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Many more articles are available through the Energy Bulletin homepage.
Mapping The Past & The Future (PDF)
Dr. Colin J. Campbell, Irish National
[Dr. Campbell’s article appears on page 4-5]
… Looking ahead, it is evident that we enter the Second Half of the Oil Age, when this critical energy supply that fuels the modern world, including its military engagements, declines from natural depletion. Today, some 60 billion barrels of petroleum a year (including gas in terms of oil equivalent) support a population of 7 billion people, but by 2050 the supply will been sufficient to support no more than about half that number in their present way of life. It speaks of a radical change, with the transition likely to be accompanied by much tension, signs of which have already been seen.
But ordinary people, whether we speak of those living in West Cork in Ireland or a village in rural France, can go about their daily lives concentrating on their local circumstances. They may face relative poverty by present standards but can soon adjust to it with smiling faces as they come to realise that they are relatively privileged.
We may see a return to regionalism with the development of local markets, even local currencies, and a new community spirit, as the imperial constructions of the past pass into history. As always, there will be winners and losers, with the winners being those who adapt better to the changing circumstances. The Transition Town Movement that had its origins in Kinsale in Ireland but has now spread around the world, sets an example of the new strategies to be followed.
(February 2012 issue)
Dr. Campbell will be appearing at the New Energy Era Forum May 8-10 in West Cork, Ireland. In addition to this URL, see page 6 of the PDF (above) for more information.
On the same site: Conversation with Dr. Campbell (video)
John Michael Greer on The Visionary Activist (audio at original)
Caroline Casey, The Visionary Activist
Caroline welcomes the return of John Michael Greer, author of “Apocalypse-NOT: Everything you know about 2012, Nostradamus and the Rapture is Wrong!” that we may discern the distinction between what is beautiful and useful and what is delusional distraction.
(1 December 2011)
Caroline Casey is one of my favorite activists. Even if you are not a believer in the various spiritual traditions, she is a kick to listen to — high energy and a sense of humor. Her motto is: “Wedding Spiritual Magic to Compassionate Social Activism.”
Suggested by EB contributor Amanda Kovattana.
-BA
The Future of American Colleges May Lie, Literally, in Students’ Hands
Scott Carlson, The Chronicle of Higher Education
A friend of mine who works at Saint John’s University and the College of Saint Benedict, in Minnesota, recently told me a story: Her book group read Anna Lappé’s Diet for a Hot Planet, one of many recent books to focus on the vulnerabilities of the industrial food system and the threats posed by climate change. The book’s treatment of the topic held few surprises, and the solutions offered were equally well-worn and deceptively simple: Buy fruits, vegetables, and meats locally, and cook them at home.
My friend’s big surprise came when the students in the group started talking about the solutions—and found themselves stuck: “Almost all the students said they didn’t know how to cook,” she told me, “and even the young, single adult employees in the group admitted they lacked both the know-how and motivation.”
What makes this story even more poignant is its setting: at sibling colleges founded by monasteries, where self-sufficiency and sustainability were once a central ethic, as outlined in the Rule of St. Benedict. The Benedictine women and men here, along with many of the older alumni, can still remember when they milked cows, plucked chickens, and picked potatoes grown on the monasteries’ surrounding land. Bread, furniture, preserved food, ceramics, and other daily necessities were produced by monks, sisters, and students on the campuses. While some remnants of that life still exist, much of it is gone.
… maybe it’s time that instruction—at least at some colleges—included more hands-on, traditional skills. Both the professional sphere and civic life are going to need people who have a sophisticated understanding of the world and its challenges, but also the practical, even old-fashioned know-how to come up with sustainable solutions.
The problems that today’s college-going generation will face in the future are enormous—and the stagnant economy is just the beginning. Climate change, fossil-fuel constraints, rotting infrastructure, collapsing ecosystems, and resource scarcities all loom large. Meeting those challenges will require both abstract and practical knowledge.
… It’s already happening at some institutions, particularly those oriented toward sustainability. In the green dorm at the University of Vermont, students can teach other students in “guilds” devoted to sewing, canning, composting, beekeeping, and other skills.
(5 February 2012)
All Screaming Id, No Brains, No Honor
James Howard Kunstler, blog
A Martian psychoanalyst observing the US Superbowl on TV would be shocked by the vicious animal spirits emanating from that spectacle, starting with the triumphal trumpet blasts borrowed straight from the old 1950s Hollywood epic movies echoing the prideful mis-steps of ancient Rome, along with the by-now clichéd CGI trick in the opening credits of gleaming metallic heraldic insignia spun into a military cordon of stars so as to protect the tender collective ego of this anxious nation. America wears its zeitgeist plastered right on its sweaty forehead.
Everybody knows that the commercial messages between the play-action amount to a national Rorschach test, and this year’s collection made us look more psychopathic than ever – starting with the advertisement for the Chevy Silverado: Fade in on a devastated nameless American city, the buildings smashed, the streets littered with debris, a gray ash coating over everything, and no living creatures in evidence…. A newspaper headline proclaims “2012 Mayan Apocalypse….” How reassuring! Wait! Something stirs behind a heap of rubble… it cracks open… and out drives a plucky American male lumpen “worker” dude behind the wheel of a gleaming giant pickup truck. He is soon joined by other men and their trucks, all of them blithely unfazed by the end-of-the-world.
A curious scenario. What’s the take away? I wondered, of course, where these plucky fellows would look for their next fill-up in the devastated landscape. Surely the service stations would miss the next scheduled fuel truck delivery. Are American men not expected to think beyond the immediate moment they are in? Are they on an intellectual level with lemurs and Holstein steers?
The Superbowl pageant is a window into the condition of American manhood, and the view is pretty pathetic.
(6 February 2012)
