Extraterrestrial Cultures

Work the Island (EVS) in Finland, hosted by Livonsaari community, coordinated by KVT Finland

Theme: Environment

Location Livonsaari, Naantali (close to Turku)

Start: 2014-04-01

End: 2014-10-31

Application deadline: 2014-02-17

Decision date: 2014-03-01

Vacancies: 1

Languages: project language — English, local — Finnish

Project Description: Work the Island -project will provide possibilities for suitable and interested volunteers to learn valuable and practical knowledge about organic farming, ecological construction and communal life. We will have a place for three volunteers. The project will last for seven months, from the beginning of April until the end of October.

We strongly prefer candidates who are willing and able to commit themselves for the entire duration of the project. This year, the main focus will be on organic farming at the farming cooperative. Volunteers will get to know the why and how of small scale vegetable production. In addition, there will be several possibilities to learn about building with natural materials, such as straw, clay and timber. The project will take place in Livonsaari community, which has been founded in 2005.

Since then, it has grown to inhabit more than 20 people. The volunteers will become a part of the community for the duration of their stay. This is a great way to learn how community works, what kind of organisation is behind the community and how to solve disagreements and make good decisions.

Work: The volunteers will participate together with the responsible person of the community to the various aspects of work available: agriculture, ecological construction, food production and processing. They will also take part in common activities, such as helping with visitors, rotating cooking shift and maintaining the common living areas. The working day is normally from 9 until 16, with one hour lunch break at noon. However, a reasonable amount of flexibilty of this schedule should be accepted, as the rural life often depends on factors such as weather, availability of tools etc. Weekends are normally the days off. Holidays can be arranged in agreement with the host.

Requirements: We're looking for volunteers who are interested in learning about community supported agriculture (CSA) and small scale vegetable production, permaculture methods and who may be planning to create such model in their own country. Applicants will have interest in ecological building methods. Because the project will happen in a community, open and open-minded candidates are preferred, and they are expected to take part in the community life during the project. After preliminary selection of suitable candidates, we will have an informal interview through Skype.

Food: Food will be provided by the host, but volunteers are expected to take responsibility of cooking and partly getting the groceries.

Accommodation: Accommodation will take place in the common house of the community. There will be other people living in this house as well, and the inhabitants may change during the project.

Pocket money: 120 euro per month

Insurance: Volunteers will be covered by the EVS group insurance.

Fees: Volunteers pay 10% of their travel costs.

Visa: Visa costs will be covered by the EVS project funding. All necessary documents for applying for the visa will be provided by KVT Finland and / or Livonsaari community.

Other: Age limit for volunteers is 18-30 years.

Application: Please send fill in the following application form and send it back before 17th of February to outgoing@svit-ukraine.org.

Extraterrestrial Cultures

"I’ve never understood how God could expect his creatures to pick the one true religion by faith -- it strikes me as a sloppy way to run a universe." -- from Stranger in a Strange Land (1961) by Robert A. Heinlein²⁶⁴³

"The Gowachin: the frog people of Tandaloor whose concept of Law is the strangest in the ConSentiency.To them, ritual (form) is the foundation upon which Law stands, but Law must change to meet each new condition. They do not even trust their own Law, believing that even the most high-minded people will use legalisms for their own benefit. The Courtarena where they try their cases can be a scene of carnage. The losing Legum (lawyer) forfeits his life. Any jurist or client who makes a misstep can be dispatched. This is a situation which makes for infrequent trials and memorable court performances." -- Frank Herbert,3026 on The Dosadi Experiment (1977)²⁶¹⁵

"I suspect that there are more things in heaven and earth than are dreamed of, or can be dreamed of, in any philosophy. The universe is not only queerer than we suppose, but queerer than we can suppose. Our only hope of understanding it is to look at it from as many different points of view as possible." -- J.B.S. Haldane (1928)⁹⁷⁴

God created every living creature that now moveth, and one was man. Mud as man alone could speak. God leaned close as mud as man sat up, looked around, and spoke. Man blinked. "What is the purpose of all this?" he asked politely.
"Everything must have a purpose?" asked God.
"Certainly," said man.
"Then I leave it to you to think of one for all this," said God. And He went away.
-- from The Sirens of Titan (1961) by Kurt Vonnegut, Jr.²²¹¹

"Every sentient creature sees beauty in a different way."-- Tec,in Janet O. Jeppson’s The Second Experiment (1974)²¹⁶⁴

At last we arrive at the apex of anthropologist Leslie White’s "cultural pyramid" -- the ideological and philosophical strata in alien societies. This cultural subsystem encompasses religion, ethics, logic, worldviews and aesthetics. In the present chapter we shall attempt to deal with these symbolic articulations of the nature of the universe which we may encounter in extraterrestrial societies on other worlds.

Xenologists attempt such an analysis with some trepidation, for they heed the warning of sociobiologist E.O. Wilson that many human concepts of ethics, aesthetics, law, philosophy, and religion may be at least partly traceable back to our primitive biological heritage. If this is so, then our human notions of "culture" may be grossly anthropocentric at an extremely fundamental level. As Wilson suggests:

Although the hundreds of the world’s cultures seem enormously variable to those of us who stand in their midst, all versions of human social behavior together form only a tiny fraction of the realized organizations of social species on this planet and a still smaller fraction of those that can be readily imagined with the aid of sociobiology theory.³¹⁹⁸

Date: 2015-01-02; view: 912