The Congressman's Letter & Other Moral Miseries

Did I tell you about my friend Cassandra? yeah, like the prophetess! The one that was condemned by a rejected lover to foretell the future but not to be believed... She writes these things from time to time, when things that happen in the world make her mad. It's like spitting, she says, because she earns her life writing, but can't afford to write things like this rant, worth reading!

The Congressman's Letter & Other Moral Miseries
It seems we should feel every type of shame and indignation going, after knowing that lies were used to justify the invasion of Iraq. Or maybe not. After all isn’t an important characteristic of ‘advanced’ societies the idea of realpolitik?

That is, the existence of a political protective shell. One made up of a mixture of relativism, cynicism and pure political calculation. This allows the citizen to ignore his or her own indignation. If such an emotion still exists in his or hers trampled emotional repertoire.

If the public are unable to feel empathy for other people's suffering, and the lies and the interests that cause them, it is because of their new status. Wage slaves. Slaves to debt. It is a type of collective hallucination, one called ‘confidence in the markets’ that keeps them quiet.

But the more deceits we have to tolerate, the worse and the more brutal will be the lies they tell. The more pronounced will be the cynicism that our rulers will expound. In just one week we have had two good samples of this moral baseness. Unfortunately it comes from the people we voted to publicly represent our political will.

First Tony Blair. The second in a trio of liars, was left basically undamaged after his imperial adventure. Repugnant in his baseness, after being re-elected he urged the British people “to forget the past, and to take care of the things that really worry us”.

Since now it is too late to measure the errors, according to Mr Blair, we are told to “forget the past”. Sorry, it is not that easy. Mainly, because that past is still the present. The coalition have left Iraq infinitely worse than before its intervention. They demonstrated that unfortunately, the ‘coalition of the willing’ can surpass even the most bloodthirsty of dictators.

Today’s reality has no quick remedy. But at least repentance and contrition would seem to be inescapable values for a honest politician. The call to look the other way is an abject example of policymaking that despises reality. Instead it looks to impose decisions through stating an opinion in the coarsest way, through fear. And they know that it works.

They frightened the population once by lying about the aggressive capacities of a dictator who no longer served their interests. Now, subtly, they try to frighten us again. Agreeing to forget the past so as not to put in danger a possible resolution of the “authentic problems”.

Shame on you, Mr. Blair, and also shame on all those that voted for him because “that’s the way it is.” It’s just one more example that, collectively, we have lost all reference, all moral norms, all notions of justice. And therefore possibly the right to live peacefully in the world.

The second example of the enormous scorn which they feel about us voters has been shown by the Californian Republican congressman, Daniel Lungren. In a letter in which he asked for the support for oil exploration in Arctic National Wildlife Reserve (ANWR) Lungren wrote the following.

I feel quite strongly that as long as we have our military in the Middle East fighting so that we can continue to purchase oil from that region, we have an obligation to find alternatives to foreign oil.

Only thanks to the action of the citizen who received it and whom, according to him, had to read the aforementioned paragraph several times before believing what it said, the subject has come to light.

It is a shameless admission of the reasons that took to the U.S.A. to invade Iraq. Taking with them Great Britain, a nation that will soon join the club of petroleum-importing superpowers.

Before notions like these we have to stand strong. To be against it with all our strength, or definitively abandon any aspiration of justice, solidarity and good will between people. Like in Great Britain, in the U.S.A. the political climate no longer is affected by the war in Iraq. Bush was re-elected. People returned to their daily lives, to worry about the truly important things. The mundane.

It is bad enough that the media is no longer interested in it. Subjects disappear from the conscience of an American population that has never felt very interested in separating reality and propaganda. Another success for modern policy, based on the control of information and the sale of fear.

In that new atmosphere, it is no wonder congressman Lungren has relaxed and has put on written record the most obvious thing. That his country invaded another, rich in oil reserves. Just in order to be able to control them.

The worse thing of all, is this. Whatever happens in respect to the really big energy challenges that await to us, we already know the kind of policy that is going to guide the powerful countries in the management of that scenario. Lies, fear, hatred, war.

That is the prescription, and that is the misfortune. Little importance is given to the concerns about technological developments, government initiatives, social efforts to ease the energy situation. Especially if at heart, the winning ideals are those shown by our leaders in Iraq.

First they will lie saying to us that it everything is well. When the situation becomes untenable, when the problems are right in the heat of their term of office, they will play the fear card. They will demand sacrifices from us or everything will be worse. They will point with the finger at the new guilty.

Those that have the oil and whose governments do not allow the entrance of the necessary foreign capital so that we can prune their reserves to the maximum. They already know that we are able to tighten our economic belt.

From the Iraq episode they know that our gullibility is still ample. We may have resigned from any kind of ethical stances, in exchange for maintaining our miserable status quo. Countries will be invaded, new enemies will be declared, they will put price on the heads of those who put our unsustainable way of life in danger. Then war, the old method that never fails, will return.

That is the great danger. In order to transform reality it is necessary to know it first. Lamentably our social model does not allow that. It disguises divergent visions, and if the lie is necessary, will dress reality with whatever consensus is needed.

It demonstrates the practical disappearance of any kind of macroeconomic policy that is not the one that dictated by the godfathers of neo-liberalism. After all, the consumers consume, sweatshops produce, the banks lend, and the wizard apprentices continue experimenting with techniques to obtain a bubble that never explodes.

Denial is perfectly comprehensible, because each step higher, (and recently we have climbed a lot very quickly), the abyss is even deeper. So, do not let us be fooled by their mirage. Do not tolerate it. Even if hurts us in the pocket.

If they are not able to be straight in the days of relative bonanza, what we can hope of them in the days of crisis?

I owed you an explanation

I know that the public at large is generally not aware of the ‘peak oil’ phenomenon, nor its potential significance. Among “peakniks” like me, it seems obvious. Peak oil as a subject has been thoroughly discussed. Just check some of the links at the right column of this blog.

The oil industry press and many analysts and consultants now openly talk about “depletion”, “plateaus” and “demand outstripping supply.”

Even magazines like The Economist, the Bible of neoliberal economics, appear scared shitless when talking about the current dangers for the global economy. And they talk a lot about oil.

But this blog is an experiment that mixes my own past (and present) as a gaming journalist, theorist and teacher, with a phenomena that could be the worst nightmare for the electronic entertainment industry. It won’t be a passing fad.

If we are really about to pass the peak of global oil production, we will learn the hard way how dependent we are on oil. Its uses for transport, as a feedstock for petrochemicals and the way it is used to produce food. Of course it is also a primary source for generating electricity amongst other non renewable fossil fuels like coal and natural gas.

My own feelings are mixed about the outcome of an early peak. Maybe we won’t have time to react. I do not think (maybe I don’t want to believe) we will suffer a catastrophic crash. But the adjustments that will occur will be remembered in the history books.

Because basically, we are in uncharted territory.

But I think I still owe you an explanation. Yes, I am games reviewer, I love racing simulation games. Yes, this blog is called Yamauchi’s Paradox. But what is so paradoxical about Kazunori Yamauchi, the man behind the Gran Turismo series?

Everything started when I read some news about the party held in Japan to celebrate the completion of Gran Turismo 4. There Yamauchi, perhaps after too many drinks, announced his new project.

"I'd like young kids to more fully understand the fun of cars. Using the entertainment power of games, we will be, in a sense increasing the number of car lovers twenty years or so down the road."

Defending this strange pet project even further, Yamauchi stated, "if we don't grow to love cars in youth, we become adults who are uninterested in cars."

Knowing what I know about the prospect of cheap and abundant oil for the coming decades, this was terrible. It was like being the only person who can see the elephant in the room. Emperor’s new clothes.

The average car enthusiast is probably expecting that we will have the same car industry in twenty years. The cars themselves will be running on whatever combustible human ingenuity could be found. But many of the solutions proposed now, such as hydrogen fuel cells or electric cars have very difficult futures.

Hydrogen, fuel cells and electricity stored in batteries are not energy sources themselves. They are vectors to store and transport energy produced elsewhere. The energy we use to fuel our cars and all the transportation we use will not be substituted easily.

If Yamauchi’s assumptions are right, and he is fostering a love of cars by young people, he could be educating youngsters for a future that may end up exactly the opposite of what he expects.

Of course Yamauchi’s vision and impact is just a tiny drop of water in an ocean of consumer orientated culture. But it can serve as a symbol for the big contradiction between what markets demand (more consumption, and an ever growing head-in-the-sand culture) and what the future can bring us. That is if we do not react soon enough to our future energy challenges.

That is the reason I write this blog. Because I need some way to bridge the part of my persona still entwined in the videogame industry to my interest in oil and energy. I am not a luddite, nor a pessimist by nature. But I am a realist. Although I love technology and all the good things it has done for me, I do not buy the notion that ‘technology will save us’. No matter how it is put. You know, after all, ‘the sky is the limit’ is just a catch phrase.

Perhaps I am wrong, but I already placed my bet. I started Crisis Energetica, which has now spawned an association. I also became an Oilcaster, starting to plan for a future where the world will not be like the world in a Playstation 4.

I know my fellow gamers are an intelligent crowd. Full of extraordinary ideas. Some of them even willing to transform the videogame medium to a fully featured form of creative expression. One able to convey all kinds of emotions, not just mindless maze chasing or button-smashing fights.

As technology lovers, they would agree that oil is finite. But they are also optimists. This optimism should no be wasted. We do not have to buy every press release that says that this or that alternative energy will solve all our problems. Instead, we have to ask the right questions.

I don’t even want to start talking about the geopolitics of oil depletion. That is when the frightening tale, that the world may be past its peak of oil production, really starts to unfold.

Maybe it is time to start a dialogue with gamers? Especially those brave gamers starting to peel off the superficial ideas that often invades the gaming industry and press.

What is going to become of us when the world oil production peaks? When the recession sets in? When every videogame will be a classic?

I know we are intelligent and resourceful, but you need to wake up. To start to think about the stuff things are made of and transported by. The stuff that fuels our bodies and our cars, what makes our high energy world run.

Maybe we can’t do anything after all, but as the always classy Dr. Ali Samsam Bakhtiari says:

Un homme averti en vaut deux

Adding injury to insult...

The little finger in my left hand is in pain. And I am not alone. Playing too much GT4 will cause various sorts of physical damage, strained tendons (my case), sore thumbs, involuntary eye twitching, etc, be it with the DSC or the DFP, not to mention the psychological damage caused by the too frequent restarts when hotlaping in Nurburgring (BTW, it's 7:30 with a BMW M5, medium sport tires, manual shifting and no driving assists whatsoever).

Worst of all is that I haven't played so much lately... aging.. agh!

***

In the oily world things are starting to get out of hand... masks are falling, PO is becoming more mainstream with each passing day. Big new oil projects, the so called "mega projects" that will come on stream from here to 2010 won' t cover projected demand, daunting reports, from Goldman Sachs, the IEA, the Bank of Montreal on Saudi Arabia...

And next week I am going to give two presentations to second graders about the multimedia industry, and how to become a game developer. Crazy.

And now for something completely different...

Racing simulators are very good for short, intense bursts of gameplay. You take seat by 18:00h and by 18:0h you’re already cruising at 200 km/h at the Ring. No need to wait to build up an army and beat your real time armchair general, no need to upgrade your weapons to defeat the big guys. Also, no need to load your savegame and try to find out what’s next in your favorite FPS maze. If you’re short on time, racing simulations are a perfect solution for your gaming needs (ok, all the puzzle and mini games are even better for a quick fix).

So here it comes Silent Hunter III. I am a long time fan of this series and other titles as well, like Silent Service II (I didn’t play the first one, I was too young!), Aces of the Deep, and a bit of the modern subs simulations, like 688 Attack Sub or Sub Command. And those games need a lot of time! Yesterday I was doing the Naval Academy missions, learning the ropes of the game. Well, yesterday I did just ONE mission, the final one. I repeated it three times, and it took me like one and a half our... Real time simulations of machines that can go over big distances in a gaming session are not new. There’s people flying MS Flight Simulator doing transoceanic flights in real time, or doing bombing runs over the Nazi occupied Europe in virtual B-17s. But with a WWII sub simulation you can do a dynamic campaign that is going to take you months!!!

Thanks gods for time compression!

Cars, cars, cars

Look at the picture. This is the place where I stayed for my Easter holydays, a very small village, whose population during the winter is just twenty people. But during weekends and in the summer, everyone comes here, from relatives to people that just got in love with the place and ended having a house here. So we go from 20 to 300 people!

Still, the place is perfect for relaxing, even now that we have free wireless Internet connection, thanks to the Internet Rural program.

In my case, I could read two or three books and still managed to have some social life!

BTW, it's been like ten days since I played GT4, how hard is to be a fan boy!

No one will notice

Today, while I was about to write a short review of Street Racing Syndicate for a magazine, I was having the traditional brainstorming with myself, trying to make the best use of the 1.300 characters I had available for the game. And then, as if my fingers and my brain weren't mine, I started writing this:

It is possible that the historians of the future will analyze in detail the popular culture of our time, and they will wonder why car culture was so fashionable at the beginnings of the SXXI. Specially bearing in mind that the proliferation of the private vehicle isn't precisely sustainable, as we have too much contaminating emissions, we will make short of fuel and we lack all the roads we'll need if we were to buy all the cars they want us to buy. But this is not important to motoring aficionados, that see as the interactive offer is always growing in the genre of "races, tuning and hot chicks in shorts".

Best thing about it? No one will notice!

GT4 time goes down as oil goes up

This doesn’t come as a surprise at all, as soon as GT4 fell in my hands, oil prices started to go up, making me as busy as ever. Add to that the unstoppable stream of friends that come to visit, and you’ll end up with a gamer that has “too much life”. And that’s good, because a life of friends is something that really has future... and videogames, well, my friend Pedro says that if you were to power your TV and PS2 manually, you’ll have to work two hours to get a hour of play... how about a cycling simulator, then? It's called a bycicle!

***

Eurogamer publishes an interview with the man. This Yamauchi is as slippery as a snake! He must have been drunk when he spoke about making a GT game for children, as that was the only time I’ve heard him saying something meaningful and not being evasive and inconsistent: “Games must not rely on hardware specifications, but on the creativity of the developers.” Yes, of course, indeed, then stop moaning about how we’ll have to wait to get car damage until the PS3 comes.