In a new, wide ranging, somewhat scattershot, not entirely convincing, but always compelling documentary Adam Curtis argues that the idea of the ecosystem is bogus. Along the way we get a glimpse into why the hippie communes failed and a look into the future of the Arab Spring (which is probably going to be an Arab winter). Watch it soon before the BBC deletes this YouTube account.
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9 comments:
Hope to get to this before it's gone...
That was very good. I had no idea of the machine mentality behind the idea of ecosystems. I had always wondered why Stewart Brand, the guy behind the old Whole Earth catalogue jumped so easily into the whole computer world. But that was obviously part of it all along.
Perhaps I've been around the fallout of the hippie commune era to be very surprised that that idealistic model of human organization doesn't work, though.
Yeah, Arab winter is probably about right...especially for women.
Seana
There's two other parts to this documentary that the uploader also has up on his YouTube channel. I imagine the BBC will purge them soon. They're all a bit dodgy and not as rigorous as I would like but they're still good. The one before this one was about Ayn Rand and the neocons and the one after this one was on altruism, biology and Dian Fossey.
I'll try to get to them, as they sound like interesting topics.
Though as I'm going with friends to see Malick's The Tree of Life after work, it probably won't be tonight.
Cool stuff. Thanks.
Hey you're welcome Len.
I've had a drink with Adam Curtis a few times through his connection with Popbitch.
This has been doing the rounds on Twitter this week and is very clever
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x1bX3F7uTrg&feature=share
Rob
He seems like a really interesting guy. I hope he is in real life.
Rob, I finally just watched that parody and find that you may have wrecked the Adam Curtis style for me.
It didn't help that I immediately followed it with the first part of that BBC series and it began with something about Sigmund Freud.
It then began, "this, however, is not a film about Sigmund Freud, but about Sigmund Freud's nephew".
I know it's legit, but now I can't help treating this as parody too.
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