Chris Jones suggests that the high technologies we are developing now with such vigour and at such expense, are leading us into a future that is not realistic. So what do we need instead?
We have become used to lives of increasing complexity, with a steady increase in the availability of ever smarter, labour-saving, pleasure-giving technology. What a few years ago seemed to be in the realms of science fiction is now indispensable to all but the poorest in society. But, I suggest, few us of feel this is a permanent progression. My own view is that civilisations are very capable of deconstructing themselves and I have a suspicion that this one that has nurtured us is in the early stages of that deconstruction.
Having been involved from the early days in the Transition Towns movement and in particular with local resilience in general I often think about the ideas and skills that are needed to make life tolerable in the resource-constrained world that we and our children now face. What does my village of a hundred and twenty households really need, come what may?
It turns out that we need a lot of things but very few of them easily fit into the realm of technology. They look more like skills, or practices, and professions. That it should be so is quite in keeping with my thoughts on one version of a quite possible future. My suggested list is not exhaustive, and I think it would be great to sit with a group of friends and speculate about what should and shouldn’t be on that list. For sure though, the average Joe or Joanna is going to have to be on top of a range of skills, especially those involved in growing and getting food — in other words a high degree of self-reliance at the household level, backed up by a range of specialist skills.
A shortlist of essentials
Our priorities should include:
Renewable Energy
Water Purification and Conservation
Sustainable Agriculture
Waste Management and Recycling
Telecommunications and Information Technology
Energy-efficient Transportation
Green Building Technologies
Healthcare and Biotechnology
Education and Skill Development
And the kind of skills and technologies we should and could realistically build upon include:
Blacksmith
IT – librarian
Basket maker
Potter
Apothecary
Tanner
Candle maker
Rat/rabbit catcher
Bicycle repair person.
Teacher
Butcher
Baker
Nurse/doctor/Midwife
Wheelwright
Cobbler
Chaplain
Saw doctor
Charcoal burner
A carrier
A builder
I completely accept that many readers may feel that these thoughts are unduly pessimistic and that it takes little if any cognisance of the incredible rate of technological change we are now experiencing. But set against the burgeoning debt of the capitalist world (and I include all three geographical entities of Orwell’s world in that), plus the steady march of climate change and the unavoidable end game of the fossil fuel driven economies, I think my pessimism is perhaps a kind of optimism. I’m suggesting after all that we might at least be able to grab some useful items to throw into the life boats of the sinking ship of the current paradigm.
The world that comes with this is at odds with what we know today, a world of constant growth, for there simply won’t be the spare energy to fuel that growth. It does not preclude change, though. We will remain curious beings who will always want to learn about our surroundings and our activities within it, and the effect of our presence on it.
Chris Jones is a Cornish Organic livestock farmer; has a BSc Forestry (UCNW) and is an ex forester with Fountain Forestry; a founder member of the Pasture Fed Livestock Association; a founder of Beaver Trust and instigator of the Cornwall Beaver Project; an ex-Rhodesian police, and ex-British Army Reservist; a long term member of the Transition Towns movement; a fellow traveller with XR; an ex-Drilling Fluids Engineer working from the North Sea to the Middle East; a founder of Low Carbon Ladock (a community renewable energy coop) and is married with grown up children.
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