Anthropocentrism and Reality

Delt Church Park

I recently posted this article about the death toll in Arizona this summer due to extreme heat in a group I run, and one comment pointed out how we generally tend to be concerned for human health but not that of other species, quote:

"When are the headlines for non-sapien [non-human] fatalities going to be here? I get it...it is sad, but also extremely telling as to where sapiens' priorities have always been."

Can you think of other scenarios and/or events where we place our own outcomes above those of other species? Obviously, almost everything having to do with cars and/or transportation puts our needs and/or desires ahead of other species, including the existence of cars in the first place. 

While we're on the topic of human health, we might as well discuss mental health in this state of collapse we are in. This article sums it up quite nicely and really brings the predicaments we face to the forefront, and two quotes point that out extremely well:

"Healing does not come from trying to bring the dead back to life, nor from trying to stop what is inevitable. There is no healing in trying to craft a better ego or to become more “normal” amidst a context of poisonous conformity. As mental health professionals, we do not honestly serve our clients by colluding in denial of the truth of collapse, or by encouraging them to seek only personal solutions to the unsolvable predicaments of modernity. For real healing, there has to be something more, something deeper, something communal. If our treatment is only aligned with the individualist reductionist model, we are unwittingly contributing to destruction."

"We have to stop pretending that we’re not collapsing. There is no Meaning in feeding our lifeforce to a dying machine that proves itself increasingly unlivable and unjust. There is no way of encountering the healing reservoir of Love by struggling against the current of what is, just as building a house in a floodplain, no matter how sturdy, makes no sense amidst a context of runaway climate change.

The real work of healing manifests when we run out of options, when the progress machine or our personal machine breaks down, or we have the good fortune of temporarily pressing pause. This is when all our fighting gives way to Truth.

Rock bottom is not considered an “evidence-based” stage in the treatment of addiction. It won’t show up in the DSM-5-TR, and no insurance company will reimburse me if I write it in my notes. And yet we all know, intuitively, that this is often what it takes for an addict to turn the corner. Rock bottom, ultimately, is nothing more than finally making contact with Reality."

Finally making contact with reality...I really like that. I see it happening in real time with many folks, too. It is actually quite a beautiful scene to behold. The awakening I see in many people is leading them to reject the bullshit narratives constantly being hyped on many media sources. This is in turn leading those folks to discover new ways of living, most likely out of necessity if one sees the implications of what is happening in this video. Rock bottom, in this case of collapse, is understanding fully what ecological overshoot is and that our addiction to technology use is the root cause of it; meaning, of course, that there is no solution because it is caused collectively and we lack agency to be able to curtail said technology use.

While I can appreciate the beauty in people reaching acceptance of the predicaments we face, many times it is because of extremely saddening circumstances smacking them in the face. I often ask myself, "Could I have done better? Is there a way to speed up the rate of acceptance by society? How can I alert more people?" Yet, I realize that it was always going to turn out this way. It was, and is, only an illusion to think things could have been or could be different. Only someone who has reached the acceptance phase (of grief over the predicaments we face) is ready to truly comprehend precisely what those last two sentences mean. 

Coming back to the main topic of today's article, two slightly different articles about the health of species in the Snake River in Idaho and Oregon paint another picture of anthropocentrism and our concern for ourselves above the health of other species. The first one is about salmon and points to their potential extinction due to a variety of issues and the second one is about the poisoning of the Snake River with a copper-based poison, quote:

"Invasive quagga mussels were found in Idaho’s Snake River in 2023. An infestation would devastate Idaho’s economy and ecosystem, clog water pipes and steal food from native species.

Biologists typically kill off mussels with chemicals, adding just enough of a lethal dose to infested waters. But this type of treatment had never been done in a river before. Moving water would move the toxic chemicals beyond the treatment area.

State officials took the risk.

Only two weeks after that first mussel detection, the state spent $3 million to flood the Twin Falls area of the Snake River with over 40,000 pounds of the prescribed copper-based poison. They had anticipated some of the impacts, like scores of sturgeon, stocked from a hatchery, up to 8 feet long and 35 years old, turning up dead. But other effects of the treatment, and the fate of the copper itself, were unknown until now.

Two years after the treatment, a study by the U.S. Geological Survey detailed that the copper destroyed up to 90% of the invertebrates living in the area, putting at stake food resources for future fish populations in the river.

The treatments also didn’t eliminate the mussels. A year later, state officials applied another round of copper.

The effects of the 2024 treatments are still being studied.

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✍️ Alex Music | Idaho Statesman
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📷 Provided by Idaho State Department of Agriculture"

I'm having trouble imagining just how large a stockpile of 40,000 pounds of copper-based poison actually is. Of course, I probably don't want to know.

A qualifier on the title of this article - reality is based on the reader's concept, so it probably wasn't really the best choice, although I'm certain that most people understand exactly the context I'm using it for. Noticing how humans generally try to make everything about us isn't difficult once one first sees it. If only we understood that it really isn't all about us. 

I wrote an article titled, Popular Narratives That Do Not Hold Up Under Scrutiny, around this time last year based on what is commonly referred to by my community as hopium. Over the last almost 5 years now, I have written many different articles on this same general theme and the one thing most people don't appear to realize is that most all of the so-called "solutions" are based on things humans see as necessary but practically every other species sees little value in outside of food and water. In other words, most of those items are reductionistic ideas which don't see the issues from a holistic perspective. This article, Scrutinizing "Hope" and Popular Strategies and Goals, written in February of last year encapsulates much of the same hopium and destroys many of the myths surrounding those popular narratives.

Another new item which destroys many of the myths surrounding the stories we like to tell ourselves is a video containing material from a few years ago but just recently released publicly titled, The Next Great Extinction Event. Similar to an article I wrote about a video the late Will Steffen was featured in, it demonstrates precisely why most all ideas labeled as "solutions" are wildly optimistic and generally irrelevant in the grand scheme. Of course, trying to get people to accept these facts is difficult, to put it lightly. They apparently like to get caught in The Narrative Trap. This article here goes into more detail about how we are a rationalizing, storytelling, and narrative-generating species. 

Meanwhile, reality can be a cruel master. In an article about the extinction of vultures, the author shows us just how beneficial they can be for us and why their extinction will bring about ecological changes we should probably fear. Most people (like me) likely have no clue how close extinction is for them. How many other species are likewise very close to being obliterated from the living in the tree of life?

I'm certain that I could ramble on for many more paragraphs, but hopefully I've made my point more than sufficiently for today. On a more favorable note, please check out two more locations on my adventures, Cabwaylingo State Forest and Mid-America Windmill Museum!