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230 comments on A Thought for Today: "Losing Faith in Peak Oil's Transformative Power"

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liferaft on September 17, 2006 - 4:07pm Permalink | Subthread | Parent | Comments top
People need good information, not fear or coercion.
There's plenty of good information available to anyone even mildly interested.  The fundamental issue is people's (and society in general) investment in the current paradigm and their unwillingness to confront anything threatening that paradigm - no matter how well the facts are presented to them.
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Nick on September 17, 2006 - 5:38pm Permalink | Subthread | Parent | Comments top
"There's plenty of good information available to anyone even mildly interested. "

That's really not true.  There's lots of information, but almost all of it is very low quality.  Further, most people don't know what to look for: they don't know what they don't know.

"The fundamental issue is people's (and society in general) investment in the current paradigm..."

hmmm.  That's certainly a factor.  But a lot of people just don't have role models for anything diffeent from fulfillment through consumption, popularity, entertainment, etc.

And those who are strongly invested in authoritarian, inflexible ideas certainly aren't going to get reformed through adversity - they're likely to just get worse.

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liferaft on September 17, 2006 - 9:10pm Permalink | Subthread | Parent | Comments top
You're missing my point, which was not about the quantity of quality information available on the subjects of energy and the environment.  These topics have been well documented since the 1970s, with the science of ecology taking off in the 1980s, etc.  Today there is a veritable explosion of books and research on these and related topics.

No role models for anything different than consumption, popularity, entertainment?  You must be kidding.  Ever heard of Jesus Christ, Buddha, Ghandi, or Muhammed?  People don't pay attention to these role models because their personal energy is totally devoted to upholding the current paradigm.

I have news for you regarding authoritarians and dogmatists.  They are by definition not open to reform, and struggle, possibly force, is the only way to get rid of them.

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Nick on September 17, 2006 - 9:44pm Permalink | Subthread | Parent | Comments top
"You're missing my point, which was not about the quantity of quality information available on the subjects of energy and the environment."

Well, I'm not sure now whether you were talking about spirituality or energy.  I was talking about spirituality.  There is an enormous quantity of info available, but most of it is misleading or low quality (see Carl Sagan's book The Demon-Haunted World: Science as a Candle in the Dark for his discussion of bad info).  

"Ever heard of Jesus Christ, Buddha, Ghandi, or Muhammed? "

I'm talking about role models in everyday life.  The ones you're talking about are very distant, and their messages have been caught in the maze of modern organized religion, which as I noted above has completely lost touch with the mystical, spiritual side of religious practice.

"I have news for you regarding authoritarians and dogmatists.  They are by definition not open to reform, and struggle, possibly force, is the only way to get rid of them. "

I'm talking about our friends and neighbors, who have been caught by authoritarian ways of thinking (I have to believe what I'm told by the Pastor, President, etc).  I think possibly what I'm talking about isn't intuitive to you, because you seem to believe that coercion is the only way to make change.

If you look closely at the role models you mention, all (with the possible exception of Muhammed - I know what the Pope is saying lately, but I'm not an expert on Islam) advocate peaceful change.

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AlphaMaleProphe... on September 17, 2006 - 10:18pm Permalink | Subthread | Parent | Comments top
Jesus fed the 5,000 from only 1 loaf of bread and some fishes. That's some pretty amazing EROEI energy source he had access too. Doesn't seem to apply to us.
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memmel on September 17, 2006 - 10:55pm Permalink | Subthread | Parent | Comments top

Dark energy + Dark Matter == how many do you want ?

Trust me.

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memmel on September 18, 2006 - 12:20am Permalink | Subthread | Parent | Comments top
Sorry to be opaque but consider this http://www.c3.lanl.gov/mega-math/workbk/map/mpbkgd.html The traditional four color problem but ask the question how many shades of grey are needed to color a map ? Is the answer still four ? If you choose the concept of color with a rational value does the four color problem even make sense ? If you can prove it does how does it relate to the integer problem. This is the problem faced by dark energy/dark matter Are you even asking the right hard questions. Sometimes you have to question the question. Btw it you can answer the above prove its not 42 :) Mike
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marxiandialectic on September 18, 2006 - 7:29pm Permalink | Subthread | Parent | Comments top
All these role models have one thing in common...
..ambivalence in the face of adversity on the
basis of a variety of outcomes...all of which
deny the dialectical nature of reality...which
by its nature is a dispassionate confluence of
events.

In other words, information and
synthesis equal state. Systemic change is a
natural event...its quality however is
determined by the underlying noise.

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Kevembuangga on September 19, 2006 - 2:27am Permalink | Subthread | Parent | Comments top
For our understanding could you translate this into English?

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Jack on September 19, 2006 - 5:49am Permalink | Subthread | Parent | Comments top
We actually agree on something. I was going to ask the same question.
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230 comments on A Thought for Today: "Losing Faith in Peak Oil's Transformative Power"

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