"The Fundamental Issue - Overshoot"

 i think it's well worth reading some of william e. rees writing here:

standstoreeson | William E Rees | Substack

then there's this 2 hour long conversation with him on youtube:

William E. Rees: "The Fundamental Issue - Overshoot" | The Great Simplification #53

finally, this excellent comment to that video from CitizenK1969 :

there is something sort of "mathematically inevitable" (note the quotation marks) about our predicament. Human cultures that are rapacious simply out compete those that are restrained in resource use... so without pan-species behavioral changes, we can't escape our "fate." I think this is why Nate started out looking at energy and the environment, but has arrived at a place of increasingly talking about human motivation, human nature. We either have to transcend our nature, or literally transform into something different, a species less inherently competitive, more in tune with its ecosystem... I'm reminded of the end of Vonnegut's novel /Galapagos/, which sees humanity survive, long term, by regressing into a kind of sea lion species. I want to believe we can overcome out nature, but history puts that in serious doubt.

what is education for?

 i came across this article linked below thanks to another source of wisdom and knowledge i recently became reintroduced to, a blog by a professor named william rees, another 'doomer'. i'll likely post a link to one of his posts soon. below are a couple of little excerpts from the article link posted here:

'What might be managed is us: human desires, economies, politics, and communities. But our attention is caught by those things that avoid the hard choices implied by politics, morality, ethics, and common sense. It makes far better sense to reshape ourselves to fit a finite planet than to attempt to reshape the planet to fit our infinite wants.'

'A fourth myth of higher education is that we can adequately restore that which we have dismantled. In the modern curriculum we have fragmented the world into bits and pieces called disciplines and subdisciplines. As a result, after 12 or 16 or 20 years of education, most students graduate without any broad integrated sense of the unity of things. The consequences for their personhood and for the planet are large. For example, we routinely produce economists who lack the most rudimentary knowledge of ecology. This explains why our national accounting systems do not subtract the costs of biotic impoverishment, soil erosion, poisons in the air or water, and resource depletion from gross national product. We add the price of the sale of a bushel of wheat to GNP while forgetting to subtract the three bushels of topsoil lost in its production. As a result of incomplete education, we’ve fooled ourselves into thinking that we are much richer than we are.'

What Is Education For?

intelligence and stupidity

 if i had any devoted readers they should know by now that in my worldview humans are idiot savants, which is to say we , both collectively and individually, all to some extent exhibit both extreme intelligence and extreme stupidity, depending on the subject. link below to an interesting article which sort of makes this point: 

The Evolution of Stupidity (and Octopus Intelligence)

religious fanaticism

PBS documentary on DocWorld titled THE ACCUSED: DAMNED OR DEVOTED? about religious fanaticism in pakistan led by a cleric named rizvi, is truly frightening. They seek to have put to death anyone who criticizes their muslim faith, based on a blasphemy law. These fanatics remind me of the MAGA movement here in the USA led by trump, only much worse. Makes me wonder why can't that happen here, or anywhere? The answer is it can, and probably has, at one time or another.

do u believe in miracles?

 for many years i've disbelieved in free will. It was obvious that everything we did, everything we thought, everything that happened to us, was the result of our genes and our environment, going back to our conception, to our universe's conception. none of which we have ever had or ever will have control over. But lately, perhaps out of desperation ,i've been entertaining the idea of miracles, of events which are or seem to be beyond the bounds of nature, or supernatural.  a manifestation of god.

i'm much more into science than theology. i suppose in a way i'm no different from faith based religion in that i must take on faith many scientific claims, often because i'm not smart enough to understand their derivation, for example einstein's theories of relativity and of a space time vortex warped by gravity.

some scientific claims are pretty mind blowing, like the big bang theory of how our universe came to be. Before the big bang, there was no time and no space. Everything was compressed into nothing, so all that existed was nothing. Then suddenly there was something, the big bang, the beginning of time and space. It's all very counter intuitive, all very mysterious. Maybe it was a miracle. or maybe it was a black hole that became too massive.

anyway, i've also thought or felt for a long time that our world is fucked, and that if it exists god is responsible, (and must be a dickhead). There's no way to fix what needs to be fixed, especially in the very short time remaining before our species makes itself extinct by making earth uninhabitable for us.

i'm also plagued by loneliness and a great alienation from society and culture. and, apparently, inability to acquire very close friends, trusted colleagues, (surprised i spelled that word right), and compatible mate(s) / lover(s). It seems i'm a misfit everywhere, with whomever i'm with. It's been so pretty much my whole life. Will it ever change?

if a miracle happened once, perhaps there are more to come. I certainly hope so, for it seems that is what it will take to salvage our world, and my social life.

wouldn't it be nice?

 touching poetic lyrics of this beach boys classic highlight the frustrations of young lovers in a society / culture which suppresses teenagers freedom, especially their sexuality and their ability to openly have erotic relationships with all the benefits derived from fulfilling those passions. (we're only young once!)

Wouldn't it be nice if we were older?
Then we wouldn't have to wait so long
And wouldn't it be nice to live together
In the kind of world where we belong?

You know it's gonna make it that much better
When we can say goodnight and stay together
Wouldn't it be nice if we could wake up
In the morning when the day is new
And after having spent the day together
Hold each other close the whole night through?

Happy times together we've been spending
I wish that every kiss was never ending
Wouldn't it be nice?

Maybe if we think and wish and hope and pray
It might come true (run, run with you)
Baby, then there wouldn't be a single thing we couldn't do
We could be married (we could be married)
And then we'd be happy (and then we'd be happy)
Oh, wouldn't it be nice?

You know it seems the more we talk about it
It only makes it worse to live without it
But let's talk about it
Wouldn't it be nice?

carlin and kennard

 just finished memoir by kellie carlin, comic george's daughter. glad i did, as it showed her dad in a broader more human light, as a mortal man who suffered from a very bad heart for much of his adult life. a courageous man who in the face of death (he would be dead in 4 months, and knew his heart was failing him) gave this great stand up performance for his last hbo special. despite failing health, and an aging brain, it showed he was still at or close to the top of his game. as usual, he saves his best stuff for last. one bit in particular resonates with me, in which he tells us why he doesn't like to be around most sheeple beyond a minute or 2 (because he can't stand listening to the stupid and uninteresting things they have to say).

George Carlin -- It's Bad for You -- 1080p Remaster

recently watched this outstanding discussion featuring matt kennard with abby martin:

Trump's Naked Imperialism & How the British Empire Never Died - YouTube