all unless. >> liz is our second event

and i will begin by an acknowledging our co-sponsors the environmental studies department here at mount holyoke and the odyssey bookshop. [applause] our own independent own bookstore right here they do of france -- feather this job every day to bring in authors it makes pioneer valley a much richer place. thank you very much. [applause] as i mentioned this is our second defense our third is on money november 7th captain charles more reading from in discussing his book plastic ocean. one of the first to identify when of the plastic trash in the north pacific and you be here to tell us the story

also on november 10th distinguished environmentalist will present the leadership lecturer and having a long and impressive resume as the founder of natural resources defense council this cheap and our mental advisor to jimmy carter in from the united nations development program entitled american prospects. it promises to be provocative and inspiring. some special think use tonight, and our student volunteers. and also to our tireless and amazing program coordinator. [applause]

and a huge think your gracious donors whose generosity make events like this possible. frances moore lappe the author of 18 books including the classic buy it for a small planet and co-founder of three organizations including food first and this small planet institute for research popular education seeking to bring democracy to new life that she leaves of her daughter. they have also co-founded this small planet fund which in those resources to democratic social movements worldwide and appears frequently as the public speaker and a regular contributor to "huffington post." her most recent work, released september 2011 is "ecomind" teefifteeteefiftee n. jane goodall called the book darfur in expiring.

"ecomind" will open your eyes and change your thinking i want everybody to read it. other books include getting a grip, and getting a grip ii. hopes edge. democracies edge. you have the power. her books have been translated into 15 languages and use dinner university courses and her influence is so great it is impossible to measure. we're happy to have her here tonight. frances moore lappe. [applause] >> thank you so very much. thank you to the odyssey bookstore especially the students i have the pleasure of meeting via skype just a few days ago and fired me

up. thank you for being here tonight. i would like to begin my talk with the words from d. hawke the says things are far too bad for pessimism. that is the spirit of "ecomind" that is the spirit i try to maintain when i get up in the morning. i would like to begin the journey that brought me here on this treacherous drive from boston actually began 40 years ago when i sat at the uc-berkeley agricultural library as a 20-something with this intuition that food is so basic.

if millions that are eating what is more important to them back? of i could just understand why is there hunger in the world that would unlock the mysteries of politics. and experts were telling us we run out of food and is it true? i sat there literally putting two in two together very soon there is more than enough food for all of us. true than and even today but were southern we're actively creating the scarcity that we say we fear. why hunger in a world of plenty and why would the species do such as saying? then it grew to the question that motivates ihop my

life, why are we together creating a world that we as individuals would never choose? because no one who gets up in the morning says yes i want another child to die of hunger. my goal is to make sure the plan it gets hotter and species are lost forever. i don't think that is going on. that seems like a pretty big question. why are we creating a world that not only would we not use the violates our common sense and deepest sensibilities of human beings? that is the question. over the decades i have had a lot of help from a lot of great thinkers. it began to dawn on me, one particular thinker who wrote the book the anatomy of human destructiveness, it began to click that if we

think about how we got to the place where we are, look at what is unique about the human species and one is how we think that that quality is we see the world according to a map each culture develops the ways and literally we cannot see outside of our map. it is like a filter this is the way we work. and to make my case a want to take you to my kitchen last thanksgiving. i got up charge step to make my route to vegetable dishes and 33 people would be in my living room that afternoon. i started to look for my favorite dutch oven and i looked in a covered and it was not there. i went to the basement and came back up and i could not

find it i got so frustrated who i had planted to and i gave up. about one hour later there was. i had put a plant in it. you can get what i am getting at. i was looking for a kitchen i am it is not a conspicuous. it is read. [laughter] i could not see it because i converted it into a planter. i put it into another frame. i could not see it from the kitchen frame. this is our challenge. the aspect of our mentality is perfectly fine if the dominant way we see is a mental map that we absorb the macy's this with you

tonight is the map that we absorber unconsciously in our future is denying and that explains a lot about why we are in the mess the rear and. and a challenge that is clear is it possible to begin to make knowledge what is taking us down to shave the more life serving map that is aligned with all we know about science and human nature? what is the dominant map? i think his it certainly carries the assumption we're all separate from one another, nature comment just as these distinct entities as a competitive struggle and their root of that struggle is the premise of black. not enough of anything.

i call it the promise of the lack of good and lack of goodness there's not enough energy, food, parking places in boston, anything. and not enough goodness in us. that a few peel away the fluff and get to but we can john, you come to assume assume, competition and materialism. that is what we can count on. what i would like to do, at the center is the motivating force comment that sets us in motion. from the sense of ourselves then resell fishbowl shoppers are in competition over scarcity.

from that we cannot possibly think we're able to come together to deliberate together to come up with what works for the whole. no, no, no we're not capable of that. what do we do? we fall for the notion we have to turn over to our fate and social outcome to something that works on its own without us. something that is infallible if not magical and ronald reagan used the term magic to refer to it. the magic of the market. our messed up little human being we let it do its magic but unfortunately on the markets have served humanity we hit upon 82 kill your idea that it can result in a benign outcome if driven by the highest return people

already own the shares in the company in from that promise -- premise that it goes to wealth, to wealth, to wealth, to the point* that i just checked out today we reached a point* where 400 americans control as much wealth as the bottom 50 percent of the american population. citigroup researchers called it for the top 1% control and the bottom 90%. that is where occupation wall street 1% language comes 10. so we start with the premise of a lack and turn over the faith to the peculiar notion of a market driven by the narrow ruled that ends of

concentrating wealth to the extent we end up creating what? lets take food for example. there is between 20 or 30% from the 1960's, when i was re teeing "diet for a small planet" there is 20 percent more food for each of us then there was back then. but yet we have historic minder. -- historic hunger. the concentration of wealth flowing from these assumptions and set creating the experience of scarcity the matter how much we grow the most 1 billion people on the planet today going hungry for the world's largest exporter but yet to half of the children will be dependent on food stamps at some point* in their

childhood. a and another form of scarcity is now with this wealth we end up with corporations and troll half of the food and beverage products in our supermarket. not because they are bad people but the logic that i am describing, the return to wealth has been from highly processed foods, we have become virtually addicted so where are we? we are at the point* where 40% of the calories our children are eating our nutritionally empty. that is another scarcity of health the nutritious food that we don't even identify as a lack often but there is. what i am suggesting, from the premise of scarcity we

actually create the experience of scarcity. then we say i told you so. we really are selfish little competitors. we see a few at the top with their riches and people struggling just to make ends meet and isn't that proof human beings are selfish? what happens? if we just trust ourselves even more, the trust in each other is declining, radical drops. we end up creating a scarcity that we say we fear that becomes self reinforcing. the good news is a lot of people are a weakening and realizing that this isn't working. this is not the world i want to live band. the ecological destruction

is devastating. the human misery is devastating. partly as a result of at and breakthroughs and a narrow science and archaeology, partly as a result of breakthroughs of ecological sciences, another way of seeing the is emerging. it is taking shape. i want to take your around that spiral for a minute. instead of the scarcity mind which is the dominant mind with the promise of a lack i now see the but "ecomind" instead of seeing the world as these distinct entities that are competing what i sense an ecological world view is we're all connected

the nature of life in the process of continuing change a continuous shaping of all the entities of every system moment to moment. many great teachers have influenced me of the physiologist at oxford university in england who wrote the music of life in which he says, well what i am trying to say. there are no privilege components time the rest what to do. rather there is a system of which every element of shapes service its interactions as all other elements in being shaped moment to moment by each other. in this world view as my friend has said in this way, there are no parts

there are only participants. rather than these entities alone 518 over not enough but we see our moments. creating even hour passive this is shaping the world around us. in the ecological world view, the only choice we don't have is whether to change the world because we are moment to moment coke creating the reality around us. i would just ask us to look at the implications. let me start the spiral in the sky from the premise that in fact,, with the interconnectedness of life with coke creation is the dominant idea from scarcity talk about the premise of

scarcity. what does that tell us about human nature? it is weird the selfish little critters. "ecomind" says yes. that is really showing up showing how we can be to one another. we also know that to look at the broad sweep of history that the interest is yes, given certain conditions, most of us will be paid with incredible brutality. think about the holocaust. not about a crazed dictator who was alone doing this or a few sadistic guards if you read the book ordinary men

you realize this here they were. they don't see themselves as science and people at all but they were sent to the villages to kill the jews point* blank and the first most resisted. gradually more and more went along intel 90% had committed murder. 38,000 jews murdered and many sent to the death camp. ordinary people. we think of the stanford prison experiment and we know there it 1971 when i was down the road for 18 "diet for a small planet" that the cyc lab there was a experiment in which of people who tested normal were put to into the mock prison and settings of postal last two weeks and the professor had to stop it after six days because they were so brutalizing one another emotional breakdowns

were happening and it looked eerily similar to abu ghraib. we know that to we can be very, very cruel to one another and from the "ecomind" we realize the evidence is equally clear functional mri is looking at our brains it is fascinating what they're learning about us. when people are competing vs. cooperating, they found there are parts of our brains better stimulated as if we're eating chocolate that is how delicious it is to cooperate. we also have tremendous evidence basic fairness if you have toddlers if things

break down if the unfairness enters into the community and read it went to break apart with unfairness. and also to return to this in a moment now because of narrow science there are now runs in our brain. when i go like this they are firing. that is how connected we are and the foundation of the buffeted. we have that to work with as well as our terrific need to make a dent in the world as my mentor point* it, we should forget the eighth idea i think therefore that

i am but i think there for i e fact. we have a capacity for unspeakable evil and just the qualities we need to make it turned toward life with their villages and committees up to the global level. i am convinced we have both from the ecological perspective we realize we're just like any other species in the environment but it depends on the context what is brought forth? maybe a certain plant is that much water or seven times what to humans need? here i am going out on a whim but i am suggesting i have a clue of the conditions to bring out the worst and the best and i hope i stimulate a lot of debate but history shows us and the lab experiments

there are three conditions to bring out the worst of concentrated power, secrecy, we do not do well when we know nobody is watching as we saw on wall street recently with the traders who were creating those risky derivatives to push them off as good investment. one of the slow dance i learned was i'll be gone, you'll be gone. we can get away with it. most of them have. secrecy is not a good thing with the better part of ourselves and cultures of claim it is nine ecological somebody is just a victim or the perpetrator if we are all implicated or accomplice

it, it makes no sense whatsoever so said teapartiers levying obama from the ecological point* of view, we're all responsible and part of the solution. the conditions of bringing out the worst are pretty clear then that is liberation because we have some direction on what to do and create the conditions that bring out the best in us. it is grounded in a great deal of reflection that is why and by the way as to then begin to recognize what are the conditions that bring out the best and restart to create those, we realize we can come together

in real deliberation and problem-solving and creates a government that is responsible to us because we know how to remove the private wealth from a political system that affects the negative side goal terribly and learned we can do that because the trust ourselves and build on that we start off with the idea we have the potential to create those which i would argue a centerpieces we could have a market that remains open and fair because we step up to set the boundaries and it ends up in a monopoly so actually

it is the citizens that are required to create a fair and competitive market. to think we could read frame the idea of the free market is our freedom to participate in it and have the wherewithal to keep it open and participate. so what happen since we began to create rules so people have access not all collected at the top been the confidence builds that is a virtuous cycle increasing and intensity. that is what i am suggesting is possible as we go that deep to surface water the assumption is taking us down to frame them based on a

more science or that type of view that can give us, not optimism or pessimism but a possible list because from that point* to view it is possible we can do this. the ultimate challenge commend the eggs of the rating time to be alive when we can align ourselves with what we know. my work now and the book "ecomind" is what happened as we make the shift and when we're all co creators trying to manifest power, i transparency come back and what is inherent in a fireball ecosystem of humanity in my view. what does that look like? but may give you a taste would it means twos shift from the scarcity mind to

the "ecomind." many people i admire so much within the environmental movement often put out if not literally that we have hit the limit in that is what is taking as down. as we are proud to reach 7 billion people, that feeling comes through all my god. 7 billion we have hit the limit the levy suggest my sense of the problem with that framing trapped in a scarcity mind and it increases beer and we know

from social psychology fear itself makes people more materialistic but to suggest somehow if we just cut back we just heard about the plastic soup and the pacific ocean i read it is the size of two states of texas. we could cut that in half would plastic debris in this mothering of aquatics life would work if it was just one state of texas instead of two states? i don't think so. we just have to cut back rather what we hope is about changing the system itself is it reminds me of another

problem of the scarcity frame we think of the problem out there and don't look at the fact we have hit the limits to feed people. we don't see the enormous waste built into the food system where less than half of the grain that we produce goes directly to human beings. 1/3 goes to animals, and one-third of our fish catch those two animals. that is before you mentioned 30 or 40% of the third is wasted a lot of it because of the concentration of

wealth they cannot store the food that they grow effective way. but how can we have hit the limits? fifty-five% through a 87% of the energy produced is wasted. but to explore, i get curious, what is it about this system of concentration of decision-making ending at generating more waste and what we really want? these areas have more. but the other problem i see coming from the scarcity mind is when i hear the adm of hitting the limits of what nature can provide i can understand to say we have to do better and have a

genetically modified organisms because we tip the limits of what nature can do. i can see how you would jump to that conclusion did you hear we have hit the limits we have a system of active destruction that is what we have to focus in on. we hit the limits for a what is the alternative? from "ecomind" and the way all of my thinking now could be summarized we have hit the limits, we could cut back and a line with the laws of nature including human nature to bring out the best and there is more than enough we can learn more and more about majors

laws and as we explore and develop the courage to create new rules to bring out the best and as we can see we're aligning with human nature and unfortunately, the rules that we currently builds from the scarcity mind. what does it begin to move to allied meant? and apply to focus on four main that you start to see those who were just those who would take our resources away but if you look at the

entire food system and is now contributing retrieve 44% in 97% because of the intensive use of mission fertilizer and. >> that is bad news but think of the possibility. the estimate is if the world move to aggro for st., ecology, and debris into accretive five stock that itself over a couple of decades could cut to eight greenhouse gases.

70% of people producing food and the road today are spinoff murmurs but this is the latest of two proof or -- grow food and work with in sex in ways that control harmful past. and to enhance organic matters excederin excederin. they are key to the solution i want to take you to one of the poorest countries in the world. think of it just below the north africa 10 countries right in the middle between the north africa and section. that country was seen last year certainly it as nothing but a famine nightmare by

yet to unbeknownst to most of us farmers have free greened by a nurturing trees as they saw as a threat they started to see been nurturing the trees to keep them growing in the field that they were growing food, it increase the fertility of their field it held the soil in place and helped to create the pathways to hold the water and nutrients are as low as firewood and 220 million new trees flourishing providing food security 2.5 million people. the researcher from whom i have learned this high said

why didn't i know about this? he said nobody thought to look. they saw the desperately poor as loser nobody thought there is all whole region there. what is going on? i was so moved by listening to the chief and the villages twos say. >> women were more empowered the canvas they did not depend nine getting credit to buy fertilizer sober men were more empowered? people could pay the school

fees for children to go school. >> that is why example when removed from frame to alignment. it means a great deal we only hear by deforestation in the road but yet to its realign our social rules with nature, what can happen. those engaged in committee for st. that they have the responsibility, the forced mish groups through but to have part and it degradation

of the effort -- forest, there is in a sufficient and the acreage f. forest cover. this is the kind of thing that happens 130 line of our it social rules with what we know about the natural grown. aho and bruce show i will take you back to the hunter question. >> fear factor negative tuition and but you that did in in particular but they

create new rules that getting rid of the market but holding it accountable and inclusive of the hungriest people so for example, the small farmer can come in in in sell your food settled coastland if you keep your food within the reach of the poorest people and these councils have brought together this is a very large city and they invested 1 penny per day. turning out what it turned out to be in this large city it is a penny per day in a multifaceted programs to make healthy food available and in one decade they cut

the death rate of babies and children by 50%. another example of aligning the social rules with what we know brings out the best and instead of having this abundance by gatt scarcity scarcity, they begin to make healthy food available and now 30% of the food and schools throughout the country has to be supplied locally from small farmers. i'd like to end with a personal message about what i think is most needed for us as the individual because i guess as you know, by now human beings are good enough. we have in us of all the

things we need we have devolved into lean it -- tightly knit social groups entirely to and socially to be sensitive to one another. we are good enough but i do think we need to work on one core quality and fat is what i like to call bold humility. buy-back, the social nature is a double edged sword knowing the preservation depended on staying on in but the larger tribe heads over.

it means that separating from the pack is life, not death but it brings up the primal fear if we have a different retry to be more

that way. it works my entire life. and now i have my children they are risk takers so i try to model myself on them. that is very real on a daily basis now because of the internet can bring stories of our heroes of our lives

and to use the courage news diet yes magazine solutions journal, those that we bring to your in box of stories of possibility. here it is. i realize i had forgotten to mention what i see as the linchpin in head turned toward life and democracy that this to us. , talk about money and politics i did not try to convince you it is possible with my superhero example.

one whose picture i have quite a year for the legislature? what do you mean? you are not paying attention. we have volunteer public financing 80% of those legislatures are run without any corporate money. you just have to get $5 from 50 people and run for office. >> i am a waitress. i can do that. [laughter] she got $5 from 50 people and has been reelected four times and has now become such a us dollar representative and now a

senator in the state of maine she has sat as the co-chair for the judiciary. her work and heard colleagues have removed the power of corporations to pass on the most important pieces of environmental legislation of producer responsibility law that has gone viral and other states and kept a pound of lead out of that state for every single citizen in the state. i took a tiny detours there because now at the national level we have legislation that is modeled -- modeled on that example that if we step up out of our distrust of each other and government and we can have a government accountable to us to get money at of the picture we can insist our legislators support called fair elections now with 75 co-sponsors, we have to

believe to get the money out of the system. that is simple part to rethinking fear to step up to get to the root of the problem of how much it takes and in my formulation. this gets easier when you're old like me. some years ago i realized after my daughter and i traveled the road together i said you realize everything in this book that we wrote about i would give almost no chance of success when i was your age? i said that is humbling but think of how liberating it is a buy would have given those initiatives no chance of success then how can i

today say nothing is possible? and realize what i needed to do was to make a checklist of the things that get me up in the morning and inspire me to think that will not happen. for example,, i grew up in texas. in the '90s the utilities company in pull together a citizen jury of ordinary people to weigh in on the energy options. they shifted their views and came to the conclusion with this randomly selected group then they began to invest in wind energy i learned that is one of the reason end texas is no-win to energy

leader that has pushed the u.s. to be a leader of the world. of somebody told me 15 years ago that that would be possible i would say no. never. not in texas no way. i also think of another hero of mine may be that has done more for my backbone than anyone i have ever read to the nobel peace prize winner the past three a few weeks ago by the 1977 on earth day while plant gained 73 use for the leaders i would have said it isn't that nice? i never would have believed that 20 years later that goes of 30 million than

45 million and then to inspire the united nations program seven you have heard plant for the planned a program 2007 i said they will set the goal of a billion trees for year that is lovely but could it happen? i've looked back last year, 11 billion trees. so in some ways have moved to help directly inspired 11 billion trees the company that eight -- planted the most his ethiopia and the president congratulated the boy scouts for their great work on that campaign. what is the less than? the one that would like to the view with is the core

less than of "ecomind" if we see the world and continuous change in the rear all participants and would say only choice we don't have is that we have ultimate freedom. it is not possible to know what is possible and that is our freedom to go further world we want to. thank you very much. [applause]

>> please go to the microphone. >> i waged skype be a year earlier talk about a occupy wall street the article don't think like a pig which is the training of the occupied movement of the general assembly more showing people what democracy looks like a dent in light of what has happened and no clear end

with the protesters being attacked with rubber bullets and tear gas and the p the actively denying what has happened what could be a hopeful response for the brutality just like being hit in the head with a tear-gas canister he is still unconscious. there is already anger on all these people for watching some advice? i don't know. >> just to contribute our energy to participate directly is the best response to turnout toward every way to help contribute to the discussion my son and i wrote that piece together.

it was trying to contribute to rather than the blame game go to the root rather than blame the greedy corporation year also participate -- participants to allow that to take place. the only response even when it's so ugly and painful that the most constructive thing we could do is to ship quote they show the support to contribute to the dialogue that turns his firm protest to a compelling vision on profound changes.

so far, i guess there is a lot of finger, but there has been a lot of good will toward people as well. when i was on occupational street with anthony, the speaker was articulating that we want to be contributors and we want to help that is a message dire was hearing more than just pointing figures that the other. >> that is of the more than saying isn't this nice? i don't know if any of view want to go to washington on saturday. their reactions starting at 1130 i will be speaking at

530 of of love it if you would come cheap meat company and figure out what to say in my two minutes. people will be speaking all through the rest of the night on saturday. organized by the coffee party. [laughter] it to it is wonderful. the name bj's the real purpose to cree and arena in which people of all persuasions can talk civilly and you have to sign a civility pledged to participate and i think the world of the founder of very low key woman who said there has got to be another ride that is not a screaming at one another. coffee party usa is the website i welcome people especially after what is happening in oakland there will be more people there

and there is temptation to focus on the anger and the outrage and how to use this? some people say this is just the moment we need. . .