Demetrie Demetrie Tyler

<h2>The Stakes</h2> This depends on how you want to define "sustainability". If I think about sustainability in terms of the long-term health of the biosphere, the stakes are extremely high. If I think about sustainability in terms of local, grass-roots quality of life issues, they are important, but let's just say I don't loose sleep over it.

My main problem is being unable to decide where to start: the local vs global problem.

For instance, say we do get the floor of the grid. That would be a fantastic and positive achievement. However, I can't help but think that it's essentially a political act. Maybe that's the point, maybe that's how paradigm shits happen (is it?) But if this is indeed essentially political, i need to know what the general political strategy is. In other words, as Gilad pointed out, the real purpose is a little unclear. Are we saving a small, but hopefully significant, amount of energy, or are we trying to raise awareness and demonstrate a model for others to follow?

Generally, I'm condemned to be a "big-picture" monomaniac, and therefor I'm personally obsessed with overwhelming global problems, of which there are many. I tend to think of "sustainability" in terms of survival. Survival of species, survival of "ways of life", survival of whatever. And along those lines, i can't figure out which of the following global emergencies to consider the most pressing:

Energy Crisis - I agree with pretty much everything Jeff wrote. Practical and immediate solutions are key.

Climage Change - My favorite summation of this dire situation can be found in Elizabeth Kolbert's 3 part New Yorker essay "The Climate of Man". http://www.wesjones.com/climate1.htm

Biodiversity Bottleneck - E.O Wilson's "The Future Of Lfe" outlines the problem: half of the Planet's species will be extinct in the next 100 years unless we act, um, yesterday (and Wilson's prediction of the consequences are much more dire than you would think).

Also, the problem I've been thinking of as "The Vonnegut Scenario" (Slaughterhouse 5, Cat's Cradle/Ice-9, etc.) - which is essentially that as technology gives us more and more powerful weapons there is an increasing risk of greater and greater destruction at the hands of smaller and smaller groups. Nuclear proliferation falls into this column. I've heard Bill Clinton recently refer to this as the biggest current threat to civilization (bioshpere too, as far as i can tell)

Okay. Fine. Saving the world. So, other than getting depressed, what is to be done?

My primary concern is that if so many of us, from so many different perspectives, don't get this collectively right we'll be collectively screwed. In other words, for arguments sake, let's say the "peak oil" situation does indeed get as bad as predicted in the next generation or so, and the global economy basically collapses. Which would lead to who knows what kind of worst-case scenario... Could we have come to a consensus about this 50 years earlier and devoted our collective resources to solving this problem first?(and putting the others temporarily on the back-burner) I know that this is essentially politically impossible, but I'm still obsessed with the question.

I'm annoyed by:

- Models of activism that cloister those who agree with each other into small "group-think" situations (academic, political, think-tanks, online communities, whatever) that essentially just fight political battles in the media and act as divisive forces in society. My mom is the worst. she can't say "bush" or "republican" without wrapping it in "motherf#@!er".

- Proselytizing. The goal, in my view, isn't to change the minds of those who see the world differently than you do, it's to learn how best to live in a world with people you don't agree with.

- Prevailing conception of "humanity" as somehow outside or opposed to "nature". I think that this way of thinking causes so many problems i don't even know where to start...

- Fatalism & Misanthropy. People aren't generally stupid, they're generally smart, that's how we got into this mess. In fact, when (we perceive ourselves to be) up against the wall we're pretty good at getting out of jams.

- My own debilitating ideological paralysis.

Proposals

1. Andrew's proposal: As I mentioned before, I'd be willing to move forward with this, but I want to know exactly what the goal is. I lived "off the grid" for a couple years, and I ended up feeling like I was some sort of "Energy Separatist". "Hey man, i don't support you're fucked up system." Great, but other than the small (really small) effect we had on how much energy the city was using, what did we accomplish? Enviro-street cred I guess. Having said that, I think a collective effort is the best idea and I would support any idea that we could come to a consensus on.

2. Sustainability Funnel I'd love to research ways to implement a system for using bottom-up-ness and "wisdom of crowds" thinking to let those of us who wanted to take part in such a system to come to a consensus and agree to act on it. Specifically, I'm thinking of a small scale experiment modeled on systems like Prediction Markets, Lotteries, or other game-like systems.