A Post Progress Future's topics - tribe.net

The road to Hell may have to go?

Roy — Tue, 13 Feb 2007 17:18:13 GMT

Something is shaping up out of the hundreds of articles & messages I read. At least it is shaping up in my head. The post petroleum era will mean a huge change for everyone. The period of spend more energy to make more money (really energy too) will be over. That is self-evident. We will have to live using something like 10% the energy that people presently use.

Let's examine a good example, the present automobile. Most people worry only about the fuel to run it. While there are others who correctly point out the amount of petroleum needed to make one of these complex gadgets is just as much a problem. But what everyone is forgetting is that a beautifully constructed automobile with a full tank is useless without roads. And we pave roads with either asphalt or concrete. Both the material used and the energy needed to do the work take huge amounts of petroleum. Anyone thinking about how to use wind energy to build roads? I didn't think so.

Asphalt roads have another problem. They rot! Over a century or so, bacteria break asphalt down producing good quantities of CO2. All the asphalt roads on Earth are scheduled to add to the CO2 levels of the atmosphere, just much more slowly.

In theory, we could continue to use concrete based on alternate energy sources but it is going to be hellishly expensive.

I don't think that road transportation will last another century unless we figure out something very revolutionary. We will be left with rail, water and, if we get off our asses and work on alternatives, air.

posted in A Post Progress Future - 3 replies

terra preta

Roy — Thu, 21 Dec 2006 16:26:17 GMT

One of the most important answers to the problem of carbon sequestering may well lie in the Portuguese term "terra preta". For an explanation see:

http://www.css.cornell.edu/faculty/lehmann/terra_preta/TerraPretahome.htm

What this appears to boil down to is, that if we reduce our garbage and wastes to charcoal in charcoal making retorts, and add it as dust to our soils, we will do a number of things:

1) Greatly increase the potential fertility of the soil.

2) Place the carbon thus trapped where it will stay fixed for millennia.

3) Considerably increase the thickness of the layer of vegetative top soil, increasing the amount of organic carbon fixed also.

The fertility of a soil is directly related to the health of the microflora of that soil. The addition of chemical fertilizers decreases the health of that microflora so lowers the long term fertility of the soil. It would appear that the addition of charcoal dust increases the heal;th of said microflora so increases the long term fertility of the soil. This effect lasts thousands of years in the soil.

What this means is that we have here a method of sequestering carbon permanently that also reverses the present rapid decrease in soil fertility the world over. Naturally those interested in selling chemical fertilizers ridicule this whole idea.

posted in A Post Progress Future - 7 replies

'Good' GM organisms

Roy — Thu, 08 Mar 2007 14:17:17 GMT

There is a strong tendency for all of us to feel that something is bad because the way it is used or done is bad. Genetically modified organisms are good examples. Present day companies in this field make the least possible modification to an organism that will allow it to have commercial value then dump it into the environment with no protection to previously existing organisms and with no real investigation as to how it will affect the environment.

Transfer of genes between very different species does occur in nature. It is, of course, by chance and occurs very rarely. It probably uses the same mechanism used by man, being carried by viruses.

It would seem to me that first a great amount of work needs to be done in the lab to create a 'kingdom' that is neither animal nor plant, almost an extraterrestrial series of organisms. In this way there will be little chance of crossing with naturally occurring organisms. I mean, gorillas just don't cross with marigolds.

Then let's take a theme seen in science fiction, a living house. This is often presented as being based on a tree-like organism. It's powered by photosynthesis, having many leafy branches but also has a very broad, hollow trunk with many contained rooms. It absorbs dust and dirt from within, as well as human wastes. It shares the water taken up from the soil and might even produce a little food for its humans. It does far better that standard trees because it lives symbiotically with humans.

This organism is self-fertile only, since the male gamete crawls to the ovule. It produces a few, coconut sized seeds that will only germinate if planted with lots of human excrement. It has a very low level of consciousness and is only happy when inhabited by humans. A house planting ceremony is something to imagine!

Would this be a worthy, albeit long term, goal for a real GM lab?

posted in A Post Progress Future - 1 reply

Biotecture anyone?

Perry — Sun, 21 Jan 2007 22:00:24 GMT

I’m wondering if anyone in this tribe has done any “biotecture” along the lines of Rudolf Doernach or the Tree Fab Hab as described in this post:
http://gulahiyi.blogspot.com/2007/01/grow-your-own-home.html
I’d be curious to hear about your experiences.

posted in A Post Progress Future - 3 replies

An independent Internet

bee_dragon — Mon, 04 Dec 2006 15:29:27 GMT

I m concerned that the Internet is controlled by large corporate interests with easy access by the US gov. (attacking the main name servers and all). I believe that an independent internet based of low power radio links between computers is possible. This would be a new and totally different protocol very much related to TCP/IP but with added features and security. Maybe every packet PGP encoded with the exception of routing information. When the crash comes we can still have an form of Internet communications and data sharing one that is free from gov snooping as well. Oh my.

I would like to hear comments and constructive criticism. My rf design is very rusty and all comments on the radio portion would be welcome.

posted in A Post Progress Future - 4 replies

Hydrogen fuel from blood?

Roy — Sat, 02 Dec 2006 11:53:14 GMT

I'm not at all convinced that hydrogen makes sense as an automotive fuel and have little patience with "water fueled" cars, but this new advance makes a lot of sense.

http://www3.imperial.ac.uk/newsandeventspggrp/imperialcollege/newssummary/news_1-12-2006-11-4-23?newsid=3016

posted in A Post Progress Future - 7 replies

Future eating

Roy — Sun, 15 Oct 2006 01:07:35 GMT

It is a well known fact that our supply of arable soils is going down while our population is increasing. Let's fast forward into a possible future where the amount of available arable land becomes insignificant in comparison to our population. Obviously with such a large population there's no going back to hunting/gathering either.

We would have to live off of non-arable land like rocky slopes, marshes, etc. Some products of these environments we can eat directly such as young leaves or starchy tubers. Most we would have to feed to other organisms such as goats, fungi, fish, rabbits, snails and then use these as food. Although many insects supposedly make delicious and nourishing food, most of us have a thing about eating certain of these foods.

Also many live in a temperate climate where one has to produce 12 months of food in 6 months of the year, a serious challenge. Where there was time available for such, rebuilding areas of arable soil would become an important activity.

This thread is to explore people's ideas about mankind's food supply under such future conditions.

posted in A Post Progress Future - 12 replies

future cars

Roy — Wed, 22 Nov 2006 18:42:38 GMT

For the most part today we must choose between a gasoline car and a diesel car. Tomorrow there may be a bewildering selection. And many of these probably will not have an internal combustion engine but a fuel cell instead.

1) all electric
2) straight ethanol
3) straight biodiesel
4) straight veg. oil
5) hybrid - electric/ethanol
6) hybrid - electric/biodiesel
7) hybrid - electric/veg. oil
8) tribrid - electric/ethanol/plug-in
9) tribrid - electric/biodiesel/plug-in
10) tribrid - electric/veg. oil/plug-in

However, even with these, we will have to cut back on energy use, a lot.

You may notice that I don't have hydrogen as a fuel on this list. This because hydrogen is obviously a gimick of the petro companies hoping to mantain their hold on the vehicle fuel market. It's impractical mainly because refueling facilities are complex and expensive. Do you really think that they will be built in Mexico, the Canadian north woods or in all the rural areas of the US? Would you buy a car that can only be refueled in the major built-up areas of the US?

posted in A Post Progress Future - 5 replies

Making biodiesel with 100% farm produced raw materials

Roy — Mon, 21 Aug 2006 02:08:36 GMT

Biodiesel production basically requires three inputs, natural oil (vegetable or animal), alcohol (methanol commonly used but ethanol will work) and lye (sodium hydroxide - other hydroxides may work). What comes off of this process are esters of the original oil (which we call biodiesel), glycerine and the same hydroxide that was originally used, as it acts as a catalyst, not a reactant. Both vegetable oil and ethanol can be produced on the farm.

The methanol normally used to make biodiesel, even by the greenest of biodiesel makers, is commercial methanol. Of any biodiesel, 10% of its volume was methanol. However commercial methanol is a fossil fuel. It is made from the methane in natural gas using said gas also for the energy to do so. Calling it "wood alcohol" doesn't mean anyone still makes it from the destructive distillation of wood any more! That would gobble up an awful lot of wood.

So far biodiesel sounds like a real good sustainable community fuel source, green as green can be! But there's a problem. The ethanol must be 100% free of water, absolute ethanol. Ethanol can only be distilled to 96%. The rest of the water must be removed chemically. Luckily there is a process that uses glycerine that can be used to do this and glycerine is a byproduct of making biodiesel. But the glycerine comes off as a sludgy solution which contains impurities and the hydroxide used in the process. Both the glycerine and the hydroxide must be separated out in a clean form ready to use, and there I'm stopped. How? And it must be a process possible in a rural community without an input of great amounts of energy or of other materials that can not be produced on the farm.

If this problem can not be solved, then biodiesel is not a sustainable fuel. Can anyone help?

posted in A Post Progress Future - 4 replies

Herding cats

Roy — Sun, 29 Oct 2006 16:50:19 GMT

As has been pointed out by thousands, human civilization is going the wrong way re the care of our planet. It is so easy to say we are doing it wrong and so easy to suggest alternate ways of living but implementing such is not something that a few people can do. Getting the human race to change direction is akin to trying to herd cats.

Many bemoan capitalism and obviously, as nice as it sounds, socialism is defective in practice. The fact is that both have valuable points but both run up against an overwhelming force, human greed. If all humans were perfect little angels, either of the the two systems could work quite well! However, human has a grave shortage of perfect little angels.

The reason for this thread is that we do have a way to herd human "cats". In certain people an effective method to control greed, indifference and corruption already exists and has been in use for millennia. This system is called religion. Of course, religion is not too effective with the more intelligent or educated population and may even encourage corruption in the religious leaders, but all in all, it has much to say for it as a control method for the masses.

I don't want to get into the truth or untruth of any particular religion; they all claim to be the absolute truth. I'm talking about religion as a control over people.

The most outstanding example today is the fact that a religion has thousands of young people strapping themselves into vests loaded with explosives and blowing themselves up in order to kill a few perceived enemies. While we can not get most people to segregate their garbage!

Could we get a system going, say in worship of Gaia, that would raise enough dedication in her devotees to get large groups really out there for our Earth? Or would starting another religion just open a Pandora's Box with too many negative aspects? What do you think?

posted in A Post Progress Future - 2 replies

Bleak Bleak Bleak

Roy — Wed, 25 Oct 2006 15:15:09 GMT

The future looks bleak. The World Wildlife Foundation just has worked out that, at today's rate of use of planetary resources, it's all over around 2050. This means we do one of two things: We stop population growth and greatly reduce resource consumption, or we lose more than half the present population by starvation, thirst and conflict. Guess which road I'm absolutely sure the human race, with all its infinite wisdom, will go down?

We will do the equivalent of being on the sofa watching a favorite TV program and being told the house is on fire. "Hey, I'm watching something here! Let me know when the house is half burned up."

So the logical thing to do is to not send food to starving people and to do everything possible to get people to killing each other off. This way, the world population growth will be brought under control while there still are a few resources left! Effective but hardly emotionally satisfying. Could the US be considering this method already? Even have started it?

Do you know what is scary? Considering human nature, I can't see an alternative! There MUST be one, other than just sitting around saying that we're doing it all wrong.

posted in A Post Progress Future - 2 replies

Infection fighting without antibiotics

Roy — Mon, 21 Aug 2006 01:32:50 GMT

How many know about natural curing of bacterial infections with bacteriophages? Herbal cures to fight bacterial infections are useful but sometimes for a massive infection, more is needed. Antibiotics used to be effective but they were overused and misused, so they are rapidly losing effectiveness. In theory, a small laboratory at a rural community level, could produce effective bacteriophage treatments. This type treatment is not allowed in the US but is in established use in many other countries. Could it be developed to the point where it is useful in a post cataclysmic world? At first it could be developed for use on animals.

posted in A Post Progress Future - 2 replies

Roads to Ruin

Roy — Tue, 03 Oct 2006 02:29:35 GMT

Generally speaking, we have two types of high speed roads, concrete and asphalt. The problem is that both add great amounts of CO2 to the atmosphere. Concrete is made using high temperatures, usually obtained by burning bunker, a low grade fuel derivative of petroleum, thus the CO2 released. Asphalt takes some energy to heat it and mix it with gravel. What is not commonly know is that asphalt roads rot! With age, asphalt roads begin to weaken, crack and break up. This is due to the action of slow working bacteria that break down asphalt. They are digesting it and, in doing so, they must release CO2 derived from the asphalt. All the world's asphalt roads that are at least a year or two old, are sources of the greenhouse gas CO2.

So where do we go for roads on which to drive our alt fuel vehicles? Concrete with alternative energy sources is theoretically possible. A solar concrete kiln? Now there's a research project!

posted in A Post Progress Future - 1 reply

Carboniferous furure?

Roy — Tue, 03 Oct 2006 02:01:56 GMT

Let's look at something. Our future is intimately connected to Earth's carbon cycles and human activity with fossil fuels is changing these cycles drastically. And of course, it's changing our climate also.

I've been looking at an interesting datum. There are very fertile, dark soils in Brazil. This is not a natural thing but is the result of the farming practices of early indians. Instead of the easy slash and burn techniques to clear forest land, they learned to cut everything down, let it dry, then cover it with soil and light it. The greatly reduce oxygen under the soil makes much of the vegetation into charcoal or char. This is, in effect, elemental carbon. When added to the soil it stays there forever as there are no biological or soil chemical activities that can attack elemental carbon.

Why does this make the soil much more fertile if plants can make no direct use of carbon? It seems that finely divided carbon makes the soil into an ideal place for the growth of the soil microflora, and this microflora is really what makes soil fertile for crops. So, if finely divided carbon is put in the soil it greatly improves the soil's microflora population and thus improves fertility and it stays there forever.

One of civilization's curses is waste plastic. It is mainly made of petroleum and quite a bit of it can't be recycled. In any case the recycling of plastic is questionable as it takes too much energy to clean, manipulate and transport. But if all this waste was to be placed in self fueled charcoal retorts so that much of it is reduced to elemental carbon then added to agricultural soils, we would be tying up carbon forever and improving our soils. Of course, this does not work well in soils that have chemical fertilizers added since these chemicals attack the soil microflora that the carbon is helping.

If elemental carbon added to properly managed soils, and it improves fertility sufficiently, this could become a part of good practice organic fertilizing systems and could earn its keep economically.

I must point out that elemental carbon IS a fuel which, if burned, produces heat energy and releases CO2. So what I am proposing here can be easily derailed by human greed.

posted in A Post Progress Future - 1 reply

The NAU raises its ugly head

Roy — Sat, 30 Sep 2006 02:24:54 GMT

n this tribe I didn't really want to get into politics but if we speak of the future that is being prepared for us, it is unavoidable. Some of us see a future where it may be necessary to leave the US, yours truly included. However that may be difficult to do because the hazy power figures that control that country seem to be expanding in an unexpected way. In what appear to be a series of secret agreements, the present countries of Canada, Mexico and the US are starting to merge, becoming the North American Union. Those three countries will continue to exist in name but less and less in practice. This seems to be being done in such a slow and "under the radar" way that nobody is going to notice until it's all over but the shouting. But it is hard to speak of the future without including this factor.

http://pesn.com/2006/09/29/9500242_NorthAmericanUnion_and_energy/

Basically there are advantages to doing this but these become nightmares under "big brother". With only a facade of democracy, the environment, the planet and we who live under such a system, can only suffer. Although I live in Costa Rica, that may not be as much protection as I'd like. The little Central American countries could be easily gobbled up as an after thought. The Costa Rican Army doesn't exist, having become a mere footnote in history. In effect, the take over of Central America could take as much as three days, but only if the invading forces obey the highway speed limit signs!

Has anyone here thought about this, or even heard of it?

posted in A Post Progress Future - 6 replies

Alt biofuels

Roy — Sat, 23 Sep 2006 02:19:08 GMT

Here's a BBC article that is a good example of misinformation and a few lies. It appears to be typical of petroleum interests that push the worst possible ways to make biofuels then criticize these systems' imperfections.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/5369284.stm

It is well known that corn and cane are both impractical ways to mass produce ethanol because their standard cultivation takes massive inputs of petroleum either as energy or agrochemicals. Ethanol can be made and profits can be made but these systems are not sustainable and take large areas of food production quality land. The same can be said of using African oil palm, plus the fact that much forest land is being denuded and damaged for its cultivation.

There are thousands of other possibilities but these do not show as much promise for profits for certain interests so are little investigated. For me, little work has been done as yet on sustainable alternative fuels. The research goes into fuels that are green in name but not in practice.

May I suggest certain criteria that would make a alt fuel crop ideal:

1)The crop or its products must not need any agrochemical or energy input that cannot be supplied from the same farm where it is cultivated.
2)The crop must be suited to cultivation on marginal land or in other situations that do not tie up prime food producing land, such as marshes or semidesert.
3)The possible by-products of the crop must be fully utilizable in order to make the system have good economic feasibility.

posted in A Post Progress Future - 3 replies

Stored value

Roy — Fri, 25 Aug 2006 15:34:03 GMT

Let's say you have 10,000 euros, dollars or whatever in your kitty, that proverbial rainy day fund. Then it occurs to you that paper money is not the best way to save value, so you rush out and buy gold or silver coins then hunt for a safe place to stash them. Bury them or put them in a bank? If someone sticks a gun in your face, you'll dig ‘em up fast. There have been many cases in history of governments, in an ultra-inflation problem, grabbing all precious metals in safe deposit boxes and replacing them with paper money at the market price at the moment.

Is there a safer way to store value, perhaps one more useful in the future? If they are still making them, what will be the cost of files, drill bits, emery cloth and such after a petroleum culture melt down? So you get a drum with motor oil and start dumping in files. They're not going to rust in there and decades later this will be worth a fortune. Also theft of hundreds of pounds of oil covered files isn't easy to pull off. All this plus the fact that files are far more useful than gold although not as pretty.

What other things can you think off for this use? Has to be something that can be stored for long periods and that are used up in use. Ideas?

posted in A Post Progress Future - 17 replies

Defining community

Lazarus_Long — Tue, 29 Aug 2006 16:38:35 GMT

Here is a link that I find interesting, which may be relevant to those interested in forming an IC regardless of what type of IC.

http://www.icdb.org

I recommend the link but I have yet to find my home there.

There are some underlying principles of presence and self definition, not just biology and culture that help form family and its relationship to community. The idea of defining this essential set of values for standards of conduct leads to synergy and in that way the sum becomes greater than the whole.

One obstacle I face is that I have a real problem with doctrinaire attitudes and conduct but I might be willing to cooperate with others that already share my standards for living of their own accord. This is the strength of similarity in what's common. In essence I possess such doctrinaire attitudes as well as those whose impositionof values offends me.

Building a community is about building home. It can also be called habitat as we refer to any species’ adapted niche. I want to lower my footprint through collective efficiency but how do we integrate our activity while tolerating our differences?

A common standard is to share wealth through resource co-dependence. Markets serve needs first and desire as long (and short) term motive. Sharing wealth is always more appreciated the more the assets to work with. This is where trust begins. However, trust in the community is commonly used and abused today. Nonetheless trust can also be learned and earned even though the falsehood is a real and prevalent threat to the common good through mistrust. Fear drives mistrust and mistrust divides family, friend and people.

So us folks want to define community from scratch and historically it has been spiritual and secular concerns, which combined families through tribalism into community by helping to overcome mistrust? But also forming community overlapped common necessity as well. This led society to an idea of common defense as well from the perspective of a common value worth defending.

OK enough about evolution.

Oh wait that is a revolution in evolution we are talking about.

The reason I do not see a place I belong on that list is that the standards are always only a portion I agree with but I am also asked to be *compatible* usually on aspects of behavior and shared belief that as a rational skeptic, I get tired of being spoon fed. I canNOT live in a community that is above question and most place some things above question

However there are other models of community and this is where the link comes in. Those are self defined families. The historical models of family are no longer meeting many perceptible needs on the part of most people. This idea of building a new type of community, especially one not necessarily restricted to a single region or space, is a beginning for a new aspect of globalism when the impacts long term are felt for people by finding ways of living socially not only with one another but upon this world with all that lives.

So how do we just do that?

You know: lower the footprint and profit by it?

Well obviously through individual conduct as the place to start. I cannot change another person, they can only change themselves. I can help show what I perceive as a better way through reason and example but like they say, you can lead a horticulture; you can't make him think.

OK here is an example others here asked about: soda bottles, link them into a massive floating island or simply stop making them ubiquitous?

Sadly it is both and thus harder or easier depending on your perspective.

The soda bottle idea is served by a honeycomb better than a massive chinampa. Connect them through the ends of a threaded plastic pipe adaptor to replace the bottle cap. I want the patent for that connector and I will show you the next step. ;~)

You are of course welcome to use the idea to your heart content for your personal use.

But what about plastic bags?

Who trades for the 2 cents?

How do we recycle them best?

There are multiple ways to meet this problem but one trick is to use them as is. I like bagging pillows of them and making cellular insulation for block walls. They are inedible and when placed in the dark will likely last the life of the container. We should be so lucky that something fed off them. They also do not hold water by absorption so they retain insulation value even when damp.

That is just another idea of many needed but it is one thing anyone with the option can do. If more people just made bags of bags and then used them in their, or other people's Passiv Haus (happy Lorenzo?) they could build them into wall insulation and the bags get recycled by tremendous quantity. I think the approach is better than hay bale but as an example could be used as a break layer in a hay bale wall between interior and exterior. The risk that needs to be monitored for the experiment would be in how its contact impacts the hay adjacent and if it accelerates the decay of that material.

I am presenting ideas in the exchange here because that is the beginning of what can be exchanged through this virtual medium but also it is the start of how to define a new currency in common for a community. Or the basis of a post currency economy as a core value for knowledge as information and ability. I see the money as we presently see it as the standard of defining the value for exchange of ideas. That is both an example of the power of ideas and their dangers.

Ideas can be more valuable and powerful than any gold. That can be defined as a spiritual choice and as appreciation for living. The value of ideas transcend wealth but we are all too often sold them as packaged goods. I find that too many people buy their ideas cheap and sometimes they can be offensive when they expect me to buy them too. It is what people can do together that most matters tough though what we do is the way many are now defining community as a shared act of what *we* do together.

Everyone has their needs in this respect but it is when we share our dreams that the important part comes in.

So how do we openly share our dreams and help them all come true?

That is how I define a community.

How do you folks define it?

posted in A Post Progress Future - 2 replies

A Human Trysting Place

Roy — Fri, 08 Sep 2006 03:02:13 GMT

In another tribe a statement was made that we are promoting preparation for the future by the use of fear. Petroleum is running out so we shall starve. The climate is changing so we will broil or thirst. The economy is collapsing so we will be unable to have shelter. Pure scare tactics.

What could be more effective is to show how life will be better in a more nature and human orientated culture. The first thing that came to my mind was could our parks be designed to show our new outlook on life? A park is where humans and nature meet but on human terms. A national park or wild life area is where humans and nature meet on nature's terms.

A park should have beautiful plants and trees, arranged in pleasing ways. Perhaps fountains, grottos and little waterfalls. But my park of the future has something very special, human trysting places. You and your beloved find yourself before a little white gate. This can be latched on the inside in such a way that it can not be opened from the outside. A little trail leads into an appealing grove completely surrounded by impenetrable thorn thickets. Under a shade tree there is an inviting curved bench. Near by is an good sized area of ground covered by the most luxurious mat of cultivated moss which is regularly checked for twigs or other uncomfortable objects. If this whole set up does not appeal to you then you are not a human adult and shouldn't be reading this.

If humanity's life style could be designed for pleasure and satisfaction rather for economic gain and arranged to not damage nature, making our lives sometimes happy-foolish, sometimes deeply satisfying, but always intensely human, wouldn't that be far more attractive a way to live? Can the others that read this carry my clumsy beginning here on to something really desirous?

posted in A Post Progress Future - 6 replies

Airless and almost rubberless tires

Roy — Sat, 09 Sep 2006 05:50:06 GMT

The picture that I put up of the experimental airless tire is being developed by Michelin. I know little about this corporation but it could well be as nasty as many others. This picture has drawn some messages to me so I'll comment.

The design was probably inspired by the wheels on the moon buggy which were done of coiled wire. Some 45 years ago Pirelli developed a cordless tire with four ridges on its outside. One installed three "tread bands" with steel cording on the outside then inflated the tire, which held the bands in place. This worked well and I was running a VW with these tires. However they had forgotten one thing. In the US winter snowy roads were salted. This salt got to the steel cording which began to break up. Soon my tires were throwing broken bands, not a very safe situation. Pirelli took my old set of tires back and gave me a new set of standard tires in exchange. They dropped the tread band design.

Why do I go into this? Well, if one could make a better set of tread bands and find a way to fix them on these airless tires, the reduction in rubber use would be great and one could "retread" his tires without even taking them off the car. Interesting concept.

posted in A Post Progress Future - 0 replies

An Online Gift Economy

Roy — Fri, 01 Sep 2006 15:27:10 GMT

All have heard of a gift economy and know that such is a possible goal for our future, but many are unclear exactly what it is or have not had any experience with such. The present scarcity economy is designed around an absolute and complete lack of trust. A normal family is, in effect, a gift economy. Said family might have a couple of boxes of cereal in the kitchen. Each member can take what he needs with no one accounting for each flake consumed. Different family members might replenish certain items too. But the children are more often consumers and less commonly replenishers.

So my idea is to form a group that participates in an operating gift economy in order to familiarize the members with such a system. This obviously can not involve physical objects nor many services, so must involve digitalized goods and services that can be offered anywhere on Earth via the internet. I suppose it could be done in a special, private tribe where each "thread" would be a listing of offerings by a specific member. Any member could contact another to request a sending, probably via attachment, of an offered file. At least, this could be a way to start it off. Another tribe, but public, could be formed as a discussion area plus the entrance to the actual gift economy tribe.

Every member would offer digitalized things, be they writings, art work, animations, music, photos, puzzles, software, designs- anything that can be digitalized. These must originals by those who offer, or offered with the permission of those who originated them if they are still under copyright, or works that are no longer under copyright that the offerer has gone to the trouble of digitalizing. As an example, I would start by offering a horror story I wrote, and a digitalized article from a magazine of 1871 of a first hand account of the Confederate sea raider Shenandoah attacking US whalers in the North Pacific. I'm sure everyone could find something to offer.

Participants in this economy must be members of the group, must be offering a number of files and, initially, should restrict their requests for files to one per day.

I'd like observations and suggestions on this idea. It is not just to "practice" such an economy but to participate in a demonstration of the viability of such a concept, to begin what we hope will be part of our future, even to start something that could grow into something very big, sort of an e-bay without money. Are people really motivated to work in such an economy? Let's find out.

posted in A Post Progress Future - 5 replies

Does Post Progress mean retro or no tech?

Lazarus_Long — Fri, 25 Aug 2006 20:34:50 GMT

I personally not only don't think so I doubt it will come about as some kind of dark age. That doesn't mean that I cannot think of a dozen different ways we could be looking at a post apocalyptic period. However that shouldn't mean that we are automatically planning for such an occurrence. It is better to plan for success while coping with failure than plan for failure expecting success.

By Post Progress I mean a period where infrastructural decay and interruptions slows the rate of excess consumerism by forcing a socioeconomic concern about more basic essentials from food, water and air (quality/climate) to electricity, transport fuels, and important resource materials both synthetic and natural that are disrupted or unavailable due to shortages caused by all the aforementioned reasons plus politics and natural catastrophe.

I do not think technology must be atavistic only realistic and adaptive. I also do not think that science as an avenue of human investigation will stop or the potential for that learning to translate into technological progress as we understand it in principle. What I do think will appear to stop is the period of wanton consumerism as the driving force of technological progress as more and more people come to realize that they have bought fool's gold and suffer the consequences.

So many vulnerable aspects of the critical infrastructure of the modern capitalist economies are predicated on aspects that can be derailed by critical shortages, critical upheavals and critical climactic impacts on food supplies or particular raw material shortages. Even things like *outsourcing* can suddenly disappear if there is no demand and those workers that are today receiving a distribution of global market wealth would suddenly be without a life support mechanism to fall back on.

Please never forget that worldwide the majority of people are in denial but they are not ultimately stupid and if necessity rears its ugly head they will respond to it. Humans tend do so through applied technology, so post *progress* for me refers to the *pilgrim's progress* of manifest destiny and the golden age of technocratic consumer based capitalism but not to some sudden return to a post modern idyllic period when technology is abandoned.

We may be running out of oil, kick starting a climactic paradigm shift and tempting fate with global conflict but that isn't enough to make most people Amish, or even ever desire to be.

So what do you folks think?

How do you really define *Post Progress*.

I read some of what you wrote about this Roy and that is why (along with the fact that I usually approve of your perspective) why I came over to discuss things. But how about the rest of you?

I would love to hear both B's address this idea and frankly we are still a small enough group for everyone to chime i if you want to be heard.

posted in A Post Progress Future - 6 replies

Going off the deep end

Lazarus_Long — Wed, 23 Aug 2006 02:29:25 GMT

The water is turbulent, murky and frankly dangerous; anyone going to join me?

That is the basis of not simply attempting a new paradigm for personal living but the a measure of the risks. The odds of failure are greater than that of success but the chances of getting to a real solution from here without taking such risks is zero.

First risk, poverty. Poverty is not merely at threat to survival it is a threat to continued development of alternatives. This is where intentional community comes into play but also how such communities when too parochial are also a part of the problem.

Second risk, success and boom!

You are not ready for success and something unanticipated goes wrong. Either things literally explode from the inside out or you find sadly that the self interests of those around you (even when cast as obligatory generosity) turn the process into a competition for wealth, power, (insert vice here).

Third risk: You are not able to stand failure and when multiple attempts all give results you don't want to accept you continue to believe fantasies rather than evidence believe that hope is more important than results OR the failure of many attempts finally sinks in and the feelings of failure are overwhelming so you quit.

Then comes number four, you don't quit but things change or all those around you quit on you thinking you too radical fringe to stay committed to and they would rather get you committed. ;~)

One problem here is that often this group includes those with little formal ed or ones that have stayed outside the route of social acclaim and it is easy to dismiss them even though many of the most important ideas are coming from those that challenge orthodoxy. Nonetheless even today to challenge orthodoxy in science, not just religion is treated as heresy.

Then comes the problem of radicalism in that you must still master the *orthodoxy* to make the radical approach valid by contrast. Few tolerate this conduct and attitude for long and getting ostracized is still the most common result. Losing the support of the general community is likely but losing the support of those closest to you is also a significant probability. Be prepared.

Last comes running out of time AND resources but anyway that is another part of the larger issue that everyone will have to face soon enough.

I think that creating alternative lifestyle changes is the first demand. Things like outsourcing to domestic labor instead of abroad by creating a new class of telecommuting labor force as communities organized around skill sets and integrating them. There needs to be a broad recognition of what these integrated skills are and that is what has to be a the core of *intentional community* not merely *going back to the land*.

I have approached my design issues by always recycling existing tech for example but this creates potential licensing and patent infringement concerns for marketing ideas. However it does mean that I am prepared to survive even when the supply chain grinds to a halt because I have already made a policy of adapting off the shelf, which could also be a euphemism for recycling trash.

One alternative is to simply build end products that are both used locally and also marketable. Trying to build a community that is completely independent is like building to live off world. Not impossible but nowhere near as easy as most think it is.

Also when building alternative communities and economies of scale the problem is going to be that many interested and able potential members will be actually located around the world distributed far and wide. Bringing them all into one place is not so easy and building a community from the top down in a large scale is not going to actually be very effective when what is needed is a way of integrating such a community into existence through far lower impact that allows participants to be rewarded for their efforts without a total commitment to someone else's dream.

Once this is done it makes them more attractive and more will then commit to these alternative approaches that integrate *daily* consumption into a life support stratagem that is effectively *wholistic* with respect to environment and sane community conduct.

BTW Roy I think this is a great tribe to be a part of so let's see where it goes from here.

Basically what I am saying is that it is too late to worry about getting people to change. It is time to change and then some people will recognize the advantages of such change and perhaps mimic it, join, or outright compete by applying the alternative paradigms even better. All while obviously some will work to prevent change but that part is to be expected and not preoccupied with. This last point is why I think conspiracy issues are a dis-informative waste of time even if some of them might be true.

So chime in everyone. Where to begin tech change and when is it enough of a beginning?

When can we build off one another effectively and take the wealth out of circulation for the system of exploitation and divert it to the support network that betters life?

Diverting capital is what it is ultimately about when capital is understood as the conversion modality of all global resource. It is pointless to worry about it terms of just getting rich.

Did that all sound like rambling?

Consider it a part of the dangerous undertow you just leaped into blindly.

You can't survive by swimming directly against it but it may be possible to surface by using its power at first and swimming with it long enough to take a better heading.

posted in A Post Progress Future - 14 replies

IC transportation

Roy — Thu, 24 Aug 2006 01:12:45 GMT

It has been stated many times that, outside of a stone age situation, a 100% sustainable community isn't possible. I suppose this is true. What could well become important is transportation and trade between communities. If a 100 person community has a small solar powered induction furnace and starts scraping old cars and making anvils, vises, cast kettles and such, in one week it will probably have made all it can use, so must turn to trade. But trade will mean petroleum free transportation and a certain level of security. Will there be a government to keep the roads open?

Something never spoken of as a community activity is maritime shipping. In a post petroleum world those giant container ships will make excellent scrap, although I hope they keep one for a museum somewhere. A seaside community might well grab some old, much smaller, steel hulls and make some cargo windjammers. Trade between tropical and temperate communities offers many advantages as long as the ‘fuel' used is renewable. Right now we are spoiled by flying grapes from Chile in the dead of the Northern winter, but there are many other more reasonable and more useful products that can be traded under sensible conditions, such as rubber and coffee for grain and paper. Any sailors here?

posted in A Post Progress Future - 9 replies

waters and salts

H.P. Meow Meow Meow — Wed, 23 Aug 2006 21:06:59 GMT

Just something that's been hitting me. I think we are not getting the minerals we need either from the salts we now make (NACL) or from the water so many of us are buying. Both water and salt, I'm starting to realize, when we get them in their natural state, give us minerals. I wonder what impact the change in level of mineralization of our salt and water is having on our health. And if there is a way to think about not just getting water that is drinkable, but water that gives us what we are actually supposed to be getting from water.

posted in A Post Progress Future - 3 replies

Home made tires?

Roy — Mon, 21 Aug 2006 05:27:19 GMT

In a post cataclysmic world we may be able to keep existing vehicles going for a century except for one thing, tires. After 25 years or so even unused tires will begin to crack and weaken. They oxidize. How to store them longer? I don't know. In a CO2 atmosphere? Under water?

Next, could one make tires? The presently used synthetic rubber takes a huge chemical industry and massive amounts of petroleum. Natural rubber tires are quite possible but most rubber comes from trees in the tropics. Just processing this rubber, winding the cording and molding the darn things takes a number of pretty complex machines. It seems to be beyond the possibilities of a small community industry. Ideas anyone?

A Post Progress Future's topics - tribe.net

The road to Hell may have to go?

terra preta

'Good' GM organisms

Biotecture anyone?

An independent Internet

Hydrogen fuel from blood?

Future eating

future cars

Making biodiesel with 100% farm produced raw materials

Herding cats

Bleak Bleak Bleak

Infection fighting without antibiotics

Roads to Ruin

Carboniferous furure?

The NAU raises its ugly head

Alt biofuels

Stored value

Defining community

A Human Trysting Place

Airless and almost rubberless tires

An Online Gift Economy

Does Post Progress mean retro or no tech?

Going off the deep end

IC transportation

waters and salts

Home made tires?

Thanks Roy