How can we expect people to understand peak oil and climate change, and formulate rational responses to the great issues of our day, when there is so much hostility expressed about “science and rationality” and when there is such a tolerance and even encouragement of unsubstantiated beliefs about the paranormal?
Bill Mollison, in his rambling but entertaining autobiography “Travels in Dreams” (Tagari 1996) writes on New Age beliefs and Permaculture thus:
“”As I have often been accused of lacking that set of credulity, mystification, modern myth and hogwash that passes today for New Age Spirituality, I cheerfully plead guilty. Unqualified belief, of any breed, dis-empowers any individuals by restricting their information.
Thus, permaculture is not biodynamics, nor does it deal in fairies, devas, elves, after-life, apparitions or phenomena not verifiable by every person from their own experience, or making their own experiments. we permaculture teachers seek to empower any person by practical model-making and applied work, or data based on verifiable investigations. This scepticism of mine extends to religious and political party ideologies”.
So there you have it from the man himself. Those who wish to bring faith-based superstition and ideology into permaculture would do better to go to their local rugby club and insist that they can win more games by appealing to the deva of the rugby ball -after all, you can’t disprove it, can you?
In the latest Permaculture Magazine, Brian Coffey has replied to my previous letter regarding geomancy and permaculture.
Unfortunately he repeats exactly the same kind of obscurifications and absurdities that New Age believers always trot out in defense of their nonsense.
First he appeals to the “New Science”- ie post-Einsteinian science- as being in support of what amounts to an extreme post-modern belief system:
“…any person’s understanding of nature is not a full description, but the partial knowledge gained from a particular method of exploration”.
The point of this is presumably to demonstrate that you can’t prove anything anyway so anyone who appeals to evidence or the scientific method is merely revealing their own subjective prejudices- “There is no such thing as Reality!! And that is a fact!!”
He then discusses the “reductionist” method beloved by scientific inquiry which, he claims, assumes that “objects are more important than relationships”. This is a way of seeing with the intellect using the eyes to examine objects in isolation. He then sets this against systems theory which sees the context in which evidence is gathered and shifts the emphases away from parts towards interactions- a way of understanding the world through the heart which “naturally sees things through relationships”:
“Focussing on an individual object with the heart will yield information that is imperceptible to the intellect but which the intellect can then use”.
All this really means is that if say I have researched and set up experiments and measured your supernatural claims and found precisely zero evidence, this is “reductionism” and therefore not likely to find the “correct” result.
If, on the other hand, I say: “I have journeyed into my Heart. I have listened to my Intuition. I have uncovered information not measurable by scientific means. And I can now confirm that you are full of crap”- this presumably must be embraced by the New Age faithful as an Irrefutable Truth.
Mr. Coffey goes onto say: “…it is utterly impossible to prove there is no such [benign] intelligence [in Nature]. So, even if one has no such supporting evidence, being open to such a possibility seems a rational choice”.
Indeed. The problem is, this reasoning can be applied to absolutely anything. There is an infinity of things for which there is no evidence- flying spaghetti monsters and invisible fire-breathing dragons being amongst the more famous examples. On the other hand, there is considerable and verifiable evidence for the seemingly inexhaustible ability for humans to deceive themselves and others either consciously or unconsciously. (eg.Creationism, Nazi Germany, abiotic-oil theory, climate change denial, ancients thinking the earth is flat, myth of unending growth, religions of many shapes and hues.)
Though tempting to look for paranormal explanations, especially if it makes us feel we have some special powers, there is always a more likely rational explanation.
The use of systems theory as a way of “proving” psychic phenomena is of course nonsense. Systems theory is something that has emerged out of and been confirmed by observational, rational inquiry. The best example of this is climate science. Find me a few climate scientists who believe in faeries could you?
The Heisenberg reference is again a classic example of the use of quantum theory to challenge common sense: anything you measure, it is believed, is effected by the measurement and therefore unreliable. However, this is a quantum effect that may take place on the quantum (sub-atomic) level; it is not the same as the observer-effect which is allowed for as far as possible in the design of experiments. Science is not fool-proof, but the scientific method functions specifically to try to minimise observer/experimenter bias with the use of trials, controls and blinding and double-blinding.
If it works for say the harnessing of micro-waves for mobile phones, why not for the detection of dowsing abilities? Surely if the effect is real, there is every reason that properly conducted and peer-reviewed methods would be able to detect it.
What we are dealing with here is the deliberate promotion of psychic/spiritual phenomena for which there is no evidence. If you think there is evidence for these things, I challenge you to find some that stands up to scrutiny. Often the only “evidence” offered is “I trust my intuition”. Well, you may well do, but dont expect me to, and be honest if you are challenged to produce evidence. People who claim their intuition -their “feelings”- reveals the Truth are claiming the Infallibility of the Pope. You cant argue with them and they are certainly not interested in that very troublesome concept of evidence.
Alana Moore on her website provides a prime example of trying to dissuade people from rational inquiry:
“Perhaps the sceptics of the world are just practising denial based on a fear of the unknown. At any rate the Sceptic’s Association practise of testing dowsing ability (only according to their own rules) at regular so-called ‘Dowsing Challenges’ is just plain rude. Dowsers are advised to steer well clear of these farcical events.
Sceptics are probably not aware that years ago in the USA master dowsers were tested scientifically. Their sensitivity to electro-magnetic radiation has, in some cases, been found to be far greater than the best magnetometer available.”
Note the absence of references.
The same absurd contradiction is apparent that Mr. Coffey uses: first we are told that sceptics are in denial because of “fear of the unknown”; then we are told there is indeed scientific evidence for dowsing but no references are given- quite typical on the New Age side of this “debate”.
In fact, the only verifiable tests I can find of dowsing (here and here) are not biased using only “their own rules” but require signed agreements from the dowsers being tested in advance that they consider it to be a fair test of their abilities and expect success.
Ms. Moore appears to be quite well aware of the sceptic’s position; but rather than engaging in an open and honest debate over the evidence she chooses to concoct a bizarre (but, again, frequently used) self-fulfilling prophesy later when discussing the use of the pendulum:
“Don’t be put off by people who say “Your hand is moving!” at this point. A strongly rotating pendulum will certainly make your hand move. When this happens the comments of sceptics can undermine dowsing confidence and ruin results. That’s why it’s best practised alone in a non-hostile environment. Don’t give the sceptics satisfaction!”
In other words, it only works if it is practiced without any method of verification in the absence of anyone who might question your own self-deception. Dowsing and use of the pendulum is sheer hocus pocus and easily explained by the not very mysterious ideomotor effect
Then we find in the new issue of Local Planet an article by Urs Tobler on biodynamics in wine producing that follows almost exactly the same nonsensical line of reasoning: empiricists are “stuck in the Newtonian Age who never made the paradigmatic change to the 20th Century physics… it is the narrow approach to life, the fearful one, where we want to control every aspect of it and only accept what can be proven that has brought us to a state where we live in total disharmony”. Spaghetti monsters anyone?
An alternative theory about why we live in disharmony would be that we prefer to believe only what suits us, despite the ready availability of knowledge and evidence.
Yet we are then told that indeed there is empirical evidence for biodynamics – but it is not clear if a reference is actually given for this study. The only one I could find is discussedhere with a follow-up debate here.
Here is a discussion on moon plantings.
Biodynamic farmers and vintners may be some of the best and get great results. But there is no evidence nor reason to believe it is because of their biodynamic practices; take those away, you still need to be a good horticulturalist and vintner to produce good wines, but the reverse is unlikely to be true.
In the UK there is an interesting debate emerging concerning new legislation to regulate mediums and psychics who charge for their services. This is a huge industry and there is a lot at stake financially. There are some intriguing implications: will it be extended to homeopaths? what about the Church’s promise of “Everlasting Life”? I mean, you can’t exactly disprove it, can you? How about dowsing, nature devas and moon plantings? Are there legal issues here too?
If you sell workshops and books to do with unsubstantiated claims of psychic ability or esoteric “energies” and back up your claims with the notion that science cannot measure these things, you are behaving fraudulently.
To deliberately discourage people from following up empirical research or from validating things for themselves is exploitative and dishonest. For a magazine to promote these scams uncritically is as disreputable as the dodgy solar panel salesmen exposed , ironically, also in this latest issue of Permaculture Magazine. Worst of all, it undermines the capacity for people to understand the scientific method and rational thought if we are to understand the environmental crisis, climate change, peak oil, loss of topsoil etc. etc. and devise rational responses.
Then again, at least the solar panels work- but who knows, maybe you can increase their efficiency by sacrificing goats to them at the Full Moon. Im sure there must be lots of empirical studies proving this- but if there are none, that is because you can only measure this phenomenon through the tonsils.
In short, dont stay stuck in a Newtonian reductionist paradigm- just Believe. It is, after all, far easier than actually measuring anything in the real world- or even believing there is a real world/
.
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16 Comments
Well written Graham. I spent a lot of time thinking about this and came to a depressing conclusion. Like all faith based positions it is actually impossible to have a reasoned argument with those who live in the world of woo woo.
The great Joe Newman said all that needs to be said in his song “Miracles”
“Folks don’t like it when you question lies they’ve been sold. Thinking can be painful, at least that’s what I’m told.
Miracles can happen. Dogsh*t can’t be gold.”
I let my subscription to Permaculture Magazine lapse, took an opportunity offered by my employer and left Permaculture and the UK behind me for now. I still think it has the potential to have huge value but the longer I looked at it the more I became bothered by the bull. Yours is the last Permie blog I actually read, recently even the transition movement seems to have become infected with ideas which seem more at home at a weekend with Deepak Chopra than in a practical movement.
I’ve frequently been told that we need a “faith” or “spiritual” dimension in our lives. I know a lot of people who seem to manage pretty well without one. I’ve also frequently been told I won’t be happy without the latest book on personal productivity, that new BMW, those new running shoes, that hair restoration cream or a six pack. Again I seem to manage without these (the hair restoration cream would be nice though:)
I don’t see any real difference between the guy selling me a faith and the guy selling me the BMW. At first glance both look like they start with the position of trying to fill a void in our lives. I actually think they both start earlier creating a void so they can sell us their product.
I remain yours faithlessly.
I totally agree that the woo woo stuff can be scarily out of touch with reality and a tool for exploitation and corruption. It is frustrating to see otherwise talented people distracted by it when there is so much real work to be done. I share your concern that the scientific method continue to be broadly understood and respected by those helping to form a new society. It is the tool we have to dispel superstition (invented realities) and forge verifiable consensus and real solutions. It was innocent observation (science) which was able to see the naked emporer.
Yes, science is cold and reductionist –rightly so. The point of it is to remove prejudice and confounding variables from a given experimental result. That said, there is no way to remove (and who would want to?) the intelligence of emotion from the undertaking. This is what motivates it in the first place: the wanting to know, the desire for new tools to accomplish something. The experiment itself is cold. Choosing what experiment to make is hot. I suspect Copernicus (the founder of modern science) may have chosen astronomy as his subject because he already suspected that Church-decreed reality was horseshit, felt constrained by it, maybe even angry about the quite disgusting corruption then prevalent, and hoped to debunk them –which he did by proving, by his own personal observation, that the earth revolved around the sun. Stong feelings such as wonder, compassion, and deep love for innocent people and the living earth are displayed throughout Mollison’s “Travels in Dreams.” I have noted the same strong feelings –deep caring and concern for humanity and the natural world (although they are not separate) in the permaculture teachers I’ve run across such as Graham, Geoff Lawton, Patrick Whitefield, Darren Doherty. These feelings are what permaculture is all about. They form its ethical basis and provide its moral compass. I like to say, “Feelings are facts.” They exist. As truly as the tree outside your window. Sure, they are invisible, often live outside of consciousness; but they contain intelligence. No one would say fear or anger do not contain important messages. Our intellect always works in tandem with emotion –otherwise it has no direction. The quantum-lovers are right: we do bring ourselves to the equation. But to abandon rationality is to have no tools. To abandon humor is to have no balance. I love the sructural open-mindedness of the scientific method. The not-knowing.
Hi Graham,
While I agree with the large majority of what you have written here, I still find myself feeling very uncomfortable with the term ‘woo-woo’, and the lumping together of things that you personally feel to be outside the boundaries of intellectual respectability. I wonder why so much of your bile is reserved for a small minority of society whose views are not replicated throughout the mainstream which is where we really need to be initiating change (a past life trauma perhaps? … joke).
There are examples of what one might call ‘woo-woo’ all over the place, not just in the New Age movement. I came across one in the Richard Dawkins book I am reading based upon your recommendation, ‘Unweaving the Rainbow’.
In it he talks about how academics are completely impartial, and how the scientific principle overrides any sense of personal identity or ego. He talks about a visiting lecturer coming to this University and giving a lecture which destroyed a theory that one of the resident lecturers had been teaching and been the expert in for 40 years. At the end, the resident lecturer went up and magnanimously thanked him for his insights.
From my experience around academia, the idea that academia is an ego-free, impersonal collective quest for knowledge is ‘woo-woo’, based on very little evidence. As is the idea that science is impartial. Those of us who have resisted GM for the last 10 years feel strongly that it is not an appropriate technology, yet there is a strong scientific case that some of it, at least, works. Science can easily be bought, and one wonders if it was ever impartial, much of it certainly isn’t nowadays. Now the GM lobby is blaming us for causing genocide due to our resisting their scientifically proven technology.
I would be very wary about lumping all my dislikes into a basket, labelling them woo-woo and consigning them to the intellectual dustbin. Clearly flying spaghetti monsters are daft, as are many of the more outlandish aspects of the New Age movement, but what about things like meditation? I meditate regularly, it creates a mental space to be quiet and still, makes one more relaxed, calmer and enables one to think more clearly, at least that is my experience. It is a practical tool, whose effects have been examined scientifically, onto which one can add as much or as little ‘woo-woo’ as one likes, but in essence it is just a tool. Yet for many, it is way out and woo woo.
I disagree with George that “even the transition movement seems to have become infected with ideas which seem more at home at a weekend with Deepak Chopra than in a practical movement”. Not sure exactly what he is talking about there.
We do integrate insights from psychology (which is a science) because we feel that to try and address the challenge of helping communities through energy descent necessitates having ways of managing the stress and distress it brings up, in effect pre-trauma counselling rather than post-trauma. Nothing ‘woo-woo’ or Deepak about that, feels to me like an essential part of it, and the failure to do this has been one of the reasons the green movement hasn’t progressed further. Any ‘woo-woo’ in the Transition Handbook? I’d like to know where…
So yes, indeed lets be rigourous and ask tough questions and challenge complacency based on nonsense, but I would argue that we should shift our gaze and look for woo woo in places other than those where it is glaringly obvious. Government’s refusal to consider anything other than economic growth is woo-woo, businesses that base their future on the belief that global markets will grow, that fuel will remain cheap and that just-in-time is resilient, they are basing their future on woo-woo. Individuals who take out vast mortgages when the economy is on a downturn and when the peak in world oil production is looming are basing it on woo-woo.
It is, it feels to me, far more skillful to challenge woo-woo in places that are more strategic to turning this mess around than targetting it against a part of the community who are easy targets and who appear to have particularly got up your nose. Where is the woo-woo in Richard Branson’s forward planning for Virgin? Where is the woo-woo in my sister’s vast mortgage that can only end in tears?
Naming these forms of woo-woo is useful, but risky. To restate, I struggle with this lumping together of these things as woo-woo, as they are, for those people, often tightly held beliefs, based on years of fears, failures, successes, emotional attachments, and which we lump together and diss at the risk of losing their potential future engagement. Unclamping peoples’ grip on ‘woo woo’ among the mainstream is harder work, yet can potentially yield far greater rewards. When people feel judged, they have far less reason to want to listen to what you have to say.
To name and shame ‘woo woo’ among the outlandish world of the West Cork New Age community is one thing, but to try and gently, positively and insistently loosen its grip on mainstream society is a whole other ballgame, and one where a more skillfull approach may be more constructive. It feels more constructive to me to not see the world in black and white, rather in many shades of grey.
Many thanks again for writing so provocatively and forcefully. Plenty of food for thought. Hope your carrots are coming up well, mine are (finally)…
Rob
While I welcome your comments I feel you have basically missed the whole point i am making, and make a number of quite false statements which just backtrack over the original issues we have already dealt with.
Rob you, like the rest of us, are really faced with a stark choice on this issue: do we continue to be apologists for superstition because we dont want to offend people who we might see as allies; or do we undertake to challenge irrationality, quackery and delusion wherever we find it? Because a big part of why we have to deal with this distraction is because of the irresponsible tolerance of it by magazine editors, educators and community leaders. In my experience, many New Agers have never met a sceptic, they have never had the rational perspective expressed to them. There is a tacit acceptance that it is just not nice to bring up the subject- remind you of something?
This issue comes down to just two alternatives: either you try to base your understanding on evidence which is verifiable (science and rationality) or you hold essentially religious beliefs which are not open to amendment with the uncovering of new evidence. It is quite false for you to say I lump together loads of things that I “personally” dont like; there is nothing personal in it. Either claims are backed by evidence or they are not. I have made it quite clear i think in the article that the reason to take on these issues is because they undermine our attempts to challenge the false beliefs (woo-woo) of the growth economy etc.. Consistency of approach is essential- you simply cannot say on the one hand -”Climate change- listen to what the scientists are saying!!” and on the other hand say “Who cares if there is no evidence for geomancy? Science is reductionist…”
Again, these views of the paranormal are indeed replicated through the mainstream- the spiritualist industry is huge and exploitative. It is absolutely part of the problem (not to mention religion of course). the point is not that it is a small minority of society but that it is a large (and growing) part of the environmental movement. > The main point of the Dawkins story is surely that in science it is possible that someone who has a very deeply held belief, which they believe is supported by the evidence, would be willing to change that view when confronted by a superior theory. That is the WHOLE point of this issue- this would be impossible within the realm of the New Age or any other religion because evidence is not the basis for the belief in the first place. However, I also think there are ideological views expressed by Dawkins, and even more so by some of his colleagues like Christopher Hitchins. So I agree that we should challenge false ideologies everywhere, especially if they masquerade as being rational.
Rob, it’s not clear what your point is here- do you think we should use rational debate based on evidence to challenge GM? Or irrational arguments based on religious or “spiritual” beliefs?
I think I agree but you seem to be mixing up too different things- meditation is a practice, not a belief. Again, I am not lumping everything together in a prejudicial way- I am responding to a set of New Age beliefs for which there is no evidence. If you think there is evidence, lets discuss that and try to assess its validity. It is obvious that both Alana Moore and Urs Tobler, Brian Coffey either dont understand the scientific method at all (in which case they should not be given air-time) or are being dishonest: first they claim there is evidence but give no references; then they claim “evidence” doesnt count because it is “reductionist”. I find this is absolutely typical of the New Age faithful.
I dont think there is any woo-woo in the Transition handbook. I think psychological approaches are important- Ive spent a lot of time looking at them and writing about them myself and that is may main contribution to the Powerdown course. Some of these approaches may be speculative however, and not really based on evidence- eco-psychology for example is quite ideologically based. There is a huge difference between saying “I am mediating- it makes me feel calmer” (not woo-woo) and “I am meditating- this helps me uncover truths about the universe which rational inquiry cannot touch because it is reductionist” (woo-woo and dishonest ie fraudulent)
It is all over my blog Rob. My attention to New Age superstition is quite minimal compared to my attention to the Industrial Growth woo-woo, as you well know!! Read the Mollison quote again: “This scepticism of mine extends to religious and political party ideologies”. What I have tried to do in this article is point out the similarities between New Age beliefs and Industrial Growth beliefs; they are born in the same stable and I believe one supports the other. There are indeed a lot of New Agers who believe the angels or whatever are going to save us; more generally, as I state in the first sentence; there is no chance people are going to find rational responses to the crises we are facing if they believe in pendulum swinging. You only have to think of the narcissistic materialism appealed to in “The Secret” http://www.skeptic.com/eskeptic/07-03-07.html to see how the two belief systems go hand in hand. (The Secret is very popular amongst many permaculture students for example; some of whom do not believe in anthropocentric climate change because they saw the channel 4 documentary last year.) Steiner had crypto-Nazi beliefs.
Is climate change to be seen in terms of many shades of grey? Is peak oil? Is the onrushing global food crisis? Some things are just plainly false and we should have the courage to say so. Again, you miss the point: New Age beliefs are all over the environmental movement, which I believe is one of the reasons that the environmental movement is seen as irrelevant by the mainstream- and it is not surprising. This anti-science ideology hangs like a millstone around the neck of the environmental movement. Far from being confined to hippy dippy West Cork it is being promoted by Permaculture Magazine, Local Planet, and many centers and workshops- including permaculture design courses- which is why I have felt obliged to challenge them here. Narcissistic materialism and New Age beliefs are in many quarters synonymous with environmentalism. In allowing this, we are in danger of simply substituting one fantasy for another. There is also the issue of fraud and exploitation which is endemic in the spiritualist community- this also needs to be challenged by those wishing to create sustainability. We have a responsibility to do so just as we have to challenge the all-too common fraud in the renewable energy sector. There will of course always be people who hold religious and spiritual beliefs- but those in the environmental community who are in a position of leadership who promote or tolerate these views should be challenged just as strongly as we challenge those who promote the free energy delusion or the unending growth delusion. One delusion will support another. Ultimately it is delusional thinking that is the problem. We all have a responsibility to foster critical thinking skills wherever possible.
We do integrate insights from psychology (which is a science) because we feel that to try and address the challenge of helping communities through energy descent necessitates having ways of managing the stress and distress it brings up, in effect pre-trauma counselling rather than post-trauma. Nothing ‘woo-woo’ or Deepak about that,
I guess this is where we have some differences in our world views. I can’t bring myself to just agree with the simple statement that psychology is a science. Some of it is, some of it is pseudoscience and some of it doesn’t even bother pretending.
Note I’m not dismissing it all, some of the views coming from psychological approaches can be insightful but they don’t always and in some area often provide answers in a form which can be verified scientifically. In all cases when ever a psychological approach is discussed I think the reader needs to be aware, and dig deep into the assumptions being made.
I don’t want to appear as having an entirely closed mind, I don’t believe that science is perfect, just less imperfect than the alternatives. I am open to the opinions and ideas of all, whether they be spiritual, psychological or commercial. But in each case I feel the need to understand rather than just accept, and when some one is making extraordinary claims I reserve the right to shout “bare bllck nekkid”.
To me the saddest aspect of the whole issue with Permaculture Magazine is there remains an important unanswered question. I accepted in my original comments that some dowsers in the field do seem to be able to produce the goods. Is this effect real and if it is how do they do that? From scientific testing we are pretty sure that it has nothing to do with energy fields, sticks, coat hangers or crystals. If they have an ability and we learn to understand it perhaps we can improve it or share it with others. By accepting the answer lies in an area science can’t go we accept that progress other than by prayer is not possible. To me that isn’t good enough as we head into an increasingly uncertain future.
feels to me like an essential part of it, and the failure to do this has been one of the reasons the green movement hasn’t progressed further.
That I don’t know. I think the reason is psychological (isn’t everything) but whether psychology has an answer is a different and more difficult question.
Any ‘woo-woo’ in the Transition Handbook? I’d like to know where…
I haven’t got a copy yet, it’s on my list though. I hope maybe I’ll find some answers and insights on how the transition world will work on a macro level.
I’ll shut up or you’ll get me onto the subject of deep ecology an then I’ll really be in trouble:-)
I dont think there is any special ability in dowsing- in some geological formations hitting water can be as likely as 90%. Even 50% success rate could easily be interpreted as being the result of dowsing as we tend to ignore the “misses” or invent some other explanation as to why our powers may have left us at a given moment.) Anyone can learn to read the landscape and learn about hydrology. I found my own spring without dowsing- rushes on a bank I had observed for some time seemed a likely bet. Hit clean good water first time! This is the sort of anecdote that a dowser would use to support their craft; in reality it was probably fairly obvious or maybe I was just lucky; but imagine how easy it would have been to claim had I used the rods: “Look! I can dowse!”
Brilliant to point out that delusional thinking is rife in BOTH mainstream and “New Age” belief systems, although the two appear opposed. I haven’t seen that point made so far elsewhere. I too have watched, slack-jawed, as Branson, et al blithely plan far into a business-as-usual future.(!) Thanks, Graham, for strongly standing up for our responsibility to foster critical thinking. And for standing up for confronting delusional thinking wherever we find it, although that takes courage. Laurence Gonzales’ 2003 “Deep Survival, Who Lives, Who Dies, and Why” vividly illustrates the appropriate interplay between emotion and intellect along with the criticality of flexible, clear, untainted observation of the forces we find ourselves effected by, both inner and outer.
Graham,
Like I’ve mentioned before on your site, you can line me up firmly on the skeptical permaculture side of the argument.
Why do Permaculture Magazine tolerate all manner of New Age claptrap in among the sensible, scientific stuff? Well, they’re a lifestyle mag, not a peer-reviewed journal, and they would probably go out of business if they offended their readership. Remember that the vast majority of people – not just people with an interest in “green” stuff – are extremely credulous and willing to belief whatever sounds good; and challenging people’s deeply cherished beliefs is seldom likely to win them over.
This is perhaps especially true of people living in “alternative” places like Totnes. I say “perhaps” because there is, anyway, a laudable skepticism about anything “mainstream” in these places – but this skepticism, sadly, doesn’t extend to the alternative theories that Bill Mollison calls “woo woo”.
People seem to need something to believe in. Is it worse for them to believe in Money or in fairies? Frankly, either one seems a pretty poor basis for living.
Good points Robert- it is the credulity of people in general that has gotten us into this mess, and the issue I am trying to address here is that the New Age beliefs are part of the problem, not the solution- they actually represent the very ideology we need to redress. To be aligned with them in any way is inherently destructive to the sustainability project.
Graham – amen to that, and doubly for the insane belief that (as Douglas Adams put it) the movement of small green pieces of paper can make us happy.
So should we say that aligning ourselves in any way with the money economy is inherently destructive to the sustainability project?
Personally I’d go for a yes on that one, while being aware that taking such a position dogmatically would severely reduce my range of allies, and make it very difficult to lead day-to-day life in the overdeveloped world.
Actually, thinking a bit more about this, I realise I can live with people who believe in planting by the phases of the moon, pendulum power, crystal healing, New Age spirituality… These may all be wrong-headed ideas but the people who believe them aren’t bad people, just mistaken. In fact, most of my friends believe in planting by the moon, and most of them are better gardeners than me (by the way, the squash seeds failed to come up – probably it was too cold and wet for them). But through discussions with them, I have noticed that some are also starting to be a bit more skeptical.
What I really can’t stand, in fact, is those who make a living, a career or a name out of other people’s credulity. People who take people’s desire to believe – combined with their own self-deception – and turn it into a comfortable living. Sadly, the alternative scene in Spain is infested with these parasites. Geobiology this, pyramid scheme that, Hopi tribal message the other, balancing therapy, facilitation, blah blah…
So in the end, it’s not people’s alignment with New Age beliefs that bothers me – it’s the fact that these beliefs, whether sincerely held or insincerely feigned, are nothing but a cover for the far more conventional desire to make money, get respect or exercise power over others while contributing little or nothing.
In a brief wander out across the webscape I came across your raging recrimination of woo-woo… And noticed that you seem to lump a lot of quite different ideas and groups into a large mass then point at them as the root of all our problems… A great tactic if you are George Bush… But for those of us in permaculture that prefer to be RATIONAL, there is a common understanding (well articulated by Rob Hopikins) that there happen to be quite a number of different frames of reference for applying analytical thought. Perhaps for a moment we could look through the eyes of a permaculturalist to see that these frames (paradigms, gestalt or worldviews) are analougous Many of those frames have been passed on as indigenous traditions for millinium and are validated by the most religious test of them all: the intersection between time and nature.
To ridicule belief systems, how ever dissonant from your own, and to incite other people to carry on the attack is not in alignment with the core principles of your chosen discipline. Permaculture is an ETHICAL design methidology and one of the three core ethics is people care….in my mind people care implies respecting peoples value systems. If I am meticulously studying agroforestry and I choose to name micro-organisms faeries…or I hold on to a deep spiritual belief in the power of intention, or if I happen to have the ability to sense water coursing under the earth, who are you to take away these ideas? What gives you or anyone else to attack and incite others to attack any belief that is not directly harming you…or harming anyone for that matter.
I suppose at this point you are going all red in the cheeks remembering about to exclaim that people who hold what you would term irrational sets of beliefs are holding us back from seeing the cold hard truth about peak oil and climate change…perhaps over population…the triumvirate of doom and gloom.
Poppycock.
I don’t need science to tell me about the problems associated with industrialized society…from clear cuts to tenement housing, from consumerism to strip mining…all of this forms a social fabric that many people would say is caused by a reductionist, individualist and competitive worldview…the same world view you are claiming should prevail over “woo woo new agey types”…
Perhaps our lesson is to discern what we each value and what helps us stay steady and make sustainable and realistic decisions in the face of fear, loathing, and madness.
If you choose hard line reductionist science to bring you to the table..so be it…but when you get here, don’t waste your energy shouting at others because they took a different path to the realization that things must change.
The bottom line, after all that, is that instead of going on the war path against your allies…people who care for the earth and are trying to do something about it…why not use that sharp mind and clever tongue of yours to focus in on helping shift society to be inclusive of environmental values instead of attacking the fellow next to you for not wearing the right color…
Thanks for your comments Greg – a fairly good example of the kind of obsurifications and contradictions inherent in New Age “thought”. Are you really unaware of the hypocrisy in attacking my “beliefs” for attacking the beliefs of the superstitious? Even after having read my post and the subsequent comments? Unfortunately this stance is all to common in New Age circles- a particularly insidious little trick to try and avoid any critical rational debate:
“If you challenge the beliefs of others, you are being really nasty; a nasty person just cannot be right; therefore, proof that you are wrong.”
This approach doesnt get us any closer to the truth, does it? which i am arguing can only be decided by discussing the evidence (something you manage to avoid doing completely).
You say:
Permaculture is an ETHICAL design methidology and one of the three core ethics is people care….in my mind people care implies respecting peoples value systems. If I am meticulously studying agroforestry and I choose to name micro-organisms faeries…or I hold on to a deep spiritual belief in the power of intention, or if I happen to have the ability to sense water coursing under the earth, who are you to take away these ideas? What gives you or anyone else to attack and incite others to attack any belief that is not directly harming you…or harming anyone for that matter.”
There is something quite oppressive about this hypocrisy: an attempt to silence debate unless it agrees with your own views. There is nothing in people care in this- as Mollison makes clear in the opening quote, do discourage people from critical thinking and rational inquiry is to disempower them.
I have also gone to great lengths in the post and comments to explain why these beliefs are indeed inherently damaging to the sustainabilty project and involve having very strange bedfellows: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/politics/7284494.stm
You sir are an apologist far fraud and disinformation: there is no scientific evidence at all for dowsing or fairies or faith healing and the perpetuation of these beliefs is indeed damaging to society as a whole. Where is the “people care” in defending con-merchants?
To claim as Alanna Moore and co that there is scientific evidence is called “lying”- and yes, there is clearly a financial incentive here in selling books and magazines and workshops.
None of this has anything to do with permaculture which is the practical application of empirically testable knowledge about eco-systems.
“I don’t need science to tell me about the problems associated with industrialized society…from clear cuts to tenement housing, from consumerism to strip mining…all of this forms a social fabric that many people would say is caused by a reductionist, individualist and competitive worldview…the same world view you are claiming should prevail over “woo woo new agey types”…”
I think you misunderstand- there is nothing “rational” about clear-cuts and consumerism, clear-cuts or iindividualism and competition- these are not the worldviews that we need to create sustainabilty; try this line of “reasoning” and apply it to climate change science: are you saying that the scientists who warn about rising C02 levels are wrong because they use the same kind of rational thought that brought us human overshoot?
Are you saying that you dont need science (for example to use a computer)- that you can “divine” the likely effects of forest destruction or sea-level rise; that you have “looked into your heart” to find accurate figures on population increase, topsoil loss or species extinction?
The kind of thought processes you express here are so confused and contradictory that they only serve as an example of the danger of these ideas going unchallenged.
I maintain that the widespread and unquestioning, naive and foolish belief in the ability of the mind to alter physical reality, as described in the professional scam “The Secret” has nothing to do with environmental ethics and everything to do with maintaining the narcissistic delusions of materialism and anthropocentrism.
And by the way, I devote very little time to challenging woo-woo and nearly all my time to practicing and teaching rational responses to the planetary crisis.
Graham I think my point is ill taken. I am a little taken aback that my comment was responded to with such vehemence. Personal attack is the last stronghold of fear.
It seems we are speaking at different levels. In the past I have noticed you have read some about Spiral Dynamics. Perhaps this model can helps us begin communicating with each other instead of writing AT each other. To use spiral dynamics to try and pull out of the muck… What I am trying to express is that people at different levels of consciousness on the spiral of human behavioral development use different sets of values and symbols to describe the world around them. The rational, materialistic view that you are using to fight against the mystical, irrational and faith-based view is only another stop on the spiral of human evolution. As Clare Graves (the creator of the model Spiral Dynamics is based on) and Ken Wilber both point out: it is of the upmost we respect the views and values of people at all places on the spiral. We may disagree, and we may see the need to help people transition or develop new behavior and understandings to help weave together a web of cooperation and interdependence to get us out of this global mess we’ve created…but haranguing people over their beliefs only polarizes the issue.
I am a scientist and permaculturalist myself. I happen to often agree with the nuts and bolts of your arguments, and am very happy to see people in your neck of the woods take such a leading role in creating a new opportunity for regenerative culture to take root. However I differ in my view that we need to create more schisms in our society. It seems to me that singling out new agey spiritualists as the problem is an inability to discern between different levelson the spiral. At every (arbitrary) point on the spectrum of human behavioral evolution humans have made massive mistakes. Purely rational and scientific thought as filtered through Herbert Spencer created social Darwinism: the rational apology for over-predation on ourselves and the world.
The next level according to spiral dynamics is a relativistic and post modern view allowing room for care and cooperation. unfortunately it gets a bit bogged down in the details and we need to combine the ability to empathize and see many truths, with the ability to pick a truth (the world is limited and we must therefor intelligently limit ourselves) and move forward.
The amazing thing about Spiral Dynamics is it give us a model to discuss people in a fairly neutral zone…and I woudl like to take this opportunity to remind you that each new level on the spiral of human consciousness includes and transcends the level before…just like an ecosystem in succession. Spiritual ideas will remain a part of our culture no matter how far we evolve up the spiral of consciousness…in some core beliefs and principles seem to simple be re-articulated in a new way to be applicable to people in the here and now. The Secret…a movie is thought was simplistic and ridiculous…offers on the positive side a reminder to be greatfull and keep hope in your heart…to not get bogged down in depression over things you cannot control. This is a valuable reminder in this age of global climate change and peak everything.
I would hope as a Mollisonian Permaculturalis (as you started the thread out with a quote form Mollison I assume you a member of the choir) that you would focus on seeing this “problem” you are busy highlighting as an opportunity for growth, and learn to speak to those people who identify with ephemeral values and symbols than you use to describe your ideas. Learning to translate ideas and speak across cultural boundaries is the path of the peacekeeper. As Permaculturalists we have chosen to keep peace with the natural world, and we all know humans are a part of the natural world. So a tool for permaculture is seeing peoples beliefs as a resource and weaving them into the duscussion, thereby helping create the oportunity for them to emerge and transcend what they previously thought and add more diversity and reselience to their mental ecologies…allowing our culture to do the same, and as a conswequence allowing us to regain our place as keystone species of a diverse and amazing planetary ecosystem.
The first step is making peace with those that you would call enemies.
I hope I am not one of them, for we are working together in a shared enterprise and I for one would rather shake your hand and congratulate you for your hard work…and have a calm discussion about what we can do to empower each other.
Alanna Moore here.
Interesting “debate”, a pity that most of the writers are awfully ill-informed on their subjects. (Hard to believe they have time to write this stuff, shouldnt they be out saving the world?). I’m not in my home office, otherwise I would pull out those missing references to investigations of dowsing using scientific instrumentation. But if you have access to a copy of Christopher Bird’s massive volume ‘Divining’ it’s all in there. If there wasnt a scientific aspect to dowsing there wouldnt be geologists in Russia being taught how to dowse and I wouldn’t have met the president of the Russian Scientific Dowsing Society, when I was a speaker at the International Dowsing Congress held in the UK in 2003.
As an international teacher of dowsing, as a qualified permaculture teacher, and as an author of critically acclaimed books on the application of dowsing to enhance life and gardening/farming – I have my reputation to defend here. I dont need ignorant people getting on my back. Especially when they obviously havent read my books (and seen the copious lists of references in them!) You can order my books from Counter Culture in the UK. (They are also published by Acres USA and elsewhere.)
I often suggest to my students to use the scientific method to test the usefulness of the experimental technologies that I’m teaching about. In other words – does it help the cabbages to grow bigger or not?
‘New age religion’ has no interest to me. I’m a practical, hands-on gal. That’s what my students love. It’s all geared to improving health and wellbeing, and helping the environment. So why I have been singled out seems most unfair. Why not spit venom at the people who channel info from Mars or wherever and gives no benefit. Dont put me in that bag. Or any bag.
Having decided to devote my life to helping the environment 30 years ago I have spent years giving my time in a voluntary capacity to Greenpeace, Permaculture International (I was a director for 6 years) and other environmental organisations, I find it incredulous to be attacked verbally for doing things that I dont do, by someone who purports to also being environmentally minded! In my experience of the environmental movement, when the ‘people care’ side of things is avoided we cant go forward at all. It is love that makes the world go round. To project ideas from anger or fear is unsustainable and these feelings act like poison in one’s system…
For you bloggers who want to know a little more of what I am promoting, look out for my upcoming You Tube offering on the subject of permaculture and geomancy (or call it geobiology, if you want it to sound more scientific!), which was filmed for Irish TV on July 26th and will be screened in the autumn coming. (It has been Graham’s voluminous comments that have inspired me to post it!)
Otherwise, I’m much too busy to be engaged in any argument on the subject, I have books to write and films to make, all of which aim to make people more sensitive to and caring for their environment.
Grahams public and private comments are verging on the libellous. And if any more negative aspersions are spread about me I will be considering legal advice to help protect my good name.
Alanna Moore
Old Knowledge can frequently be substituted for Old Religion.
I’m an electronic engineer by trade, and I work in the pharmaceutical, brewing and dairy industries.
So I have no vested interest in any way here.
However, doing things according to old natural cycles, as is ridiculed here, is inherent in all of the industries I work. People do it because it works for them, even if they didn’t fully understand why it works. Mocking it because you don’t understand how it works just reveals one’s own gross ignorance and narrow-mindedness.
So, it occurs to me that the attack on Alanna Moore (whom I don’t know and have never met), for promoting a system of divining that has worked for generations (and Government Departments have engaged the services of dowsers for years), is at best a misguided attempt to appear knowledgeable, and at worse is the type of sneery, self congratulatory, know-it-all approach that serves only to alienate those that should be assisting each other.
Of the many ways that people use knowledge that works, even though we don’t fully understand how, I’ll just include:
For example: Milk collected at night has a higher level of seratonin.
One very popular product in Ireland at the moment is milk by Lullaby Dairies (it’s in all Superqinn stores) It’s used as a natural bedtime sleep promoter, as seratonin has proveable sleep enhancing effects.
Wyeth Medica Ireland makes the contraceptive pill, a hormonally based medicine, which is dispensed in 21day+7day break form. When I asked the head of pharmacology why it used this timing, he said it was because the normal female hormonal cycle was 28 days, in common with moon cycles (he made complicated allowances for the extra day) Wyeth Medica are a multi-billion dollar corporation, and don’t do silly things. Maybe they just research a little deeper than most.
Guinness (Diageo) use a particular seaweed extract to maintain the head on the Pint of Black Stuff. (One of the reasons Guinness is so rich in iron, and is given to blood doners after donation in Ireland, and is recommended to pregnant women in moderation). This seaweed is collected at the full moon, as it’s nutrient cycle maximises it usefulness at this time. No-one knows why, it just does.
Guinness are a multi-billion dollar corporation, and don’t do silly things. Maybe they just research a little deeper than most, and realise that the old traditions are useful additions to modern technology. They’ve been using the same methods for 300 years (and the exact same yeastculture). Because it works. And at one of their international plants (in Nigeria, if I remember correctly) they required a source of water. After a failed geo-tech survey, thy employed a dowser, and got what they needed.
Enough said?
We all have the planet’s best interest at heart. Does it matter if the motivation is Gaian philosophy, Old Religions, self interest, familial loyalty or even, (dare I say it), profit, if our methods conspire to produce the same results?
So include all those who share your peramculture ambitions, even if you don’t fully understand their way of operating. To do otherwise is to do the planet a disservice, and it needs all the help it can get.
Ray
P.S. Before I’m called a sell-out, I should note that my employment in the multi-national industries is in an environmental monitoring capacity, ensuring licence adherence. And I’m a member of the Green Party Science and Technology Advisory Group.
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