Cohousing-L Mailing List: Re: Coho & LIFESTYLE CHANGES--> Sustainability?

[Stuart Staniford-Chen (stanifor]

Rob writes:

> lack of respect/understanding of those differences.   To claim that 
> some values are better than others, is subjective to your viewpoint.  

I disagree.  The way one chooses to live has consequences down the line, and 
so it is often possible to tell something about whether a given set of 
values is good or bad by looking at the results of living by them.  To 
choose an extreme hypothetical, suppose you believed that it was essential 
to your kids development that you give them several sound beatings every 
day whether they misbehaved or not.  In twenty years, if we found all your 
kids in mental institutions, we could conclude that your values were bad, 
while if they all turned into stellar citizens we could conclude that you 
might have been on to something.

Similarly, the test of the twentieth century's values about resource use 
will be the state of the planet in the twenty first century.

Now I recognize that in practice some issues will always be gray.  To take 
an example: suppose when all the Amazon rainforests are gone, Latin 
America turns into productive farmland and not much else changes.  Then it 
will be still be very much a value judgement as to whether it was better 
to have the rainforest or the farms.  On the other hand, if the Amazon 
area ends up as arid semi-desert, and also the resulting climate changes 
affect the North Atlantic circulation so that the agricultural productivity 
of Northern Europe is severely damaged, then the world will have very 
little trouble agreeing that our rapacious removal of tropical rainforests 
was a bad thing.  

Thus facts and values interact in complicated ways, which is why I think 
"all values are subjective" is too simplistic a picture.

(I am not saying that either scenario is more likely for the Amazon.  But
humanity is getting to the point where our impacts on the natural systems
of the planet are big enough that it is no longer safe to assume the 
impacts can be absorbed without changing the systems - we just don't know 
what is going to happen.)

> If I don't hold your values, and you proclaim them to be superior, then 
> I can just write you off as an "extremist".  

That is always your privilege.  My point is: time will tell.

Anyway, we are all extremists here, no?

< deleted -     1) Communities should agree on their values in advance. 
                2) Values are the root of passion
>

I agree completely.

This discussion is straying further and further from cohousing.  I would 
prefer to go back to Mike Mariner's ideas on specific ways to reduce our 
impact.  *But* I, for one, would appreciate it every time someone proposes 
straw bale construction, or attached walls, or higher densities, or any 
other progressive environmental measure, you could be a little slower and 
more stinting with the cold water (particularly since you speak with a lot
of authority on many topics on this list).

Stuart.