Replying to LO28728 --
Dear Organlearners,
Jan Lelie <janlelie@wxs.nl> writes:
>Dare Organleaners dare! Dear @,
>
>Thank you for your clear statements - and funny misspelling.
Greetings dear Jan,
My typing has to be blamed!
By the way, i enjoy your play with symbolism in your contributions. For
other fellow learners, the At is pronounced lake the "at" in "what"
without the "wh", but not like in "sat" without the "s".
>The coming die-off is inevitable - i have always wondered
>why i had nightmares about this, but i still assume they 're
>just internal projections of despair. And although all the
>spirits of good will are gathering, there will be not enough
>loving care around to prevent, to circumvent a series of
>manmade disasters.
Jan, whenever i think of die-off (and that is often because of under-
standing how things are linked) i get a "cramp" in my groin. It is only
the last few weeks that i have been waking up in the early hours of the
morning with literally cold sweat -- and that in winter.
The anxiety is because people in general do not act to prevent die-off,
but actually promote it by their actions. This means only one thing --
should knowledge be the capacity to act, then they do not have the
knowledge to prevent die-off. Much of this knowledge will also be needed
to survive during die-off, but since they do not have it, they will also
not be among those who will survive during die-off.
Information on die-off began to do the rounds since the early nineties.
Yet very few people act in a decisive manner to prevent it. This is for me
a remarkable demonstration of the categorical difference between
information and knowledge. For example, knowledge has wholeness, but
information is devoid of wholeness. This is why people have no
understanding of die-off. Die-off is a gigantic network of interlinked
phenomena acting under positive feedback. Who will understand this without
sufficient wholeness? Likewise for the other six 7Es (seven essentialities
of creativity).
Die-off is a human made problem. Its solution is to prevent it by taking
appropiate actions now. This solution requires a higher level of thinking
than that which made it possible to identify the problem. In other words,
a paradigm shift is needed. But what fills me with such anxiety is that in
stead of a paradigm shift, people have become cemented into the mental
model that economical growth can be sustained by wealth machines.
(snip)
>The Netherlands emerged with a new social structure,
>a social, technical and economic structure that in a way,
>triggered the Industrial Revolution, amongst others. The
>coming struggle will be larger, heavier, deadlier and longer.
>I'm not to blame for this situation, but it is my responsibility
>- if you're not part of the solution, you're part of the problem.
I agree with your comparison, except in one word, the "longer". I think in
terms of all the kinds of die-off which I experienced, that it will be
much faster. The agroload on Dutch soil happened over many centuries. The
mechanoload which will cause the coming die-off is at most two centuries.
The faster the over load, the faster the die-off.
>As i look at this puzzle, this question, this queeste - it is
>somewhat like finding The Holy Grail: a bunch of knights
>looking for the key to eternal (= sustainable) life; were is
>Arthur? Who is Merlin? - i see no path of resolution.
Jan, I may foresee a path for solving the problem, i.e. preventing
die-off. But what i may foresee is useless because it has come to an
individual. Only when a large portion of humankind learn collectively to
indentify the problem and solve it proactively, will die-off be prevented.
But how will we organise such collective learning? I see one way and that
is by transforming existing OOs (Ordinary Organisations) into LOs
(Learning Organisations).
>So there is the first step: we have both an image of the
>problem and of the solution. In order to get constructive
>acceptance, the participants in the solution have to
>participate in its construction and adoption.
Yes, this is what many black and white South Africans realised when the
writing on the wall appeared for apartheid.
>The second step is to explore, to review, to re-imagine,
>to redefine the problem(s) - to deconstruct the issue.
>Because - i assume - the root cause of this situation is the
>very core of the way we own ourselves.
This is the crucial step -- to deconstruct (enact a creative collapse) to
undo exactly that which caused the problem in the first place.
Nelson Mandella was able to do it with respect to apartheid. He did it in
such a grand and compassionate manner that he became a revered hero for
most South Africans on all sides. But because of old age he is not our
president any more. And we have nobody else who can even closely match him
in doing such deconstructions (creative collapses) In stead we have many
leaders on all sides who want to exploit sectional interests for
opportunistic reasons. Our present president Thabo Mebki does his best,
but he does not have the stature of Mandela to do it so boldly precisely
when needed.
What can we learn from it? For a fleeting moment we had in Mandela our own
Arthur to remind us that the days of a solitary leader are over. Relying
on an organisational system by which a solitary leader can make the
difference is for me part of the problem of die-off and not its solution.
>This devil ("de evil") is telling us things that we shouldn't
>listen to. In fact, i believe that this is the origin of the word
>satan: "de lagen-legger", the one that trick us.
The word "satan" is a Hebrew word which means enemy. So what is the enemy?
I find a clue in your "telling us things that we shouldn't listen to".
When somebody tell me things in speach or script, it is impossible for me
not to hear or see it. It also is impossible for my mind not to make some
meaning out of it. So the evil is something else than what is actually
told. I think it is to consider that which had been told as knowledge
rather than as information
>Later more; thanks for raising the issue.
I raised the issue because i think that as we get closer to die-off the
concept LO (Learning Organisation) will play an increasingly important
role in preventing it happen. Should it fail to do so, then where ever
communities want to survive, they will have to become LOs.
With care and best wishes,
--At de Lange <amdelange@postino.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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