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I went to the woods because I wished to live deliberately, to front only the essential facts of life, and see if I could not learn what it has to teach and not, when I came to die, discover that I had not lived.
— Henry David Thoreau, Author, Naturalist, Philosopher, 1817-1862

This week’s title reference to wildness is perhaps Thoreau’s most well known quotation: “In Wildness is the Preservation of the World.” This quotation however does not come from his many books and essays published during his life but from a booklet called Walking published after his death in 1862. We have a PDF copy of Walking in our Resources Section. For context the wildness preservation reference occurs on page 13 of that document.

However Walden, Thoreau’s most famous book, is looked upon by many in the environmental movement as a natural Bible. While not a scientific survey, it is not uncommon for backpackers and hikers to pull out of their packs a copy of Walden to provide their daily devotions.

Free copies of Walden, in a number of formats are found at Project Gutenberg, as well on Amazon where a search for “Walden Thoreau” returns 2,801 results. Top on the list is a pre-order release, this week, of a new paperback that features a log cabin and a side fireplace, not at all similar to Thoreau’s 10 foot by 15 foot shingled cape cod structure.

Thoreau began his stay on Walden Pond on July 4, 1846 and continued there for just 2 years, 2 months and 2 days, at which time he moved back to the city to house sit for fellow Transcendentalist, Ralph Waldo Emerson. It is stated that it took Thoreau longer to write Walden than the time he actually spent living in the woods.

In that enlighten vision I thought that this introduction would serve as a great segue into my announcement that I too am in the process of leaving my hut in the woods, and returning somewhat to civilization. While I have made numerous excursions into the outside world during this time in the Boulder Creek Canyon of the Kettle River, it would not be difficult to say that my time would be double Thoreau’s stay; essentially 4 years, 4 months, and 4 days.

Tags: Thoreau, 2nd Great Awakening, fear, Christianity, Amoeba Theory, Native Americans

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“There are no… limits to the carrying capacity of the earth that are likely to bind any time in the foreseeable future. There isn't a risk of an apocalypse due to global warming or anything else. The idea that we should put limits on growth because of some natural limit, is a profound error and one that, were it ever to prove influential, would have staggering social costs.”

— Larry Summers, Former Director, White House Economic Council, While at the World Bank

Plop! Plop! Fizz! Fizz! Oh, what a relief it is!

We need to no longer fear taking financial fizzics, yet the world has not lost its belief that a couple of effervescent tablets is going to make the financial heartburn disappear. But before anything can be truly prescribed to what ails us all, we must look squarely at the reality of the current financial disease.

Our current bellyache is best outlined in the totality of Larry’s worldview above. In a world based solely on the universe of money, and since money, as defined in the twenty-first century, has no intrinsic values or limits, by accepting the economist’s financial metafizzical universe, growth is by definition unlimited.

Again by this definition, it leaves out the complexity of the human personality and the reality of natural law, especially the real physics of natural energetics.

So what happens when the real physics of the universe comes into conflict with the world’s financial elite fizzics? An old cranky, primitive duffer like me tends to think that natural physics is going to win, along with all the natural laws that accompany this form of reality. Furthermore, to quote the esteemed Mr. Summers, “were it (natural limit) to prove influential, would have staggering social costs.”

Tags: fizzics, GDP, Larry Summers, Keynesian, FED, fear, metis, Natural Law