Monthly Archives: February 2006

Energy Beyond Oil – Paul Mobbs

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If I were to recommend one book on the energy crisis, to a reader in the UK, it would be this one. It is thorough, running through all the aspects of the problem – Peak Oil, viability of alternatives, conservation and consumption. It is almost entirely non-partisan, and steers clear of discussions of foreign policy, concentrating primarily upon the physical constraints that a diminishment of energy represents. It is written from a UK perspective rather than a US or world perspective, which makes it more readable and relevant for a UK resident.

It reads in many ways like a school text-book, and I mean that as a compliment. There are a great number of ‘side boxes’ going into detail about various technical elements, and Mobbs takes great pains to explain all the different terms that he uses.

Of course, the bottom line remains the same however it is explained, and his essential point is expressed pithily: could you cut your energy use by 60%? I found his final discussion of alternative paths quite useful – the ‘burn everything’ model, as opposed to the ‘renewables only’ model. In a hundred years the amount of energy available to the economy from choosing those opposite paths is exactly the same(!) – the difference is that one will cause global warming, exacerbation of income inequality and associated chaos – whilst the other will minimise all those associated problems.

It is clear which way we must go. We just have to summon the spiritual will to walk that path.

Hmmm.

The Cluetrain Manifesto

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I came across this from reading Chris Locke’s ‘Mystical Bourgeoisie’ blog (which I read whenever it is updated – I’ll do a post about that separately), and it wasn’t at all what I expected. It was good to read something totally surprising, which was also informative about the business world, and personally clarifying for me.

The Cluetrain Manifesto began as a website developed by Locke and some friends, articulating the way in which the internet was changing the viability of standard business models. In sum, the cluetrain manifesto argues that the internet allows a genuine market to re-emerge, the genuine market being a meeting place of individuals, with a high level of human contact, and consequent structures of trust and authenticity shaping the boundaries of trade.

For example, if you are considering purchasing a digital camera, it is now possible to use internet search engines, not simply to find the cheapest model, or the cheapest outlet for any particular model, but also to discuss the qualities of the different models with other users. In this situation where there is a wealth of available information to the purchaser the producer of any particular digital camera can no longer enjoy what economists call ‘informational asymmetry’ – we can’t be brow-beaten or intimidated by the (apparent) possession of superior knowledge on the part of any particular seller. Often (and this has often been my experience in places like Dixons!) the purchaser knows >much
In this context, a viable business model is one that ‘lowers the barriers’ between the company and the purchaser. There is no benefit to a company in enforcing ‘company speak’ or a ‘line to take’ – all that happens is that the purchaser comes to the reasonable conclusion that this particular company ‘doesn’t have a clue’, and therefore disengages. A company which, on the other hand, allows its own workers to speak directly to customers, without insisting on corporate ‘firewalls’ (whether electronic or social) stands to benefit directly from the high quality human interactions (trust) thus generated.

This might seem overblown – surely the internet is, even now, a minority pursuit, and most companies can safely ignore it, at least for some time to come? This ignores what economists call ‘marginal income’. If a company manufactures widgets, the cost of manufacturing widgets is split between the ‘fixed costs’ (establishment of factory, salaries etc) and the ‘variable costs’ (the material used to make a particular widget). So to make any money at all, the company must first cover all of its fixed costs; once that has been done, then the level of profit accruing from the extra sales of widgets increases radically. Let us assume that a company has to sell 100 widgets to cover its fixed costs in any particular year. If the company sells 110 widgets then those extra ten widgets only have ‘variable costs’ associated with them (the raw material from which the widget is made). That raw material cost is generally a much smaller proportion of the total cost of each widget. What this means is that the ‘marginal widget’ – ie the widget that is sold last – provides a much bigger contribution to overall profits than the first widget; and each extra widget sold is crucial. However, if a small proportion of the company’s market is put off from purchasing widgets due to the company ‘not having a clue’ – ie behaving in a bureaucratic and generally inhuman fashion – then the sale of those marginal widgets becomes immensely problematic. Even if the internet only diminishes sales by a few percent – that few percent can make all the difference to a company between profit and loss. This is why the internet hugely magnifies the effect of informational symmetry between buyer and seller – it is the impact that it has on the margins which levers in huge social and cultural changes at the level of the corporation.

The theme in the book which most struck me, however, was the emphasis upon the human voice. That the traditional market was one in which the human voice made the difference between buying and selling, and where all participants become experts at sniffing out the bullshit. The development of Fordism in all its forms minimised this historic aspect of the economy – giving rise to the corporation in all its alienated and alienating glory – and it is this which the cluetrain manifesto argues is coming to an end. The most important thing for any company now is to be a recognisably human institution, with recognisable human beings working within it. One recent example – the Times newspaper is encouraging its writers to start blogging directly, as with Ruth Gledhill or David Aaranovitch. If there is to be a viable economic model for news organisations, it will surely be along those lines.

This is, of course, why it made so much sense to me – for the blog is indeed the best expression of particular human voices on the ’net, and it is why I enjoy blogging so much. Here I can express my own thoughts, in my own voice, and it is liberating.

So: an excellent book, thoroughly recommended. It is available free, on-line, here.

Anglican Liberalism, and the interpretation of Scripture

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My mother-in-law lives near Lampeter, where there is a university with a good theological faculty (indeed, should I ever be enabled by God to scratch the theological itch and finish a PhD I may well end up doing it there). Whilst on holiday I attended a lecture given by Professor Paul Badham on Anglican Liberalism. After a promising start, it was deeply disappointing.

The promising start was the argument that Anglican liberalism was not driven by the agenda of the Continental Enlightenment. Badham pointed out that in the dispute over Henry VIII’s divorce, the salient question became ‘what is the authority to interpret Scripture?’ In other words, if the authority of the Pope was rejected, what was to be put in its place?

Cranmer’s answer was: ‘the consensus of the universities in Europe’. From this Badham argued that the Anglican tradition had developed a liberal ethos on a different track to that of the Continental theologians, arguing, amongst other things, that Schleiermacher’s writings were not translated into English until very late in the day (some 20th Century) and that Anglican Liberals “derived their views direct from their Biblical and theological work”. The continental theologian that Badham felt was most influential was von Harnack, whose work ‘What is Christianity’ was apparently the best-selling theological work before John Robinson’s ‘Honest to God’. In addition to that, Badham alleges that the Enlightenment critique of religion had been considered answered within British culture by the writings of Joseph Butler, especially his ‘Analogy of Religion’ in 1736.

Badham sees the Liberal tradition as defined by an acceptance of Modern Biblical Criticism (MBC), and he went on to run through the key stages by which influence of the Liberal tradition within the Anglican establishment developed – so 1862 marked the legal acceptance of MBC by clergy, and 1864 saw the right of clergy to deny substitutionary atonement and the doctrine of hell; 1917 saw the appointment of Henslow as Bishop of Hereford despite his denial of the Virgin Birth; 1938 saw the publication of a Church Doctrine Commission affirming the place of Liberalism within the Anglican church; 1995 saw the same Doctrine Commission denounce the doctrine of Hell as ‘incompatible with belief in the love of God’. So Badham argues that Liberalism is now the broad mainstream of church opinion within the Church of England: all theological faculties accept the validity of MBC, and consequently (after Cranmer), the Church of England is a Liberal church.

Some of Badham’s historical material was interesting, and plugged a few gaps in my knowledge, especially in terms of the 19th century. Yet on the whole his argument seemed weak, almost vacuous. One suspected a desire to protect his flank from contemporary criticisms, given his beginning with a distancing from the continental enlightenment, yet – although I believe a significant argument could be made supporting the point – Badham did not succeed in persuading this particular listener that Anglican Liberalism was not hugely influenced by the mores and assumptions of the Enlightenment. In large part that is because I follow Roy Porter’s analysis of the Enlightenment, rooting it in English culture of the seventeenth century, most especially the influence of John Locke. (The links between Locke and the Anglican church, esp Clarke, are an area of much interest for me.) Badham, for example, cites Paley as being ignorant of the Enlightenment – and thus an instance of the ‘separation’ from the Continent of the English tradition – due to his deployal of an argument from design, despite Kant having ‘demolished’ such arguments a generation previously. This argument does not achieve what Badham wants it to achieve. Irrespective of its relationship to Kant, Paley’s argument is saturated with Enlightenment assumptions, not least the notion that the correct analogue for the creation is a mechanism, viz a watch, thus betraying the thorough-going Newtonian perspective governing his approach. To say that the lack of reference to Kant demonstrates the independence of English thought from Enlightenment presuppositions is vapid.

My suspicions were confirmed at the end of the lecture when I asked Badham about his beginning with Cranmer. Was it not the case, I asked, that when the church accepts an authority outside of itself (the interpretation of Scripture no longer being a matter for the church to determine, but for the ‘consensus of the universities in Europe’ to establish) it has lost something essential, that it has ‘sold its soul’? Badham was robust in his response: No! the church is accountable to Reason!

The voice of the mid-twentieth century could be heard clearly in the seminar room, on this January evening in 2006.

There was nothing in Badham’s lecture that could not have been said and argued fifty years previously. Fifty years previously this may have been stimulating. A young theologian would have found much to ponder – and not much room for disagreement. The theological consensus was overwhelming – there was no middle ground between fundamentalism and the relentless march of MBC – and so Liberalism would indeed have been the accepted consensus.

Yet these last fifty years have witnessed a tremendous transformation of the terms of the debate, and the greatest disappointment of the lecture, especially given the promise of its beginning, was the complete lack of attention given to the way these debates are now shaped, not least through a more developed suspicion of MBC, and an awareness of what the church as a whole has lost through its ‘delegation’ of the authority to interpret Scripture. To make an appeal to ‘Reason’ as an arbiter of Biblical interpretation is vacuous – it merely marks the argument as one long past its sell-by date. More than this, it seems a virtual dereliction of duty to be making such an argument in the context of teaching undergraduates for a university degree in theology. All the most interesting theology of the last thirty years – most especially Alasdair MacIntyre and John Milbank, but there are many others – has been concerned with overhauling this naïve construal of ‘Reason’. In such a context Badham’s arguments meet a far worse fate than being wrong, they have become dull.

Thomas Kuhn argued that a paradigm shifts not so much from force of argument as from a generational change. Where there is a dispute over the most fundamental framings of discussion, the old guard do not change, they die out, and new students coming in to a discipline simply don’t engage with the assumptions of the fading paradigm. The new one holds out much more interest.

It seems to me that the core debate within the church as a whole remains the question which Cranmer pondered – how to interpret Scripture? What authority governs the interpretation of Scripture? Fundamentalism is itself a creature of the Enlightenment, and offers very little in the way of theologically creative hermeneutics – and thus is of no service to the church community, proving by its lack of compassion the terminal absence of the Holy Spirit. Nor does the delegation of authority to the universities meet the need: this may, conceivably, have had some merit in an environment where theological faculties were staffed by committed Christians, where you had to take Holy Orders in order to teach – but now? The vast majority of theological faculties are wholly captured by secularity, both in terms of governing intellectual attitudes and the more obviously malign forces of government funding and bureaucracy. For the church to remain beholden to the interpretations of such a community is for it to remain in Babylon. How can we sing a love song in a strange land?

I am more convinced than ever that the centre of theological gravity must return from the academy to the cloister; that no coherent understanding of the faith can be formed apart from a viable eucharistic community. It is this line of thinking that every so often makes me wonder whether I should become a Roman Catholic, for there the lines of authority are much clearer – it is the Magisterium which provides for the definitive understanding of Scripture (a structure which, despite the most strenuous denials, is replicated in substance within the various Protestant establishments; so it seems to me, and at least the RC has [some] history on its side!).

Yet this offers not much more than the removal of one problem by the imposition of another: the Reformation was not without abiding purpose, after all. So the Anglican system, as developed by Hooker, with its three-fold division of authority between Scripture first and foremost; then the teachings of the early church; and then finally the application of our reason – there is something here that is beautiful, and is perhaps the distinctive gift of the Church of England to the wider church. A way in which to negotiate the hazards of premature closure to discussion; an openness to the continual promptings of the One who leads us into all Truth. That is the via media which seems authentically liberal; not one which takes its bearings from Modernist epistemology and Enlightenment secularity, but one which is centred upon the ongoing inspiration of the church; which takes the fruits of the Spirit seriously, not least in the gift of Scripture itself, the ordering of the church, and the creeds; and is therefore one which gives freedom, for it is for freedom that we have been set free.

This side of the eschaton, the final resting place for the interpretation of Scripture is, for me, the consensus fidelium – the considered and settled opinion of the faithful – and that settled opinion can itself develop over time, and change. It is expressed, most of all, through worship – lex orandi, lex credendi – this is why it must be rooted within the communion, when we sing our love songs to Jesus and renew our marriage vows. It is when we break the bread and renew the new covenant that we are authentically the church, that we are authentically the Body, and that we can authentically listen to His voice. It is when we are enabled to truly hear the word that we are enabled to interpret the word; and then to speak that word within the world. Scripture belongs to the church – it was formed by the church for the church, and it is for the church to interpret it, so help us God.

Anansi Boys – Neil Gaiman

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Long time readers of the blog will be aware that I consider Neil Gaiman to be a genius. Anansi Boys is his latest novel, and it follows on from American Gods in its exploration of magical realism and fantasy. It centres on Fat Charlie, a rather sad individual who seems to be fated to a life of boredom and ill luck, until he goes to his (estranged) father’s funeral in Florida. Here he discovers not only that his father was in fact Anansi the spider god, but that he also has a long-lost brother, Spider. Fat Charlie calls his brother back into his life, whereupon Spider proceeds to cause utter chaos, taking over Fat Charlie’s life – including his job and his fiancee… Fat Charlie (who isn’t fat by the way) seeks help from some of the other gods, and gets into deeper waters than he bargained for.

This was great fun, very readable (I stayed up to read it in one sitting – one of the pleasures of reading whilst on holiday) and satisfying as a story. The one caveat I have is that it seemed to be reprising some of the Sandman points in a minor key – Anansi being the weaver of stories in the same way that Morpheus is. The novel doesn’t have the psychological or theological depths that the Sandman sequence attains, but it doesn’t aim that high. It’s simply a good story, enjoyably told. A good place to begin reading Gaiman if you are unfamiliar with his work.