[Editor's note: You have probably wondered why Mexico is the way it is, and you may have a fair idea. But hidden historical truth can help explain a lot more than endless news coverage and dozens of movies. Evans delivers.]

"There is nothing new in the world except the history you do not know…" - Harry S. Truman

Early in the Spring of 1983, riding an old Pinto that had carried me from the other side of the Sierra Madre Occidentale, I surfaced on the Border at the town of Palomas, Chihuahua just south of Columbus, New Mexico. I'd gone South in late January, on account of my father dying, just to get away, and find time to think in the solitudes of the mountains of Sonora.

I bought my horse in the town of Bacerac, which lies between the sixth and seventh ranges, in the high country of Sonora. Along the way, I'd met old timers who had seen Pancho Villa when they were eight or nine years old...

In this time of more discussion about climate, war, peak oil and other major issues, debate almost rages about the relevance of resistance and activism versus accepting or encouraging total collapse. This debate is not allowed to be very public, thanks to control of the media by the corporate state, but people do discuss it if they prefer such topics to the Superbowl, for example.

Some disputants in the debate are rather compassionate and energetically optimistic, and as a result they may be more popular as dinner guests than, say, some morose, self-centered analyst of our world's dilemmas. However, who is right, and who will be left? Both, perhaps.

Culture Change has combined a dire outlook for the short term with the need for action to uphold positive models for sustainability. In this report we contrast two well-known writers' views of collapse and resistance. To bring out the best in this debate and see the commonality, let us consider the psychological factors involved in (1) surviving in large cities, and (2) why we behave as we do.

Culture Change Letter #148

As we share our worries about global warming, we are actually doing so separately by virtue of lifestyle and culture. We know this poor approach to be ineffective, and our despair mounts as we keep seeing the wrong kind of economics churn along. Clearly the Iraq disaster and other crises are symptoms of a system run amok.

It appears that all but the most fortunate people have to experience today's pain and frustration separately and in an alienated fashion, in a private, stressful quasi-hell. We each undergo unprecedented pressure on our psyches and our bodies. Although we know we're in a collective pickle, we are curiously delaying acting like a collective intelligence. Could it be that we are now about to see the light?

[Editor's note: I've been sitting on some questions on peak oil and climate change for my sister Trilby Lundberg the gasoline-price celebrity, as well as for the many reporters who cover her twice-monthly analyses. In the public interest, here are my questions and observations, after I've not heard back from her in several weeks. - JL]

MSNBC proclaimed, "Trilby Lundberg is ‘Prophet of the Pumps’" (AP, by Jeff Wilson) on August 20, 2006.

After the wide syndication of the Associated Press feature on Trilby Lundberg and the firm I used to run, Lundberg Survey, there was very little reaction in websites or letters-to-the-editor. From within the family among environmentalist Lundbergs, and from some Culture Change readers, there was consternation about her comments. But I see an opportunity in stirring public debate on peak oil and climate change.

All too many news stories of relevance and significance pop up and are quickly overtaken by more news. But could it be that the newspapers and corporate websites were only too happy to print a pro-gas-guzzling feel-good story? After all, selling SUVs and lesser global warmers is the big revenue base for newspapers and most of the U.S. corporate media.

Following the shocking revelation that heat generated by vigorous exercise is a major contributor to global warming, we are all having to reassess our own activities. It comes as a major surprise to many of us that storing energy in human fat is actually a valuable way of reducing our impact on the environment. Government may be introducing plans to extract this fat by large-scale liposuction programmes and storing it underground, but we all have a responsibility to reduce our participation in ecologically hazardous physical activity.

Looking at my own lifestyle, it was easy to identify my cycling habit as a major problem. I’m only too aware of the amount of heat that cycling can generate but cutting down was not going to be easy, so six months ago I turned for help to my friend Jeremy. He has not cycled since he was a child and is a respectable three stone heavier than me. He now runs a consultancy helping people like me to face up to and overcome our environmental deficit.

What we can do about passing the energy tipping point

The energy tipping point has been reached, just as a system such as the climate has been found to have a critical threshold that some scientists believe has probably been reached. Obviously, climate disaster is much more ominous than the enormous consequences of passing the energy tipping point. As if it's a matter of choice, there are those who don't want to see any concerns about energy supply distract us from the climate challenge. Yet, the two crises are related and inseparable. There happens to be a common approach to mitigate each of them.

Meanwhile, the mainstream corporate press is finally hinting at limitations on the economy from the "constraints" of both climate and energy. This is heresy for free marketeers who believe in endless growth. The New York Times ran a guest editorial column on Nov. 29 that said,