future
worldchanging.com
While reading blogs last night, I’m delighted I discovered worldchanging.com, blogging and co-ordinating a sustainable future for us all.
From: a worldchanging how-to:
WorldChanging.com works from a simple premise: that the tools, models and ideas for building a better future lie all around us. That plenty of people are working on tools for change, but the fields in which they work remain unconnected. That the motive, means and opportunity for profound positive change are already present. That another world is not just possible, it’s here. We only need to put the pieces together.
So great to see a group of people focussed on the future and the answers, rather than the past and attendant, comfortable recriminations.
Movie: The Corporation
Libby and I made one of those rare trips into Perth last night to see the documentary The Corporation at Cinema Paradiso.
Fantastic film. Deep and wide with ideas and concepts. Here are a few that struck me:
1. Corporations exist as ‘persons’ under the law. They tend to behave with all the symptoms of a psychotic person, even if most of the individuals in the Corporation are be reasonable, moral, caring people.
2. Some Corporations view illegal behaviour and resulting fines as a cost of doing business and therefore make a habit of breaking the law and paying the fines because it is cheaper than behaving legally.
3. Corporations have got really good at getting themselves out of their expensive impacts on others and the world. These ignored impacts are called externalities. The more stuff that corporations can make somebody else’s problem, the more profit they can make.
4. It is possible for a Corporation to be ‘put to death’ or have its charter removed by government. It rarely, if ever, happens.
There is lots more there. It is sobering and ironic and funny in places. Well worth a look. See William’s review for more.
We stopped in at the Greek Taverna for a bite afterwards. It was crap. Don’t bother.
High fuel prices = alernative energy innovation
Instability in word oil supplies and higher oil prices, while expensive for people and a threat to our oil-sensitive economy, does have a good impact.
As oil nudges up in price, alternative energy technologies and energy conservation start to look attractive to investors, stimulating innovation where it is needed to help treat our fossil fuel addiction. Which is good, because the oil supply is finite and going cold turkey on oil 50 years from now would be pretty ugly :-)
Wired News: Energy Gets Jolt of Venture Cash.
Human Use-By Date?
Do we have a built-in use-by date as a species? Do we have our own time-bomb terminator gene built in already?
Kate Ravilious writes in the Guardian Weekly:
Every species seems to come and go. Some last longer than others, but nothing lasts for ever. Humans are a relatively recent phenomenon, jumping out of trees and striding across the land around 200,000 years ago. Will we persist formillions of years, or are we headed for an evolutionary makeover, or even extinction?
According to Reinhard Stindl, of the Institute of Medical Biology in Vienna, the answer to this question could lie at the tips of our chromosomes. In a controversial new theory he suggests that all eukaryotic species (everything except bacteria and algae) have an evolutionary “clock” that ticks down through generations to an eventual extinction date.
Future of Energy Links
Here are the my Future of Energy links supporting my talk to Curtin Graduate Certificate in Future Studies students on the weekend:
It was a great day, most enjoyable and inspiring to me to meet and talk with such an engaged and interesting group of people.
Viridian Design Movement - a design movement led by science fiction author Bruce Sterling to, as the website puts it, “Create irresistible demand for a global atmosphere upgrade” using design as a tool for change.
A Clean Energy Future for Australia. A really useful report. Essential reading.
Australian Greenhouse Office (Aust. Federal Government)
For a good set of current energy stats, have a look at BP’s Statistical Review of World Energy 2003
OECD: World energy to 2020: prospects and challenges
Hubbert Peak entry in Wikipedia - a pretty balanced explanation.
A ride through Chernobyl by motorbike. This shows what can go wrong with Nuclear reactors in a graphic way.
Bush drags us back
George Bush has had a “devastating impact” on global sustainable development and set the world back more than ten years, says Jonathon Porritt, the prime minister’s senior adviser on the subject, today.Writing in Guardian Society Mr Porritt, who is the chairman of the Sustainable Development Commission, says it is hard to exaggerate the damage done to the planet by Mr Bush’s drive for a “new world order”.
On a whole series of issues including climate change, international aid, family planning, nuclear proliferation, trade and corporate responsibility, “staying true to a discredited model of extreme economic liberalism has set the world back a decade or more”, says Mr Porritt.
This quote from a Guardian Unlimited story with the sobering title “World set back 10 years by Bush’s new world order, says Blair aide“
Creative Commons in Australia
Good news! I’m really pleased to see that work is in progress to start adapting the Creative Commons licenses to the Australian legal system. Respect to Tom Cochrane, Brian Fitzgerald and Ian Oi and all who are working on it.
Reflection: World, Australia, WA
Remember my gra’s first law that I blogged about a while ago?
Thoughful reflection conserves human energy and time.
Well, people like me make up things like this because they are trying to tell themselves something. I’ve been busy doing things and not reflecting. I’m overdue for some reflection.
There is a reason to do it today. I’m forty years old today. Turning forty has been in my mind for a while, but I’ve let any reflection wait until today, I’ve been busy doing things and not really reflecting for a bit.
So here I’m going to focus on the reflection, not the doing. Let’s see where I am at, and where my thinking is taking me at the moment. I’m going to start with the big external stuff in this entry and reflect on myself more a bit later. The big stuff is occupying my mind a lot. I need to tell you.
World
Iraq is a huge mess, especially with apparent US arrogance stirring up civil war. Israel and Palestine are a huge mess. The UN is weak, little more than a huge toothless committee. The standard solution to inter-national problems now seems to be tit-for-tat militarism justified by deception and lies from the highest level of government in the US, UK and Australia.
Nobody in power seems to want to do anything about this. As if the solution to terrorism is to bomb the crap out of a few countries. Of course it isn’t, we all know that.
The doomsday clock is sitting at seven minutes to midnight, indicating the threat of nuclear war has been on the increase since 1991 when the START treaty was signed and the clock sat at seventeen minute to midnight.
A change of government in Spain is positive, as are the now flagging popularity of Bush, Blair and Howard. With these three out of power, there is a chance that we can get the world back on track to a safe and fair modern world.
Australia
Today my country is lost. As a nation we are stuck in a fear-driven make-more-money work-really-hard cynical follow-the-US close-borders pacific-solution lock-up-all-the-refugees-because-they-are-terrorists space. Australia and Australians have lost their self-respect, and people with a sense or the rest of the world are looking fondly to foreign shores and away from an Australia stumbling back into the 1950s.
I’m looking for signs of change. I’m a big optimist and I’m looking for the next wave that redefines Australian and brings our self-respect back.
The rise of Mark Latham as head of the ALP looks exciting to me. He brings youth and freshness with him. Could it be that Latham will help us find ourselves?
Bring on the federal election. I’m scared but hopeful. A conservative victory in the next election would darken my soul. May the conservatives reap the harvest of their fear and desperate lies.
Western Australia
Some emerging good stuff is happening locally. Great local people like Will are doing amazing, aware, beautiful things.
At the end of the day, though, we still have an economy driven by digging stuff out of the ground and shipping it overseas unimproved.
As a state, we are still way isolated. That is lovely because it is safe, but it also tend to mean the future seems to happen somewhere else. Folk here wait for thing to change elsewhere, then bring changes here. Not very progressive. I’d like to play some part in changing that over the next few years, but I don’t know how.
Perth has the potential to be quite liveable in the future, IF governments keep up investment in public infrastructure (trains, busses, …) and adopt some sensible, sustainable development. Mapping out enormous sprawling dormitory suburbs surrounding the city will be a nightmare without good planning and infrastructure. Perth has always had the potential to turn into a mini Los Angeles, hopefully this can be avoided.
To be continued…
Coming in my next few postings: Stuff closer to home. Like me. And Technology and Society.
FTA will cause us lots of problems in the future
Look, this trade deal will bring on a host of legal changes that will make our lives worse. In the Intellectual Property area, it looks like we will end up with new laws that will sacrifice our rights for those of the big global copyright holders.
And bye-bye multi-region DVD players, I bet.
I think you and I need to work on our Senators to make sure the enabling legislation does not get through our senate.
Here’s a quote from the informative press release from Electronic Frontiers Australia:
Electronic Frontiers Australia (EFA) today expressed dismay about the intellectual property clauses of the recently announced Free Trade Agreement with the United States of America, saying they would leave average Australians at the mercy of legal action from multinational media companies, and represent a massive step backwards for Australian Intellectual Property law.
“The United States has one of the worst systems of intellectual property laws in the world.” said EFA board member Dale Clapperton. “Their Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA) has been widely condemned by civil liberties and users groups throughout the world, and now the Howard government has committed itself to implementing its worst, most insidious provisions.”
Eventually petrol prices will rise… a lot.
Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists has an informative article about the world’s finite supply of oil and the strategic implications of Iraq’s oil.
This is the same crew that publish the Doomsday Clock, giving their assessment of nuclear danger. The current time is seven minutes to midnight.
Anyway, a quote from the oil article to get you thinking:
Petroleum reserves are limited. Petroleum is not a renewable resource and production cannot continue to increase indefinitely. A day of reckoning will come sometime in the future. The point at which production can no longer keep up with increasing demand will mean a radical and painful readjustment globally to everyday life.
In spite of that indisputable fact, people behave as if the global petroleum supply is unending. Predictions of the exhaustion of oil reserves seem to have lost all credibility. The public assumes that inexpensive oil will be available essentially forever. The idea that petroleum resources are finite and that petroleum production might peak in the near future seems to have vanished from all discussions of energy policy in Congress, in the press, and even among public interest groups.
Augusta-Margaret River Sustainable Future
I’m down in Margaret River for the weekend, along with half the population of Perth, enjoying cooler weather and that whole wine-beach-food thing we love.
Half the population of Perth. It sure seems like it on these big holiday weekends. Is it sustainable? Probably not.
However, the CSIRO and the local shire are working on a two year partnership focussed on helping to create a sustainable future for the region.
Augusta-Margaret River Sustainable Future is an initiative that will involve the whole community in planning for the future.
Over the next two years, the Shire and community of Augusta-Margaret River will be working with CSIRO to develop a better system for making decisions that
affect how the region develops into the future.
Our aim is to ensure Augusta-Margaret River remains a vibrant region with a great quality of life for all.
More at the Augusta-Margaret River Sustainable Future website.
Sustainable New Year
We all secretly know deep down that us affluent first-worlders are living beyond the means of the planet just by living our normal first-world lives, driving a car, and buying and having and using and throwing out lots and lots of stuff.
So, how about making a resolution of two to make your existence more sustainable and your ecological footprint smaller in the new year? Here are some ideas:
Offset CO2 emissions from your car
Burning petrol or gas releases CO2 into the atmosphere. However, by planting enough trees, you can remove an equivalent amount of CO2 from the atmosphere. In Australia, for $30 per year, Greenfleet will plant and maintain 17 native trees that while growing should absorb the CO2 generated by your car in normal use.
Buy sustainably generated (renewable) power
Ask you electricity retailer to sell you renewable power or green power. In Western Australia, Western Power have two Green Energy products to choose from.
Make a committment to using public transport
Stop driving around in a car, and take on public transport instead. You save money and gain time by doing this, and make a more sustainable life for yourself. Also, somebody else is driving for you, so you can concentrate on other things. And you get exercise doing this as well. In Western Australia, see the TravelSmart site for support and details.
Focus on Less
Make a conscious commitment to buying less stuff. We fill our lives with many unnecessary or superfluous things, and then need to maintain and store them. If you never acquire them in the first place, you save money, energy and materials. If you want to get conscious and political about your consumption, have a look at The Media Foundation’s Buy Nothing Day site.
Creative Commons 1st birthday flash
Creative Commons have a new flash presentation that talks about the first year of the amazing creative commons license. It is called Reticulum Rex or is that Remix Culture.
Very clever, very inspiring. Doesn’t look like anybody is adapting the licenses for Australian law yet. This is something we should get onto. Know any good Australian Copyright lawyers?
Who’s IP is in my pee?
I have been reading Steve Talbott’s NetFuture: Technology and Human Responsibility newsletter for some years now. If you are looking for a deeper understanding about the role of technology in our humanity, read what Steve has to say.
His latest issue reviews Bill McKibben’s book
“Enough: Staying Human in an Engineered Age”. This is all about gene manipulation and you and me.
Do you want your genes manipulated to make you better at something?
Yes?
No?
A little bit?
I’m thinking I might go for a little bit myself, just to see how it feels.
But who am I once I have done that? Do I still belong to me? Who do I belong to? Am I carrying around molecular-sized copyright symbols inside me. Is there some corporations IP in my pee?