I am an engineer, an old one. I spend my time inventing things, and a lot of them work.

I have founded two companies that employ a lot of people to do good things that have never been done before, and are not being done now by anyone else.

I don’t like to hear any of my people say “Hey, you can’t do that!”

Usually, Hey, I have already done it- at home, on my own time.

I like one of my highly educated engineers’ characterization of me -”You are not qualified to do what you have done”. Right.

“Sometimes nothin’ is a mighty cool hand.”

So what?

Here’s what to do.

1) recognize we are in a hell of a mess and need to do something NOW.

2)realize we can’t whimp around with standard procedures. We gotta do something BIG and QUICK.

3) quit doing all the wasteful, energy- burning suicidal stuff we do now that does nobody any good, and the world a lot of harm- SUV is the current metaphor for that sort of thing. This never-should-have-been-done stuff is about 73.5% of everythingl we do, according to my guy on the supercomputer.

4) Take that money, talent, time, organizations, saved by quitting those stupid things, and use it right now to put the right slope on all those curves- population, CO2, carbon use, etc. We know how to do it.

5) Live happily ever after, or a good approximation thereunto.

Of course– I know, I know — “You can’t do that!” I have heard it many times.

Shalom.

PS. Fact is I AM too old to do that. But- heh, heh-you aren’t.

I’ve studied global climate change for two decades. I concluded nearly ten years ago that there is no politically viable solution. That leaves energy decline and the associated collapse of the industrial economy as the only hope for a planet habitable by humans. And, if the latest projections are anywhere close to accurate, the collapse better happen very quickly.

In other words, I largely agree with Peter Kingsnorth on this issue. We’re headed for far fewer humans on the planet, and it’s much more humane — for every culture and species on the planet, and ultimately for our own species — if we get there quickly vs. slowly. A slow decline kills the living planet, and takes our species into the abyss. So, much as I appreciate George Monbiot’s efforts, I cannot imagine a “steady-state” or “slow-decline” scenario that allows the persistence of our species beyond 2050 or so.

I’m optimistic enough to believe we can bring down the industrial economy and therefore leave a few fragments of the living planet for the enjoyment of our children and grandchildren. The associated economic collapse will be painful for most industrial humans, and it might cause many of them to die. And I’ll almost certainly be part of that group. Such are the consequences of ecological overshoot.

There is a Way, … to build a Future of PAHS Communities, that produce more, rather than consume more, energy in all of it’s forms, eliminating Fossil Fuels, and the need for them.

That Way, will provide employment for all, and result in, a much healthier population of all ages, eliminating the need of Insurance paid Health Care, and the Plethora of Doctors and Staff we do not need.

Do you know of a way to reach President Barack Obama, to set up a Meeting to explain these Solutions ?

Reality is a naturally chaotic phenomenon. As has been observed by many, JMG being one of the more lucid to point it out, we tell ourselves stories to make sense out of the chaos. These two opposing lenses are just that – stories told to make sense of the chaotic mess of the world in which we dwell. That we all too often fail to recognize our stories for the tools that they are is one of our great failings as a species that claims to be sapient.

The only way to make sense of it, in a way that will prepare us for the future that looks ever more likely, is to learn to use all the stories we have available to us. Monbiot’s lens is vital to us because it reminds us of the very real tragedy that faces us, and impels us to wish to act, to step forward and face a struggle that may be unwinnable.

Kingsnorth’s lens is important, because it tells us we can both look back and forward to other times of trial; times when, despite the immense personal cost to individual people, humanity as a whole has persevered and survived odds much, much worse than our own; we have endured, as a species, events as monumental as the Toba supervolcano detonating. We are a survivor species. Even in the most dire of straits, we do not succumb.

And there is a third lens, the one that I personally see in the narratives provided by Greer: the lens that shows us that the actions of individuals can impact the grand sweep of history. Consider his short string of stories, published a few years ago, about the lives of three people, in succession, who live through the fall of industrial civilization. True, these character don’t save the world from sweeping climate change – but they do struggle through it, and endure, and bolster the lives of those around them, ensuring that people can still be there when the world they know slowly falls apart. Ensuring that there will be someone there to see tomorrow, for better or worse.

There are many other lenses to be looked through, all of them useful in their own way; to communicate with a person, you need to understand the lens they use to perceive the world, or else – as is all too often the case at many debates these days – you will end up talking past each other, hearing the words but not the meanings behind them. That, I think, is the true downfall of Monbiot and Kingsnorth; neither understands the grid the other uses to order the chaos of the world, and so each of them sees discord where the other sees order.

No-one will pay attention to me perched on the end of the thread here, so I will just say what I really think: I can’t understand this conversation at all.

How obvious can you get? It’s all in what Sharon is saying:

There’s an old Jewish saying that one isn’t obligated to complete the work (of tikkun olam, the repair of the world) oneself, but neither is one free not to attempt it.

There’s nothing more to say!

What did people think they were doing here? Getting some kind of reward? Getting a ‘better world’? Did people really think they were going to see a ‘solution’? (As Greer says, predicaments don’t have solutions.) Why did they think this, for heavens’ sake? The most surprising people have the strangest ideas.

Do what seems best, but the result is not known. Hope may fail or hope may not, but what option is there? Between what and what? Everyone has more than enough to do, just get on with it as best you can! There’s no such thing as ‘it turned out alright’, there is only ever the next challenge. One must avoid what the Hermetics call ‘lust of result’. You ruin everything by hedging your bets.

Personally, as a Stoic, I think everyone should read Marcus Aurelius on things like this. But you can take your pick of sources. Now is the time when you see if you really had a religion, a spirituality, a philosophy. I guarantee, your favourite books have this in them somewhere.

I grew up on fantasy authors, how about the mouse Reepicheep from C.S.Lewis’ ‘Voyage of the Dawn Treader’, who is determined to reach the country of his god, Aslan –

“While I can, I sail east in the Dawn Treader. When she fails me, I paddle east in my coracle. When she sinks, I shall swim east with my four paws. And when I can swim no longer, if I have not reached Aslan’s country, I shall sink with my nose to the sunrise.”

Are we all going to be outdone in our humanity by a mere talking mouse? It’s not about what we get, it’s about what we do.

If there’s no wonderful new society to be had, whatever the next best thing is which is morally possible, that is what we go for. Whatever might work, will it dispense with communities? No, we need communities. So Sharon‘s idea of community action will be useful. Will it be ‘enough’? Enough for what exactly?

I don’t get it, I really don’t. As if a world coming ‘swiftly to the brink of chaos’ were any different from any other world as a basis for action! The moral imperative, the task of survival, and the necessity to proceed, remain as they are. The game hasn’t changed in any way, ‘doom’ or no ‘doom’. We don’t know what will happen, but we know what we must do.

It’s not a lie to tell people, you’re going to need to work as a community to grow your own food. It’s true whether they will be killed by a hurricane tomorrow or not; it’s as true as 2+2=4. Death happens; some consider it a disaster, and although I do not, I’m hardly hankering after being burned or starved in my final moments — or weeks. But misery and illness will be upon us, as they have been throughout history. There are more of us now, more mistakes, and more misery. I don’t see what that changes.

The only way you couldn’t see this is if you really believe the adverts are true — the kind of commercial crap in Sharon‘s latest post. But nobody still believes that do they?

I often wonder why it’s necessary to continue hating on that kind of thing, it’s just the death throes of a monster, poor tired thing, let it die. Meanwhile, we have stuff to do.

I think this is common amongst greens – as you say, we have to lie to ourselves, because the alternative seems to be despair. How do we talk about this, you ask? It is a good question and I don’t have the answer yet, but my new initiative, the Dark Mountain Project, is predicated on trying to work this out. I do think the first step is to stop lying to ourselves – to let go, because then we can be much more honest about where we really stand. And then the illusions fall away, and we can get busy; which is what you’re doing, and I think your approach is impressive and right. But it all has to start with honesty.