Stephen Squibb - Academia.edu (original) (raw)
Papers by Stephen Squibb
from Georgia Sagri Georgia Sagri, Sternberg Press, 2008
Revolutionary theory begins with recognizing accumulation as a fact of planetary existence. We fi... more Revolutionary theory begins with recognizing accumulation as a fact of planetary existence. We find ourselves on a rock on which five billion years of solar accumulation have already taken place. If we also find ourselves in a planetary crisis, it is because rather than capturing the energy already falling on the earth, we have rereleased previously gathered energy back into the air. Rather than shifting our legacy infrastructures away from digging up old, consolidated sunlight and towards capturing contemporary sunlight, the latter continues to fall while we add to it the sunlight buried beneath. This doubling up on sunlight Ð adding the energy from the ground to what continues to come from the sun Ð is the cause, unsurprisingly, of what is called Òclimate change.Ó 1 ÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊKnowing what we know about planetary existence in the visible universe, it is likely that this problem Ð of climate change due to semi-intelligent, self-instituting sunlight burning the traces of a previous eraÕs self-organizing sunlight Ð is a fairly common one. Statistically, we can be confident that this planetary drama has played out countless times before across ours and other galaxies, and to various degrees of destructive intensity. ÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊWe can imagine a number of different planets confronting our problem in their own ways. Maybe some just solve climate change the way we solved polio. Maybe the sixth planet in Alpha Centauri just got solar power correct relatively quickly and the whole problem was avoided. But maybe this same planet struggled for centuries to construct an internal combustion engine. Maybe they never discovered the novel or invented their version of basketball. I wonder: of all the things we cherish about our semi-intelligent self-instituting existence together, which are truly rare in the universe and which are hopelessly common? ÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊIt is important to recognize that climate change is a problem we can solve, based on our institutional track record. It is a very big project, probably top ten, maybe top five, but it is totally manageable, and there are hundreds of thousands of semi-intelligent planetary societies that have solved similar problems. No doubt they struggled with other issues. Perhaps the arrival of the interstate highway system coincided with a residual commitment to fashion that resulted in centuries of passengers going without seat belts until some method was invented to secure these creatures with magnets. And that when confronted with the relative ease by which earth-critters invented the seat belt, representatives from the planet of seat-belt refusers will marvel at our wise intelligence the way we will marvel at how they solved the climate-change problem almost without realizing it.
Talks by Stephen Squibb
from Georgia Sagri Georgia Sagri, Sternberg Press, 2008
Revolutionary theory begins with recognizing accumulation as a fact of planetary existence. We fi... more Revolutionary theory begins with recognizing accumulation as a fact of planetary existence. We find ourselves on a rock on which five billion years of solar accumulation have already taken place. If we also find ourselves in a planetary crisis, it is because rather than capturing the energy already falling on the earth, we have rereleased previously gathered energy back into the air. Rather than shifting our legacy infrastructures away from digging up old, consolidated sunlight and towards capturing contemporary sunlight, the latter continues to fall while we add to it the sunlight buried beneath. This doubling up on sunlight Ð adding the energy from the ground to what continues to come from the sun Ð is the cause, unsurprisingly, of what is called Òclimate change.Ó 1 ÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊKnowing what we know about planetary existence in the visible universe, it is likely that this problem Ð of climate change due to semi-intelligent, self-instituting sunlight burning the traces of a previous eraÕs self-organizing sunlight Ð is a fairly common one. Statistically, we can be confident that this planetary drama has played out countless times before across ours and other galaxies, and to various degrees of destructive intensity. ÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊWe can imagine a number of different planets confronting our problem in their own ways. Maybe some just solve climate change the way we solved polio. Maybe the sixth planet in Alpha Centauri just got solar power correct relatively quickly and the whole problem was avoided. But maybe this same planet struggled for centuries to construct an internal combustion engine. Maybe they never discovered the novel or invented their version of basketball. I wonder: of all the things we cherish about our semi-intelligent self-instituting existence together, which are truly rare in the universe and which are hopelessly common? ÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊIt is important to recognize that climate change is a problem we can solve, based on our institutional track record. It is a very big project, probably top ten, maybe top five, but it is totally manageable, and there are hundreds of thousands of semi-intelligent planetary societies that have solved similar problems. No doubt they struggled with other issues. Perhaps the arrival of the interstate highway system coincided with a residual commitment to fashion that resulted in centuries of passengers going without seat belts until some method was invented to secure these creatures with magnets. And that when confronted with the relative ease by which earth-critters invented the seat belt, representatives from the planet of seat-belt refusers will marvel at our wise intelligence the way we will marvel at how they solved the climate-change problem almost without realizing it.