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Worshipping the Overshoot Predator

Worshipping the Overshoot Predator

Unread postby Ibon » Wed 03 Apr 2013, 08:21:20

Our hunter gatherer ancestors developed cultures and mythologies while living within natural limits. Their technology allowed them to thrive but in no way enabled them to disrupt radically the physical constraints {famine and disease) that held them within carrying capacity.

Agriculture and civilization started the process of tinkering with these physical constraints 10000 years ago but certainly nothing humans physically did on the planet before the industrial revolution and the emergence of fossil fuels posed any major threats to our planets biodiversity or the stability of our biosphere. The civilization however that started to emerge say 5000 years ago or so did take humans into the territory where nature was no longer the center stage. Humans and their cities became center stage. Our modern religions started shortly after this time and all the mythologies of all modern religions are anthropomorphic because of this. God created humans and put all the creatures here for our use etc. Man is the center and the universe twirls around us etc. Our poor suffering sentient sensitivities aware of our mortality required some bonbons to feel better. What better way than creating a god that created us.

Just as the existing technology of their day influenced and determined the mythology of our HG ancestors, so it did when our modern religions and ethics were established at the onset of civilization where we went from nature based to human centered.

As mentioned up to the industrial revolution and the usage of fossil fuels our religions and morals and ethics never had to consider natural limits as a significant force that would in itself force a cultural or ethical response. When our population and consumption went into exponential radical overdrive during the past 100 years we carried the ethical and moral principles from an earlier age along with us. In addition our predominant growth based economic model (capitalism) became the dominant global economic model on the planet.


Now in the 21st century we are at the dawn of an unprecedented age, the first global disruption where natural constraints and limits will throw humans off the center stage. Copernicus and Darwin did this conceptually. But these cerebral scientific concepts haven’t reached to the deeper underlying archetypal ethical and moral frameworks that guide our religious sentiments or our dominant economic model. We rationally understand evolution and the movement of stars but irrationally persist on seeing progress as a linear projection going one way. Is this not clear evidence that something deeper, underneath the cerebral rational secular understanding of our material world is distorted? Is this distortion a rational or spiritual deficit??? Why do both the secular and the religious suffer this delusion equally?

We Kudzu Apes removed all the competitive top predators from our environments long ago and tucked the remaining ones in national parks. We shot the grizzly bears dead, the lions, the wolves, the jaguars. We tamed (temporarily) the germs. So the consequences of overshoot represent a metaphorical predator more formidable than any grizzly bear. This is one predator you can’t shoot at. It is more wryly than any fox we have had to attend to. It is the first “predator” to show up in our natural environments that leave us no options but to surrender our domination. So let’s give him or her a name; The Overshoot Predator.

We created the Overshoot Predator. Just like we created God. In fact, we will worship him more devoutly in the upcoming centuries than any deity yet created.

This might sound like hyperbole to many but not when you consider we went from 1 to 7 billion in less than a 100 years and that billions of new high energy consumers are striving and succeeding in making up a newly configured human population.

We cannot master this new predator. He will master us. Nothing else has. No bubonic plague alone could. No germ has yet succeeded. No crop failure or drought. No collapsed Mayan culture taught us any lasting lessons. But The Overshoot Predator is a wryly fox with a bag of tricks that can and will be delivered more quickly than Kudzu Ape’s technology can mitigate. In fact like the aids virus that uses our immune systems as part of its strategy, the Overshoot Predator takes our technological responses and uses them to strengthen its arsenal (think of the population increase as a result of the green revolution in agriculture or the resource consumption growth with capitalism spreading to China).

Technology in the hands of human centered morals and ethics and economic institutions have awakened the wrath of the Overshoot Predator.

Where is the Overshoot Predator at this very moment? He is still hiding behind our human centered delusion of dominion that causes Kudzu Ape to see only his foot prints and react only to his symptoms leading us into possible resource wars, civil wars, ideological wars, religious wars etc. up until the moment the Overshoot Predator himself can no longer camouflage himself in the statistics of climate change and all the other ecological collapses that are currently unfolding.

Like early Christians some of us have identified the new Messiah and are beginning to worship him, soon more and more of us will. For the Overshoot Predator does not really work in mysterious ways. The Overshoot Predator matches our delusion perfectly. If we are awake the Overshoot Predator reveals himself with subtleness. If we deny him he will emerge with a wrath and be quite blunt. Currently the obtuse dense delusional nature of Kudzu Ape is slowly awakening the wrath of the Overshoot Predator leaving him no options but to raise the seas.

Some skeptics may consider the hubris of Kudzu Ape beyond redemption and that collectively we will choose extinction. The Overshoot Predator will lead us however to salvation for no other God has emerged that bends all creeds to his will.
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Re: Worshipping the Overshoot Predator

Unread postby ennui2 » Wed 03 Apr 2013, 09:57:52

I just read your sig.

"Patiently awaiting the pathogens. "

What exactly does that mean? Sounds like Montequest.

Three years ago when I first got into Xtranormal I posted a prank video of a comic book villain claiming that he's releasing "pathogens" to create a die-off to cleanse Gaia. That's the whole Moonraker scheme, the sort of thing that CT loonies actually believe "the elite" plan to do, for their own benefit. And it REALLY pissed people off that I pulled that prank, but what I was actually doing was mocking the views of Montequest who seemed to almost relish the "pathogens" but wouldn't come out and say it. Instead he would hide behind hellfire and brimstone pronouncements. It was the vantage-point of clinical detachment, as if us doomers are somehow not in the petri dish, that we and our loved ones are not going to suffer through this.

Your post above has some of the hallmarks of Monte's rants. I think we all are tempted time and again to adopt the tone of the Old Testament God and pronounce our damnation of the human enterprise just to get our frustration and bitterness out. I certainly have. But I am not going to put "patiently awaiting the pathogens" in my sig, because really, you've gotta admit that it sounds misanthropic.
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Re: Worshipping the Overshoot Predator

Unread postby Ibon » Wed 03 Apr 2013, 11:13:00

ennui2 wrote: But I am not going to put "patiently awaiting the pathogens" in my sig, because really, you've gotta admit that it sounds misanthropic.


Kudzu Ape is doing just fine without the help of any misanthropes in creating a merciless Overshoot Predator. It's in my sig because I am patiently awaiting pathogens and a whole suite of other corrective consequences that make up the arsenal of the Overshoot Predator. In the same way that I embrace climate change. These consequences are the missing catalysts toward deep fundamental changes in Kudzu Apes disfunctional world view.

But this is a distraction. I am more curious if you buy into the narrative?
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Re: Worshipping the Overshoot Predator

Unread postby Plantagenet » Wed 03 Apr 2013, 13:47:38

Ibon wrote:
We created the Overshoot Predator. Just like we created God. In fact, we will worship him more devoutly in the upcoming centuries than any deity yet created.

..We cannot master this new predator. He will master us. Nothing else has. No bubonic plague alone could. No germ has yet succeeded. No crop failure or drought. No collapsed Mayan culture taught us any lasting lessons. But The Overshoot Predator is a wryly fox with a bag of tricks that can and will be delivered more quickly than Kudzu Ape’s technology can mitigate. In fact like the aids virus that uses our immune systems as part of its strategy, the Overshoot Predator takes our technological responses and uses them to strengthen its arsenal.

...Where is the Overshoot Predator at this very moment? He is still hiding behind our human centered delusion of dominion that causes Kudzu Ape to see only his foot prints and react only to his symptoms leading us into possible resource wars, civil wars, ideological wars, religious wars etc. up until the moment the Overshoot Predator himself can no longer camouflage himself in the statistics of climate change and all the other ecological collapses that are currently unfolding.

Like early Christians some of us have identified the new Messiah and are beginning to worship him, soon more and more of us will. For the Overshoot Predator does not really work in mysterious ways. The Overshoot Predator matches our delusion perfectly. If we are awake the Overshoot Predator reveals himself with subtleness. If we deny him he will emerge with a wrath and be quite blunt. Currently the obtuse dense delusional nature of Kudzu Ape is slowly awakening the wrath of the Overshoot Predator leaving him no options but to raise the seas.

Some skeptics may consider the hubris of Kudzu Ape beyond redemption and that collectively we will choose extinction. The Overshoot Predator will lead us however to salvation for no other God has emerged that bends all creeds to his will.


Oh. my. god.

That is pure doomer poetry. That is some of the best writing I've ever seen here.

You sound like a biblical prophet---the old Testament kind---whose prophesies are all of coming doom. Most people don't want to hear the message the prophet brings----but in the back of their minds everyone knows the prophet is speaking the truth.

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Re: Worshipping the Overshoot Predator

Unread postby ralfy » Wed 03 Apr 2013, 14:13:06

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Re: Worshipping the Overshoot Predator

Unread postby davep » Wed 03 Apr 2013, 15:22:57

I think he's just trying to resurrect the tired old overshoot meme with a bit of extra "embrace it" spice.

Many societies have avoided the "dominion over the earth" philosophy, and we will too eventually. Whether that entails a die-off is yet to be seen. It's not a scientific Liebig's Law thing, as we can control our environment to an extent that Liebig's Law is not relevant. But the question is can we control it in a sustainable manner. The answer is that we could but probably won't due to the inertia of the current system. I prefer looking at how we can enter the transition to a sustainable future rather than embracing something that is not necessarily inevitable nor terribly healthy as an object of worship.
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Re: Worshipping the Overshoot Predator

Unread postby Pops » Wed 03 Apr 2013, 15:44:49

Overshoot is the same whether the threshold is 7 or 7 billion.

It's completely believable that the noble savage ate the last American horse so what's the difference now except a couple of technological discoveries?

Steel and FFs have raised the carrying capacity the last 150 years but really it ain't no different than the caveman times.
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Re: Worshipping the Overshoot Predator

Unread postby davep » Wed 03 Apr 2013, 15:54:37

what's the difference now except a couple of technological discoveries?


One difference is the huge pool of potential labour. Apparently 60% of the population used to be involved in getting food onto our plates. That time will probably come back.

Another difference is the fact that we can plant perennials that have calorific yields similar to current crops without the fossil fuel inputs. But this takes time and either political will or a grassroots action. The concept of forest gardening was not generally available pre-industrial revolution.

And we can move from a substantially meat-based diet to a more vegetarian diet, dramatically reducing overall land requirements.

And the majority of the world's population doesn't live in the first world. Die-offs will probably be localised rather than global, depending on the ability to adapt. A lot of these third world places still have functioning small-scale farms. Appropriate technology and labour intensive agriculture will probably be the future, with or without die-offs.
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Re: Worshipping the Overshoot Predator

Unread postby Pops » Wed 03 Apr 2013, 17:00:22

My point Dave (I wrote it before I read yours) was that we're no more or less noble now than we ever were. We're no less cognizant of our limits than a HGer who could only travel 20 miles a day, we just have greater limits. We're no less frugal than a caveman, we just have a huge amount of near-free labor to splurge.

We're no more destructive than a spear-chucker if you take away our "spear", we're simply so many and so technologically advanced beyond spear chucking that mass destruction is unavoidable. When 7 billion get a hankerin for fish n chips, the fish disappear overnight.

Although Ibon has adopted a more opaque writing style lately, lol, I think he's saying the same as I was in his last thread; basically that we need to find a new religion that sees the things you suggest as righteous instead of fringe, hippy nonsense or the best that ignorant 3rd worlders can achieve.
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Re: Worshipping the Overshoot Predator

Unread postby davep » Wed 03 Apr 2013, 17:12:58

I don't know. It struck me more as revelling in a fatalist position than actively pursuing mitigation. But I could be wrong. But I agree that once the transition starts to bite the rational age will wane to be replaced by more spiritual communities involving sustainability in the belief system.
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Re: Worshipping the Overshoot Predator

Unread postby Quinny » Wed 03 Apr 2013, 17:21:45

I don't know about your village, but a lot of Villages throughout Europe supported much higher populations before the use of fossil fuels. A friend of mine lives in a village where the population peaked nearly two hundred years ago at a level over 3 times present day. The productive capacity of the land is potentially very similar to back then, in fact there is less food and essential products produced now from the area than when there were much higher numbers of people working the land.

It's no panacea, as the village couldn't take a sudden massive influx from nearby towns/cities, but in a long emergency such an area could provide more than just subsistence. Life would definitely not be as easy, but it doesn't mean everyone must starve.
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Re: Worshipping the Overshoot Predator

Unread postby Pretorian » Wed 03 Apr 2013, 19:12:18

Quinny wrote: Life would definitely not be as easy, but it doesn't mean everyone must starve.


Of course not. Me and mine surely must not. But I do keep an open mind as for the rest of the world
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Re: Worshipping the Overshoot Predator

Unread postby Quinny » Wed 03 Apr 2013, 19:39:58

I doubt that we will be able to 'manage' our way through the predicament we find ourselves in and IMHO war following financial collapse is a major factor that is impossible to predict, as is disease in any post collapse society. Unfortunately I cannot see a way forward that doesn't involve major increase in premature deaths. I just hope to do the best to help family and friends and my local community, I once had ideas grander than that, but they never materialised. I can understand people believe that relationships will by necessity not be as materialistic and people will move towards a more spiritual way of life, but the idea of worship (of anything) is not something that I find easy to accept. Surely the bad experiences with religion around the world will result in more people adopting a more rational approach.
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Re: Worshipping the Overshoot Predator

Unread postby dohboi » Thu 04 Apr 2013, 11:21:53

Humans have certainly been responsible for extinctions of species and destruction of ecosystems in the past. Usually this involved humans who had newly moved into alien (to them) territories, where species had not evolved instinctual fear of humans and so were very easy to stalk and kill. I would also guess that there were no traditional taboos in those cases against killing the newly 'discovered' species, since these, too, generally take time to evolve.

But once human communities settle for any amount of time in a particular area, they do start to impose limits on their predatory ways through taboos of various sorts, and specialization of food preferences...

This is especially true of small-scale societies, who come to recognize that the depletion of natural communities (or 'resources' as we would say) their immediate environs would mean that they would have to move into possibly hostile territories already inhabited by others, so they have a collective interest in maintaining things.

Larger-scale societies--essentially empires, though not always on the vast scales we associate with that term--do indeed seem to have a strong tendency to over-exploit the resources of the immediate environs and even more those of their subjugated neighbors.

What we have today are new resources in the form of ffs that we have never evolved a set of taboos against exploiting. In the process of using these up, we have also evolved a particularly virulent ideology that scorns pretty much anything that looks remotely like a taboo, i.e. modernity, growth-obsessed industrialism/consumerism, and now globally rapacious capitalism.

This has also allowed for a new kind of imperialism that extends not only across physical territories, but also across time:

Fossil fuels--both because once they are burned they do not self-regenerate on anything close to human time scales, and because the product of their combustion produces a global toxin that lasts for centuries to millennia--allow us to impose an empire-like dominance over all future generations and species, depriving them both of the energy and materials that the ff otherwise could have provided them, and deprive them of even a livable planet to enjoy those benefits on.

But we are now entering the future we have been dominating and robbing from--that is the post-PO and the increasingly globally warming world, and what we have seen so far are just the faintest whiffs of what is in store in this dominated future we leave our offspring.

Even if we immediately and universally adopt the strongest of taboos against any further use of fossil 'death' fuels, we are still going to leave a deeply destabilized climate system that is rapidly spinning beyond anything seen throughout human existence as we speak, at a speed probably faster than any the earth has ever seen.

---

I can't quite bring myself to revel in such development, but I do want to see them as clearly as possible, without rose- or any other color- glasses. My ruminations do leave me wondering whether our species deserves anything better than extinction, misanthropic though that surely sounds.

Most small-scale, traditional societies (the few left at this point), and kids that have had little conscious choice in their participation in creating the maelstrom, certainly don't 'deserve' extinction; but many of those will be the first to go.
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Re: Worshipping the Overshoot Predator

Unread postby Pops » Thu 04 Apr 2013, 13:56:51

The idea that people are moving away from the human-centered god and toward a greater reverence for our place in nature must be getting the attention of TPTB:

"egalitarian visions of the "dignity" of all living creatures…
...end up abolishing the distinctiveness and superior role of human beings. They also open the way to a new pantheism tinged with neo-paganism, which would see the source of man's salvation in nature alone, understood in purely naturalistic terms."
--2010 New Year's Day message for World Peace, Pope Benedict
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Re: Worshipping the Overshoot Predator

Unread postby mmasters » Thu 04 Apr 2013, 14:21:00

Someone's smoking the pipe of doom!
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Re: Worshipping the Overshoot Predator

Unread postby Newfie » Thu 04 Apr 2013, 15:49:43

I think my take is a bit different..... I hear Ibon talking about something in our collective subconscience. Something that is there and lurking that has the ability to emerge.

Further, I hear Ibon asking if his method of exploring this topic resonates with the audience. There reort her ways of exploring the same theme, this is just one way.

I got a bit lost in understanding the Over Shoot Predator. I think it is that part of us that is driving us over the edge, beyond sustainability. I think I have a different but related idea, that Nature evolved humanity in Nature's effort to increase entropy. In both cases there is some submerged, but very powerful, influence driving us forward to our own doom. We can understand it personally, on an individual level. But on a statistical level, as a culture, we are completely blind.

If you equate Over Shoot Predator to free market capitalism, or "the silent hand", or endless growth ( the prevailing religious myths of Western society) then the concept is less opaque. If that is indeed what Ibon means.

So I think Ibon is saying that we are pretty screwed by our current ethical set, and we are unlikely to change that ethical set even if we experience traumatic events.

Did I get you right?
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Re: Worshipping the Overshoot Predator

Unread postby Narz » Thu 04 Apr 2013, 17:30:11

Doom is coming, doom is coming!

It's hard to get too alarmed anymore.

Life isn't about waiting for the predator (with a mix of primal fear & craving?) but what you do in the meantime.

Two guys, one spends the next 5-years stocking a root cellar & practicing guerrilla tactics in the woods outside his isolated cabin in the hills. The other guy works, saves some money, dates different women, has fun with his friends. Doom comes. Who's led a better life? It's totally subjective. Even if guy #1 is better prepared it's not like guy #2 is gonna die overnight. Maybe he'll outlive the 1st, who might step on one of his one landmines he placed outside his property.

It's too strressful to worry. Me personally, I'm more interested in finding intelligent community than "being ready for anything" which is impossible anyway.
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Re: Worshipping the Overshoot Predator

Unread postby careinke » Thu 04 Apr 2013, 20:35:02

Narz wrote:
Two guys, one spends the next 5-years stocking a root cellar & practicing guerrilla tactics in the woods outside his isolated cabin in the hills. The other guy works, saves some money, dates different women, has fun with his friends. Doom comes. Who's led a better life? It's totally subjective. Even if guy #1 is better prepared it's not like guy #2 is gonna die overnight. Maybe he'll outlive the 1st, who might step on one of his one landmines he placed outside his property.


You forgot the guy who Turns his front lawn into a food garden and the rest of his place into a food forest. He uses no pesticides, oil based fertilizer, or other earth killing products. If he has a surplus, he shares it with others, or uses it for trade with other like minded individuals. The food he doesn't produce, is bought from the local organic producers. He supports local CSA's. He may also raise some chickens and bees increasing his independence.

He donates his time and knowledge to others in the community through volunteering, and teaching others how to become more self sufficient.

He does not buy frankin foods (GMO), or other heavily processed food. His material purchases are always bought considering the return on the purchase, and the total life cycle of the product. He strives for no waste. He avoids debt.

He plans for a future of energy decline and climate chaos.

He bases his moral code on 1. Care of the Earth 2. Care of people 3. Share the surplus.

Not to hard to do if you put your mind to it. Plus you don't have to do it all at once, just keep moving in that direction.
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Re: Worshipping the Overshoot Predator

Unread postby Quinny » Fri 05 Apr 2013, 03:36:55

Kind of like the Careinke way.
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