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There should be little doubt that this 'new age' concern about our 'environment' is little more than a different tack toward top-downism. Or, rather: "the big worry in that case wouldn’t be powering my iPod so much as not getting eaten by cannibals":a great realization that we are wholly, and radically, unprepared to deal with any disruption to our (fragile) status quo. That we have,little, in the way of /civil defense/ training, should be tell-tale enough to keep awake at night, if not to pause us to wonder why.. 
There are lots of people living "off the grid" in the world today. Many of them do not have access to adequate food, clean water or proper sewage disposal either. Most of them are in that situation, not in spite of their governments' "top-downism", but rather because of it. Most of them live in villages. They live rather less well than those in the US who choose to live "off the grid", fragile as our existence may be.
Haha... We humans all live of the grid and not off the grid. The grid being nature. We cannot stop eating, drinking or breathing? I like the sentiments of the billions secret asian men... we need more individualism not less. Utilitarianism can be used to make an argument for environmentalism and animal rights - but any ideology and philosophy and religion can make a good agreement for it. Just as we can make great arguments for Might Makes Right based on any ideology - collectivism or individualism. I have become an environmentalist because of individualism. I have become an animal rights advocate because I do not believe in collectivism or utilitariansm. It is not about the group to me - it is about me and you. Not about humans per se. We all, group or individual, need the same nature to surive and to be happy. Respect for the individual implies acknowledging the few differences by recognizing the many similarities. He/she might not be as sweet, fast, intelligent as me but we feel the same - no need for seeking the Tree of Knowledge utility equation. We are not firstmost humans (gods), chickens (food), dogs (friends) but individuals who all want and feel the same. Every chicken is different compared to every other chicken. Some are by nature more extrovert and some more introvert but they all experience the same feelings based on their senses and their experiences. They have their own culture which they pass on to their young. Those at the top feel like those at the bottom. When you give an important presentation to the team, when you give birth, when you lose a loved one, when you play games, when you.. you feel what animal nature allows us to feel. Relaxed, anxious, fearful, confident, lust, hunger, appetite, etc. These emotions are older than any rational thought and are the basis for our experience. Our feelings are our only currency and if we could measure feelings on earth we would have a much better index than our bank account or the DJ or NASDAQ. If we destroy what keeps our senses and emotions happy - we will be off the grid. The problem here is that environmentalism forces us to acknowledge that the economy depends on the ecology and not the other way around. Worse - environmentalism forces us that happiness comes from the senses and emotions and not from rational thought (which is less present in humans than in Animals as Socrates argues. We are not the rational animal but the rationalizing one). This vital lie of the wanna-be-gods, that thought is above emotion, leads us to ignoring our own emotions most of the day. Why is Hillary really so angry? It connects us with a tiny, artificial class-system that shares the same education or terminology as us. It disconnects us from the grid of life. We need another and a wiser and perhaps a more mystical concept of animals. Remote from universal nature and living by complicated artifice, man in civilization surveys the creature through the glass of his knowledge and sees thereby a feather magnified and the whole image in distortion. We patronize them for their incompleteness, for their tragic fate for having taken form so far below ourselves. And therein do we err. For the animal shall not be measured by man. In a world older and more complete than ours, they move finished and complete, gifted with the extension of the senses we have lost or never attained, living by voices we shall never hear. They are not brethren, they are not underlings: they are other nations, caught with ourselves in the net of life and time, fellow prisoners of the splendour and travail of the earth. Please watch how we treat our emotions! They are earthlings and we are weaklings - afraid of our own emotions and what they prove to us every day without the need for faith and believe! Marry Christmess!
Guilty, "on the grid man" responds, hereafter OTG man says he is all for communalism or lets call it by one of the more mundane names; community man or commonwealth man, whose epitomy might be Ben Franklin. A man for whom the idea of a library, a grid if you will of resources available to everyman/woman in the land was considered a concept worth fighting for. OTG man says you stop short, as screeds like yours usually do and suggest that, may I?, off the grid man, is going to GO IT ALONE, say in matters of health maintenence,going to learn to set his own arm is he and cut his sides when its time for the appendix to go. And I must, just must suggest that he grows his own food as the matrix that is the food distribution grid that he now enjoys is gone along with the grid. As is all of the power to that which we share, retail, construction, manufacture or would our secret man suggest that they too "go off the grid". Bone up "off the grid man" cuz you and your kids are going to create their own wisdom, defend themselves against the forces of evil, and secure fuel for their Pria in mano e mano combat. Does off the grid man really want to deny the cooperation that is inherent in the success of any great community. Does off the grid man really imagine he can survive alone and apart as his asian brothers and sisters clog the roads, the air, and the hospitals with the consequences of their independence, Western Style. (John Wayne's name graces the gridded airport in Orange county, the hub for common carriers that whisk us to far away lands). No, OTG man realizes the absurdity of the concept, much more the arrogance and is content to share that which he has in common with his fellow human beings and hope the resources are there to repair the grid and keep it up. He remembers the consequences of the black outs, brown outs, and lights out, and realizes the scandalous hubris of anyman assuming he can go it alone.
PS: Scott made a great post. What Scott means when he writes about going off the grid is "living sustainably". Nobody owns the air or nature. It does not matter if we are talking about a grid-connected country or Robinson Crusoe - all animals have to follow the same natural laws of gravity and sustainability, group or individual. How much land would we need if we wanted to eat meat and drink milk? How much energy would we have to invest to harvest food and store it (in the case of animal products freeze it)? Right now there is no transparency regarding ecological costs in the market place. Growing your "own" food and energy can give you more transparency and hence can teach you a lot. But off or on the grid - we all have to live sustainably if we wanted to live. Getting off the grid as an individual living in the US while China is adding 90 GigaWatt in coal plants on a regular basis... Scott has made a great post. It started off by him realizing that even if he covered his house with solar panels - it would not produce enough to cover 100% of his demand. That is right but not the point of solar. Solar is only price competitive for peak loads right now (20-30% of energy). We lose money and nature if we do not cover peak loads with solar here and now. The off-grid For off loads it is far more expensive than non-transparent coal prices today. But following that rational - how much land do you need to feed yourself on animal products... Those who complain that solar would take too much space (a misconception) to cover 100% of energy demand should meditate in the following three key words first "livestock", "land", "species"... PS II: Shear Will - I loved your ballade. But like in the Opera - I am not always certain what was just sung. I think that we are in agreement but can you explain it to me as you would to a child?
Too often, those who talk about going "off the grid" overlook the fact that they are still dependent on interactions with the rest of the world. Some are really proud of the fact that they are literally off the (power) grid because their homes are totally solar powered -- but where did those solar panels come from? Bet they didn't make 'em in their very own garage!
"not getting eaten by cannibals." dunno about the idea of off-the-grid... since roughly 128,000,000 people live in the top 50 metro areas in the US [all areas above 1mil each] I'd think that the density prohibits them from going off grid anyway, without some small, powerful source of energy. Which neither solar, nor wind really are... {ie. if you live in high density housing, there isn't enough area on the lot to have adequeste solar for that.] if you all had some kind of fuel cell, then perhaps. The big however has been mentioned though. If someone has to deliver fuel to you in some way, you are no more off the grid, than if they deliver electricity direct. The bottom line is that most people are "fundamentally interconnected" regardless if if they like it.
SwissArmyD wrote: happily in this case... most guns don't require electricity to fire.
For those who are considering the virtues of living truly and completely off the grid, I have two words to make you reconsider: "Modern" and "dentistry."
I know someone who lives off the grid.
Not having to go outside to use the toilet is pretty handy this time of year, too.
Every chicken is different compared to every other chicken. Some are by nature more extrovert and some more introvert... And some taste better than others.
How can one live off the grid? What ever you burn to create power/stay warm emits C02, and if you do that, they will come to regulate you. The US government spends 3 trillion a year from a ecomomy of 13 trillion. If you drop out, they will still want "THEIR" piece of you. Keep your powder dry!
Gotta agree with Adams. Hey, I wouldn't mind going off the grid. It's just too damn impractical, at least until they come out with self contained nuke plant that'll fit in my closet. Deep inside, I long to live like the late Richard Proenneke. But of course, only on my terms. If there were some doomsday scenario forcing such a lifestyle change, we'd all be in a serious world of hurt.
Shecky, They don't have one that will fit in your closet yet but Toshiba is building a micro nuclear reactor that is 20 ft x 6 ft and is designed for small communities. I understand they are ready to install some in Alaska.
Ironically, a prime concern of many people in non-urban areas is getting ON the grid: That is, to get broadband internet access. (So thay can easily find and read stories like this one, of course.) While some grids are wasteful and inefficient, others (water delivery, sewage removal, roads and bridges, cell networks, and the aforementioned internet) are pretty darned necessary. Off-topic: Love your site's pop-up spell checker in comments. First I've ever seen on a blog. Where does one get such a thing?
While yes, almost everyone is on the grid, to some degree or another, its still beneficial to move as much off the grid as decently possible. For those who can't see the beauty of independence, let me just point out the practical value of hardening points in a network. If one of fifty houses has enough electricity from solar/windmill/propane generator/waterpower to keep on going for a couple weeks, this nation will pull back from the brink of the abyss with a LOT more ease than otherwise. These hardened nodes offer HQ's for the recovery effort after the Warplague/Nuke Strike/Asteroid Impact. They also hearken back to the Jeffersonian conception of America as a land of small farmers who are neither subservient nor arrogant. Its politically good for America that so many own guns. For much the same reason, it'd be good if more owned generators and a week's supply of fuel.
All you ON-THE-GRID people are p*ss**s. The beauty of off-the-grid is the challenge. Where's the challenge in sitting overweight in a big comfy chair, quaffing a six pack of Bud Light and munching on Cheetos all the while watching Those Cowboys?
Hey Snitch, Once you create your off-grid power supply, then you can power up all the broadband you can swallow. Wirelessly! You'll still be on a wireless network of course, but you won't be limited by the geographical reach of a conventional telecommunications provider. Americans who want to maximize their autonomy in an increasingly "grabby" world, will like the liberty that gettin' off-grid offers. Others will be led involuntarily to it by high energy costs and off-grid technological advances. Eitherway, I'm glad bloggers like Scott and Megan are pondering the topic. Thanks.
Off the grid will become more common in the near I look forward to the day it becomes the norm
Benefits of trade, anyone? -dk
I'm encouraged by these technologies, but I'm afraid they won't do much use where I'm living now. Sure solar power works fine during the day, but even the new batteries won't last through six months of night. And the nuclear option - although far more environmentally friendly than the fuel that is flown in for the generators, especially when you consider the fuel and other resources used just for transportation - is prohibited by treaty. If I were three hundred miles north of here, in the right direction, I'd consider geothermal. There have also been some terrific advances in geothermal lately, which could cheaply produce vast amounts of energy, and geothermal is not dependent on the sun shining or the wind blowing (although the katabatic winds are pretty consistent, I don't want to be the guy setting up the windmills in those 100+ mph winds). - Megan's southernmost fan
I am currently living on a boat, where I am effectively "off the grid". I have solar panels, a windmill, advanced controllers, a diesel generator, an inverter to make AC for some appliances, and a high-output alternator on the main engine to keep 7 batteries charged enough to power the lights and systems, run the water-maker, and enable me to listen to the radio and connect to the internet. I also have the ability to connect to the grid thru "shore-power" if I am in a marina. I am a 57 year-old engineer who used to design nuclear power plants, and let me tell you, this is NOT a simple system to manage. My wife cannot do it. People who want to go "off the grid" need to understand that their lives will become quite complicated, and they will have to learn a LOT of engineering to maintain these systems. And they will have to get their hands quite dirty, or else pay a LOT of money to people to provide them with regular maintenance. It is only practical for people like me on boats, or for remote locations when grid power is too expensive. Otherwise, it is just romantic dreaming. Ask yourself, could you mother maintain such a system in her house/apartment? Until it is this easy, it will not be practical. Ralph
Homes and businesses being I am not a builder but I suspect that homes and businesses today are being built using some of the old technology of the neolithic times (ramps, chisels, etc). Old isn't necessarily bad. I look forward to the day it becomes the norm So I take it from this that you build your own solar cells/wind turbines/heat pumps etc, rather than being dependent on equipment manufacturers? Do you mine your own ores and then melt them down for the metals, before refining for any high-quality steel, in order to make the equipment to build your plant to make the silicon for the solar cells? Out of curiousity, how do you find the time? (I personally have no particular desire to maintain a full set of electrical equipment, despite having a degree in electrical engineering, and I can't see any emotional advantages for myself in my money going to a solar cell manufacturer rather than some traditional power companies.)
Ralph, You are such a "killjoy"! Can't you just imagine the true joys of life as a noble non-savage? Go buy mom a good tool set for Christmas. She might surprise you after all.
Hugo, Are lions murderers? Or just mindless beasts? If they are murders, why aren't you preventing them from committing murder? If they are mindless beasts why is it not ok to kill/eat them and their prey?
Sam Are lions murderers? Or just mindless beasts? I do not have time for a short one and am uncertain if understand your question. What is a murderer to you? Why should lions be murderers or mindless beasts at all? They are lions. There are some vicious ones among them who kill the young of other lions and are punished for it if caught by the pack. There are smart and stupid lions too. Animal rights is not about killing as is being implied. That is as much a misconception as the claim that animal rights must be linked to utilitarianism. All living beings die. Death is rarely pleasant. What kind of death would you prefer?
What is your favorite death? To be honest – I have personally meditated a lot about death – following Epicurus’ and Buddha’s advice. It really makes you feel better about life when you are comfortable with your own death – no matter what it is. Even the most painful cancer death does not have to take longer than a few months – and compared to the many years of enjoyments that most of us have already experienced it is marginal and manageable. I have prepared my family about how I would like to them to behave when my time comes etc. I am therefore a bit more concerned about life than death. I have become an animal rights advocate almost two decades ago because I care about how beings live and not how they die. My family lived under a regime that protected them from violence, wild beasts and even fed them and provided universal health care etc. The only thing that was somewhat restricted was their freedom to express all their thoughts and also to travel where they pleased. Can somebody here explain why they literally risked their lives to escape this free-range existence? But I digress again. cont...
All the above does not mean that I do not feel empathy for those who have experienced a horrible death – but it is usually only a small part of the overall equation to me. For example - I do pity most carnivores in the wild. When I was very young – I thought, like most, that lions are powerful kings of the jungle. It took me a lot of awakening and reading and learning and observations in the wild to get the full picture. When I then read the discussion between Solon and Croesus – it became clear to me that the modern West holds the value system of Croesus, the Arian/Persian and not Solon the Greek. But I digress. Lions usually starve to death over many weeks and months. Rarely does a weak, old or injured lion get the luxury of a quick death via nature’s euthanasia aka being eaten by another carnivore. Prey animals are at first sight much better off. They do not starve as easily as carnivores and experience often relatively quick deaths. Even when a very big buffalo is being chased by a pack of lions – the chase does not take longer than a few hours. That is the worst case – often it is over in minutes. But as I said – I do not care if carnivores are at the bottom of the death chain or at the top – both carnivore and herbivore enjoy all animal emotions during their lives and that is what counts. It should not matter if you are a cop or a soldier who has to be violent or if you are a doctor who has to cure wounds of violence – both doctor and soldier determine their happiness based on their senses and emotions BEFORE death. The big questions to animal rights advocates is: Is there life before death! How has the animal that has been killed by a lion lived compared to the 25 billion animals that "live" in factory farms in the US today? But factory farms do not pop up over night. Such a perversion and disconnect from nature needs time to distance itself one generation at a time. The big question therefore, going back in history, for animal rights advocates is: how has an animal killed by a lion lived compared to an animal that has been killed by an ape hunter? Another consideration is: Why does the lion kill the animal and why does a hunter in the West kill an animal. How does the method influence the rest of the ecosystem, etc. Most hunters today kill quite different animals than lions. By that I do not mean that they kill different species. No – human hunters who have not evolved to kill with their teeth or their speed or their strength kill by using culturally and not biologically evolved weapons. We have enough nukes to destroy the planet how many times? But because of that – they find it easier to kill a big and healthy specimen rather than a young or old (the older and weaker the shier many animals become). It is the leaders of the herds that stand out and leave last. It is those who we kill. Doing that breaks the millions of years of evolution where the genetic strength of the species is determined by fair fights based on biological evolution. Lions and buffaloes live in perfect symbiosis, following natural laws of survival of the fittest and not destruction of the fittest. They are actually one animal. They keep each other alive and genetically fit. The lion has no hands for climbing trees in order to get to fruits. The lion has evolved to provide a quick death to the weak prey animals and to keep them from overproducing too quickly in order to avoid unsustainability. Because the buffalo continue to evolve most efficiently – they guarantee that the lions cannot overproduce quicker than their food can grow back etc. They are like racket and ball – they need each other to exist and for the sport to happen. The dictionary defines murder as: The unlawful killing of one human by another, especially with premeditated malice. A lion does NOT break any natural laws. And the lion has also no premeditated malice in mind such as pursuing a benefit despite his survival not depending on it... The delicate balance of ecosystems ensures animals' own survival — if they are left unaltered. Again - natural predators help maintain this balance by killing only the sickest and weakest individuals. Hunters using weapons cannot determine that as lions can. They kill healthy animals who are needed to keep the population strong. Elephant poaching is believed to have increased the number of tuskless animals in Africa, and in Canada, hunting has caused bighorn sheep's horn size to fall by 25 percent in the last 40 years; Nature magazine reports that "the effect on the populations' genetics is probably deeper." While hunting may have been a crucial part for some humans' way of life a 100,000 years ago, hunting is now nothing more than a violent form of recreation that the vast majority of hunters does not need for subsistence.
... Only because rape and murder is natural for some apes and also for humans - there are better ways, in line with nature, to deal with each other. The latest ape and our closest kin the bonobos but also some peaceful chimp tribes have proven that culturally/socially long before we outlawed it legally. There are much better, more natural, ways for apes to protect their lives than to kill animals. With billions of people on the planet - hunting has contributed to the extinction of animal species all over the world and is in not way sustainable. We could get away with it while we numbered only a million not long ago. But those times are over and the luxury and posing of living wasteful and against the laws of nature has reached its limits? Here some teasers for the discussion ahead:
The nutshell. Animal rights is about life before death - not about killing per se. Freedom of expression and freedom of movement. Lions respect all that. When humans kill the healthy adults rather than the weak young and old - they disrupt the whole ecosystem to their own disadvantage. Like a king who thinks he has dominion and intervenes with the economy so much that his own tax revenue suffers and the he becomes unpopular and at risk of.. When we enslave animals it is even worse. When we enslave animals and take away everything that is natural to them... Obviously we have come a long long way. We value ratio over emotions and the economy over the ecology. We trust hunters more than our biologists and ecologists. We seek magic in an universe beyond ours as if the only one we know were not magic enough. We seek faith and believe in all the wrong places when all we need to know is here and now right in front of us. Tolstoy called this condition Christianity with beef stake.... Marry Christmess
Hugo, It is widely quoted, referred to, that it takes 3 lbs. of 'fish protein' to raise, in aquaculture, an lb. of Fish.. Would you have, know of, better methods?
MEH Regarding my many linguistic, grammar and spelling "mistakes" – again, "I am talking and not writing to you" and I usually do not have time for a short one (where I am staying Xams is being celebrated one day earlier). Any writing deficiencies of mine are a combination of time pressure, foreign language issues, dyslexia, Xmas drugs, freedom of speech taken literally and generally not carrying. Even I find it charming. What is your excuse? Either way - thanks for the flirt and the bait. Regarding the fish dilemma – I would work on the root of the problem. Literally. Aquaculture should be outlawed asap if we wanted to have more happy holidays in the future.
Hugo, I hearya, though, I didn't think I was ragging on your syntax. If you ask me, post any way you care to. And, by Aquaculture, I was referring to on-land, indoor 'closed-system' Aquaculture. Do you still think it, too, should go?
MEH Aquaculture is as sustainable as using hydroponics to grow feed for factory farms. It is among the most perverse things that we humans have come up with from an ecological and ethical point of view. I have made the ecological case against hunting – why do you think that aquaculture should be better and not worse?
Hugo, I thought as much, as to your take, just wanted to be clear which Aquaculture I was referring to. It's a hard Q: our global Fisheries are being strip-mined as efficiently as ore bodies on land. What is going to be interesting is to see how we, even Vegans, deal with the continuing increase in the cost of foodstuffs..
MEH As vegans are competing with livestock feed you are quite right. It does not help that animal products have received hundreds of billions in tax subsidies and vegetables and fruits virtually none. Nevertheless - it should be quite obvious that the most efficient ecological and hence economical way to live is far down the virtual food chain. Yes - resources are getting scarer with almost 7 billion people on the planet - but that does not mean that the most sustainable method to live suddenly loses its attraction. Quite the opposite. Because there are 7 billion people on the planet we, for the first time, cannot be as wasteful as we used to when we numbered only a million. As I said - the age of showing off how inefficient and self-destructive one can be is reaching its limits? You can still be rich or poor - but the welfare state that supports your right to torture and destroy for taste and pleasure alone has reached its limit. As always - we will start to change only when it hurts and never before. Watch how, right after some CO2 measures, "water" markets will pop up next (right now water is not really transparently traded and priced anywhere). Land, the most important resource will be last. It will be a thriller. Question - if it really takes only 3 lbs of fish protein to raise, in aquaculture, an lb. of Fish - why not eat the 3 lbs directly? (fishing is not sustainable for the same reasons as hunting or factory farms - but lets go back, de-veleop, only one step at the time).
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This why I think leftist environmentalists are about to get the shaft.
They don't want environmentalism, you see, they want communalism. Some (understandable) ones want to be the rulers, and some (strange) ones want to submit and be protected, but both groups oppose individualism and want communalism.
Thirty years ago, it was "The earth is cooling! quick, we must all become communalists!"
Now it's "The earth is warming! Quick, we must all become communalists!"
Similarly, there's always "The population is too dense! We must rely on government-run mass transit instead of individual vehicles!" but also "The population is too sparse! We must rely on government-run mass transit instead of individual vehicles!"
(bear with me, Dilbert relevance is coming soon)
The solution given for global warming looks suspiciously like the solution given for global cooling looks suspiciously like the solution given to pretty much any other problem.
The solution given is of course the same one that's been given by autocrats and elites since the days of the Pharoahs: "give up your harvests, give up your freedoms, or the natural order of the earth will fail and you shall starve!". For only the Pharoahs with their learning can understand and placate the gods, and if the gods are angry, why the Nile won't flood.
But, here's what's going to backfire:
We, being Americans, won't go for that. When gas gets expensive, we don't become communalists, we buy hybrids. When power becomes an issue, we start looking at going off-grid.
Environmentalism may turn out to be the catalyst for yet more individualism.
I happen to like both things, so that would make me happy. It'd also make me laugh.
Posted by secret asian man | December 22, 2007 1:24 AM