Overview:
The book contains a range of topics which include epistemology, economics, national security, and agriculture. The topics are intimately tied, especially because each has a political theme. To understand information, needs an understanding of a lot of related information and how they interconnect. With that information can an understanding be built as to the potential consequences of behavior, alternative ways to behave, and solutions to problems.

Citizens within democratic societies need to figure out how to manage the various topics together, rather than just have decision told to them by leadership. Citizens need to discuss the issues, and understand the consequences of taking certain actions, because they impact other citizens and nations. Economic production can threaten communities and the environment, but citizens can change policies and behavior. Conflicts do arise, but if they are resolved with violence, then violence becomes justified. To end cycles of violence requires peace oriented behavior.

National Security, Violence, and Democracy:
Leaders speak from a perspective of representing citizens, but the decisions made are by the individual. They do not necessarily reflect what citizens actually think. Leaders during war assume an acceptable price, but that price becomes what was paid. There never was an accepted level of sacrifice. While others make sacrifices, those who live proclaim them acceptable.

When a nation is attacked, the reasons for defensive action would be publicly known. Alternatively, reasons for aggressive or preemptive action would not be publicly known, but known to the few close to the center of power. Preemptive war can be started by the leader. Justifying the war with secret information, without the need to share the contents of the secret information. The war is planned in secret. Without the need of forewarning to execute the plan.

Preemptive attacks do need secrecy, for a discussed preemptive attack would risk being preempted by opposition. Preemptive war is undemocratic, for the leader cannot obtain the consent of the governed. This strategy requires the public to be manipulated by executive power. As information will not be shared, that means that the public needs to be ignorant. Public needs to be fearful of potential consequences of not following the directives of executive power. Even legislature would need to be intimidated. Depending on how much secrecy there is in the government, determines how democratic and free its people are. Secrecy is inherently undemocratic.

Violence without authorization from a national government is considered terrorism. The same acts of violence with the authorization from a national government is considered war. The same acts that are condemned as atrocious under terrorism, are not condemned under war. Using different standards for the same violent acts for terrorism and war, means accepting and affirming the legitimacy of war. Sanctioned violence defined as ‘just’ by the state, enables the same acts to be justified in the same way by individuals. Committing violent actions against opposition, justifies the opposition’s use of the same acts against one’s own people. By trying to destroy the opposition, nations create conditions to destroy themselves.

A war on terrorism requires constantly needing new enemies. Making the war endless, expensive, and supportive of bureaucracy. A nation that is at war with terrorism is making a case of good versus evil. That the government wants to remove evil from the world. Which has the assumption that the government and the nation are the representatives for the good. But nations are far more complicated than being just good. Making the assumption that what the government does is good precludes public dialogue. Assuming the side of the good prevents self-criticism or self-correction.

It is very understandable to want to reaction against an attack. But the reaction usually comes from fear and lack of proper direction. There are many domestic issues that cannot be rectified by attacking foreign peoples. Reactions to attacks cannot protect against destruction of the environment, selfishness, wastefulness, and greed nor obtain self-sufficiency or the consequences of dependence. Foreign and domestic terror are related, but while the public is usually kept aware about foreign terror, domestic terror is ignored.

National security would require becoming more self-sufficient, to prevent dependence on other nations who might not be at peace later. This policy would require appropriate taking care of the environment, adjusting resources use, managing imports, improving community relations and foreign relations. Without an environment that supports life, there would be no point in military strength. Difficult to defend freedoms, when necessities are imported from foreign nations with no such concern for one’s own nation. Should a war break about in which the imports are no longer provided, would have negative consequences on the national supply.

The rule of law is upheld by a nation that declares itself above the law. Foreign power catastrophic weapons are deemed illegitimate, but not one’s own national catastrophic weapons. It is contradictory to speak of wanting cooperation and many other celebrated virtues, while also making claims about sole intention for making war. Cannot reduce terror, by holding terror as a fear against the world. A rouge state is defined in the pursuit of national interests with military capabilities that can threaten neighbors. That is any nation, expect one’s own.

The end of WW2 brought about ideals of a united world for peacemaking. But has become globalized under trade that seeks to plunder the world of cheap resources. Difficult to know how nations protect themselves under this regime. Difficult to know how the economy would survive wars of nations.

War is a profitable business, while peace is not. War has been extravagantly subsidized. Violence does not lead to peace. Peaceable means are needed for peace, but are not yet the methods used to obtain peace. Method is still the paradox of trying to make peace by making war. Opposition to violence has become selective or fashionable, which is a brutal hypocrisy of violence against other humans and nature.

Historically, violence leads to reciprocity of violence. Violence committed with moral superiority of justice, affirmation of rights, or defense of peace do not end violence. They justify the continuation of violence. Preparation for more violence.

Economics, the Environment, and Agriculture:
To obtaining the products to satiate economic desires, nations have been willing to sacrifice their environments and communities as normal costs of operations. Work and economic production needs to not destroy the environmental resources, but be sustainable without degrading the users. There needs to be a balance between environmental preservation, and economic opportunities.

The modus operandi is to delegate economic and political activities to others. That change can only occur in the realm of politics, which has already gotten the economic proxies. An assumption that passive consumers can change which will cause public experts, politicians, and corporate executives to change.

Delegation of production to industrial society has led to people not knowing the histories of their products. People no longer know how to produce food, take care of the environment, or even their communities. Difficult to understand the environmental costs of products, and even the origins of the products. The information is too scattered, and the economic processes too complicated. Those within the industries that supply the products, can have reasons for not wanting to share the information about the product histories.

Globalization has become dominated by supranational corporations, which use economic exploitation similar to colonialism. Supranational corporations manage the rules of the global economy through the World Trade Organization. Operating without election and can overrule regional laws that conflict with the free market.

Agriculture is lucrative for everybody, except those who produce the food. Powerful corporations and food conglomerates became wealthy through the work of struggling and failing farmers. While the agriculture business claim this as progress. Neither industry nor politics expects decent prices for food products that can help farmers. Farmers need to be part of the solution within the agriculture economy.

The Knowledge of Facts:
Knowledge is impossible to know in any complete form, or all the consequences of actions taken. Mystery is the norm. Existence is more complicated and intertwined than simple. Individuals and societies are complicated, and are most certainly not idealized perfections. Willingness to judge negatively ancestors who were partly sinners, means being judged under the same terms by successors.

Things that become popular, are in danger of being oversimplified. Such an as oversimplification of the destructiveness of human relationship with nature. Movements also oversimplify, and have a tendency to become self-righteous and self-betray. Denying people rights and privileges, that those within the movement demands for themselves. The problems caused are by other people, and propose policies to change the problems, but not behavior. Claiming to be a particular type of movement or for a purpose, but in practice not keeping to how they define themselves such as peace movements using violence. Making impossible to mean what is said because language becomes anything that anybody wants it to mean.

Knowledge is useful no matter its age, or whether it is empirical or not. Factual information is not sufficient for what is considered true. A fact is a sum of information about the thing. Abstract representations would not be recognized in practice for what they are. Recognition requires incorporating various information. Facts do not live in isolation of other facts. Facts are only true with all their associated facts. Departmentalization of knowledge limits understanding and creates many false ideas. Only the thing, idea, person, or place can represent itself. Everything else is an incomplete model. Only tautologically can reality be represented in its true form.

Social orders are socially constructions fiction. Not because they are false, but because they are incomplete. Even by trying to make them as inclusive as possible, still makes them exclusive. Usually find what has been excluded too late.

There are different ways of handling information such as being rational or sympathetic. Under a rational mindset, any trade-off can be rationalized. While under the sympathetic mindset, nothing can be rationalized. Fear of being wrong or misled motives the rational mindset, while the sympathetic mindset is motivated by failures of carelessness and exclusivity. Many trade-offs fail as they lead to disaster.

Caveats?
The essays have varied quality. Topics are interrelated, but the essays are not necessarily related to each other. Synthesizing a coherent understanding from all the topics is the responsibility of the reader.
Recognizing social contradiction is a familiar theme in the book, but sometimes the explanations are lacking and are one-sided. Sometimes making moral arguments, without explaining why the alternatives are causing the harm. Simplifying the alternative ways and solutions opens the arguments to their own contradictions and counterclaims. Understanding the why of the alternatives can facilitate in finding solutions.

An example of a one-sided argument is the negative consequences of delegating economic production to others. By delegating and not needing to think about that production, the individual can apply themselves elsewhere. If everyone needs to understand every bit of economic production, there would not be much delegating and each person would not have much more on their minds than that information. Ideas, economics, and society can become stagnant.

Another example of a one-sided argument is the need for self-sufficiency. Security and other benefits of self-sufficiency are provided, but not their costs. Self-sufficiency means less trade, but that makes war more likely. Trade increases the cost of going to war, for the nations rely on each other. As the author supports peaceable ways of cooperation, trade is what makes peace become profitable. Self-sufficiency means not having much peaceable negotiations with neighbors. Limits the products and ideas within a nation for the nation would have to produce and figure out everything on their own rather than dividing the labor of that effort. Also, the author supports a sustainable environment, but agriculture production for different foods can be done more sustainably in other countries because their soil and environment can be more adequate for that kind of food. Self-sufficiency is just a different way of degrading the environment. ( )

http://www.newsreview.com/sacramento/Content?oid=oid%3A33769

My interview with Wendell Berry (2/10/05):

Wendell Berry was running a bit late for his recent telephone interview with SN&R. “I’ve been at work in my writing place and out among my animals, and the time slips by, and I don’t know it,” he apologized. Berry has the soft accent of his native Kentucky, warm and husky. He speaks with the deliberation of a philosopher--an appellation he waved off.

“I’m not a philosopher,” Berry insisted. “I’ve no gift for abstract thought at all. I’m simply a person who is trying to think carefully about practical issues.” This careful thought has produced an impressive body of work--one that might be mistaken for the work of a philosopher, if he didn’t insist otherwise. Since 1960, he has written 17 collections of essays, 15 volumes of poetry and almost as many works of fiction.

Berry, who takes the stage at the Crest Theatre next Thursday as part of the California Lectures series, has eloquently championed agrarian issues in many of his essays. He’s worked his family’s farm in Kentucky’s Henry County for most of his life, which gives him experience to draw upon as he writes about the natural world and humanity’s place in it.

Berry’s most recent collection of essays, Citizenship Papers, opens with a series of essays about life in a post-9/11 world. His interest, as always, is in thinking carefully about practical issues--in this case, national security in the age of terrorism. One of the things he questions is whether the current administration’s policies actually will lead to more security for citizens.

“The right to question is the fundamental responsibility and right of patriotism,” Berry said. “It’s a fundamental requirement of patriotism. If we’re going to be fundamentalist, we need to be right about what it means.”

Some of Berry’s points in these essays seem prescient in light of recent events. For example, in an essay from 2002, he pointed out that the United States could not hope to be secure from terrorism without addressing the lack of security in our national food supply. He takes no delight in outgoing Secretary of Homeland Security Tom Ridge’s recent statements about the vulnerability of that food supply.

“Everybody who knows anything about farming knows that the food supply’s been in danger for quite a while in a lot of different ways,” Berry said. “It’s been in danger from pollution and from too narrow a genetic base, and if you put terrorism into the mix, then you’ve got the vulnerability of long-distance transportation, as well as the vulnerability of a food system that’s both extensive and centralized.” He pointed out that when consumers buy cherries in the Northern Hemisphere in January, they should know that the fruit didn’t come from the United States. “We’re gathering food from the whole world,” he noted.

The ability to gather food from the entire globe is dependent upon the ready availability of transport. It makes those who rely on imported food vulnerable to a multitude of dangers that range from scarcity to contamination at any point in the supply chain.

Berry long has encouraged the development of local economies and local food supplies. Such small--one might say human--scale is desirable, and not simply for ideological reasons. There is also the practical reason that, unlike a global economy with industrially produced foods, community-based economies and foods are less vulnerable to the vicissitudes of international politics, including the price of oil.

“Industrialized agriculture is allowed by one thing and one thing only: petroleum,” Berry said. “Up until the beginning of the last century, our agriculture was mostly solar-powered, dependent on the sun, and since then, it’s been based on fossil fuels. We are now eating and wearing fossil fuels, because the synthetic fibers all come from fossil fuels. The pesticides come from fossil fuels.” Such dependence on one source of energy to produce food leaves us all in danger, Berry believes, whether from terrorism or environmental degradation. In this sense, agricultural issues are universal issues, since we all rely on agriculture and those who practice its arts for our survival. We all have to eat.

So, how do we begin to change our attitudes toward industrialized agriculture? “I have an essay called 'Compromise, Hell!’ that is about that question exactly,” said Berry. Despite its sensational title, he said, the essay makes the point “that some things ought not to be compromised, and one of them is the health of the world.” Berry doesn’t mince words on this subject. “If you don’t take care of the world, then sooner or later you don’t have a world. And it’s no solution if you say, 'Well, we’ll use it up just a little at a time.’ You don’t compromise with utter destruction.”

As an example, Berry cited strip mining. “[It] utterly destroys everything, including the coal,” he said. “Strip miners do it because it makes a short-term kind of economic sense, but people are beginning to see that one of the answers is better accounting.” That means running the numbers over a longer term--thinking beyond immediate profits--and including what might not be considered quantifiable costs initially. The sustainability of a practice must be examined over not just a single lifetime, but many lifetimes.

This way of thinking, Berry said, “can be reduced, for convenience, simply to the idea of taking care of things.” There’s a basic moral imperative at work here. “We’re supposed to take care of things: each other, everything that’s dependent on us and subject to us, everything we depend on.”

This belief that conservation “means taking care of everything-- everything” is at the root of Berry’s dissatisfaction with contemporary thinking that reduces the concept of conservation to protecting wilderness areas only. Preserving a few pristine natural spaces isn’t going to cut it. “If you stop taking care of it all, you’re done for,” he said.

Such an obligation to be stewards or caretakers of everything is a pretty tall order, one that might intimidate most people. Still, Berry thinks it’s a worthwhile endeavor to take on the Buddhist vow to save all beings. “It’s a quandary that’s good for humans to be in,” he said. “If you get yourself into that sort of quandary, you’re not going to presume on our own intelligence. It’s a charm against hubris.”

Berry's Sacramento lecture, titled “The Way of Ignorance,” will address the hubris that can occur when humans become overly reliant on their own abilities. The lecture developed from an ongoing conversation with his friend Wes Jackson, a scientist who is the founder and director of the Land Institute, a think tank dedicated to studying sustainable agriculture. Berry said the conversation began with the question “What’s the difference between acting as if you had adequate knowledge and acting as if you are irreparably ignorant?”

“The person who thinks adequate knowledge is somehow available is going to work on a big scale and take big chances and risk big mistakes, big damage,” Berry said. Because this is the rationale for industrialism, examples of this way of thinking abound, such as building nuclear power plants without having a clear idea of how to handle the waste generated and assuming that somebody will figure it out at some point. “People who acknowledge their own ignorance understand the need to work on a small scale.”

Berry doesn’t specifically call this attitude humility, though it certainly is implied in his description of it: “We don’t have adequate knowledge, and we can’t be sure that adequate knowledge is going to become available.”

Ultimately, though, Berry believes that understanding the world we live in and the best way to care for it comes from a different sort of knowledge, the knowledge that comes from affection. “There are certain things that are revealed to affection that are not revealed to scientific inquiry,” Berry said. “The whole life of a place is what reveals itself to you by way of your affection for it.”

Such a revelation occurs, Berry said, when we stop seeing the world as something that can be categorized. A dog is not just a dog, but that dog, and anyone who’s ever loved a dog knows that one dog can’t be exchanged for another. Instead of viewing creatures, including other humans, as representatives of a type, we must see them in their particulars.

“The proper job,” said Berry, “is simply to make as much sense as you can.” ( )