-----Original Message-----
From: Harry Pollard <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
To: Jay Hanson <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Cc: [EMAIL PROTECTED] <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Date: Thursday, December 04, 1997 10:01 PM
Subject: Re: It looked like a hand grenade ...
Jay wrote:
>>>HARRY: The earth is a veritable storehouse of everything we need.
>>>If we run into a temporary shortage, the market will handle
>>>it while government is printing the appropriate forms.
>>>
>>>If we run out of something, we'll use something else. We are
>>You are probably right Harry about using something else. It
>>may be possible to boil raw sewage into something edible. I
>>suppose road kill may not taste too bad if one adds lots of
>>spices. No oil though, so you're your going to have to cook
>>with reclaimed Pampers ... but again no problem, you can wrap
>>wet rags around your head to survive the greasy smoke.
>>
>>I am constantly amazed that economists would prefer to live
>>like this. Do economists assume that everyone would prefer
>>live in the gutter?
>This kind of hyperbole, unfortunately will get you everywhere. Perhaps
>conditioned by "Film at 11" we expect ever escalating scenarios.
>
>It bares little relation to reality, but it isn't intended to. It's
>intended to shock, to present a frightening aspect of society. That wakes
>'em up!
But of course this IS REALITY Harry. History is littered with
dead civilizations that devoured their natural resources:
"Some 4,400 years ago, the city-states of ancient Sumer
in modern-day Iraq faced an unsettling dilemma. Farmland
was gradually accumulating salt, the byproduct of
evaporating irrigation water. Almost imperceptibly,
the salt began to poison the rich soil, and over time
harvests tapered off.
"Until 2400 BC, Sumerians had managed the problem
of dwindling yields by cultivating new land, thereby
ensuring the consistent food surpluses needed to support
their armies and bureaucracies. But now they had reached
the limits of agricultural expansion. And over the next
three centuries, accumulating salts drove crop yields
down more than 40 percent. The crippled production,
combined with an ever-growing population, led to shrinking
food reserves, which in turn reduced the ranks of soldiers
and civil servants. By 1800 BC, Sumerian agriculture had
effectively collapsed, and this once glorious civilization
faded into obscurity."
p. 5, SHRINKING FIELDS: Cropland Loss in a World of
Eight Billion, Gary Gardner; Worldwatch Institute, Paper
#131, July 1996. Worldwatch Institute, 1776 Massachusetts
Ave., NW, Washington, DC 20036, Phone: 202-452-1999; FAX:
202-296-7365, [EMAIL PROTECTED], http://www.worldwatch.org/
Economists DO NOT STUDY REALITY. Remember Plato's
Allegory of the Cave?
It's about a religious cult of economists chained in their chairs
so they can only see reality through price shadows thrown on the
wall of their cave. Years of training has damaged their eyes so
they are physically unable to face reality.
Scientists have released the economist's chains, and have been
trying for years to get economists to twist around and look at
reality. But they can not, and remain in their world of shadows.
A PREMONITION OF THE FUTURE
"West Africa is becoming THE symbol of worldwide demographic,
environmental, and societal stress, in which criminal anarchy
emerges as the real `strategic' danger. Disease, overpopulation,
unprovoked crime, scarcity of resources, refugee migrations, the
increasing erosion of nation-states and international borders,
and the empowerment of private armies, security firms, and
international drug cartels are now most tellingly demonstrated
through a West African prism. West Africa provides an appropriate
introduction to the issues, often extremely unpleasant to
discuss, that will soon confront our civilization. ..."
http://www.theatlantic.com/atlantic/election/connection/foreign/anarcf.htm
Jay
