Defense Mechanisms and Technology Use

 

Lake Murphysboro State Park, Illinois

Recently, I have tackled several different themes all relating to denial of reality. Whenever I find something confusing or something I don't yet quite understand completely, my curiosity compels me to dig deeper. Several of these occurrences have happened within the past two weeks, and they all involve defense mechanisms. While I understood this to be the case, I came back to something I learned about a long time ago: compartmentalization. This is the process where a person mentally "separates" conflicting thoughts, emotions, or experiences to avoid the discomfort of contradiction. That uneasy feeling the contradiction produces is called cognitive dissonance which often promulgates denial. So, in a sense, compartmentalization is also a form of denial. By keeping certain facts and/or ideas "buried" in one's mind, one allows these conflicting ideas to co-exist by inhibiting direct or explicit acknowledgement and interaction between separate compartmentalized self-states.

This is frequently accomplished subconsciously, as are most defense mechanisms. We all have them and they generally exist in our blind spots until pointed out to us. I wrote another article about denial and false beliefs which goes into more detail, including about where our unsustainability began, quote:

"The extinction of herbivorous megafauna and other species (caused by both climate change and anthropogenic pressures as seen here and here) which fed ancient peoples along with countless evidence of violence against outside tribes and/or groups, the existence of "warriors" within the cultures, and that these systems of power have risen in most cultures, both Indigenous and European, point to the beginnings of unsustainability. Those systems of power and struggle are precisely what fueled the development of tools of warfare, and tools are technology. Technology use being unsustainable means that eventually, these cultures would have either developed technology on their own, borrowed technology from others through trade, or been wiped out by superior forces who utilized the power of technology against them. In other words, unsustainability would have prevailed sooner or later regardless of how sustainable a particular group was at a particular time period. This is the evolution of our species - cleverness is a feature, not a bug - and long-term wisdom is often exchanged for short-term gain as pointed out by human psychology and our addiction to dopamine hits (see Agency - Do We Have Free Will?).

Of course, I'm well aware that our capacity for denial in many ways exceeds our capacity for comprehension of the facts. There's even more denial I wrote about in this second part. Recently, in fact, it was pointed out to me that a new book by David Graeber and David Wengrow lays out the case for humans living in sustainable ways. I'm not certain that the book actually makes this claim and according to the reviews, I see no evidence of this claim. In fact, the reviews point to the duo turning the common myth of life in ancestral cultures being "poor, nasty, brutish, and short" on its head but say absolutely nothing about whether civilization is or is not sustainable. Either way, I don't see how a civilization eliminates the need to transport resources into said civilization and transport wastes out or the need to defend such a settlement against outside tribes and/or groups, the very reasons civilizations become unsustainable. So, the two issues which appear to be at the heart of unsustainability are civilization and wetiko. I wrote two articles (here and here) regarding the mindsets we tend to get stuck in which lead us into traps, and it is these very issues of unsustainability and colonialism which are at the heart of our inability to solve (or in reality, reduce, since predicaments don't actually have solutions) the predicaments we face."

So, what does compartmentalization, denial, false beliefs, and the roots of our unsustainability all have in common? They provide the behavioral basis for our use of technology (tools) which has created ecological overshoot. It is quite important from my perspective to demonstrate how all of this evolved and that all of it fits into who and what we are - a rationalizing species, not a rational one. I used to be convinced that we once were a species which lived in a sustainable fashion, and indeed we did. But our unique ability to develop and build complex technology had a predictable outcome due to the inherent requirements of said technology. In other words, things were always going to turn out this way; where we devised the very tools, the very systems, and the very means by which overshoot doomed us all. This does not equate to the people who originally developed each item or each system having known what it would eventually lead to. Each succession and each transition were seen to be advantageous at the time they were unveiled, no differently than the way society sees each medical advance or each success in fusion development or each step that demonstrates how AI (artificial intelligence) can work better. Each development is seen as "progress" and almost nobody ever looks at any potential long-term consequences down the road. So, none of these consequences was intended at the time the developments were made. 

This picture which I have posted before is rather helpful to discover precisely why this occurred:

Not only are we (as animals) dissipative structures, but all the technological devices (tools) we use act as dissipative structures as well. The energy for all of this must come from somewhere; and the more energy use employed, the more ecological overshoot is increased. Complexity is increased as more and more technological devices are added, and despite the hype one constantly is subjected to about so-called "clean" "green" "renewable" energy, everything relies utterly on the fossil hydrocarbon platform for its existence, maintenance, and eventual decommissioning. This means that the same energy laws that limit oil extraction limit ALL forms of energy production. While I assume that most of my regular readers already understand this, I also assume that these articles get sent on to others who may not have the same understanding - in these cases, this older video (less than 4 minutes long) explains things quite well.

I've said it before quite a few times; we are very clever beings, we're just exceedingly weak in wisdom. The Indigenous custom of thinking 7 generations out (into the future) is a very important strategy in terms of sustainability and one sorely lacking or missing entirely in many different fields today. Seeing things from an Indigneous perspective would definitely help and this TED video brings forth many different ideas, even if those ideas will no longer work very well with the new era (the Anthropocene) we are entering from the Holocene. If nothing else, at least these ideas are worth discussing. 

Here's another excellent video demonstrating lack of foresight. The ideas brought forth don't change the overall system of agriculture, civilization, or technology use. In fact, these ideas ramp up technology use; especially with the ClimateAI story. If one visits their website, this line appears near the top, quote:

"Turn climate risk into a competitive advantage - ClimateAi gives you the insights to climate-proof your business now and into the future."

That is a pretty hilarious claim, considering the fact that machine learning can not and will not control extreme weather events and the effects those events have across the spectrum of flooding, drought, infrastructure, supply chains, and on and on. Yet they also claim that they are "Climate-proofing the economy, while aiming for zero loss of lives, livelihoods, and nature." I suppose they can claim that they are only giving YOU the insights to climate-proof your business...but good luck actually accomplishing such a feat. One might as well play whack-a-mole. Never mind the fact that information and computer technology (ICT) are responsible for between 2.1% and 3.9% of GHG emissions, higher than the aviation industry at 2%. So, by hiring this company, you can increase emissions while possibly saving some money! More bargaining in an attempt to maintain civilization.

As is par for the course, all the ideas in the CBS video attempt to tackle emissions (a symptom predicament) instead of the root predicament (ecological overshoot) and its causes (technology use). The real trouble here is that these ideas might reduce one form of emissions here and there, while the emissions caused by actually applying and scaling up those ideas goes up, cancelling out any real benefit. So, in effect, while it looks like action is being taken, nothing of any significance changes because no systems are being dismantled.

One of the most frustrating parts of the constant stream of "solutions" I see being promoted to solve the predicaments we face is the simple fact that most of them just don't add up when looked at from a long-term perspective. Anything that supports civilization, for instance, most likely can do nothing but add to our troubles rather than promote the reduction of ecological overshoot. While I support some programs such as permaculture and regenerative agriculture, it is because I see these as being possible right now (but increasingly less possible as time moves forward). Considering the extreme weather events now occurring and the future forecast conditions, it is painfully obvious that organized agriculture will become difficult if not impossible in the near term, and regenerative ag and permaculture cannot overcome these long-term trajectories. Children being born today might live to see this situation become reality where living a nomadic lifestyle may be required, and this is only if nuclear war hasn't broken out and destroyed growing conditions for most plants. It's always wise to remember that tomorrow is never guaranteed. 

The same defense mechanisms mentioned above are also responsible for the constant stream of ideas which amount to little more than hopium or even worse, complete nonsense. While some of these ideas may be technically possible, the likelihood that they can gain widespread traction in society in general is remote at best. Themes such as "the more beautiful world we know is possible" come to mind. Hundreds if not thousands of utopian societies have been attempted based upon this same concept and have failed. That certainly doesn't dictate that one of these ideas cannot succeed where others have failed, but the main question here is whether these ideas are actually truly sustainable or not and whether said ideas could be popular enough to gain wide acceptance. Let's face the facts - society isn't likely to adopt a plan much different from today's system of civilization. Letting go of today's technology even though it is entirely unsustainable is highly unlikely due to loss aversion, which humans are highly resistant to. I certainly want to believe in a better world, but I look for facts, not hype; and most every idea I've seen (and I am admitting that I haven't yet seen them all by far) doesn't pass the sniff test. 

One reader made the comment in my last article that the cultures of East Asia "were able to sustain themselves for nearly a millennium, and could have lasted still longer if not for the intrusion of the West." A culture being able to sustain itself for nearly a millenium is great, but that doesn't mean that their culture was necessarily sustainable from an ecological standpoint. It just means that negative feedbacks were able to do their job at keeping the population low enough not to go into overshoot. Many Indigenous tribes were able to likewise accomplish this same feat. But one must remember that these were local and/or regional populations and not the population of the entire planet. Nature doesn't recognize national, state, or tribal borders. Many people hope that somehow we can make civilization sustainable, but the reality is that we can't. There is literally no way to provide the technology required to support civilization (with its concomitant requirements) AND have that technology and civilization be sustainable. As the supply of food grows, so does the population. As more people enter the workforce, new ideas emerge on how to tackle what are seen as problems. New technology is devised to solve these problems, which creates new problems once said technology is scaled up. Sooner or later, the civilization collapses, the people who are members scatter in an effort to find habitat, and a new civilization is born somewhere else. This worked as long as there was still pristine habitat available elsewhere, but today there is no such thing.  

For me, I gave up on the idea of "solutions" quite a few years ago. Whether they are technically feasible or not is pretty much irrelevant if they cannot win majority approval and gain widespread acceptance, knowing that what is really required is something few will want; these ideas of "emergence" and "a new civilization" and "the more beautiful world" sound great but lack any real substance. Most of them actually increase ecological overshoot rather than the opposite. 

Finally, the one thing to keep in mind (and repeat to yourself often) about all of this regardless of what kind of circumstances we may find ourselves in: "Remember, you must die."

Live Now!