permaculture

[John Schinnerer <john@eco-living.net>]

Aloha,

> Society at large is not equipped to approach the problem in this manner. It 
> has been built around the premise of infinitely convenient transportation at 
> cheap prices. Change that and not only do we precipitate a worldwide depression, 
> we become unable to serve a dispersed population.

We are equipped to change, always have been and always will be (until 
we're extinct anyhow).  We're just not willing (enough, yet).
There are countless useful ideas and good designs and helpful steps from 
tiny to huge that *can* be applied, implemented, taken.
We're just mostly choosing not to do any of that, at least in 
mass/mainstream terms.
The ones we are choosing to focus large amounts of attention on (hybrid 
vehicles, large-scale biofuels, LEED and associated 
high-energy-industrial "green" building, etc.) are just rearranging the 
deck chairs.
Some of them could be useful transitional strategies for localizing and 
energy descent, and, we're mostly not using them that way.

> It's exactly comparable to the distress an organism would feel if it were 
> unable to get enough oxygen. Just advising it to learn how to get by on less air 
> would not be seen as a viable approach. It must have more air! 

The perceived distress may be similar.
The actual situation is not comparable.
An oxygen-breathing organism does in fact absolutely require a certain 
amount of oxygen to continue to live.
We do not in fact absolutely require our current high-energy culture in 
order to continue to live, and even live well.
Part of our problem is not discerning between perceived dangers and 
actual dangers.

> It is a tremendous step forward for
> them and the dinosaurs who lead them just to begin thinking in terms of using 
> switchgrass to generate ethanol. 

It is no step at all in the direction of energy descent, when they are 
clearly talking about doing so in order to maintain and increase current 
energy usage (remember that we have an "endless growth" economy, which 
includes the need for endless growth in available energy).

It doesn't matter what imagined future people won't stand still for.  If 
they have no choice, they will just have to stand still.
There is a lot happening all over the world that one could say people 
won't stand still for - war, torture, famine, despotism, drought, etc. 
And there they (we) are, standing in it.

> Otherwise, a viable approach might be to do something about the projected 
> nine billion humans we're going to have on the planet within the next forty 
> years.

Projections like that, and plans based primarily on them, are part of 
the problem.
As with traffic - planning for projected future traffic pretty much 
guarantees traffic (and much else in 'quality of life') will get worse.

> We need to find a lot of new energy-- and fast.

That's what the junkie says when their regular dealer gets 
busted...ohmigod gotta find a new source for my fix, no time to focus on 
consequences of my behavior in the larger picture.
Enabling denial is IMO only going to make it worse.

I don't even support building a nuke plant in *your* back yard, because 
the poison won't stay there, sooner or later it'll be in my back yard.

hi ho,
John S.

--

John Schinnerer - MA, Whole Systems Design
------------------------------------------
- Eco-Living -
Whole Systems Design Services
People - Place - Learning - Integration
john@eco-living.net
http://eco-living.net