[nowthatsweird.co.uk]

A local debate between pro-T-Town and Ian Crane the person with actual, on the job experience in oil industry matters, who is NOW RETIRED and has a genuine interest in alternative remedies, btw.

Ross Hemsworth writes:

(quote)Under attack from all angles lol!
Well, the peak oil debate aired last night on Glastonbury Radio, and whilst most of the audience thoroughly enjoyed it, a few old foes couldn’t help but attack me personally for airing it!

Although I tried to stay firmly “on the fence” throughout the interview, I got criticised by people for not giving Rob Hopkins enough time to respond!! Now anyone who understands interview technique knows that if you are holding a debate and one interviewee gives shorter replies and stops dead at the end of the sentence, you then go to the other interviewee/s for their response to avoid “dead air”, so was it MY fault that Ian Crane gave longer and more factual, comprehensive replies than Rob Hopkins? No! But some people seemed to think so!

One local “speaker” Nicholas Mann who seems for some reason to be revered by many, has chosen again to amongst those attacking me on a local forum (not for the first time incidentally) - I wonder if this is because he has never been invited on Now THAT’S Weird? I don’t know what else I have ever done to this man to be singled out for undeserved criticism in this way, but one thing’s for sure - he don’t seem to like me lol!

It seems to me that a few staunch followers of Rob Hopkins felt he didn’t get his argument across well in the interview and therefore tried to defend HIM by blaming ME for the fact that he turned up unprepared and unable to defend his position against Ian Crane. Mr Hopkins himself accused me in an e-mail, of being biased and obviously a friend of Mr Crane, yet I had only met Ian a week before in Glastonbury and knew nothing of his research until watching a couple of his DVD’s the night before the interview, to prepare for the debate.

In my opinion, Mr Crane’s arguments are built on good effective research with evidence to back them up, whereas Mr Hopkins opinions seem to have little actual evidence to support them. I guess time will tell who is right and who is wrong, but Mr Hopkin’s failure to even recognise that at the very least, he needs to look into some of these points, means that as the spokesperson for the Transition Towns movement, I believe he should not be in that driving seat.

Please remember, that this is MY opinion based on what I heard and saw from the interviewees.

Ross
(unquote)

as an aide memoire here is Ian Cranes invitation

[transitiontownwatch.blogspot.com]

His profile reads;

About Me
Ian Crane
An ex-oilfield executive who has lived and worked in the Middle East, mainland Europe and the USA, Ian has spent the past ten years studying mythology, alternative history, secret societies, esotericism, … and deep geopolitics! Ian does not represent or speak or write on behalf of any organisation; consequently all views expressed are based upon his personal knowledge and research.

Shakti has suggested a valuable method by which to assess these projects--the elements of conspiracy, catastrophe and paranoia.

It is interesting that there appears to be a link between Velitchkovsky and one of the key figures in the Peak Oil movment.

Another Peak Oiler, Ruppert, had background as a police detective, but no work experience in or around the oil industry.

Mark Koslow remarked that The Reign of Quantity (a book by Guenon that influenced EF Schumacher) could be considered 'a is a great classic in the growing genre of what could be called Paranoid literature.'

Steiner was not a traditionalist but did share some similarities in that he started out in Theosophy as did Rene Guenon, and both men created world views in which modern culture and society are seen as entangled in a dark age and imperilled by dark forces, and that only a small elite, strengthened by correct initiation, can rescue humanity.

Guenons solution was to convert to Islam, which he considered untainted, but he brought his own interpretations and retained his interest in Masonic symbolism.

Steiner created an entire cosmology, system of farming, and a program of action, schooling and daily living that were robust enough to continue his program after he died. Schools for children remain in demand, and that, and a polity of politic with holding of Steiners doctrine, has enabled the Waldorf schools to spread and in the US, some are successfully gaining support as charter schools. As Steiner put it, sometimes one must use Ahirimanic technologies to serve the Anthroposophical project.



A note on Alexander Dugin:

He has been classified as a traditionalist. Traditionalism derives from the work of most of French esotericist Rene Guenon, Fritjof Schuon, both of whom believed in a perennial or primordial unity of tradition, that has been corrupted during the Kali Yuga, making most religions with just a few exceptions, inversions of tradition--these are imposters and lead away from true Tradition, for which a valid intiation is needed.

Schuon and Guenon sought this through conversion to their interpretation of Islam, making Islam a mere means by which to adhere to Traditionalism.

However, another contributor who unlike the first two, did believe in taking political action to restore society to a lost purity, was Julius Evola. Evola sought for a more pure form of Fascism--so much so that Himmler distrusted him and Mussolini finally revoked his passport.

For Alexander Dugin read here

"Although often described as a Fascist, Evola was something else (and quite possibly something more frightening). Because he was something other than a Fascist, he was not implicated in what many Italians saw as the fiasco of Italian Fascism. In the postwar period there was little competition to Evola for the role of Italy's principal political philosopher of the far right, and his books became the chief intellectual inspiration of Italian rightist terrorist groups during the 1960s and 1970s. Those readers who remember the bombing of Bologna railway station and similar outrages of the time may be surprised to learn that the ultimate objective was the restoration of a quasi-medieval spiritual and chivalrous order.

After the suppression of political violence (of both left and right) in Italy, Evola's writings entered the cannon of the European radical far right, and today are to be found on the websites of countless minor far-right groups from Italy to Germany. The fault line between Catholic and Protestant Europe that defeated Guénon's Traditionalism has not restricted the spread of Evola's political Traditionalism. One important point needs to be made here. Evola drew on Guénon, and although Evola and Guénon corresponded, Guénon took little or nothing from Evola. Serious readers of Evola are thus led sooner or later to Guénon, but readers of Guénon are not led to Evola. Traditionalist Sufism is almost without exception apolitical.

The radical far right is at present marginal to European politics, and so political Traditionalism is marginal in Europe. One exception to this is Russia, where the collapse of Communism gave rise to a much more varied and confused political scene than elsewhere. One of Russia's better known radical political philosophers is Alexander Dugin, a former Soviet dissident who once belonged to a small Traditionalist group established in Moscow during the 1960s. Dugin's Traditionalism derives more from Evola than from Guénon, and has been adapted from various other sources to create a philosophy appropriate for contemporary Russia, for example by emphasizing Russian Orthodoxy rather than Sufism as the repository of esoteric truth.

Dugin's Russian Traditionalism provided much of the ideological justification for an apparently unlikely alliance, established towards the end of the Yeltsin years, between what remained of the Russian Communist Party and one of Russia's major radical right groups, the Patriots of Alexander Prokhanov. At one point this alliance looked as if it might become significant in Russian politics, but faded after the election of President Putin. Dugin then shifted his approach from confrontation with the Kremlin to cooperation. At the time of writing he heads a foreign-policy think tank that seems to be well regarded by the Kremlin and also by parts of the Russian security services and army high command. He has recently launched a political party, the Eurasian party, the significance of which remains to be seen.

The central theme of Dugin's writings, think tank, and party is that Holy Russia embodies tradition and spiritual virtue as identified by Guénon and Evola. The Atlantic alliance dominated by America embodies its contrary--the spiritually empty shell of true civilization that Guénon left for Cairo in 1930. Dugin sees as inevitable a major conflict between a traditional and spiritual Eurasian block under Russia, and a modernist and spiritually desolate Atlantic block consisting largely of America. This thesis is in some ways the Russian equivalent of Samuel Huntington's Clash of Civilizations thesis, according to which the conflicts of the post-Cold War period would be not between ideologies but between civilizations, for example between America and Islam. Dugin's thesis has proved as Attractive to Russian strategists as Huntington's did to American ones"

[www.traditionalists.org]

For more citations read here

[www.google.com]

Quote
shakti

1. Who the hell is Rob Hopkins? I have yet to read a bio that shows his higher education or career in the field of petroleum geology. Yet, we are supposed to take him as some kind of "expert" and follow a movement based on his "expertise"? From what I can gather he merely teaches permaculture classes at the British equivalent of a diploma mill. Sorry, not trying to be condescending, correct me if I'm wrong. This is not to say that I'm not impressed that "some guy with a blog, a permaculture class, and no petroleum geology degree or oil experience" could turn himself into some kind of "world-renowned" expert on "Peak Oil". It IS an impressive achievement, in a sense! If I'm way off the mark, and somebody has a link that shows something like "PhD with honors from Cambridge School of Petroleum Geology", then send it to me so I can apologize to Mr. Hopkins.

So, let's review:
-we have a new movement spun out of peak oil... lead by a non-geologist, Hopkins... whose main influence Heinberg is also a non-geologist and non-academic.
-we have Heinberg as an aide and ally to Vellikovsky, a guy who tried to change astronomy to his liking... but who is not an astronomist! Are we seeing a pattern yet?

From Plymouth University (UK) website, internal students, graduate projects

Policy and Governance in Europe Research Group Postgraduate project Oil peak scenarios and the implementation of energy descent pathways at the local level: the case of Totnes (Devon, UK)

Rob Hopkins
Director of Studies: Professor Geoff Wilson Other PhD advisors: Dr Ian Bailey
Rob Hopkin‟s PhD is entitled “Oil peak scenarios and the implementation of energy descent pathways at the local level: the case of Totnes (Devon, UK)”. His research is supervised by Professor Geoff Wilson and Dr. Ian Bailey. Rob is a mature student, who completed his BSc. (Hons) in Environmental Quality and Resource Management at the University of the West of England in 1996, and an MSc. in Social Research at Plymouth in 2006.

His research has arisen from his work as founder of Transition Town Totnes and as CEO of the Transition Network (www.transitiontowns.org). Both arise from the twin issues of climate change and peak oil, the impending peaking in world oil production. Since initiating Transition Town Totnes in 2005, the model that has been created of community scale engagement and the equal prioritizing of reducing carbon emissions and building resilience (the provision of local food, energy, manufacturing and so on) has gone viral, with over 300 communities around the world now beginning this process. Rob lectures widely on the subject, runs www.transitionculture.org, one of the most popular websites on the subject, and is the author of “The Transition Handbook: from oil dependency to local resilience”, due to be published in March 2008. Aims and Objectives of the Study Rob‟s study is based on the assumption that peak oil is a distinctive and realistic challenge. Using the town of Totnes (Devon, UK) as a case study, the aim of this study will be to analyse whether and how energy descent pathways can be implemented in a locality based on processes of relocalisation, and to assess what socio-economic and community-related structures would be necessary to implement such a relocalisation process. The study will have four key objectives:

1. To analyse constraints and opportunities for the adoption of relocalised energy descent pathways in Totnes. Specific emphasis will be placed on whether and how this could be achievable in the context of Totnes (i.e. the practicalities of achieving energy localisation), whether current community structures would enable and facilitate such relocalisation processes, and which stakeholder groups would be empowered or disempowered by such processes. In particular, the study will explore the conceptual tools advocated by Owens (2000) both for public participation (e.g. „open space‟ and „world café‟) and use in facilitating community „brain storms‟ and as methods for enabling community envisioning of a relocalising process.

2. Based on Objective (1), to assess the suitability of Heinberg‟s (2004) framework – in particular exploring the conceptual space between his „powerdown‟ and „building lifeboats‟ approaches – as a tool for facilitating a response to the challenge presented by peak oil in Totnes.

3. Building on Objectives (1)-(2), to develop an empirically-based behavioural model by which communities can be actively engaged in a process of relocalisation of energy descent pathways. Using theoretical approaches grounded in behavioural approaches (see above), the study will particularly explore existing models of what produces environmentally responsible behaviour, both at individual and community level. Here scientific insights from the literature on co-intelligence theory, eco-psychology and transition management will be particularly useful, with the objective of identifying the challenges of behavioural change potentially necessary for the implementation of relocalised energy descent pathways.

4. At a broader level, to examine whether and to what extent lessons learned from the Totnes case study can inform similar debates on energy descent pathways in other localities.

Methodology The methodology for this research will be comprised of several interlinked qualitative and quantitative methodological approaches that will enable triangulation of research results. These will include the use of oral histories from residents in Totnes to obtain information about how the town functioned prior to the availability of cheap oil and how residents coped at the time of energy crises and a quantitative questionnaire survey of residents in Totnes based on a random sample of about 100 households to generate background data on current energy use, attitudes towards energy strategies at the local, regional and national levels, and the willingness of residents (i.e. psychological barriers) to embark on energy descent pathways by changes in lifestyles and energy use. A third methodological step will be based on in-depth interviews with both a selection of questionnaire respondents who provided particularly revealing answers along a spectrum of pro- and anti-energy descent scenario acceptance. Simultaneously, interviews will also be held with key representatives from stakeholder groups in Totnes who are both in charge of energy-related decision-making processes (e.g. city council, policy-makers, local and regional [but also some national] decision-makers, some environmental NGOs with a stake in policy-making processes, etc.) as well as those stakeholder groups affected by energy-descent processes (e.g. local businesses [especially linked to or reliant on transport], commuters, representatives from the agricultural sector, etc.) The fourth will be based on the now well-established method of focus groups. This will be used, in particular, as a basis for formulation of an action plan for Totnes based on an in-depth discussion with focus group participants about the advantages and disadvantages of adopting relocalised energy descent pathways. Step 5 will be closely interlinked with step 4 and will consist of a series of community think tank events. The focus here will be to explore public reaction to the action plan developed with focus groups and to assess how residents will/may/would react to energy relocalisation processes.
Methodological step 6, meanwhile, will involve innovative public engagement mechanisms such as „Open Space‟ and „World Café‟ approaches. These will act as a platform for engagement of both Totnes residents and other global stakeholders involved in energy descent debates. The final methodological step will involve internet-based interviews
3
conducted by myself with representatives from other communities around the world currently engaging in localised energy descent processes. Rob has been awarded a full studentship by the ESRC.

My note - TT is more about adjusting behaviors in order to effect change. Emory University's Melvin Konner has also written about the efforts of the "Green Revolution" not addressing the causes of environmental crises. The TT movement is not about manipulating geology and geography to access more fossil fuels. Instead, it looks at what is known, not really by scientific research but what industry is reporting, and looks for ideas to change behaviors to adjust and/or conserve. It isn't as far I've seen first hand, not catastrophizing, but is coming up with practical ways to conserve.



Edited 3 time(s). Last edit at 05/12/2010 06:51AM by Hope.

I went a Transition Towns event in my city tonight. It was co-hosted by a neighbourhood climate action group.

The event was held in a neighbourhood bistro that was specially booked for the occasion. About 25-30 people came.

After some introductory chit-chat, we watched a documentary about local responses to oil dependency. The first 5-10 minutes were about the peak oil concept; the rest was about specific projects in different parts of the world that are being done with little to zero use of oil and related by-products. There was a focus on agricultural projects but there were housing, transportation and alternative energy projects too. The main thrust was, if other communities are already doing this stuff, what are we waiting for?

Then we broke up into groups of 2-3 to discuss: 1) what types of projects we could do in our neighbourhood, and 2) what are the next steps to make them happen. Each group shared its ideas with the rest. Some people mentioned different eco books they are currently reading. One guy offered to show people how to adjust their worm composters so they don't have to handle the actual worms as often.

The organizers mentioned some upcoming events, then thanked everyone for attending, and the meeting was over. Some people hung around to chat for a bit. I went home.

The end.

Thanks for info, Hope, I appreciate it. So Hopkins has a PhD. Or at least worked on one. Did he ever finish? The fact that his doctorate was on an idiot like Heinberg makes me wonder what his advisors thought.

"My note - TT is more about adjusting behaviors in order to effect change. "

My guess is that is true. But it may be an effort to adjust behaviors so that people are so focused on their local scene, that they are unwilling to challenge multinational corporations, and therefore, there efforts become diluted and non-effective. The Transition Towns seem steadfastly committed to not rocking anyone's boat. In other words, their plan simply won't work. It's all very "New Age".

" The TT movement is not about manipulating geology and geography to access more fossil fuels."

Not on the surface. But that was certainly the purpose of the Oily Peakers like Heinberg (advisor to National Petroleum Council) and Colin Campbell, Herrere, Matt Simmons, etc.

" Instead, it looks at what is known, not really by scientific research but what industry is reporting"

-Well put. That sums up the problem exactly. They are taking industry at face value and not looking at what scientists are saying.

Bottom line: if the Oily Peakers were legit, the first things out of their mouths would be "read this book from so-and-so, petroleum geologist at Harvard". Instead, they go to... Heinberg.

"Well put. That sums up the problem exactly. They are taking industry at face value and not looking at what scientists are saying.

Bottom line: if the Oily Peakers were legit, the first things out of their mouths would be "read this book from so-and-so, petroleum geologist at Harvard". Instead, they go to... Heinberg."

No. The Peak Oil concept originated with M. King Hubbert, who was very much a scientist.

[en.wikipedia.org]

Not Heinberg. I had heard of it before Heinberg wrote his books. There are many other books on this subject written by scientists of various stripes. Heinberg is a latecomer.

There are literally thousands, even hundreds of thousands, of people around the world concerned about oil dependency. They are not one homogenous group of "Oily Peakers" who all think the same way or who all follow Heinberg. Some want to challenge multinationals head-on, some want to just stop using so much oil (which in itself would challenge the oil industry, just buy less of what they produce), some like to sit around and talk about it and not do anything.

I know I'm coming on strong on this thread. It's not because I think Transition Towns is 100% OK. I don't know - none of us know, yet. But I do know that there a very large movement with exactly these same concerns proposing exactly these same solutions and it's all on the up and up. I've followed this stuff since at least 1993, although back then terms like 'car-free cities' and 'sustainable transportation' were in vogue.

And let's go back to first principles: the definition of a cult, per Singer et al. Does Transition Towns meet the criteria? Based on the data we have so far, no.

Dodgy, sleazy, weird, flakey, pointless - a group can be all these things, and still not be a cult.

Oh, and for what it's worth, I have a degree in urban planning. I've done my homework on this stuff, especially re: sustainable urban design.

Research Resource

Sun at Midnight: The Rudolf Steiner Movement and Gnosis in the West
2nd Edition, © 2009 by Geoffrey Ahern

(Geoffrey Ahern, on his blog, refused to pass any judgement on whether Steiner's belief system could be considered 'crazy'. Instead, Ahern suggests using the bench mark of what, as a layperson, I call honesty/full disclosure.

"So my thinking comes back to transparency as a main criterion of acceptability. Whatever the metaphysical basis of the (Waldorf) education, is this made sufficiently clear? Sufficient explicitness here could be a qualifying condition, it seems to me, along with other more specific educational criteria to do with the quality of the teaching etc. For example, is enough said by Steinerians in their school brochures etc about just what kind of ’science’ Steinerian science would be perceived to be by non-followers?"

Earlier Ahearn did make this distinction between Scientific Method and Steiners form of 'spiritual science':

" Steinerian science clearly is a form of knowledge, however crazy we may find it, but it is not framed so that it has falsifiable hypotheses."

(So, thats how we can evaluate TTown or any project: does it have falsifiable hypotheses? And are the organizers up front/transparent about their belief system and financial backing, or do they consider themselves a gnostic elite entitled to keep secrets from us, 'for our own good'.? Corboy)

[www.sun-at-midnight.com]

More About the Book
Extensively revised and updated, the long-awaited second edition of Geoffrey Ahern's definitive classic text on Anthroposophy is now available in stores and for direct order from Lutterworth Press.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

◦Waldorf Schools (also known as Steiner Schools)
◦Camphill Communities (for the disabled)
◦Biodynamic produce and agriculture
◦Weleda medicine
◦Eurythmy
◦Speech Formation
◦The First Class
◦School of Spiritual Science
◦The Christian Community churches
◦Anthroposophy
◦Astrosophy
◦The Triodos Bank
◦The Threefold Commonwealth
Chances are that at least one of these things is familiar to you, whether you're a parent who has looked at the schooling options for your child(ren), or you've seen one or another of these labels on products at your local health food store (or in your chain store's new "healthy choices" section). Or maybe you've seen them as a student of comparative religion, or even of some of the so-called "alternative religions" that seem to be growing in popularity and/or public awareness.

What you may not know is that a single thread runs through all of these diverse practises, and others that may seem even more disparate as well, such as:

◦Theosophy
◦Freemasonry
◦The Order of the Golden Dawn
◦Ordo Templi Orientis
◦and the origins of such religions as Wicca and other neopagan traditions.

That thread is Rudolf Steiner -- whose dedication to sharing his 'spiritual science' with the world led him to found what has become a world-wide movement based upon his teachings.

This has been difficult for outsiders to this movement to fully perceive and understand, because to know Rudolf Steiner in the context of only one of the institutions he founded is to know only a facet of his background, or his teachings. Those who know of him only as the founder of the Waldorf schools, for instance, conceive of him as an educationalist -- they are generally seeking to know only his background in this area, and this is what is presented to them when they inquire about the founder of this "alternative, arts-oriented" form of education.


(quote)

Likewise, many 'green' consumers in shopping for organic foods, have gotten used to seeing biodynamics as just another word for 'organically grown', or at best a certain set of organic production standards.

'Yet, like the Waldorf schools, the entire practise of biodynamic agriculture has a much deeper set of beliefs and practises behind it, far beyond its avoidance of synthetic chemical fertilizers, pesticides, and herbicides. These too are sourced from Steiner's unifying 'spiritual science', in addition to the invaluable bits of pre-industrial agricultural knowledge that he gathered from the farmers of the rural countryside, and preserved through the height of the Western world's infatuation with the new wonder sprays of chemical agriculture.

Who was Steiner? What were these teachings and beliefs that tie together so many disparate fields, from education to agriculture, from medicine to religion to finance?

(quote)

That thread is Rudolf Steiner -- whose dedication to sharing his 'spiritual science' with the world led him to found what has become a world-wide movement based upon his teachings.

This has been difficult for outsiders to this movement to fully perceive and understand, because to know Rudolf Steiner in the context of only one of the institutions he founded is to know only a facet of his background, or his teachings. Those who know of him only as the founder of the Waldorf schools, for instance, conceive of him as an educationalist -- they are generally seeking to know only his background in this area, and this is what is presented to them when they inquire about the founder of this "alternative, arts-oriented" form of education.

Yet his schools derive as much or more from his other aspects as from his background as a tutor, and the years he spent in his twenties, educating the children of the Specht family. Much of his dedication in those years is shown in the arduous care he devoted to the 'sleeping soul' of one of the boys, who overcame his 'water on the brain' to become a doctor. It is from this experience that he derived many of his beliefs about the potential of 'curative education', which in turn take form in the practise of Eurythmy, and in more specialised form in the Camphill Communities for the disabled, where staff and patients live together as 'co-workers' and 'villagers', with no social dividing line between them. Developed still further, these teachings became the field of Anthroposophical medicine, whose leading brand name of Weleda is now a common sight in health food and natural products stores the world over.

...Likewise, many 'green' consumers, in shopping for organic foods, have gotten used to seeing biodynamics as



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 05/13/2010 07:36AM by corboy.

"His doctorate wasn't ON Heinberg."

-No, but his work was clearly part of Hopkins PhD. In fact, from the thing you sent, it looks like it was the main part. So I'll rephrase "his doctorate was ON Heinberg's work".


"No - that's not what TT is about. If you look at each TT group on an individual basis, they all have different plans, based on location and where along the CONTINUUM of thought (from those who feel oil is abiotic to the doomsday crowd) on energy supply they are. "

-OK, point me to some Transition Towns that are free from New Agey content. I have yet to see one. Also, it doesn't make sense how somebody who "feels that oil is abiotic" would sign on to a 12 Step group where one of the key questions is "Do you believe in Peak Oil?"

"A quick Google search will provide enough information on the debate of peak oil and the diverse scientists, industry people, and science that supports nearly all these views, except perhaps the abiotic ones.

-OK, show me some legit scientists NOT working for an oil company who posits that "oil will peak by 2015" (moved back by Peakers every year since 2004). The USGS doesn't see it happening until at least 2037 or so.

"You also won't find the big media names that the anti-Peakers throw out all the time, in the research."

-Which media names? What research?


"And that industry is full of the geologists and energy scientists we would hope to get our information from. "

-Why get it from them, why not the universities who have less at stake than the oil companies? I don't "hope" to get information from most corporations. Why is it that the USGS is in disagreement with the Peakers?

"And quick Google research does provide information on the many independent researchers and groups studying energy supply and demand."

-OK, point some out who agree with the viewpoint of Colin Campbell that oil will peak by... 1990.. or was it 2004? Or is it 2011?

"f scientific research were that simple. It's not that black-and-white. Medical research is full of bias and payoffs, and then the media does a number on everything that will sell news. Look at the scientific genome project, which basically names genes but the reports in the press make all kinds of promises and physicians are making money on it. Most discoveries in the field of nutrition are based on observation, not random controlled, double-blind studies. "

-You're not really making any sense. So are you suggesting that college petroleum academics are being bribed to NOT explore Peak Oil? By who?

"The experience OutofTransition had may very well be he ended up in a doomsday group using TT as a guide. "

-Hardly surprising considering that TT itself was founded by somebody relying on a Catastrophist like Heinberg "as a guide". Why would anybody be surprised that a TT group might wind up being a "doomsday group?" I would find it far more anomalous if they WEREN'T a doomsday group.