What if we could think of the earth as a very large and very
old spaceship, governed by finite supplies and systems, subject to cycles of
growth and discovery as well as disarray and destruction?
The International Space Station (ISS) is considered
incredibly successful to have survived for over 12 years. What if we treated
our far more ancient planet earth with the same respect for its longevity?
On ISS, life support systems are constantly monitored.
Inhabitants must balance available food with the number of people on the
station at any given time and their needs for a healthy diet. Water must be
carefully monitored as well as atmospheric control systems that monitor oxygen
levels. Carefully monitoring of energy and thermal levels affect how and when
certain operations on ISS can happen. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/International_Space_Station#Life_support.
What if we brought the same care to spaceship earth? How in
the world can so many of us live in a time of such scientific and philosophical
complexity and yet fail to apply the same understanding to the tiny world on
which we live?
A quick digression: “For the World Is Hollow and I Have
Touched the Sky.”
In 1968, a Star Trek episode aired that was called, “For the
World Is Hollow and I Have Touched the Sky.” Captain Kirk and the Starship
Enterprise detect an asteroid on a collision course with another planet.
Arriving at the asteroid, they discover it is actually a spaceship. They learn the people living on the spaceship
believe they are living on a planet governed by a strict god that controls what
they can think and speak, as well as what changes they can make to their
society. Only when Captain Kirk, Mr. Spock and Dr. McCoy reveal to them that
their ‘god’ is actually a computer that has outlived its usefulness—only then
are the people willing to reprogram the computer and avoid their own and
another planet’s destruction. Note that this episode was broadcast in 1968. It
should be mandatory viewing this year, when our own outmoded and harmful ways
of life threaten us all. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/For_the_World_Is_Hollow_and_I_Have_Touched_the_Sky
It’s Amazing How Much Humans Have Changed the Planet in a
Short Time
Scientific data suggests our planet formed 4.6 billion years
ago.
http://www.mbmg.mtech.edu/gmr/gmr-everybody.asp (I realize these graphics are too small to really read. Please use the links to check out larger versions as well as the great information on their websites.)
Ancestors of the current human didn’t appear on the earth
until 4.2 million years ago.
We are a blip on the earth’s historical radar screen. And
yet we somehow feel entitled to take complete control of the planet, even if we
bring harm to the only home we have.
All of our negative behaviors can be seen as a way to stave
off our awareness of the finiteness of things and the finiteness of life. We
fear dying and so have created philosophies, and systems designed to hide this
fear from ourselves.
Senescence and its inevitability
Apparently there are now three laws of thermodynamics. Law
one: energy doesn’t disappear, but it converts from one form to another. Law
two: or the law of entropy means that everything eventually tends toward a
chaotic state. Law three or MEPE states how chaos is achieved depends on the
possible paths one might take; the path of least resistance is the one that
will prevail. Human birth and infant growth could be said to reflect the first
law. A person’s journey toward death reflects laws two and three. What surrounds
us and the choices we make about our surroundings will contribute to how we age
and decay. (See: Sognnæs, Ida Andrea Braathen, “Maximum Entropy and Maximum
Entropy Production in Macroecology,” Norwegian University of Science and
Technology, April 2011. Also: http://www.lawofmaximumentropyproduction.com/.)
My husband described our lives like this, “Human growth is a
bubble. The energy required for conception, birth and growth, it comes around.
We must pay all of that back in the end” as we age and die.
Our determination to push away an awareness of death causes
serious harm to our species, to other life forms on the planet, and to the
planet itself.
My husband described our lives like this, “Human growth is a
bubble. The energy required for conception, birth and growth, it comes around.
We must pay all of that back in the end” as we age and die.
- Our determination to push away an awareness of death causes serious harm to our species, to other life forms on the planet, and to the planet itself.
- Already the current human population is two to three times greater than our planet can support. http://www.worldpopulationbalance.org/3_times_sustainable
- All earthly realities—air, water, land—are being harmed by our numbers and theway we take earthly resources while considering only the desires of our species.
- Living in denial of the realities of our planet and our place upon it will bring great suffering to future generations. http://www.preservenet.com/WeBelieve.html and http://www.consumptiongrowth101.com/Basics.html#WhatShouldOneDo.
As my husband said to me this morning, “We need to think not
so much as individuals, but as members of this population of homo sapiens on
this planet. It’s another way to think about immortality. Is there a way to
achieve another consciousness that transcends the individual?”
The Beauty of a Finite Life
Since ancient times, cultures have sought to understand how and
why humans are aware of their mortality.
In the Hindu tradition, Brahman
dreams for one night that lasts for 4.32 million years. While he dreams, our
world exists to us. When he awakes, that dream of the world exists no more and
4.32 million years will pass before Brahman returns to sleep and a new dream
commences. This concept is not unlike western theories of the expansion and
contraction of the universe.
Even in western culture, at the
individual level of awareness, we recognize that the death of a child is
somehow more sad than the passing of a much older person. Sometimes we say, “At
least he or she had a long life.” We do understand, at least sometimes, that
dying is an undeniable part of our world.
Our awareness that all things and
all life forms are finite brings beauty and intensity, a desire to experience
fully the time we have, and a sense of connectedness to other life forms, all
of which we would not have if we did not know we would die.
We need to ask ourselves why we
have created economic and political systems that do not acknowledge the
finiteness of existence. Instead we act as if:
1. We
do not understand that our human population is too large and is bringing great
harm to other species and the planet itself.
2. We
fool ourselves into believing that the finite resources of our planet can
provide for unlimited population growth. For example, oil and gas come from dead
and decaying organisms. We have convinced ourselves we can grow forever off a
finite amount of dead matter. In other words, we have tried to push away our
understanding of the connection between oil and gas and death, and instead have
built an entire culture on seeing this substance as “energy.” Our current
reliance on this form of energy is a dangerous expression of our need to deny
the existence of death and decay.
3. We
hang onto outmoded lifestyles through the belief that technology will somehow
make our current lifestyles in the west endlessly possible. To measure the
health of our society using the GDP or GWP means that unsustainable companies
may grow even as we deplete and destroy our planet. To believe that corporate
profitability will translate into prosperity for all humans requires an incredible
denial of planetary realities.
4. We
refuse to reign in artificial corporate entities that can only thrive when our
most harmful ideas of unlimited growth are touted as indisputable and necessary
truths. In the U.S. the courts have ruled that these artificial entities are ‘persons,’
the ultimate fiction.
5. We
behave as if the needs and goals of affluent humans somehow justify any
decisions we take that bring harm to large numbers of poor humans, or harm to
lifeforms and ecosystems on the planet.
Death and darkness are as much a part of our world as birth
and life
“For
those who seek to understand it, death is a highly creative force. The highest
spiritual values of life can originate from the thought and study of death.”
“You
will not grow if you sit in a beautiful flower garden, but you will grow if you
are sick, if you are in pain, if you experience losses, and if you do not put
your head in the sand, but take the pain as a gift to you with a very, very
specific purpose.”
Elizabeth Kübler-Ross, http://www.ekrfoundation.org/quotes/
“Of
course, even when you see the world as a trap and posit a fundamental
separation between liberation of self and transformation of society, you can
still feel a compassionate impulse to help its suffering beings. In that case
you tend to view the personal and the political in a sequential fashion.
"I'll get enlightened first, and then I'll engage in social action."
Those who are not engaged in spiritual pursuits put it differently: "I'll
get my head straight first, I'll get psychoanalyzed, I'll overcome my
inhibitions or neuroses or my hang-ups (whatever description you give to
samsara) and then I'll wade into the fray." Presupposing that world and
self are essentially separate, they imagine they can heal one before healing
the other. This stance conveys the impression that human consciousness inhabits
some haven, or locker-room, independent of the collective situation -- and then
trots onto the playing field when it is geared up and ready.
It is my experience that the world itself has a role to play in our liberation. Its very pressures, pains, and risks can wake us up -- release us from the bonds of ego and guide us home to our vast, true nature. For some of us, our love of the world is so passionate that we cannot ask it to wait until we are enlightened.”
― Joanna Macy, World as Lover, World as Self
It is my experience that the world itself has a role to play in our liberation. Its very pressures, pains, and risks can wake us up -- release us from the bonds of ego and guide us home to our vast, true nature. For some of us, our love of the world is so passionate that we cannot ask it to wait until we are enlightened.”
― Joanna Macy, World as Lover, World as Self
The words above are thoughts to live by, and to remember as
we grow sick and die.
More than that, they are words that can inform the decisions
we make in this incredibly important time on the earth. Whenever we doubt that
change is necessary, we must remember that all things, and all beings,
eventually pass away. How do we want their passing to happen? In a cataclysm
brought on by our own need to deny the reality of our planet’s limits? Or can
we choose to remain aware that we could exist as part of a balanced and healthy
world in which birth and death are equally celebrated?
So we can work on our inner awareness and we can work to
promote environmental sustainability, steady state economies (http://steadystate.org/discover/), population
control (http://www.populationconnection.org/site/PageServer?pagename=about_us),
human and planetary rights (http://www.earthsite.org/rights.htm),
and the dismantling of any and all systems that insist on remaining asleep (http://live.huffingtonpost.com/r/segment/rep-jim-mcgovern-citizens-united/5101ccadfe3444527e000230).
Choose your life’s work and do what you can. As Joanna Macy
says, “It is a privilege to be alive in this time when we can choose to take
part in the self-healing of our world.” http://www.joannamacy.net/thegreatturning.html
For me, I'm out the door to plant tomatoes, peppers, chamomile, bergamot, and a few others that I've grown from seed. I need some dirt under my fingernails after all this time on the computer.
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