Peak Water December 18, 2009
Posted by Graham in : Food, Human Ecology, Overshoot, Population, book review, climate change, collapse, water , add a commentPeak Water Civilisation and the World’s Water Crisis
Alexander Bell
Luath Press 2009
Hardback 208 pp
If oil supply peaks and begins to decline times will be hard. Standard of living will decline and people may go hungry but they will be able to adapt by powering down and making do with less.
If water supply- for domestic use but also for irrigation- peaks and declines people have no option but to migrate.
UK journalist Alexander Bell spells out his thesis starkly in this fascinating and clearly written book: many of the world’s major regions are past or on the brink of peak water and face growing populations with declining supplies. (more…)
The Heretic’s Guide to vegan Cookery November 12, 2009
Posted by Graham in : Food, Health, Science and Rationaltiy, book review , 1 comment so farBook Review: The Heretic’s Guide to Vegan Cookery
Warning! Not suitable for Breatharians
Andy Murray
The Good Elf Press 2009
187pp
Astrology is an amazing tool to run your life by, without having to waste time with the fraudulent pseudo-scientific mumbo-jumbo of Science. Astrology explains wars, thunderstorms and plagues. We can even use it historically. For example, if we know exactly when and where Queen Elizabeth was born, we can find out exactly who she was without having to waste time on fictitious history books. With it we can even discover why Einstein was so damn clever. Astrology is way better than sex.
You don’t have to be a vegan to enjoy Andy Murray’s brilliant Heretic’s Guide, which is packed with dozens of tasty simple recipes to satisfy even the most hardened omnivore at least some of the time, you dont even need to have any great interest in cooking or even food. That is because for our amusement and philosophical delectation there are numerous passages in between the recipes giving us fascinating and hilarious perspectives from the Mecca of New Age beliefs in Britain, the town of Glastonbury near where the author lives.
While waiting for the pumpkin soup to cook or in between making preperations for the Hazelnut and Celery Risotto you will be able to work up an appetite by rolling around clutching your belly after reading the sure -to-become-classic passages “Reiki Reiki Rise and Shine” “Cooking with Astrology” or “Breeding Gurus for Profit”.
This book has it all really- great advice on cooking with fresh ingredients and all the usual good reasons to grow your own and buy local; loads of easy to follow recipes including a big choice of soups, salads and dips; and inspirational chapter on cooking in the great outdoors, including a useful guide to wild food; Posh Things to Do with Vegetables; Main Meals; Side Dishes and Extras; Desserts, and Cakes and Biscuits.
And then the alternative Contents covers everything else- Cults, Gurus, Satanism, Religion, Crop Circles, Homeopathy- nothing is sacred and nothing is spared the sharp rib-splitting egg-whisk of Murray’s irreverence.
Homeopathic Cookery Doubters of this form of cookery pour scorn on the fact that a diner might receive a drop of gravy and a shred of carrot on a plate. How can this be a meal, they ask? What they fail to understand is that carbon,the building block of all life, has a memory. A potentised meal maintains a complete carbon hologram, the information of the whole, even down to the smallest atomic sum of its parts.A homeopathic amount of food is of course more than sufficient to provide all the nutritional benefits that would be expected from a plateful of food, and puts paid to any shrill cries of fraud. Filthy skeptics who come to the homeopathic table having already made up their tiny minds will trhow down their napkins and walk away still believing what they believe tio be true, and little can be done to change their wrongness.
Even the his own sacred Creed of Veganism is given the once-over. This is something I know a little about, because I once lived in a vegan community on the Welsh Borders. I was not especially into veganism per se and went there to learn to grow vegetables; I happily lived a vegan diet however, but was aware of an accute divide between some of my fellow communards, who seemed to be at each other’s throats all the time.
On one extreme there were the the vegans who were happy to eat anything so long as it was vegan, including skip food, vegan chocolate from Malaysia (or somewhere) and chip butty’s. This group of vegans were also keen to give over some of the best land we had to rescued sheep and ageing dogs, and generally turn the place into an animal sanctury.
All this tended to jar somewhat with the second group who apart from being rather snobby in their choice of edibles- Vegan Organic Wholefoods only, no white flour allowed, lots of Miso- didnt seem to like animals at all anywhere near them. Wild animals were OK in their own wild homes, but no pets, farm animals or incontinent retired donkeys of any kind permitted.
Murray gives a total of 7 Vegan groups, including the Fat Vegan, the Sensitive Vegan and the Style Vegan, but presumable fitsd into he first category of The Common Vegan:
The most widespread of all vegans, the common vegan has been quietly animal free for years and still hasn’t died. Usually healthy, fit and happy, they tend to be quite normal, although sometimes a little willowy to stand in a strong wind.
For Murray, veganism might well play a role in a sustainable future, but is mainly just about bloody good food. While no longer a Vegan myself, my animal-free taste buds have been re-awakened by the Heretics Guide and who knows, so have some of my chakras.
And with that I think Ill go and make a quick Potato Rosti.
Reading the Great Book of Life October 27, 2009
Posted by Graham in : Biodiversity, Environment, Human Ecology, Permaculture, book review , 4commentsBook Review:
The Living Landscape: How to Read and Understand it
Patrick Whitefield
Permanent Publications 2009
334pp
48 color photos
When I first saw in the recent Permaculture Magazine that Patrick Whitefield had written a book on reading the landscape I became very excited and thought, “That’s probably a book David Holmgren would have liked to have written!”
Holmgren called it “reading the great Book of Life”- looking at the living landscape of the countryside through the lens of ecology,botany, geology, archaeology, history and even politics and economics.
Observation of the natural world is the starting point of permaculture design and with this book Whitefield helps us gain an insight into the myriad of the many natural and human processes that make up our landscape, and how to interpret their hidden indications.
Patrick Whitefield covers all of these impacts on the British Countryside, taking his examples from all over the country, and shows us how to be a kind of landscape detective, painstakingly uncovering the meaning of signs and indications of past land-use, some obvious – the absence of trees indicating ongoing grazing- some much less so- the horeshoe bat indicating an intact mosaic of different habitats.
The book begins with some chapters on general patterns in the landscape and underlying features of geology, soil and then climate and natural succession before moving onto more specific cases including animal signs; niches; succession; Different Kinds of Woodlands; Grassland; Heaths and Moors; Water in the Landscape; and finally, Hedges and other field boundaries and Roads and Paths.
Throughout Patrick gives us pages from his extensive notebooks that he has kept over the years which show actual examples of reading the landscape in a wide range of landscape types he has encountered on travels up and down the country, from the Highlands of Scotland to the Somerset “Levels” – or Moors as they are more usually known locally; the remnants of diverse wildflower meadows still found on the chalk downs, and the semi-ancient wood of Lady Park Wood in the Wye valley.
Patrick is always an agreeable travel companion and makes fascinating observations throughout. The pleasure he takes at discovering new landscapes or unpicking the story of a woodland and how it got to have the species mix it has- the subtle interplay of geology, microclimate and grazing patterns- is always obvious, becoming most so when discovering a new hedgerow with large number of species ( a possible indicator of antiquity).
we have been using Patrick’s previous books, The Earth Care Manual and How to Make a Forest Garden on the Kinsale course for the past several years; The Living Landscape is another great addition which fills an important niche in permaculture literature. A fascinating and engaging read with great color photos, it will have to find a place on every designers’ bookshelf.
The Transition Timeline June 29, 2009
Posted by Graham in : Health, Peak Oil, Population, Powerdown, Science and Rationaltiy, Transition Towns, book review, climate change, community , 6comments
Book Review:
The Transition Timeline
for a local, resilient future
Shaun Chamberlin
Forward by Rob Hopkins
190 pp pbk
Chelsea Green 2009
The follow-up to Rob Hopkins’ seminal The Transition Handbook uses the method of “backcasting” from an envisioned future from which we create a timeline of how the transition to a more local, resilient world unfolded.
The first part goes through four different scenarios presented as “cultural stories” roughly along the same lines as the scenarios we are familiar with from Holmgren’s Future Scenarios, this time under the headings:
-Denial
-Hitting the Wall
-The Impossible Dream
-The Transition Vision
The transition approach is to look at these possible futures in terms of the cultural stories that we tell ourselves, the idea being that we have the power to make our own cultural stories and thereby empower ouselves to guide the future to a more desirable outcome:
Human Nature is the ability to choose our own path
The second part of the book takes a deeper look at the Transition Vision in the five areas of population and demographics; Food and Water; Electricity and Energy; travel and transport; Health and Medicine.
Each of these sections presents a thorough and well-researched overview of the current situation, ending with a Timeline of how we reached a more desirable situation by 2027.
At the back of the book Chamberlin states that “This book has not attempted to quantify the energy/emissions footprint of each aspect of the Transition Vision, but this represents a critical avenue for further work.”
Unfortunatley, this lack of analysis seriously compromises the usefulness of the book, as the projected scenarios may be widely implausible or purely aspirational. (more…)
Future Scenarios June 11, 2009
Posted by Graham in : General, Human Ecology, Peak Oil, Permaculture, Powerdown, book review, climate change, collapse , 7commentsBook Review- 
Future Scenarios How Communities Can adapt to Peak Oil and Climate Change
David Holmgren
Chelsea Green 2009
When I first saw David Holmgren’s Future Scenarios talk and slide at a permaculture design course in Slovenia in 2005 I was still quite new to the concept of peak oil and listened transfixed at what seemed to be a detailed vision of the future: not precise predictions but an outline of four possible scenarios that may unfold over the next generation and beyond as human societies adapt to the consequences of the peaking and decline of our primary energy sources, peak oil and natural gas.
A couple of years ago David continued his explorations of these issues first examined in detail in his earlier book, Permaculture- Principles and Pathways Beyond Sustainability (2002) with a new website Future Scenarios.
Now in book form, Future Scenarios provides one of the most succinct and lucid accounts of the possible paths that await us as we start the new era of energy descent.
Holmgren is in agreement with John Michael Greer that while much mainstream discussion about energy futures centres on the first two of his scenarios- “Techno-explosion” and “Techno Stability”, and the doomer/survivalist meme amongst the peak oil community tends to focus on the fourth scenario of “lifeboats” or versions of collapse, the more likely would be the third possibility of “Energy Descent”- a more gradual adaptation to diminishing energy supplies resulting in a contracting economy and reversion to technological simplicity that may play out over many generations.
This pathway of earth Stewardship is assumed by the permaculture agenda- an adaptive approach in which human scale design and general sustainability practices are progressively implemented and are informed by the energy flows through human society and ecology, and the energy base of our economies is clearly understood.
The real problem is that this more likely future is currently still marginalised as the mainstream culture refuses to abandon its faith in the myth of progress- a belief that rests on the mistaken assumption that gains in human welfare over the past few hundred years have been as a result of some teleological process propelling us forwards, or of a general increasing application of our genious for technological improvements and innovation, while ignoring the underlying reosurce base that has made all this possible: technology is merely different ways of using energy that is usually dug out of holes in the ground.
The likelihood that this transition will be to one of less energy is such an anathema to the psychological foundations and power elites of modern societies that it is constantly misinterpreted, ignored, covered up, or derided. Instead we see geopolitical maneuvering around energy resources, including proxy and real wars to control dwindling reserves and policy gymnastics to somehow make reducing carbon emissions the new engine of economic growth.
Holmgren categorises the scenarios according to the varying potential severity of peak oil and climate change and how these tow factors interplay:
- Brown Tech- slow oil decline, fast climate change;
- Green Tech- slow oil decline, slow climate change;
- Earth Steward- fast oil decline, slow climate change;
- Lifeboats- fast oil decline, fast climate change
These typologies may necessarily be too simplistic- so many other factors may also come into play, such as financial collapse which, while no doubt linked to both peak oil and climate change, may impact in ways as yet unforeseen. However, Holmgren provides a deeper analyses by showing how the scenarios may be “nested” one within the other- each acting on the different scales of the household, local, national and international economies; or may take a stepped form over time- attempts by governments to keep the system going a little longer by following a Brown Tech path may hasten an eventual collapse; equally, an attempt to switch to green tech may result in the adoption of Earth Stewardship further down the line as renewables fail to fill the gap left by oil. The scenarios may also play out differently in different parts of the world.
Throughout Holmgren’s analysis is informed by ecological systems, the foundation for his permaculture principles, as he sees how energy dynamics in nature may be mirrored in human socieites:
Natural ecosytems tend to maintain homeostasis under stress through the allocation of stored resources. if the conditions continue to deteriorate, then further stress can fracture the homeostasis. If the stress involves a reduction in energy availability, the system may collapse. But total collapse and system disintegration are rare, at least in the short term. More typically a restabalization occurs at a lower level of energy processing and organisational complexity. The new homeostasis will typically be stable for some time before declining energy availability precipitates another crisis. This may also be a model for how human societies respond to the crisis of resource and energy decline.
Holmgren is keen to paint a more positive vision of the future in the earth Stewardship scenario- “conditions for ordinary people may actually improve when resources devoted to maintaining societal complexity are freed for meeting more basic needs”- a reference to the diminishing returns provided by endless growth.
There is a desperate need to recast energy descent as a positive process that can free people from the strictures and dysfunctions of growth economics and consumer culture. This is now apparent to many people around the world and is far more fundamental than a public relations campaign to paint a black sky blue. It is a necessary [process to provide a sense of hope and connection to fundamental human values expressed by every traditional culture throughout human history, among them, that the prusuit of materialism is a false god.
No doubt materialism without bounds, as expressed in modern society in unending growth and the development of consumer culture, is a false god; however, I am not sure that an awareness of this has always been present in every traditional culture. Holmgren here seems to betray a romantic view of the past, at odds with the ecological basis for his work, which is itself of course fundamentally materialistic. What seems more likely is the insights of anthropology and evolutionary psychology: that we have as a species a fundamental propensity towards getting more stuff, as is evidenced by the ready emergence in traditional societies of cargo cults after contact with the west.
This weakness is apparent in his assessment of the corresponding ideologies and belief systems that accompany the scenarios: he seems to equate secular humanism with the materialistic ideology of “Brown Tech” and suggests that these beliefs systems are inherently negative, giving rise to dysfunctional behaviours;
While the elites continue to be driven by a commitment to superrationalist beliefs, a sense of hollowness and lack of purpose characterizes the shrinking middle class, while fundamentalist religions and cults play a stronger role in the lives of the working and unemployed classes, partly through genuine reaction to the failures of modern humanism and partly manipulated by the elites to deflect anger and disenchantment.
While this may be very true, he compares this to a shift in values in “Green Tech”:
Civic culture strengthens where further transition toward nonmaterialistic society combines with the maturation of feminism and environmentalism, and a resurgence in indigenous and traditional cultural values.
It seems to me that there is a contradiction between “traditional values” -many of which may be parochial and overly conservative or reactionary – with post-modern feminist and environmental values; it is far from clear that they would be the same or even compatible.
Similarly, under “Earth Steward” Holmgren suggests that a “simplification in the material domain is seen as the opportunity for growth in the spiritual domain. There is a resurgence in leadership by women and a celebration of the feminine in nature and people”.
But what is the “spiritual” domain? This needs to be defined here becasue there is a vast range of possible interpretations. For the same reasons I have always had some difficulty with Holmgren’s domain of “Health and Spritual well-being” in the Permaculture Flower. I interpret it to mean “Health and Psychological/emotional well-being”. However, it is abundantly apparent that permaculture has become almost synonymous with New Age religion in many quarters, a reactionary and delusional trend that all permaculturalists should challenge strongly. Holmgren’s loose use of the word “spiritual” in this context, and his “celebration of the feminine” will inevitably be seen by many to sanctify pseudo-science and the worship of spirits and nebulous “energies”.
(Again “the feminine” and “feminine values” really needs to be defined: we are presumably not talking about the feminine values of Sex in the City; too often “the feminine” is associated with “the spiritual” in a quite meaningless way which I feel is rather patronizing to women.)
Here, Holmgren looses an opportunity to call for a celebration of secular humanism and rationalism- the most important legacy of the modern world, which will need to be protected less we fall back into a new dark age of superstition and delusion with energy descent.
Nor is it necessary to embody any kind of “earth spirituality” in order to foster more sustainable lifestyles- these should come of their own accord, naturally emerging from a scientific understanding of ecology and our place within it, combined with a simple sense of beauty and wonder at the natural world, unfettered by ideological presumptions.
There is a great danger within the environmental movement as a whole to replace the delusion of unending growth with the delusion of narcissistic spirituality, part of a wider failure to acknowledge the real gains of modernity through science.
For all this, Holmgren remains one of the most significant of contemporary thinkers, and Future Scenarios is an important contribution to peak oil literature, and one of the clearest assessments of the kind of world that awaits us.
Book Review: When Technology Fails April 5, 2009
Posted by Graham in : Food, Peak Oil, Permaculture, Science and Rationaltiy, book review, collapse, survivalism , add a commentWhen Technology Fails- A Manual for Self- Reliance, Sustainability, and Surviving the Long Emergency
Matthew Stein
Chelsea Green 2000, 2008
494 pp
Matthew Stein’s massive survival manual When Technology Fails packs into one volume everything you need to survive “The long Emergency”- (a phrase later used by Kunstler in his 2005 book of that name on peak oil and its consequences) from fire making and hunting, gardening and wild food gathering, technology and power, metal working and constructing simple shelters.
There is a detailed discussion at the start of the book on the environmental crisis, pollution and resource depletion, as well as climate change and peak oil- and the consequent need to learn many new skills to survive; perhaps this section isnt srictly necessary for such a book.
More of an encyclopaedia than a handy book to throw in your grab-and-run bag, it probably suffers from trying to do too much; nevertheless, there is a serious amount of information here to help survive emergencies, powerdowns, social collapses and energy descent transitions- most of it useful and well laid out, while some of it smacks of New Age-ism and gives advice which would be more of a hazard than a help in a survival situation.
The “When Hi-Tech Medicine Fails” chapter in particular should come with a severe health warning: a credulous mish-mash of a range of Quackeries from homeopathy and acupuncture through naturopathy, “energy healing” and even the Power of Prayer. Anecdotal “evidence” is offered about miraculous cures achieved through the services of members of the whacky Christian Science cult. He quotes Larry Dossey’s Healing Words as providing “numerous scientific studies ” which “now confirm that p[rayer does, in fact, have a positive effect on healing” when in fact it does nothing of the kind.
Futile of course to suggest that if you believed in the Power of Prayer you wouldn’t need a survival manual, but even worse is the section promoting the use of colloidial silver for a range of illnesses including some serious conditions.
Quackwatch surveys the evidence forand the dangers of use of colloidal silver here. Stein presumably thinks that if uncritical self-medication with such stuff lead to argyria, you always have the Power of Prayer as a Back-up.
The early section on Survivor Personality Traits is also tainted with pseudo-scientific nonsense. While stories of survivors of disasters are interesting and may provide useful insights, Stein seems to make he contradictory claim that your intuition is more useful than your rational mind- at least in emergency situations.
Now, there may well be situations where intuition is simply all you have to go on- and clearly we have evolved instinctive responses to danger which have allowed our species to survive as well as it has. This doesnt mean that intuition is superior to rational thought- after all, this is an emergency preparedness manual, the whole point is to use your rational ability to prepare for emergencies ahead of time. I dont see any scientific evidence tha shows people with New Age beliefs such as those promoted by Sein are more likely to survive an emergency.
These reactionary and dangerous ideas are enough to put me off he book entirely, and it is certainly a matter of concern that Peak Oil luminaries Richard Heinberg and James Howard Kunstler would endorse it.
Nevertheless, there is much to offer in the other chapters, which are oddly rational and practical in their approach(!)
Each section begins with a view of the global situation vis-a-vis current use of resources and environmental impact. There is then a survey of different techniques with a brief description, and a wealth of resources and further reading to conclude.
The section on food is wide-ranging, with good information on both gardening and wild-food gathering. Stein advocates Jeavons’ Bio-Intensive method; the section on permaculture is only a few paragraphs, with no mention of perrenial food crops or edible forest gardens, nor permaculture principles.
The sections on natural building, off-grid electricity and traditional methods of home-crafts such as soap-making, clothes-making, pottery etc provide useful introductions, though perhaps not much more than that.
In short, there are probably other survival manuals which are more useful as pocket-sized books for emergency situations; and specific permaculture books and building manuals would be more useful for long-term survival/powerdown scenarios.
Most worrying is the apparent unquestioning acceptance of the reactionary ideologies promoted here by at least some of the wider peak oil/permaculture community.
Come with Me to Solla Sollew March 7, 2009
Posted by Graham in : Science and Rationaltiy, book review , 1 comment so farI was delighted to read in Sharon Astyk’s Casaubon’s Book that last Tuesday was the 105th birthday of Dr. Seuss.
Like thousands of others, my upbringing was influenced and enriched by the famous Cat in the Hat books- which Astyk’s piece provides some interesting insights into that I had not previously considered.
In more recent years I came across The Lorax 
a classic hymn of environmentalism and anti-capitalism that is as poignant and powerful now as when it was written in 1971. It is a prophetic as well as cautionary tale of the “Once-lers” who turn the natural paradise of truffula trees into profit with o care for the Brown Bar-ba-loots, the Swomee-swans or the hapless Humming-fish who lose their once pristine habitat to the pollution of gluppity-glupp.
The Once-lers’ are seemingly unable resist the growth imprative, despite the protsts of the mysterious Lorax who speaks for the trees:
“And then I got mad.
I got terribly mad.
I yelled at the Lorax, ‘Now Listen here Dad!
All you do is yap-yap and say Bad! Bad! Bad! Bad!
Well I have my rights, sir, and I’m telling you
I intend to go on doing just what I do!
And for your information you Lorax, I’m figgering
on biggering
and Biggering
and BIGGERING
AND BIGGERING !“
I was more delighted that Sharon’s own favourite Dr. Seuss book is the moral tale “I had trouble in Getting to Solla Sollew”, a wry comment on the fraility of human psychologyand our seemingly inexhaustable ability to be deluded by false promises, dreams of riches and generally implausble solutions offered to our problems.
“There I was,
All completely surrounded by trouble,
When a chap rumbled up in a One-Wheeler Wubble.
‘Young fellow,’ he said, ‘what has happened to you
Has happened to me and to other folks too.
So I’ll tell you what I have decided to do…
I’m off to the City of Solla Sollew
On the banks of the beautiful River Wah-Hoo,
Where they never have troubles!
At least, very few…”
Solla Sollew could be anything from the beads-and-mirrors lure of pyramid schemes or housing bubbles to the simplistic solutions to health problems offered by homeopaths, the promise of everlasting life in heaven offered by some religions, or the truly insane delusions marketed so successfully by such scams as The Secret.
Dr. Seuss offers essential guidance to counter all these falsehoods and should still be essential reading for chldren of all ages.
Bad Science- and Good January 9, 2009
Posted by Graham in : Health, Science and Rationaltiy, book review , 18commentsUpdate: Jan 9th 2009 “Unprecedented” rise in Measles cases in England and Wales due to poor uptake of MMR: “
“We shouldn’t forget that the children who weren’t vaccinated many years ago are at real risk.”
” ‘Big pharma is evil’, goes the line of reasoning, ‘therefore homeopathy works and the MMR vaccine causes autism’. This is probably not helpful”.
So says Guardian columnist and evidence-based medical blogger Ben Goldacre in his highly recommended and also hilarious book Bad Science.
Some of the comments in response to my review of Greer’s The Long Descent before Christmas lead me to think I should follow up with more explanation on acupuncture and alternative therapies, and I can do no better than give a brief review of Goldacre’s superb explanation of the scientific method in this book.
He begins with a chapter on homeopathy, not as he says because it is particularly important but because it provides such a good example of how to test therapies and see if they work:
Homeopathy is perhaps the paradigmatic example of an alternative therapy: it claims the authority of a rich historical heritage, but its history is routinely rewritten for the PR needs of a contemporary market; it has an elaborate and sciencey-sounding framework for how it works, without scientific evidence to demonstrate its veracity; and its proponents are quite clear that the pills will make you better, when in fact they have been thoroughly researched, with innumerable trials, and have been found to perform no better than placebo. Homeopathic remedies- in liquid drops or pill form- in fact contain nothing at all- perhaps explaining why they are often promoted for their qualities of “being natural alternatives to mainstream medicine without the side-effects”. (more…)
Book Review: The Long Descent December 11, 2008
Posted by Graham in : Human Ecology, Overshoot, Peak Oil, Science and Rationaltiy, Tools and technology, book review, collapse, consciousness , 12comments
The Long Descent- A Users Guide to the End of the Industrial Age
John Michael Greer
New Society Publishers 2008
John Michael Greer has written a fascinating and engaging, but also contradictory and perplexing account of how he sees the industrial age ending.
His primary thesis is that collapse will not come as a sudden, abrupt End Of Days or Die Off scenario- one minute thriving bustling affluent society with the universe at its feet, the next a crumbling pile of rubble with nothing but wisps of smoke to hint of its former glory- but will follow a “catabolic” process of progressive disintegration, over possibly a couple of centuries. In Greer’s scenario, short periods of abrupt and sharp downturns- the beginning of which we are experiencing now- punctuate longer periods of relative stability. Like an organism that begins feeding on itself, society will collapse in a series of stepped-down stages as it becomes progressively unable to meet maintenance charges with income.
One of the most interesting parts of the book is the chapter “Tools for the Transition” Greer has a most interesting discussion of the merits of the slide-rule over the pocket calculator, and explains why it is infinitely more suitable to a low-energy world:it is durable- a solid aluminum slde-rule could last nearly geological time-scales-, independent, dependable and perhaps most significant of all its use of transparent- a future archeologist would be able to work out exactly how to use it. I have never actually used a slide-rule, but this discussion has inspired me to get one, and even teach its use on permaculture courses as an example of durable technologies. There are many other insightful observations Greer makes in this chapter, including comments on salvage and organic agriculture, and what will endure into the post-collapse world.
What sets Greer’s book apart and make it really interesting is his focus on “The Stories we tell Ourselves”. He weaves his discussion of the Long descent around what he sees as two modern myths- the myth of unending progress and technological supremacy on the one hand, and imminent catastrophe and collapse on the other. Both are myths or stories that fail to see the much more likely outcome of catabolic collapse. (more…)
The Shock Doctrine: No Conspiracy Necessary November 30, 2008
Posted by Graham in : Geo-politics, book review , 5comments
Essential reading for anyone who wants to understand world history of the last 50 years is Naomi Klein’s The Shock Doctrine.
Her extraordinary account begins with the exploits of one Dr. Ewan Cameron, president of the American and World Psychiatric Association, who’s theories on treating psychiatric patients by erasing their personalities became influential in the spread of Electric Shock Treatment (EST) in U.S. hospitals from the late 1940s.
Cameron believed that he could use a combination of sensory deprivation, EST and drugs to reduce the personality to a tabula rasa- “shock and awe warfare on the mind.”
The application of these methods in political torture are probably obvious and well-known, but what Klein’s book does is to show the link between this method of first erasing the personality and then reconstructing it according to the desires of the “therapist” were applied systematically, not just to individuals but to whole countries through the economic theories of Milton Friedman. (more…)
