<!DOCTYPE HTML PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.0 Transitional//EN"> <HTML><HEAD> <META http-equiv=Content-Type content="text/html; charset=iso-8859-1"> <META content="MSHTML 6.00.2900.2802" name=GENERATOR> <STYLE></STYLE> </HEAD> <BODY bgColor=#ffffff> <DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2></FONT> </DIV> <DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2></FONT> </DIV> <DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2>I wrote that internal combustion engines were a means of living, pointing out that all of our food and other consumption goods are delivered by vans and lorries. To Wojtek replies:</FONT></DIV> <DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2></FONT> </DIV> <DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2></FONT> </DIV> <DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2><FONT face="Times New Roman" size=3>"Similar arguments were, no doubt, advanced to defend<BR>slavery in the US South - it would be the end of<BR>civilization."</FONT></FONT></DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2>Which parallel defeats me, I have to say. Is Wojtek aiming to free the combustion engines from servitude to the human species? Keep them enslaved, I say.</FONT></DIV> <DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2></FONT> </DIV> <DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2>Then he goes on</FONT></DIV> <DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2><FONT face=Arial size=2></FONT></FONT> </DIV> <DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2><FONT face="Times New Roman" size=3>"If you engage enough spin doctors you<BR>can prove anything - that tobacco is good for your<BR>health, lead is harmless, and the 6 thousand year old<BR>flat earth sits in the center of the universe around<BR>which everything else revolves."</FONT></FONT></DIV> <DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2><FONT face="Times New Roman" size=3></FONT></FONT> </DIV> <DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2><FONT face="Times New Roman" size=3>Well, no, you can't prove anything no matter how many spin doctors you engage. (I engage precisely none, by the way.) All propositions are open to dispute, but Wojtek prefers not to, just hiding behind the blather 'lies and statistics'. But evidence makes an argument stronger, not weaker. If you have no counter-evidence, that's fine.</DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2></FONT> <DIV><BR>Grumpily, Wojtek continues:<BR></DIV> <DIV>"It is amazing how far the human mind can go on the<BR>road of self-justiciation of one's "way of life.""</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2>But it's not my way of life, its that of the 60 million or so people who live here, and no doubt it is pretty similar to that of the 280 million who live over there. If you want to slash their wages, or put them on ration books, or take their driving licenses away, you should come out and say it.</FONT></DIV> <DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2></FONT> </DIV> <DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2></FONT> </DIV> <DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2>Wojtek</FONT></DIV> <DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2></FONT> </DIV> <DIV> "To<BR>paraphrase Karl Marx,  "way of life" is like religion<BR>- everyone else's is "man-made" i.e. artifical, ours<BR>is "god-given " i.e. the only true one.  I guess the<BR>iron Lady taught you right - there is no alternative,<BR>so shut up and keep consuming."</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV></FONT><FONT face=Arial>Well, OK then, why don't you stop consuming, and we'll come back to this question in two months or so, to see how you fare. If you want some tips on how, just have a look in your fridge and cupboard. Anything you bought there from a shop was almost certainly delivered by van or lorry (nobody yet has suggested railway lines to shops). Those are the things that you think you can live without.</FONT></DIV> <DIV><FONT face=Arial></FONT> </DIV> <DIV><FONT face=Arial>I am all for alternatives, but in the UK we have had enough austerity, and I prefer the modest growth of the last seven years to the bitter misery of spending cuts, wage restraint, power cuts, council estates, and 'getting on your bike' that preceded it in the early nineties, eighties and seventies (let alone the post war misery of rationing my parents had to put up with when they were growing up).</FONT></DIV> <DIV><FONT face=Arial></FONT> </DIV> <DIV><FONT face=Arial>It seems to me that it is incumbent on those who think that the alternative is to reduce mobility to explain how that is to be done. </DIV> <DIV><BR></DIV></FONT></FONT></BODY></HTML>