Veganism vs. Extinction Event

Being out of synch with society is one way to identify iconoclasts.

Being out of synch with a jury of my peers is something I value, though it seems to preclude all those traits identified with career-ladder climbers.

Being out of synch with majority perspectives lends me a contented smile. However it’s not something I leverage and monetize.  For much and more on the phenomenon of contentedness, I recommend the works of Hariod Brawn.

Arcane topics of personal interest elicit mighty yawns, eye-rolls and eye-flinches among my fellow sapiens. This realization makes me most mindful and grateful for the readers who lend me their attention span, I am curious about the value systems of those who choose the seldom trod path for a living. I also suffer from “fear of not learning something.”

Now, let me test your patience with some more evidence supporting the existence of THE ANTHROPOCENE, something that elicits yawns, eye-rolls and eye-flinches among the masses of asses who would rather shrug shoulders, move bowels and move on.

ages

What are the odds of each of us actually being present on this planet as it prepares to shrug off the shoulder shruggers? Staggering or no? 

Consider the sheer number of homo sapiens presently residing on this orb.

Now consider that our population is increasing at an increasing rate, and now stands at 7.x billion, 97% of these guys consume 70.x billion edible and appetizing fellow Earth inhabitants per annum. Each of those non homo sapiens possesses a highly developed central nervous system, each has two eyes. There’s a market for every part of an animal, from fur to marrow, nose to tail. See my piece Inverting Pork Rectums for a Living for more. By the way, that article was inspired by William Brigg, statistician to the stars. 

Here’s the thing about veganism methinks: it removes a complicity with this butchering of 70.x billion this year and 70.x butchering of brand new beasts readied for butchering next year. By the way, I’ve an issue calling the slaughtered “beasts” and the slaughterers “consumers.”

AnimalsVeganManifesto_CVF

Did you know that only a few rodents survived the firestorm that accompanied Meteor Meets Planet. We are the descendants of those rodents.

In 1915 a chemist named Fritz Haber discovered a process for isolating nitrogen atoms from the atmosphere and combining them with hydrogen for the mass production of fertilizers, explosives and pesticides.

Not surprisingly Haber received Nobel Prize for Chemistry in 1918. Nobel knew a little chemistry himself.

Haber also invented Zyklon gas, a pesticide.  IG Farben removed the odor from the hydrogen cyanide product so that the exterminated in German death camps would not be alerted until it was too late.

fritz.haber

Ironically Fritz Haber’s achievement of  increasing population ultimately brings the concluding moment of the Anthropocene closer.

You may have read news items on the massive decimation of flying insects in the last few decades. I am old enough to remember wiping the windshield clean of accumulated flying bugs every hundred miles or so on Summer drives. Today your wipers clear dust and debris only. You could put off cleaning bugs from the grill until they built up by the thousands. I recall seeing massive tanks along the Ohio River at Cincinnati — mostly labelled Sohio and Monsanto.

Rex Tillerson began his career with Exxon at the same time that Exxon scientists discovered that their product would tip the scales in favor of runaway global warming.

Most hardware stores in my neighborhood stock massive aisles of their über money-maker Roundup® — don’t buy into their propaganda. Merely a suggestion of course.

Ending on a positive tone — vegans and proponents of sustainable living have much in common. Go team!

Discover veganism, another mere suggestion 🙂

Thanks for reading

Nothing, or a Useful Pot?

Hariod Brawn has asked me to write my take on “nothing happening” and “nothingness”. So it is my every privilege to respond with something on nothing. For all and each, with sheer gratitude for simply being in the company of my readers.

Hello in there. Hello.

hello-in-there

Critics of composer John Cage are legion. His best known work 4′ 33″ is a quite quiet piece. Audiences chime in with coughs, traffic noise, sound absent upon the stage. Movements end with a drop of the piano-key lid, they begin upon opening the lid.

 

The most common objection to 4′ 33″:

“Why, anyone can do that.”

Cage’s reply:

“No one had before I did.”

Nothing doing, or doing nothing.

cage-against-the-machine

 

You may know of the Zen koan on the cup full and the cup empty. Some good nothing there.

That reminds me of something. Reading literature in original language is a way to avoid the lie of translation. All translations are variations on untruth. Poetry is highly susceptible to mistranslation. Reading Rilke in the original German is worth the effort.

Languages are subtle windows into culture. Deliberate mistranslation is a bludgeoning tool for propagandists.

Perhaps I digress.

“Yes.”

Oh well.

“Death to America” is a deliberate mistranslation from Farsi, inexcusable ignorance of ancient and marvelous Persian culture. The proper translation is “Down with America,” but the word “death” suggests “jihad” and feeds Islamophobia. Bomb ’em. 

Now, back to nothing.

Well, almost.

Die Unendliche Geschichte by Michael Ende quite accurately tells the universal tale of a nihilist threat: das Nicht (The Nothing). This tale is nothing like that empty cup or the useful pot. Milne wrote about a wonderful birthday present that Piglet gifted Eeyore: “The Useful Pot.”

useful-pot

Emptiness can be wonderful. It can be horrible. Another fantasy by Ende: Momo. A tale of time thieves who deviously steal hours at a time from unsuspecting, innocent hardworking people.  Give us the time of your life and we will invest it for you. Momo is a homeless waif who lends her time freely and with gratitude. A most rare quality.

michael-ende-momo-copy1

I proclaim that we are all existential, and by “all” I mean all sentient beings. We all exist, but some of us are exploited. To the victors go the history books — sometimes those victors also build expedient death camps for tasty or despised fellow sentients. Truth is not something generated by majority rule.

Do I again digress?

“Yes.”

Oh Well.

Thanks for reading.

 

 

 

 

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