Politics as religion.

I once wrote a futuristic story with a vast corporation as the bad guys. I had vague ideas that the corp had formed through a process of multimationals merging and taking oneanother over until there was but one all-encompassing corporation left. Yesterday, I was wandering up a bush track when it struck me that there was another possible origin. A political one.

Say a small political group begins to focus on the far future. Proposing radical things like long term environmental management and energy distribution re-structuring aimed at indefinite sustainability. It works out and makes up consumer-friendly representations of projections of what resources are left (oil, timber, etc) and how long they will last given current trends for consumption, then draws a vivid picture of what the future will be like in ten, tewnty-five and fifty years time.

Then it lays out it's proposed re-structuring of society - ten, twenty-five and fifty years time.

It probably has differential descriptions depending on the percentage of the population who are living by the party's guidelines.

The party would be a way of life - comparable to an evangelical cult. If you follow the guidelines, you will be healthy and make the world a better place. If you can encourage more people to join up, it will be of benefit to them and of benefit to the world as a whole.

If humanity can be viewed as a malignant infection, what more humane solution than to benignly infect the infection?

'course, when exposed to Human Nature, such things have potential to spontaneously mutate into less benificial forms. Buracracies spring up, factions form and war with oneanother. *sigh*

"They."

There has been a massive networked energy source for a century in the developed world, and people have grown accustomed to it. For the duration of the development of most of our existing systems and infrastructure, we have had oil to use as a cheap source of energy. Civilisations so adapted seem to be looking for some way of replacing that reservoir of energy. The hope and assumption is that "They" will find a solution, and cheap power will continue to flow as ever. That way, people can continue to consume as we have. There will be no need for change.

I don't have faith that such an energy source will present itself. I'm not sure that the people who could concieveably be thought of as "They" do, either.

The government is waiting for free enterprise to do it, and free enterprise is waiting for the government to do it.

Given that it may not happen, I feel that it is wise for people to look at ways of producing energy on a very local scale. We have the technology to fulfil the energy needs of any isolated house to a functional level. Working on power supply from the household level on out into a network that serves as a battery and a back up or top up is one approach that I think is worth examining. At least as a failsafe in case the replacement energy source is not discovered by the ubiquitous "They".

Supplying power to industry is a more difficult problem. The cost of energy will make up a larger part of the cost of goods and services to consumers. Consumption will be reduced, as the increased cost of filling needs will reduce the amount that can be spent on wants. (As I look around at the amount of pre-ordained rubbish that is produced and consumed to no end, I can't help but think that that might, ironically, be a good thing for the environment under particular circumstances.)

__________

I'm one of those people who believes that human impact is having unforseen impacts on global ecosystems. I believe that if humans keep on as they have, the global environment will break down to a stage where human existence will be severely hampered. There are climatic events like droughts in some parts of the world that I think are the beginnings of the effect of human caused climate change. I don't have the resources or authourity to argue against people who put such changes down to the naturally occurring fluctuations in global climate, but I'm working on it.

There have been summits and conferences, meetings and conventions regarding climate change. But whatever conclusions are drawn from them are simply another statement in a veritable sea of statements, because there is no ultimate authoutity. The lack of centralised authourity is good for debate, but less good for actually coming to conclusions and taking action.

Yes, I'm talking about a world government. Or at least an advisor. Maybe an umpire is a better term.

Unfortunately, the examples of world wide governing bodies that I have seen are disturbingly inefficient and ineffective, so a different kind of organisation would have to be figured out. There are so many questions over how to institute such a thing that it makes my head hurt. But if there were.... if I could pretend for a minute that I had the power to say how things should be done, I'd have to start by knocking the heads of the leaders of many diverse religious organisations together and saying 'We are all in this together so we have to get along. Get over it.'

And then I'd do the same to various cultural leaders across the globe. (I'd probably accidentally knock Mugabe's head against a rock, and a little harder than was compatible with human life, but that's just me.) That would be a good start.

By way of getting wiser heads than mine involved, I'd like to give some actual authourity to scientific types. At the moment, authourity rests with political people and religious people. The closest scientific people come to leadership on that scale is as minions of those two authourity groups. I've often wondered what the world woudl be like if the scientific community had that kind of authourity.

So I'd institute a body known as "They".

As in; "They really should do something." "They should come up with a better way." "They ought to know better."

They are a centralised authourity. They have the final say. They make the rules and They are the referees. They take in all available data, draw conclusions, make decisions and take action. They are subject to instantaneous feedback from the public (the feasibility of which has been field tested through popularity voting shows on television.)

They allow for the fact that knowledge will always be imperfect, but balance that with the knowledge that timely action is essential. They are moderated by compassion checks from within. They always vote their conscience.

Ooh - and They are in charge of the Amish Inquisition. (See previous post)

(Scary and unfeasible as hell I know, but hey, it's just an fantasy in a blog.)

Why am I not a vegetarian?

Given my loathing of animal cruelty and knowledge of agricultural reality, given my dire fears about the degradation of the environment, given the hazards that consuming meat enials regarding disease and nutritional imbalance, I examine my reasaons for not being vegetarian.

A vegetarian diet is not difficult to maintain. It takes a little more attention toward getting appropriate nourishment, but there are many attractive options available there.

I believe that a balanced diet can be managed with or without meat. I don't manage a good diet in either mode, so no real advantage to being vegetarian, only some minor inconvenience in that the default setting is still for omnivorousness in public catering.

Diseases transmitted through meat products are scary. BSE is one biggie, but appears to be anomolous and confined to exotic climes. So far. Ditto bird flu. I am uncertain about the veracity of claims that undigested meat lingers in the digestive tract for a harmful period of time.

I like meat. When I go on a vego kick, I miss meat. When I eat well prepared meat, I enjoy it.

On the ethical front - the area most likely to inspire me to make a profound change to my diet - I feel conflict. I do object to factory farming. I've seen it first hand in egg production, and it is thoroughly inhumane. Regulations don't improve animal wellbeing unless they are adhered to, and they are not adhered to unless they are enforced. I did not see much sign of enforcement when I was working on an egg production farm. Admittedly that was many many years ago, but I can see that the same potential exists for abuse.

Dairying is something I have seen a lot of, and the practices there are distressing to me despite even the very best efforts of the most humane and empathetic farmers out there. Calves are removed from their mothers, to the distress of both, and the unwanted calves are trucked off to become meat products at a couple of days of age or as soon as their umbilical cord is dry. Or at least, that's the rule. Calves that are to be kept for rearing are taught to drink form artificial sources of nutrition. The care and effort that is put into calf survival varies wildly. Disease and casualties are not uncommon.

The suffering of the cows in producing milk for human consumption is largely unavoidable. Genetically, dairy cows are being custom bred to be more efficient producers. In some instances this leads to breakdown in compatibility between their different systems - for example, when their ability to produce milk exceeds the capacity of their udder to hold it, they suffer swelling and inflamation and the ligaments that hold the udder are over-stretched and damaged. Even after the milk supply tapers off to a manageable level, such cows with low hanging udders are disposed to kick their udder as they walk, step on their own teats and suffer infections. For this reason, they are usually culled, and trucked off to become meat products.

Of course, consumption of animal products that are humanely produced - free range eggs, milk from the pet house goat etc, is ethically acceptable.

Eggs that are used in commercially produced pastry won't be from free-range hens. Neither will the milk products. If I choose the vegetarian option at a resteraunt, I'm still supporting the default farming techniques of caged hens and large-scale dairying, aren't I?

Seriously folks, if I were a vegatarian, I'd have to be a vegan.

And that leads me to contemplate the environmental impact of broad acre crop production. Okay, so feeding the grain to a bullock and then eating the bullock is far less efficient, therefore requires far more grain than simply feeding the grain to a human, but the production of that grain is still of detriment to the environment. If I were a vegan, I'd have to be sure to consume only organically grown produce, or produce gleaned sustainably from natural systems.

About there, I collapse form exhaustion at the very thought, and go roast a slab of some deceased animal.

I have to ask - is feral rabbit meat, humanely harvested, ethically acceptable meat? Feral rabbits are being eradicated by far less humane means than a careful shot to the head, or digging them up and despatching them. Ditto for carp. Some don't like the taste of carp, but when prepared properly, they are good eating indeed, and it's far less wasteful than dumping them into landfill. As for leaving a small number of carcasses to natural predators, I've been cautioned against that, as it is a potential source for spread of the species.

There is an old saying: "Wherevery you've got livestock, you'll get dead stock." I have to ask whether ethical vegetarianism allows for the use of suitably dead stock for human consumption. Say one of the goats that is tethered to the fence breaks it's neck? If the body could be recovered in a timely fashion, would I skin it for it's hide and butcher the carcass or simply bury Pollyanna wholesale?

I vote for an impromtu goat roasting party/wake for Pollyanna, myself...

Paranoid Ramblings: Code Merlot

I'd be surprised if among the differential scenarios following 9/11, there was not the possibility that the US would become a magnet for every lunatic - group or individual - that had ever held a grudge against it. A wave of terrorist attacks - some blatantly state sponsored - might ensue, if the US were seen to be wounded.

So how to respond?

Maybe - and it may just be the wine talking (It really is some seriously funky wine, it might ...speak)

....maybe:

1) go after the perpetrators. (alright, so you'd need a dust-vac to get the actual perpetrators, but you know what I mean) The nation of the perpetrators. Show the world that military force will be brought to bear against some connections of identifiable groups responsible for striking the US, even up to the scale of a nation.

2) start a genuine unjust and controversial war to draw the loonies and the scandal away from the vulnerable homeland. "Look!" *points* *Elvis!" So the War on Terror, striking against non-existent WMD's may have been a case of picking the least sympathetic country that could usefully be made war on...

Just a thought.

Applied Metaphysics............*cough*

The idea that metaphysics is irrellevant because it has no predictive quality does not mean that I believe that no metaphysical things exist. It's just that data without replicable methods cannot yeild predictions about future events. What good is it?

Compare to Apatheism; the idea that the existence or lack thereof of god does not effect the way I behave, therefore is irrellevant. My ethics are based on and driven by things other than the idea of divine retribution or edict.

I can only work within the framework of testable phenomena and predictable behaviour. Unpredictable things baffle, fascinate and disturb me.

Humans most of all.

Abstract Art as Telepathy.

Some artists render images so relaistically that there is no mistaking the analogue. Other artists, on the other hand, will reduce and refine their response to the ubiquitous bowl of fruit to such a high degree of abstraction that it is less of an illustration and more of an attempt at telepathy.

For someone with no arty education to stand in front of a canvas painted solid yellow and somehow divine that the artist intended it to depict the crucifixion of Christ* would indeed be an extraordinary thing.

*That painting (not mine) happened in Art School...

The Problem

"If you aren't part of the solution, you're part of the problem" it has been said.

I've been machine-gunned a few times recently for not doing my utmost to minimise my impact on the environment. Apparrently, according to a particular school of thought, if I believe that climate change is influenced by human behaviour, and that it is a bad thing, I should go and live in a cave, and subsist on leaves and roots. Re-planting as I go, of course, to ensure that I leave a minimal ecological fooprint. *sigh*

I can see where they are coming from, but I disagree. Of course. If all people who fit the 'believes humans are negatively impacting the environment' category were to retreat to what's left of the wilderness, it would be detremental in any ways. Aside from the obvious point that teeming hordes of naked, leaf-eating humans would make a serious mess of the described wilderness, ceding the field to 'progressive' memes would not help our biosphere at all.

As with the 'Zero Population Growth' movement, the problem remains one of swaying the vast majority of the populace toward our way of thinking. To flee and live in the hills would not achieve that. In fact, it would not achieve much of anything. It would give a huge advantage to those who live unfettered by concerns about pollution etc.

Personally, I'd like to contribute to efforts to sway humankind to more Earth-friendly behaviours. To promote environmentally sound memeage. To work toward solutions to the planets problems in some small way, or, failing that, to help to find and implement ways to mitigate the harm humans do.

I can't do that if I live nekkid in the scrub. As far as I can see, I have to work within existing social frameworks to garner knowledge and obtain tools to make the kind of positive contribution I want.

Besides which, if environmentalists cede the feild to unfettered consumerism, the planet will more rapidly become incapable of sustaining life in any comfort. And there is no life boat. There is no 'somewhere else' as in: "If you don't like how we are plundering the planet's resources and poisoning our environmnet, go live somewhere else." There is not even a 'somewhere else' as in: "They are screwing the planet ever harder and will not acknowledge the problem let alone make genuine efforts to change, so let's leave them to their fate and live somewhere else."

No lifeboats, people.

Anyway, back to the quote I did quote.

"If you aren't part of the solution, you're part of the problem"

The observer, by observing, influences the outcome, IIRC.

So, simply by being aware of a problem, we are already part of it. An influence on it.

I believe that in order to be part of the solution, one has to be part of the problem, by default.

It's not something I can explain to a bunch of angry conservatives when I'm being told, yet again, that environmentalists are hypocrytes for travelling by polluting forms of transport etcetera, but having set it down here in a somewhat comprehensible form might somehow help me.

I hope so.

Perception

I believe in Objective Truth.

I believe that as flawed collecters of subjective data, we cannot have access to that Truth.

But we can try to get as close to it as we can, and that's what Science does.

I've had conversations with people who see Science as some kind of blinkered machine, dismissing anything it cannot explain as being non-existent. Science, as I understand it, does not do that. In small samples, in practice, of course it happens far too often. But as a meta-concept, the Scientific Method does not do that. The scientific method is more open to all ideas than any of the spiritualities that so love to cast it as rigid and exclusive.

When testable data which is of predictive value is encountered, it is incorporated into the Scientific Method Uber Worldview.

Of course, insisting that phenomenon be predictable or replicable or testable to be relevant to my world view gets spiritualists up in arms.

I've had it suggested to me that Science and Religion should work together to cure the world's ills. Well, as science has already explained religion as a fascinating example of evolutionary psychology (Or at least, I have, so I have to hope that Scientists at large have grokked that concept) the idea of science working with religion is both redundant and impossible.

When I point out that there is no evidence for the existence of God, proponents of religion generally either state that the lack of proof is, in itself, all the evidence needed to definatively prove that God does exist, or they begin to provide what they see to be evidence or proof of the existence of god. There is nothing to be gained by pointing out that the things that they tout as proof of the existence of God have been explained by science to have entirely non-supernatural causes, because, to their mind, that is simply Science making stuff up to explain away the Truth! It can be quite frustrating.

But at least I have a scientific explanation for their fervent adherence to their beliefs. They just put mine down to being brainwashed by the evils of science. :-P