How we treat each other

[Dougald]

Friends -

I've just deleted a whole lot of comments and closed a thread on this forum, because it had degenerated into the most toxic kind of mutual abuse.

I realise Paul and I are both absentee hosts on this site a lot of the time, so I'm open to anyone else's suggestions for how we go forward - but I'm not prepared to host the kind of foulness that has been going on here.

I'm passionate about the strengths of the internet at its best, but I do hate the way these machines allow us to forget that we are talking to other human beings. I find it hard to believe that you would say to each other's faces the things you have been saying to each other on here.

So, what do we do?

Can we create, between us, some kind of shared code of hospitality?

Is anyone willing to offer their time and attention as a moderating influence in the conversations here?

I'm quite upset by what's been going on - I know it's not the first time people have got heated and become rude to each other here, but it's certainly the worst case I've been aware of. I'm going to take the rest of the weekend offline. If I come back to find more of the same, or any kind of blame game going on, I'll be very saddened.

Let me leave you with a passage that means a great deal to me, from Ivan Illich's 'The Cultivation of Conspiracy':

"Learned and leisurely hospitality is the only antidote to the stance of deadly cleverness that is acquired in the professional pursuit of objectively secured knowledge. I remain certain that the quest for truth cannot thrive outside the nourishment of mutual trust flowering into a commitment to friendship."

Dougald

[Maurice Spurway (Mozz)]

As much as I dislike censorship, I think that deleting some of the comments on the discussion was the best thing to do, so thanks for doing this Dougald.

 

It gives us an opportunity to take a rest and reflect. ... always a good tactic.

 

I hope that we can avoid the trap of employing a moderator for this list.  Far better that we each become our own moderators. 

 

And thanks, wolfbird, for you comments above.  Your question; How do you define 'nature' ?  is a good one, and is a fundamental one for the Dark Mountain endeavour.  I hope we get an opportunity to discuss it again in the near future.

 

As for the drunk in the pub, my own reaction would be to follow the philosophy of the stoics ... simply ignore him.

Ideally, the response should be humour (preferably self deprecating), but if that's not possible, then to respond in a way that simply ignores the insult is the most successful strategy, I think.

(I'm reading William B Irving's "A Guide to the Good Life: The Ancient Art of Stoic Joy" at the moment ... very relevant to the Dark Mountain project).

 

Mozz

[Steve Gwynne]

As I see it the thread was an open forum so saying I barged in uninvited likea drunk imples that it was a closed discussion. The thread in question was not advertised as such and when I posted my definition of Nature W B proceeeded to viciously flame me. 

Displaying uncontrollable intolerance for another person's ideas however bizzarre or loopy they may subjectively be perceived is not how to treat another human being in my opinion. 

 

Therefore in response to the statement HOW WE TREAT EACH OTHER, I feel the first ground rule for any discussion should be to be tolerant of other people's ideas whatever one feels about them.  In fact this may be the only ground rule necessary.  Unfortunately when everyone except one is intolerant then a discussion can rapidly decend into a game of power and control rather than a game of sharing and mutuality.

[Steve Gwynne]

Wolfbird said

Apologies to all/any, for causing offence, by my part in all that. I'm all in favour of discussing in a polite, friendly way, free from abuse and trolling.

The way I visualize it is like going to a pub for a good chat, and then some drunk comes over and insists on butting in. What do you do ? invite them to join you ? ask them nicely to go away ? move away ? go to some other premises ? tell them to go away, or else.. ? complain to the landlord ? typically landlords ban people who misbehave... if that doesn't work, call the police ? punch them on the nose ?

 

bert louis offered an intervention, I asked S G to desist, Douglas asked nicely, didn't work, did it....

 

I'm generally less than patient with people who hold views I consider unacceptable. In retrospect, upon reflection, I was restrained in that thread, considering the insults showered upon me. Or did I provoke that effect ?

But never mind that. The only alternative I can think of, would have been to post nothing - That was an option. I can't think of any others. Any suggestions ? - but if I'd remained silent, then S G and his ( IMO ) loopy ideas would have been uncontested. Would that have been okay ? Most of the rubbish on the internet I don't bother to contest, even if I could, there's a whole ocean of nonsense and offensive junk out there.

 

Please read and comprehend :

 

" If I come back to find more of the same, or any kind of blame game going on, I'll be very saddened."

 

 

 

wolfbird said:

Please read and comprehend :

 

" If I come back to find more of the same, or any kind of blame game going on, I'll be very saddened."

Steve Gwynne said:

As I see it the thread was an open forum so saying I barged in uninvited likea drunk imples that it was a closed discussion. The thread in question was not advertised as such and when I posted my definition of Nature W B proceeeded to viciously flame me. 

Displaying uncontrollable intolerance for another person's ideas however bizzarre or loopy they may subjectively be perceived is not how to treat another human being in my opinion. 

 

Therefore in response to the statement HOW WE TREAT EACH OTHER, I feel the first ground rule for any discussion should be to be tolerant of other people's ideas whatever one feels about them.  In fact this may be the only ground rule necessary.  Unfortunately when everyone except one is intolerant then a discussion can rapidly decend into a game of power and control rather than a game of sharing and mutuality.

[Steve Gwynne]

If you hold these thoughts in your mind then I appreciate what you are feeling.  Your horror filled conceptions of what will be is not shared by me but that does not make me or others fools, we just conceive and perceive the future differently. 

 

http://uk.news.yahoo.com/solar-plane-makes-first-international-flig...

 

Have you ever read Positive News http://www.positivenews.org.uk/cgi-bin/Positive_News/welcome.cgi.  I often find the articles inspiring and the initiatives gives me hope that people are trying out new ways of being and making positive contributions to the pool of ecological processes.

 

Anyway I don't want to argue with you.

 

Have a good day.

 

Steve

[Douglas Strang]

Thanks wolfbird

for articulating the anguish many of us feel at this time.

Here's a brief quote from Clive Hamilton's Requiem for a Species: "Behind the facade of scientific detachment, the climate scientists themselves now evince a mood of barely suppressed panic. No one is willing to say publicly what the climate science is telling us: that we can no longer prevent global warming that will this century bring about a radically transformed world that is much more hostile to the survival and flourishing of life."

 

And that's just the climate. Then there's what we're doing to the sea, and the species therein, and the forests, and the air we breathe, and the peoples who don't share our worldview. I've spent the last ten years educating myself, reading the scientists, the ecologists, the psychologists. 'Facts are chiels that winna ding' as Burns has it. I've swung between rage and depression and numbed acceptance. Though can we really 'accept' in any way that might be considered healthy the destruction being wrought by our culture.

 

For most of my adult life I've worked in organic horticulture. For the last few years, I've been part of a community that grows it's own food, keeps animals, makes cheese, keeps bees, grows hay, runs a hydro, coppices firewood for cooking and heating. I don't fly, I run my car off used chip fat oil, I've built my own wee home in the woods from recycled timber and straw. And none of it, none of it, makes me feel in any way smug or superior. I feel incredibly lucky to be able to live the way I do, but I don't think for one minute that I'm living a genuinely sustainable lifestyle; not if we define sustainability, according to Jensen, as being able to live off your immediate landbase and at the same time not degrade that landbase or the other species that also inhabit it. I also know that my choices are not helping to cause any 'great turning' any time soon.

I'm not by nature an angry person, or a depressive. I relish life - I have two beautiful children, one has just celebrated her 8th birthday - but I cry far more easily than I used to and I find it hard to think about the loss my children will inherit. In my darker moments I wish, for their sake and mine, that I hadn't had children.

I know what's coming, what's already happening, and this isn't just some territorial war, with the sacrifice of the odd million young men and women. We're taking everything down, and we're doing our damndest to ensure that there will be little chance of some future recovery.

Talking to others, some are sympathetic, some quickly glaze over. I'm accused of negativity, misanthropy. People get angry, call me arrogant, 'it's just your opinion, it might not be that way.'

The facts the facts the facts.

 

I have no religious faith for comfort. I'm interested in deep ecology, but mostly I just go outside. Our beautiful, beautiful world. How do we live through these times? How do we best serve?

 

Dougie

wolfbird said:

This morning I awake, filled with fury, thinking of Illich, as he was dieing of cancer and refusing any medical treatment, and it is now 1911, instead of 2011, and I, like Cassandra, see the horror and the insanity of The Great War, WW1, approaching, and I know it will happen, and that is why I am furious, because I want that suffering to be avoided.

 

I don't want it to happen, it is too terrible to imagine, and I have no power to avoid it, I say this to you, every one, and I am surrounded by fools, people who tell me 'it'll be alright', people who tell me 'we'll adapt', people who tell me 'the sun is shining, the birds are singing, where's the problem ?', people who believe that if they wish that it won't happen, then it will not happen, and this too is the exploration of the Dark Mountain... people telling me to look at the bright side of the Dark Mountain, as if somehow, Spike Milligan, Monty Python, Jesus Christ, can make the nightmare go away, the nightmare of what we are doing to ourselves, and to this Earth, and what the results will be...

 

Sure, catastrophe can be avoided, nothing is preordained ....in theory the catastrophe could be avoided, in practice, it cannot be avoided, will not be avoided, because people are blind, deaf, deluded, filled with self-satisfaction, conceit, vanity, hubris, misplaced confidence, the shallow business of the day...

 

I defy this sense of helplessness, I hear the screaming of men and horses drowning in mud, and I have compassion for them, and for myself, and my fury, and I defy those who, sick with fear for the future of their children, tell me I am wrong, must be wrong, that it cannot be so, that we can change history, that we can manipulate the course of events, that someone, somehow, will come up with an invention, a brilliant techno-fix, that we will 'transition', 'evolve', mmm, ... go tell your cheery optimistic wishful lies to the ghosts of those who perished amidst all that horror, speak to them in Greek, German, Russian, in French, in English, ask them why, why, from Troy, to Flanders, to Hiroshima, we did not learn how to avoid oncoming catastrophe...

 

and ask them if, now, 2011, at last, we know better...

 

Yes, Illich, taking opium for the pain, a flame in the dark, trusting the truth of the flickering candle-light...

[Steve Gwynne]

I am glad Michel Serres and myself seem to have a similar understanding of ecology (and Nature) :-)

 

"In studying the interlinked totality of living beings and inert objects, ecology relies on the combination of both traditional and recent disciplines, mathematics (differential equations), thermodynamics, biochemistry etc".

 

Nature = the totality of organic and inorganic life-forms within the boundaries of Earth :-).

Nature = the sum total of ecological (organic and inorganic) processes and structures within the boundaries of Earth  :-).

 

Next subject ... Ecological Ethics

 

http://www.guardian.co.uk/society/2006/jun/07/guardiansocietysupple...

For that we need to turn to dark-green or deep ethics, which is fully "ecocentric". Here, all life - including the non-organic - is recognised as the source of value and is worthy not only of respect but reverence. It includes entities such as species, ecosystems and places, and allows for the possibility that the interests of humans are not necessarily always paramount.

 

Byeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee :-)

[Steve Gwynne]

Ignoring the last post I want to return to the discussion because I am beginning to realise what is at the heart of my line of argument.

 

Before moving on to that, if one is to use Serres's definition of ecology to include thermodynamics, then as such nothing is static.

 

Although I know that inert objects or non-organic life within a deep ecological perspective generally alludes to minerals I would like to point out that Serres does not make this clear.  An inert object can be a rock or it could be concrete.   This raises the issue of what can and cannot be classed as natural within a deep ecological perspective.  We all know technology is acknowledged within a shallow ecological perspective but not normally within a deep one.  Consequently,  a deep perspective has tended to allude to various forms of primivitism as an ethical lifestyle (or interestingly Armish communities might be a good example).  If this is correct, then a deep ecological lifestyle would need to minimize to an absolute minimum the use of human technology.

Nevertheless a deep perspective does invariably include human technology.  Moreover as Serres states

"In studying the interlinked totality of living beings and inert objects, ecology relies on the combination of both traditional and recent disciplines, mathematics (differential equations), thermodynamics, biochemistry etc".is the nor does any other deep ecologist to my knowlege make it clear to what extent a deep ecological lifestyle would include human technology"

 

Does he conceive of humans and their technology as being living beings and inert objects as part of the totality.

 

Whether he does or he does not, what becomes apparent is that the deep ecological perspective has a fundamental flaw in its reasoning - how to classify human technology.

 

To omit human technology from ecological processes and sturctures is to not only deny its existance as a part of Nature but also by extension argues that humans do not act naturally.

 

At this point, human ecology is not considered a part of the overall ecology which means deep ecology has successfully seperated humans from Nature including human ecological processes such as the ability to create technology.

 

However, a deep perspective must be able to include human ecology, at least to some extent, so the question that arises is to what extent human ecology is considered a part of the overall ecology of Nature.  Without being able to discriminate between natural human ecology and artifical human ecology this question cannot be answered.

 

Therefore, how does a deep ecological perspective discriminate between what is natural human technology and what is artifical human technology?

 

 

[Steve Gwynne]

Ref my definition, as I stated earlier the ecology of the Sun is interlinked with the ecology of the Earth.  This demonstrates that not only ecological processes within Earth are interlinked but also that ecological processes within our Galaxy are interlinked.

 

Wth regards the natural/non-natural dichotomy - if one truly exists - see above! 

[Steve Gwynne]

Ok you are mssing my point so I'll ask the question another way. 

 

From a deep ecological perspective, how and in what way is a natural material transformed into a non-natural material using a human technological process?  Here I am thinking the chemistry elements table.

 

Are atoms only natural if they are in natural materials?

 

I did answer your two points.  I said the ecology of the Sun is interlinked with the ecology of the Earth.  If we are defining the Nature of the Earth then there is no need to define the Nature of the Sun.

 

However if you wish to define the Nature of the Earth to include the Nature of the Sun please post it.

 

As of yet I am unconvinced by your argument that there is an adequate distinction between natural and artifical human technology and as such the deep ecological perspective remains flawed.

To have coherence a deep ecology perspective has to assert an eco-centric perspective which embraces human ecology whilst at the same time positions it as equal to all other ecological processes.  As soon as a deep green perspective becomes anti-technology then an eco-centric perspective is lost since surely "eco" includes humans.  Human ecology in this sense describes human ecological processes and structures.

 

So to be clear, what I am trying to ascertain is at what point, from a deep ecological perspective, is a natural material transformed into a non-natural material using a human technological process?

 

What I am asserting, to your discontent, is that the distinction between natural and artifical is an anthropocentric distinction and as such contradicts the eco-centric a priori that underlies deep ecological thought.  In my mind, the label artifical is an illusion and all is natural and all remains natural.  So unless you can clearly articulate an answer to my question then I remain unconvinced that the word 'artifical' is a useful concept in order to provide an adequate solution to the problematic of ecological ethics in our time.  Unless the adequate solution is that the whole of the human race reverts back to primitivism which in my mind is not an adequate solution but an utopian ideal but will never become a reality.

 

In this resepect, current ecological ethics whether shallow, intermediate or deep are no longer suffucient models to plan our societies.  THey did form a valid evolutionary function in terms of highlighting different lifestyle practicies however in terms of creating a Turning Point, then obviously, shallow allows too much technology, intermediate does not give protection to minerals and deep does not allow enough technology and would require a cmplete transforation or revolution of global human society.  The alternative is that these different viewpoints are all valid ecological processes and each compliments the other and it is a case of getting the balance right which means everyone living the conviction of their ethics.

[Steve Gwynne]

wolfbird said:

The Sun has an ecology ? Well, I'm shocked. That's a new one on me. Citation needed please, Steve.

 

I have just created it so no citation needed.

 

Look, YOUR definition of Nature, " ...within the boundaries of Earth ", is no good, as a starting point. It simply doesn't hold up.

 

Why?  When we talk about Nature are we not discussing the ecological processes and structures here on Earth.

 

Where ARE these boundaries ? 50 feet above your head ? 100 km up ? a mile beneath your feet, the molten centre of the planet. Wherever life exists ? I'm told men have been on the Moon, so presumably life has existed there, for a day or two.

 

At the point when we leave the atmosphere of Earth and enter space.

 

To exclude the Sun.... well, as I go out through my door, I feel this peculiar warm sensation on my hands, and there in front of me, that strange dark patch called a shadow... but, under your definition, these things shouldn't exist, because they are 'Sun', and that's outside the boundary....

 

In my definition of the Nature of Earth.  Our existance within the galaxy is obviously alot more than that.

 

Well, yes, of course, sunshine isn't Sun, warmth and shadow are experienced here, on Earth... in the brain of the observer.

damn Star is kissing you, you can actually play with it, you are directly connected to it, it's only eight minutes away...

 

It is part of the Ecology of the Sun :-) 

In its absence, what ? no Nature, no us, no you, no me, no food, no thoughts about ecology or philosophy or technology....

 

And yet, you propose a foundational definition of Nature that leaves all that out... ??

 

Is your conception of Nature within the boundaries of the galaxy then?

 

" ...within the boundaries of Earth "...

 

Ah, so we stop just before we fall off the edge, eh ? Is that how we find the boundary ?

 

Just after the sign that says 'Here be Dragons ' ?

 

Steve Gwynne said:

Ref my definition, as I stated earlier the ecology of the Sun is interlinked with the ecology of the Earth.  This demonstrates that not only ecological processes within Earth are interlinked but also that ecological processes within our Galaxy are interlinked.

 

Wth regards the natural/non-natural dichotomy - if one truly exists - see above! 

[bert louis]

Good grief, if this is going where I think it is going, I have to be quick and post my bit. Not that it is particularly relevant at this point in the discussion, but I had worked on it previously when this topic had only 5 posts ... ok than.. 

 

For me apologies are not in order - I was not offended.

I see that my post, Wolfbird referred to as an 'intervention' has been removed. I did not save my text, but I tried to point out that the discussion was going polemic. Although both Wolfbird and Steve denied to be polemic, several on-line encyclopaedia's confirmed to me that the discussion indeed had all the characteristics of a polemic. Polemics is all about the dominance of one point of view over an other. Practised  most commonly in  serious matters of religious, philosophical, political importance. This form of verbal and war-like interaction is  unavoidable (even necessary) when we feel that the different visions are realy fundamental, and when adapted by the community or the powers that be, will indeed lead us on different path we can never return from.

 

A few posts after my 'intervention' post Wolfbird came back strong with a  knowledgeable piece about deep ecology tied in with a sort of historical overview of the expansion of knowledge and technology in general, starting form about 3 million years ago I believe.  

I am saddened to see that this piece of fine writing has also been removed, for I was ready to post on it, but thought it better to wait for Steve to react first. I also wanted to see if Steve could now be stoic about the only few words at the very end that could be taken personal - "aren't I nice to you?" ... or something like that,.. and just respond on topic.  Anyway, I never got the chance, for when I came back on-line the posts had been removed.

 

I agree with Maurice, it would be best to be stoic about that what enflames the ego (or flatters is) and just react to the content (if there is any.) Being stoic isn't easy when one is told that one has stupid ass idea's. 

 

Maybe Wolfbird has saved the text I am referring to and will at some point find an opportunity to replace that in an other topic.

 

[Steve Gwynne]

In my mind this appraisal of technology does not take us to a place much different from where we are now.  I say this because even if the 6 billion or so humans within global human society did wish to live an anarchistic way of life (and I am not personally opposed to this), then each of these 6 billion or so humans have different needs and different ideas of which technological device or system would serve vital needs.  For a start we each have our own choice of occupation, our own choice of lifestyle, our own choice of leisurely activity and our own path of self-fulfillment.  The point being that each individual can argue that their own choice of technology is conducive to 'their' deep ecology way of life.  

 

This is why I asked what would be considered appropriate and inappropriate technology.  The answer is that it is all appropriate from different individual points of view.  In this respect, how can we can judge another's use of technology when we intend to use technology ourselves.

 

The problematic that arises is that any technology requires other technology to create and sustain it and so where do we draw the line.  It is this line that I have been trying to discern.  So far appropriate/inappropriate and natural/artifical have not proved to be useful dichotomies to use in order to discern this line.

 

So without severely limiting the liberty of individual humans how do we create an ecological ethics that gives reverance to all organic and inorganic life-forms without severely constraining the activity and perhaps evolution of humans.

 

As I assert, so far shallow, intermediate and deep green perspectives have not been able to adequately answer this question to a reasonable degree.  This is why I have been exploring a different line of thinking or polemic as Bert rightly points out and one which embraces ALL ecological structures and processes, whether of human design or not, as part of Nature.  Partly I have chosen to lend from the spiritual point of view of Oneness or Holism and partly I have chosen to lend from my own experience of an elevated or satori type moment when I have suspended disbelief and chosen to  perceive everything as Nature.  When I have these moments, I feel a personal intimacy with everything which is nice to say the least.  Consequently I have been trying use this satori type experience as the basis of my polemic.  It has certainly brought up some interesting contradictions in current ecological theory!

 

Now upon some internet research I have discovered that much of my polemic fits in with what is usually known as Holistic Ecology which if anything is trying to use a different model in which to theorise an ethics in which humans can create a technology that works with the rest of Nature by treating human ecological processes and structures (including technology) as inseperable from the wider ecological system of Nature.  However creating this ethics is no mean feat since as we know for anything to live (including technology) something must die.  Similarly, as I said earlier, each individual/community will have different needs according to environmental conditions, survival strategies and self-fulfillment.

 

Therefore, this raises the question of whether these life/death decisions can be made by individuals alone or whether they have to be made collectively or both?

 

http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/holistic

http://landscapemodelling.net/pdf/NavehNotes.pdf

http://www.columbia.edu/event/eros-and-cosmocracy-birthing-holistic...

 

 

  
wolfbird said:

For the record, here's what Deep Ecology ( Devall & Sessions, p.35 ) had to say about technology, published 1985. I'll leave it to readers to contrast it with what Steve Gwynne has said, and consider how well it has stood up, in the face of what has happened during the last 20 0r 30 years of technological developments :

 

" To question technology - as a system or a specific device such as a certain type of vehicle or a computer - can often arouse defensiveness, irritation, and resentment in listeners. Anyone who questions technology can be branded a Luddite or an antimodernist. A person who says 'no' to any technological device is often charged as being antiprogressive. Yet it is crucial to question technology, in spite of these criticisms.

We need technology which is compatible with the growth of autonomous, self-determining individuals in non-hierarchical communities. We need principles that will help us escape the trap of technocratic soceity, where technology is the central institution.

Technology can be criticized and evaluated based on general principles, scale or structure. The following questions can be asked of any technological device or system :

 

1. Does this technological device serve vital needs ?

2. Is this device or system of the sort that can be immediately understood by nonexperts ?

3. Does it have a high degree of flexibility and mutability or does it impose a permanent, rigid, irreversible imprint on the lives of citizens ?

4. Does this technological device or system foster greater autonomy of local communities or greater dependency upon some central 'authority' ?

5. Is this device or system ecologically destructive or conducive to a deep ecology way of life ?

6. Does this device or system enhance the individuality of persons or does it lead to bureaucratic hierarchies ?

7. Does this device or system encourage people to behave and think like machines ?

 

A fully informed, appropriate technology is a meeting ground of ethics, politics, mechanical understanding, and deep ecological consciousness."