Eugà ¨ne Delacroix - La libertà © guidant le peuple.jpg by Wikapedia commons
We find ourselves today at, arguably, the most pivotal
moment in the short history of our species. In fact, given that the fate of all life
on Earth is now hanging in the balance (see my recent essay " Hell
on Earth "), we likely stand at the single most pivotal instant in the
multi-billion year saga of life on Earth. What we do, or fail to do, in the
coming years will decide the fate of our species, and possibly of all
Earthlife, irrevocably and forever.
500 years of unending human geographic and economic
expansion are creaking to a certain halt. Soon, economic contraction must
commence. This is coming about because net energy per capita has stagnated, and
must soon begin to decline--even as human population continues to rise from
today's seven billion towards a projected mid-century peak of about ten billion.
Production of "conventional" oil (basically the stuff that
comes out of a typical oil rig) flatlined at around 74 million barrels per day about
eight years ago. Soon, it must begin to
decrease. Much hype has recently surrounded allegedly new recovery and
production techniques such as "fracking." Despite much wishful thinking to the
contrary, this
is not, and indeed cannot be, a "game changer" with respect to energy
production. Strategically we are making the worst, the stupidest, possible
allocation of irreplaceable energy reserves. We are using high net energy
content oil to produce oil with much lower net energy content! The net effect is
that the cost
of energy increases over time, and it does so in an ever
more volatile manner as high prices collapse demand, lowering prices,
increasing demand etc." Worse, fracking
is known to poison water supplies and could cause formerly productive regions to
become uninhabitable, and thus to be subtracted from our food supply. However, from the corporatist perspective, this strategy maximizes quarterly profits, therefore it is "optimal". Political oversight with a view to the long term is lacking because it has been bought off by these selfsame corporatists.
From a biospheric perspective this means that we have
decided upon an economic strategy which maximizes short-term profits for an ever wealthier elite while, incidentally, also maximizing our dumping of carbon into
the atmosphere. NASA climatologist Dr. James Hanson has pointed out that this
strategy, if carried out long enough, will CERTAINLY cause a greenhouse
effect on Earth rendering it lifeless for eternity . Even if we were to
somehow avoid that fate, the consequences of rapid, unconstrained warming would
still be utterly devastating, including environmental and economic collapse.
Aside from declining net energy in our future, our planet
girdling economic system is rapaciously tearing apart the entire web of life in
pursuit of short term profit. According to a study recently published in the
journal Nature, we are rapidly approaching an "imminent
irreversible planetary collapse." Climate, the long term, cumulative,
statistically predictable variance of temperature, rainfall and other weather
variables, is rapidly spinning out of our recognition--and this is only the very
beginning of the process. (See HERE
and HERE
and also HERE .)
At the center of these rapidly accelerating destabilizations
lies our growth-based economy. At the center of our growth-based economy lies a
monetary system based on debt. Existing debt, represented by a corresponding
amount of money loaned into existence (for a mortgage for example), must be
paid off, with interest, in the future.
Accomplishing this task requires that more money exist in the future to pay
back the original amount plus the accumulated interest. In other words, our
global economic system is fundamentally predicated upon growth. Without growth,
a debt-based economy will collapse. Yet right now, growth is stalling. So we
will begin to experience planetary economic contraction, as net energy per
capita begins to decline, and then the decline rate accelerates.
If we had possessed the foresight to begin preparing for
this back in the 1970's, when this future first became visible, then we would
today be well along the way towards a path to a sustainable, no-growth future.
However, we collectively as a species, failed to muster the
required foresight. Now, we are doubling down on our mindless folly, substituting slogans such as: "drill, baby,
drill" and "fracking is a game changer" and other brainless idiocies, instead of
embarking on an immediate course correction towards sustainability while this may still be possible.
To summarize: Humanity is hurling itself blindly towards utter
planetary doom. This is, obviously, undesirable. Therefore our species historical
trajectory must be altered in a quick and decisive manner if doom is to be averted. Because this world-killing
system is so deeply entrenched into the fabric of human reality however, it seems impossible to destroy it before it
kills us. Yet, there is no alternative; we must succeed in accomplishing just that.
Historically in times of economic stagnation, elites became
more "conservative" in the sense that they hoarded ever more wealth for
themselves at the expense of the general population. This naturally caused
dissatisfaction on the part of the citizenry. This dissatisfaction leads to
ever greater accumulation of draconian military and police powers by the
political leadership which exists to serve the interests of the few,
obscenely wealthy, elites. Assertion of these police powers against an
increasingly enraged population begins to delegitimize the government. If this
repression and reaction cycle continues to repeat long enough, revolution becomes probable.
Already this reactionary process is fully
underway. Yet political disarray here in the US and likely many other
countries, does not actually do anything to stop the world-destroying system
from continuing to march us all towards our utter doom. Using our capacity for
forethought, or sapience,
what strategy should we adopt to maximize the possibility that we succeed in
altering our historical trajectory, before it becomes too late?
First, we must begin with ourselves. If we don't free our
minds, we ourselves can never be free. Think for yourself. Exercise your inborn
capacity for sapience.
Next, arrange your living environment, to the degree
possible, for sustainability. For example, my wife, Ramona, and I are
homeowners. We have installed sufficient (3.7 kilowatts, "KW") solar and wind
power (1 KW), in conjunction with batteries (33 KW) to allow us to be entirely
self-sufficient with respect to electricity. We have a 4,000 gallon catfish
pond (also solar powered) which can meet our needs for animal protein year
round. We have about 900 square feet of organic gardens based
on Amazonian terra preta soil techniques which we've struggled
for several years to reverse engineer and adapt to our unique climate. We
are able to produce our own drinking water independently from the local water
supply. We have ongoing projects to create
a permaculture garden
out of our front yard. We will be installing a catchment rainfall cistern
system and tying it into our drip irrigation network for the various gardens.
As our projects come online, we are now, and will be in the near future, organizing groups of interested people from our community to view them, ask questions, and generally be available to facilitate others taking similar actions. This facilitates networking with like-minded individuals locally. Moving up one level in scale, we have developed various relationships with local politically oriented groups of various sorts. I have a sort of networking advantage here, in that I was the Democratic Party's candidate for US Congress facing the odious Darrell Issa back in 2004.
I note that the established mainstream political parties are wholly co-opted
into the system of corporate rule at the national level. Cooperation with them
is nonetheless, sometimes possible locally
however.
Across the local region, state, nation, and planet, people are thinking independently and organizing at the personal and community level. It is from this large and ever growing mass base that deep revolutionary change will come. The existing system is rapidly delegitimizing itself. As a direct consequence, violent (ask yourself who has most of the guns in our society), and non-violent revolutionary movements (think Occupy) are certain in some nations, probable in others such as ours, and possible anywhere.
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