Tom Desrosier
Much of what we believe about ourselves, our world and our politics, we learned from someone else.
Sometimes, years later, we still cling to this stufff, long after its proven wrong.
Go figure...
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About those Lemmings from yesterday…
Looks like the electric grid is in transformation too.
Yeah, I know - we still have the melting economy to worry about. No doubt we’re all acting like lemmings there!
Tom
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The Lemmings Predictive Tool for World Oblivion
Clifford J. Wirth, Ph.D. gave a rather scholarly treatment of the dire situation we all face as we approach this condition coined, "Peak Oil." See his comments here.
Dr. Wirth, runs his own blog, entitled, "Surviving Peak Oil" should you wish to read further.
I took a casual glance at his blog, then went here, to this rather noteworthy quote by Peter Goodchild:
"We live in a morass of bad politics, bad economics, and bad education (and bad news media that spoon-feed us with half-truths), and we elect thieves and liars to guide us. But the loss of oil, which is almost the only support of our unique industrial society, will be the factor that brings all the rest down."
He got most of it right - all except one key thing. Like so many others, he’s assuming that humanity is utterly helpless and incapable of self-guided action. Somehow he believes innovation and change requires government and government money. Somehow he thinks politicians must rise to the challenge and save us:
Lo. Look left to see who we got to save us from our lemmings-like demise! !
Sure. Americans are really that dumb. We’re all dumb enough to believe government is the solution to all our problems; we’re dumb enough to simply keep walking into oblivion. One step in front of the other…
Hup, two, three, four…
Yes, don’t hesitate! Don’t wait! Don’t think! Just keep following the dumb, mouth breathing moron in front of you because government will save you!
Such is the most critical assumption in predictions, like peak oil, like global warming, like the economic crisis… Yes, all doom and gloom predictions assume that one quintessential thing about humanity.
We are all…
Lemmings!
Go ahead - click on the picture above - it goes to the flash game! Be my guest - play a few rounds.
I just got done playing myself. What a mindless, fun respite… All those cute little guys, following one another off cliffs and stuff… The object of the game being, to hurry up and give the little Lemmings umbrellas to break their fall, or you can make one a ramp builder or a digger… Otherwise, they just mindlessly keep moving, one behind the other, into oblivion.
Fun. Might be a useful diversion next time the wife insists on watching that "You got Talent" thing on TV.
And that’s us, by the way; the game describes us to a Tee! - 6 Billion Lemmings, all in single file, heading for our demise! Too dumb, too ineffectual to change our course - ours is but to follow, one behind another, unto the death.
Damn.
Dr Wirth, are you reading this? Perhaps you could consider these questions:
What would be the affect on the world’s oil supply if people like me, seeing the price of oil rising and rising, bought a pellet or wood boiler to heat our home?
And what would be the affect on the world’s oil supply if we converted our trucks and cars to run on Natural Gas; I imagine we’re moments away from some enterprising inventor coming up with an inexpensive kit to convert our gasoline hogs to natural gas.
Oh look! We’re there already!
And still, what would be the affect on the world’s oil supply if people like us started installing wind mills, solar panels, and so forth, instead of waiting for the government to build this so-called energy grid?
And what would be the affect on the world’s oil supply if we started making stuff locally again because suddenly it became more expensive to import all that crap from China?
Just imagine for a minute, that we bought toys, tools, paper, soap, wood, knick-knacks and pocketbooks, right here in the USA! And they were transported via trucks, using Natural Gas!
And finally, what would be the affect on the world’s oil supply if our burgeoning information economy relied more and more on telecommuting and web-based work processes, and less and less on people commuting to work everyday?
Gee, would we avoid the "Mad Max Beyond Thunderdome" future you predict?
Look. We need to stop scaring people with our dire forecasts, forecasts derived by the use of but one rather shoddy method: "The Lemmings Predictive Tool". It simply doesn’t describe us, and it certainly doesn’t redict our future. We’re not lemmings, we’re humans!
And I challenge you to name just one instance in human history where we were!
Nuts.
Oh look! This just in from the recent Inauguration of President Obama:
Apparently Obama is in cahoots with space aliens. Now I know we’re all going to die!
And so on.
Tom
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That we don’t see, we look upon with indifference
This just in!
Pharmaceutical companies do testing on animals. And although I cannot speak of first-hand knowledge, I assume that they inject these animals with every manner of disease, and then, at some critical moment, they introduce a cure. And sometimes the cure works, sometimes it doesn’t.
Animal testing.
Its how humanity solves the problem of testing products.
And its not exactly our finest hour.
I was just struck by how convenient all that is. Someone injects these animals, and dutifully and soberly records each re-action. They then determine if this or that is safe for humans.
And that’s important.
Because God forbid, someone misses out on a cancer cure because we couldn’t test a drug on some dumb %$# animal!
God forbid a new deodorant causes a rash under someone’s arm because a company failed to see how much of it a dog could eat before it died.
Humanity loves our drugs, our quality of life, our medical miracles. What matter how its afforded us!
Onward.
Beef.
I love beef.
Steaks, burgers, roasts…
Its what’s for dinner.
But God forbid!
Someone unseen, kills the cow, then chops it up into all the usual chunks, finally, putting everything in pink foam deals with cellophane wrap over the top.
Imagine if someone else didn’t kill the cow for us. Imagine if we had to kill the cow ourselves.
On to War.
Someone else is doing all that for us too.
You see, America now has an all-volunteer force. And unless you’re one of these volunteers, you have the luxury of looking down upon the whole thing with the same disdain we might casually view a Hispanic field worker, an African American bus driver an out of work mendicant… Just little people, busily doing little things.
No America is not at war. All those airplanes flying into buildings happened years ago; it might have even been a hoax! We have no enemies in the world; its just a misunderstanding.
But I digress.
The whole point of my post is Guantanamo Bay , Cuba.
You see, Guantanamo symbolizes the whole thing.
It says, America is at war and is holding prisoners who would otherwise harm us. It says, we know you’ll kill us in wholesale numbers and we will do what we can to extract what you know.
Guantanamo says, "when we’re at war, we fight to win at any cost."
Yes, here’s war’s dirty little secret: War says, we want you, our enemy to die! We will lie, steal, cheat, kill, bomb… Anything to assure our victory. War is the last resort of a civilized people to assure their survival. War requires the total commitment, of heart, soul and mind. There’s no room for sympathy, truthful discourse, polite talk, empathy… We must look our enemy in the eye, and with steel-eyed resolve, kill him.
Because In war, we suspend the Marquess of Queensberry rules. In war, there is merely defeat and victory: those dying on the battlefield, their bodies mangled beyond belief, and the victor - a haunted, hollow look upon a dirty face.
Time to close this up.
You see, only George Bush and a few fervent followers were at war. The rest were at the mall. And that is the very crux of our discourse about Gitmo today:
One group says, "We’re at war," and the other says, "we’re at the mall".
Yes, America is not at war. Its time to release the terrorists.
Quick! release them all before 7PM - its my bowling night.
Tom
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