Are there any other leftists here? 👀

[ilumairen]

10 minutes ago, thelerner said:

Yes, I'm referring to European style socialism, not Comunism or the formal definition of Socialism. 

 

These days in the US most people think of socialism as European style government.  A stronger social net and more services for higher taxes. The Canadian and European system. 

 

There should be a better name for it. Without the stigmas. 

 

Like Social Democracy?

 

10 minutes ago, thelerner said:

I'd say Sanders is not a 'classic' Socialist, rather the European kind looking for a more equitable society without the government planning or control of business. 

 

I just brought up the Unions, and their backing of the Democratic party is, imo, one of the reasons Sander's (or someone like him) is unable to win. They've become part of the system..

[Apech]

7 minutes ago, ilumairen said:

 

Like Social Democracy?

 

 

I just brought up the Unions, and their backing of the Democratic party is, imo, one of the reasons Sander's (or someone like him) is unable to win. They've become part of the system..

 

 

I just watched Sanders on Joe Rogan and he's a completely reasonable guy.

[ilumairen]

Some considerations which I generally don't consider:

 

https://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2016/03/bernie-sanders-democratic-socialism/471630/

[Taomeow]

3 hours ago, Apech said:

If you mean soviet style communism - there are a lot of factors why that failed - some to do with Russia itself and its geopolitical makeup and so on.

 

One of the main factors being that it was never in existence.  "Communism" was something the Soviet Union was supposedly "building."  What was operational for 70 years was called "socialism" and the residents asserted they lived in a "socialist" country, which was only dubbed "communist" in the West -- a bit like "eskimo" instead of "innuit," not the self-name.  We were only indoctrinated to look forward to the "communist future."       

 

Whatever it was, it had the same features of feudalism that I now lovingly recognize in the simpler, more straightforward approach to exploiting the masses known as "capitalism," operational since Sumer and Babylon and to this day pretty much everywhere and for all purposes.  The differences, if you take a bird's eye historical view, are minor.  Whether the emperor owns the fief overlords or is owned by them; whether the government owns the corporations (as it did in the Soviet Union) or the corporations own the government (as in "capitalist" countries), serfs are still serfs, property is property and serfs still own 1% of all there is to have under "capitalism," are allowed to use a varying percentage of it but usually no more than 1% under "socialism," and control even less of all there is to control -- plus new and improved propaganda spins that blind them to the fact, and a helluva lot of distractions.  Of course for a decade or two or three you can find yourself lucky living in the rare and precious period of social well-being happening locally in a particular spot.  A kinder emperor, nicer fiefs who have read some social justice philosophy or other.  A currently less precarious geopolitical spot.  In other words, for a short while, you're Norway.  It happens.  It doesn't last.            

 

Any rewilders out there?.. 

 

...Didn't think so.    

[thelerner]

3 hours ago, ilumairen said:

 

Like Social Democracy?

 

 not widely used, which is too bad, cause that that sounds about right, ie American 'Leftists', who might be considered Centralists in Europe, like Warren and Sanders are advocating Social Democracy

Social democracy - Wikipedia 

Social democracy is a political, social and economic philosophy that supports economic and social interventions to promote social justice within the framework of a liberal democratic polity and a mixed economy.

 

From now I'll use Social Democracy instead of European Socialism.  More accurate but probably just as misunderstood. 

[sean]

A few random thoughts.

 

I think part of the difficulty in succinctly defining these political terms, e.g., capitalism, socialism, communism, etc. is that they are just really enormous concepts that intersect and interact with disparate philosophies, religions, economic theories, world histories, mythologies, etc.

 

One crucial concept worth investigating though is definitely around ownership of the "means of production."

 

I don't have time to nitpick that Atlantic article bit by bit. I will agree though, that, yes, Sander is completely not a socialist in the classic sense. Which is why he's a compromise to the right for a vast number of U.S. leftists, myself included.

 

I'm also fine with how the term "socialism" has become rather imprecise, mostly because I see this vagueness helping create a "big tent" that gateway drugs libs who e.g., agree with universal healthcare into deeper socialist praxis. 👹 The U.S. left has been emaciated to the point of nonexistence for at least forty years.

 

Another side note, my understanding is that the distinction between socialism and communism, e.g., that socialism is transitional toward full communism is Leninist, not Marxist, in origin. To Marx, and other revolutionary thinkers of his time, socialism and communism were roughly synonymous. I'm just mentioning this as an aside, it's not all that important to this discussion, and I'm not against a Marxist-Leninist analysis.

 

How to transition from a society organized entirely in favor of a savagely wealthy and powerful 1%? Oof. Yeah. That's the money question. It's obscenely unlikely the 1% will ever give up this position peacefully. Demonstrably quite the contrary. Hence revolutionary politics. ✊

 

A core disagreement between anarchists and communists is how necessary the maintenance of a robust state is, post-revolution. Simplifying broadly, but communists find it naive to think we won't need at least a few generations of consolidated state authority to defend against class enemies — a kind of dictatorship but of, by, and for the actual working class.

 

Anarchists are deeply skeptical of state power entirely. They believe that socialist participation in the state, regardless if done through democratic election or revolutionary seizure, etc., it all always and inherently transforms its victims into oppressors. 😳 Some heavy shit and hard to ignore this arguably prescient critique.

 

I appreciate both perspectives. I think the dialectic between them is essential as we evolve our "leftist maps" into the present-day struggle; hence why I loosely identify as anarcho-communist.

 

Rewilding, the anarchist current, is ... pretty wild. I've met some rewilders. At the AnPrim extreme I feel they have really bad, antisocial takes. But I'm a biased computer nerd that would be dead in the forest without my machined, coke-bottle glasses. 🤓 I fear it abandons important technological advances and doesn't really have practical ideas for how to compassionately take care of our current human population.

 

Sean

 

[flowing hands]

3 minutes ago, sean said:

A few random thoughts.

 

I think part of the difficulty in succinctly defining these political terms, e.g., capitalism, socialism, communism, etc. is that they are just really enormous concepts that intersect and interact with disparate philosophies, religions, economic theories, world histories, modern mythologies, etc.

 

One crucial concept worth investigating though is definitely around ownership of the "means of production."

 

I don't have time to nitpick that Atlantic article bit by bit. I will agree though, that, yes, Sander is not a socialist in the classic sense. Which is why he's a compromise to the right for a vast number of U.S. leftists, myself included.

 

Another side note, my understanding is that the distinction between socialism and communism, e.g., that socialism is transitional toward full communism is Leninist, not Marxist, in origin. To Marx, and other revolutionary thinkers of his time, socialism and communism were roughly synonymous. I'm just mentioning this as an aside, it's not all that important to this discussion, and I'm not against a Marxist-Leninist analysis.

 

How to transition from a society organized entirely in favor of a savagely wealthy and powerful 1%? Oof. Yeah. That's the money question. It's obscenely unlikely the 1% will ever give up this position peacefully. Demonstrably quite the contrary. Hence revolutionary politics. ✊

 

A core disagreement between anarchists and communists is how necessary the maintenance of a robust state is, post-revolution. Simplifying broadly, but communists find it naive to think we won't need at least a few generations of consolidated state authority to defend against class enemies — a kind of dictatorship but one of, by, and for the actual working class.

 

Anarchists are deeply skeptical of state power entirely. They believe that socialist participation in the state, regardless if done through democratic election or revolutionary seizure, etc., it all always and inherently transforms its victims into oppressors. 😳 Some heavy shit and hard to ignore this prescient critique.

 

I appreciate both perspectives. I think the dialectic between them is essential as we evolve our "leftist maps" into the present-day struggle; hence why I loosely identify as anarcho-communist.

 

Rewilding, the anarchist current, is ... pretty wild. I've met some rewilders. At the AnPrim extreme I feel they have really bad, antisocial takes. But I'm a biased computer nerd that would be dead in the forest without my machined, coke-bottle glasses. 🤓 I fear it abandons important technological advances and doesn't really have practical ideas for how to take care of our current human population.

 

Sean

 

 

Most politicians have never read Marx and so right wing parties band it about calling their opposition "Marxist", just to try and slur them in front of the public. The public have very little experience of any proper socialist regime that has not been corrupted. So they are scared. Socialist parties like the Labour party lose many votes because of this, but in 1945 when the Labour party came into power such enormous strides were taken to level out social injustice and bring healthcare, education and welfare to all and to make sure all essential services were under the control of the government. Now with a succession of Tory governments these have been broken down sold to private enterprise where those that now run essential services like water etc. make huge profits and pay out share holders. Of course the service is now far more expensive for the ordinary person. Many parts of the NHS have been sold off to private enterprise who charge far more for supplying their service, which exhausts the budget. The main Tory policy is to get rid of the NHS and make people pay for their healthcare directly and many of the extreme right wing want to open the work houses for the poor, I am in little doubt about this.

 

What I think is let people make lots of money, but lets tax them properly and that money go back into society to help others who were not so fortunate. This seems to me spiritually and morally fair and it produces an economic growth that is not limited to the super rich.

[Taomeow]

Thank you for the "random thoughts," Sean.  

 

I think the fighting spirit, the imperative to actively engage, in any revolutionary thinker, is directly proportional to his or her level of energy available to invest in the engagement and inversely proportional to the experience.  I have to confess I was a revolutionary kindergartener, or maybe it started even earlier.  But now there's only the cynical "nah, been there tried that" remarks from Experience and the tired "nah, just cultivate your own garden" mumbles from Energy. 

 

Rewilding (for which I happen to have both the energy still and the experience in the past, but not enough of either to pioneer anything -- I'd only jump on the bandwagon if a bandwagon that is not falling apart as it rolls ever showed up) is not likely to appeal to many precisely because we're all children of technology, and nothing scares most of us more than an invitation to be weaned off that artificial mother's tit.  I, too, imagine myself with assorted bodily needs of my civilized body not being met should civilization collapse...  but the truth is, rewilding (if it was possible somehow without civilization collapsing first, or even after -- put it in your pipe and smoke it, then try to put the smoke back in the pipe...) is likely (all the indoctrination to the contrary notwithstanding) to produce bodies down the line that might need none of those crutches, not being disadvantaged and distorted from the start by the usage they were never built for.

 

But who can blame us if we're not prepared to fight for those hypothetical future bodies and their happiness, and are more interested in winning over the minds of our contemporaries.  And those are fully civilized minds, and I have no idea how to undo that.  Yes, AnPrim extreme is antisocial -- so is our society, despite the oxymoron an "antisocial society" is -- so the best they have come up with is fight fire with fire...  and that's where my Energy says forget it, you've used up your quota, and my Experience says forget it, if they actually do something practical,  they'll just be marked as troublemakers (or worse) and banned (or worse) and that's the end of it. 

 

So...  considering I do believe in a main premise of my own -- yours is "ownership of the means of production," right? -- mine is "civilization is not sustainable" -- I'm pretty much left without a fight to fight and without hope that someone else will fight mine.  Except...

 

Except I've been trying for at least 15 years to write a rewilding novel that would make my case indirectly -- art sometimes convinces while bypassing intellect, just turns something around in the imagination.  And now I'm writing on TDB again instead of fighting that fight.  Sigh.  We're all hopeless.  

Edited August 7, 2019 by Taomeow

[Apech]

33 minutes ago, Taomeow said:

Thank you for the "random thoughts," Sean.  

 

I think the fighting spirit, the imperative to actively engage, in any revolutionary thinker, is directly proportional to his or her level of energy available to invest in the engagement and inversely proportional to the experience.  I have to confess I was a revolutionary kindergartener, or maybe it started even earlier.  But now there's only the cynical "nah, been there tried that" remarks from Experience and the tired "nah, just cultivate your own garden" mumbles from Energy. 

 

Rewilding (for which I happen to have both the energy still and the experience in the past, but not enough of either to pioneer anything -- I'd only jump on the bandwagon if a bandwagon that is not falling apart as it rolls ever showed up) is not likely to appeal to many precisely because we're all children of technology, and nothing scares most of us more than an invitation to be weaned off that artificial mother's tit.  I, too, imagine myself with assorted bodily needs of my civilized body not being met should civilization collapse...  but the truth is, rewilding (if it was possible somehow without civilization collapsing first, or even after -- put it in your pipe and smoke it, then try to put the smoke back in the pipe...) is likely (all the indoctrination to the contrary notwithstanding) to produce bodies down the line that might need none of those crutches, not being disadvantaged and distorted from the start by the usage they were never built for.

(....)

 

I read this inspiring story about a Brazilian couple:

 

https://aleteia.org/2019/05/01/brazilian-couple-replants-forest-with-over-4-million-trees/

 

 

"Salgado’s wife came up with the wonderful idea of replanting trees on their land in Minas Gerais. Along with relatives, the Salgados set up the Instituto Terra, an organization that has managed to plant an impressive four million saplings over the years. The results are remarkable.

Land that was completely destroyed by the stripping of its forests is now carpets of green. And while the impact of the work of this devoted couple is impressive, Salgado also explained in the Guardian: “All the insects and birds and fish returned and, thanks to this increase of the trees I, too, was reborn – this was the most important moment.”

 

 

if I had the money I would do something similar - as although I live in a supposedly rural area it is all mono-culture and wildlife has noticeably reduced even in the last few years I've been here."

 

I think the future could be this kind of thing but married with some hi-tech for communications, remote home working and the like.  Small communities based round sustainable ecology.

 

I find Marx and the like too 1890's for my liking - we need new solutions that meet social needs, more sane and healthy living and an economy that doesn't destroy.

Edited August 7, 2019 by Apech

[flowing hands]

20 minutes ago, Apech said:

I find Marx and the like too 1890's for my liking

 

Oh yes, its very long winded and is almost as bad as 'war and peace'. I was using this as an example of how politicians use labels wrongly and to wrongly influence and scare the voting public. Rewilding is great, trouble is with my country, the government wants to and is  building millions of houses to prop up the economy making more money for the super rich, trouble is no ordinary people can afford them and soon there will be nowhere to put them anyway.

 

[liminal_luke]

@sean @Taomeow Thanks for the recent thoughtful posts.  I never thought political discussion could actually be educational, rather than merely combative, but I was wrong.

 

The rewilding concept is new to me.  While I´m not personally ready for the collapse of civilization, I think the zeitgeist is moving ever so slowly in a rewilding direction, perhaps not as rapidly as some would like but moving nevertheless.  There´s a resurgence of interest in all things analog.  A dawning awareness that life is about relationships with other people, relationships that are best fostered face-to-face rather than through technology.  People are eating more grassfed beef and wild fish.  Some of us are growing our own tomatoes and planting flowers.  Foraging and hunting. The Japanese concept of "forest bathing" is gaining a foothold.  Physicians in-the-know are telling their patients to turn off their electric devices a few hours before bedtime for the best sleep.

 

I imagine true rewilders won´t be impressed.  All these changes will strike many as too-little too-late. Still, I believe in the power of little changes.  There are so many little changes any of us can make short of getting rid of our laptops.

Edited August 7, 2019 by liminal_luke

[manitou]

If rewilding is in our future, this sort of coincides with the function of the Dao being reversion.

[Nungali]

8 hours ago, ilumairen said:

 

 

Wait.. what?

 

Is this an oxymoron? Or is there something I'm missing?

 

Wouldn't the idea of entrepeneurialship be at odds with the basic premise of communal or government ownership of means of production?

....

 

 

Oh boy !  Have I had some small scale grass roots experience in that !

 

 

It works .... initially .... then  'human nature'  steps in .    Like many issues, eople just ASSUME they can implement an idea , without any training or changing of their conditioning  .

 

" Let's share everything ! "     ...... excuse me , have you EVER done that before , do you have any idea  what that implies ?  

 

For Aussies, they can learn a bit of that by going and living with an extended family Aboriginal group ( if they can get accepted)  .  I have seen visitors get extremely confronted by it .   On the commune it exists in an insidious undercurrent , where its all peace love and sharing on the outside   ( which is becoming shabbier and decayed and bits falling off .

 

You either go with human nature or train and practice to effect change .

 

Dreams are good  - gotta ground them at some stage though  ... or loose it .

 

Whether it was the local communal tofu and tempeh plant , putting on festivals or the whole concept .  It is also a trend that changed Kibbutz  concept .  ( And apparently some communist economies  ?  ) 

[rene]

Wow. Just realized I bombarded ya with all my Like clicks. Sorry 

 

Fascinating thread! Thanks to everyone for your words; I learned much...and have too many things to say so I'll limit it to 3.

 

It'll take a while to get the image of the red white and blue strap-on outta my head  ; I attribute the success of the nordic systems directly to their Viking ancestry - specifically clan loyalty and support; and lastly - I am a rewilder, though I didn't know there was a word for it, and not just in theory. Where I now dwell it's still possible to live in this manner. 

 

That's all.

Thanks again for sharing!

 

 

[Taomeow]

2 hours ago, rene said:

Wow. Just realized I bombarded ya with all my Like clicks. Sorry 

 

Fascinating thread! Thanks to everyone for your words; I learned much...and have too many things to say so I'll limit it to 3.

 

It'll take a while to get the image of the red white and blue strap-on outta my head  ; I attribute the success of the nordic systems directly to their Viking ancestry - specifically clan loyalty and support; and lastly - I am a rewilder, though I didn't know there was a word for it, and not just in theory. Where I now dwell it's still possible to live in this manner. 

 

That's all.

Thanks again for sharing!

 

 

 

Rewilding as I understand it is not an individual endeavor though, there's probably a different word for your (awesome) lifestyle.  It would mean being part of a social structure that is very different from being either a "citizen" of any which "country" (with all it entails), subject of any which "government" you are not acquainted with personally and not related to by blood or common/shared life or both, or a lone wolf (with or without a partner.)  A "lone wolf" is an exception even among wolves --- normally they live in packs, extended families, supremely supportive of each other and fiercely loyal to each other -- yes, not unlike that clan loyalty you mentioned...   whatever happened to ours?...  we used to all have it, humans that is, no exceptions.  Clan loyalty  that is not toxic is only possible if the clan is real though.  All those bogus loyalties to all those bogus clans that replaced (always by force or cunning) our real tribal lifestyle are nostalgic atavisms, pining for the real thing, projecting onto whatever bogus thing is available those orphaned genuine feelings of unity and loyalty and devotion to the native tribe.  Normal human societies (before all the tweaking) are tribal-cooperative, not imperial and not every-man-for-himself competitive. 

 

That kind of a solution is a bit harder to implement this late in the "civilized" human day than just moving away from the city...  exponentially harder.  Possibly impossible.  But if you feel you're wild enough as it is, I can fully understand that and genuinely admire the move.    

Edited August 10, 2019 by Taomeow

[Nungali]

2 hours ago, rene said:

Wow. Just realized I bombarded ya with all my Like clicks. Sorry 

 

Fascinating thread! Thanks to everyone for your words; I learned much...and have too many things to say so I'll limit it to 3.

 

It'll take a while to get the image of the red white and blue strap-on outta my head  ; I attribute the success of the nordic systems directly to their Viking ancestry - specifically clan loyalty and support; and lastly - I am a rewilder, though I didn't know there was a word for it, and not just in theory. Where I now dwell it's still possible to live in this manner. 

 

That's all.

Thanks again for sharing!

 

 

 

 

I had to look that up

 

rewilder (plural rewilders)

1. A person who advocates the reintroduction of animals into the wild (as a means of conservation)

 

 

We do that with dogs 

 

 

 

[gendao]

On 8/7/2019 at 3:47 PM, Taomeow said:

But who can blame us if we're not prepared to fight for those hypothetical future bodies and their happiness, and are more interested in winning over the minds of our contemporaries.  And those are fully civilized minds, and I have no idea how to undo that.  Yes, AnPrim extreme is antisocial -- so is our society, despite the oxymoron an "antisocial society" is -- so the best they have come up with is fight fire with fire...  and that's where my Energy says forget it, you've used up your quota, and my Experience says forget it, if they actually do something practical,  they'll just be marked as troublemakers (or worse) and banned (or worse) and that's the end of it.

YAS!!!  I just realized I've shifted further off the reservation from Libertarianish to ecospiritual AnPrim!

 

Granted, I'm also like a weak, domesticated puppy bred and raised in captivity...but that's part of what saddens me.  Watching the health of our species keep degenerating and thus "needing" more and more technological crutches (GMO humans will become the new normal next).  I would love to regain the robust health of livestock gone feral again!

Quote

Anarcho-primitivism is an anarchist critique of the origins and progress of civilization. According to anarcho-primitivism, the shift from hunter-gatherer to agricultural subsistence gave rise to social stratification, coercion, alienation, and overpopulation. Anarcho-primitivists advocate a return of non-"civilized" ways of life through deindustrialization, abolition of the division of labor or specialization, and abandonment of large-scale organization technologies.

Meanwhile, Trump's colonialist assault on Nature continues like a runaway freight train in the exact opposite direction!

Quote

The U.S. Forest Service, under President Trump’s Department of Agriculture, has proposed major revisions to the agency’s rules for following NEPA. The proposed changes would end longstanding requirements that the Forest Service notify the public, allow for public comment, and analyze environmental impacts when approving logging, road building, pipeline construction, and a host of other activities across the U.S. National Forest system, including Kentucky’s Daniel Boone National Forest and Land Between the Lakes National Recreation Area. This is a radical turn toward secrecy that benefits industry at the expense of the public.

Under the new rules, the Forest Service would be allowed to clearcut up to 4,200 acres at a time – nearly 7 square miles – for pretty much any reason, without telling the public or performing any meaningful environmental review. Their “one size fits all” approach treats Kentucky’s 170,000 acre Land Between the Lakes National Recreation Area no differently than the 17,000,000 acre Tongass National Forest in Alaska.

 

Quote

The US government has approved the continued use of "cyanide bombs" to kill pests such as coyotes, foxes and dogs that live in the wild in America.  It comes despite thousands of objections to the M-44 devices, which have killed more than just wild animals since they were first introduced.  They work by drawing animals with bait then spraying poison into their mouths.
Animals which aren't considered a threat to farmers and their livestock - such as skunks, raccoons and bears - have also been killed by the traps.

In 2018, the US Fish and Wildlife Service agreed to assess the use of the M-44 devices after a lawsuit was brought by four conservation and animal welfare groups in America.

They've been in use since the 1960s.

The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) says 200,000 people wrote letters of objection to the M-44 devices during the 18-month assessment period.

And the Centre for Biological Diversity says that 99.9% of responses to the EPA's proposal were in support of a ban.

But the EPA has decided they are still safe for use, after support from rancher groups and "stakeholders" including farmers groups.

It said that the cyanide bombs stopped predators from killing livestock and that a ban would result in farmers losing money.

Yep, more deforestation & keep killing more NATIVE "pests" (colonialese for "wildlife") that "threaten" the colonialists' exotic LIVESTOCK, domesticated PETS, & PROFITS!!!  And any public opinion/comments to the contrary mean absolutely NOTHING, BTW!  Yes, go "democracy" & MAGA!!!!!

Edited August 10, 2019 by gendao

[rene]

7 hours ago, Taomeow said:

 

Rewilding as I understand it is not an individual endeavor though, there's probably a different word for your (awesome) lifestyle.  It would mean being part of a social structure that is very different from being either a "citizen" of any which "country" (with all it entails), subject of any which "government" you are not acquainted with personally and not related to by blood or common/shared life or both, or a lone wolf (with or without a partner.)  A "lone wolf" is an exception even among wolves --- normally they live in packs, extended families, supremely supportive of each other and fiercely loyal to each other -- yes, not unlike that clan loyalty you mentioned...   whatever happened to ours?...  we used to all have it, humans that is, no exceptions.  Clan loyalty  that is not toxic is only possible if the clan is real though.  All those bogus loyalties to all those bogus clans that replaced (always by force or cunning) our real tribal lifestyle are nostalgic atavisms, pining for the real thing, projecting onto whatever bogus thing is available those orphaned genuine feelings of unity and loyalty and devotion to the native tribe.  Normal human societies (before all the tweaking) are tribal-cooperative, not imperial and not every-man-for-himself competitive. 

 

That kind of a solution is a bit harder to implement this late in the "civilized" human day than just moving away from the city...  exponentially harder.  Possibly impossible.  But if you feel you're wild enough as it is, I can fully understand that and genuinely admire the move.    

Thanks tm 

Yes, what you described as rewilder is how it is. It would be impossible for most to do this, and it took a lifetime for me to get to this, but like Laozi - I climbed onto the blue ox and rode through the western gate.

 

 

 

[silent thunder]

...

 

Edited May 26, 2022 by silent thunder
added link

[Apech]

Tree planting drones!

 

https://www.good.is/articles/drones-planting-trees?fbclid=IwAR36AdldreNYCG8sbHTElutEz0Zj0XfzKldk2qwfaJpBjBQZF0Xn51WykoQ

 

In September 2018, a project in Myanmar used drones to fire “seed missiles” into remote areas of the country where trees were not growing. Less than a year later, thousands of those seed missiles have sprouted into 20-inch mangrove saplings that could literally be a case study in how technology can be used to innovate our way out of the climate change crisis.

Edited August 10, 2019 by Apech

[Taomeow]

21 minutes ago, rene said:

Thanks tm 

Yes, what you described as rewilder is how it is. It would be impossible for most to do this, and it took a lifetime for me to get to this, but like Laozi - I climbed onto the blue ox and rode through the western gate.

 

 

 

 

Laozi was an individual rewilder -- i.e. he wound up going it alone.  (What else do you fellow bums think Daodejing/Tao Te Ching is if not an apology of the natural way and a condemnation of civilization and the so-called "progress?")  But he wrote a book trying to plead his case with the powerful -- and even he failed.  I'm also trying to follow in Laozi's footsteps.  I.e. to write a book to plead my case.  I, too, expect to end up throwing up my hands and riding off through the western gate.           

[Taomeow]

7 hours ago, Nungali said:

I had to look that up

 

rewilder (plural rewilders)

1. A person who advocates the reintroduction of animals into the wild (as a means of conservation)

We do that with dogs 

 

 

Yeah, something less tame than that is probably nowhere to look up.  A rewilder is a person who avocates the reintroduction of  all animals into the wild -- humans included.  It's not conservation (turning into conserves and putting in a can) that's the goal.  It's opening the can.    

[Taomeow]

14 minutes ago, Apech said:

Tree planting drones!

 

https://www.good.is/articles/drones-planting-trees?fbclid=IwAR36AdldreNYCG8sbHTElutEz0Zj0XfzKldk2qwfaJpBjBQZF0Xn51WykoQ

 

In September 2018, a project in Myanmar used drones to fire “seed missiles” into remote areas of the country where trees were not growing. Less than a year later, thousands of those seed missiles have sprouted into 20-inch mangrove saplings that could literally be a case study in how technology can be used to innovate our way out of the climate change crisis.

 

Terence McKenna defined animals as "something plants invented to move seeds around."  I guess replacing animals with machines is well underway.  Who needs animals if we have drones now.     

[Earl Grey]

46 minutes ago, Taomeow said:

 

Terence McKenna defined animals as "something plants invented to move seeds around."  I guess replacing animals with machines is well underway.  Who needs animals if we have drones now.     

 

That reminds me of what Phillip K. Dick wrote about in the original Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? that inspired Blade Runner. The world went to hell and the few animals that remained were signs of wealth and luxury, and many had synthetic imitations to show they had pets, as a foreshadowing to the Replicants for humans. 

 

McKenna is a fantastic mind and I can read his books and listen to his lectures day after day. I do not believe this is the kind of cybernetic world he imagined or the resurgence of the Divine Feminine he and Robert Anton Wilson spoke about, but I do believe that they both still hit upon it with frightening insight that we would do best to revisit before moving forward. 

[Apech]

38 minutes ago, Earl Grey said:

 

That reminds me of what Phillip K. Dick wrote about in the original Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? that inspired Blade Runner. The world went to hell and the few animals that remained were signs of wealth and luxury, and many had synthetic imitations to show they had pets, as a foreshadowing to the Replicants for humans. 

 

McKenna is a fantastic mind and I can read his books and listen to his lectures day after day. I do not believe this is the kind of cybernetic world he imagined or the resurgence of the Divine Feminine he and Robert Anton Wilson spoke about, but I do believe that they both still hit upon it with frightening insight that we would do best to revisit before moving forward. 

 

 

I'm quite keen on the idea of harnessing new tech with the purpose of greening the planet - as long as it is a process of return to the natural.  Although of course there is hardly any natural terrain left on earth - we have been terraforming since the neolithic (at least).