How to prevent the destruction of the biosphere? (Proposal for the lecture or workshop at Interference.io) 15. June 2014 The most important questions we are facing are: - how to prevent the destruction of the biosphere? [1], [2], - "why didn't they act?" [3] , [4] - how do YOU want the world to look like in the year 3000? [5], [6] I believe that the hackers, activists, artists, scientists, philosophers, lovers and parents need to focus thier energy on these questions. The answers to those questions would result in the new myth / value system / culture / way of thinking… that will be helpful to the people in the year 3000 , in order not to repeat our mistakes, and the keep the biosphere alive for the next 100.000 years. My goal is to invite you all at "Interference" to join in the formation of this new way of thinking. BECHA at xs4all.nl / @ms_multicolor / https://wiki.techinc.nl/index.php/User:Becha Mailing list: https://lists.puscii.nl/wws/info/uncivilization My writings: Hackers_tribes_for_the_world_after_collapse (December 2014, for the "Nature Bats Last" blog) http://wiki.techinc.nl/index.php/Hackers_tribes_for_the_world_after_collapse https://wiki.techinc.nl/index.php/Hackers_tribes#UnCivilization https://wiki.techinc.nl/index.php/Hackers_tribes_quotes_culture Non-reversible collapse of Global Consumer Civilization https://wiki.techinc.nl/index.php/Hackers_tribes_GCC References: [1] Daniel Quinn: http://www.ishmael.org/Origins/Beyond_Civilization/ , http://www.davidsheen.com/b/ [2] Guy McPhearson http://guymcpherson.com/ [3] Deric Janssen http://www.derrickjensen.org/ [4] Naomi Oreskes: The Collapse of Western Civilization: A View from the Future, http://www.amazon.co.uk/The-Collapse-Western-Civilization-Future/dp/023116954X/ [5] Dispossessed , Ursula K. LeGuin [6] Binding Chaos, Heather Marsh http://georgiebc.wordpress.com/2013/05/24/binding-chaos/ ==== Longer version: Here are the lessons that I have learned by now, but they do not offer definite answers, only more questions. * it is important to remember PREhistory * at what price did we built the network that connected millions of people in the last 30 years…?? * civilization needs NOT to be maintained Pre-History "The recorded history" is a very short time period in the human existence. We somehow tend to "forget" that fact. Daniel Quinn, in "The Story of B", names this "the great forgetting", and, like you, calls for "great remembering". "State" is a very recent form of organization of society in the human cultures. First states developed few thousand years BC. There was 100's of thousands of years of human societies and cultures before that. Admittedly, on the short term it looks like "the state" is a very successful model of organisation, that won over all the other models. However, it is successful only on the relatively short term of 10.000 years. Comparatively much longer period of human existence WITHOUT STATES also offers valuable knowledge about our past and present, and possibly gives us insight into, and alternatives for, the future. Further reading "Against His-Story, Against Leviathan" Fredy Perlman http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Against_His-Story,_Against_Leviathan http://www.marxists.org/reference/archive/perlman-fredy/1977/revolutionary-leaders/index.htm the whole book, chapter by chapter: http://noblesavagery.blogspot.nl/2007/03/fredy-perlmans-against-his-story.html https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Story_of_B / http://www.davidsheen.com/b/ 1) The Great Forgetting 2) The Boiling Frog 3) The Collapse of Values 4) Population: A Systems Approach 5) The Great Remembering At what price? While building the Internet, we have continued the "growth and progress" myth of the (Western) civilization, and the price we pay is the destruction of environment, destruction of our home planet, while we are needing more and more energy, and more and more resources, for more and more gadgets, more bandwidth, more people... http://www.popularresistance.org/video-can-this-current-way-of-life-continue/ It was not worth it, and the cost is too hight, the cost is unacceptably high! Civilization needs NOT to be maintained Just like the history did not start with the state or "first written record", so is the civilization NOT the only possible way for people to live. I would like to challenge the need for roads, or for the managed water supply, as the reason for the existence of oversight institutions, be it the "state" or "liquid democracy" or something yet-not-invented to replace them. I would like to offer the post-apocaliptic scenario that might be more similar to pre-historic, pre-civilization, pre-state times, where there were no roads and no need for them, and therefore no oversight needed either; where the water supplies were decentralized so there was no need for the management of them. This unattractive future might be brought up upon us by one or multiple collapses: ecological, environmental, energy or $anything. If we are to imagine how the world might look like in a 100 years from now, this is something we must consider. We may not have the luxury to keep the roads. Further reading Derrick Jensen: Endgame http://www.derrickjensen.org/work/books-dvds-cds/ Daniel Quinn http://www.ishmael.org/Origins/Beyond_Civilization/ Addressing the next thousand years I find that the state of emergency on this Burning World requires even more attention, since the fundamental conditions for all life on Earth -- including humans -- might disappear in less then 100 years, and certainly in the next 1000 years, unless we learn from our history & prehistory and take responsibility over the culture we are living in, which governs the technologies we are deploying and to what end. Some of the answers offered: "Edward Abbey @Edward__Abbey The answer to the environmental crisis facing the world is the destruction of all capitalist, consumerist, values." Running on Emptiness: The Pathology of Civilizatio , John Zerzan "Against His-Story, Against Leviathan" Fredy Perlman Uncivilization - The Dark Mountain Manifesto http://dark-mountain.net/about/manifesto/ http://monoskop.org/images/a/ab/Tainter_Joseph_The_Collapse_of_Complex_Societies.pdf ▪ Kees van der Pijl: ".. a frozen constellation, in which the oligarchies collude with the national security apparatus, keeping each other in power, is unable to deal with popular demands and with objective, life-threatening crises that result from the destruction of the Earth’s biosphere." http://snuproject.wordpress.com/2014/04/15/interview-with-kees-van-der-pijl-global-rivalries-today/ http://cluborlov.blogspot.nl/p/the-five-stages-of-collapse.html http://cluborlov.blogspot.nl/2013/10/the-sixth-stage-of-collapse.html Communities that abide: http://www.amazon.com/dp/B00KSR2Z6M