One individual apple seed creates a mature tree that can literally produces hundreds of apples each year. Abundance is normal in nature. Only we humans believe in scarcity. So how did we come to this belief? When I lectured in my worldviews class, I finished the class on a lecture about the mindset problem of abundance and scarcity and ideas of how to solve it. I shamelessly use Daniel Quinn’s ideas from his Ishmael philosophic novels and give credit to the amazing mind of Daniel Quinn (e.g., see earlier post) as I integrate my ideas along with his. This will be the next couple of posts, but I hope you bear with me as I lead you down a path of ideas about understanding abundance and scarcity and how we got be a global society of fear and scarcity.
We use the terms ‘civilized’ and ‘primitive,’ which are our way of justifying our technological world and its resulting worldview of dominance over the natural world. From this we can, within our ‘civilized cultural story, derive two categories to describe humanity, ‘Takers (the civilized ones), and Leavers (the primitive ones)’ – those who try to dominate nature and those who live in harmony with nature. Cultural stories are important because they shape how we think. So, the Takers (which is most of us) are enacting a story – but what is it? How did we come to be this way in our current global culture?
For starters, let’s quickly review our ‘civilized’ cultural story of human evolution? Let’s start with the question of whether the world was made for humans? Most Taker religious philosophies put us front and center of our creation stories. For nearly 3 million years, primitive humans lived within the world, apparently struggling to exist (which is part of our Taker story), evolving into modern homo sapiens some 200,000 years ago, and eventually developing advanced Leaver societies, simply because they had no other option. Then glory of glories, some 9,000 years ago, civilization arrives – we start farming and developing technology and start to change the world to suit ourselves. Then almost as quickly we begin to start trying to conquer the world as if it was a given human destiny – but for the civilized ones only of course, since there still some Leavers in the world today.
Our story tells us we are supposed to be making paradise for humanity on Earth, but that this paradise is being spoiled by greed, stupidity, destructiveness, and short-sighted thinking. Therefore, something seems wrong with humans that puts them at odds with the world?? How do the “prophets” tell us to live? Scared texts from many sources tell us that the right way to live is like Leavers! Yet, we persist on enacting a cultural story that puts us at odds with the world?? So, how did we get to a story where the world is a foe to be conquered??
Ishmael (the main character in the Quinn Stories) asks his Taker student, “You know how to split atoms, how to send explorers to the Moon, how to splice genes, but you don’t know how people OUGHT to live.” Is there an answer staring us in the face about how we ought to live. We ignore our prophets’ words, so where else does the answer exist? There is an answer, but it is being destroyed (and ignored) like everything else we do. Can modern humans really use technology to live apart from natural systems, while exploiting them? Let’s look at a metaphor story to explain.
One hundred and twenty years ago this month, the Wright brothers flew the first heavier than air aircraft. They studies birds and had a rudimentary understanding of the laws of thermodynamics built upon numerous disasters to fly from early trials, but humans made it work by trial and error. We have known about gravity since Newton’s discovery in 1687. But, did the Wright brothers flight transcend gravity? Using technology we were able to rise above it for short periods of time, but gravity being what it is has always brought us down (crashing or otherwise) to Earth. Gravity always wins despite our best attempts through physics and engineering to conquer it. One day we may find anti-gravity, but for now it is not an option.
Is there a law of living? If so, how do we discover the Law of Living? That can come from a discipline called Anthropology. While we study ‘primitive’ societies that have cultural stories much older than our modern one we still act as though the laws of life are not for us, and that we are above those communities that we study who do have an answer, but one that we disregard for our civilized selves?
Discovering flight did not make us exempt from Gravity? Gravity has a purpose in how it organizes things and keeps the universe together. So, what Law of Living (LOL) can we use to understand how life is organized? That is modern ecology. We can describe how all species live and thrive together but somehow miss the lesson of how it works for humanity? Did technology exempt us from the LOL? Just as the Law of Gravity is not about flight, but applies to flight, so the Law of Living is not about civilization, but applies to civilization.
The LOL is not quite as obvious as gravity, but careful observation shows us how it works and how we fool ourselves into believing the LOL is not for civilized humans. While we have to admit that gravity always beats our flight technology, we like to believe that by using technology the LOL has been beaten. As an example of human hubris, how can you tell if you jump from a high-flying plane whether you are actually flying or simply in free-fall? A skydiving friend of mine said that despite the wind-rush, which you would feel if you were flying, the obvious happens when you are only ten seconds away from ground-rush, which occurs at around 3000ft. Then you are either pulling your ripcord or making an imminent splotch on the ground.
Quinn refers to this example as the Taker Thunderbolt Express. That is, the belief that we are somehow transcending the physical laws of nature. We metaphorically feel as though we are flying when in reality we are really in cultural free-fall? There are plenty of previous ‘civilizations’ during the last 9000 years that have failed because of their mindset of trying to conquer nature. Even with the proverbial wrecks of civilization beneath us we complacently continue to believe we are flying and not in a plummeting free-fall to join them.
Meanwhile, alongside the Taker Civilized Societies, ‘primitive’ Leaver societies have continued to thrive as they did for hundreds of thousands of years before ‘civilization’ came along. We must ask the question, “What makes societies work?” Or perhaps more succinctly, “What do Unsuccessful societies do that successful societies NEVER do?” Over Three Million Years, a line of Hominids: [Homo] Australopithecus à Habilis à Erectus à Sapien à Sapien Sapien – all survived admirably – we’re here aren’t we. Yet, in the last 500 generations we have brought the planet to the edge of ecological collapse? The planet will recover, but as for much current life on the planet, including humanity, that is less likely. And almost certainly not in the civilized form we arrogantly think is the pinnacle of human sucess?
Lets’ look more closely at the LOL. In the minds of the Takers, the Gazelle and Lions are enemies. Yet, think about what a Lion does with a herd of gazelle! It takes down a single gazelle and then the lions eat while the rest of the gazelle herd complacently graze nearby, knowing this pride of lions are satisfied for two or three days. The Lions hunt what they need and ‘leave’ the rest of the herd alone until the next hunt. The lions do not think they own the whole Gazelle herd, although they will protect their kill until all the lions are fed, then leave the scraps to the next round of scavengers (vultures, Hyena’s, etc.). Leavers are no more conscious of LOL than Gazelles or Lions, yet it works for them. Did early aviators fail due to lack of knowledge of Laws of Aerodynamics? Observations told them what worked and didn’t work. Those Leavers that followed the LOL thrived, while those that didn’t and followed a Taker mindset – well we have no information about them, except they left no traces of their mistakes.
What do modern Takers with their technology, in their Thunderbolt Express, do differently than the Leavers? Takers exterminate all competitors (like destructive invasive species). Takers destroy competitors’ food to make way for own (What do animals do? – take what you want – leave the rest). Takers deny competitors access to food (Animals deny access to what they’re eating now but not all food). Takers destroy diversity needed for Community resilience and survival (Animals and Leavers live within the limits of the system).
Are takers exempt from Law of Limited Competition? We kill off direct competition (predators); kill off our competitors twice removed (Grazers and Weeds); kill off anything that doesn’t feed what we eat; and this is almost Holy Work by ranchers and farmers. ALL species will expand to the extent that the food supply expands – so ingenious humans decided to claim all food and exclude all other competitors through species extermination using pesticides, herbicides, and overharvesting, not realizing how they would ruin the delicate ecological balances that created so much food in the first place without human need to manage it. (see last post about Aldo Leopold’s observations).
To Be Continued ……………………..
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