Nature makes a perfect counter-ideal to technology for several
reasons. Nature (that which is outside the power of the system) is the
opposite of technology (which seeks to expand indefinitely the power
of the system). Most people will agree that nature is beautiful;
certainly it has tremendous popular appeal. The radical
environmentalists ALREADY hold an ideology that exalts nature and
opposes technology. [30] It is not necessary for the sake of nature to
set up some chimerical utopia or any new kind of social order. Nature
takes care of itself: It was a spontaneous creation that existed long
before any human society, and for countless centuries many different
kinds of human societies coexisted with nature without doing it an
excessive amount of damage. Only with the Industrial Revolution did
the effect of human society on nature become really devastating. To
relieve the pressure on nature it is not necessary to create a special
kind of social system, it is only necessary to get rid of industrial
society. Granted, this will not solve all problems. Industrial society
has already done tremendous damage to nature and it will take a very
long time for the scars to heal. Besides, even pre-industrial
societies can do significant damage to nature. Nevertheless, getting
rid of industrial society will accomplish a great deal. It will
relieve the worst of the pressure on nature so that the scars can
begin to heal. It will remove the capacity of organized society to
keep increasing its control over nature (including human nature).
Whatever kind of society may exist after the demise of the industrial
system, it is certain that most people will live close to nature,
because in the absence of advanced technology there is not other way
that people CAN live. To feed themselves they must be peasants or
herdsmen or fishermen or hunter, etc., And, generally speaking, local
autonomy should tend to increase, because lack of advanced technology
and rapid communications will limit the capacity of governments or
other large organizations to control local communities.
TK