What I meant on Friday was...

My post on Friday was a bit disconnected, sorry about that. Let me see if I can explain myself better.

Social conflicts of opinion can usually be seen as a group of optimists ("ops")positioning themselves against a group of pessimists ("mists") or vice versa. Who came first matters in this case because a group of ops can start to change massive public opinion before the mists can get in there. You can apply this model to almost any public debate: the environment, the economy, The War, etc. Even more convenient for me and my theory is that you can MAKE it fit anything: Thai vs Chinese food for dinner, the decision to have kids, MySpace.

When you have these well-defined groups it makes it very easy for the debate to continue ad inifitum. Pick a side, read the appropriate literature, and, soon enough, everyone has an opinion. Unfortunately for the subject at hand, not a lot gets done because it appears to be hard for people to have an opinion and still keep their mind open. A two-party system appears where you're either one or the other, you're either part of the problem or part of the other problem.

The environmental debate rages on just like this, one side versus the other. We're either on a course for utter destruction or everything is completely fine. The grey area is approaching zero like an e^(-x) function.



Just like any social debate, the answer, OF COURSE, always and will always lie in the grey area. If you are unwilling to believe this you need to check your convictions and start reading more.

Which is why I enjoy examining the middle. I like the idea of our chemists and biologists and physicists working diligently (like we enjoy) towards real progress. I also like the idea of them getting to their jobs on magnetic trains, bicycles and EV scooters because that's the only way to get anywhere anymore.

I like the idea that everyone has a backpack they take with them because that's how much stuff you need to get through your day. You have your own coffee cup and silverware and you don't leave home without your touchpad PC/reader or your solid-state hard drive copy.

I like the idea of our crappy, destructive, selfish technology (think thoughtless use of fossil fuels, thoughtless industrial pollution, thoughtless waste creation) crumbling apart as it becomes unnecessary and outdated. I like the thought of vastly unsustainable corporations shrinking and being gutted, forced to make changes that they mocked for years as being "unproductive" and "not profitable." I like the intricacies of biology taking over where human ingenuity has reached a perceived brick wall. And I like the fact that all of this can only happen at such a pace that you have no idea what's happening until it does... because that's just the way it is.

I'm not a hippie and I'm not a captain of industry so I like the grey.

Well, sometimes: