permaculture

[John Schinnerer <JohnS@STLabs.com>]

Aloha,

> -----Original Message-----
> From: uwe [SMTP:uweb@megalink.net.mx]
        >...your post sounded very important to me (the thread it's about),
but I didn't understand a >word. What's the background?

Gee, thanks!  Not sure what you mean by "background"...I particularly
noticed the phrase "...persons who could bend or shape unseen forces to
their will..." as being a dangerous manner of explaining.  Attempting to
"bend or shape" systems about which we cannot know everything (ecosystems,
for a PC example) guarantees that there will be unexpected consequences.  To
me this is clearly exhibited throughout human history, and applies to
engineers and scientists as it does to witches, shamans, priests and so on
(who was it that said "any sufficiently advanced technology will appear to
be magic?").  It applies as well to permaculturists, if we start claiming we
are controlling the larger systems rather than aligning ourselves with them
- and/or if we start playing magician, shaman or technologist rather than
inviting others to their own experiences and understandings.

So...I suspect that true "witches" were (and are) simply people with deeper
understandings of various systems who used those understandings in ways that
could only appear to be "magic" to people without such understandings.
Chief Tecumseh's use of a solar eclipse (which he alone among his people had
learned about) to try and re-solidify the leadership positions of his shaman
and himself would be an example...  Those who really tried to "bend or
shape" without adequate understanding no doubt got (and get) their systemic
(karmic) comeuppance (the Sorcerer's Apprentice comes to mind...as does
large-scale mechanized monocrop high-external-input agriculture... :-)

As for the bit about "sacred," I was saying that I feel "sacred" is
constituted in human actions rather than being a property of any "thing."
For example - a peace pipe or talking stick may be labeled a "sacred
object," but in practice it is the very actions, the emotionings and
relatings of people when they come together to use the pipe or the stick,
that constitutes any sacredness that may arise (as in the original post - it
was relatings between people that stood out from all else in the description
of the spiral dance, not the technical details of the steps or the time
signature of the beat or the number and types of drums or any of that).  

To me, all of this may well have something to do with "-culture" in
"perma-culture"...

John Schinnerer