Very interesting indeed! I'd like to make the following three points:
Nature goes on - so we are not trying to save the planet (the planet will survive), we are trying to save ourselves!
My view is that we have reached the environmental AND economic limits to capitalism - the chaos we see is a result of the owners of capital trying to squeeze the last remnants out of a dying system. What will come next? Nobody knows - but ... it might be good, despite what most of us think.
The laws of physics tell us that there is a self-correcting process in most things. History has shown us that this also happens in social affairs. But ... no doubt, this new era of social media outrage at EVERY single thing that happens does not help. Perhaps, it is this that we need to fix first!
Beautifully written review of an obviously thought-provoking book. I will be reading this book soon. A few thoughts that may (or may not) be applicable to some of the concepts you describe from the book... The Daoist philosophers base their entire philosophy on the "system" called The Dao. Embodied symbolically in well-recognized the Yin/Yang symbol. That symbol is meant to demonstrate that the universe (the system of all things), when looked at holistically, is in perfect balance.
Another excellent post. There's a lot here, more than I have time to respond to with two Tasmanian Devils running circles in the house.
I do wanna say a couple things, though, because I love the post and the topic.
First I agree that things are both perfect and chaos all at once. I was really into I Ching for a while too, and that certainly affected my thinking. I think things are unfolding perfectly to help us see what we need to see to move forward and create more peace and joy.
I also think that this contrast is crucial to our evolution. We can look at something and see that it is fucked (absolutely a technical term, finally someone understands) and then decide, well, this would be so much nicer, funnier, more loving, more feel goody.
Which leads me to the last point I can remember amidst the chaos that is his house. It's so much easier, I believe, to facilitate and witness the change from a positive perspective. Like, solar panels are so much fresher, sexier, and yummier for my lungs than coal! Is much more productive than: coal sucks, and all those dirty oil barons and corrupt politicians and lobbyists are fucking us (also technical), and we're all gonna die in fires and hurricanes.
Oh yeah, one more thing. Blaming everyone else, including imaginary entities and governments also keeps people from taking personal action. It's the government's responsibility, so I can sit here scratching my ass bitching on social media.
I agree with a lot of what you are saying here and it's certainly all things worth thinking about.
The Taoists possessed great wisdom. Included in their philosophies was the idea that the world is all unfolding in Divine perfection - the chaos included. In the midst of our emotional reactivity to news stories about how horrendous the world is, we forget that. We've continually lost sight of the fact that this is all an evolutionary process unfolding perfectly according to natural law.
But here I can't help but disagree a lot. Neither the world itself, nor evolution in any of it's forms guarantee or even promise perfection. Quite the contrary, both human society and evolution are messy, come with a lot of dead ends and die-offs and none of the things produced so far are perfect - they are just things that work on some level and don't on others. Like our bodies - they are magnificent and they are awesome to have, but are they perfectly adapted to everything? Of course not. That's why we are susceptible to both illness and misconceptions in the first place - we are far from perfect. And so is the world we live in. It's chaotic and viewing chaos as some form of perfection is just a way to help us feel better about everything that seems wrong and scary. But it is a misconception and a delusion too. It's finding purpose and reason where there is none.
If one wants to be fully pragmatic, I think one should accept the reality of chaos being chaotic. Improvement is not guaranteed and that's why I think powerless as we are, it's still worth nudging the system towards it as gently as it might be. As the collection of those nudges is what has gotten is that far.
the distinction here at root of the disagreement comes down to a matter of the definition of "perfection."
i.e. nature operating perfectly according to its laws of physics, mathematics, biology, etc - versus man's idealization of scenarios as "perfect" based on his value systems.
nature DOES operate perfectly... a virus invades the body, the outcome executes perfectly - healing if the body's systems are strong enough to fight it, disease and death if not. economies thrive if certain fundamental principles of universal law are adhered to, falls apart when man tries to override nature with his ideals. etc.
"perfection" herein doesn't mean outcomes fit our ideals. it means that the operating dynamics of this universe execute perfectly. thus, if outcomes and situations seem like shit, it's not random fate, but the product of dynamics in motion executing perfectly, and altering the outcome relies not on focusing on the outcome, but understanding the underlying dynamics and tweaking what's churning beneath the surface such that the perfect execution of the natural law and order will produce different outcomes...
i.e. nature operating perfectly according to its laws of physics, mathematics, biology, etc - versus man's idealization of scenarios as "perfect" based on his value systems.
Oh, then I have no objection except that perfect in that sense becomes a meaningless word. Everything that happens, happens in a universe governed by the laws of nature and it is indeed absurd to expect that anything would have a way to not follow the laws of nature. So things happening perfectly becomes synonymous with things happening. I see neither the utility, nor the wisdom of such hollow usage, but I have to agree that under this very specific and unpopular usage of the word, the statement rings true.
a virus invades the body, the outcome executes perfectly - healing if the body's systems are strong enough to fight it, disease and death if not.
Oh there are other possibilities like the virus fusing with the cells and becoming part of their genome. Nature and life are extremely messy when you look into them at that level. But that's just the example really...
economies thrive if certain fundamental principles of universal law are adhered to, falls apart when man tries to override nature with his ideals.
I would call that an unsubstantiated assertion for now. The fact that there are laws of nature has very little to do with the principles that guide human behavior and thus economy as an emergent system based on a vast amount of humans interacting.
As you pointed out, to affect a system desirably, we need to understand the laws or underlying mechanics that govern it. That's what scientific inquiry into reality tries to do day in and day out. But I would say that there are still a lot of question marks around both economy and psychology and we have a lot to figure out before we can claim things like your assertion above. If you don't know the laws, you can't say with certainty when something will thrive. On top of this, thrive and my definition of perfection are based on human ideals so if what you are saying is true, one should also expect chaos instead of desirable outcomes like with everything else.
Very interesting indeed! I'd like to make the following three points:
Nature goes on - so we are not trying to save the planet (the planet will survive), we are trying to save ourselves!
My view is that we have reached the environmental AND economic limits to capitalism - the chaos we see is a result of the owners of capital trying to squeeze the last remnants out of a dying system. What will come next? Nobody knows - but ... it might be good, despite what most of us think.
The laws of physics tell us that there is a self-correcting process in most things. History has shown us that this also happens in social affairs. But ... no doubt, this new era of social media outrage at EVERY single thing that happens does not help. Perhaps, it is this that we need to fix first!
Thanks for your great post!
Amen.
And your welcome. :-)
Nice post
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Beautifully written review of an obviously thought-provoking book. I will be reading this book soon. A few thoughts that may (or may not) be applicable to some of the concepts you describe from the book... The Daoist philosophers base their entire philosophy on the "system" called The Dao. Embodied symbolically in well-recognized the Yin/Yang symbol. That symbol is meant to demonstrate that the universe (the system of all things), when looked at holistically, is in perfect balance.
Not a book review at all, actually - I just referenced that one concept from it into the topic.
And cool observation - The Tao itself being a system. I hadn't exactly thought about it like that, but sure enough...
Another excellent post. There's a lot here, more than I have time to respond to with two Tasmanian Devils running circles in the house.
I do wanna say a couple things, though, because I love the post and the topic.
First I agree that things are both perfect and chaos all at once. I was really into I Ching for a while too, and that certainly affected my thinking. I think things are unfolding perfectly to help us see what we need to see to move forward and create more peace and joy.
I also think that this contrast is crucial to our evolution. We can look at something and see that it is fucked (absolutely a technical term, finally someone understands) and then decide, well, this would be so much nicer, funnier, more loving, more feel goody.
Which leads me to the last point I can remember amidst the chaos that is his house. It's so much easier, I believe, to facilitate and witness the change from a positive perspective. Like, solar panels are so much fresher, sexier, and yummier for my lungs than coal! Is much more productive than: coal sucks, and all those dirty oil barons and corrupt politicians and lobbyists are fucking us (also technical), and we're all gonna die in fires and hurricanes.
Oh yeah, one more thing. Blaming everyone else, including imaginary entities and governments also keeps people from taking personal action. It's the government's responsibility, so I can sit here scratching my ass bitching on social media.
🙌
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I agree with a lot of what you are saying here and it's certainly all things worth thinking about.
But here I can't help but disagree a lot. Neither the world itself, nor evolution in any of it's forms guarantee or even promise perfection. Quite the contrary, both human society and evolution are messy, come with a lot of dead ends and die-offs and none of the things produced so far are perfect - they are just things that work on some level and don't on others. Like our bodies - they are magnificent and they are awesome to have, but are they perfectly adapted to everything? Of course not. That's why we are susceptible to both illness and misconceptions in the first place - we are far from perfect. And so is the world we live in. It's chaotic and viewing chaos as some form of perfection is just a way to help us feel better about everything that seems wrong and scary. But it is a misconception and a delusion too. It's finding purpose and reason where there is none.
If one wants to be fully pragmatic, I think one should accept the reality of chaos being chaotic. Improvement is not guaranteed and that's why I think powerless as we are, it's still worth nudging the system towards it as gently as it might be. As the collection of those nudges is what has gotten is that far.
the distinction here at root of the disagreement comes down to a matter of the definition of "perfection."
i.e. nature operating perfectly according to its laws of physics, mathematics, biology, etc - versus man's idealization of scenarios as "perfect" based on his value systems.
nature DOES operate perfectly... a virus invades the body, the outcome executes perfectly - healing if the body's systems are strong enough to fight it, disease and death if not. economies thrive if certain fundamental principles of universal law are adhered to, falls apart when man tries to override nature with his ideals. etc.
"perfection" herein doesn't mean outcomes fit our ideals. it means that the operating dynamics of this universe execute perfectly. thus, if outcomes and situations seem like shit, it's not random fate, but the product of dynamics in motion executing perfectly, and altering the outcome relies not on focusing on the outcome, but understanding the underlying dynamics and tweaking what's churning beneath the surface such that the perfect execution of the natural law and order will produce different outcomes...
Oh, then I have no objection except that perfect in that sense becomes a meaningless word. Everything that happens, happens in a universe governed by the laws of nature and it is indeed absurd to expect that anything would have a way to not follow the laws of nature. So things happening perfectly becomes synonymous with things happening. I see neither the utility, nor the wisdom of such hollow usage, but I have to agree that under this very specific and unpopular usage of the word, the statement rings true.
Oh there are other possibilities like the virus fusing with the cells and becoming part of their genome. Nature and life are extremely messy when you look into them at that level. But that's just the example really...
I would call that an unsubstantiated assertion for now. The fact that there are laws of nature has very little to do with the principles that guide human behavior and thus economy as an emergent system based on a vast amount of humans interacting.
As you pointed out, to affect a system desirably, we need to understand the laws or underlying mechanics that govern it. That's what scientific inquiry into reality tries to do day in and day out. But I would say that there are still a lot of question marks around both economy and psychology and we have a lot to figure out before we can claim things like your assertion above. If you don't know the laws, you can't say with certainty when something will thrive. On top of this, thrive and my definition of perfection are based on human ideals so if what you are saying is true, one should also expect chaos instead of desirable outcomes like with everything else.