don't know if the google WMD thing below still works. maybe it was a temporary hack done for the "hacking" contest of a few days ago. hope it is still there.
it's dark and cool - but humid - outside this morning so i'll head out for a walk in a minute. this is easier said than done for me, since i have to check blood sugar when i wake up and if it is too high correct it with insulin pump and wait for it to come down while the sun comes up, which quite often means no walk until it's too hot. speaking of type I diabetes today is the day for my yearly retnothopy - sp? - check with eye doc. used to dread it, as blindness is such a bugaboo. nowdays i just go, thankful that somehow they will deal with me, even tho i don't fit into any socio-economic pigeon hole. in a culture that defines identity by role, marginalized pioneers sometimes pay a heavy price.
which reminds me of a sci-fi book by harry harrison i read a lifetime ago, bill the galactic hero, in which there were people called the "de-planned", who had lost thier way in the cutural matrix. can you say "marginalized"?
ken wilber, along with a lot of other folks, think that the outer edges of culture is where the action is, where the values and worldview of the future emerge. in a discussion i had with friends the other day it was observed that maybe some of us, because of this, might consider this group the true "elite". i don't. i think the "dispossesed" might be more accurate. i don't think any mature person would voluntarily put himself or herself in this catagory. but i think more and more folks will find themselves there. has to do with values, experience, intuition, and perspective, none of which are wholey self selected.
speaking of wilber, i am just about finished with sex, ecology, and spirituality, reading the footnotes at the end of the book, where i found this:
"for a particular chilling account of this retribalization and it's growing influence in the immediate future, see robert kaplin's 'the coming anarchy' in the february 1994 issue of the atlantic. kaplan also sees the world heading towards globalization, but with an extended period of retribalization: 'whereas the distant future will probably see the emergence of a racially hybrid, globalized man, the coming decades will see us more aware of our differences than our similarities.'
"kaplan ties his thesis to the work of van creveld's transformation of war, homer-dixon's environmental studies, and huntington's thoughts on culture clash: under various intense environmental and demographic stresses, numerous state mechanisms of governance will fragment into ethnic tribal bands. and, kaplan points out (quoting van creveld), future 'armed conflicts will have more in common with the struggles of primitive tribes than with large-scale conventional war' (i.e., regression to tribal warfare prior to state warfare about which van clausewitz theorized).
"...and thus, kaplan points out... 'in places where the western enlightment has not penetrated and where there has always been mass poverty, people find liberation in violence.'
"...as tribalized warfare increases: 'because the radius of trust within tribal societies is narrowed to one's immediate family and guerilla comrades [largely preconventioal and egocentric] , then truces arranged with one commander may be broken immediately by another.' likewise, 'when cultures [ethnicities], rather than states, fight, then cultural and religious monuments are weapons of war, making them fair game.' "
