dagblog - Comments for "Societies Fail: We Might Have to Get Over It"

Orlando:I just finished

wws — Wed, 22 Sep 2010 12:48:31 +0000

In reply to I used to worry about that

Orlando:

I just finished reading The Ivory Gate by Margaret Drabble, a novel set primarily in Cambodia, in which the story shifts in time and place between present day observations of various fictionalized journalists in England, Thailand and Cambodia, to factual and speculative flashback historical references to Cambodia through time. If you haven't read it, I hope you will, while you are where you are.

Can American "civilization" be done without? Sadly, I think so. Our own country has become so skewed in favor of corporate and/or military/industrial profit goals that we have become a clear and present danger to the well-being of the globe.

Our enemies are not external; our enemy is within. So, if we are unwilling to contain ourselves, to reform from within, then we will have to suffer a demise as a country we caused ourselves.

Communism failed. Our American Democracy has failed. The good news? Maybe now another country can lead the way toward a Socialism that is geared to the common good.

I've thought about your

AmericanDreamer — Sat, 04 Sep 2010 19:17:27 +0000

In reply to Wondering aloud: what are

I've thought about your question. For me, I think the main reason is pride, or at least a desire to feel pride. Proud of what I have left behind for our and other peoples' children and for posterity. Proud to be a member of a species that is admirable, enlightened, worthy of survival.

Part of what goes along with my current intellectual and moral crisis or mini-crisis or whatever the hell it is that has me feeling so cranky, depressed and emotionally spent these days, is feeling less proud than I think I have ever felt in what we as Americans and we as humans are doing with and about our collective fortunes, and to our planet, these days.

Because we know, we know, what we need to do. And we could do it. We just aren't doing it. There is no single reason. No single person is entirely at fault. We just aren't getting it done. We are not adapting in the ways we need to adapt.

I can't do any better than that right now. It's a good question.

I used to worry about that

Orlando — Sat, 04 Sep 2010 17:12:32 +0000

In reply to Our son worries about the

I used to worry about that when I was a kid as well. I understood that it was a long time away, but I think I didn't have any sense of my own mortality at that point, so even a hundred years from "now" was a meaningless marker.

Our son worries about the

AmericanDreamer — Fri, 03 Sep 2010 21:22:42 +0000

In reply to Exactly, DF. We've put

Our son worries about the expanding sun. He is 12. I try to explain to him that that's a long, long, long time into the future and by the time earth is going to be destroyed by the sun we will have had plenty of time to prepare and try to find another home.

I don't add the most obvious major qualifier, "if we humans are still around just before then". He worries enough about this matter as it is, and not enough about things he can and needs to do something about in the nearer term.

We're so screwed.

Orlando — Fri, 03 Sep 2010 00:02:41 +0000

In reply to Yep. Earth is a just a wet

We're so screwed.

Yep. Earth is a just a wet

DF — Thu, 02 Sep 2010 22:26:35 +0000

In reply to Exactly, DF. We've put

Yep. Earth is a just a wet (for now) rock. It's not even capable of caring about whether we flourish or perish. I agree with you that it's really a matter of the peculiar question of what a species does with the foresight of such risk to its own survival.

Exactly, DF. We've put

acanuck — Thu, 02 Sep 2010 22:15:21 +0000

In reply to Right. Which is actually a

Exactly, DF. We've put ourselves and a bunch of other species at risk, but the planet will outlast us all and be just fine. Until, of course, the expanding sun finally fries it to a smoking ember. Not much we humans can do about that part.

Right. Which is actually a

DF — Thu, 02 Sep 2010 21:13:34 +0000

In reply to Since we're quoting comedians

Right. Which is actually a more compelling narrative than "save the planet" because it appeals to our inherent self-interest. It's not the planet that needs saving. It's not even "our children and our children's children" at this point. People need to get concerned about saving their own sweet asses.

Since we're quoting comedians

Doctor Cleveland — Thu, 02 Sep 2010 20:51:09 +0000

In reply to Scientists have recently

Since we're quoting comedians now, I'll go with George Carlin:

"The planet is fine. We're fucked."

Woody Allen, I think. (No

Doctor Cleveland — Thu, 02 Sep 2010 20:48:00 +0000

In reply to "The Brain? That's my second

Woody Allen, I think. (No disrespect to DF.)

It's from Sleeper.

EDIT: I see now that DF was identifying the earlier bit, not the one Donal quotes. My apologies, DF.