For those of the big-picture persuasion

[GliderGuider]

Here is a long but brilliant article, just brimming over with juice.

I haven't seen the concept of fractals applied like this before (seeing the larger universe, life and human history through a fractal lens), and the fit is intriguingly resonant. This is a first-class contribution to the big-picture explication of WTFIGOH ("What the F#@% is Going On Here?&quot

It's a real Gibbons of an article, very hard to cram the feeling of it all into four graphs. I beg the mods' indulgence for pulling out five.

Collapse Is Humanity Adapting To Its Own Presence

I believe the universe can be viewed as an entropic fractal. Energy and matter collect into differentials that work to more efficiently dissipate available energy. When a differential is formed that can contain a portion of available energy from a source and stabilize it in negative feedback loops, it will form a more complex and energy dense structure at a smaller scale than its source.

In turn life is also an entropic mechanism, it harnesses available energy and dissipates it. However, given the magnitude of available energy in relation to the earth, life forms a massive positive feedback loop expanding and processing larger and larger amounts of available energy. Organisms greatly increase energy density and make energy more available on a local scale by doing things like excreting the byproducts of metabolization (such as when anaerobic organisms oxygenated the biosphere) by being energy dense packets for predation, or simply by decomposing.

So what are we looking at when we peer into the future using this understanding of population growth? Ignoring either a stratospheric rise or total collapse into oblivion, what we see in the J-curve is a drop followed by stabilization, a state of equilibrium forming a relatively straight line. When we look at this part of population patterns in terms of human history, what we are looking at is a radically different society than any we have ever experienced before.

It represents a transformation or mutation in human social structure as radically different in its function and self conception as the differences between Hunter Gatherers, Agriculturalists and Industrials. The only other thing that I think can be said with relative surety is that on a historical scale the process of transformation will be bloody well fast.

In my view there is no more noble and honourable task that we might take on in our lifetimes than to try and create this future for our descendents. To create a world in which we are the ancients that they look upon with that mixture of horror and awed respect, forgiving us our confusion and complexity for having done our best with what we knew.

My hat's off to the author.

[phantom power]

1. it's like Stuart Kauffman says,

All species simultaneously navigate and alter their fitness landscape.

[GliderGuider]

2. Yes, I thought of Kauffman as I read this.

[CRH]

3. Hi Glider long time, Namaste. ...

I have a question of the piece you posted.

Is this a contemplation of Alexander Aston, written in the first person; then reposted with a changed title by the poster "Ilargi"? Am I understanding this correctly, it is Alexander Aston who is the author of his thoughts, and the artwork and title was added by the poster?

Also, if it isn't a secret, are you also known as Bodhi on other sites?

Thank You, Howard.

[GliderGuider]

4. Yes on all counts.

Alexander write the article, Ilargi added the images and changed the title, then posted it on TAE.

And it's no secret, I use the first name Bodhi on various other sites like FB, QuestionEverything and TAE.

I just started commenting at TAE with this article, though I've known Ilargi and Stoneleigh personally for years - the minutiae of economic doom aren't that interesting to me any more, it's just one thread in the grand tapestry of collapse.

[CRH]

5. Thanks, and I'm with you in apathy of the minutiae of economic doom, ...

Economic doom has been a forgone conclusion for me for some time as the ecological disaster unravels at ever increasing pace. Back in the nineties I assumed I would be dead and gone before tipping points were reached, now at 61 years I'm seeing daily reports of the limits stretched too far. I've recently felt that perhaps 2030 is an optimistic outlook, by 2100 it might be a world out a science fiction flick with polar colonies trying to escape climatic and social chaos from all that is in between. I used to worry about great grand children, now the quality of life for our sons and daughters is beyond a doubt.

Many threads are unraveling in the 'grand tapestry of collapse', and we are absolved of the question of if we were correct or needless doomsdayers. I guess my next philosophical question is, do I want to stick around and watch it happen, or should I venture into all activities I've always been afraid to try. You know, one of them webbed glider suits, half kite half bat out of hell, might be a rush!

Ah well, time to check out other thoughts of Mr. Aston. Thanks again, luego, Howard.