As Promised

[Trogdor]

In the thread "anarchy won't work" (here) Alucard, while lamenting the fact that I was hopelessly ignorant of the sacred mysteries of anarchism :lol: , suggested that I read something called the Thirty Theses, here:

http://anthropik.com/thirty/

This is some pretty interesting stuff. As far as I can tell (correct me if I missed a reference somewhere) it is not peer-reviewed which means it does not have the weight of proven science; however that does not mean it should be ignored. So, as promised, I'll give my response to it here.

1. Whether or not diversity is the primary good depends on who is doing the judging, but I agree that it is a good.

2. I disagree. While it is true that genetically diverse species are more evolutionarily fit than genetically uniform ones, this does not mean that the uniform ones are not evolving, just that they aren't evolving successfully. And as far as diversity between species goes, this has it completely backwards. Evolution creates diversity as a direct result of niche-filling and speciation, diversity does not create evolution.

3-8. I agree.

9. True, but so is hunting and gathering.

10. I disagree. The fundamental flaw in this argument is that it assumes that the transition to agriculture was a conscious desicion made by some "big man" at a specific place and time (or by many "big men" seperately, it makes no difference). Anyone who would advance this argument does not understand, at a fundamental level, how evolution works. Nobody "chooses" what direction to take their species' evolution; everyone participates in it through a multitude of day to day actions, but the process as a whole is far beyond the reach of any one man, no matter how "big" he is.

The fact that Godesky can make this argument comes from another misconception he has, where he states that

Yet there remains a pivotal moment here, as well: when those first foragers settled down in horticultural villages, and decided that from now on they would grow their food in gardens (and hunt to supplement), instead of hunting for it (and gardening to supplement)–a huge difference".

This argument reflects a fundamental misunderstanding of how gradational changes are accomplished in the real world. There was no "pivotal moment". The transition between gardening-to-supplement-hunting and hunting-to-supplement-gardening took place over hundreds, if not thousands, of years. And during that middle period there would have been some seasons when the hunting was good and the gardening was bad, and other seasons when the gardening was good and the hunting was bad, and they would have alternated with each other in no particular order.

In addition, he assumes that there was a one-to-one tradeoff between eating seeds and planting them. He neglects the fact that a typical harvest will yield thousands of seeds, and that a farmer (or prospective farmer) could eat 99% of his seeds and by saving merely 1% to plant the next year be assured of bountiful food in the future, without going hungry in the present.

11. Anthropologists have made a study of the things common to all human societies everywhere. Along with such things as belief in the supernatural and a code of right and wrong, hierarchy is on the list. So "evil"? Maybe. But "unnecessary"? Definately not.

12-15. Probobly true.

16. Technology cannot stop collapse but it can delay it.

17,18. Any number of things may be the proximal causes of collapse. Although in reality it will probobly be a combination of several factors.

19. True. This is a natural consequence of entropy.

20. To some extent this may be true, but keep in mind that collapse is not an orderly process and the laws of economics have a hard time dealing with chaos.

21. True. The amount of carcinogenic shit we are exposed to every day is mind-boggling.

22-24. True but misleading. While it is true that medicine, knowledge and art can be produced in the absence of civilization, they are significantly reduced in both quantity and quality. In addition, without civilization knowledge is also drastically diminished in scope. That is, hunter-gatherers might have an intimate knowledge of all the local flaura and fauna where they live, but they will know nothing of the underlying laws of biology.

25. Also misleading. Civilization reduces relative quality of life, by increasing inequality, but it increases absolute quality of life by providing access to things like electricity and hot water. You can argue about which is the better standard, but that is a whole other discussion in itself.

26. Absolutely agree. Entropy ensures that collapse is inevitable. Its just that, as I said in the last thread, I would like to see it happen later rather than sooner.

27. See number 25.

28. Actually, I only give us about a 50% chance of surviving. That is because we are currently causing a mass extinction, which scientists estimate will kill off about 50% of the species on Earth.

29. I disagree. If humans survive they will be the same species that built civilization in the first place, and since the resources (except fossil fuels) will still be there, they will be able to rebuild civilization. Maybe not to the same level we have now (because they won't have fossil fuels to use for cheap energy) but definately to at least the level we had around 1800.

30. This is not a thesis, this is a philosophical statement. And I agree with it as such.