civilization collapse

tainter says civilizations collapse becuse their problems solving solutions eventually fail to solve problems but what he doesn't say is why my hypothesis is that elites fail to solve to the problem. sumerian elites were aware of the problems mayan elites were aware of the problems roman elites were aware of the problems spanish elites were aware of the problems british elites were aware of the problems french elites on hispaniola were aware of the problems cuban elites were aware of the problems russian royal elites were aware of the problems USSR elites were aware of the problems US bank elites were aware of the problems Enron elites were aware of the problems you can't imagine they were stupid or blind or unaware so why did the elites not solve the problems? personal benefit behaviors that that had established their wealth and position as elites were the problem a tipping point had been passed private profit public peril elite exist to exploit the commons as parasites it is

carrier group etc = gilt kings sword and armor = impotent and vain and useless against weapons that negate your defenses i learned that after the attack on the USS Cole - the navy in employs a "cloud" or "net" divers to patrol the underwater perimeter increased costs for no increased benefit - just maintains status quo carrier groups? vulnerable to carrier busters china is rumored to be developping tanks? humvees? IED's that cost next to nothing to build and are extremely effective attack helicopters? they can be taken down by lucky shots from an RPG assault rifles? kalashnikovs can be purchased for less than $100 what do all of these examples of have in common? American weaponry can be destroyed by weapons that cost 1 to 4 orders of magnitude less the financial burden of this is crippling the US - effective destroying the US economy and it's ability long term to confront external threats immediate action is required to develop and deploy weapons that compet

Tainter says - "Tainter argues that sustainability or collapse of societies follow from the success or failure of problem-solving institutions" Consider "wicked problems" and "super wicked problems" - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wicked_problem - and it's just a matter of time until there's a bullet with your civilization's name on it...

http://www2.macleans.ca/2011/08/18/get-ready-for-armageddon/ "Yet within a decade the United States will be paying more in interest payments than it pays for the military—and that’s not because the Pentagon is such a great bargain."

List of wars and disasters by death toll - http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_wars_and_disasters_by_death_toll and my favorite new phrase - Anthropogenic disaster!

What do Joseph Tainter and the Lockheed Martin F-22 Raptor have in common? You guessed right if you said "declining marginal returns on investment in complexity"! According to wikipedia "Upgrading the first 183 aircraft to the 3.2 upgrade is estimated to cost $8 billion." - which works out to $43 million per plane. Don't you wish you had that software development contract? Sure the contractors make more money - but civilization suffers as a whole. The wikipedia also notes that "the Ada software language was blamed for slow progress and increased costs on the program, leading to a reorganization in 2011." When in doubt - blame the tool. But what is this really about? Why are these planes needed? Why are the new capabilities that these planes represent needed? Why are the upgrades needed? Incremental threat escalation. It is not a called an arms race for nothing. These planes with these newer capabilities and upgrades a

Der Spiegel has an excellent article - that highlights the "destruction power" of fininacialization - check it out here for a 2011 look at the crisis: http://www.spiegel.de/international/business/0,1518,781590,00.html

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Financialization In his 2006 book, American Theocracy: The Peril and Politics of Radical Religion, Oil, and Borrowed Money in the 21st Century, American writer and commentator Kevin Phillips presented financialization as “a process whereby financial services, broadly construed, take over the dominant economic, cultural, and political role in a national economy.” (page 268). Philips considers that the financialization of the U.S. economy follows the same pattern that marked the beginning of the decline of Habsburg Spain in the 16th century, the Dutch trading empire in the 18th century, and the British Empire in the 19th century: (It is also worth pointing out that the true final step in each of these historical economies is; collapse) ". . . the leading economic powers have followed an evolutionary progression: first, agriculture, fishing, and the like, next commerce and industry, and finally finance. Several historians have elaborated this point.

trends - increasing population increased population results in increased resource depletion increased resource depletion results in increased exploration increased exploration results in increased border tension increased border tension results in increased border hostilities increased border hostilities results in increased border skirmishes one border skirmish at the wrong time, at the wrong place, with the wrong people results in war what is more precious in war time than life & liberty? - resources - intelligence - labour - time what do armies consume? - men - weapons - medical supplies - munitions - alcohol - avionics - satellites - chemicals - vehicles - computers - telecommunications - debt / finance / bonds what will war do the stock market? bonds? mutual funds? gold? silver? what can produced and sold at a profit during war time? - hospitality services what happens to the civilian economy? what careers / skills will people pay gold for? - security - resources - health - me

there was once a beautiful island in the pacific ocean, off the coast of chile. it was not too and not too small. it would take about 8 hrs to walk around the island. a long time ago the people that lived in chile sailed in large open boats for fishing. they carried lots of water and food so they could sail for weeks. one day a group of fisherman found the beautiful island. it was covered with great trees and had a spring with fresh water. the fishermen went back and brought their families, and live pigs. perhaps by accident or maybe on purpose they also brought rats. life was good. they cut down trees to build more boats for fishing. they cut down trees for houses. but still there were lots of trees on island. they were able to catch so much food from the ocean that they lots of spare time. over time the number of people living on the island as more and more babies were born. the people living on the island each wanted their own space so the island was divided in to 6 or 7 areas.

moai - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moai their construction mania is likely the cause of the collapse of rapa nui consider how big they ACTUALLY are:

Civilization collapse and willful blindness are likely linked. Roman senators were likely willfully blind. American congress members are likely willfully blind. The Sumerian elite were likely willfully blind. Tainter rising complexity addresses the how but not the why. Willful blindness addresses the why.

men compete for resources women reward men for collecting resources men that use a military industrial complex have better reproductive success men that build bigger moai have better reproductive success and the afterlife? if only it were true it breaks my heart that the meek will NOT inherit the earth that good deeds in this life will not be rewarded that ancient people's whose ancestors were all killed are gone forever from the gene pool we are the descendants of Cain make no mistake - the meek are dead and it breaks my heart to accept it

intuitively the conclusion i get from: "consider military industrial complex users - are they better able to reproduce than non military industrial complex users?" or "evolution has selected for weaponizers, exploiters, polluters" or "consider fossil fuel users - are they better able to reproduce than non-fossil fuel users?" is that this is true of the competition between males for females that is the males that have the most reproductive success are the weaponizers, exploiters, and polluters - and so those characteristics are propagated further when i consider this i am struck by other existing civilized high density populations in the ecosystem - ants and bees. they build complex structures, they alter their environment, they have complex communications - and they use males for reproductive purposes only because males are too expensive

facts: - indigenous people's fight civilization -- the celts fought the romans -- the gauls fought the romans -- the amazonian peoples fight the canadian mining companies - why fight? -- because the civilized people act brain damaged -- they pollute rivers -- they destroy forests -- they dig huge holes in the groud -- that is the behaviour of someone with brain damage - consider rapa nui aka easter island -- the civilized people that built the moai -- did moai users have better reproductive success? -- did competitive moai (ie. building bigger) have better reproductive success? -- they chopped down the last tree -- they lived on an island -- no trees = no boats = no food - consider the farmers of the central valley in california or farmers in ancient sumer -- the water table falling -- salt increasing -- increased production leads to decreasing yields -- http://www.cvsalinity.org/ -- http://related.springerprotocols.com/lp/de-gruyter/salt-seed-and-yields-in-sumerian-agriculture-a-c