Replying to LO24558 --
Dear Organlearners,
Dan Chay <chay@alaska.com> writes:
>Thinking systemically, I'm interested in the relation of the
>doublings I've more or less experienced in the last thirty to
>fifty years, continuing growth trends, ramifications of delay
>in feedback, and Zeitgeist assumptions of growth.
Greetings Dan,
I have read your contribution LO24532 with great interest. It made me
happy to see how much "data mining" on internet resources you have done to
present a sense-making picture. Perhaps someone else will still join in
the dialogue on the topic which you have pointed out. However, it is sad
that you had to reply to your own initiating contribution because one
should not talk too much to oneself ;-)
Actually, having had no reply ( I wanted to reply, but had too much to
write on) made you focus in this contribution you on that which worries
you -- the "dance of change". Children even at school level are confronted
through rote learning with mathematical series. Because of the rote
learning they never understand the important features of any series. Thus
they remain Homo ignoro with respect to series depite all the hurt of rote
learning involved. Yes, the key feature of any series (a set of members
with a ordered pattern between them) is the "dance of change" from one to
another member along the order.
There are basically two types of "dance of change"s. I will avoid
mathematical symbols as far as possible to articulate them, but I cannot
avoid the seven essentialties in doing so ;-). They are the
BEING with DANCE on BECOMING:
Nr-yrs Ordered outcome
1 being + change
2 being + (change) + change
3 being + (change + change) + change
4 being + (change + change + change) + change
.. (ditto) ..
n being + change x n
( "change x n" means "change multiplied by n")
The feedback diagram is
===>being + ===>change ===>
|| ||
<====( x n )<====
DANCE on BEING with BECOMING
Nr-yrs Ordered outcome
1 (being) + change
2 (being + change) x change
3 (being + change x change) x change
4 (being + change x change x change) x change
.. (ditto) ...
n being + change ^ n
( "change ^ n" means "change multiplied by itself n times")
===>being + change ===>
|| ||
<======( x n )<========
The "dance on becoming" is called by mathematicians an arithmetical
series. (See if you can figure the reason for this name ;-). Nevertheless,
this dance has an aversion to its context and history so that the future
of its outcome is bound to linearity. The change is reversible because it
can easily be reversed at every step by simply back-tracking that step.
However, the "dance on being-becoming" is called by mathematicians a
geometrical series. (See if you can figure the reason for this name ;-).
Furthermore, this dance has an attraction for its context and history so
that the future of its outcome is curved with a propensity for change. The
change is irreversible, although it can reversed by making a deep,
complementary change in the surroundings which will involve the full
complexity of its context.
>Do At's essentialities apply here? How about spareness,
>quantity-limit?
>
>Oil, because of its quality, has been a rich source of free
>energy, i.e., as At observes, energy not needed simply to
>maintain current level of organization, available, I assume,
>to emergent reorganization.
Dear Dan, as you have pointed out, the ACTUAL PRACTICE of utilising "free
energy" sources happens according to the "dance on being with becoming",
but our MISERABLE THINKING on the availability of "energy" sources happens
according to the "being with dance on becoming". Our thinking is static,
vague, fragmented, unconnected, unbounded, banal and closed whereas the
actuality of practice requires dynamic, clear, wholesome, connected,
quantified, qualified and open thinking. We think that we are in control
by dancing on a snake whereas we are dancing mesmerised by that snake
preparing for the bite.
As you have pointed out, the most obvious essentiality here at play is
spareness ("quantity-limit"). But I want to urge you to trace each of
other six essentialities too so that your learning can progress beyond
your wildest expectations. What I have decided to do in this contribution
is to think along liveness ("becoming-being") on this issue.
Lets face it. The "total energy" in the sand of the Namibian desert known
as the Skeleton Coast is many orders more than the energy requirements of
all living organisms (including us with our smart technology) since the
days of the first prokaryotic cells a couple of billion years ago up to
doomsday how far off that may still be. But it is the chemical
organisation (as is measured by entropy) within each grain of sand in the
Namib desert which makes virtually none of that vast "total energy"
available to us as "free energy".
Sadly, since our thinking on energy and entropy is the "being with dance
on becoming" rather than "dance on being with becoming", we create with
our actual practices day by day more miseries. The term "energy crises" is
perhaps the best term to indicate our misery. We are too ignorant by way
of our mental dance to know that what we are actually experiencing is an
"entropy crises" rather than an "energy crises". Furthermore, because a
very small number of persons among humankind "dance on being with
becoming" rather than "being with dance on becoming", the vast majority of
the rest of humankind think that because of the skew ratio of numbers
involved, these few individuals are crazy, clumsy, unstable and thus the
actual danger to their future as Homo sapiens. When all the lemmings rush
to the cliff ignorant of what will happen to them when they get there, it
is difficult for anyone of them to get out of the way as it is with Homo
ignoro.
>Today I read in the news about the US congress "a bill with
>bipartisan support from two key senators was introduced
>Thursday to triple the use of ethanol over the coming decade."
What will happen when we keep on increasing the rate of "entropy
production"? I wonder whether this question has ever been asked by all
those who have their hands in the cookie jar? I wonder whether they will
be able to understand the question should the masses succeed by hook or
crook to rub the question under their noses. I need not wonder whether
they will be able to answer it correctly because of what they are now
doing.
Yes Dan, thanks for pointing out to fellow learners what you have been
able to dig up yourself:
>Yet here is what I have read from one of those other links I sent
>you earlier: "Energy companies are in business to make money
> - not energy. For example, economic subsidies allow ethanol
>companies to waste energy while making a profit. Specifically,
>about 71% more energy is used to produce a gallon of ethanol
>than the energy contained in a gallon of ethanol...."
The figure for nuclear energy is even worse, but hidden in "top secret"
files beacuse of clever manipulating of fear.
People are now making money by wasting "free energy" and our ecology. When
will we begin to put a stop to this practice of wasting two dollars of tax
payer's money just to make one dollar of profit cleverly kept away from
the tax payers? Is it not using one of the two dollars to divert the other
dollar out of their reach? When will we stop destroying the bodies and
souls of humans to make self money with seemingly no aquisation printed on
the moeny bills?
When will we begin with a new "dance of change" which involves
"becoming-being", i.e. liveness?
With care and best wishes,
--At de Lange <amdelange@gold.up.ac.za> Snailmail: A M de Lange Gold Fields Computer Centre Faculty of Science - University of Pretoria Pretoria 0001 - Rep of South Africa
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