for fire). Hence the enchantment of the tool section in the hardware store (which is quite absent in women) and the appeal of barbecues - we have been selected for these.
http://www.betterworldbooks.com/list.aspx?SearchTerm=The+Ecotechnic+Future
http://www.newsociety.com/bookid/4051
As for agriculture and education, the old Chinese saying goes:
For a return on investment in a year, plant rice.
For a return on investment in a decade, plant fruit trees.
For a return on investment in a century, educate men.
A Dream of Education for the Future
The Purpose of Education Children need to learn what is needed to help them grow and achieve self-actualization (see also, Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs). No matter what the future brings in terms of the energy status of our communities, if we fail to create a social structure that supports this ...
"We can choose
to allow billions of people to starve, dehydrate, or succumb to diseases from population density effects."
Actually, we do not have to make that choice. It is the default outcome. We can choose another outcome, but we cannot reset the default.
And there is no reservation or restriction on "Reproductive Rights" that requires the intelligence, knowledge, foresight and motivation promoting actions that manifest responsibility towards future society and its members.
In some ways it is reminiscent of the spawn of frogs or fishes.
The Hardest Moral Dilemma of All
The Hardest Moral Dilemma of All Global Population Speak Out This blog is to fulfill my pledge to the GPSO effort to speak out in February regarding the overpopulation issue that many of us feel is at the heart of most of our global challenges. To see what many other scientists and citizens are ...
Pardon the cynicism, but maybe the shrewd are positioning themselves for the best chance of getting through the bottleneck without stampeding the herd.
Tom, Tom, Tom, Tom, Tom. Not Again!
My Favorite Kicking Boy Asks For It Again! What is now a long time ago I used to marvel at New York Times columnist Tom Friedman's observational skills. He seemed to pick up important new shifts and trends before most of the other pundits realized anything was happening. But over the years he h...
A beautiful template for the Future reflecting sincere hope in spite of the odds.
A WWII+ attitude was advocated by James Earl Carter in April 1977 shortly after he took office ("The Moral Equivalent of War"). We have wasted more than three decades since then and the consequences are at hand.
The future arrangements will not support today's population: Albert Bartlett had said that if we do not limit population voluntarily, Nature will do it for us. That leaves us with William Catton's bottleneck.
These complicating circumstances will also have to be addressed in the transition.
What is a Feasible Living Situation for Future Humans?
How Do We Establish Feasible Sustainable Living? The peaking of oil extraction and refining appears to be upon humanity. The evidence is quite strong (if you want to follow this story I recommend you regularly read The Oil Drum for news and updates as well as technical reports). Because the cos...
I had 4 riceburners starting with a Datsun 280Z in 1996.12 and three Toyota Supras (the last one being a "twin intercooled turbocharged 320 hp V6 which I gave up in 2007.05 for a Bowling Green z06 only because Supras were no longer made. It unfortunately lacks the dependability of those others. Toyota's fall from grace may have been a while in the coming but was swift in its dénouement.
The basic problem with science today is avarice. There was once a time when it was considered unethical to seek more than a modest profit on a new drug - at least that was the case at the time of the discovery of sulfonamides, cortisone and insulin; they could have made their discoverers extremely wealthy in our day and age, where different attitudes are the norm (the patent for insulin was sold to the University of Toronto for one dollar.)
But in other sciences as well, everyone is out to see how they can make a buck. Knowledge can continue to advance in such an environment but it will be molded to those constraints.
Perhaps when we are out of sheep to shear, the shepherds of our social conscience and noesis may revert to those values.
What Institution Is Working?
Toyota Goes Down OK, I know, it isn't buying American, but for the past nearly thirty years I have been very happy with Toyota cars. The largest vehicle I've bought from them was their moon buggy van in the mid 1990's. Otherwise they've all been compacts. My current car is a Corolla that got me...
We comprehend levels of emergence above the level of our individual selves: the family, the community, the county/state/nation, local chapter/regional/national organization, etc. And at whatever level we seek a purpose, it is in a wider context than the entity for which a purpose is sought. Once we reach the widest comprehensible context, our quest for purpose can go no further.
Are we to presume that there is no context beyond our comprehension? Or that there are levels of emergence beyond the dimensions of our existence?
The question of purpose cannot be answered within the framework of a finite context. Hence the workaround - a reference to the "Divine", when grappling with this issue.
The Core of a Sapient Society
The University of Noesis It has been a while since my last blog on education. Being back in the classroom after a three month hiatus on sabbatical has refreshed my sense of mourning for the loss of education with a human purpose, as opposed to training for getting a job. In that vein I can only...
The more one stirs a bucket of - shall we say - humanure, the more it stinks. Maybe in his wisdom the POTUS has decided to let it compost. Let's hope it does not hit the fan!
The State of the Union Address That We Should Hear
Below are the words I would expect to hear from an honest, clear thinking, and knowledgeable POTUS. Of course it is easy to predict that the actual address will sound nothing like this, except possibly in veiled innuendo. That isn't because Obama isn't honest, or tries to be. It is because he i...
The B-52 did not fly until 1952 - well after the Serond World War:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/B-52_Bomber
Lanec versions carried quite sophisticated (for the time) electronics.
Even the "Enola Gay" (which dropped the "Little Bay" on Hiroshima) was a B-29 Superfortress - a prop job. its successor, the B-47 Stratojet served the United States Air Force from 1951 through 1969
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/B-47_Stratojet.
The State of the Union Address That We Should Hear
Below are the words I would expect to hear from an honest, clear thinking, and knowledgeable POTUS. Of course it is easy to predict that the actual address will sound nothing like this, except possibly in veiled innuendo. That isn't because Obama isn't honest, or tries to be. It is because he i...
the power to go to engage in preemptive war in Iraq, I'm asking you, this evening, to give me the economic adjustment equivalent of that power.
Echoes of Carter
The State of the Union Address That We Should Hear
Below are the words I would expect to hear from an honest, clear thinking, and knowledgeable POTUS. Of course it is easy to predict that the actual address will sound nothing like this, except possibly in veiled innuendo. That isn't because Obama isn't honest, or tries to be. It is because he i...
A discussion about "meritocracy":
http://www.frontporchrepublic.com/2009/05/the-decline-of-middle-america-and-the-problem-of-meritocracy/
The Core of a Sapient Society
The University of Noesis It has been a while since my last blog on education. Being back in the classroom after a three month hiatus on sabbatical has refreshed my sense of mourning for the loss of education with a human purpose, as opposed to training for getting a job. In that vein I can only...
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