WE CAN HAVE 'A VISION'
(It is, for now, still  a matter of choice)

by Jeff Berg

December 27, 2005


We can have a vision: A vision that holds that the weak are to be protected, not made to compete unto death so as to achieve some imagined greater purpose. A vision that holds that selfishness is a childish attribute that all need outgrow not the basis for whole systems of human endeavour. A vision where the fundamentals of equality include the equality of opportunity, for freedom without opportunity is a devil's gift. A vision which is founded upon the idea that the resources of nature belong to all for all time and as such they are by law to be nurtured and renewed. A vision which holds that it is an evident truth that nature's bounty is not held in our portfolios today for the purpose of exploiting to the point of extinction but instead held in trust for all time and for the sustenance of all future generations. A vision which holds the equally evident truth that the future belongs only to those who plan for one. Mankind has no guarantees. If we want a future we are going to have to gain it the old fashioned way. We are going to have to "Earn it!".


Today we are seeing the violent reaction of a vision reacting to its terminal stage, a vision that history will refer to alternately as the era of the Anglo Empire and the 'Age of Oil and Industrialism'. A vision which today holds that it is the manifest destiny of the U.S. and its branch plant managers to grasp and consume whatever periphery they are able to claim as their own. Whether this ownership comes by sword, dollar or pound of flesh. This vision recognizes no limits to itself, no limits to growth, no limits to Nature. As such this vision fails the test that reality puts to all visions. And so, as it has ever been when man's vision failed to recognize nature's limits, it will fail. "For when reality and theory conflict it is theory that must and will give way." [1]


To date our civilization has been like a young child, precocious, selfish, and dreaming of a limitless world where everything material is possible and nothing material is forbidden. Ever since we were granted the power of Newtonian mechanics we have striven relentlessly with great energy and ingenuity to harness the forces of nature. And when we discovered natures most energetic bounty, the one time gift of hydrocarbons, and then the seemingly limitless potential locked inside the atom, our dream took off like a rocket towards the stars. Now we had the power to bend Nature to our will and service, and to force her for the first time to act as our slave, to serve us and our youthful dreams. This was perhaps an understandable part of our development as a civilization, as a species, the foolish but in many ways laudable striving of creative youth to reorder the cosmos in its own image. But it is time now to adapt this project to our more mature understanding that there are limits to this world we inhabit. And it is true to say that just as our parents tried to teach us the lessons they learned the hard way about limitations, and we tried to listen and instead went out and also learned the hard way. So too has society tried to listen to its wise women and men who have preached to us about the nature of limits and the limits of Nature and instead we have gone out and had to learn the hard way. As I say, this is perhaps understandable, in any case it is certainly true. But again, now is the time for us to mature, to act like adults, to plan our legacy. For we are but mortal men and women, and what we do is not now nor has it ever been solely or even principally for ourselves but for those that will come after us. Our family, our tribe, our country, our species are part of a continuum. We were granted extraordinary favours by those who came before us and it is incumbent upon us to do the same for those that come next.


To do this we must act together and we must act now. We must use our collective will to bring about the creation of a new body of laws and regulations. Laws and regulations that legislate that the laws of man and his commerce be brought into harmony with the laws of nature. For it is past time that we bound ourselves to living within the confines of limitations that are after all at least as self-evident as the human truths of liberty, equality, fraternity and the pursuit of happiness. I leave you now with my most favourite of double edged swords, a quote from Marion King Hubbert: "Our ignorance is not so vast as our failure to use what we know." For all of us now our work is to ensure that this blade cuts the right way for it may well be that what many of us suspect is in fact true and that time is doing terrible things. Be well and take heart for those two things will ever remain by far our most valuable resources and skills, yours truly, Jeff Berg.


[1] Senor Juan G. Carbonel