FW: collapse outlook: production - the air crete domicile
biz modl
hi folks,
a discussion about sustainability that might be of interest to the group.
have fun, biz
From: biz modl [mailto:biz...@gmail.com]
Sent: Tuesday, October 10, 2017 4:31 PM
To: 'JStu...@aol.com'
Subject: RE: collapse outlook: production - the air crete domicile
yep, it is distressing and depressing that we struggle to realize what we are capable of becoming. it is possible that learning about cas's can help us realize our limitations and influence cultural design accordingly. it is the illusion of control and management that appears to get us into trouble, and that illusion has been reinforced by our technological work (which, ironically, drives us across the threshold of control of our cas's).
perhaps our cas's will teach us what a safe level of scale and complexity is. but we have a hint from our past J we know that the most durable and persistent social form we have created over the past millennia is the village (100-200 souls):
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Village
I quote:
A village is a clustered human settlement or community, larger than a hamlet but smaller than a town, with a population ranging from a few hundred to a few thousand. Though often located in rural areas, the term urban village is also applied to certain urban neighborhoods. Villages are normally permanent, with fixed dwellings; however, transient villages can occur. Further, the dwellings of a village are fairly close to one another, not scattered broadly over the landscape, as a dispersed settlement.
In the past, villages were a usual form of community for societies that practice subsistence agriculture,
many go back 1000 years or more:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_oldest_continuously_inhabited_cities#North_America
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_oldest_continuously_inhabited_cities#Central_and_Southern
maybe it does really 'take a village':
http://nypost.com/2016/04/12/if-you-want-to-live-forever-move-to-this-italian-town/
states and empires come and go, but villages endure. why? small scale (big enough but not too big), low complexity (complex enough but not too complex) - but high flexibility. they are not rich enough or big enough to justify a lot of effort (you may recall the harris decision matrix). nobody wants them. people think they are full of idiots (is there any social form that doesn’t have idiots?).
the bigger and more complex the society becomes, the more rigid, inflexible and unpredictable it becomes (as well as stupid). they always devolve back to the village level.
want to preserve yourself and your family? build a village J
have fun, biz
From: JStu...@aol.com [mailto:JStu...@aol.com]
Sent: Monday, October 9, 2017 9:38 PM
To: biz...@gmail.com
Subject: Re: collapse outlook: production - the air crete domicile
Dear biz,
You have articulated here what could well be one of the most important questions
we face as a species. That is, whether we are likely to survive as a species for a few
more millenia. I find your argument to be compelling so I will remove that one from my personal
long list of worries.
But the horror, oh the horror, of the environment having to force us to reduce our numbers
to a sustainable level. Sad enough that lemmings and other creatures do not know
the limits of their environment. But sadder still that we have the intelligence and thus
the knowledge to know there are options but we refuse to take advantage of that knowledge.
All the unnecessary pain and carnage remains on my list of sad inevitabilities.
Apparently we are enslaved by our complex adaptive systems without the collective will and wisdom to
rise above them. Perhaps we stupidly believe it is the will of our gods.
Jack
In a message dated 10/8/2017 7:58:07 A.M. Eastern Daylight Time, biz...@gmail.com writes:
yes, we have developed cultures that are complex adaptive systems:
http://www.trojanmice.com/articles/complexadaptivesystems.htm
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Complex_adaptive_system
a cas is constantly changing in a search to 'fit' the environment it senses and uses. its goal is survival, not sustainability. this means that a cas is not static as long as its environment changes, and, as the first article suggested, the cas itself is one agent of environmental change. for example, as we change the level of petro resources, the feedback from the environment changes, producing a new state in the cas. states that don’t 'work' create feedback as well, so the cas 'bounces around' inside its solution space.
unfortunately, the game of adaptation is messy, but the alternative is worse J and, as the article states as well, complex systems in equilibrium die, i.e. the ability to change is what keeps a cas alive, not its ability to maintain a static equilibrium.
humanity is a biological species that creates cas's in order to adapt to its environment. that is the only requirement nature places on humankind. 'success' in nature is survival, but the quality of that survival is merely a population of members that can reproduce enough to avoid extinction. that is 'sustainability' in nature. under that definition, there is absolutely no evidence that we are unsustainable as a species. the level of species population only matters at the lower limit, not the upper limit.
what we are whining about is the sustainability of a particular form of our cas, which will not and should not be persistent (nor any other form, including 'sustainable' ones). it will vanish because all states of a cas are doomed to vanish, replaced by new states that seek a better 'fit' to the environment. as a cas transitions from one state to another, agents within it will experience different effects, positive and negative. the primate strategy is to 'buffer' the effects of change with a center/periphery social form, where the effect of change is faster in the periphery than the core, allowing the core additional time to adapt, i.e. make changes to the cas. in other words, the periphery dies first, then the core J
our current population levels, within the current state of our cas, have not reached the levels where die off exceeds reproduction. we will expand population to the limit of our cas; there are no 'ideas' powerful enough to stop such a primal imperative. the only issue seems to be about what type of die off occurs: can we, under the current cas, achieve a gradual move to the equilibrium point? or will we have a more abrupt die off to put us back inside the survival space? keep in mind, the solution space is based on the minimum survivable population, not the maximum J so die off can exceed reproduction for quite a while, and even a large die off, at a level of 7 billion, will be well within the survival space.
as you point out, the social structure layer of culture contains its regulatory function. as long as we see population increasing, the regulatory function is working. even when we have die off, as long as we produce a minimum survivable population, the regulatory function is working. from nature's point of view, growing populations increase survivability (more margin of error) - falling populations are the problem. fluctuation in populations are normal, as populations move up and cross the limit of their cas, they fall back. there is feedback at every level of population that stimulates cas change. population will bounce around within the cas survival space (which constantly changes as the cas changes). human population has been increasing, for the most part, steadily in this particular glacial interval, so we havent hit the limit yet.
if we look at the set of possible cas's that can sustain a survivable minimum population, it looks pretty large. so I would say, sit back, relax and enjoy the ride J
the infrastructure, based on the core production platform and the core population platform (somatic and psychological), defines the limit of survivability, not the regulatory mechanism. the regulatory mechanism only fails if it corrupts the infrastructure to the degree that it cannot maintain a minimum survivable population (not the maximum). the infrastructure only fails if it destroys the environment to the degree that no possible alternative infrastructure can maintain a minimum survivable population (not the maximum).
there is no evidence that the current cas is anywhere near these conditions. all the political and economic behavior we observe is mostly just bull shit, chickens clucking over who gets the corn. it is as Shakespeare said:
She should have died hereafter.
There would have been a time for such a word.
Tomorrow, and tomorrow, and tomorrow,
Creeps in this petty pace from day to day
To the last syllable of recorded time,
And all our yesterdays have lighted fools
The way to dusty death. Out, out, brief candle!
Life’s but a walking shadow, a poor player
That struts and frets his hour upon the stage
And then is heard no more. It is a tale
Told by an idiot, full of sound and fury,
Signifying nothing.
the sustainability of a particular state of the cas is not a requirement in nature at all; in fact, it is an impossibility. the sustainability of a particular population level is also not a requirement of nature at all. survival is the goal, not a particular state of the cas or a particular level of population (above the minimum survivable level). the last thing nature cares about is some wimpy asshole in malibu whining about whether there will be a latte tomorrow or enough help to make it J
have fun, biz
From: JStu...@aol.com [mailto:JStu...@aol.com]
Sent: Saturday, October 7, 2017 9:08 PM
To: biz...@gmail.com
Subject: Re: collapse outlook: production - the air crete domicileSeems to mean that we could put increasing billions of humans into structures that protect them from a wide range of environmental conditions.
But why stop there? By using air crete (or some similar building materiel) we could erect condo like living spaces that would allow increasing billions of us to "fit" here.
Eventually we will need to to replace all the conventional houses people like you and I have lived in or are living in now because they are too energy inefficient to build, maintain, and live in.
What is the overarching requirement for mankind? Housing more of us more efficiently? Or is it a requirement to find economic, political, religious and social solutions to our predisposition to make more of us. We have to reach a concensus on population control as well as a transition to not just a "more" sustainable way of life, we must find an actually sustainable way of life. And our economic, political, religious and social systems drive us in the opposite direction.
What's a fellow to do?
In a message dated 10/7/2017 7:43:00 A.M. Eastern Daylight Time, biz...@gmail.com writes:
I don’t see how you make it much simpler than this - panelize the air crete: