Current random mix of interests: (low/appropriate) technology, science (open, electrochemistry, mech/chem eng), libertarian socialist/municipalist type stuff , social ecology, degrowth, cooperatives, manufacturing, academia, federation, open source (hardware mostly).
The Dispossessed (in later printings titled The Dispossessed: An Ambiguous Utopia) is a 1974 utopian …
First fiction I've read in a while, and first time reading Le Guin, really liked the book! Lefty science folks are sure to enjoy. Themes of collectivism, anarchism, feminism run throughout. Kind of a world like if Elon Musk wanted to take over Earth instead and deported the nonconformists to Mars. Relevant to our current times...
About what I anticipated - essentially a manifesto for traditional green-growth, technocratic climate solutionism. I do admire what Saul has done with Otherlab, building practical solutions outside academia and trying to implement them. Their lab is a model of how to do public-facing applied research outside of a university. But he seems stuck in a Bay Area mindset.
The book's clearest sentence: "It means that instead of changing our energy supply or demand, we need to transform our infrastructure - both individually and collectively - rather than our habits."
I couldn't agree less.
He has read Graeber on debt though!
Assorted notes: book is entirely US-focused. Written for a general audience. Half of residential energy use is space heating. Highway transport uses 10x energy vs. air travel sector. Advocates ditching 70's-style "efficiency/sacrifice" rhetoric for one of clean energy abundance (I also embrace a rhetoric of abundance, but under degrowth). Electrification …
About what I anticipated - essentially a manifesto for traditional green-growth, technocratic climate solutionism. I do admire what Saul has done with Otherlab, building practical solutions outside academia and trying to implement them. Their lab is a model of how to do public-facing applied research outside of a university. But he seems stuck in a Bay Area mindset.
The book's clearest sentence: "It means that instead of changing our energy supply or demand, we need to transform our infrastructure - both individually and collectively - rather than our habits."
I couldn't agree less.
He has read Graeber on debt though!
Assorted notes: book is entirely US-focused. Written for a general audience. Half of residential energy use is space heating. Highway transport uses 10x energy vs. air travel sector. Advocates ditching 70's-style "efficiency/sacrifice" rhetoric for one of clean energy abundance (I also embrace a rhetoric of abundance, but under degrowth). Electrification > efficiency. Very soft/lacking on discussion of mineral requirements (cobalt, neodymium), very car-centric, yet realizes the urgency of climate and related issues. Promotes 100% electrification of US economy without any degrowth, which leads to a staggering estimate of material requirements, like tripling electricity generation. He and his lab have done much work on these estimates and energy/carbon accounting though, which is valuable work. He is doubtful on thermodynamics of carbon capture, which is realistic IMO. Very big on heat pumps. Suggests ramping production of goods in line with availability of clean energy, and increasing physical goods storage capacity appropriately. Acknowledges wood can be good for heating in depths of winter for those with the right local sustainabile supplies. Against geoengineering. Pessimistic on hydrogen as energy carrier because of low round-trip efficiency (I agree). Pushing for gov't-backed lower interest rates on climate-related domestic tech. Lots of invoking WWII production/New Deal-era industrial /gov't mobilization. Admits going vegetarian is pretty impactful. Acknowledges smaller houses are helpful to reach targets. Not anti-nuclear, thinks nuclear should stay in mix and adopt SMR's/etc but acknowledges nuclear is way more expensive than new wind/solar. Advocates planting trees! Lots of cool data-rich diagrams. Under his electric US, each person requires 4kW on average at all times, and therefore a 20 kW, 2,000 lb solar array! (across the economy, presumably).
"Not since Marx identified the manufacturing plants of Manchester as the blueprint for the new …
Highly recommend reading this if you're interested in transitioning away from capitalism by embracing the commons and decentralized collaboration. Good high-level overview of several topics.
Feels like a dystopic future, except it already happened
5 stars
At various points during this book, I could not believe what I was reading. The West Virginia mine wars were brutal indeed, and the events are shockingly unknown in the modern American public discourse, at least in my social network centered in the American Midwest.
This book is thrilling, and to me evoked an aesthetic similar to the Wild West, despite being about labor struggles in Appalachia. It made me watch the film "Matewan," which I also recommend. While the history recounted is overwhelmingly tragic, it's also inspirational for modern times. The labor organizers and sympathizers of this era overcame incredible odds to achieve unionization.
Imagine if Amazon and Jeff Bezos owned vast swathes of land, spanning entire state counties - including the roads and all other public infrastructure (even more than they already currently do). Then, imagine Amazon setting up their own Amazon police departments, hiring their own sheriffs, …
At various points during this book, I could not believe what I was reading. The West Virginia mine wars were brutal indeed, and the events are shockingly unknown in the modern American public discourse, at least in my social network centered in the American Midwest.
This book is thrilling, and to me evoked an aesthetic similar to the Wild West, despite being about labor struggles in Appalachia. It made me watch the film "Matewan," which I also recommend. While the history recounted is overwhelmingly tragic, it's also inspirational for modern times. The labor organizers and sympathizers of this era overcame incredible odds to achieve unionization.
Imagine if Amazon and Jeff Bezos owned vast swathes of land, spanning entire state counties - including the roads and all other public infrastructure (even more than they already currently do). Then, imagine Amazon setting up their own Amazon police departments, hiring their own sheriffs, etc, all with the express approval of a seemingly legitimate state government. Then imagine Amazon constructing company towns, forcing warehouse laborers to live in squalor and pay for rent, purchase foodstuffs and other essentials in company scrip / "AmazonBucks." In such a scenario, any labor uprising would be immediately crushed with violence - if not infiltrated by spies. This is not too different what happened during the mine wars, and yet there are countless labor victories and for the most part, unions inevitably prevailed.
The book was shocking, thrilling, and somehow gave me hope, despite its primary-source coverage of a series of mostly horrific events. Largely isolated laborers were able to organize and overcome the circumstances of their times to improve their condition despite being vastly outnumbered and under-resourced, and I gained hope and motivation from learning of their ultimate victory.
