Your "tragedy of the commons" is an evident reality that i wouldn't bother mentioning. Your interpretation of my incomplete idea was very far from my intended mark...but this is to be expected since it was an incomplete post.
What i was pondering is this...what is the necessary sequence to arrive at a point where a public movement becomes an acted upon reality by a sufficient number of people so as to accomplish(for the greater part) the 'understood' objective or maintenance program? I was not inferring anything, let alone the philosophy of selfishness/societal-anomie that you apparently understood.
Even within my own realm of actions i can easily identify many contradictory habits...why do i always give back what i find(while griping all the more when my lost articles aren't returned)...why do i refrain from littering? At the same time, i won't vote, carpool or recycle(i'd like to, but it just seems too much of an effort)? these contrasting tendancies are nearly universal...efforts to be a mature, considerate member of society combined with childish, ego-centric and irresponsible actions(or lack thereof). But this is not my question...i suspect the answer lies within our underlying selfserving nature...i.e.do we give money to help 'them' or make ourselves look/feel better/eliminate our guilt? --but this is a pointless question since the best we can hope for is that the 'good' thing is done, if we get some benefit out of it -great..if martyrdom were the only path to philanthropy, our lives would be short, cruel, and agonizing i suspect....
To get back to my original question/statement...what is the 'necessary sequence'? with regard to environmental crisis...it seems as though it follows a somewhat mathematical model...i.e. people will deal with what they can 'afford' to deal with; with their respective 'budgets' derived from a combination of socio/cultural background and personally difined levels of social/material satisfaction/gratification....
but with other arbitrary trends...it seems to be based on social acceptance. No man is an island has and always will remain entirely relevant. Easily seen in the world of children, where the 'different' child becomes the natural target of the others. Even in our adult life..large portions of the population seem to 'wait' until the other guy participates in some new fad or folly before deeming it an ok, or good thing to do/not do...it would seem that there must be a number out there somewhere?...ok, enough for now, this is a strange thing to try to express...i believe i've failed.
>From: David McFadzean <david@lucifer.com>
>Reply-To: virus@lucifer.com
>To: virus@lucifer.com
>Subject: Re: virus: Critical Mass of Enlightenment
>Date: Thu, 15 Apr 1999 17:05:12 -0600
>
>At 10:48 PM 4/15/99 +0000, Dr Sebby wrote:
>>benefits in the minds of the very ephemeral, human being. This
>>phenomena is directly related to the state of desperation the
subject
>>groups members' posess combined with their relative sense of
>>importance within both their immediate society and the global
>>society...primarily the former. woops...more on this later...i
gotta
>>go...sorry...don't tear my head off for an incomplete
>>project...hopefully someone will see what i'm saying and finish it?
>
>I'll take a guess. I think you're saying that there are common
>situations where if you do the "right thing" then you're the
>only one that loses, but if everyone (or a significant portion)
>did the "right thing" then everyone would benefit. AKA the
>"tragedy of the commons", and the "prisoners' dilemma".
>
>Why vote? Why recycle? Why carpool? Why stay off the grass?
>Why not litter? Why not take more than your share? Why not
>keep what you find?
>
>--
>David McFadzean david@lucifer.com
>Memetic Engineer http://www.lucifer.com/~david/
>Church of Virus http://www.lucifer.com/virus/