iggy mogo
-
“Almost everyone living in urbanized centers around the world feels intuitively a lack of something in their lives due directly to the creation of an artificial environment from which nature has been excluded to the greatest possible extent.” — Seyyed Hossein Nasr (via thelittlephilosopher)(via mercuryrisinginvirgo)
-
Always remember we’re not the minority
zuky:
We’re the great majority of humanity, and we’re the holders and keepers of many flames of knowledge and wisdom passed on to us by our ancestors. We’re the ones who sensed the delicate balance of nature and humanity, before their fossil fuels set fire to the ghost world and exploded into endless war. We’re the ones who grasped sustainable food systems, before their industrial agribusiness turned farms into factories and oasis into desert. We’re the ones who mapped the infinite cartography of the spirit, before their narrow literalism drained the magic out of people’s eyes. And we’re the only ones who are going to fix it. They’re the trembling minority clinging to their violent supremacism for dear life, and we’re the ones who are coming to take it away from them and make things right.
(via lostintrafficlights)
-
“ If capitalism wants to continue to exist in the history of mankind, then the history of mankind has to become a site of total violence, because only violence is decisive. Beginning in 1977, the word ‘competition’ becomes the crucial term for economists. I don’t know if economics can be considered a science. I don’t think it can. I think it is a technology. It is a technology whose aim is the transformation of time into labor, and labor-time into value, and the transformation of our relation with nature into one of scarcity, need, and consumption.
But since 1977, the project of the science of economics (or technology, I don’t know) is the submission of human relationships to one single goal: competition, competition, competition. Now ‘competition’ has become a natural word, a normal word. This is not right, because ‘competition’ means violence, war.
This is the meaning of competition. Otherwise, you forget the meaning of words. You forget that competition equals war. Deleuze and Guattari, in A Thousand Plateaus, try to define fascism, and they say: fascism is when a war machine is hidden in every niche, when in every nook and in every cranny of daily life a war machine is hidden. This is fascism.
So I would say neoliberalism is the most perfect form of fascism, in terms of Deleuze and Guattari’s definition. Competition is the concealment of a war machine in every niche of daily life: the kingdom of competition is fascism perfected.
”— Franco “Bifo” Berardi, The Uprising: On Poetry and Finance (2012) -
Most animals live in a delicate ecological balance with their natural surroundings. It’s simply the most efficient formula for survival: Take only what is needed, and waste as little of it as possible. But a few animals take “reduce, reuse, recycle” to the next level. It’s a good thing, too: Someone needs to help clean up the mess that so many humans leave behind.
dung beetle FTW!
-
“What is it about modernization that causes suicide? Modernity comes with capitalism and individualism, which travel hand in hand. Reduced to its core (and thus risking gross over-generalization,) modernity causes suicide because it commodifies individuals.
What does it mean to be commodified? In a pre-modern society, people’s social identity is defined by their unchanging relationship to the larger society. If you are someone’s father, you never cease to be the father (short of a catastrophe.) Accordingly, your duty and worth as a father likewise never change throughout your life. Such unchanging constancy is precisely the character that a commodity lacks. The worth of a commodity is strictly proportional to its usefulness. If the commodity loses its usefulness, it automatically loses all of its value. The commodity, quite literally, becomes worthless. And once rendered worthless, its existence no longer matters.
Perniciously, modernity commodifies human beings, with sophistication and precision never seen before in human history. In a capitalistic society, every “human resource” (hideous words, if you think about it) comes with a sticker price, precisely indicating his/her value. A lawyer costs $350 an hour; a stripper, $20 a song. And inevitably, for a large number of humans, the value is zero or near zero—useless, therefore worthless. Likewise inevitably, for even larger number of humans, the sticker price that are given to them (which is something that they can only partially control) is far lower than their own ideas of their intrinsic value. This discrepancy pushes such people to view themselves as worthless. The next step is easy—the commodity whose existence no longer matters proceeds to end its existence.” -
“Philosopher-gardeners, or farmer-poets, are distinguished by their sense of wonder and real feeling for the environment. When religions cease to obliterate trees in order to build temples or human artifacts, and instead generalize love and respect to all living systems as a witness to the potential of creation, they too will join the many of us now deeply appreciating the complexity and self-sustaining properties of natural systems, from whole universes to simple molecules. Gardener, scientist, philosopher, poet, and adherent of religions all can conspire in admiration of, and reverence for, this earth. We create our own life conditions, now and for the future.” — Bill Mollison (via sol-psych)(via epistephilia)
-
Jindo Island, in South Korea, is host to one of the world’s most amazing natural phenomenons, called the Moses Miracle. Two times a year, at the beginning of May and in the middle of June, the waters between Jindo and Modo islands split and create a causeway 2.8 km (1.7 miles) long and 40 meters (131 feet) wide. The path lasts for roughly an hour and allows people from both places to meet halfway and celebrate.
photos via amusing planet
read more at http://www.amusingplanet.com/2011/11/parting-of-sea-in-jindo.html -
“The more man makes himself at home in the heart of the world, the further he advances in his possession of nature, the more strongly also does he feel the pressure of his finitude, and the closer he comes to his own death.” — Foucault, The Order of Things (via tiredshoes) -
“As you can probably tell, my background in revolutionary theory comes from Marxism, which I consider to be a brilliant critique of capitalism. But as to what should be implemented in capitalism’s place, I don’t think Marxism has shown us the answer. One of the reasons for this, I believe, is that communism, socialism, and all other left ideologies that I know of speak only about redistributing the spoils of raping the earth more evenly among classes of humans. They do not even address the relationship of the society to the earth, Or rather, they assume that it will stay the same as it is under capitalism - that of a gluttonous consumer. And that the purpose of the revolution is to find a more efficient and egalitarian way to produce and distribute consumer goods.
This total disregard of nature as a life force, rather than just a source of raw materials, allowed Marxist states to rush to industrialize without even the most meager environmental safeguards. This has resulted in such noted disasters as the meltdown of the Chernobyl nuclear power plant, the oil spill in the Arctic Ocean, and the ongoing liquidation of the fragile forests of Siberia. It has left parts of Russia and Eastern Europe with such a toxic legacy that vast areas are now uninhabitable. Marx stated that the primary contradiction in industrial society is the contradiction between capital and labor. I believe these disasters show that there is an equally important contradiction between industrial society and the earth.” -
“Energy problem ?
I see the sun shining, plants growing, birds singing and animals eating.
I think it’s a lifestyle problem.”— Garth Oldman (via reconnect-restore-rewild)(via mamitah)
-
“According to Žižek, modern understanding of ecology is the real false consciousness, connected with mystification of real problems. Postmodern mysticism arises when disasters begin to be rationalized, interpreted in strict logic terms of cause-effect relations. Such interpretation makes life easier. However, nature is not an absolute balance and total harmony (this aspect of Žižek’s thought makes him akin to classical conservatives). Nature is a series of unthinkable disasters. Žižek believes that ecology is transforming into a new western conservative ideology: “One should not play games with nature! Do not touch DNA! Do not develop new medicines! Do not invent new technologies!” How one should react to these reproaches? Žižek’s recipe is to reinforce alienation from nature, to become more artificial.” — Arthur Vafin, Zizek, Ecology, Conservatism -
Nuclear Waste & Cancer Rates
“Staggering number of cancers, illnesses, and birth defects” linked to nuclear waste? Over 700 cases found in only four square miles — “There’s something very wrong” (Excerpts From Video)
Anchor: There are radioactive secrets beneath the banks and waters of a north St. Louis County creek that may be linked to a staggering number of cancers, illnesses and birth defects. In four square miles, there are three reported cases of conjoined twins and cancer rates that one data expert says is statistically impossible. […]
Janell Wright, class of ’88 McCluer North High School, Accountant and former auditor: “There’s something very wrong.” […]
Leisa Zigman, Reporter: At first she found 30 cases. Within two months, she had data on 200 cases. Now, her maps have more than 700 cases in four square miles […]
Wright: “The children usually came down with brain cancer in the first 15 years of life, in addition, leukemia. In my peer group’s children, there were several children who had to have their thyroid removed before they were 10-years-old.”
Zigman: In the 1940s, Mallinckrodt Chemical Works in downtown St. Louis purified thousands of tons of uranium to make the first atomic bombs. […] 21 acres of airport land became a dumping site where a toxic mixture of uranium, thorium, and radium sat uncovered or in barrels. In the 60s, government documents noted contents from the rusting barrels were seeping into nearby Coldwater Creek. And by the 90s, the government confirmed unsafe levels of radioactive materials in the water. […]
From; http://enenews.com/tv-staggering-number-cancers-illnesses-birth-defects-linked-nuclear-waste-700-cases-found-only-4-sq-miles-video
cancer. clusters. google maps.
-
A Man Feeding Swans in the Snow:
Polish photographer Marcin Ryczek snapped this once-in-a-lifetime photograph of a man feeding swans and ducks from a snowy river bank in Krakow. The trifecta juxtaposition between black/white, water/snow, and person/animals is simply astounding. You can download a desktop sized version of the photo here, and check out more of Ryczek’s photos in his portfolio. via (thisiscolossal)
-
science and nature.
(via sleepyhead0525)
