Sometimes I feel like I'm barely getting anywhere. The recent world events (near collapse of the global banking industry, high likelihood of global depression, war, "terror" attacks, etc.) have brought the need to move to a better way of life where my family can ride out the tribulations into sharper focus.
Then I step back and look at where I am vs. where I was just a year ago. We're about to head out to Vancouver, which is the first huge step on our road to our new life (not counting Simon, of course). All the small steps that have led up to this point have been tough but worthwhile. The shift in our mental state has been dramatic, to the point where we're more than ready to be gone.
I feel that while I don't know all the details of what lies ahead of me, the act of finally taking that first big step onto the road will quickly bring all of that into focus.
The downside is that the road ahead may be a lot bumpier than it otherwise would be if the world held steady for a few more years. The old Chinese curse comes to mind: May you live in interesting times.
Friday, December 5, 2008
Wednesday, May 21, 2008
Been a while
This was a draft I started in May 2008
The harsh reality of life right now is that I have to work within the system I want to leave to facilitate my escape from it, so it's been a while since I've had the time or inclination to write.
Expanding on the fifth point of my previous post, that we are not above the world around us, there is a particular conceit among many cultures that the ability to destroy something gives one power over it. This is, in fact, true: we hold the power of life and death over much of the world in a way that most of the other animals that inhabit it do not. I don't think it's possible that we could permanently erase all life on earth without a concerted effort, it certainly is conceivable. There was a time when man, collectively, feared the wilderness. That the cities were bastions that kept that which we feared at bay. Now the wilderness is something that has been conquered. There are few natural events that give us much pause. We can now reasonably build structures that the mightiest hurricanes, earthquakes and tornadoes can't do significant damage to.
The harsh reality of life right now is that I have to work within the system I want to leave to facilitate my escape from it, so it's been a while since I've had the time or inclination to write.
Expanding on the fifth point of my previous post, that we are not above the world around us, there is a particular conceit among many cultures that the ability to destroy something gives one power over it. This is, in fact, true: we hold the power of life and death over much of the world in a way that most of the other animals that inhabit it do not. I don't think it's possible that we could permanently erase all life on earth without a concerted effort, it certainly is conceivable. There was a time when man, collectively, feared the wilderness. That the cities were bastions that kept that which we feared at bay. Now the wilderness is something that has been conquered. There are few natural events that give us much pause. We can now reasonably build structures that the mightiest hurricanes, earthquakes and tornadoes can't do significant damage to.
Friday, December 21, 2007
Thoughts for the day
The key difference between humans and our animal brothers is not our ability to think. All animals possess unique adaptations: that is ours. Rather, it's our capacity for arrogance in thinking that we're above natural law.
-----
Western society is, essentially, a very large pyramid scheme, and we're running out of people to force into the bottom rung.
Friday, November 23, 2007
On Capitalism, again
Started this one over a year ago. Good to come back to it.
It's interesting: I used to think I was pro-capitalism. What I've realized is that I'm not pro-capitalism, I'm pro-free-market, but in a very strict sense. For a free market to function, the people must be free to choose between goods and services on an informed basis, and free to opt NOT to participate in a consumption based culture. This is essentially impossible for most people born today. In order to own land anywhere in western civilization, you have to pay taxes on that land. This means that you MUST somehow contribute to the system that you may be trying to avoid.
I believe that we need to shift from an ownership based society to a stewardship based society. This is in keeping with my feelings that the Judeo-Christian belief that man was created to rule over the animals is a misinterpretation. The belief by many people of the Yahweh based faiths is that God gave man a place above the animals, to do with as he pleased. I believe that this is a corruption of what ancient (and more modern "primitive") peoples knew: that for the earth to provide for us, we need to live in stewardship of the land. Rather than act as if it is a possession for us to do with as we please, we were entrusted with responsibility for the land, and have failed miserably in keeping watch over our charge.
Healing of our relationship with the planet cannot begin until we take a hard look at how we've behaved as a culture. The so-called progress of the last 10,000 years has been an wholesale plundering of the world's resources with little thought for how we should responsibly live within our means. It might seem trite to refer to a popular movie, but the description of humanity in the Matrix had an eerily pure ring to it: humanity, or at least the dominant part of it, most resembles a virus that invades, poisons and chokes off another organism.
The problem with perception that causes us to perpetually fail at this needed introspection is the curse of incrementalism. Given our lifespans and relatively narrow frame of reference, it's very difficult to see how the bits of damage that we do add up to a major catastrophe. Very broad-minded thinkers have been able to make observations about what's happened and what's happening, and they've sounded alarm bells for generations now. Outside of our culture, though, there are other societies that have a more natural way of living, and a stronger connection to the history of the place where they live. It's difficult for Americans to understand, as we've only been on this continent for a few hundred years. The native populations still maintain the stories of their ancestors, when food was so abundant that you could catch fish with your bare hands, bring home plenty of meat for your village and gather whatever you needed from near your home. We have no frame of reference beyond the institutionalized story of Thanksgiving, and no real connection to the land itself now that the vast majority live as part of the city-sprawl networks fed by factory farms and institutional agriculture. We hear stories told by our parents about how this or that area was woods or farm when they were kids, but our culture is so mobile now that even that has little meaning as a child grows up in one or more areas, likely not close to where his parents grew up, then moves away to a college town and finds a job in the nearest city, or possibly another city far away.
The pursuit of capital is directly to blame for this state of affairs. Not so long ago, it was rare, indeed, for a person to travel more than a few miles from their home on any regular basis. The people knew the land, they knew their place in the order of things. Now ones place is mutable. This is good in some ways, but it also harms our connection to the land and one another. By seeing markets from a global perspective, we learn how best to manipulate those markets. But we need to see more than markets to fulfill our role not as owners, but as stewards. Understanding that introducing a commodity in limited supply to a world market will deplete that supply and possibly damage the system that it is a part of is far more important in the long term than the profit to be made by exploiting the resource. But the failure of our culture's moral system leads us to believe that if we "own" it, the consequences are unimportant.
Localized economies have inherent stability based on factors like what crops grow well in a particular climate, what natural resources are readily available and what the nature of the land is. A protected bay, for example, will likely be a port. Without careful management, the introduction of foreign influence on these local economies can drastically change the face of those economies: an area that has good wood can be quickly stripped bare, leaving the locals with reduced resources; an area with ability to support a limited population can be propped up based on resources pouring into that area, but when those resources become scarce, the population is left starving. This isn't the problem of the capitalist, but it is the problem of the locals. The locals may not understand the consequences – resources that have seemed endless may suddenly become scarce, or the greed of some will overshadow the conservative planning of others.
The point of all of this is that capitalism is a great tool for making money, but it must only be one tool in a greater tool set used for managing our resources.
It's interesting: I used to think I was pro-capitalism. What I've realized is that I'm not pro-capitalism, I'm pro-free-market, but in a very strict sense. For a free market to function, the people must be free to choose between goods and services on an informed basis, and free to opt NOT to participate in a consumption based culture. This is essentially impossible for most people born today. In order to own land anywhere in western civilization, you have to pay taxes on that land. This means that you MUST somehow contribute to the system that you may be trying to avoid.
I believe that we need to shift from an ownership based society to a stewardship based society. This is in keeping with my feelings that the Judeo-Christian belief that man was created to rule over the animals is a misinterpretation. The belief by many people of the Yahweh based faiths is that God gave man a place above the animals, to do with as he pleased. I believe that this is a corruption of what ancient (and more modern "primitive") peoples knew: that for the earth to provide for us, we need to live in stewardship of the land. Rather than act as if it is a possession for us to do with as we please, we were entrusted with responsibility for the land, and have failed miserably in keeping watch over our charge.
Healing of our relationship with the planet cannot begin until we take a hard look at how we've behaved as a culture. The so-called progress of the last 10,000 years has been an wholesale plundering of the world's resources with little thought for how we should responsibly live within our means. It might seem trite to refer to a popular movie, but the description of humanity in the Matrix had an eerily pure ring to it: humanity, or at least the dominant part of it, most resembles a virus that invades, poisons and chokes off another organism.
The problem with perception that causes us to perpetually fail at this needed introspection is the curse of incrementalism. Given our lifespans and relatively narrow frame of reference, it's very difficult to see how the bits of damage that we do add up to a major catastrophe. Very broad-minded thinkers have been able to make observations about what's happened and what's happening, and they've sounded alarm bells for generations now. Outside of our culture, though, there are other societies that have a more natural way of living, and a stronger connection to the history of the place where they live. It's difficult for Americans to understand, as we've only been on this continent for a few hundred years. The native populations still maintain the stories of their ancestors, when food was so abundant that you could catch fish with your bare hands, bring home plenty of meat for your village and gather whatever you needed from near your home. We have no frame of reference beyond the institutionalized story of Thanksgiving, and no real connection to the land itself now that the vast majority live as part of the city-sprawl networks fed by factory farms and institutional agriculture. We hear stories told by our parents about how this or that area was woods or farm when they were kids, but our culture is so mobile now that even that has little meaning as a child grows up in one or more areas, likely not close to where his parents grew up, then moves away to a college town and finds a job in the nearest city, or possibly another city far away.
The pursuit of capital is directly to blame for this state of affairs. Not so long ago, it was rare, indeed, for a person to travel more than a few miles from their home on any regular basis. The people knew the land, they knew their place in the order of things. Now ones place is mutable. This is good in some ways, but it also harms our connection to the land and one another. By seeing markets from a global perspective, we learn how best to manipulate those markets. But we need to see more than markets to fulfill our role not as owners, but as stewards. Understanding that introducing a commodity in limited supply to a world market will deplete that supply and possibly damage the system that it is a part of is far more important in the long term than the profit to be made by exploiting the resource. But the failure of our culture's moral system leads us to believe that if we "own" it, the consequences are unimportant.
Localized economies have inherent stability based on factors like what crops grow well in a particular climate, what natural resources are readily available and what the nature of the land is. A protected bay, for example, will likely be a port. Without careful management, the introduction of foreign influence on these local economies can drastically change the face of those economies: an area that has good wood can be quickly stripped bare, leaving the locals with reduced resources; an area with ability to support a limited population can be propped up based on resources pouring into that area, but when those resources become scarce, the population is left starving. This isn't the problem of the capitalist, but it is the problem of the locals. The locals may not understand the consequences – resources that have seemed endless may suddenly become scarce, or the greed of some will overshadow the conservative planning of others.
The point of all of this is that capitalism is a great tool for making money, but it must only be one tool in a greater tool set used for managing our resources.
Expansion of Premises
So I should mention in the name of full disclosure that much of my thinking on this stuff is being heavily influenced by my choice in reading material of late. Ask me in person if you're interested in what it is.
I want to expand on Premise 2 of my last post, that there are many things that we take for granted that are, in fact, false. When viewed in the short span of our lifetimes, they may seem as true as the sun rising in the east and setting in the west, but with the benefit of some historical analysis, we can see that they're as false as the illusion that the sun is circling the earth.
The first thing we take for granted is that our current state of being is in any way a natural one. For most of human existence, people lived in hunter/gatherer style groups, some nomadic, some relatively stable. The state of being removed so thoroughly from our food sources, our homes/shelter, and the creation of our cultural artifacts alienates us from the simple joys of life and is a very new experience for humans. Even until very recently (less than 100 years ago), most of the products we consumed(1) could be easily traced to a local producer who was responsible for their creation.
The second thing that we take for granted, coming to life within a capitalist society, is the primacy of capitalism. On the one hand, the idea of a free market seems to make a lot of sense, and is very much how commerce began: one person had item A, another had item B, and they freely chose whether or not to exchange these items. However, our market is so far from free at this point that any idea that we are somehow benefiting from it is utter delusion. A free market, in order to function properly, must allow also for the free flow of information about the items being exchanged. Otherwise, the people engaging in transactions are making choices that are not truly free. Without knowledge of the production techniques used in bringing items of consumption to us, we can only make comparisons on relatively inane details: aesthetics, price, comfort, etc. We cannot, for example, easily make a choice based on whether production used exploitative labor practices, degraded the environment or involved torture. In fact, it is in the best interests of those bringing products of this nature to market to obfuscate these attributes. The capital market actually facilitates many negative production techniques by generating additional net profit to be reinvested in public relations and marketing.
The third thing we take for granted is that the cost of an item is the same as its dollar value, that which is deducted from our account. I shouldn't need to elaborate on hidden costs with the melting of the ice caps FINALLY making headlines, though I am having a difficult time understanding why it's not the ONLY headline, as climate change is likely going to spell the end of this chapter of our civilization. That's only one example though. Another example is the hidden price of, for example, oil on the people and landbases where the oil comes from. Every time we fill up our tank, we are buying into a system that forces people off their land, causes environmental degradation on a grand scale, and in many cases outright kills people.
The fourth thing we take for granted, related to the third, and the last I'll talk about in this post, is the idea of property, and our right to exploit it as we see fit. Our culture has an unbalanced concept of property rights – that if we own something it is ours to destroy if we so choose. I believe that this comes from the biblical notion that we are meant to be somehow superior to the land and its inhabitants, to rule them. There is a fifth thing that we take for granted, which I will elaborate on in a later post, and that is that we are somehow different from, unconnected to the world around us – that we are above it. The primary difference, in my mind, between us and our non-human neighbors is our capacity for this arrogance. However, the responsibility that comes with 'rulership' (I'm actually looking to move away from this concept towards a term more like 'stewardship') is ignored entirely. When we take actions on our 'possession' (most obviously land) that cause it to be degraded, we reduce its capacity to carry life, and in doing so, we diminish the real value of that possession. While it's easy to see this on a spreadsheet, again, it is the hidden cost to the long term viability of that land that is cause for concern. On a small scale, this seems to be of little consequence. When we reach the economy of scale that we are now experiencing approaching a population of 7 billion, we finally realize (quite likely too late at this point) that exploitation of our landbase without true concern for its long term viability is long term suicide.
Some cultures believe that you cannot own any more than you can carry on your back. If we apply this concept to our property rights, that you are only entitled to damage your own possessions, and you are responsible for the maintenance of anything beyond that in order to sustain life, we could truly reach a point of a sustainable culture.
(1) – "Consumption" itself is a relatively new concept in many ways.
I want to expand on Premise 2 of my last post, that there are many things that we take for granted that are, in fact, false. When viewed in the short span of our lifetimes, they may seem as true as the sun rising in the east and setting in the west, but with the benefit of some historical analysis, we can see that they're as false as the illusion that the sun is circling the earth.
The first thing we take for granted is that our current state of being is in any way a natural one. For most of human existence, people lived in hunter/gatherer style groups, some nomadic, some relatively stable. The state of being removed so thoroughly from our food sources, our homes/shelter, and the creation of our cultural artifacts alienates us from the simple joys of life and is a very new experience for humans. Even until very recently (less than 100 years ago), most of the products we consumed(1) could be easily traced to a local producer who was responsible for their creation.
The second thing that we take for granted, coming to life within a capitalist society, is the primacy of capitalism. On the one hand, the idea of a free market seems to make a lot of sense, and is very much how commerce began: one person had item A, another had item B, and they freely chose whether or not to exchange these items. However, our market is so far from free at this point that any idea that we are somehow benefiting from it is utter delusion. A free market, in order to function properly, must allow also for the free flow of information about the items being exchanged. Otherwise, the people engaging in transactions are making choices that are not truly free. Without knowledge of the production techniques used in bringing items of consumption to us, we can only make comparisons on relatively inane details: aesthetics, price, comfort, etc. We cannot, for example, easily make a choice based on whether production used exploitative labor practices, degraded the environment or involved torture. In fact, it is in the best interests of those bringing products of this nature to market to obfuscate these attributes. The capital market actually facilitates many negative production techniques by generating additional net profit to be reinvested in public relations and marketing.
The third thing we take for granted is that the cost of an item is the same as its dollar value, that which is deducted from our account. I shouldn't need to elaborate on hidden costs with the melting of the ice caps FINALLY making headlines, though I am having a difficult time understanding why it's not the ONLY headline, as climate change is likely going to spell the end of this chapter of our civilization. That's only one example though. Another example is the hidden price of, for example, oil on the people and landbases where the oil comes from. Every time we fill up our tank, we are buying into a system that forces people off their land, causes environmental degradation on a grand scale, and in many cases outright kills people.
The fourth thing we take for granted, related to the third, and the last I'll talk about in this post, is the idea of property, and our right to exploit it as we see fit. Our culture has an unbalanced concept of property rights – that if we own something it is ours to destroy if we so choose. I believe that this comes from the biblical notion that we are meant to be somehow superior to the land and its inhabitants, to rule them. There is a fifth thing that we take for granted, which I will elaborate on in a later post, and that is that we are somehow different from, unconnected to the world around us – that we are above it. The primary difference, in my mind, between us and our non-human neighbors is our capacity for this arrogance. However, the responsibility that comes with 'rulership' (I'm actually looking to move away from this concept towards a term more like 'stewardship') is ignored entirely. When we take actions on our 'possession' (most obviously land) that cause it to be degraded, we reduce its capacity to carry life, and in doing so, we diminish the real value of that possession. While it's easy to see this on a spreadsheet, again, it is the hidden cost to the long term viability of that land that is cause for concern. On a small scale, this seems to be of little consequence. When we reach the economy of scale that we are now experiencing approaching a population of 7 billion, we finally realize (quite likely too late at this point) that exploitation of our landbase without true concern for its long term viability is long term suicide.
Some cultures believe that you cannot own any more than you can carry on your back. If we apply this concept to our property rights, that you are only entitled to damage your own possessions, and you are responsible for the maintenance of anything beyond that in order to sustain life, we could truly reach a point of a sustainable culture.
(1) – "Consumption" itself is a relatively new concept in many ways.
Saturday, September 29, 2007
Where I'm coming from
For the inaugural post in Silent Weapons for Quiet Wars, I feel a bit of an explanation is in order. I've realized recently that there is a war going on that's been raging for 6000 years (give or take), and that we're on the verge of losing that war (or winning it, depending on what side you're on, though in winning, everyone loses). The reason most of us haven't heard about this war is that the perpetrators have had a LOT of experience (6 millenia worth) with getting people who would otherwise be inclined to not be at war to participate unknowingly, and have refined their tactics to ever more subtle and effective means, especially in the last 250 years or so. For a long time, it was pretty easy to not be involved in that war (all you had to do was live somewhere that western civilization hadn't yet reached out to), but around 200 years ago, the last areas that weren't locked in this struggle were finally explored. Now, there's only a very small minority of the world's land that can be said to be free of this conflict, and that's really only because the "generals" haven't needed to get what's there yet.
In case you're wondering what the fuck I'm talking about, let me spell it out: the war I'm referring to is the one that our western civilization is at with the rest of the world. It's the war called expansion. In some ways I use the word war metaphorically, but in some ways I'm being deadly literal, such as in the case of the US government's war in Iraq. There's nothing metaphorical about that.
I'm going to throw out a few basic premises, and expand on them as I go in this blog.
Premise 1. Expansion within a finite space has limits. Seems like a no brainer there.
Premise 2. There are many things that we take for granted that are false. We only take them for granted because we've been indoctrinated to. People who have not been indoctrinated into western culture are universally puzzled by most of our choices.
Premise 3. Western civilization can only continue to function by continued observation of the doctrines mentioned in premise 2.
Premise 4. Capitalism is very good at one thing: concentrating resources in the hands of those who have the most money. It is very bad at just about everything else, with "everything else" defined as providing life, liberty and happiness to the rest of the population.
In case you're wondering what the fuck I'm talking about, let me spell it out: the war I'm referring to is the one that our western civilization is at with the rest of the world. It's the war called expansion. In some ways I use the word war metaphorically, but in some ways I'm being deadly literal, such as in the case of the US government's war in Iraq. There's nothing metaphorical about that.
I'm going to throw out a few basic premises, and expand on them as I go in this blog.
Premise 1. Expansion within a finite space has limits. Seems like a no brainer there.
Premise 2. There are many things that we take for granted that are false. We only take them for granted because we've been indoctrinated to. People who have not been indoctrinated into western culture are universally puzzled by most of our choices.
Premise 3. Western civilization can only continue to function by continued observation of the doctrines mentioned in premise 2.
Premise 4. Capitalism is very good at one thing: concentrating resources in the hands of those who have the most money. It is very bad at just about everything else, with "everything else" defined as providing life, liberty and happiness to the rest of the population.
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