Escaping The Progress Trap
A book review on escaping the dead end we have made for ourselves
I received a copy of the book Escaping The Progress Trap by Daniel B. O’Leary [CDN professor from Montreal, 2005] when I was a first time Green Party candidate in 2007. He wrote in the cover: “Good Luck Gord!”. Well, I did quite well during that election because the movie “An Inconvenient Truth” had come out the year before, getting 11% of the vote. At the time people thought this was only the start of a socio-political-economic “Green Wave”, but the sad fact is the ‘Green Wave’ never materialized. I do not mean in terms of the political party, I mean in terms of shifting towards a sustainable economic system. This book helped me frame a message on why and how we can make that shift and I as I am now rereading it I thought that it may be time to revisit this “old” idea. Below I will simply quote excerpts from the book, after a short introduction of the history of the concept of the Progress Trap. But let’s start with a concrete example to make this real for you.
An example is irrigation systems of the ancient Middle East. This was a terrific idea for the Sumerians, allowing them to grow food in the desert. However, as time went on, irrigation led to a build up of salt in the land. Eventually, over a few centuries, the Sumerian fields began to turn white from salt. After about a thousand years, their crop yields fell to only a quarter of what was possible in the fields they started with. Large parts of southern Iraq had to be abandoned, and still haven’t recovered. – Ronald Wright
As you can see a progress trap is the condition human societies experience when, in pursuing progress through human ingenuity, they inadvertently introduce problems that they do not have the resources or the political will to solve for fear of short-term losses in status, stability or quality of life. This prevents further progress and sometimes leads to societal collapse. The syndrome appears to have been first described by Walter Von Krämer in his series of 1989 articles under the title Fortschrittsfalle Medizin. The specific neologism “progress trap” was introduced independently in 1990 by Daniel B. O’Leary with his study of the behavioral aspects of the condition: The Progress Trap – Science, Humanity and Environment. The term later gained attention after the historian and novelist Ronald Wright‘s 2004 book and Massey Lecture series A Short History of Progress in which he sketches world history so far as a succession of progress traps. With the documentary film version of Wright’s book Surviving Progress, backed by Martin Scorsese, the concept achieved wider recognition. [Wikipedia]
“What is the aim of philosophy? To show the fly the way out of the fly bottle ” Wittgenstein
And now some quotes from a 1990 essay by Daniel O’Leary that were the basis for the book. [THE PROGRESS TRAP Science, Humanity and Environment by Daniel O’Leary Global Ecopolitics POLI 399G]
I have argued that humanity does not have one kind of civilization, but two: the natural and the artificial. There is a dear tendency for the two to diverge and for the man-made civilization to be apprehensive of nature, seeking always to control it.
The transition between natural and artificial lifestyles can be described as culture shock. My argument is that men have tried to deal with this emotional shock by rational means which often resemble obsession and frequently lead him away from natural reality. Much of contemporary intellectual life aims for a detached control of nature: science and technology are the tools which men, and more recently women, try to achieve this domination of humanity and the environment. In my analysis of this syndrome, it follows that the greater the divergence between the human intellect and natural reality the greater will be the ignorance and abuse of nature. Since humanity is a small product of nature, he can by definition not control nature. To believe that he can is a delusion.
When science returned to Europe, it came with a vengeance. The rationalism of Scholastic Christianity had paved the way for the empiricism of men like Bacon and Galileo. The scientific and Industrial revolutions that followed brought to an end the richly imaginative culture which we associate with Leonardo da Vinci, Shakespeare, Gothic cathedrals and Beethoven. Their culture was one of faith, hope, charity and imagination, a delight to the spirit, but not one which offered any conceptual defence against Darwin, dark satanic mills and the survival of the fittest.
Left and right brain research might explain why, as technical culture becomes more specialised and rigorous, it attempts to solve problems of nature and technology in the same way: through analysis of the problem, with the assumption that solutions will automatically follow. However, the exponential growth of scientific research, along with the diminishing number of inspired solutions, suggests that the exclusively intellectual approach, although rational, is in fact counter productive. It also suggests that the intellectual approach has a limited ability to comprehend the totality of man-made and natural reality. This approach is characterised by an escalating quantity of technical treatments of man-made problems and situations, creating a technocratic burden that results in new problems, such as funding shortages for research, technical incompetence as in the American. space program and mental mysteries such as nuclear waste disposal This situation is the progress trap. From these facts it is reasonable to infer that the mind’s problem-solving abilities tend to atrophy in an excessively technical environment, and to hypothesise that a revival and enrichment of right-brain abilities is necessary before creative problem solving skills can be recovered.
The concept of the purity of science should be abandoned. Science is not cleaner or more pure according to its degree of detachment from the real world: it is more dangerous. Formulas and chemicals which are produced in laboratories, in glorious isolation from nature, are likely to do damage, as E=mc2, chlorofluorocarbons and polychlorinated biphenyls attest. The re-engagement of rational with natural experience will help ensure that the inventions of science are real life necessities, not intellectual fantasies. It is clear that logic does not guarantee realism and that if a little knowledge is dangerous, a lot of knowledge is very dangerous. However it is also evident that the prediction in Genesis that man will eat of the tree of knowledge in sorrow, all the days of his life, may have been too pessimistic. It seems that we can return to the Garden of Eden, and we must, at least when we are not working, in order to get the inspiration we need to solve the problems we have created and to remind ourselves that we are products of nature, capable of beauty and ugliness. If we banish ourselves from Eden forever, we will forget the beauty. The concept of yin and yang that is found in eastern civilizations is closer to this idea of a balance between science and nature than the western dualistic tradition. Though today’s technical advances are founded in ideas which originated in the west they have been greatly enhanced in the east, so successfully that the west is in danger of stagnating through loss of motivation and reward, and through inferior production. Conclusion: avoiding the boom and bust cycle in western civilizations. It is accurate to conclude that, based on the evidence I have assembled, that industrialised society will decline, through overconcentration on systems and technicalities in much the same way as Greek, Roman and Renaissance civilization did in earlier times. When intellectual culture deviates from natural and human norms to the point where oblivion sets in then nature will reassert itself. Human nature rebels against repression by revolting against the oppressor, by victimising a weaker scapegoat or by abandoning unmanageable political and economic structures.
Environmentally friendly industries must be devised. This can only be achieved by allowing humanity to recharge its spiritual batteries as often as possible through cultural, sensory, educational and physical enrichment, so that mankind can find the inspiration to find forms of industry which do not degrade the planet and overburden society.
All of the above quotes are by Daniel O’Leary.
Another writer then used his ideas to write a book that was showcased in a Massey Lecture.
Many civilizations who thrived and achieved brilliant things, such as the Sumerians or the Maya, eventually fell victim to their own success. This is what I call a “Progress Trap,” which happens when technological innovations create conditions or problems that society is unable to foresee – or unwilling to solve. – Ronald Wright
This is our escape from the Progress Trap – an affirmation of the YIN, of imagination, of faith, of transcendence. So what can you do? To begin to answer that I leave with a rant from a random website I found by a guy called Elliot.
“I see a world being built right now that I do not want to be a part of. Climate change is acceptable, endangered species are normal, pollution isn’t a big concern, people work in cubicles, drive square cars, live in square houses with square lawns and driveways and windows, dogs are left in kennels all day or stuck in square houses, genetically modified foods kill our bees, our veterans are forgotten, and our wars aren’t really wars. Prescription drugs are given to 5 year olds because they can’t sit still in a classroom listening to a boring teacher talk about something boring, teenage girls are constantly told they aren’t good enough and need the newest beauty products, and all the while, we sit in our cubicles, saddened by our depressing jobs, waiting for something to change but knowing that it probably won’t. I think we should stop putting energy into the problems and start putting energy into how you want to live. Grow your own food, supply your own water, build sustainably, cultivate eco-systems instead of farms, stop driving so much, ride a bike, keep buying electric and hybrid cars, support small business instead of Wal-mart, eat organic and avoid Monsanto, but most of all, vote for what you want every day. Support what you believe in, stop giving in, stop compromising your values. Its hard, but we have to do it, or this world will be dead and us with it. This is our home, lets start acting like it. So stop going places without purpose, start being where you are with purpose. In yoga, there is this idea called “Dharma” and it means purpose, conduct, virtues, laws, values, rights, and “the right way to live”. I think that as a planet, we are out of balance, we are too focused on progress. There is a natural balance between Pragati, and Dharma or progress and purpose in life and we are too far on the pragati side, for no reason. This leads to depression, sickness and overall increased disease in our lives. We have enough progress, the technology available today is simply mind numbingly incredible; as a race, we have to learn how to use it effectively to help fulfill our purpose.”
Ever thought that the behaviour of fruit flies and humans are similar in they get themselves into situations that they cannot extract themselves from?
References
Movie Surviving Progress https://www.filmsforaction.org/watch/surviving-progress-2011/
The book https://www.amazon.ca/Escaping-the-progress-trap-ebook/dp/B003F77CVU
escape the traps in your life video https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WWPNV_CTEuQ
rant https://elliottelford.com/progress-where-2/
https://thenarwhal.ca/locked-progress-trap-interview-author-ronald-wright/
Hello
Regarding your opening lines “I received a copy of the book Escaping The Progress Trap by Daniel B. O’Leary [CDN professor from Montreal, 2005] when I was a first time Green Party candidate in 2007” you surely meant “I received a copy of the book ‘A short history of progress’ by Ronald Wright”. Your subsequent quotes and excerpts are from Wrights book, not mine. Thank you, Daniel (not a professor, btw. More info about my book can be found at progresstrap.org and progresstrap.blogspot.com)
yes, many quotes are from r.wright, BUT I do have a signed copy of your book with me with your signature too, I clearly mixed up where some of the quotes came from – oops!