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Ayten Aydin wrote: Any scientific findings
and practical experiences need to be widely disseminated. People
are more intelligent than what we usually think they are, even at times
they let themselves guided as flocks by their shepherds.
I love your optimism, Ayten. It's good to be reminded that just
because 51% of Americans behaved like sheep in the last election doesn't
necessarily mean they ARE sheep. I tend to become cynical in my anger, which is
not constructive or productive and I can at least recognize THAT. When people
are afraid, they tend to cut away all reasoning except the very basic necessary
for survival. It's a more primitive mode of brain activity. I think that is what
was responsible for the outcome of our election; the politics of fear was
invoked. It was invoked on several fronts, which is why it worked as well as it
did.
I agree with your assessment, also, which has given me the seed of
an idea. Many years ago, in college, I had an assignment for a mass media class
I had taken as one of my electives. The assignment was to "design a
new magazine which filled some unnoticed market niche". I designed "Environment
New York". It was intended to be sort of like Time Magazine, only it was an
environmental news magazine for the State, with a lot of practical information
and timely legislative information, and I designed it to teach a more Rosennean
mode of approach to the innumerable environmental problems we faced-- so it
would have a global reach in terms of educating New Yorkers about aspects of
global problems which have local impact, (and vice versa!)...etc. Perhaps it's
time to resurrect this idea and combine it with BioTheory. It would not be a New
York based focus anymore, of course, because that would not be appropriate. But
environmental applications for Rosennean Ideas is one of my own dearest hopes
for development of my father's work.
I'll have to let these ideas cook a bit.....
Judith
----- Original Message -----
Sent: Thursday, February 17, 2005 2:09
AM
Subject: Re: [ROSEN] Recycling, Rosennean
Style...
Judith, Dan, Leo, all concerned,
A few quick thoughts on what Judith says:
There are things which informed individuals can do without
waiting governments take corrective actions on present environmental problems,
both in cities and country sides. It is now important that american
people act individually as US Government has not ratified Kyoto Protocol
(reducing gas emissions) which yesterday declared operational and the
RESPONSIBILITY moved to the grassroot. Any scientific findings
and practical experiences need to be widely
disseminated. People are more intelligent than what we usually think they
are, even at times they let themselves guided as flocks by their
shepherds.
Such a move springing up from grassroots may carry with it
very many other positive actions to establish a more meaningful democracy and
provide a good example in the right direction. Every cloud has its silver
lining.
regards,
Ayten
----- Original Message -----
Sent: Wednesday, February 16, 2005 4:47
PM
Subject: Re: Recycling, Rosennean
Style...
I think Ayten's point is very well posed. What may once have
been possible to entrust purely to Nature's way of remediation, in Nature's
time scale, would not be enough at our current level of global
overpopulation and that level is continually growing. Ultimately, Nature
will take care of our problem for us if we don't take care of it for
ourselves, but it will be very unpleasant...
So, we can look at a number of things we could
do to improve the situation. My favorite is to live smarter, as a
species. But I have few illusions that this is going to happen fast enough
to really prevent climate change or worsening of other global forms of
damage. My country just re-elected George W. Bush!!!! (Forgive me a
primal scream.....) It would require a massive unified effort to
reorganize our ways of doing everything, from what we build our houses out
of, and how we build them, to how we supply all our physical needs (food,
power, water, etc), to how we get around (transportation) to how we run
our industries, to how we handle inevitable waste flows... To make such
sweeping changes at the pace humanity is used to would take generations, and
that will be too late to prevent many of the global changes, I
fear.
Failing that, then ways to slow down the global climate
and other environmental changes, whilst working to encourage the human
reorganizational changes, would be my second choice. What I suspect will
happen is that as global climate changes manifest themselves in ways
that scare humanity, there will be far more interest and willingness to
embrace the wider-scale, more difficult reorganization of our ways of doing
things. We at least have a chance, then, of "beating the clock"; our efforts
at slowing down the changes may just provide us with enough time to prevent
the worst of the global climate shifting. What I'm most concerned about is
the kind of "system oscillation" my father spoke of, which happens when
systems are destabilized. He said the oscillation is very difficult to stop
and will continue until it runs its course and the
system regains equilibrium. If we can avoid destabilizing global
climate to that extent, we can consider ourselves very, very
lucky.
So, to that end, where would our efforts best be spent? What is
both feasible and do-able, in terms of application of Rosennean Complexity?
That's what got me to thinking about the molecular recycling/reconfiguration
idea in the first place. I'm sure there are plenty of other applications we
could come up with, on this group, so I suggest a brainstorming session.
Who's game?
Judith Rosen
PS: I'm currently researching, thanks to Leo's suggestions for
links and databases, the nature of Dioxin molecules... Specifically, the
worst of the dioxin compounds is 2,3,7,8-tetrachlorodibenzo-p-dioxin. It's
created by burning things with chlorine in them, or processes which use
chlorine with other hydrocarbons... so garbage incineration, paper mills,
PVC plastic manufacturing, Pesticide manufacturing, etc..... The trouble
with dioxins is that they mimic hormones in living organisms, so they have
all sorts of widespread effects. Worse; they persist in the environment
and bioaccumulate in fat (which females mobilize when they are
pregnant or nursing-- dosing the developing embryos and newly born with
it). I chose dioxin as my research subject because I've been reading about
it for twenty years; ever since my first pregnancy, during the Reagan years,
which was also the beginning of my environmental activism (Coincidence?
Not!). Dioxin is a bigger problem now than
ever.
----- Original Message -----
Sent: Wednesday, February 16, 2005
3:01 AM
Subject: Re: [ROSEN] Recycling,
Rosennean Style...
Leo, Dan
A query on the following:
"Perhaps in a
glance towards Judith's desire for a practical approach,
one could
develop the appropriate higher-level "soil" analogy in terms
of the
functional strata of an integral recycling framework for
the
myriad waste products that we produce.
Nature does this stuff so
very well."
Once, still in remote areas now, it was/is believed
that running water will
not get polluted as it purifies the
waste by oxiganating it while flowing.
Nature does this stuff so
very well was therefore a correct statement to
make, also for soil. We
have since then realized that it was the matter of
quantity. We have
never experienced the effects of present quantities and
varieties of
waste. Both flowing water/shores and soil get polluted and
in
times and places die for good!
What is then the practical
value of trusting the nature's inherent ability
to purify or transform
the waste naturally? In this connection I would go
along with Leo's
view:
"I would imagine in practical terms there is more to be done
in raising
awareness of 'total system accounting' than in any
underlying
technology or science. " I would add:
with a lot and
effective public education and consciousness raising
activities also
with a continuing research to produce supporting scientific
proofs and
perhaps some remedial solutions.
Ayten
----- Original
Message -----
From: "Leo Caves" <***>
To: <***>
Sent:
Tuesday, February 15, 2005 7:25 PM
Subject: Re: Recycling, Rosennean
Style...
> Dan, I think your comments on the importance and
role of the soil in
> the wider system are very interesting and
pertinent.
> Perhaps in a glance towards Judith's desire for a
practical approach,
> one could develop the appropriate higher-level
"soil" analogy in terms
> of the functional strata of an
integral recycling framework for the
> myriad waste products
that we produce.
> Nature does this stuff so very well.
>
Leo
>
>
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