The cedar is still rusty at it’s tips, but when the elm trees go maroon spring will be soon. Just after this next cold snap. And we will start riding again

Without Energy Nothing Happens

I was listening to a podcast about shamanism today while working diligently on the Energy book so I can post it for you ASAP. It was very good, the podcast, from The Interdependence Project, but the man kept using the word energy as though he believes all the different kind of energies are the same sort of phenomenon.

Of course energy is all around us. And all through us now that we have cordless computer connections. Who knows what interesting medical conditions will result. But we can’t get away from energy in any case. Every minute of life pulses with change, growth and movement. Most of that activity is work, and energy makes work possible.

We know that the work of the ecosystem is powered by organic energy, as studied by modern basic science, using measurable facts. We also know that the universe is vibrant with other kinds of energy that we can not study using modern basic science, but the important message of the science of ecology is what we do know factually. The physical life of the ecosystem requires it to maintain a consistent balance between the light energy that the ecosystem uses to generate organic energy, the organic energy that is required for survival on earth, and the heat energy that is released when organic energy is used to do the work of life. The organic energy for our life comes from the food we eat.

Personal Opinion! Sometimes people want to argue about their various experiences with energy. That kind of argument makes me cranky. (Actually, more often they don’t want to talk at all and that makes me even more cranky.) Yes other forms of energy exist that science can not measure. Furthermore, we probably sometimes use the same word “energy” for phenomena that are different from energy as we understand it. Phenomena that can not be measured can not be studied using the scientific method. That doesn’t mean they aren’t real; it also doesn’t mean they are real. It simply is not relevant to our factual knowledge of the ecosystem, and I don’t see the point in arguing over things we do not understand if we are using that argument to avoid dealing with critically important facts that we do understand. Surely there is no shamanic or religious or New Age tradition that would relieve us of our responsibility for stewardship over the welfare of mother earth, and our responsibility to understand the measurable facts about her needs, so that we can know which of our behaviors are helpful and which equally well intended behaviors actually make things worse for the ecosystem.

Texas Skies

The Texas Sky Book has been well received, so we will add a few more pages to it and republish. This is Britten’s pasture across the road.

The Ecosystem is a Living Thing

As is true of all living things (including our selves) the ecosystem requires (minimally) the following to stay alive:

The flow of energy through itself (energy is required to do work; work includes everything that moves or grows; without energy, nothing lives or grows).

The recycling of materials – we aren’t talking about this today, but notice this is the one we are trying politically to do — because it is easier than actually trying to solve the energy problem. Recycling is a good thing but it can not solve the energy problem. Because energy does not recycle.

The flow of information through time so the system knows how to function – also we aren’t talking about this today.

If the living ecosystem were to die, nobody knows what would happen, but if you need a metaphor think of your own body, because all living things require these same things.

The American Dream

When I was growing up, and when I was a productive member of the work force, my goal was to save and to share with the future (to sustain) the “American dream.” Of course, that wasn’t my only goal, but it was foundational, and it defined the boundaries of my personal dream. The whole point of “my” dream was that we all can have different dreams so long as my dream does not cause harm to you or your good dream. Of course, that’s an ideal — an impossible island within which to function. Therefore, the other half of my dream was a continual process of negotiating the boundaries of our individual dreams so that our community dream can be a positively functioning whole.

It was only after retirement that I realized some of the people I worked with — and with whom I shared a mutual commitment to the “American Dream” — it wasn’t the same dream at all. We had never explained ourselves to each other, never negotiated our ideas, and so we all were seriously trying hard to sustain different and incompatible dreams. This was a shock to us all, and we very soon were arguing/debating/fighting rather than sustaining. It became clear that we can not build an American Dream if we don’t know what it is and discuss it among ourselves — before we start to fight over misunderstandings that we don’t know exist. We cannot understand each other unless we define our words.

Sustainability is a word that we must understand if we are to build a future for ourselves, first because Americans have multiple different ideas of what should be sustained, and more importantly because the word has been deliberately co-opted and re-defined by the economic community, following the green revolution, to mean the exact opposite of what it means. The idea of sustainable growth (which is impossible within the living earth ecosystem) has overcome the actual meaning of sustainability. The implications of this reality are, to me, genocidal. I see this campaign to change the meaning of the word sustainability as a deliberate attack on the life and health of the whole earth ecosystem for the profit of a few. Worse, the attack seems to have succeeded, and the result, literally, is a Ponzi type of growth scheme that is manipulating the resources of the entire world. Like all Ponzi growth schemes, it’s lots of fun while it lasts; however, it is not sustainable. The fact of sustainable growth is physically impossible, even though the concept of sustainable growth has become embedded in our culture as a synonym for sustainability.
(This is an excerpt from Bare Bones Ecology, in production.)

Taken From Bare Bones Ecology, soon to be posted

A Big Blue Miracle

If you could hold it in your hand, like a treasured family heirloom or a memento of a beloved grandmother now lost to you, the earth ecosystem would probably look fairly simple, like the first astronauts said, the “big blue marble.”

I was down here looking up when they took that first picture. You can’t see me, but I was here all the same, a tiny atom of the miracle of life. And somehow the bigger miracle is that you, and I, and all our friends can understand, if we want to. Not completely of course, but we can understand the basic principles of how our big blue miracle functions.

Slide Five of the Presentation to HPJC

This picture was taken in front of the George Bush Library. Please if you know them (father and son) would you point out there would be no sunset, no tree and no me if there were no ecosystem.

We already discussed that the ecosystem is a living thing, but this slide is a little reminder before we get to slide 6 that lists the three most basic requirements for the ecosystem to stay alive.

The most basic living thing on earth is the cell; the largest living thing on earth is the whole earth ecosystem. All living things on earth are made of cells; the whole earth ecosystem consists of all the living things on earth.

Nothing That Uses Resources Can Grow Forever

Here is another little thought while you wait for Thursday morning when I will post slide number 5 of the series of slides that I used at the HPJC presentation. I will post the entire series on the blog site as a pdf for download when I can figure out how. The book was no help. If anyone knows how to do this, please let me know. In the meantime, here is a rather depressing thought for the day.

Nothing earthly can grow forever. That is obvious. All money that is worth anything is tied to resources. Most of us know that. If you pay $100 for a pet rock and pet rocks go out of fashion, what you have left is a rock that is worth about $1.00 if it is cute. The rock is not worth $100, your $100 bill was worth about $1. Looking from the other end of the dollar, the oil companies will be getting larger and larger shares of our money as we are now on the down slope of the oil/gas/coal resources available on the earth. If you want a better explanation of this, I recommend the Crash Course of Chris Martenson.

When you grow money that is not tied to the resources, the name for that is a Ponzi scheme. A Ponzi scheme grows the money basically by selling the same resources to many people.

Our growth economy is a Ponzi scheme. The earth does not have resources to support any further growth of the sort we are now experiencing.

It will crash.

Using growth to solve problems only works if the problems are political, and then only temporarily. Growing our economy to save ourselves from our growth economy is a Ponzi scheme. It will not save us from the economic consequences of trying to grow the economy after we have already taken more out of the earth resources than she has to give.

Slides Number Three and Four

In our study of the Ecosystem at the HPJC retreat.

03 Our Tools-Facts Understood
Real facts are the foundation of real solutions. I am presenting here very basic well established biological facts about what the ecosystem requires for its survival. There is no point debating facts that are as well understood as those I will describe, because we can’t change them. Better to debate our own behaviors in response to the facts.

04 Our Tools-Opinions Under Discussion
It is extremely important that we discuss our opinions about these facts so that we can grow and benefit from the wisdom of the community.

“It’s only when we use (these tools) to act on our deepest beliefs to change unjust policies that exploit the powerless, only when we challenge entrenched power holders who fail to address the root causes of disparities, and only when we endeavor to change hearts, especially our own hearts, to impart dignity for all, that we are advancing peace and justice.” Cheryl Crozier, HPJC

“I really believe that people need to step back and examine these (economic and environmental) issues a little bit so we stop treating symptoms . . . and get to the root causes.” Helena Norberg-Hodge, ISEC

The trick is to find out good facts about the root causes. A movie (Ancient Futures) that is distributed by ISEC, provides one of the best studies of historical facts that I have seen.

I sat down to write “Bare Bones Ecology” when I realized to my horror that the biological facts about how the ecosystem functions are generally not available from our usual sources of information.