I sometimes have the oddest sensation. I feel as if I have only the most tenuous grasp on my train of thought and if I let go it will just fly apart. Odder yet, when I am in this situation conversations are sometimes hard to follow. I hear words and I can feel my brain absorb them but only through a strong effort can I chain them together to make anything with any larger semantic value. Fortunately, this doesn't happen very often. Just enough to keep me on my toes. It is, however, kind of an interesting thing to add to the how the brain works (or doesn't) pile.

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Welp, I've finished Daniel Quinn's _Ishmael_. While not the best writing I have ever read it is definitely worth a perusal. Quinn is trying to say something very important. Before I launch into some kind of lengthy discussion of the book, however, I would like to get one thing off of my chest: The main character annoys the unholy hell out of me. Glahhhh...

The rear cover of the book says something about a want ad that reads: "Teacher seeks pupil. Must have an earnest desire to save the world". Nice line there, and, oddly enough, that's what the book's about. I'm not sure I can tidily sum up the premise yet. In fact, I'm not sure I really have my brain around it. In pieces, it's easy to ingest. Taken as a whole, however, it is another matter. I guess what I came out of it with is this: Capitalism bad, diversity (mainly in the biological sense) good, most of human culture in trouble thanks to failure to coexist (fit in to the natural order of things).

The first two of these points are sort of obvious when you think about it. Capitalism, in the end, really serves no one and diversity and speciation are critical to having a workable ecosystem. On second thought, I dunno... maybe those aren't too obvious. Leave me a comment if you want more info. I'll try and dig up some links about the world capitalist system and ecology. The third tidbit is, imo, by far the most important and ties in with the other two in interesting ways.

I suspect, as does Quinn, I believe, that our failure to fit into the natural scheme of things will be our undoing. Take, for example, the issue of population control. Most animals have simple population control mechanisms... namely there can only be as many individuals as there is food to support. Most humans, on the other hand, have the capability to increase the amount of food available to match or exceed what is needed (the magic of agrictulture). On the surface this seems like a wonderful thing... and it is... except that instead of leading a better existence thanks to a plentiful food supply, we will continue to breed to exceed any surplus. Looks like a nasty feedback loop to me. It is NOT sustainable.

Just for extra fun add to this the fact that we are systematically eliminating anything that competes for the resources necessary to continue this feedback loop. This is where we tie back in to the diversity/speciation line of thought. The more "competitor" species we eliminate the less diverse, hence more fragile, our ecosystem becomes. And, for completions sake, we have a capitalist/corporate culture that actively conspires to sedate us into to overlooking these problems. Problems that will, in the end... well... will be the end if we fail to do something.

Unfortunately that leads us to my point of confusion. What do we do to break the loop. It's hard to break out of a broken society from inside only to erupt into some lonely but righteous vacuum. Quinn advocates a kind of pyramid scheme of education. I, I guess, am playing the doubting Thomas.

At any rate it is a fascinating read if you are not too picky about his narrative tone. Give it a go because I need someone to discuss it with. Any thoughts on what you have read here?