Industrial Society Destroys Mind and Environment

Sushil,

Americans don't care about 'rag-heads' or their children so your comments here will fall on deaf ears as you can clearly see.

 

Log in or Sign up to hide all adverts.

Wes,

You sound like a politician.

Government demands? LOL.

Isn't it your corrupt government that keeps starting wars to feed its glutinous populations lifestyle the problem in the first place?

How is technology going to cure gluttony?

 

Log in or Sign up to hide all adverts.

Log in or Sign up to hide all adverts.

Lol. "laws", "regulations", "public outrage" that results in policy, etc.

I wasn't speaking of a particular government.

In what sense of the word? One can be a glutton for a lot of things. If you just mean fat, that one is coming relatively soon actually, well again subject to the process I mentioned regarding profit. They just isolated the "skinny people" gene or section of DNA or whatever. Google for it.

 

No, it's just that if you really read the commentary without buying into his emotional propaganda, you'll find it entirely vaccuous. Discussing the ramifications of industrial society is not correlated to one's "caring for rag-heads" as you so gracefully put it, unless you're kind of a stupid emo-pimp (or emo-whore I guess).

 

Oh and your generalization is disgusting and retarded. "Americans" comprises a large and diverse group for whom you (or I) are unqualified to speak. Speak for yourself, jerky.

 

"How big should a U.S. steady-state economy be in order to be sustainable indefinitely, or for the very long term? It should not exceed a size that allows it to meet the following criteria, as set forth by Professor Daly (1990):

Output rule: Waste outputs should be within the natural absorptive capacities of the environment.

Input rules: (a) For renewable inputs, harvest rates should not exceed regeneration rates (nondepletion of the source services of natural capital). (b) For non-renewable inputs the rate of depletion should not exceed the rate at which renewable substitutes can be developed."

 

Wes,

I mean over-consumption... the greatest sin of the Western world.

Whatever it is food, fuel, energy, sex, leisure, work, etc... the West equals excess.

Below is a series of maps in which each nations size is directly related to a quantity being measured (known as a cartogram).


ENERGY CONSUMPTION

Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image!

AIDS/HIV SUFFERERS

Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image!

INFANT MORTALITY

Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image!

 

Your cartograms support the theory then, that more consumption = less aids and less infant mortality.

 

I liked this part of the OP a lot and I can at least see where it might relate to Eastern Philosophy - unlike most of the thread.

My experience is that when emotions stop thought occurs. Thoughts are the breaks in emotions, or perhaps pinnacles on waves of emotion that catch my attention.

I do see modern society as overstimulating, overly mental, too fast and destructive of our inner natures and this process is mirrored by what is happening to outer nature. My intuition says that the disconnect between us and our emotions makes it easier to see nature and other people as resources to exploit. Without emotion it is harder to take others (including nature) seriously as sentient and having internal rather than instrumental worth.

 

Wes,

I think that the cartograms demonstrate that the world is tragically unbalanced.

This is an inevitable result of capitalism, ie, there's not room at the top for everyone.

If you want poor countries to increase their consumption then they will start getting richer, rich countries must get poorer. That means more disease and infant mortality for us and a lower standard of living in materialist terms. Will Americans tolerate gas and power shortages and an industrial slowdown as Third World nations begin dominating oil resources?

Let me spell it out simply:

Less American power = Less suffering in Africa.

Are you signed up?

 

Grantywanty,

It is the separation of thought from feeling that allows man to rise above and dominate his environment. By subjugating feeling to a lower order of being - down into the body - the mind is raised on to a pedestal. "I think therefore I am". Feelings are excommunicated and considered 'base'.

If you get a chance read 'The Republic' by Plato as this is one of the founding texts of Western civilization and the first time thinking men are considered the only ones fit to govern. Plato relegates women, children and slaves (blacks) to a lower rung of society and makes the thinking philosopher king.

Women get hysterical, children are messy and noisy, blacks are primitive sambos but the thinking man stoically faces the world and overcomes through the power of his intellect (his ability to subjugate his feelings).

The Terminator is born.

 

As it will be until gluttony is satiated, which I think either spirtuality or technology could potentially bring to pass, technology seeming to have the edge to me.

It's my opinion that every form of economy is just capitalism with another name put on it for marketing purposes. I think that's as real as it gets. You're a capitalist for your own ideals no doubt. You're correct that there's not enough room at the top for everyone, but it doesn't matter, people will claw to "the top" in any economic scenario. Capitalism is another word for nature. You think of it as greed, but grantywanty had it right a few posts ago or something. Capitalism is an inevitable consequence of existing. You seek what you value, simple as that. There's no escape.

There's no "fixed amount of wealth", so your comment is untrue. "Wealth" expands and re-distributes over time.

You're simply ignoring the fact that EVERYWHERE used to suck in terms of the statistics you're claiming, now some places don't, because they've worked they're asses off to figure shit out. Now for having done so, they tend to their best interests in attempting to improve their chances at ensuring abundant resources for themselves. This is the human animal. We are fascinating.

That sounds silly to me. I don't see the connection. American power isn't directly correlated to african suffering as far as I can see except, well okay probably in lots of ways, but I still don't think that statement is correct. I doubt africa would be one iota better off for america having less power. You fail to account for human nature. There is a percentage of humans that will fuck you no matter how ugly you are. Know what I mean? If you think the US is fucking them up, knock them down and wait for chavez or china, maybe england or france to go in and fuck them over ROYALLY, as well as can be done. It's the nature of the beast IMO. I liken the competition between nations to the relationship between pimps and whores. Seems to cover it well to me. It's basically the whole alpha male ugly thing.

A government's responsibility is to represent the needs of its people. All failings as you've described them start right there.

No, I think you're wrong so I'll pass. You'll have to be much more convincing to persuade me.

 

While I'm somewhat sympathetic to your point, it's this stoicism that allowed us this medium, and way way too much other stuff to go into.

The thing is, people are emotional creatures regardless of what they tell themselves. The rationalizations like plato's you mentioned are lenses through which they shape their egoes. It takes a really well functioning ego to be "emotionally healthy", though it would probably difficult to agree on exactly what constitutes emotional health. There is no standard by which we can say "hey this is the perfect balance of emotion and intellect" because the "test conditions" (if you will) are always changing (their circumstance is always changing to some degree).

Bah, rambling and tired pardon. I'd agree that people are all jacked up in their emotions (all kinds of weird problems, too much, not enough, skewed reality, denial, etc.)... but I'd ask if you can really, actually and truly concieve of a state in which things could be any different given the real, actual truth about the way things are this very instant? Are you sure you can manage the 6 billion minds it takes to get from here to where you're thinking of? Really? You sure that's not ego talking? It is, regardless of whether you recognize it or not!

Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image!

I wonder sometimes if I'm just tragically apathetic or if I have an actual point. I like the idea of the latter but can't objectively verify. I just think reality is a self-balancing system and if one fails to notice that, it isn't reality's fault. I think that this is accepting the hard cold truth of reality. I think that there is a beautiful folly in that, which enables me to delight in the irony of it all, even in bad times for the most part. People are what they are and you can't change it overnight. It's a species thing, and we'll either get over ourselves or go extinct. Either way the sun burns 5 billion more years. Of course I'm on the "hey let's survive side" and find technology (in the broad sense) to be a naturally occuring phenomenon, in fact pretty much that which separates us from our ancestors... but we're still just a bunch of damned talking apes pretending to be sophisticated and cool.

pardon for run-on paragraphs, might try to clarify later.

 

Key word: separation. I feel therefore I am has always seemed a firmer bases, thoughts being so ephemeral.

I've read it. Plato/Socrates did a lot of damage. His splitting the ideal from the concrete opened the way for a lot of ignoring the consequences on the concrete. On individuals, nature, animals, plants etc.

And it is a history shared by the churches AND by rationalists. Oddly they spend a lot of time sniping at each other as if they were the only choices. A lot like the Dems adn Repubs.

 

1) simply because one uses one of the options of a society does nto mean one would not happily give up use of that option and enjoy other ways of contacting others.
2) stoicism in not the only way to achieve complicated goals.

It is very hard and there is so much damage to this balance I doubt most of us would recognize real balance if we saw it. But we can see the ways we are taught to hate our own emotions and to stifle them and slowly unravel the splits in oursevles caused by this training.

Wouldn't this argument fit any general criticiam of society? Couldn't it have been used in relation to say, slavery, or the power of the Catholic church? At first all changes come from some people who can intuitively feel the general problem. These people seem like dreamers or to have no chance of changing things or the changes they are yearning for seem unlikely, society having based itself on certain unhealthy practices for so long they seem like built in rules. But this is not the case.

Again, this role you are choosing has certain emotional benefits and costs. It could be a stance in relation to any issue and I am sure on some of those issues you are not complacent. There are some people who do make complacency the rule of their lives.. Some even meditate their way to a state where they really do not care. No way to reach them. They've transcended us and good riddence.

 

but any way in which it was done on a mass scale would be considered technology, and be a result of intellectual pursuit with little emotional relevance.

well, "employing the intellect" is the only way to design complicated devices, like those required for mass communications. that's all I was saying. intuition, etc, maybe leads you to a theory, but testing your theory has to be pretty well emotionless or bad things like creationism happen. lol.

It's just my opinion that to move through this problem independently, acceptance of what is, is fundamental to comprehension. This line of thinking has brought me to a strange place in what you've mentioned: I think people should be "trained" as you put it, because if they're truly capable of handling themselves without that training they'll overcome it naturally. To me, this is the balance that has been struck.... naturally.

To me what I said was more of a warning I use to myself when some random altruism I temporarily adopt starts making me feel like an ass to myself. 6 billion minds. each of their own perspective. sort of puts things into perspective for me.

Generally it's a matter of scope. On the "six billion minds" scope, I generally feel somewhat humbled/apathetic. In the scope of my direct circumstance, not nearly so much (usually).

 

I couldn´t get this part.

Were you really lol? If it struck you so strongly, perhaps the emotions swayed you and the point was wrong. I am not arguing that we should not have intellect. Often it is seen as either/or. From my experience this is not the case. Fundamentalists are avoiding emotions as much as the stone faced researcher is.

 

Wes,

I assume you mean the potential for wealth generation here, ie, it's unlimited.

I have to disagree because all wealth is ultimately tied to production. Money is a claim on goods and services and if those goods and services don't exist your money quickly becomes worthless.

There is a limited supply of resources which will limit the supply of goods and services.... in order to stay on top an Empire must retain the greater share of control over all of them. This is why there will inevitably be conflict in a capitalist (free-market) world. China and India will need much more oil than America because of their huge populations to feed and sustain their increasingly materialistic lifestyles. There just isn't that supply of oil available to please everyone.

There's a great film called 'Syriana' with George Clooney and Matt Damon. Give it a watch.

 

Well then you should reconsider your comprehension:


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wealth

While this is true, it's quite misleading. There will always be conflict so long a people value things, because each person's perception warrants a unique value function. Conflict is a divergence of value. As such, humans will conflict, it follows that their governments do as well.

I don't see the relevance besides perhaps a reasonable example as to why wealth isn't limited. Oil is not the end, it's just what's got us here and what we're stuck with in the short to perhaps mid-term.

Meh. Clooney's smugness is almost unbearable.