Energy is the foundation of life

Energy is the foundation of life in the Goulburn Valley.

Whatever form you choose: it makes our cars go, warms and cools our houses, makes the trees and grass grow, fattens our animals, takes us around the world and takes our kids to school, allows us to make and use things and, in a more intimate sense, literally makes our heart beat.

Energy in all its varied forms is what has allowed humans, who have understood it best, to build and develop a complex society which, without energy would collapse.

Read Ugo Bardi’s “Extracted” and you begin to understand that fossil fuel-based energy upon which modern civilization is founded came from two specific periods in earth’s history, 90 and 150 million years ago.

It is unlikely the world will ever exhaust its fossil fuels, rather they will become so expensive and difficult to extract that economically, we will be forced to leave them in the ground.

Beyond that, there is the further complicating factor – the burning of fossil fuels has altered the chemical makeup of earth’s atmosphere and is changing weather patterns to such a degree that humanity is edging closer to the abyss.

Some people have thought deeply about this challenge and on Friday of next week, the Shepparton-based group, Slap Tomorrow, will present a forum in Mooroopna at which the idea of powering tomorrow will be explored and discussed.

Leading discussions will be the Associate Professor and Deputy Director of the Institute of Environmental Studies at the University of New South Wales, Dr Mark Diesendorf.

Dr Disesnedorf, who has written the book “Sustainable Energy Solutions for Climate Change” is convinced, and can illustrate how Australia could be powered now by renewable energy, if we only had the will.

With him will be a director of Applied Horticultural Research and an adjunct Professor of Horticultural Crop Physiology with the University of Sydney, Dr Gordon Rogers

He has a PhD in crop physiology, and 24 years in agronomy and crop physiology specialising in sustainable horticultural production systems, crop water uptake and irrigation in horticultural crops.

Dr Rogers can help farmers understand how they can apply renewable energy to their agricultural processes.

Dr Mark Diesendorf.

A third speaker is a PhD student from the University of Melbourne, David Coote, who has focussed his studies and research on community-scale woody biomass energy systems, the integration of bioenergy with solar power, small scale on-farm use of renewable energy and biodiesel manufacture.

Overseeing the September 26 forum will be thinker, comedian and advisor to the Melbourne Sustainable Society Institute at the University of Melbourne, Rod Quantock.

The world’s conventional energy sources are either past their peak, or unusable and next week’s Slap Energy forum will shine a light on a new and renewable energy future.

If there something beyond civilization - tribalism?

The idea that there is something better beyond civilization might be incomprehensible to most.

Mesopotamia is thought to be
 the cradle of civilization.

Civilization arose about 10 000 years ago, being midwifed by our first agricultural revolution, as people were then able to settle in groups and over time civilization  became the predominant and accepted manner through which people related.

Any objective observer taking even a cursory view of human society could see that what we have and what we call “civilization” is not working.

Fewer than 100 people have more wealth than half those on earth; that is about 3.5 billion people – the inequality that civilization has wrought is inexcusable.

Tribalism was supplanted by civilization, which for many is the epitome of how society should orchestrate its affairs, but it is hierarchical, while tribalism operates entirely differently.

Although obviously having a leader, a tribe favours no one, all are equal, and all are cared for from cradle to grave with values contrasting markedly with a hierarchical civilisation.

Some two million years ago homos-erectus evolved in Africa and from then until about the time of that first agricultural revolution, the predecessor of modern-man lived in tribes.

The shift some 10 000 years ago from tribal living to the much celebrated civilised living is not of itself the root of our present difficulties, rather it was the emergence of hierarchy and through that divisions among people and stratification of classes.

The hierarchical impetus brought on by civilization resulted in an autocracy peddled to the people as democracy, but it was simply an administrative process that enriched a few, created alarming inequality and left most of humanity with simple triviality, frivolity and frequently, damnable poverty.

Tribalism of ages past would obviously not work today, but some modern version adopted whenever and wherever possible to existing practices would provide some defence against the gluttonous behaviour and individualism of contemporary living.

Tribal members are of equal importance and with group survival depending upon individual wellbeing, everyone is cared for and treated with equal respect and the subsequent flow-on manifests itself in broad reverence for the tribe itself.

Those who choose to level the accusation of “utopianism” at the tribalism idea need to first think about the utopian drive of those who claim civilization to be the epitome of humanity.

Cheering the loudest for civilization are mostly those who by chance and exploitation are at the pointy end of society and stand with those who have ravaged earth’s riches, eating into the capital and leaving little for their progeny.

Civilization has produced some wondrous things; wonderful ideas, processes and products that have extended our lives, but equally destructive devices and ideas.

Tribalism is about creating resilient, resourceful and tightknit neighourhoods that share and have no need to plunder the earth’s finite capital.

Exponential population growth is exhausting earth's resources

Humans have historically exhausted what existed and then moved on.

Our world is full and it is
 time we started listening
to those with ideas
about slowing exponential
 population growth.

The earliest small groups of humans, or tribes, settled briefly and when the immediate environment was no longer viable or provided the live-giving resources they needed, the group simply moved on.

Space was never a problem and the richness of the planet continued just over the horizon and so it was simply a matter of shifting your belongings, as few as they were, and re-establishing life in the “foyer of a new supermarket”.

The idea that we could always move to a new place has become entrenched in our psyche and humans have always looked longingly to the horizon convinced the solution to their difficulties were “just out of sight”.

That assumption has been evident throughout our history right from when the first “thinking man” emigrated from Africa to the dream of many that we could colonize other planets.

When our numbers were few and we had room to spare, the dynamic of staying for a season or two and then moving-on made complete sense.

When we arrived an area was rich with life and by the time we left it was pretty well exhausted, but as human demands were relatively small and, importantly, infrequent, nature had a largely uninterrupted chance to repair the damage.

The idea that our planet was voluminous and forever giving has become entrenched in human thinking, leaving many of us with the “throw-away” mentality.

Mostly humans everywhere have always exploited what existed, customarily to civilization’s detriment, and then moved on.

Most civilisations, history illustrates, survive for about 1000 years, except for those that were founded upon a rich stream of nature that saw the essence of life refurbished annually or more frequently.

Nature has put out the “No vacancy” sign ending our free-wheeling approach.

We don’t, however, appear to be paying much attention to the fact that the world is full as we continue to live as resources upon which modern life depend are endless – they are not and if don’t think the world is full, ask yourself why the only survivable space for many families in India, for example, is literally on a rubbish tip.

What do we do?

We need to support those with ideas to slow the exponential growth of human numbers, for if we don’t do it voluntarily, a pandemic will insist, killing billions, and we need to embrace and apply the grossly misunderstood idea of equity.

How do we do that? First, accept and understand the damaging reality of exponential growth; second, abandon narcissistic individuality, live altruistically; and, third, embrace equity, fairness and justice.

Australia’s asylum-seeker dilemma is simply about people moving to escape political crossfire and resource depletion – they are simply exercising humanity’s historic exit option.

Enlightened humanism is about peace and good will

Careering toward Christmas we encounter, almost every day, adages urging us to behave for the betterment of others or in some other uplifting sense for the good of all.

One adage argues that we seek “peace on earth and good will toward men”.
Such intent is honourable and might have some cumulative impact if said often enough, but it is fleeting and unlikely to have any lasting impact.


Enlightened humanism will
bring peace and good
will, and enhance democracy.

That wish has theistic roots, but in its secular sense does not apply to any “ism” and so being free of any ideological constraints, it is a plea we should take up with enthusiasm.
Sadly, such enthusiasm has been lacking, although some argue we are in the midst of a “long-peace”, a claim supported by unquestionable statistics.
Civilization, the idea that life has an intrinsic value and that existence is enhanced when we bond with and support each other as opposed to exploitation, is edging forward to become deeper, broader and stronger.
The de-civilizing events of life are becoming rarer, although the 24-hour news cycle that encircles the globe would have us believe otherwise.
Not many decades ago a quarrel in some remote place that cost 100 lives went unnoticed, but today it is in our newspapers and frequently leads television news, not to mention references on many internet websites.
Although the barrage of deathly news sometimes seems overwhelming, in an historical and statistical sense it is measurably significantly less than what humans once endured.
The peace that you and I now take for granted, was once absent from the daily lives of all and the idea of “peace and good will” was an urgent need that challenged the norm in which most anyone, anytime, could be assaulted, robbed, murdered, declared a witch or had their personality assassinated by the application and implications of some perverse superstition.
Christmas is the high point of a superstition we can live without, but within it are the seeds of “peace on earth and good will toward men”, but whether or not we have the skill to divorce myth from reality is, considering humanity’s history, a seemingly insurmountable challenge.
However, we should not be disheartened for happily saddled with enlightened humanism there are many who value peace and the profit it brings to all people ahead of the pointless costs of conflict.
The arrival of circumstances and conditions about which we know little, such as burgeoning populations, energy scarcity, a dysfunctional economy and changes to our climate, will test adherence to principles allowing continuation of the present “long-peace” or, the collapse of morals prompting an incomprehensible collision of humans.
In the name of “peace on earth and good will toward men”, I long for the former.

We are living in a dream; a dream that's becoming a nightmare

Dreams, good, bad or otherwise, have bequeathed us this world.

Our modern world is the product of dreams, much of what we enjoy sprang from dreams and, interestingly, disillusionment also arose from dreams.


James Howard Kunstler

Today’s dream, or life narrative, has become something of a nightmare with the indisputably reality of human triggered global warming and then to further complicate matters, the end mid-way through this century of the world’s oil resources. Last week I invited readers to join me and consider my dream, a dream that I humbly suggest would ease the difficulties that society and humanity generally, face as our climate changes and we embrace a low-energy future.
To withstand significant changes to our climate and live successfully and psychologically prosperously in a low-energy future we need to re-engage with our near-neighbours, in turn with our wider communities, society generally and so civilization.
Early in his 2005 book “The Long Emergency” James Howard Kunstler said he hoped it would wake the American public from its sleepwalk and defend the project of civilization.
“Even in the face of epochal discontinuity, there is a lot we can do to assure the refashioning of daily life around authentic local communities based on balanced local economies, purposefully activity and a culture of ideas consistent with reality.
“It is imperative for citizens to be able to imagine a hopeful future, especially in times of maximum stress and change,” Kunstler wrote.
Discussing why alternative fuels won’t rescue us Kunstler said: “Based on everything we know right now, no combination of so-called alternative fuels or energy procedures will allow us to maintain daily life in the United States the way we have been accustomed to running it under the regime of oil.”
And so what do we do locally? The world-wide Transition movement enables communities to ease into a low-energy future and a Tatura based group aligned with those aims is working to expose its community to those critical ideals – join them, or at least endorse its ambitions.
Tatura Transition is working to understand our crisis-laden future and can help us turn a certain nightmare into a dream.