re: "We've missed your updates"

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Richard Moore

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Feb 19, 2010, 2:10:28 PM2/19/10
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From: Andrea Lea 
Date: 18 February 2010 20:01:01 GMT
To: Richard Moore <r...@quaylargo.com>
Subject: Re: dialog thru 20 Jan 2010
Hi rkm,
We've missed your updates. Is everything okay?
Hoping to hear from you,
Andrea Lea 
O'Brien, Florida

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Hi Andrea,

Thanks for asking.

The fact is I've had a hard time getting inspired. My basic message hasn't changed in quite some time, and I feel like I keep saying the same things, with slight variations. We keep on sliding into a dismal and predictable future, and no hope appears on the horizon. 

My goal isn't to chronicle the descent, or predict it, but to do something to change it. In that regard, I can't see any progress. I think I know what needs to happen, and I've thought of ways it might get started, but I don't know how the getting started can get started. I feel trapped in the virtual world of the Internet, where everything can be envisioned, and the only consequence is pixels on a screen. In a real sense, the Internet has become The Matrix, and the time we spend here is the equivalent of the blue pill.

I'm feeling like I did before I left California. Like I've done everything I can do in my current situation, and I need a new situation. But I don't have an image of a new situation. Don't know whether I need a change of location, a change of activity, or a change of associates. 

I do know that I enjoyed my climate research. I love tackling 'big problems'. Here we have the most controversial topic of the day, with scientists divided, with everyone saying it's complicated, and I was able to cut through all the nonsense and figure out what was really going on, starting from first principles. And it wasn't because I brought any special knowledge, or even cleverness, to the project. It was actually quite straightforward. It took only the courage / confidence / hubris to engage the problem. Lots of you could have done it better.

Perhaps there's a lesson there. We need to be more audacious. How's this : "Our power lies in awakening our audaciousness." ?

The lesson for me, as one who likes to solve 'big problems', is that I need to put myself in a situation where 'people getting along' is the 'big problem'. Because 'people getting along' is what needs to happen for things to change. So I need a place where people are motivated to action, but divided in their understandings. 

I'll have to think about that. In the meantime, I'm working on an essay for you folks, "Prognosis 2012".

cheers,
richard
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