I'm not trying to challenge Rees' solid analysis. Just pointing to actual shifts in reality. Hence, "wicked problems."
Renewables Projected to Soon Be One-Fourth of US Electricity Generation. Really Soon
I got to this from a new "discovery" on my part:
Econ4: Economics for people, for the planet and for the future
About
Our aim is to change both the economics profession and
common-sense understanding about how the economy works and should
work. For this we need to disseminate new ideas, train the new
generation of scholars and public intellectuals, and advance new
research agendas.
-- Ashwani Vasishth vasi...@ramapo.edu (201) 684-6616 (Jabber-enabled) http://phobos.ramapo.edu/~vasishth -------------------------------------------------------- Professor of Sustainability Convener, Sustainability Program (BA) Convenor, Environmental Studies Program (BA) Director, Center for Sustainability http://ramapo.edu/ramapo-green http://ramapo.edu/sustainability You can ALWAYS set up an Appointment with me, without negotiation, seven days a week, at: https://calendly.com/vasishth/webex-meeting Ramapo College of New Jersey 505 Ramapo Valley Road, SSHS, Mahwah, NJ 07430 -------------------------------------------------------- I respectfully acknowledge that Ramapo College is located on the ancestral and traditional Indigenous territory of the Ramapough Lenape Nation.
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Dear Bill and Richard,
My apologies--distracted by the start of my semester.
To be clear, and as I have said before, I do NOT disagree with either of you. My point was NOT that renewables can even BEGIN to "save us." I was simply sharing a factoid--however flawed--that I thought OUGHT to be a piece of our reality.
Tom pointed out to me, correctly, that:
"Wind/solar to be 26% of electrical production is how the graph reads- not 26% of total energy production"
To this I say--read the headline. "One-Fourth of US Electricity
Generation." Who said "total energy production"?
But here's my main point--as it always has been.
We seem to have been dancing around this bush for some time. Let me try to summarize my own understanding of our lived reality:
We are, ALL OF US, quick to point out how this or that
"solution," cannot possibly work. We cannot stretch our minds to
see that--though this is indeed so--together they MIGHT make a
difference. And that's all I am asserting we must aim for. Make
a difference.
All this said, the never-ending arguments that we seem to engage
in, within SCORAI, can only (gently) be called "type three
errors." We're simply asking the wrong question.
-- Ashwani Vasishth vasi...@ramapo.edu (201) 684-6616 (Jabber-enabled) http://phobos.ramapo.edu/~vasishth -------------------------------------------------------- Professor of Sustainability Convener, Sustainability Program (BA) Convenor, Environmental Studies Program (BA) Director, Center for Sustainability http://ramapo.edu/ramapo-green http://ramapo.edu/sustainability You can ALWAYS set up an Appointment with me, without negotiation, seven days a week, at: https://calendly.com/vasishth/webex-meeting Ramapo College of New Jersey 505 Ramapo Valley Road, SSHS, Mahwah, NJ 07430 -------------------------------------------------------- I respectfully acknowledge that Ramapo College is located on the ancestral and traditional Indigenous territory of the Ramapough Lenape Nation.
To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/scorai/CAMZghTbO2jNm9N7vN8HBDFpiSuSM5QJ0y5wQ6Xp136eUjf_iqQ%40mail.gmail.com.
Then there is the larger issue of simply extending overshoot which is ultimately a fatal condition. Here's a similar lament:
https://tsakraklides.com/2022/09/25/the-myth-of-clean-energy/
Bill
Dear Bill,
First, know that I love your mind. I truly do. And I know, with
certainty, that both your analysis and diagnoses are most likely
very close to spot on.
But when people point out weaknesses in proposed action, I have
to ask if this is a flag of caution--something to be thought about
and planned for--or an objection to stop action to ANY amount.
We are NOT going to solve this issue. We may well be doomed.
But if we can tweak 20% of the source, should we not, because we
leave 80% unaddressed?
-- Ashwani Vasishth vasi...@ramapo.edu (201) 684-6616 (Jabber-enabled) http://phobos.ramapo.edu/~vasishth -------------------------------------------------------- Professor of Sustainability Convener, Sustainability Program (BA) Convenor, Environmental Studies Program (BA) Director, Center for Sustainability http://ramapo.edu/ramapo-green http://ramapo.edu/sustainability You can ALWAYS set up an Appointment with me, without negotiation, seven days a week, at: https://calendly.com/vasishth/webex-meeting Ramapo College of New Jersey 505 Ramapo Valley Road, SSHS, Mahwah, NJ 07430 -------------------------------------------------------- I respectfully acknowledge that Ramapo College is located on the ancestral and traditional Indigenous territory of the Ramapough Lenape Nation.
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From: lumpo...@gmail.com Sent: January 21, 2023 6:35 PM Subject: Re: [SCORAI] Renewables Projected to Soon Be One-Fourth of US Electricity Generation. Really Soon |
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Dear Ruben,
Okay, I take back the walk/chew gum metaphor. But that was NOT
my point. Each one of says--there's no such thing as a magic
bullet. Yet, way too often, each one of us assess potential
actions one at a time. "This cannot save us." So it is not worth
considering?
I KNOW renewables are not going to "save us." So should we NOT use renewables? Or promote them? Does a strategy have to "save us," before we will consider it as ONE part of a complex set of actions we can deploy as a civiization?
Beyond that, and way more trivially, you say, in sequence:
When we ask for attention, when we consume attention, it can’t be used for other things.
So what are we using one another's attention for, here? We're certainly not making any perceptible progress.
convert our energy systems to renewables at the same time.
is "converting our energy systems" ENTIRELY to renewables the only circumstance we can consider?
but just because this is the best we can do
I disagree. As a civilization we have not even BEGUN to act.
But my biggest grouse is this--we treat "renewables" definitionally as PV and Wind. This is what gets me riled the most.
I read Steward Brand's Whole Earth Catalog, out of pavement
stores in Delhi, in the early 1970s as an undergraduate college
student. In INDIA, in the 1970s. How many of us have even SEEN a
Whole Earth Catalog? Let along exponentially growing the WEC into
a web-based archive--free knowledge for the human race.
MANY houses in India have plain black PVC water heating panels on
their roofs. This will NOT deliver the kind of hot water we like
in our pipes. But it WOULD cut our energy use to SOME degree.
Show me ONE that you have seen in this sophisticated country?
Who, today, talks about passive energy. conservation and
efficiency with the same passion we seem to be able to put into
PVs and Wind? For or against? Funnel all that energy into DOING
something, and we begin to move the world.
We KNOW that conservation and efficiency are a fuel in themselves. Where are we on this front?
The things we KNOW would make a difference are not even on our
horizon. No, sir. This is NOT "the best we can do." Not even
close.
-- Ashwani Vasishth vasi...@ramapo.edu (201) 684-6616 (Jabber-enabled) http://phobos.ramapo.edu/~vasishth -------------------------------------------------------- Professor of Sustainability Convener, Sustainability Program (BA) Convenor, Environmental Studies Program (BA) Director, Center for Sustainability http://ramapo.edu/ramapo-green http://ramapo.edu/sustainability You can ALWAYS set up an Appointment with me, without negotiation, seven days a week, at: https://calendly.com/vasishth/webex-meeting
Ramapo College of New Jersey 505 Ramapo Valley Road, SSHS, Mahwah, NJ 07430 -------------------------------------------------------- I respectfully acknowledge that Ramapo College is located on the ancestral and traditional Indigenous territory of the Ramapough Lenape Nation.
Ruben (not Nelson) -
Very well stated. Humans have very limited cognitive capacity -- we evolved in relatively simple circumstance and hence tend to think in simplistic, reductionist terms. We don't get complexity so are being confounded by a world of increasingly entangled, overlapping
complex systems. We are where we are because, from within the MTI mindset, "... this is the best we can do."
Bill
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On Jan 21, 2023, at 9:11 PM, Ruben Anderson <anderso...@gmail.com> wrote:
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Thank you, Ruben.
You have given me much to think about.
I will not take this further, here. But I will let this steep in
my mind.
-- Ashwani Vasishth vasi...@ramapo.edu (201) 684-6616 (Jabber-enabled) http://phobos.ramapo.edu/~vasishth -------------------------------------------------------- Professor of Sustainability Convener, Sustainability Program (BA) Convenor, Environmental Studies Program (BA) Director, Center for Sustainability http://ramapo.edu/ramapo-green http://ramapo.edu/sustainability You can ALWAYS set up an Appointment with me, without negotiation, seven days a week, at: https://calendly.com/vasishth/webex-meeting Ramapo College of New Jersey 505 Ramapo Valley Road, SSHS, Mahwah, NJ 07430 -------------------------------------------------------- I respectfully acknowledge that Ramapo College is located on the ancestral and traditional Indigenous territory of the Ramapough Lenape Nation.
Friends -
At the risk of prolonging this discussion, but in the hope of bending it in a different direction, I have a favour to ask. I wonder whether we have given enough thought to why so little progress?. Is it because "we haven't begun to act" as Ashwani very hopefully suggests or more because "we are already doing the best we can" as Ruben (not Nelson) put it.
I had already begun to think a bit about this in connection with another project. The question I asked is "can we identify the major barriers to resolving the overshoot crisis." I approach this (by default of training) from the biological/ecological perspective and suggest that many stumbling blocks are innate, that they are variations of heritable, once adaptive survival strategies that have been ‘selected for’ in the course of human evolution. (So this note is rather compatible with Ruben A's notion that "our brains evolved to run our body, and not much more than that.")
Here's what I came up with -- I'd be grateful ffor critique or additions:
[i] Normally, population dynamics reflect a fluctuating balance between positive feedback (exponential potential) and negative feedback (e.g., disease, food and other resource shortages).
[ii] Since the early 19th Century, the human population has expanded eightfold from one to eight billion and real gross world product (~consumption) by over 100-fold. With exponential growth, half the fossil fuels ever used have been consumed in just the past 30+ years (see: https://ourworldindata.org/economic-growth and https://ourworldindata.org/fossil-fuels .)
[iii] C. Fowler and L. Hobbs, “Is humanity sustainable?” Proceedings of the Royal Society of London B (2003) 270(1533):2579–2583.
[iv] See M. Pratarelli, Myopic man: On the nature and universality of human self-deception and its long-term effects on our environment (Medici Publishing, 2008).
[v] See D. Carpenter and D. A. Moss (eds.), Preventing Regulatory Capture – Special Interest Influence and How to Limit It (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2014)
[vii] This was a highly adaptive trait, assisting individuals easily to acquire the beliefs, values, and norms of their tribe which, in turn, confer a sense of personal identity and reinforces group cohesion.
[viii] See B. Wexler, Brain and Culture: Neurobiology, Ideology and Social Change, p.180. (Cambridge,MA: MIT Press, 2006).
[ix] R.A. Burton, On Being Certain – Believing You are Right Even When You Are Not (p.xi) (New York: St Martin’s Press, 2008).
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Hi Joe -
A couple of quick 'off the top' reflections.
1a) In theory the world (humans) could address the climate crisis much more effectively than at present, without technology, by transition to more sustainable less energy dependent lifestyles but they won't (see previous bits of this thread) By the way, so far technology has arguably worsened the crisis -- which leads me to my next point.
1b) As I have argued previously, climate change isn't the real issue, overshoot is. Climate disruption is caused by and is a symptom of overshoot. Technological approaches to climate change are not only unlikely to fix the climate, but they also tend to create complacency and stimulate further material growth (in fact, they are designed to do so -- look and the frenzy of subsidies for job creation, etc., going into EVs even as these grow in size and weight to the point that attendant carbon dioxide emissions are no better than ICE vehicles and other eco-damage much worse) all of which exacerbates overshoot.
2) Can we "fundamentally change human behaviour and our civilisational culture on a global level (even if it’s possible at all) within a time frame that will make a difference to climate change progression?" No. there is little evidence to support this proposition.
Bill
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Great conversation. Two very small points to make.1. Re Gabor Mate. Yes we are doing the best we can. But! We can also do better he says by changing culture. We can stand and face our personal to cultural traumas and miraculous things can happen2. The entire world is not imperialist, colonialist or modern so let’s not discount that solutions may come from beyond the not quite all-dominant MTI.I just read a piece by Rebecca Solnit in The Guardian I really liked. She says ‘despair is a delusion of confidence that asserts it knows what’s coming‘ and ends the piece with ‘we see no farther than the little halo that is cast by our lantern, but we can travel all night by that light’CheersNoel
Dear AllThis has been a fascinating conversation. I am left with a couple of questions:- there has been much talk (at least as I have understood it) that it’s foolish to believe that technology will provide the answer to climate issues. My question is the opposite: does anyone believe that we can address climate issues WITHOUT technological advances or playing a role?- there has also been much talk about the barriers erected by human behaviour and our civilizational culture. Given that one of the issues to be addressed is speed of change before tipping points are reached, does anyone believe that we can fundamentally change human behaviour and our civilisational culture on a global level (even if it’s possible at all) within a time frame that will make a difference to climate change progression?Would be grateful for views.BestJoe
Three things are needed to make change; we need three capacities. We need the Technical capacity, the Material Capacity, and the Social capacity. Let me explain:
If you have a recipe for apple pie, and some sort of an oven or other way to concentrate heat, you have the technical capacity to bake a pie.
If you have apples and flour and sugar and butter and pinch of cinnamon you have the material capacity to bake a pie.
And if you have someone who is willing to cut butter into flour, slice apples and wait around while the pie bakes, you have the social capacity to bake a pie.
If you lack any one of these three, there will be no pie. Pie will be impossible. You cannot have pie.
I grew up a collapsenik and always thought that once we hit the jackpot - plagues, fires, floods & other systemic problems we can no longer solve - society would drop the head-in-the-sand attitude. I didn't expect the denial to *increase* as crises become more undeniable.
On Jan 22, 2023, at 12:52 PM, Ruben Anderson <anderso...@gmail.com> wrote:
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On Jan 22, 2023, at 1:15 PM, 'Rees, William E.' via SCORAI <sco...@googlegroups.com> wrote:
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- Even ordinary citizens are reluctant to sacrifice their comfortable lifestyles for the general welfare of humankind, present or future.Economists recognize this as a variation on the ‘public good/free rider problem.’ “Why should I give up my vacation house and automobile to reduce my carbon footprint for the public good, particularly if few others do? I would be making a significant sacrifice in exchange for an infinitesimal share of the benefits. Meanwhile, other people would get a free ride on my ‘gift’ to the public.”
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Dear Bill, and others,
Okay, say it is so. Collapse--in some unknowable form and to some unknowable extent, appears inevitable.
I really liked Ruben Nelson's response as well. I truly did.
BUT. I am not persuaded that any of this tells ME (forget
everyone else--all my students), as thinking volitional entities,
what my options for action are. What should I do?
I'll gladly and unhesitatingly concede that my understanding is
at least sub-par. But tell me. What do you expect from me as a
response to your likely on-point analysis? What would I need to
do next, for you to accept that I havem indeed accepted your
analysis?
If I am NOT willing to "fold my hands and wait," If I believe that the past is not NECESSARILY and inevitably a reliable predictor of the future, if I genuinely believe that evolutionary processes are supra-systemic to human civilizzation, and do not grind to a halt because we have been incredibly--well--ineffective, and if we can somehow stop ourselves from EXPECTING this or that of our future....what ought I to do?
-- Ashwani Vasishth vasi...@ramapo.edu (201) 684-6616 (Jabber-enabled) http://phobos.ramapo.edu/~vasishth -------------------------------------------------------- Professor of Sustainability Convener, Sustainability Program (BA) Convenor, Environmental Studies Program (BA) Director, Center for Sustainability http://ramapo.edu/ramapo-green http://ramapo.edu/sustainability You can ALWAYS set up an Appointment with me, without negotiation, seven days a week, at: https://calendly.com/vasishth/webex-meeting Ramapo College of New Jersey 505 Ramapo Valley Road, SSHS, Mahwah, NJ 07430 -------------------------------------------------------- I respectfully acknowledge that Ramapo College is located on the ancestral and traditional Indigenous territory of the Ramapough Lenape Nation.
[iv] See M. Pratarelli, Myopic man: On the nature and universality of human self-deception and its long-term effects on our environment(Medici Publishing, 2008).
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Humans, like all other species, are capable of exponential population growth and tend to use accessible food and other resources as soon as possible.
H. sapiens evolved under relatively simple, more or less predictable environments
Run for election?Just model anti-consumption and live a one-planet life?Educate about our biophysical reality?Support people healing from trauma so they are able to focus on our common existential threat?Just watch the show as our innate nature brings our species or at least MTI crashing down?Civil disobedience?
On Jan 22, 2023, at 3:19 PM, Ruben Anderson <anderso...@gmail.com> wrote:
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Dear SCORAI Colleagues,
See below details of an online & in-person public lecture I’ll be giving at Trinity College Dublin, Ireland, Geography Department on “Climate Justice and the Role of Universities in Transformative Change” where I will present a vision of a paradigm-shift in higher education toward facilitating structural, systemic social change. Both in-person and online registration is here. The online lecture will start at 6:25pm Irish time / 1:25pm EST.
All welcome – feel free to share with students and other colleagues who might be interested.
Thanks!
Jennie
-------------------------------------
Trinity College Dublin, Inaugural Geography Annual Lecture
We are honoured that our first speaker in this new lecture series will be Professor Jennie C. Stephens, Dean’s Professor of Sustainability Science and Policy at Northeastern University.
Wednesday 15 February, 2023
18:00-19:30
Haughton Lecture Theatre, The Museum Building and ONLINE
Climate Justice and the Role of Universities in Transformative Change
Transformative social change is needed to address the climate crisis which is exacerbating other crises and worsening social injustices, economic inequities, and health disparities within local communities and around the world. During this time of growing instability and human suffering, this lecture proposes that we collectively reimagine the role of universities advancing climate justice and promoting societal transformation toward a more just, healthy, and stable future. A commitment to climate justice provides a helpful framework for colleges and universities to leverage their unique position in society and align their many initiatives to contribute to transformative change for the public good.
More information and registration for both in-person and online registration is available via the link below. tcd-geo2023.eventbrite.ie
This is an evening event and light refreshments will be served ahead of the lecture and it will be followed by a wine reception, all in the Museum Building.
We look forward to seeing you there and to welcoming Professor Stephens to launch this new initiative for Trinity Geography. If you have any queries please contact Rory Rowan at ROW...@tcd.ie directly.
Jennie C. Stephens, PhD (she/her)
Dean’s Professor of Sustainability Science & Policy
Northeastern University, School of Public Policy & Urban Affairs, Boston, MA USA
jenniecstephens.com @jenniecstephens (twitter)
Recent Publications
Higher Education Needs a New Mission. How about Climate Justice? Boston Globe. 2022
Beyond Climate Isolationism: A Necessary Shift For Climate Justice. Current Climate Change Reports. 2022
Action Research for Energy Transformation, Educational Action Reesarch. 2022
Climate policy conflict in the U.S. states: a critical review and way forward. Climatic Change, 2022
Feminist, Antiracist Values for Climate Justice: Moving Beyond Climate Isolationism. Sacred Civics: Building Seven Generation Cities. 2022
Green New Deal Proposals: Comparing emerging transformational climate policies. Energy Research & Social Science, 2021
Book
Diversifying Power: Why We Need Antiracist, Feminist Leadership on Climate and Energy, Island Press, 2020
Bill and all:
I for one agree with Marina and think that your reading of her comments misses her focus on ecosocial history and power (and hopefully I am not missing her point, also). I think that Marina provides an alternative way of looking at these problems that is worth engaging in its own terms.
Dimitris
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Scorai-ers,
I also will challenge some Bill's assertions even though I agree with him on many points. I agree with Bill that we are in severe overshoot. I also agree that high overshoot contributors like the USA should reduce affluent consumption by at least 75-80% . Bill does not see much path for technological or behavioral solutions, in doing so, he seems to arrive at a single outcome, complete catastrophe for life on earth. Case closed?
Coincidently I listened to a two hour Nate Hagens interviewing Bill Rees titled The Fundamental Issue - Overshoot ( https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LQTuDttP2Yg). Therein the same diagnosis and prediction was made, we could reduce consumption but we won't, and the renewable technology path we're pursuing makes thing worse. Really? While not the only technology in the queue, what about small modular reactor (SMR) nuclear power? Three days ago the Nuclear Regulatory Commission announced that NuScale Power received a license for the first SMR for US domestic consumption. Small nuclear reactors have been operating for more than 70 years on ships, and the large aircraft carriers carry four reactors generating electricity to support a community of 2700 people, propel the ship at 35 knots, and go for 30 years on a single fueling. Currently there are 185 ships powered with some version of SMR reactors. Small modular reactors are projected to be less expensive than conventionals, zero meltdown risk, less dependent on long distant transmission, safer overall, and perhaps capable of recycling existing spent fuels in a manner to reduce radioactivity by 90%. The United Nations Life Cycle Assessment of Electricity Generation Options 2021 is a credible document to compare our range of energy options for the future.
I am not a salesman for nuclear power, rather I advocate for open-mindedness in this time of crisis. Unquestionably, nuclear deserves a high degree of skepticism. As Bill has repeatedly points out, so does solar, wind and rare metal energy storage devices. If the UN report cited just above, nuclear may be one of the least environmentally impactful energy sources after lower consumption behavior. Our first choice of action should conservation and lowering consumption, for lots of reasons.
Sometime I would like to offer more about my
ongoing verifiable
life-style of zero carbon
emissions. But
until all of us on this SCORAI listserve are ready to practice a
1-2 ton
emission per capita lifestyle, perhaps a more open mind toward
technology is
called for?
The topic of exemplifying sustainable behavior
seems to fall on deaf eyes with this group! It's still a worthy
group nonetheless.
Tom Bowerman, Policy Interactive Research
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We can lead with grief and death literacy, we need to learn how to somatically metabolize dread and fear.But then we need to mature our manner of approach to include responding with curiosity, desire, pleasure, meaningfulness; we must learn to rest in states of well-being and explore responses based in appreciation of quality, and craft, integrity, leadership and enoughness.
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Dimitris, Bill, Marina,
Marina, thank you for putting this fresh air into this discussion. I totally agree with you and Dimitris that we need to keep focused on specific power relationships.
Quoting you: “….but it is a matter of social power struggles and our socio-political organization - not of our biological nature.”
We cannot change our biological nature; but we need to continue to be engaged in the ongoing power struggles: globally, regionally, and locally.
I personally get a lot of inspiration working on the local level. Not that change comes easily; but everywhere there are people of good will; and willing to help change (little parts of) the system.
We cannot know the outcome; but we should keep trying to do the right thing; wherever and whenever possible.
Philip
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Hello again, Ruben (not Nelson) --
What can I say? (or add). Wonderful!
I much appreciate your thoughtful and exquisitely nuanced response to my query. Which is not to say that we couldn't quibble about some nuances over several bottles of cider. For example, you say:
But I would argue that scanning for small changes only and discarding 99.999% of other information is a good 'first cut' description of a major condition for myopia.
I obviously agree that "we have very limited cognitive capacity" and that this is "all our brains can do" but I don't for a second consider acknowledging this as "mocking" human beings. It is simply a fact of our evolutionary heritage which offers some explanation for our failure to use one of the truly unique qualities of humans the capacity to plan ahead, to alter our future. (Ironically we actually do exercise this ability quite well when the benefits are obvious, but when our "scanning" the future plain reveals unpleasantries, we "deny, discredit, reinterpret, or forget that information". Perhaps this means our myopia is, to a degree, selective.)
You would also nudge my assertion that "H. sapiens evolved under relatively simple, more or less predictable environments" into a seemingly contrary variant, "we evolved under simple, but UNpredictable environments" on grounds that, for example, our "predators evolved to be unpredictable".
Quite right, of course, but here I would protest that we are quibbling over degree. First, the probable presence of predators was predictable; the danger was known if not specifiable as to time and place. Second, I deliberately use the term "relatively" compared to the present day. So the predictability of paleolithic environments still seems to me somewhat more that the predictability of today's environment, a mega-complex system of overlapping complex subsystems (everything from the internet to the military industrial complex, the global economy, climate system and the biosphere. No person or institution can get a controlling handle on any single subsystem (and that cannot end well).
I will refrain from additional quibbles since they mainly make the point that our differences are more defined by semantics than real disagreement.
Again, your care and attention to detail are grand.
Not to mention your "lifting a glass."
With love too.
Bill
Bright ideas for salvation with almost no possibility of realization are always more attractive than the darkening realities actually unfolding around us. It's the human way.
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Hi Bill and Ruben A,
Thank you both for such a rich conversation. You have offered a lot to chew on and to be fed by. If I could I, too, would sit with you and sip some cider. You could call me “Butch”, my family nick name, so as not to confuse the issue of which Ruben is speaking.
And it seems to me that you have offered a clear demonstration of how we who were formed by and within MTI cultures unconsciously accept the MTI “take” on reality as THE right, good and sound way to frame the human experience of reality.
It is this point that I want to explore. If the MTI assumption is sound, then we are good to go. However, if it is faulty, then we need to identify times we have made an assumption that we now find to be faulty. You can surmise that by raising this issue that I am among those who find the MTI presupposition about the fundamental adequacy of its own ways of knowing to be wrong-headed and dangerous. Yes, I want to suggest that a truly fundamental issue of our time is our need as MTI peoples in MTI cultures to come to recognize the ways in which our MTI ways of grasping and construing reality are and are not adequate to the work we face in the 21st Century.
The point I wish to make is both simple and contentious, at least if viewed within widest/deepest/most integral MTI frame of reference. It is simply that our MTI ways of becoming, being and living, including the sense we make of the bio-physical world, are only one of the three major ways we homo sapiens have developed to date of presenting ourselves to, grasping and “taking/construing” the vast reality of which we are a part. I acknowledge that for this statement to be taken seriously it implies that, writ large, the reality of which we are a part must be inherently ambiguous enough that it can be “taken/construed” in quite different ways; ways that are different enough to make significant differences. What is more, it implies that there is enough supportive evidence for each of the ways of construing reality, that under particular conditions, each appears to make enough sense of the vast bulk of the available data that it is safe and even wise to commit to that way of experiencing reality.
I have attached a couple of diagrams of how I think about these things. I do so in a “causal layered” manner. You will see that I agree with Ruben A. when he said that: “You change the system and you change behaviour. You change behaviour and you change the values/story.” I note that ‘system’ refers to the physical arrangement of things. Marx understood that most human learning occurs by the processes sociologists now call “socialization.” When we learn by doing we are not only learning what to do with our hands and our mouths, but with our minds and our imaginations. I assume on this we agree.
My disagreement is on three points:
1. There is a fourth layer which Ruben A’s comment does not refer to. It is the layer of our most fundamental ontological and epistemological presuppositions. This layer is critical. At this level we find answers to such questions as: What is the nature of reality? What is the nature of human beings/persons? What is the relationship of reality to human beings? In what ways can we grasp reality and in what ways can reality grasp us? It is differences at this level that enable us to distinguish the various forms of civilization from each other. If the differences are as important as I see them to be, then it must be the case that both reality and human experience is “plastic” enough to be “taken/construed” in ways that are different enough that the differences matter. (Pun intended.) If this is the case, then we must learn to distinguish among both the various forms of civilization that have emerged to date in human history and the cultures which exemplify each of these forms.
2. We can conclude from the above that human forms of civilization and the cultures which exemplify them matter far more than we in MTI cultures understand. This means that any sweeping understanding of human history must include the emergence of the forms of civilization by and through which we have lived as a species. This means that the MTI bias to ignore our evolution as civilizational and cultural species by privileging our biophysical development is no longer adequate. Yes, we are biophysical beings. And yes, many living species have some capacity to develop and live by their cultures. And we appear to be immersed in cultures to degrees that no other living species is. The human story is inherently time-bound and cultural, even the sweeping story of our development. We must learn to tell it how it has been and is.
3. Human learning is bi-directional. It moves not only from physical substances to thinking, imagination and O/E presuppositions. It runs from insights that burst our O/E presuppositions to our imagination to our manner of thinking and then what we physically do. Such insights re-orient our lives and practices. They are the great insights of science, psychology and spirituality. The insights which alter the trajectory of human history.
When these things are understood they illuminate our history, our present condition and our future in ways that include, but move beyond the implicit behaviourism of our MTI cultures.
In short, it is the case, as Bill has so clearly explored, that we are in bio-physical overshoot and that this alone can do us in. My point is that in order to make enough sense of this fact, we must also understand that we are in civilizational overshoot. Otherwise, we will continue to try to extricate ourselves from the mess of living complex messes we are in by using the very means of grasping and manipulating reality that has brought us here in the first place.
Ruben
Ruben F.W. Nelson
Executive Director
Foresight Canada
Courageous Leadership for Transforming Change
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Noel --
Individual action, while it might make you feel better, is not going to make much difference and, since it suffers from the public good/free rider problem (see the fifth bullet in my list) there are more free riders than those willing to contribute to the public good.
Education of the truly ignorant is
important, but we do not have an information deficit on this issue in the context of policy development.
Overshoot (a fatal form of unsustainability) is a collective problem requiring collective solutions. At present, this mostly comes from government intervention in the economy on behalf of the common good. Only governments can implement the policies capable of the needed heavy lifting -- they should reserve FF for essential uses; establish quotas/rationing of any remaining fossil fuel budget (some say there is none); implement carbon taxes and other eco-taxes to move us closer to full social cost pricing; phase out private automobiles (including EVs which, all in, are as eco-damaging as ICE vehicles); massive investment in public transit, etc.
In this light, seems to me that harassing governments, including street protests and civil disobedience, crashing all-candidate meetings with lots of questions and supporters, writing frequent letters, is the best thing to do to get politicians to notice there are more citizen voters than corporate voters. If this is not successful then "just watch the show as our innate nature brings our species or at least MTI crashing down."
Bill
On Jan 23, 2023, at 7:33 PM, Rees, William E. <wr...@mail.ubc.ca> wrote:
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Ashley Colby
PhD, Environmental Sociology
Co-founder Rizoma Field
School
My book: Subsistence Agriculture in the US
Twitter @RizomaSchool
See my most recent writing here
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Of course this question does not explain anything conclusively or broadly although it can give some insight about governmental permissibility without revolt or outright dictatorship. Nor is this question standing alone. SCORAI could also debate nuances of whether the general public is intelligent or stupid. But is there disagreement with the precept that government operates durably without pluralistic support?37. Many people have mixed opinions about the long term impacts of climate change. Based on your own crystal ball best guess about climate change impact one hundred years from now, please assign a percent chance for each of the outcomes listed below. If you are certain it's completely one option, put 100% on that one, or if you give some credence to others, put your personal odds on to each box but percentages must total 100%. [randomize answer choices]
Choices:
[ insert % of probability for this option ] 1. Climate shifts all the time and the current climate trend isn't as bad as some predict and could actually be good overall; changes will occur but we'll adjust as the years progress, as we always do.
[ insert % of probability for this option ] 2. Climate change is a disaster in the making but human ingenuity in science and technology will keep pace with the challenge.
[ insert % of probability for this option ] 3. Climate change is on-track to cause an ecological collapse of unimaginable magnitude, and major loss of human life from drought, fatally high temperatures, and uncontrollable mass migrations.
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A key term that became important in the initial model building was “the sustainable effort,” which was defined as the “total amount of resources” a movement could expend in trying to achieve its goal. This term differs from the descriptive way the word “sustainable” was used by other scholars working with Forrester. As Randers indicated, the “sustainable effort” of a social movement included allocation of efforts to increase its relevance, visibility, income, services, etc. in order to gain momentum for the cause. Sustainability thus understood was a way of describing the survival capacity of a movement based on measuring its “efforts.”
The sustainable efforts made by an organization or social movement would enhance the quality of its member experience and thus produce more members, some of whom would become active participants in providing more sustainable efforts which would lead to more members, etc. This feedback loop served as the basis for what became Randers’ model of the lifecycle of movements. The dynamic of a lifecycle could be positive by generating new members or negative, depending on the capability of maintaining the “sustainable effort.” What determined the process was both the quality of member experience and actor experience.
These somewhat simplistic models would grow in complexity the following year as Randers’ work matured into his dissertation entitled Conceptualizing Dynamic Models of Social Systems: Lessons from a Study of Social Change. There is not much on religion in these pages. Rather, Randers focused on the general dynamics of social movements as a consequence of introducing an idea into society. The overall perspective of the thesis was very much a top-down approach that provided tools for leaders of movements – a type of reasoning that was typical within the Sloan School of Management.
What is notable about this is that progressive Church leaders at a time of religious upheaval would look to Randers and his ideas about social movements in order to make sense of the dynamics of their organizations. He provided them with managerial tools inspired by natural resource management to understand and deal with their respective congregations at times when the member base was fluctuating greatly. For example, Randers’ work was “received with great interest” by representatives of the Jesus Movement and Pentecostals, among others, at the second conference on the Relevance of Organized Religion in January 1973. In the process, Church leaders learned about the importance of leading a “sustainable effort” in order to reach the Golden Age of sustainable equilibrium.
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- Even ordinary citizens are reluctant to sacrifice their comfortable lifestyles for the general welfare of humankind, present or future. Economists recognize this as a variation on the ‘public good/free rider problem.’ “Why should I give up my vacation house and automobile to reduce my carbon footprint for the public good, particularly if few others do? I would be making a significant sacrifice in exchange for an infinitesimal share of the benefits. Meanwhile, other people would get a free ride on my ‘gift’ to the public.”
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On Jan 24, 2023, at 1:45 PM, Noel Gerard Keough <nke...@ucalgary.ca> wrote:
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Marina -
I think now we are paddling the same canoe.
What will be 'selected out' is modern techno industrial culture and sensibilities and, as you say, it won't be a one- sweep process. Some better prepared societies/institutions, whether by accident or design, will survive.
All of us at least dimly aware that a global simplification is already beginning to take place are working to slow the descent into the abyss and, indeed, how well we perform is a matter of continuous analysis, social power struggles and socio-political organization. To that list I would add continuous striving to create an alternative foundation of beliefs, values, expectations and behaviours that can serve to catalyze the transformation to a new/old way of being on Earth.
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All very true -- my problem is that the conditions that might produce sustainable behaviours (values, beliefs, etc.) are rather horrific to contemplate.
Is it not time to test the human capacity for forward planning? To head off those conditions? I agree, it's a long-shot but with enough consciousness-raising...
Bill
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