Subject: "Forward" and "back"

From: John Schinnerer <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 29 Jun 1999 12:44:18 -0700

Aloha,

> -----Original Message-----
> From:	Greg E [SMTP:[email-masked]]
>Many utopian systems I've read about speak of essentially throwing away
most if not all
>technology and basically shifting back to "the simpler times" of agriarian
societies
>from hundreds of years ago. I believe this is dead wrong, and completely
pointless,
>given the current state and size of the human population. We need to move
forward, not
>go back. This means continuing to support and develop and embrace new
technologies of
>all kinds to solve some of the problems we have created for ourselves in
this current
>mess, continuing on the thought from bullet item six above.

How about taking off the cultural blinders that get us stuck in living an
argument of "forward" (whatever that is) versus "back" (whatever that is)
when there are so many other paths?  

Can you expand on what "forward" and "back" mean to you, and more
importantly, where you acquired those meanings?

Quite a few wise folks have pointed out that it is unlikely that more of our
"technology" (whatever that is) can save us from the messes we've made with
our technology.  It's what we do with "technology," not what it "is," that
matters - and the underlying manner in which we use it does not necessarily
change with the creation of "new" technologies (it certainly hasn't
lately...).  

This is a challenge permaculture faces...a big one, I think...how to avoid
becoming another bundle of technologies, methods, and techniques without
adequate attention to *how* they are being applied (underlying cultural
habits - the "culture" in permaculture?) and the consequences thereof.

John Schinnerer

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