Sunday, November 15, 2015

Shill or Serious? The Question of the Rose


"We are as gods and might as well get good at it."
Opening sentence of the Purpose of the Whole Earth Catalog, 1968

Thanks to Su for the heads up on this one.
Ecomodernism? A Manifesto?
"As scholars, scientists, campaigners, and citizens, we write with the conviction that knowledge and technology, applied with wisdom, might allow for a good, or even great, Anthropocene. A good Anthropocene demands that humans use their growing social, economic, and technological powers to make life better for people, stabilize the climate, and protect the natural world."
http://www.ecomodernism.org/manifesto-english/

A piece on the Manifesto by someone who thinks it is wrong*
http://wolvesofdouglascountywisconsin.com/2015/11/15/the-ecomodernist-manifesto-is-a-program-for-genocide-and-ecocide/

And, a "Degrowth" response to the Manafesto (thanks Jerry for the link )  http://www.resilience.org/stories/2015-05-06/a-degrowth-response-to-an-ecomodernist-manifesto

The creators of the Manifesto?
http://thebreakthrough.org/index.php/voices/michael-shellenberger-and-ted-nordhaus/an

SourceWatch entry on the Breakthrough Institute

A presentation by an institute fellow

Google Scholar search string on ecomodernism



"You become responsible, forever, for what you have tamed." 

Antoine de Saint-Exupery

Are these related precursors? (a straight question, i do not know)
Whole Earth Discipline


Reconstructing Earth: Technology and Environment in the Age of Humans


"I am not here to argue that the human species ought to take responsibility for evolution on the planet, and begin through public and private institutions to make collective decisions about such matters. If that were the question to be decided I would advocate that we put it off for a few centuries or more--let things run themselves while we get accustomed to the idea of evolutionary governance, develop the appropriate ethics and myths and political structures, and perhaps mature a bit. However, that is not the question before us, since we are already governing evolution. This is the great paradox about the threshold: It is not out there ahead of us somewhere, a line from which we might conceivably draw back. We are well across it. To say that we are not ready for evolutionary governance is equivalent to saying that a teenage child is not ready for puberty; the statement may be true, but it is not much help." 
By the author,  Walter Truett Anderson.

*In which the writer employs the classic America hyperbolic trope; offering a fine illustration of Godwin's Law

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