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March 29, 2024, 08:53:17 AM

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End of the World News (Dose me Up)

Started by Twit 2, February 27, 2019, 06:21:01 PM

Previous topic - Next topic

Mobius

Quote from: Twit 2 on April 20, 2019, 02:18:04 PM
Really fascinating article. Scary as fuck too, natch.

https://www.theguardian.com/books/2019/apr/20/what-lies-beneath-robert-macfarlane

Wow, really cool article. I literally had no idea there was sand dunes underground and shit like that. Or that people died of defrosted anthrax!

What's the maddest underground place do you reckon? I'm going to watch a youtube video about the Paris catacombs now.

Shoulders?-Stomach!

Sky News and the other centrist gatekeepers were basically patronising the protestors. Adam Boulton in particular,  what a sneering fucking gammon he is. The first man to figure out how to present his anus sonically.

Theremin

This is a really fantastic read, on how to face the possibility of (effective) human extinction within our lifetimes.

http://www.catherineingram.com/facingextinction/

There's a lot of really interesting Positive Pessimist philosophy being written over the last few years - especially around climate.

I sprang on to the general subject after reading Thomas Ligotti's Conspiracy Against The Human Race.

garbed_attic

Quote from: Theremin on April 28, 2019, 12:57:12 PM
This is a really fantastic read, on how to face the possibility of (effective) human extinction within our lifetimes.

http://www.catherineingram.com/facingextinction/

There's a lot of really interesting Positive Pessimist philosophy being written over the last few years - especially around climate.

I sprang on to the general subject after reading Thomas Ligotti's Conspiracy Against The Human Race.

Part of me thinks this is wise, sage and clear-sighted... another part of me notes that Catherine Ingram, Guy McPherson and other Baby Boomers who have been writing about near-term human extinction for years have spent decades jet-setting over the world giving their talks and making money for themselves... Such writers also tend to note that if humans had effectively lobbied for emissions cut-downs around the time they first had their realisations, we'd now be in a situation in which hope for the future was realistically viable.

I know such statements don't make me popular around here, but considering this, I cant help but feel that it's very bloody convenient that McPherson and Ingram espouse Boomer philosophies of "Personal pleasure while you can!" and "No blaming and shaming!" Because they know where that blame would and should fall - upon their uniquely privileged generation in the 1st world. There's somethin grotesque about the pronouncements of how they have come to great self-acceptance and love while all the other deluded sheeple are going to horribly suffer. That said, I appreciate that Ingram writes in such a way to suggest she has not had children, unlike McPherson.

BlodwynPig

Precisely. To realise that even the most altruistic human is essentially selfish can allow you to understand why we are where we are.

https://phys.org/news/2018-06-cheatersexploring-bacterial-social-interactions-pathogens.html

Howj Begg

Posted this in the climate change protest thread; appropriate here too.

https://decolonialatlas.files.wordpress.com/2019/04/names-and-locations.png



Quote"The earth is not dying, it is being killed, and those who are killing it have names and addresses." – Utah Phillips

Just 100 companies are responsible for more than 70% of the world's greenhouse gas emissions since 1988. The guys who run those companies – and they are mostly guys – have gotten rich on the backs of literally all life on Earth. Their business model relies on the destruction of the only home humanity has ever known. Meanwhile, we misdirect our outrage at our neighbors, friends, and family for using plastic straws or not recycling. If there is anyone who deserves the outrage of all 7.5 billion of us, it's these 100 people right here. Combined, they control the majority of the world's mineral rights – the "right" to exploit the remaining unextracted oil, gas, and coal. They need to know that we won't leave them alone until they agree to Keep It In The Ground. Not just their companies, but them. Now it's personal.

Houston tops this list as home to 7 of the 100 top ecocidal planet killers, followed by Jakarta, Calgary, Moscow, and Beijing. The richest person on the list is Russian oil magnate Vagit Alekperov, who is currently worth $20.7 billion.

The map is in the form of a cartogram which represents the size of countries by their cumulative carbon dioxide emissions since industrialization.

Shoulders?-Stomach!

QuoteNow it's personal

Erk, sounds a bit lynchy, and not the David kind

Howj Begg

Quote from: Shoulders?-Stomach! on April 28, 2019, 04:53:01 PM
Erk, sounds a bit lynchy, and not the David kind

you seen First Reformed? The issue is in the air.

garbed_attic

Indeed... there was a strong message of "no blaming and shaming" at the XR protests (to the degree that I wasn't allowed to read out a Kurt Vonnegut quote which was deemed to be too negative in that respect!) and I think that spiritually and pragmatically that is healthy at this late stage of the game of human existence...

But, at the same time, there's going to be a lot of anger and, as civilisation breaks down, mass violence, rape and murder and there is part of me that feels righteous indignation at the fact that it'll be people who have individually contributed very little to ecological chaos who suffer this, while those named above will likely retreat to their private bunkers and undisclosed locations to die peacefully.

Twit 2


Sony Walkman Prophecies

I'm all for the Extinction Rebellion movement, but wouldn't something like a general strike be more effective? As someone said earlier, a huge city like London can easily cope with major transport links being shut down for a while - it has always managed it, what with tube strikes/maintenance work that frequently spills over the weekend.

I'm happy to hear why this wouldn't work, but I intuitively feel a mass strike would be the more effective option.

Shoulders?-Stomach!

A general strike was called for over the whole campaigning period. I think that's very much on the medium term agenda

A general strike requires a certain critical mass and solidarity over the issue that hasn't yet formed, it also requires the consent and enthusiastic support of Labour which is only just starting.

The climate emergency thing Labour are proposing goes someway towards providing legitimacy to the campaign, and, if successful, and followup call for a general strike It will be interesting to see whether the Lib Dems or CHUK come on board or be exposed as charlatans and stooges again.

grassbath

Quote from: Theremin on April 28, 2019, 12:57:12 PM
This is a really fantastic read, on how to face the possibility of (effective) human extinction within our lifetimes.

http://www.catherineingram.com/facingextinction/

There's a lot of really interesting Positive Pessimist philosophy being written over the last few years - especially around climate.

I sprang on to the general subject after reading Thomas Ligotti's Conspiracy Against The Human Race.

Fucking hell, this has destroyed me. I'm not sure whether I'm glad I read it or not.

Sony Walkman Prophecies

Quote from: Shoulders?-Stomach! on April 28, 2019, 08:08:16 PM
A general strike was called for over the whole campaigning period. I think that's very much on the medium term agenda

A general strike requires a certain critical mass and solidarity over the issue that hasn't yet formed, it also requires the consent and enthusiastic support of Labour which is only just starting.

The climate emergency thing Labour are proposing goes someway towards providing legitimacy to the campaign, and, if successful, and followup call for a general strike It will be interesting to see whether the Lib Dems or CHUK come on board or be exposed as charlatans and stooges again.

So...promote the agenda (via protesting) before calling for a general strike? Seems reasonable enough.

Twit 2

Quote from: grassbath on April 28, 2019, 08:32:36 PM
Fucking hell, this has destroyed me. I'm not sure whether I'm glad I read it or not.

I agree with gout_pony's reservations about the piece, but it's a great read overall. I found it really useful to read about her experience of her family and friends either not knowing or not caring enough about all this.

My daughter is nearly 9 years old. She's fucking awesome. Even as a nearly-35 year old, I feel like I've lived plenty of life and am not too sad about having the rest of it curtailed. But what a total shitshow most of hers will be. I genuinely wish I hadn't had her. In the last 10 years the world has totally gone to shit, in the exponential ways described in the article. 10 years ago I didn't give a lot of credence to the 'don't want to bring a child into this shitty world' brigade. But now I do, I'm one of them.

Shoulders?-Stomach!

QuoteBut what a total shitshow most of hers will be.

May as well double down on that and cancel her into the care system so you can slob about and have a pint

Twit 2

Bung her in a bin and have a kebab, yeah. Then I'll sharpen a stick to use against the motorcycle rape gangs, get them in the spokes.

Shoulders?-Stomach!

Secure your post-parental slob compound with an array of difficult latches and bolt systems looted from Wickes.

Twit 2

https://www.theguardian.com/film/2019/may/08/artifishal-film-fish-salmon-climate-change

Interesting review/article. It's strange and yet reassuring that we're seeing the kind of assessments of human nature that would normally feature in something like Ligotti's Conspiracy Against the Human race, but in a national newspaper. I had a drink with a friend I don't see much recently, and when I brought up climate etc they said we're (humans, not just us two) a parasite that shouldn't exist. This is someone who doesn't read philosophy and is one of the most positive people I know.

garbed_attic

Quote from: Twit 2 on May 09, 2019, 01:00:37 AM
https://www.theguardian.com/film/2019/may/08/artifishal-film-fish-salmon-climate-change

Interesting review/article. It's strange and yet reassuring that we're seeing the kind of assessments of human nature that would normally feature in something like Ligotti's Conspiracy Against the Human race, but in a national newspaper. I had a drink with a friend I don't see much recently, and when I brought up climate etc they said we're (humans, not just us two) a parasite that shouldn't exist. This is someone who doesn't read philosophy and is one of the most positive people I know.

Part of me agrees... but then another part of me does thing it's notable that it is almost always seems to be 1st world folks who say this... In almost the inverse of what you'd expect, I also haven't read any Holocaust survivors say this, either.

Twit 2

Some steps in the right direction. Not holding my breath yet though.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-48069663

Here's an uplifting poem by the great WS Merwin about being thankful, even for the shit:

https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/57937/thanks

I try to remember this tidbit too:

Quote from: CioranWe are all deep in a hell, each moment of which is a miracle.

garbed_attic

Not holding my breath either with this dismal, evil government still in power, but worth pushing this up to 100,000 in order to maybe get it debated:

https://petition.parliament.uk/petitions/254607?fbclid=IwAR2G9OfcUjpp8KSO8j_BmtHKJ4pMgwmZCTvEpHgDqRIxVr9etYsIaYyqCt4

BlodwynPig

That should be standard practice, not propping up ailing heavy industry.

GMTV

The Earth is heating up by the equivalent of 15,000 9/11's EVERY DAY

Twit 2

Is the world still ending? Gone a bit quiet.

Cuellar


BlodwynPig


Gregory Torso

There's people just wlkaing around town drinking actual pint glasses of beer that they've nicked from pubs. I saw a man on a train with a pint glass of beer, drinking it calmly as if he was allowed, an actual fucking glass pint, just supping it like that was nothing. Is this what happens in england now. Just go to a pub, get a glass and immediately take it for a walk. think I have time to sit in a place inside indoors, get on my level, bitches, get up here, i'm going nomad, i'm travelling with glass. Wandering shit faced through Argos with a streaky pint of Harp. Chugging a yard of London Pride on the tram, what are you going to do, shake my hand, bruv. I'm getting lathered in a churchyard looking at me mam's final kip, get a glass of pint from the Swan With No Face and bus it up to the hospital to kick my girlfriend in the kidneys, do you what some and all, there's plenty of kick to go around.

Theremin

For anyone interested in this subject, I thoroughly recommend watching the film First Reformed.

It's about a Baptist priest who gets called in to counsel a depressed environmentalist.

It's broadly about how alienation and pain can be a force that radicalises people to destructive actions, but also (to me) meditates a lot on how Despair is essentially a narcissistic state chracterised by extreme self-involvement in one's own emotions, to the exclusion of anyone else's needs.

It's a very spiritual film that I was able to deeply relate to as an atheist, which is also a positive.


garbed_attic

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/climate-change-breakdown-arctic-frost-thawing-canada-environment-a8959056.html

You'd like to think this'd be on the front page of every newspaper really...

As ever, I encourage everyone to join XR or any other environment protest movement that has any momentum (unless you actually work for Ice 911 or something). I'm never having kids, but things are moving fast enough that we can all expect severely increased suffering within our lifetimes. I think it's worth trying to slow that down or limit it as much as possible.