{"id":3474076,"date":"2018-10-26T09:01:08","date_gmt":"2018-10-26T09:01:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.resilience.org\/?p=3474076"},"modified":"2018-10-29T10:50:18","modified_gmt":"2018-10-29T10:50:18","slug":"durable-goods","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.resilience.org\/stories\/2018-10-26\/durable-goods\/","title":{"rendered":"Durable Goods"},"content":{"rendered":"

Ed. note: The post below is a transcription of Post Carbon Fellow Stephanie Mills’ remarks at the 50 year anniversary of the publication of the Whole Earth Catalog.<\/em><\/p>\n

Gratitude to Mother Earth, ground of being. Gratitude to Stewart and Ryan and their colleagues for realizing this event.\u00a0 Gratitude to Stephanie Feldstein for her partnership tonight.<\/p>\n

The image was taken this summer in a stand of old growth White Pine saved in 1973 from the chainsaws by a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens. The flowers are Bunchberry and Canada Mayflower. Gratitude to all those beings.<\/p>\n

Stewart, master of compressed utterance, asked for five minutes on the last and next half-centuries: More than a tweet, less than a tome.<\/p>\n

Fifty years is an eyeblink.\u00a0 Yet despite many good faith efforts at every level to prevent waste and ruin, the growth of industrial civilization has ravaged the Earth, depleting soil, water, and biodiversity, contaminating oceans and the atmosphere.<\/p>\n

In 1968 Paul and Anne Ehrlich dropped The Population Bomb<\/u>.\u00a0 There were about 3.5 billion of us then, over seven billion now.\u00a0 Contraceptive means improved, while political calculation, cultural conservatism and patriarchy hampered their widespread adoption.<\/p>\n

Sixties temblors of revolutionary change cracked a few foundations. In 1972 from the Club of Rome we got a world systems model forecasting industrial civilization\u2019s inescapable limits to growth. In 1974, Congress heard of M. King Hubbert\u2019s curve mapping the limits to oil production, the end times for a petroleum-driven global infrastructure. Big business as usual has continued. Critical thresholds have been crossed.\u00a0 A late-breaking discussion of degrowth is underway but yet to reach a wide audience.<\/p>\n

[slide-anything id=’3472166′]<\/p>\n

A half-century ago we thought about living more responsibly. \u201cAccess to tools\u201d enlivened possibilities of household, homestead, village, and neighborhood self-reliance. There was hope of stalling the Apocalypse Juggernaut.\u00a0 There still may be.<\/p>\n

While I was at CoEvolution Quarterly<\/u> (best magazine that ever lived), I also worked on The Next Whole Earth Catalog<\/u>. Its extensive reviews of essential means like hand tools and simple machines, how-to books for scores of timeless crafts, a spectrum of advice on farming and gardening, and astute reporting on appropriate technologies remain durable goods. Where I live, quite a few young hand-makers, digital natives, cherish the Catalog<\/u> for its can-do spirit and for arraying the physical and conceptual tools they wield. They\u2019re flourishing while reducing their dependence on brittle systems and long lines of supply.<\/p>\n

What\u2019s coming? Possibilities I hope for, probabilities to dread. Possible: A renewed stirring of love for the Earth. Respect for and reciprocity with all beings.<\/p>\n

Both love of place and interest in nature stem from our longtime past. Although these days they court struggle and grief along with authentic connection, they\u2019ve got survival value. Belly botanists and bird nerds, frog-counters and foragers begin as kids.\u00a0 They\u2019re the ones who grow up to be the Rachel Carsons and E.O. Wilsons, the Water Protectors at Standing Rock. Maybe you\u2019ve got such a one. Hope so.<\/p>\n

In the chaos of our moment, perhaps a new understanding is immanent. A fundamental change of heart is needed, and there are harbingers, from the eco-Pope to ecological restorationists everywhere. Animals of our kind are supposed to be uniquely moral actors. Now\u2019s the time to prove it. If our descendants are to inhabit a whole earth after this collision with ecological limits, we had best embrace virtues like Taoism\u2019s Three Treasures: frugality, fairness, and humility. We can polish up our capacities for neighborliness and mutual aid. We may be as gods, but we\u2019ll live better as members and plain citizens of our biotic communities.<\/p>\n

Thank you.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

What\u2019s coming? Possibilities I hope for, probabilities to dread. Possible: A renewed stirring of love for the Earth. Respect for and reciprocity with all beings.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":128238,"featured_media":3474021,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[213522,213526,213524,79718,79720],"tags":[163844,94247],"class_list":["post-3474076","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-inspiration","category-act-inspiration-featured","category-editors-picks","category-environment","category-society","tag-buildingresilientsocieties","tag-connectiontonature"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.resilience.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3474076","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.resilience.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.resilience.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.resilience.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/128238"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.resilience.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3474076"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.resilience.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3474076\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.resilience.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/3474021"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.resilience.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3474076"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.resilience.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3474076"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.resilience.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3474076"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}