Aims:

1. Identify/vet potential 'ecolate' (systems literate) elders who share a 'matter-energy systems worldview' whom the young may view as credible/accomplished (developmentally accomplished as distinct from merely achieving longevity) to form an elderhood, a Union of Concerned Elders.
   1. Invite each to write a warning to young humans (13-19 year olds) such as they once were (if an ecolate elder is illiterate, e.g. a Kogi Máma, they would need assistance to transcribe their warning).
   2. The writer of a passable warning will then be invited to consider/critique the current warning/warnings.
   1. The end result, when significant changes end, is to be one multi-faceted yet coherent warning.
   2. Possible is one core warning narrative with noted points of non-consensus thinking noted.
   3. Each signatory may submit a personalized warning to explicate their concerns.
   3. The warning(s) will then be shared with elders who did not write a warning, who will be asked to be signatories with editorial input considered.
   4. Prior to release to the public, 1,742 world elders will have to be identified/invited and agree to sign/endorse the warning.
2. Public release of the elders' warning to include preparations for the possibility that some young humans (<100, <1,000, <10k, <100k?) will respond.
   1. Responders may seek additional information, which can be provided online and in print.
   2. Responders may seek to be educated outside any schooling system.
      1. Students may seek to leave their social setting to study within a community of learners, an academy, having a shared aim of renormalizing the expansionist form of human with respect to the nature of things, aka reality (to become functional, sapient, adaptive, evolvable humans again).
      2. Multiple regional campuses with subsistence working communities (perhaps 20 to 50 band-sized communities, e.g. food production, arts, crafts, construction focus) of 20 to 50 individuals are to envision, as is a foundationally different (i.e. 'New') education system, one that does not exist to serve the global monetary growth culture.
      3. The global academy, six ecolate academies, and the 30 sublate universities are for advanced studies, and so the 50 community and 50 person limits to size may experimentally extend up to 150 communities of up to 150 autodidacts per community of scholars in an Academic Watershed Management Unit of up to 22,500 humans (dependent on trade),well above (hence potentially non-viable) human ecology norms of 400 to 2,500 individuals, a limit set to help modern denormalized humans renormalize.
3. The work of the academies will be to transition from all existing non-viable forms of society to a viable form of civilization by renormalizing humans to live properly (in a manner that works long term as determined by the nature of things) with the planet (and one another).
   1. The outcome of such an endeavor is unpredictable and failure (e.g. no literate humans, such as with the Indus Valley Civilization collapse or Late Bronze Age collapse, pass through the bottleneck) is a possible outcome, as is human extinction.
   2. Within an alternative learning community, a vision and implementation of a viable future, of a viable ecolate civilization, may auto-organize and be replicable (spreadable).
      1. What works could be selected for to spread among those who would be adaptive and evolvable agents (which excludes those currently locked into serving the business-as-usual monetary system in its various forms).
      2. If the modern techno-industrial form of civilization proves to be non-viable, considering a viable form of complex society will become more thinkable during climax and on the downslope.
         1. Consider the possibility of one academy becoming 30 academies worldwide, each a latter-day Library of Alexandria preserving prepared information packages, supporting 2k to 8k autodidacts of all ages living in up to 150 satellite communities, low-intensity agrarian/forager communities, each endeavoring to renormalize, within a two hour walk from the central academy/library (a 250 km² or 62k acre area).
         2. Each academy preserves information packages on media and in the form of lifelong learners endeavoring to live in viable communities able and willing to share what demonstrably works with those on the downslope whose teachable moment has come.

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"If society does not succeed in changing attitudes and institutions for a harmonious descent, the alternative is to prepare information packages for the contingency of restart after crashing." —Howard T. Odum, systems ecologist

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Elders may send a letter/email to colleagues they assess to be potential elders (whose acceptance into the elderhood will be pending the outcome of being vetted by other elders). For example:

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Topic: A possible World Ecolate Elders' Warning.

"If society does not succeed in changing attitudes and institutions for a harmonious descent, the alternative is to prepare information packages for the contingency of restart after crashing." —Howard T. Odum, systems ecologist

 

Dear Potential Signator:

The goal of the Union of Concerned Elders is to issue a warning with 1,742 signatories, approximately the number as signed the first World Scientists' Warning to Humanity in 1992. Quantity is not the goal. A common adjective that was used was 'top' or 'prominent' scientists as in over half of Nobel Laureates signed. H.T. Odum was presumably invited to sign (and did) and David Suzuki (who likely would have signed) was presumably not. All scientists, active or retired, were evidently not invited to sign.

Selection was by a core group of scientists (the Union of Concerned Scientists) who had resolved to offer humanity a warning. They invited others, and as others agreed, they could have become part of the selection-by-invitation dynamic. The outcome was the intended warning that the media would have to view as an event to report. The warning, if not front page news, spread about the planet in 1992. And 25 years later, a second warning, more inclusive with 15,364 signatories, was offered with a similar outcome.

Waiting until 2042 to issue another warning is to reconsider, both as the pace of change is rapidly increasing and the prior two warnings failed to slow the pace of planetary destruction. To consider is: Issuing another warning, but not to humanity (evidently not listening, being distracted by their prattle).

Are there humans who are more likely to listen? How about 13 to 19 year olds who are likely to pursue a higher education? A third warning directed specifically at them could have a different outcome (a guess to be tested).

A core group of ecolate elders have each written their first draft of the warning independently, then together are iterating towards a final consensus warning. Those who would consider signing (with editorial input) or joining the core group as a writer, may do so. Those who offer to be a potential signatory will author their warning independently and submit it for consideration (anyone who self-identifies as an 'ecolate elder', which could include the Pope, President Xi, or Elon Musk, may submit a warning). Potential signators will then be vetted by the extant core group (initially members of the Naturocracy Alliance of Concerned Elders).

Those whom the elders come to consider a plausible ecolate elder will be invited to become (anonymously to members other than the core group) part of the invitation/vetting process. The Elders will 'meet' in a closed to non-members online forum and do so anonymously (identity not known to members other than core moderators who will need to vet potential signatories/co-authors for association). Anyone seeking to be an ecolate elder (which could be an illiterate indigene with help of a stenographer) will be vetted and if accepted, they will know, but not others. Anyone claiming to be an ecolate elder could not have their claim verified, and so no ecolate elder would make the claim. Identities of signators will become known only if/when the warning is published.

The consensus warning is that the current world socioeconomic-political system (WSS) that selects for growth is not remotely sustainable and may not be reformable (i.e. that a Great Selection is coming). If modernity is judged to be reformable (into its opposite dynamic, one of managed degrowth to a steady state whether a prosperous way down or not), if its sustainability is deemed possible, then activists by all means should seek to be schooled to better serve the WSS dynamic by reforming it.

The warning, however, adds that such efforts to 'save the world' by reforming it may fail. If there is evidence and reason enough to be concerned about civilizational failure, and some young people come to a best-guess view that failure is locked into the WSS, into modern techno-industrial (MTI) society's trajectory, then seeking to be educated (schooled) by the MTI/WSS hegemon will be incompatible with their best guess. While any view of the future will be wrong, at least in any details, we are playing (evidently badly) a high-stakes endgame and all of us humans had best not assume the MTI/WSS form of civilization will win/persist (by foundationally changing) because it is too big to fail.

The goal/outcome is to encourage all young people to consider three futures: 1) the MTI/WSS is viable (e.g. when the singularity comes, everyone will become a transhuman, so let's just keep on keeping on), 2) the MTI/WSS is not viable, but is reformable, so let's work to make it work, and 3) the remainder who guess that the MTI/WSS form of civilization is foundationally not viable (i.e. life as they know and are intended to live cannot be made to work long term), but perhaps could be replaced by a form of civilization that has the potential to become viable. The third pathway will involve having to work outside (walk away from) the MTI/WSS dynamic to replace it.

One widely expected future requires only that everyone do what humans are now doing (business as usual), but maybe better, and with more enthusiasm. The other two pathways (Plan A and Plan B should Plan A fail) require action, i.e. reform the WSS or commit an act of revolutionary change that replaces it prior to complete dissolution. For those who take the path less traveled by (likely <0.1%), the ecolate elders can provide support.

Initial support will be an online meeting place to allow young'uns, after self-identifying as Plan B'rs (along with the few adults who have already come to doubt whether humanity can persist in its MTI/WSS form), to auto-organize and endeavor to instigate a viable form of civilization able to persist as the millennia pass. The other service to focus on is to provide vetted best-guess information about humanity's problematique and any resolutique that might work. Documents, graphics, databases, message boards, subgroups (open or closed), polling of members, chat areas, an event calendar, and an 'ecolate' (a Garrett Hardinism) wiki will be hosted. If more than 10k young humans refuse to be schooled, support would include founding a matter-energy systems worldview academy (one or more, 30 regionally worldwide, but start with one).

The initial outreach comes first as a precondition for anything that might follow (e.g. a viable form of civilization), including a favorable to posterity (and the biosphere) outcome. This involves 1) a warning message, 2) 1,742 credible/vettable ecolate elder signatories (ecolate="systems science literate" based on M. King Hubbert's "matter-energy systems worldview," but not limited to professional scientists).

David Suzuki has come to self-identify primarily as an elder. Elderhood, as a developmental achievement, is short for 'the set of developmentally advanced elders' (as distinct from chronological elders who achieve only longevity). Implied is George Mobus' 'sapience' (or at least the endeavor to be). The 'elder' meme is chosen to describe those who would tell young humans what they would tell themselves when they were 13 to 19 year olds (if they could).

Please, for posterity's sake, consider what you would want to say to your former self, a pillar of error, ignorance, and illusion (a likely product of MTI schooling). Each potential signatory should consider what their message would be, in writing for maximum clarity.

The action called for now is 1) do not reply, or 2) reply with a few words (or many) to express your critical thoughts and concerns related to the proposed warning. One option is to write/submit your warning. To include prior elders/mentors now dead, a collection of quotes should be included to preface (and postscript) your best-guess elder's warning, so please cite past elders of note by quote or reference. Authors may be invited to consider and help rewrite the current warning/warnings. If one consensus warning is not possible, then from the many views, a few may be distilled.

 

Thank you in advance for your consideration,

 

A Would-be Ecolate Elder (WEE),
To apply, contact webmaster: webmaster(at)naturocracy.org

 

Articles for public consideration may be found at the Medium publication: World Ecolate Elders' Warning

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PS: If the MTI growth society fails, "does not succeed in changing attitudes and institutions for a harmonious descent," and "the alternative is to prepare information packages for the contingency of restart after crashing" is an adaptive/sapient best guess, then:

In 2022, 13-19 year olds numbered about 700,000,000. If 10% (7,000) of 1% (70,000) of 1% (7,000,000) of them refuse to be schooled, but seek an ecolate education, then that is enough to found the first academy watershed management unit (AWMU). This would be noticed by a significant percentage of the 13-19 year old cohort (and the 20-24+ year olds not fully committed to an MTI life). A goal of founding 29 other ecolate academy watershed management units (AWMUs, one per global sublate) would be actionable/achievable with a bit of matter-energy flows diverted from GDP growth (i.e. money diverts flows). Each AWMU would serve as a model for other regional watershed management units (WMUs) to form about the AWMU. If ten form on average about each AWMU, then some AWMUs and associated WMUs may be able to pass through the foreseeable bottleneck, with information packages intact, for the advent of rebuilding a viable global civilization, including replacing the AWMUs that were overrun, based on perhaps 25,000 WMUs, 25k eggs in humanity's basket (which could have a better outcome than 1 global MTI egg).

 

As envisioned by members of the Naturocracy Alliance of Concerned Elders, founded 2019