(*Reprinted from Food Poisoning for Thought as part my ongoing process to unify my web presence.*)
I think my greatest fear is that I can take it. I fear that as much as I
Hate the world, it won't break me. I won't truly commit to changing or
fighting what I know to be evil. I fear I'll never reach the point of
yelling, "no more!"
Showing posts with label fear. Show all posts
Showing posts with label fear. Show all posts
Thursday, August 3, 2017
Monday, October 13, 2014
Monday Meditations: What is the fear that drives domesticated man?
What is the fear that drives domesticated man? Where does his terror lie? What drives him to lock his dead away from their nurturing mother in the final sleep? What drives him to coat the comfortable ground with stone and steel until the earth sleeps so far below that it cannot be felt? What drives him to insulate himself within buildings so much larger than are needed? What drives him to interact with the world and with other domesticated humans through ever more convoluted intermediaries?
(domesticate man can safely be referred to as male- for his politics explicitly marginalize the female as well as the minority and the servant and the slave)
Let us examine the words in common across differing views. Lets us look for the assumptions not questioned, but held by all.
"That he may have dominion over . . . every creature."
Genesis 1:26
"There is not, within the wide range of philosophical inquiry, a subject more intensely interesting to all who thirst for knowledge, than the precise nature of that important mental superiority which elevates the human being above the brute, and enables man alone to assume the sway wheresoever he plants his dwelling; and to induce changes in the constitution and adaptions (sic) of other species, which have no parallel where his interference is unknown."
by Edward Blyth
(The Magazine of Natural History Vol. 10. 1837)
"If it can be shown possible for man to have descended or ascended from the lower animals, it will require enormous additional evidence to show that such descent is probable; and still much more to make it certain. "
by Rev William A. William
"Homo heidelbergensis was developing a complex mind - once this boundary had been reached, there was no turning back."
"The more disciplined behavior (behavior determined by intellect) displayed by the individual, the more human he becomes. The less disciplined behavior (behavior in response to instinct) displayed by an individual, the more he becomes like the lower order animals that are lacking in intellect and are driven by their instincts. "
The assumptions should be clear.
Domesticated man does not consider himself an animal. Or, if forced to admit that indeed he is an animal in the technical sense, then domesticated man maintains that he is so different- so above- other animals so as to render the argument moot.
I would like to use a different quote to draw attention to the second assumption in the above quotations.
"It is an important and popular fact that things are not always what they seem. For instance, on the planet Earth, man had always assumed that he was more intelligent than dolphins because he had achieved so much - the wheel, New York, wars and so on - whilst all the dolphins had ever done was muck about in the water having a good time. But conversely, the dolphins had always believed that they were far more intelligent than man - for precisely the same reasons."
Why is domesticated man afraid of being an animal? Why is domesticated man so driven to enforce his conception of order upon an already perfectly functioning and ordered world? What does this have to do with domesticated man's need to hide from the world he is seeking to re-order in his own image?
So many questions. So much fear.
Monday, October 6, 2014
Monday Meditations: Rotting Life and Decomposition Phobia
The domesticated human is afraid of death and more precisely- afraid of decomposition. Dead human bodies are sealed in boxes before they are allowed to enter the earth, safe now from every remixing with the land that birthed and sustained them, safe now from ever returning and being part of the next cycle of life. The domesticated human removes themselves from the landscape, from the eco-system. They take food, they take air and they take in minerals and nutrients, but never return them- as is the bargain life makes with itself.
The domesticated human is a thief and a parasite. The domesticated humans takes and takes and does not give back. So the question arises- why not?
The domesticated human is afraid to die, afraid to rot, afraid to give back, afraid to return. Do they fear retribution, angry vengeance from the rest of the earthy community if they allow their body and perhaps their spirit to rejoin the earth from which it was composed?
Do they fear something else?
Do they fear many other things?
Wednesday, September 24, 2014
The Future
I want to talk to you today and I want to let you know that you are the most important generation in history. And that because of that, history will remember people like you and me as history's greatest villains. The world is in danger on multiple levels.
The evidence has been obvious for years. But only now are people starting to accept the evidence in large numbers. As a result, this generation- you and I will be blamed for the collapse that is likely coming. This is not fair, but this is how it is.
The previous generation- your parents and mine- will claim ignorance. They will say that the signs weren't clear. They are lying, of course, to save their guilty souls. The signs were clear. Our parents simply stuck their heads into the sand and passed the buck to us. Well, unfortunately for us- the buck seems to have stopped here. Our parents are busy playing denial or pass the blame or both. So we are all that's left.
And based on our performance so far- history will remember us as villains and cowards- as world breakers. In the time it has taken to say this. Another species is likely extinct, 15 will be extinct by the end of this hour, over 300 by the end of the day. Between 300 and 600 acres of rain forest will have been deforested permanently. Almost 300 people will have been born, onto a planet whose population has gone from 1.5 billion to 6.7 billion is roughly 100 years.
Species extinction, deforestation and associated ecosystem destruction, overpopulation.
Why do we allow this?
Because its too big? Because we need to make a living? Because we have bills to pay and assignments to hand in? Because time spent saving the world means an F in biology or not paying the cable bill?
How dare we.
A Formal Objection
The paragraph above exemplifies nearly everything destructive and self-defeating about our civilization. It articulates near perfectly almost the whole of the Industrialized Nation's philosophy.
Let us start with this passage. It is, just to start, patently untrue. This statement implies that the natural world lies in disorder without us civilized humans. That the water cycle, and erosion and plate tectonics are disordered and without pattern. That natural selection and macro-evolution are just random events. That ecosystems are simply random collections of animals and plants. The ignorance in this statement is simply astounding.
The second half of the sentence is even worse however.
Tribal cultures have an incredible level of order- just to limit ourselves to humans for the moment. Pretending that there is a higher level of complexity in civilized society fails to take into account all the myriad of nuances of tribal society.
Beyond human affairs however, the passage says implicitly and explicitly that what civilized humans make is more complex than a leaf of lettuce or a grain of millet and the accompanying plant that produced it, and the accompanying ecosystem, food web/food chain that made that plant possible- tying together thousands of species and even more apparently inanimate forces such as the wind and the nitrogen cycle.
The arrogance in this statement, arrogance that is left as a premise and not even examined by its author, is almost beyond belief. Or at least, the arrogance would be beyond belief if it did not come from a culture with a ten thousand year history of such arrogance.
The next sentence is not as bad, but it has within it one of the key miss-assumptions of civilized humanity.
By assuming that the world is harsh, everything becomes an enemy or an attack. This basic belief in a hostile wilderness (the wilderness itself being an invention of civilized humanity) is what allows us to drive all species before us and destroy them whenever they resist or simply stand in the way of our expansion.
This statement is partially true on the surface. Such societies are rarely more adaptive and just as rarely better at solving problems. They don't need to be either, because they can simply pour energy into the problem. Much in the way a rich person can simply spend money to make most problems go away.
And this does not make the rich person more adaptive. They pay other people to be adaptive. All of this does make the society more resilient however- at least temporarily. The weakness of this statement is that such societies are thus dependent upon a mass of cheap and readily available energy.
In other words, such societies are addicted to energy. They are slaves to cheap fuel and act like junkies when they need another 'hit' of cheap energy to keep their economies and the accompanying systems running.
Another Path?
Instead of looking at the world around us as both a dangerous wild place and also as a giant piggy bank we can take as much from as we like, we should instead look at the world as a partner.
The world is not alien. We have made ourselves very alien, but the earth is not alien at all. The earth is our home and our parent and our partner in our continued existence.
We need to treat it like an equal. Take what we need, but never again become so gluttonously greedy. Give back to the earth when we take from it. Treat it, and by association ourselves and our children, with respect.
This lifestyle will necessitate adaptive cultures, and resilient cultures, because your become more capable and adaptive and resilient when you cannot simply throw money/energy at a problem and attempt to over power it. In such cases you must be creative and capable and - obviously- better at solving problems.
Our problem is that all that -very limited- high energy fuel has made us very lazy; and wealth has taken the place of ingenuity. We need to regain our ingenuity and our resilience. And that starts with changing our premises.
The earth is not a wilderness, full of disorder and dangers. It is our home and our workshop and out school. We do not need more energy to be more adaptive and resilient. We need more ingenuity, more mental flexibility and more competence to be adaptive and resilient.
We need to seek enough, not more. We need to work with our partners on this planet- the animals, the green plants, the fungi, the bacteria. We have been at war with 1.5 million species, as well as the ecosystem that makes our continued survival possible, and it is a war we cannot win.
We need a whole new world view, and we need it now.
The evidence has been obvious for years. But only now are people starting to accept the evidence in large numbers. As a result, this generation- you and I will be blamed for the collapse that is likely coming. This is not fair, but this is how it is.
The previous generation- your parents and mine- will claim ignorance. They will say that the signs weren't clear. They are lying, of course, to save their guilty souls. The signs were clear. Our parents simply stuck their heads into the sand and passed the buck to us. Well, unfortunately for us- the buck seems to have stopped here. Our parents are busy playing denial or pass the blame or both. So we are all that's left.
And based on our performance so far- history will remember us as villains and cowards- as world breakers. In the time it has taken to say this. Another species is likely extinct, 15 will be extinct by the end of this hour, over 300 by the end of the day. Between 300 and 600 acres of rain forest will have been deforested permanently. Almost 300 people will have been born, onto a planet whose population has gone from 1.5 billion to 6.7 billion is roughly 100 years.
Species extinction, deforestation and associated ecosystem destruction, overpopulation.
Why do we allow this?
Because its too big? Because we need to make a living? Because we have bills to pay and assignments to hand in? Because time spent saving the world means an F in biology or not paying the cable bill?
How dare we.
"Of Course, these are critical services, but energy's role in our lives is actually more fundamental, essential, and subtle. We extract energy from our environment to create order out of disorder and complexity out of simplicity. Put simply, societies with access to lots of energy are generally more adaptive, resilient, and better at solving problems."
(The Upside of Down, by Thomas Homer-Dixon, page 37)
A Formal Objection
The paragraph above exemplifies nearly everything destructive and self-defeating about our civilization. It articulates near perfectly almost the whole of the Industrialized Nation's philosophy.
"We extract energy from our environment to create order out of disorder..."
Let us start with this passage. It is, just to start, patently untrue. This statement implies that the natural world lies in disorder without us civilized humans. That the water cycle, and erosion and plate tectonics are disordered and without pattern. That natural selection and macro-evolution are just random events. That ecosystems are simply random collections of animals and plants. The ignorance in this statement is simply astounding.
The second half of the sentence is even worse however.
"...and complexity out of simplicity."
Tribal cultures have an incredible level of order- just to limit ourselves to humans for the moment. Pretending that there is a higher level of complexity in civilized society fails to take into account all the myriad of nuances of tribal society.
Beyond human affairs however, the passage says implicitly and explicitly that what civilized humans make is more complex than a leaf of lettuce or a grain of millet and the accompanying plant that produced it, and the accompanying ecosystem, food web/food chain that made that plant possible- tying together thousands of species and even more apparently inanimate forces such as the wind and the nitrogen cycle.
The arrogance in this statement, arrogance that is left as a premise and not even examined by its author, is almost beyond belief. Or at least, the arrogance would be beyond belief if it did not come from a culture with a ten thousand year history of such arrogance.
The next sentence is not as bad, but it has within it one of the key miss-assumptions of civilized humanity.
"We often use this order and complexity, in turn, to help us solve the problems we face- for instance, to shelter ourselves from our harsh environment and to protect ourselves from attack."
By assuming that the world is harsh, everything becomes an enemy or an attack. This basic belief in a hostile wilderness (the wilderness itself being an invention of civilized humanity) is what allows us to drive all species before us and destroy them whenever they resist or simply stand in the way of our expansion.
"Put simply, societies with access to lots of energy are generally more adaptive, resilient, and better at solving problems."
This statement is partially true on the surface. Such societies are rarely more adaptive and just as rarely better at solving problems. They don't need to be either, because they can simply pour energy into the problem. Much in the way a rich person can simply spend money to make most problems go away.
And this does not make the rich person more adaptive. They pay other people to be adaptive. All of this does make the society more resilient however- at least temporarily. The weakness of this statement is that such societies are thus dependent upon a mass of cheap and readily available energy.
In other words, such societies are addicted to energy. They are slaves to cheap fuel and act like junkies when they need another 'hit' of cheap energy to keep their economies and the accompanying systems running.
Never despair; but if you do, work on in despair.
-Edmund Burke
Another Path?
Instead of looking at the world around us as both a dangerous wild place and also as a giant piggy bank we can take as much from as we like, we should instead look at the world as a partner.
The world is not alien. We have made ourselves very alien, but the earth is not alien at all. The earth is our home and our parent and our partner in our continued existence.
We need to treat it like an equal. Take what we need, but never again become so gluttonously greedy. Give back to the earth when we take from it. Treat it, and by association ourselves and our children, with respect.
This lifestyle will necessitate adaptive cultures, and resilient cultures, because your become more capable and adaptive and resilient when you cannot simply throw money/energy at a problem and attempt to over power it. In such cases you must be creative and capable and - obviously- better at solving problems.
Our problem is that all that -very limited- high energy fuel has made us very lazy; and wealth has taken the place of ingenuity. We need to regain our ingenuity and our resilience. And that starts with changing our premises.
The earth is not a wilderness, full of disorder and dangers. It is our home and our workshop and out school. We do not need more energy to be more adaptive and resilient. We need more ingenuity, more mental flexibility and more competence to be adaptive and resilient.
We need to seek enough, not more. We need to work with our partners on this planet- the animals, the green plants, the fungi, the bacteria. We have been at war with 1.5 million species, as well as the ecosystem that makes our continued survival possible, and it is a war we cannot win.
We need a whole new world view, and we need it now.
Tuesday, September 16, 2014
Denial of Death - Denial of Consequences
We need to welcome death. Death is the creator of life. Dying, silently, painfully, violently, peacefully- however- is what generates momentum that creates energy, space, resources and opportunity for the next generation.
Karl Marx famously declared on his death bed that last words were for those who hadn't said enough in life. I would argue that fear of death is for those amongst us who haven't done enough in life. If I am right in my assertion, then this speaks volumes for our culture.
Death creates life. Decomposition is fuel for the next bloom of life cycle. Everything has its turn in the sun, and everything must surrender to death eventually. If we do not admit that we must die, and take this truth into account, we will fill the world with so much life that there is no longer enough death to feed our next generation. And then, like the locusts who clear the plains of Africa with their hunger and die in a blaze of glory to feed the next generation- we will learn the hard way that death will not be denied.
Monday, September 15, 2014
Monday Meditations: Rotting Life and Decomposition Phobia
The domesticated human is afraid of death and more precisely- afraid of decomposition. Dead human bodies are sealed in boxes before they are allowed to enter the earth, safe now from every remixing with the land that birthed and sustained them, safe now from ever returning and being part of the next cycle of life. The domesticated human removes themselves from the landscape, from the eco-system. They take food, they take air and they take in minerals and nutrients, but never return them- as is the bargain life makes with itself.
The domesticated human is a thief and a parasite. The domesticated humans takes and takes and does not give back. So the question arises- why not?
The domesticated human is afraid to die, afraid to rot, afraid to give back, afraid to return. Do they fear retribution, angry vengeance from the rest of the earthy community if they allow their body and perhaps their spirit to rejoin the earth from which it was composed?
Do they fear something else?
Do they fear many other things?
Saturday, September 6, 2014
Saturday Thoughts: Professional Fighting VS. Actual Fighting
I was reading the paper recently, something that I do only occasionally, and I stumbled upon an article arguing the pros and cons of different scoring systems for mixed martial arts sporting competitions. This struck me as reaching to a central problem in our culture- we want somebody else to decide.
Of the mixed martial arts competitions out there, the UFC (Ultimate Fighting Championship) is arguably the biggest. It uses a complicated judge run scoring system to determine what happens whenever there is no clear winner- which is often in recent years. This, however, was not always the case.
In the first several UFC competitions, there were no judges and- in fact- the competition trumpeted this as a positive thing. A doctor was at ringside and could stop the fight to prevent permanent injury. A refereee was in the ring to prevent illegal blows. A corner could throw in the towel for the fighter if they feared for his ability to defend himself. That was it. The fight went until a fighter was knocked out, tapped out, or the fight was stopped by one of the afformentioned officials for safety's sake.
The argument for judges, derives from the desire by TV producers to put a time limit on fights so as to prevent a fight from running outside the time alloted for the television slot. Once a time limit is added, there seems to be no way to avoid judges. And once judges are added, fighters can begin to work the clock and act aggressive rather than fight effectively in order to please the judges.
A simple solution would be to add the time limit; and then score both fights with a loss on their record if the fight goes the distance without a clear winner. The problem with this is that, domesticated culture wants a winner and doesn't like systems that are self-running. Domesticated culture needs to see oversight and managers and judges- these things validate our view that world needs to be managed and ruled.
Because after all, if things can manage themselves, "Oh my gosh, what will our Kings and Priests do?"
Of the mixed martial arts competitions out there, the UFC (Ultimate Fighting Championship) is arguably the biggest. It uses a complicated judge run scoring system to determine what happens whenever there is no clear winner- which is often in recent years. This, however, was not always the case.
In the first several UFC competitions, there were no judges and- in fact- the competition trumpeted this as a positive thing. A doctor was at ringside and could stop the fight to prevent permanent injury. A refereee was in the ring to prevent illegal blows. A corner could throw in the towel for the fighter if they feared for his ability to defend himself. That was it. The fight went until a fighter was knocked out, tapped out, or the fight was stopped by one of the afformentioned officials for safety's sake.
The argument for judges, derives from the desire by TV producers to put a time limit on fights so as to prevent a fight from running outside the time alloted for the television slot. Once a time limit is added, there seems to be no way to avoid judges. And once judges are added, fighters can begin to work the clock and act aggressive rather than fight effectively in order to please the judges.
A simple solution would be to add the time limit; and then score both fights with a loss on their record if the fight goes the distance without a clear winner. The problem with this is that, domesticated culture wants a winner and doesn't like systems that are self-running. Domesticated culture needs to see oversight and managers and judges- these things validate our view that world needs to be managed and ruled.
Because after all, if things can manage themselves, "Oh my gosh, what will our Kings and Priests do?"
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