Re-tribalizing America

Earlier this summer, Canadian newspapers and national magazines published essays honoring the 100th birth-date of Marshall McLuhan. Up through the 60's he was a widely respected social analyst here in Canada. He taught in several universities and while at the University of Toronto he established a Center for communication studies. His most important work was the study of the impact of media on culture and the human condition.

Currently McLuhan is probably remembered best for his observation that media not only conveyed messages, but intrinsically was a message itself; in his words, "the medium is the message." Through that phase he invited us to look not only at the content of media, such as newspaper, radio, TV (and now the internet), but what the medium creates . He concluded that these forms of communication gather communities of recipients all at the same time but in widely varying contexts and locations. In other words print, radio and TV, by their very nature of being a mediated experience, in contrast to actual face-to-face experience, had the capacity to recreate alliances and loyalties among people who probably don’t know each other, probably don’t share ethnic similarities, or even similar cultural contexts.

These “re-tribalizations” as he called them emerged slowly as the forms and content of media changed and larger, more diverse audiences developed. Print media had as its ‘message’ persuasion and information (advertisements side by side with ‘news articles’). Reading about an event in a distant locale, or even in the same town, gave every reader the same information, and thus linked them together. Right next to the story was an ad for toothpaste. “Since we have you all together reading about this tornado in Oklahoma, don’t forget to get “X brand” toothpaste. The newspaper functioned to inform and persuade everyone who was reading it no matter what time of day or where they were reading it.

Radio added entertainment to the media message: “We will entertain you, perhaps offer some information such as the weather predictions and persuade you to buy this product.”  Information, entertainment and persuasion was the intention of radio as a mediated experience. Radio was a more powerful media; it could link people not just in the same community or region as newspapers did, but across the nation and even further. At the same time, radio required that everyone listen simultaneously to the same program. Slowly people grew to expect their radio shows to entertain them as much as to inform them and were willing to be at least passive recipients of persuasion. Even “news” shows were expected to be entertaining, rewarding those commentators with wit and wisdom. Gradually, loyalty to particular shows, commentators, entertainers grew in strength. My grandparents and parents began to organizing their daily schedule so that they wouldn’t “miss” their favorite shows or news programs. My grandfather, a plumber, would arrange to be home for lunch every day between 12 – 1 in order that he wouldn’t miss Paul Harvey news and “Oxodol’s Own Ma Perkins”

It was in this setting, that Neil Postman, a contemporary of McLuhan in the U.S., began his media analysis trying to distinguish between information and entertainment. He suggested that if a listener heard something and acted upon it, that was information. However, if they heard, for example a news story about a flood in another state, and did nothing, the listener was just being entertained. And with newscasts being filled with numerous stories, it would be humanly impossible to “act” on all of them. In his book, Amusing Ourselves to Death, What, he asks, are the implications when we become far more interested in being entertained than being informed?  Postman pleaded for building a curriculum of media literacy that would help us distinguish the media’s intrinsic messages of entertainment, information and persuasion from the content of a broadcast. Unfortunately, apart from a few isolated public school settings and specialized cinematography courses, his analysis got little traction.

With TV, the lines separating entertainment from information (news) and persuasion became even more indistinct, primarily because the media experience was now visual.

This was no insignificant change. Mark Pagel, professor of evolutionary biology at the University of Reading (England) proposes that the way early humans utilized vision provided the basis for language. He suggests that through the humans’visual capacity we learned how to imitate and copy what each other was doing. They could visually ‘steal’ an action and then repeat it. This, in and of itself, was not a significant shift from earlier humanoids and other sapiens. Imitation has generally been the primary form of learning even among a wide array of mammals. Among higher primates copying each others actions built a bond between individuals but wasn’t sufficient to grow larger bands with diversified tasks. Humans soon learned how to utter sounds that conveyed more than imitation; the sounds enabled them to move toward cooperative forms of sharing. He uses the example of a person who has a collection of arrowheads, but doesn’t know how to make good shafts. If he were to place his collection in front of a skilled shaft maker but says nothing, the shaft-maker could just pick up the arrowheads and keep them, not knowing the purpose of that action. But if, through some sounds, the arrowhead-maker conveyed he needed some shafts made and would give the shaft-maker some of the arrow heads to keep for his labor, then both parties benefited from this cooperative venture. Speech and visualization, Pagel suggests, provide the foundation for shaping a larger community that valued cooperation and mutual benefit. A tribe emerges with its capacity to continue reshaping its life and its technology through shared language.

Sight and sound build tribes. “You speak my language” points to a bond that welds two individuals into a sense of belonging to each other.

Narrative is also essential to media’s capacity for re-tribalization. It is no accident that TV shows, commercials, news reports are all built in story forms; information, persuasion and entrainment are packaged in stories which often intermingle the three. Even camera placement is an ingredient to the narrative being generated. “What story do you want to tell” is among the early advice given to someone learning photography and video-graphy.

But there is more going on than just ‘telling a story’. Jerome Bruner, who is now a senior researcher with the NY University School of Law, throughout his long career as a psychologist has focused on how we think. He suggests that there are two primary modes of thought: the narrative mode and the paradigmatic mode. In narrative thinking, the mind engages in sequential, action-oriented, detail-driven thought. In paradigmatic thinking, the mind transcends particularities to achieve systematic, categorical cognition. In the former case, thinking takes the form of stories and "gripping drama." In the latter, thinking is structured as propositions linked by logical operators.  He included in the description of narrative a number of essential characteristics such as (1) the story needs to convey a sense of taking place within a time frame; (2) a story deals with particular events; (3) the characters in the story have beliefs, desires, values, theories; (4) the story conveys a sense of “acutalness” even if not verifiable;(5) the story conveys the sense that it is tied to a larger story, or an older story. (See his Actual Minds, Possible Worlds). Michael White, an Australian psychologist, builds on narrative by noting “We enter into stories, we are entered into stories by others, and we live our lives through stories”. (See his Selected Papers , 1989).

What commercial, what sitcom, what ‘informational program’, what news and commentary program does not contain all 5 of Bruner’s narrative characteristics? The words that compose a story are not simply vehicles or tools we use to represent an event or reality; as the Austrian philosopher Ludwig Wittgenstein noted, words construct the event. The story shapes a reality; we can choose to embrace that reality as true or to question the veracity of that reality. The task of media is to convince us as to what is real or not real. And even if I declare that a particular sitcom in only “fantasy’ I have at least permitted it to entertain me, which has brought me into companionship with all the others who were simultaneously (or even later watching a recording) engaged the story in some way.

The media, then, constructs realities through narratives, inviting our engagement in a new tribal alliance through a skilful intermingling of information, entertainment and persuasion.  In accepting that invitation we enter into an almost invisible network of others who also have engaged the narrative. It becomes visible, for example, when over a cup of coffee we talk about last night’s episode of “Grey’s Anatomy”, marvel as some episode of “Nature” or comment about how the President’s actions were characterized by the commentary on Fox News. With almost every American household having a TV set(s) that operates on the average of 6 hours per day, the building and rebuilding of social relationships – re-tribalization -- goes on unabated. So essential has this daily relational experience become for Americans, that a campaign conducted a few years back to “Turn Off Your TV” for one week, didn’t make it beyond the first feeble effort. We don’t want to leave our tribal gatherings.

Of course, with the rapid popularization of ‘social networking’ media, re-tribalization is even more evident. It is not too far-fetched to relabel “My Friends” on Facebook as “My tribe”. And being connected so instantaneously, expressing likes and dislikes, linking into other networks (tribes), setting up ‘instant mobs’ actions all these and much more are now available expanding the reach of media’s message of entertainment, information and persuasion.

I am interested in applying these reflections on two spheres of American life to see if they help make sense out of what is happing. The first is the current state of church life.

Up through the 1950’s denominational (tribal) loyalty was quite strong. Indeed, one’s denomination signified both theological and personal identity. “I am a Methodist (or other variety)” was a way of telling you not just my personal preference, but also what were my ideals, my obligations, my values, my spirituality, where I belonged, and what I did with my time. I may have chosen to be a Methodist, or I may have been “born” into the faith. But I drew my religious identity fromthis well-establsihed tribe.

Beginning in the 30’s and 40’s, along with the increasing popularization of radio and the creation of national networks various evangelists began to make use of the media to “entertain, inform (indoctrinate) and persuade,’ creating a following. Persons like Oral Roberts and Billy Graham were able to parlay their tent-meeting evangelism into weekly, even daily radio shows. As TV production became more accessible, religious programming moved away from the typical Sunday morning broadcast of a church service to a whole network of religious shows, thus intensifying the re-tribalization.  Denominational loyalties began slipping as more people turned to the mediated experience of TV ‘evangelists, who combined the media message with the “big tent” rally, making places of worship into large studio audiences. Traditional loyalties to ‘denominations’ began eroding as people turned to places of worship and clergy who could provide the media message they were growing accustomed to with other media experiences:  persuasion, information and entertainment. Traditional denominations (tribes) have been scrambling trying to staunch the outbound drain of membership with efforts to mimic the TV media experience, often called “contemporary worship”.

What happens next? In all likelihood these religious realignments will not be reversed. Traditional denominations will continue to build and maintain their tribal loyalties but face diminished resources and influences. No amount of ‘strategic planning’, leadership training, repackaging theology will return these denominations to their 1950’s ascendancy. What seems to make sense is the creation and nurture of relationships across denominational fences, for the sake of common projects and advocacy for the benefit of the wider society, Theological alliances, social justice projects and community enrichment are still possible but on a scale commensurate with the size and resources of the denominations.

However, I’m not sure if the lessons learned from the past in how tribal loyalties can be made more permeable will apply in our present chaotic situation. For the ‘traditional’ churches trying to compete with the newer tribes has not proved to be successful. In all likelihood, the traditional denominations will continue to fracture, spawning newer and perhaps hostile tribes. (The current conflict within the Presbyterian Church primarily over the ordination of gay and lesbian clergy is a good case in point). Conversations and relationships between the existing tribes can be beneficial but won’t reverse the powerful tribalizing trends in place.

There are increasingly larger numbers of non-aligned spiritual ‘searchers’ who move in and out of the existing tribes without necessarily stopping to align with one or another (See “A Month of Sundays: Searching for the Spirit and My Sister” by Julie Mars). Such impetuousness is not generously received by the traditional churches, for tribal loyalty and continuation cannot be constructed without a degree of “I’m staying”. Even  some of these independent searchers are looking for kindred persons with whom they share their frustration of not having their own tribe, thereby creating their own tribe of “searchers.”

Our political life is also being radically changed by re-tribalization. Watching the debate unfold in Congress over the debt-ceiling, signaled to me that at the heart of the acrimonious speech masquerading as political discourse there is a major tectonic shift in the political plates out of which we construct our national life, again as a result of re-tribalization. While much attention is being given to the Tea Party movement, in fact what appears to be emerging is the “Fox News Tribe” (which includes the radio commentators espousing a similar ideology), Meanwhile “Democrat” and “Republican” tribal loyalty is slipping away into a minority status.

It will be interesting to see how the use of media in the coming election cycle will shape the tribal alignments. Negative political advertising is nothing more than the tried and true strategy of strengthening one’s own tribe by hostile confrontation with the other tribe(s). They must become dangerous strangers in order for our tribe to be strong and right. Our tribe must elect gladiators who will “fight” for our cause. Tribal survival is more important than the common good and well being for the whole community.

In this sense our political context is not that markedly different than Iraq or Libya. As I learn more of the conflicts now occurring in Mediterranean countries such as Libya and Syria I have grown suspicious about seeing the conflicts as solely between ‘democratic forces’ and dictatorial regimes. In fact they represent tribal conflicts dating back over considerable time. In Libya, for example, there are about 140 tribes or clans, most of whom are Sufi, with others representing various branches of Islam, along with a small minority of Christians. The current conflict represents the efforts of the Sufis and their allies to regain control from the tribal clan of Gadafi and reestablish themselves as the ruling class as they once were. The lethal tribal conflicts in Iraq primarily between the Shia and Sunni also illustrate how tenuous the notion of “nation” can be; loyalty to the tribe/clan often overruns loyalty to the country.

I am not hopeful about a significant reversal of the re-tribalization of the churches or of the political parties in the US. Until we learn how to read the media we have, we will be shaped by it. Efforts to encourage direct engagement with natural settings, community service, and volunteering all are laudable as they give experiences that are not mediated. Settings where relational experiences are intentional also offers alternatives to media built tribes. Out of these settings it is possible to bring critical skills that provide the capacity to transcend tribal loyalties and boundaries. How long it will take, I have not a clue. But the conversation seems critical.

If you enjoy PEI mussels, here is one place they are grown: in Orwell Bay, right out in front of our cottage. Those small white floats are mussel bags in which they are grown.

A couple of jottings

The Breathing

In the stillness between waves

Ending their journeys

Across leagues of sea

With a single polishing

Of black beach pebbles,

Themselves offspring of

The elegant cliff rising high above,

Itself sculpted by ancient glaciers.

In that in-between

The Universe breathes.

Vowels evaporate, no longer

Linking consonants together,

An unboundaried softness

Cradling the assurance later chanted:

“As it was in the beginning, is now,

and shall be evermore.”

Welcome the Night

When your words become sharpened with

Fear spearing this way and that, the

World becomes mean, alarming.

When hope unravels,

No longer tethering you to

Confidence, you begin to

Stumble, the path gives away.

It is time to let the evening

Shadows wash you from toe to

Forehead, sponging away

The harsh details sculpting your profile.

Enter into the night, leaving

Hesitancy at the border.

Stop the urge to

Switch on a light;

It only prolongs the glare of

Exhausted assurances, depleted

By the day’s constant obligations.

Permit the deep darkness of the

Universe to hold you with its

Pledge that you are not

A statistical coincidence.

Invite your dreamer to step into your

Imagination, there to gather the

Ingredients of the day and begin

Concocting healing dramas foretelling

Your well-being.

Welcome the night enfolding you into

Its womb, there to be prepared for

Birth once again.

The virtue of argument

In our local PEI  paper, the Guardian (actually the main Provincial paper), world news is generally relegated to one page. It’s therefore interesting to see what world events are chosen for this limited space. Recently, one of the three articles on the page highlighted the IMF’s “reprimand” of the US government’s incapacity – so far – to resolve the US debt ceiling crisis, broadly hinting about the global repercussions should Congress fail to raise the debt limit.

For a few weeks now I have been away from the daily reporting of what the federal government is doing or not doing, so decided to listen in for a few evenings via NPR. I wasn’t surprised however to hear how the debate about the debt ceiling, taxes, budget cuts sounded like what I had heard weeks ago.

As I listened to the repeated rhetoric, charges and counter charges, I begin pondering on the value of arguments. Normally, I consider arguments as non-productive and a source for generating hostility. But the pondering is a result of a report I read recently written by 2 respected cognitive-scientists about the value of arguments.

A recent paper "Why Do Humans Reason? Arguments for an Argumentative Theory," published  in Behavioral and Brain Sciences, has stirred much conversation about the positive evolutionary value of argument. (for a fuller exploration, see: http://www.edge.org/documents/archive/edge342.html ) The paper’s authors are Hugo Mercier and Dan Sperber. Hugo Mercier is a cognitive scientist and a post-doctoral fellow at the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia. He did his doctoral work under Sperber's supervision on reasoning and argumentation and he has published many articles on the argumentative theory, several of them in collaboration with Sperber. Dan Sperber, an influential French social and cognitive scientist, is widely recognized as being among the most brilliant cognitive scientists writing about reason, language, culture, and human evolution.

They state, "Reasoning was not designed to pursue the truth. Reasoning was designed by evolution to help us win arguments.” So, as they put it, "The evidence reviewed here shows not only that reasoning falls quite short of reliably delivering rational beliefs and rational decisions. It may even be, in a variety of cases, detrimental to rationality. “Reasoning can lead to poor outcomes, not because humans are bad at it, but because they systematically strive for arguments that justify their beliefs or their actions. This explains the confirmation bias, motivated reasoning, and reason-based choice, among other things."

To summarize the article: If you take the point of view of the argumentative theory, having a confirmation bias makes complete sense. When you're trying to convince someone, you don't want to find arguments for the other side, you want to find arguments for your side. And that's what the confirmation bias helps you do.
                                 
The idea here is that the confirmation bias is not a flaw of reasoning, it's actually a feature. It is something that is built into reasoning; not because reasoning is flawed or because people are stupid, but because actually people are very good at reasoning — but they're very good at reasoning for arguing. “Not only does the argumentative theory explain the bias, it can also give us ideas about how to escape the bad consequences of the confirmation bias.”

People want to make decisions that confirm their bias, their predilection, their preference. I will argue for my point of view, my perceptions, my take on reality, my options, my decisions. “What has been observed is that often times, when people reason on their own, they're unable to arrive at a good solution, at a good belief, or to make a good decision because they will only confirm their initial intuition.”
                                 
On the other hand, when people are able to discuss their ideas with other people who disagree with them, then the confirmation biases of the different participants will balance each other out, and the group will be able to focus on the best solution. Thus, reasoning works much better in groups. “When people reason on their own, it's very likely that they are going to go down a wrong path. But when they're actually able to reason together, they are much more likely to reach a correct solution.”

And here is where I was forced to ponder: the theory fits in very well with the idea of deliberative democracy. “In deliberative democracy, the idea is that people should argue with one another more often, and that instead of simply using voting as a way of aggregating opinion, people should instead be deliberating with one another, they should be discussing their ideas, they should be sharing their points of views and criticizing each other's point of view….. And our theory can both provide an explanation for why deliberative democracy can be helpful and effective. It can also help us perfect the way deliberative democracy can work by making us better understand how it works, and in what circumstances it can really help.”

Mercier goes on to suggest, “.. even in our personal lives it's quite important to keep in mind that when we're reasoning on our own, it's quite possible that we're going to arrive at false conclusions and misleading decisions. If you take a very intuitive example, let's say you have a quarrel with your partner and you go to brood over what happened in your room. And you keep thinking about why it was all his or her fault, and why you did everything that was possible to make things right, and you know it really has nothing to do with you. You find many, many reasons why you didn't do anything wrong, and it's all the other person's fault.”

A final caution from the authors: “ In our theory, what's important to keep in mind is that reasoning is used in a very technical sense. And sometimes not only laymen, but philosophers, and sometimes psychologists tend to use "reasoning" in an overly broad way, in which basically reasoning can mean anything you do with your mind.

By contrast, the way we use the term "reasoning" is very specific. And we're only referring to what reasoning is supposed to mean in the first place, when you're actually processing reasons.” (Emphasis mine).

O while considering the value of reasoning, I was reminded of a recent TE D lecture I listened to. I don’t recall the lecturer’s name, but he was suggesting that there are three levels of responses when parties disagree. First, “you must be ignorant of the facts or you wouldn’t disagree with me. Or, you must be stupid, because you know the facts but can’t put them together in the right order. Or, you must be evil since you know the facts are deliberately disagreeing with me.”

These three responses are a good example of what happens when a disagreement crosses over from arguing about observable facts, ideas or strategies to evaluating who the other person is. Attacking instead of reasoning can only escalate the intensity of feelings, usually negative anger or other expression of hostility.

                      
It also prevents the argument from going forward in a way that may reveal new understandings. But to do so, we first have to affirm the value of disagreements and arguments, and not consider them as irrational and harmful. Conflict of ideas, when not couched in evaluation of the other party, can be a positive contribution to an emerging truth or strategy.

But can one disagree while still being compassionate, still being empathetic, bringing those feelings and motivations into the process? I want to explore that one a bit more, soon.

Jeremy Rifkin: Emergence Visionary

 Jeremy Rifkin’s more recent project resulted in the encyclopedic book, “The Empathic Civilization: The Race to Global Consciousness In a World In Crisis.” In this work he places, in the words of one reviewer, empathy in contrast to social entropy with the implicit question as to which will emerge as the dominant theme for the future of human kind. He makes the claim that the rise and expansion of empathy as a shared human experience is a rather recent development in human history, dependent in no small part on the enlarged sense of self that has emerged during the 20^th century due primarily to the expanse of psychology and neuroscience research.

I will explore that possibility in a future blog, but for now I’m interested in recognizing Rifkin’s significant contribution to our understanding of emerging trends. A quick glance at Rifkin’s writing more than suggests the breadth of his interest and explorations:

·          1973, How to Commit Revolution American Style, with John Rossen, Lyle Stuart Inc., ISBN 0-8184-0041-2

·          1975, Common Sense II: The case against corporate tyranny, Bantam Books, OCLC 123151709

·          1977, Own Your Own Job: Economic Democracy for Working Americans, ISBN 978-0-553-10487-5

·          1977, Who Should Play God? The Artificial Creation of Life and What it Means for the Future of the Human, with Ted Howard, Dell Publishing Co., ISBN 0-440-19504-7

·          1978, The North Will Rise Again: Pensions, Politics and Power in the 1980s, with Randy Barber, Beacon Press, ISBN 0-8070-4787-2

·          1979, The Emerging Order: God in the Age of Scarcity, with Ted Howard, Putnam, 

        ISBN 978-0-399-12319-1

·          1980, Entropy: A New World View, with Ted Howard (afterword by Nicholas Georgescu-Roegen), Viking Press, ISBN 0-670-29717-8

·          1983, Algeny: A New Word—A New World, in collaboration with Nicanor Perlas, Viking Press, ISBN 0-670-10885-5

·          1985, Declaration of a Heretic, Routledge & Kegan Paul Books, Ltd, ISBN 0-7102-0709-3

·          1987, Time Wars: The Primary Conflict In Human History, Henry Holt & Co, ISBN 0-8050-0377-0

·          1990, The Green Lifestyle Handbook: 1001 Ways to Heal the Earth (edited by Rifkin), Henry Holt & Co, ISBN 0-8050-1369-5

·          1991, Biosphere Politics: A New Consciousness for a New Century, Crown, ISBN 0-517-57746-1

·          1992, Beyond Beef: The Rise and Fall of the Cattle Culture, E. P. Dutton, ISBN 0-525-93420-0

·          1992, Voting Green: Your Complete Environmental Guide to Making Political Choices In The 90s, with Carol Grunewald Rifkin, Main Street Books, ISBN 0-385-41917-1

·          1995, The End of Work: The Decline of the Global Labor Force and the Dawn of the Post-Market Era, Putnam Publishing Group, ISBN 0-87477-779-8

·          1998, The Biotech Century: Harnessing the Gene and Remaking the World, J P Tarcher, ISBN 0-87477-909-X

·          2000, The Age Of Access: The New Culture of Hypercapitalism, Where All of Life is a Paid-For Experience, Putnam Publishing Group,ISBN 1-58542-018-2

·          2002, The Hydrogen Economy: The Creation of the Worldwide Energy Web and the Redistribution of Power on Earth, Jeremy P. Tarcher,ISBN 1-58542-193-6

·          2004, The European Dream: How Europe's Vision of the Future is Quietly Eclipsing the American Dream, Jeremy P. Tarcher, ISBN 1-58542-345-9

·          2010, The Empathic Civilization: The Race to Global Consciousness In a World In Crisis, Jeremy P. Tarcher, ISBN 1-58542-765-9       (list from Wikopedia; also see his bio in the same article about Rifkin))

His public lectures, which are numerous, are a combination of “Jimmy Swaggart, Phil Donahue and Werner Erhard” according to a 1989 Time Magazine interview.  The article goes on to give a typical opening statement he used in that time (which illustrates his style of presentation):

            The nation's foremost opponent of environmental neglect  (in 1989)  is waving a $20 bill as he      makes a bet. … (he) bets that no one can answer this question: "What value has emerged in the        past 100 years as our most dominant value, a value that is the key to our science?"

                He rarely loses, not because the answer is so obscure but because it's so obvious. At an easel, he             writes his answer, leaving the word to hang like a biohazard warning sign: EFFICIENCY.   "Everything is efficient," he says. "We're so skewed toward efficiency that we've lost our sense of             humanity. What we need to do is to bring back a sense of the sacred."

Another illustration of his creative presentations can be experienced on a recent You Tube program on empathy: http://i3.ytimg.com/vi/l7AWnfFRc7g/3.jpg  (Don't miss this one!)  (There are also a number of other lectures by Rifkin on YouTube.)

That book-list is a quick indication how Rifkin is, for me, one of those visionaries who can see “emergence” in the less obvious – to me at least -- cultural currents of our time. His sometimes audacious comments and robust claims make criticism of his work easier. But his prognosis has sufficient substance and evidence as to make it more than just noticeable.

Take, for example, what he described in his book, “The Biotech Century: Harnessing the Gene and Remaking the World”. In this work he calls for, among other things, a comprehensive ethic which will help guide the rapidly enlarging body of biotechnology. We’ve already failed by and large to have an effective ethic governing our carbon-based economy, one which considers the long-term consequences to our environment and the future of humankind. Even though we are now more aware of these consequences, of what we are doing, very few of us are willing to seriously modify our reliance on cars (transportation of all forms), electrical generation and plastics which carbon/oil provides;  making any substantial public policy changes are rapidly DOA and buried under the fear of economic chaos: witness what continues to happen to the Koyoto Accords. Now Rifkin poses questions about how we will ethically manage the new emerging economy of biotechnology, attempting to sketch what the consequences will be for this new unregulated sector of our economy.

(In case no one has noticed, biotechnology – which includes health care – is now quickly surpassing the carbon-based economy as the driving force of our lives. The so-called health reform debate illustrates how difficult it is to attempt some modicum of restraint on the large sector of our economy.)

A good case in point is stem-cell research. It wasn’t too long ago that researchers proposed that the stem-cells in embryos could be harvested and used to repair various organs and conditions in our bodies. Soon both religious and political prohibitions were established because the process required creating an embryo in a Petri dish in order to harvest the cells. The resulting limits forced researchers to attempt other strategies for harvesting, such as taking cells from a mature body (such as hair fibers) and train the cell to reverse back into the stem-cell stage. The problem so far is the resulting stem-cell is not nearly robust enough to do the healing work anticipated. In the meantime, the ethical repugnance of creating a live embryo and harvesting stem-cells  has been eroding, for the sake of science and the possibility of living longer with healthy organs. Thus we have a conundrum of wanting to be more healthy and developing technologies running at the whim of researchers looking for the next major source of wealth. I’m not – and certainly wouldn’t represent Rifkin as a ludite; however, he does call us to grapple with this emerging economic force.

Now Rifkin poses the critical question which has emerged in  our time: will we transform our civilization  to one founded on empathy for one another and for creation or will we continue to burn up the earth’s resources, drive ourselves into irreversible economic chaos through gargantuan allocations to shore up the national security state, and encourage tribal, ethnic and religious  warfare. It’s a question worth not only pondering, but seriously letting it contend with our current values.

A three-week musing

ISLAND MUSINGS, VOL. X, NO. 1

June 20, 2011 Val and Wally Ford

           

We just finished breakfast, huddled in front of a small electric heater with the floor heaters on, too, watching it rain and blow as the fog lifts. We arrived 3 weeks ago today, and the weather has been cold, cloudy and or rainy, with only one or two sunny days; temperatures have been in the 50s and 60s with lows in the high 40s at night. We sleep under two comforters in our winter pajamas, and the forecast is for more of the same. We have been able to hang out the laundry only one time. So I’m happy to be upstairs at the computer where it is warmer.

Firsts

Each year there are things we look forward to as we approach the Island, and this year, as always, we weren’t disappointed:

The first view of the sea and the red rocks that mark the Island as we limped across the 9 mile bridge on an almost empty tank;

Planting those first seeds and pulling the first weeds;

Seeing our first lupins, lilacs and tulips;

Going to our first community small hall performance;

Reading the June Buzz to find out what there is to do here this summer – always too much for our minds to take in;

Reading the Sat. Globe and Mail and the daily local Guardian both of which give us a respite from the relentless ugly politics in the US and help us locate ourselves as participants in our summer Canadian home;

Our trip to the local market and our first dozen eggs from our friend, Carol; those eggs really do make recipes richer!

Seeing our first red wing blackbird as we take our first walk along the sea, our first heron perched on the sandy beach, and our first American gold finch and purple finch at our newly filled feeders watching them fight and fuss over a full tube of  niger seed;

Sitting down with Mary Oliver and our journals for the first time and beginning our summer of reflections;

And best of all realizing that our pace can now slow to a crawl until harvest.

Gardens:

We were able to get the veggie seeds in about a week after we arrived, and everything has peeked out of the red soil, but they are not growing as fast as usual because of the temperatures and lack of sun. This year we have planted carrots, beets, green beans, romaine lettuce, chard, kale, rhubarb, mesclun, cucumbers, and tatsoi (an oriental mustard green). We have weeded all of the 10 flower gardens as the weather and my back has allowed, so it has gone more slowly and peacefully than usual. I have finally realized the weeds don’t care when they get pulled. It’s a joy to watch the beauty of the flower gardens from the front windows surrounded by the sea and bayberries.

Entertainment

Festival of Small Halls Opening: The Island is dotted with small community halls from one tip to the other, and the Festival is a ten-day event that honors these rural halls with evenings of music, storytelling and dance. This year there are 33 events with performers from away (Nova Scotia, Ireland, Quebec, US) as well as PEI, and it showcases some of the best fiddlers in the world. The opening event was sold out and included performances by Richard Wood whom we go to hear each year and who makes the fiddle strings dance; Le Vent du Nord, a group from Quebec that plays classical Acadian music featuring the hurdy curdy, the accordion, fiddle, and guitar; Irish Mythen, a marvelous lesbian singer, and Meaghan Blanchard, a country western singer plus 3 story tellers and three step dancers from the College of Piping. It was a 3 ½ hour evening and took our breaths away.

The Full Monty: We were amazed that such a raunchy musical could be performed to sold out crowds on PEI – and it was a wonderful show. The Guardian had several articles about how the director had to work with the men to deal with their hesitancy about removing their clothes. While the full monty at the end was blocked from view by strong lighting, the men did appear in red g strings, and we certainly experienced their courage – especially the very heavy set man whose g string hardly showed as his belly covered it. I loved the show because through music and drama it deals with sexism, classism, racism, and homophobia. Our uptight Presbyterian neighbor, who went with us, was offended by the language and the inclusion of two gay men who fall in love and oh, my gosh, hold hands! So I guess it worked.

Books and Movies that we recommend:

The Space Between Us by Thrity Umrigar (set in modern day India with two amazing women at its center)

Suddenly and then because I liked the author so much A Good House by Bonnie Burnard (a Canadian author who won the Giller Prize)

The Room by Irish writer, Emma Donoghue, who now resides in Ontario

That Old Cape Magic by Richard Russo, a Pulitzer Prize winner and one of our favorite authors

And movies include: Mao’s Last Dancer (absolutely breathtaking); Blue Valentine, Made in Dugenham (set in London in the 60s about a strike at Ford by women – a sheer delight); Welcome to the Rileys;

Wolf Hall  by Hilary Mantel (set in England in the 1520s following the steps of Thomas Cromwell).

From Our Journals (Val)

Sitting in my chair                                              Wanting nourishment

With gratitude and delight                                  Earth fed by rain opens up

Aging like the trees                                           I dance in the mud

News and Views

The daily Guardian is the primary provincial newspaper. As such, it carries stories that are quite local in importance (.e.g., a recent front-page article outlined the 30 minute traffic delay caused by a fender-bender auto accident on the bridge coming into Charlottetown) although the one page ‘world-news section’ does give us a flavor of what’s happening globally. Interestingly, a recent ¾ page article carried the headline “New Mexico Fires Smother State in Smoke.” The Globe and Mail Saturday edition fills in global news, the arts and book reviews, in-depth reporting (such as gang-life on the Rez) while offering a range of opinion pieces. We spend most of Saturday afternoon and evening perusing it.

Sticker Shock

This is the first year in our sojourns that the exchange rate has turned against us as US  citizens. The lower dollar value plus bank transfer fees takes about $.05 out of each US dollar. Gas prices continue to be much higher here, about $5 a gallon, and our first trip to the grocery store reminded us of the higher costs for food.  All of which is a good exercise in remembering the importance of frugality, reducing tendencies to frivolous purchases. Taxes run about 15% on purchases – although a little less that ½ of that is for the universal health plan – so no complaints.

Our Karma?

Before we left Albuquerque, we spent some attention attempting to rid our patio of squirrels (not that we dislike the little beggars; its just they nibble away at fresh  plants); we successfully trapped and relocated 2 of them. After about a week here, having set out our bird feeders, low and behold one shows up. They are known to be destructive if they nest in a house (as one neighbor recently found out). So I got out our ‘coon’ trap and relocated our visitor. Only to have 2 more – probably juveniles – show up. They too have been relocated into the woods.

Harvesting

Last Wednesday we had our first low tide, so out I went to do some claming; found enough for our first batch of clam chowder. Had planned to go in Saturday as well (the best low tides are around full-moon and new-moon). But the persistent wind and rain prevented that. So now must wait until new moon.

From My Journal (WF)

Tidal time not only encourages a slower pace, but also patience. As Lao Tzu teaches: Do you have the patience to wait until the mud settles?” Rilke: “Have patience with everything that remains unsolved in your heart….Try to love the questions themselves, like a book written in a foreign tongue which one day you will learn.”

            Shouldn’t trees be doing more than just standing there

            adding another dark ring celebrating a successful rotation

            around the sun?

           

            Shouldn’t dandelions be doing more that just

            growing their roots deeper,

            popping up stems with yellow flowers

            camouflaging the next population explosion

            parachuting a 1000 progeny all around?

            Doesn’t the ocean have more to do than lick away

            at my shore, taking it away grain by grain,

            then heaping them somewhere

            giving clams a free home?

            And none of these spend much time with

            “if only’s” and “what if’s”.

And this prayer offered one day in a funk:

            Spirit, dance me into the center again.

            Lift this grey cloud,

            Or at least let it become rain

            For some new seeds trying to germinate

            An enthusiasm for the day.

             

What's in a name?

A brief side-trip: how I came to name this blog: emergence. It’s not so much a novel idea. In fact, a quick perusal of some recent book titles indicates how wide-spread the idea is:

• Emergence: The Connected Lives of Ants, Brains, Cities, and Software , Steven Johnson, 2002.
• Emergence: Contemporary Readings in Philosophy and Science, Bedau and Humphreys, 2008
• Emergence: The Shift from Ego to Essence, Barbara Hubbard, 2001
• Emergence: From Chaos to Order, John Holland, 1999.
• Emergence, David Palmer, 1985
• Engaging emergence: Turning Upheaval Into Opportunity, Peggy Holman, 2010
• The Emergence of Everything: How the World Became Complex, Harold Morowitz, 2004
• The Architecture of Emergence: the Evolution of Form in Nature and Civilization, Michael Weinstock, 2010
• The Re-emergence of Emergence: the Emergentist Hypothesis from Science to Religion,  Clayton and Davies, 2008
• (I myself have written an extended essay on emergence as the spiritual and moral foundation of human relationships)

What I have found to be a common theme in these explorations, is how conflict, collapse, deterioration, disorder, chaos, are not necessarily negative. In fact, emergence signals rebirth, regeneration, revival, reconnecting, rebuilding – all a part of the creative enterprise. As a mediator, for example, I can attend to the conflict which two persons may have with each other not as a problem to be solved, or reestablishing order, but the creating of a new relationship narrative, a new horizon of possibility.

While most political and religious institutions detest chaos and conflict, there are spiritual traditions which not only embrace such events but recognize the potential for new life, new beginnings in such situations. For example, Taoism affirms that it is out of chaos in which the new is created. The creation story in Genesis 1 is an affirmation of the creative power of chaos out of which comes the unfolding of life itself.

In the list above, Peggy Holman looks specifically at organizations and systems which are moving into a state of decline, even chaos and identifies key methods by which the new can be created, quickly or incrementally revive, restructure, redesign, rebuild that which is ‘falling apart’.

The recent experience of Egypt is another example of emergence, where the old order was seen truthfully for its incapacity to maintain the well-being of the citizens and out of the chaos is beginning to emerge new possibilities, all in spite of the futile attempts of the old order to maintain the status quo.

The emerging church movement is yet another example of those who have gathered around the evidence of the institutional churches growing incapacities to be relevant and are exercising creative options for new forms and ways of being church.

On a personal level, -- and here is where the theme fits in for me – emergence points to new perspectives that shift the landscape in which I find myself. The old voices and values keep tugging at my imagination. Yet, I sense a chaotic disentangling also taking place. Peeking into that vista awakens the possibility for creative discoveries.

Part of making all this more public is the possibility of sharing a larger conversation with you, one that generates a creative engagement with what is ‘emerging’.