Re: [GBlist] Better than OT politics

["Paul" <webmaster@globalcircle.net>]

Some of us have tried to help keep this list out of political arguments,
because we were asked to.
Then there are these corporate spinmeisters who keep baiting us. When will
they be stopped? There are other lists they aren't allowed to disrupt like
this. And we can just go to those lists instead, and goodby to this list.

--paul, webmaster http://globalcircle.net
peace and liberty, sustainability and justice
*********** REPLY SEPARATOR  ***********

On 1/28/02 at 5:10 PM Mark R. Johnson wrote:

>I am completely a newcomer to reading this list. I came to it because I
>wanted to learn about BUILDING, using the kind of methods which are
>highly economical. You can call them Green if you want, most people do.
>I would be more comfortable with the term "Low-Impact", if other people
>are willing to use that.
>
>Why? Because I am a conservative person, past the approximately college
>age when those "The World Will End" litanies are believable. I used to
>think there was some possible truth to that, now I regard it as a
>gigantic scam which some people use to base a career of fear-mongering
>on. 
>
>Do I think the world will exhaust its oil? No I don't, this lament has
>been made many years running and the world has always changed to
>disprove each earlier forecast of doom. Do I want to therefore drive an
>8-mpg, 7000-lb vehicle myself? Hell no! 
>
>Do I think we are morally wrong by using more energy than Europeans,
>than Africans, than Chinese, than the world average? In my opinion not
>as long as we pay for it using open market, consenting adult
>transactions. Do I therefore want to live in a house which costs $3000
>to heat and cool each year? Hell no!
>
>But I would point out that improving the gas mileage of all Suburbans by
>a couple miles per gallon, would do more good than the Toyota-hybrid
>owners have done so far. Improving the energy efficiency of mainstream
>homes by 10% is quite achievable, and that would do more good than the
>small population of really "green" believers do with their own lives.
>Those are essentially conservative actions, not revolutionary but
>evolutionary. But after making those modest improvements and helping the
>world, we can discuss how valuable it is to go another step -- if we
>keep this up for an extended period, a lot of good can be done for the
>world.
>
>So we can conceivably agree on *actions* and *values* to a very
>meaningful extent, without requiring we synchronize our ideologies. That
>is what I would prefer to do. To me, all this off-topic jabbering about
>what's wrong with the world (as opposed to more light-hearted or
>humorous griping) is just a philosophy that I have considered and
>rejected, and this forum does not seem like a very good place to talk it
>all over again. Surely there is another forum somewhere about the
>"Green" issues where you can discuss that more directly.
>
>Regards -- Mark Johnson
>
>P.S. A very influential book I read about 25 years ago was titled "THE
>CHICKEN LITTLE SYNDROME". You can probably guess what it was about.
>Right now I am slogging through "THE SKEPTICAL ENVIRONMENTALIST" and
>trying to decide how valid are the vehement criticisms printed in the
>January Scientific American. But what I would really treasure would be a
>book on how to build a super energy-efficient home in the hot and humid
>South part of the country.
>
>______________________________________________________________________
>This greenbuilding dialogue is sponsored by REPP/CREST, creator of
>Solstice http://www.crest.org, and BuildingGreen, Inc., publisher of
>Environmental Building News and GreenSpec http://www.BuildingGreen.com
>______________________________________________________________________




______________________________________________________________________
This greenbuilding dialogue is sponsored by REPP/CREST, creator of
Solstice http://www.crest.org, and BuildingGreen, Inc., publisher of
Environmental Building News and GreenSpec http://www.BuildingGreen.com
______________________________________________________________________