Serious question re - sustainability: Is anyone optimistic?

[GOPBasher]

I'm being very serious in this question. I have kids, but if I knew seven years ago what I know now, I would not have any. I'm terrified for their future. I think everything is about to blow up. We talk about all the separate problems -- e.g. overpopulation, peak oil, global warming, pollution, deforestation, loss of topsoil and freshwater, loss of biodiversity, etc. -- but they are all just symptoms of one disease. I think we have reached our Malthusian limits, and we're about to plunge into an era of chaos and scarcity.

Is there anyone here who is optimistic? Does anyone think we can live and prosper as a global society? That does not necessarily mean economic growth as we know it, which is basically consumption; we know that is not sustainable. But does anyone think there is a possibility we can have a world in which we all live fairly comfortably (food, water, housing, education, health care, home heating) in a sustainable manner?

Even if all of this is possible, does anyone think we can muster to political will to do so?

[kestrel91316]

1. No form of growth is ultimately sustainable. Growth without limits

is the credo of the cancer cell.

For a time, at least, some of us will continue to live acceptably comfortable lives. But society as a whole is headed for a very steep cliff.

And to your final question, NO.

[GOPBasher]

2. I agree --

Infinite growth in a finite system is an oxymoron. But as I said, I'm not talking about continual economic growth in the sense that we're used to. I mean, can we live comfortably? My sense right now is no.

[GliderGuider]

3. Unfortunately, no. However...

I don't think there is any way to prevent the radical transformation that is threatening our global civilization. As you already suspect, the number, depth, variety and interaction of the problems are too severe at this point. However, you might take a bit a comfort from the following, which I recently wrote to a woman who was experiencing the same sense of horror and grief that you are:

----------------------------------------------------------
I am in full sympathy with your sense of despair. As I say in one of the essays on my web site, I shared it for a long time. In fact I spent two years in what verged on a clinical depression brought on by my perception of humanity's existential crisis.

Four new understandings brought me back from the brink and made me realize there is hope of some sort.

The first was to take a larger perspective on the problem. Humanity has gone through bottlenecks before, and the species (and perhaps even some aspects of our civilization) will survive. There is a reason so many Eastern philosophies center around the idea that life is cyclical -- that belief expresses a fundamental truth found in all of nature. While the human organization that will arise after the coming changes is bound to be very different, it will still express the values that have traditionally made it possible for us to survive in hard times: compassion, altruism, cooperation and nurturing.

The values that are antithetical to those - competition, exploitation and selfishness - are possible on a large scale only in times of artificial abundance, such as we have created though our use of fossil fuels. They are supported and reinforced by our social institutions - our economic and political systems, our schools and media. There is no doubt in my mind that the coming changes will sweep away many of those institutions, because they are built to exploit conditions that will no longer exist. If many of them crumble, that will leave major opportunities for new and more humane institutions to take their place.

The second hopeful thing was the realization that the seeds for those new humane values are already in place. If you read my essay "Red Herrings and Hope" you will find at the end the section where I discuss the worldwide movement consisting of two million local, independent environmental and social justice groups. I call these groups "Gaia's antibodies", and I realized that not only are they working right now to improve local conditions around the world, they are perfectly positioned to act as a resilient, survivable seed stock for the values that will be needed to build a more humane, sustainable civilization in the next cycle.

The third thing that gave me hope was realizing that the collapse is not going to be one vast, amorphous, simultaneous die-off. Different parts of the world will experience different effects. When I did an analysis of energy decline that took these regional differences into account, I found that the West is quite well positioned relative to, say, Africa and South Asia. Those places may well experience a Malthusian collapse, but we in the west have such a vast amount of discretionary consumption and capital that we will have much more opportunity to respond to the crisis. Whether we do that well or poorly when TSHTF is an open question, but we do have some maneuvering room. The fact that we can still influence events, even if those influences will be very localized, means that there is still a purpose to action.

The fourth thing that gave me hope was what amounted to a spiritual breakthrough that I describe in the essay I mentioned first. While I no longer identify my new world-view as pantheism, the perceptions it gave me are still the same. I now realize it was a spontaneous discovery of the principles of Deep Ecology, which are very similar to pantheism, though focussed more on the natural world. The breakthrough realization is very simple. Humanity is but one part of the web of life that embraces this planet. We are not above it, in the center of it or separate from it in any way. We have just the same inherent value as any other part of that web, no more and no less. We do have a responsibility to govern our actions because we can reason, but we are still subject to the same influences as any other species on Earth. Coming to see humanity in that way allowed me to let go of much of the disappointment I felt over our myriad failures as a civilization and a species.

I hope you can see the resonance of Buddhist philosophy though all these points. If you are familiar with Buddhist teachings, you have an opportunity to use them to overcome your despair. What you are feeling is the purest expression of the problem of attachment. The ego fears its own demise, and sees in these vast changes a great probability that will happen. All the things to which we are attached are about to undergo a profound transformation, and our egos are terrified of that prospect. You need to reach out past that attachment to the understanding that change is the only constant in all of existence. It doesn't matter what level of existence you look at - individual, family, community, national, global, even out to the entire universe -- change is the nature of this reality.

There will be many, many opportunities for you to use and even shape the changes that are coming. I hope you can use some of the ideas here to help you look forward with courage.

Best wishes,
Paul Chefurka

[GOPBasher]

4. Thank you for that! I'll keep that and your website handy. n/t

[Bigmack]

13. Thank you so much

for the time and energy you took to write and to post this. It quite resonates. I'll copy it to the desk-top and re-read it. Ms Bigmack

[all.of.me]

33. This is beautiful.

Thank you. What pulls me through in any time of stress or despair is knowing that whatever is happening is supposed to happen for the simple reason that it IS happening. We don't know how things will unfold, but they will, and we have to let them. I liken myself to a bystander watching the show. That eases the pain of a lot of unrest, globally and personally.

[XemaSab]

5. Not I,

Not I. :(

[cedric]

6. Where there's life

Well I'm not sure about a global society but there is a chance that a future is possible though it won't be as now and it will require a transformation which won't necessarily be pleasant.
However part of the problem is that the society at large and those individuals and organizations that hold power are only slowly waking up to the issues and are far too often seeing technology as the sole solution without considering the need of individuals to change their lifestyles and aspirations.

However whilst their is only so much that each individual can do, individuals can push for a tipping point that will encourage change. My suggestion would be to look at local initiatives that are looking to create localized change which if you are not already involved in you can work with. The following is one such initiative.

http://transitionculture.org/

The answer has to be seen as starting to put the solutions in place without simply waiting for politicians to do the work for us.

[TreasonousBastard]

7. Not in the least optimistic, but nor do I despair...

because I am unable to change whatever comes to pass.

What's the worst that could happen? The human race wipes itself out and takes all existing life with it?

OK, that's pretty bad. But when you get right down to it-- so what? I'll be every bit as dead as if I died from cancer, a car wreck, a terrorist attack, or old age. And I'll be in no position to mourn whatever is, or isn't, left behind.

Worse might be living in some world where not quite everything was wiped out, but we are reduced to bands of hunting and gathering savages of the sort doomsday fiction writers have fun inventing. But, again, so what?

I like to think that the human species is differentiated from the rest of the planet's life because there is some sort of plan for our unique talents, as many preachers and philosophers have taught, but there's no real evidence of that. More likely we are simply one of many curious random effects that pop up in this enormous universe, and we are neither particuarly special nor would we be missed by anyone.

So, should we choose to kill ourselves off, and take the planet with us, so be it. As an individual, I take great issue with that demented decision, but, as a member of the species, it is also mine to accept.

[GOPBasher]

16. For me, the worst that can happen is

I watch my kids suffer all their lives.

[OKIsItJustMe]

8. I remain guardedly optimistic

In my experience, people are at their best when experiencing shared adversity. I believe that part of the reason for our relative isolation is that our lives are the least challenging ever known to our species.

Oh sure, I know all about Mad Max and Lord of the Flies but those are fiction.


I would advise you to teach your children well. Teach them math, science, history, sociology, psychology, philosophy, art, music. Teach them to love nature and gardening/farming. Teach them to love others as much as you love them.

Don't expect the world to go to Hell. However, expect fundamental change.

[GOPBasher]

17. Thank you. :-) n/t

[losthills]

9. All the tools for a sustainable civilization are in our hands.

All we have to do is use them.

There have been a lot of periods in history where great changes took place in a short time frame. The Renaissance, the Industrial Revolution, the Civil Rights Movement, the Green Revolution, the collapse of the Soviet Union....

The change can come when people are ready for it, and it can come very rapidly.

If you want it, then work for it now, my friends, and you will see it happen before you die.

[malakai2]

10. Nope

It's not human nature to function that way, collectively on so large a scale. People are wired for altruism within a small sphere of family and close friends, and others only when resources are not limiting. When resources start to get scarce, we tend to scramble for what we can get, and priorities become narrow and focused. Anything that can be used as a label to identify an "in" group from an "out" group will be used to justify hoarding, stealing, etc. Skin color is obvious, as is nationality, religion, economic status, gender, and anything else you could imagine.

The only political system that can stop that kind of scramble is a very strict authoritarian system, and stopping a scramble scenario is not synonymous with "we all live fairly comfortably in a sustainable manner." I think what will happen, realistically, is mass starvation in Africa and southeast Asia as it suits politicians elsewhere (let them starve there so we don't starve here); resource wars over fossil fuels and limited supplies of other necessary materials (we NEED that oil to grow our food, so we'll GET that oil by any means necessary); further spread of famine to developing and developed nations that suddenly find themselves without fuel for transportation and farm equipment, plentiful water for crops, fuel for heating, and feedstock for fertilizer (well, we're back to doing it like we did before oil, except with all the resources that were extractable by the old methods already gone); and simultaneous mass migrations of people from inundated coastlines inland and people from cold, dry continental areas toward warmer maritime climate zones (if the earth had been ~4 degrees warmer during Jackson's presidency, where would people have settled in North America?).

After all that, I think we'll still be stuck with some version of a feudal system. Imagine something like the book "The Jungle," except with no coal for heat, much less wood per capita for heat and building, and a class disparity just as glaring. That system isn't sustainable, even with a much smaller global population, unless you consider the underclass a disposable resource.

[emmadoggy]

11. I could have written your post exactly.

You took the words right out of my mouth. I have two kindergartners and I am in absolute terror for their future. I'm apprehensive about my own and my husband's fate as well, but for my kids....I'm terrified.

And like you, if I had known then what I know now, the decision to have them would have been much more difficult - and I say that as someone who went through a number of years of infertility and the pain of desperately wanting to be a mother and having it denied. During those years, the option of remaining childless was a consideration, but ultimately, one that I just couldn't fathom at the time.

I don't have any answers. I know that since I have been coming to DU, and especially the E/E forum, I have learned so much and have really woken up to so many things. Based on what I read and learn here every day and from what some of the really knowledgeable folks here on this forum say, I feel pretty hopeless and helpless a lot of the time. Unfortunately, I'm not really in a position to be able to make a lot of the changes that would help us to prepare for what may be coming - which is frustrating and frightening - but just knowing what could happen does at least give me the ability to mentally prepare and to think through the what-ifs and try to formulate some simple plans.

I pray that mankind's resourcefulness will come through in the end, but I fear that many, many people, animals, and ecosystems will suffer and be lost before that happens. And I pray that my children reach a good ripe age before the worst horrors begin. :( :cry: :scared:

[GOPBasher]

18. Thank you for your post. I'm sorry you feel as I do. :-( n/t

[lectrobyte]

12. I'm optimistic. We have a great example of sustainability already: The Amish.

[Dead_Parrot]

21. Well, maybe

I'd point you towards this paper (pdf) - it seems most of them are shifting / have shifted to urban occupations, due to lack of suitable farmland for low-intensity agriculture. As of 1997, only 21.42% work in agriculture.

And if the Amish are too numerous and under-resourced, the rest of us are in some really deep shit.

[OKIsItJustMe]

25. That paper refers to the Amish residents of a single county

It's a mistake to assume that one particular population accurately reflects all Amish, and all Amish lifestyles. I have reason to go to "Amish country" in Pennsylvania occasionally; I assure you, they are a diverse people in their own right.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amish#Lifestyle_and_culture

...

Amish lifestyle is dictated by the Ordnung (German, meaning: order), which differs slightly from community to community, and, within a community, from district to district. What is acceptable in one community may not be acceptable in another. No summary of Amish lifestyle and culture can be totally adequate, because there are few generalities that are true for all Amish. Groups may separate over matters such as the width of a hat-brim, the color of buggies, or various other issues. The use of tobacco (excluding cigarettes, which are considered "worldly") and moderate use of alcohol are generally permitted, particularly among older and more conservative groups.

...

It's fair to say that not every Amish family lives on a farm. But, then, isn't that the idea? Farmers grow more than enough for their own families, allowing other members of the community to explore other professions.

That doesn't mean the community is not self-sustaining.

[Dead_Parrot]

28. A perfectly fair point

And I wouldn't write off that way of living based on on one paper (on the contrary, I still aspire to it). But it does, I hope, highlight that we are an awful lot on people on one small rock - and even something as drastic as a leap back into the 18th century may not be sufficient for us to sort our shit out.

[lutherj]

29. There's no lack of farmland in the U.S. If modern agribusiness

is no longer able to cultivate it, then small organic farms could reclaim it.

[Dead_Parrot]

30. I see no immediate problem...

...with US farmland feeding the US population. There's a lot of it.

The problem is the world's farmland feeding the world's population, and providing biofuels, and possibly providing fodder for horses/donkeys/oxen et al for those people who can't afford the biofuels, Or of course raising meat for the really rich.

IIRC, Globally there's currently about 1 acre of farmland (including permanent and arable) per person. I'll leave it as a mental exercise for any interested parties to divide it up as they see fit.

[OKIsItJustMe]

31. There's no particular reason why Organic Farms need to be small

http://www.ers.usda.gov/Briefing/Organic/

[GliderGuider]

32. That's true. China is doing a booming "organic food" business...

...

[amandabeech]

53. Farmland is being replaced by housing and shopping centers.

I lived until recently in central PA. It broke my heart to see so much farmland being transformed into commercial or housing development.

We're talking some of the best farmland in the U.S. under the tarmac of a used car lot.

Our population keeps growing and our arable land keeps decreasing, particularly good land just outside cities in the eastern Midwest and mid-Atlantic.

What will happen if climate change turns the southeast into a permanent savannah. What if precipitation decreases permanently in our current ag areas, like the western drought?

I wouldn't be so sure about the unending supply of U.S. farmland.

I think that your idea that there's no lack of farmland in the U.S. to be increasingly out of date.

[Dead_Parrot]

14. With 6.65 billion people? Not a hope in hell.

With 2 or 3 billion, probably. There won't be the resources available there are today, of course - no NG-based fertilizer, no oil-based transport, probably not much long-distance travel, and no disposable metals or plastics.

The only question is whether we get there via a co-ordinated effort to reduce population and resource use, or via a systemic collapse. And there's not much co-ordinated effort going on at the moment, to be honest.

[GOPBasher]

20. I agree -- that's what I mean when I said

"live in a sustainable manner." The population would have to decrease. What I hope is that it will decrease by voluntary methods, i.e. people having fewer children; what I fear is that it will decrease the malthusian way.

[Dead_Parrot]

22. Embrace the fear...

There's a good population clock http://math.berkeley.edu/~galen/popclk.html">here. If you ever see it dropping by about 20 per second, it means:

a) we're making a start, and
b) you've still got electricity.

Good luck, but don't hold your breath.

:(

[stuntcat]

35. exactly

even if first-worlders slow down breeding the population will keep going up to at least 9 billion by 2050. If babies born right now live to my grandparents' age they'll be here in 2095 seeing the world really going to hell. I pity the kids I see and I can't respect their parents. I am on Earth's side though :) it will swallow us up and shit us out and in a few thousand years start to recover. We're worse than lemmings.
I have an article from over 20 years ago telling exactly what's happening now. A few more people are paying attention lately but a lot of first-worlders are still in denial.. and what could slow down India and China's boom?
The only thing I have hope for is that the end happens sooner than later so the animals can have a chance.

[Dogmudgeon]

15. Possible but very unlikely

The key to survival and progress of any kind is the synthesis of human intelligence and action. But the inertia of our enormous system is taking us over the waterfall in a barrel.

The strange thing is that this is a concern of the bourgeois world, yet the disasters will happen to the poor people. We could easily have a die-back of 90% of the population (e.g., 6.3 billion in 2013) of the world and still maintain a society similar to what we now have. I am coming to the conclusion that such a scenario is exactly what will happen.

On the other side of it, we will have abundant natural resources, a 50-year reprieve from environmental and energy crises ... and plenty of pathos for the poor unfortunate victims whose death we will benefit from.

But that's the entire history of capitalism right there.

If we want to avoid mass death, we will have to submit to a "gentle" and "green" form of fascism for three to six generations (50-100 years), until we can re-stabilize our civilization. Then, if we want growth, we may have the ability to conduct it in space instead of on the Earth.

But who wants fascism? And space development is un-hip.

Don't fear for your children. Fear for the children of the guy who got your programming job in 2002.

--p!

[GOPBasher]

19. Good line at the end. Thanks for the post. n/t

[skids]

59. Yeah, optimistic it is possible, not so much that it'll get done. n/t

[The2ndWheel]

23. Everyone will not have everything

"But does anyone think there is a possibility we can have a world in which we all live fairly comfortably (food, water, housing, education, health care, home heating) in a sustainable manner?"

If we do, we won't have much of a habitat. We live in physical reality, and that's just how things work. The more we take for ourselves, the less the rest of life gets.

The worst thing we can keep doing is trying to make everywhere the same. In colder climates, making it warmer with home heating. In warmer climates, making it cooler with air conditioning. When we do those things, we have to increase our impact. The thing about our modern world is that we're a sedentary species based on expansion. That's a hell of a combination.

We can't even live comfortably because we have that concept of progress. Relentless forward motion. That's why I feel that digital clocks are so screwing up how we see the world. I know, I know, "what the fuck is this guy talking about?" It's the constant 1, 2, 3, 4, etc. At least with the old clocks, there was a cyclical feel to them. They didn't count backwards or anything, but you could at least see that life/death cycle. If I had it my way, there wouldn't be any clocks.

Anyway, now that that little off topic rant is done...

I just think the standardization of life/humans is at the core of the problem. It's "everyone" living comfortably in terms of food, water, education, etc. To be able to not only make that possible, but maintain it, requires us to increase our impact. It requires us to make the world, no matter where you go, an exact mirror image of where you just were. It requires us to make the environment fit us, as opposed to us adapting to certain conditions. Then we're shocked when everything starts to break down. We know evolution(or whatever the process is that we felt the need to categorize as evolution) exists, we just don't like it. We can't allow it to define life, because if we did, we might not win everytime. That certainly isn't progress.

If you're asking if there is a system where we can make sure everyone has everything and live healthy lives until an increasingly older and older age in a sustainable way, I can't think of an answer that would start with yes. There is no perfect state to existence. No matter what we do, there will be benefits and consequences.

[cedric]

24. From the level of pessimism here I would suggest the following Survival link

http://www.survivalblog.com/

[Kolesar]

26. Economic growth ended and people quit emigrating to here* in the 1930s

A vast swath of the American population got by without buying automobiles and by eating very little meat. We have thrice the population and depleted resources by now, so it is going to be much tougher this time.

*USA, USA, USA

[smoogatz]

27. If we're a democracy, there's hope.

If we're a corporatocracy, we're screwed.

On edit: I think, in fact, that the human population of earth is within a few generations of re-enacting, on a global scale, the Easter Island scenario.

[bananas]

34. I'm optimistic

and WWIII is still a worse threat than climate change.

From the Bulletin of Atomic Scientists:

"We have concluded that the dangers posed by climate change are nearly as dire as those posed by nuclear weapons."
"Nuclear weapons present the most grave challenge to humanity"

http://www.thebulletin.org/minutes-to-midnight/board-statements.html

Board Statement

17 January 2007

We stand at the brink of a second nuclear age. Not since the first atomic bombs were dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki has the world faced such perilous choices. North Korea’s recent test of a nuclear weapon, Iran’s nuclear ambitions, a renewed U.S. emphasis on the military utility of nuclear weapons, the failure to adequately secure nuclear materials, and the continued presence of some 26,000 nuclear weapons in the United States and Russia are symptomatic of a larger failure to solve the problems posed by the most destructive technology on Earth.

As in past deliberations, we have examined other human-made threats to civilization. We have concluded that the dangers posed by climate change are nearly as dire as those posed by nuclear weapons. The effects may be less dramatic in the short term than the destruction that could be wrought by nuclear explosions, but over the next three to four decades climate change could cause drastic harm to the habitats upon which human societies depend for survival.

This deteriorating state of global affairs leads the Board of Directors of the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists--in consultation with a Board of Sponsors that includes 18 Nobel laureates--to move the minute hand of the “Doomsday Clock” from seven to five minutes to midnight.

Nuclear weapons present the most grave challenge to humanity, enabling genocide with the press of a button. In 1945, scientists warned the world about the nearly unimaginable destructive power of the atomic bombs they had created. As Eugene Rabinowitch, one of the cofounders of the Bulletin, wrote, “The Bulletin’s Clock is not a gauge to register the ups and downs of the international power struggle; it is intended to reflect basic changes in the level of continuous danger in which mankind lives in the nuclear age, and will continue living, until society adjusts its basic attitudes and institutions.” As inheritors and trustees of the Clock, we seek to warn the world that this level of danger has escalated precipitously.

<snip>

[NickB79]

49. But what if global warming causes WWIII?

:evilfrown:

Wouldn't that be a bitch: a global nuclear exchange after we've already exhausted most of the world's resources.

[OKIsItJustMe]

50. A blast from the past

http://www.jimmycarterlibrary.org/documents/speeches/su80jec.phtml

Jimmy Carter
State of the Union Address 1980

January 23, 1980

...

The region which is now threatened by Soviet troops in Afghanistan is of great strategic importance: It contains more than two-thirds of the world's exportable oil. The Soviet effort to dominate Afghanistan has brought Soviet military forces to within 300 miles of the Indian Ocean and close to the Straits of Hormuz, a waterway through which most of the world's oil must flow. The Soviet Union is now attempting to consolidate a strategic position, therefore, that poses a grave threat to the free movement of Middle East oil.

This situation demands careful thought, steady nerves, and resolute action, not only for this year but for many years to come. It demands collective efforts to meet this new threat to security in the Persian Gulf and in Southwest Asia. It demands the participation of all those who rely on oil from the Middle East and who are concerned with global peace and stability. And it demands consultation and close cooperation with countries in the area which might be threatened.

Meeting this challenge will take national will, diplomatic and political wisdom, economic sacrifice, and, of course, military capability. We must call on the best that is in us to preserve the security of this crucial region.

Let our position be absolutely clear: An attempt by any outside force to gain control of the Persian Gulf region will be regarded as an assault on the vital interests of the United States of America, and such an assault will be repelled by any means necessary, including military force.

...

[Dead_Parrot]

54. "WWIII is still a worse threat than climate change."

Now there's a man with his finger on the environmental pulse.
:eyes:

[tinrobot]

36. Our kids can be the heroes.

I worry about my kids as well. The only thing I can do is to educate them to take better care of the planet than we have. Maybe they can be the ones who turn things around.

[cedric]

38. That's a cop out

Why expect your kids to turn things around.

As their parent who admits awareness of the problem shouldn't you also push for change rather than expecting them to have to sort out the mess that we've created.

[eridani]

37. We could, but neither of our candidates will talk about it

The ones who do are, of course, "unelectable." We could do it if we threw all our spare resources into inventing the next energy economy, starting yesterday. That would mean completely scrapping the war machine and the goal of military conquest of a declining resource. However the money thugs who determine who is and who is not a real candidate profit from our military empire and don't want to give it up.

[cedric]

39. Well don't vote for the useless candidates

Find those who are advocating real change, support them and make a difference.

[eridani]

41. Them kind are only available at local levels, not nationally n/t

[Nihil]

43. Did you read the post you replied to?

You posted:
> Well don't vote for the useless candidates
> Find those who are advocating real change, support them and make a difference.

... when the post you were replying to said:
>> We could, but neither of our candidates will talk about it
>> The ones who do are, of course, "unelectable."

As you're another UK DUer (Hi! :hi: ) you might not be aware that the
only candidates who were advocating real change are now out of the race,
having been deselected by the media who have decided that only the two
corporatists are left.

[GOPBasher]

40. It's up to us, the people.

If we start demanding changes, the politicians will have to listen to us. It's a democracy, after all. Right now, there is not the political will in this nation (or most nations) to really change our lifestyle. Americans love consumption, and this country will not vote for someone who wants, for example, to outlaw disposable plastic products. If there is ever a critical mass of people who really believe we need to alter our lifestyle (for example, if over 50% of people want to outlaw plastic products), then the politicians will respond. But that's what scares me more than anything -- the masses are too ignorant about ecology and human dependence on the biosphere.

Yes, most Americans will support a new energy economy, but that's just because we think techno fixes will solve everything. Not many of us in this country really believe we will have to change our gluttonous lifestyles, but we will for our kids to have any future.

My basic point is this: our greatest challenge is summoning the political will to really change our lifestyles.

[eridani]

42. I think we can have reasonably comfortable lives--

--with far, far less throughput of energy and raw materials.

[OKIsItJustMe]

44. Once again, Education is key

Look at what happened with An Inconvenient Truth. All of a sudden, one aspect of ecology became a real political issue (not enough of a one, I'll grant you, but... it's building...)

Locally, a large grocery store which until recently only offered plastic bags, now (at least) asks, "Is plastic okay?" They also offer reusable bags. (I don't know how long they've been doing this, as I generally eschew them.)

[GliderGuider]

45. Absolutely, education is critical.

From the work I've done in this topic over the last few years, it's become obvious that outreach and education on the nature, scope and scale of the converging crisis is essential. We may already be out of time for large, coordinated, national and trans-national programs to influence the outcome (even if such programs were politically or psychologically possible in the first place, which I personally doubt). That means it is up to individuals, whose behaviour can be quickly and radically changed through education.

The trick is to raise awareness in such a way that the evidence of the scale and apparent insolubility of the problem don't paralyze people with despair. This is not an easy task, because most people immediately see the problem as threatening a disruption of their deeply cherished patterns of existence that they have used as the foundations for their very personalities. When faced with hard evidence that those patterns are at risk, people tend to react very strongly with a full range of toxic psychological defenses: denial, distortion and delusional projections. If you break through those, the next step can easily be depression and despair.

It seems to me that the only effective approach is to re-frame the problem, and in so doing change it into something that is in fact soluble. I've been struggling with exactly how to productively re-frame it. I'm now fairly sure the real problem is our old friend Cartesian dualism, which has resulted in mankind's self-perception as preternatural, or separate from nature. On an individual basis that can be addressed through a number of spiritual avenues, from Deep Ecology to Zen Buddhism. However to get people to that point, one needs to lead them right up to the brink of despair -- otherwise they will be unable to even see the holistic, integrative exit, let alone understand why it is the only option left. This is similar to technique that has traditionally been used by Zen masters to trigger sudden insight.

This process needs to start with a complete explication of the converging crisis, which is something that could easily require a multi-day workshop just to arrive at a broad-brush understanding of the dilemma. Many people are on this journey right now, feeling their way along individually, but most of them have chosen to untangle only a single thread of the "tapestry of crisis" we face (Peak Oil, Climate Change, food security, economic instability etc.). A few are becoming aware of the convergence and interaction of these multiple problem areas, but frankly, exploring such a complex problematique in any detail is too daunting for most.

So the question becomes, what is the most productive avenue of introduction to this unfolding new reality? It needs to be one that leads people to a core understanding of the dynamics of the crisis. This understanding would give them the tools they need to figure out much of what's going on for themselves. At the same time it needs to be an avenue that leads them towards a solution set that is based on human communities rather than technological band-aids, towards wisdom rather than just more cleverness.

I'm certainly not prepared to plunge into such an undertaking, at least not just yet. My own awareness is still developing, and I will readily admit to still being vulnerable to despair in the face of new and ever more pessimistic evidence. However, I worry that education on single aspects of the crisis (e.g. Peak Oil outreach or even Al Gore's contribution) that don't present a clear path towards the re-framing I describe above, might not do that much good. After all, I constantly see technically astute participants on Peak Oil web boards (and even here) who completely fail to put the problem into any kind of broader context, and reject the notion that there is an underlying human dynamic that is driving the convergence to an ineluctable conclusion.

[OKIsItJustMe]

47. The billiance of "An Inconvenient Truth"

When I finally got around to watching An Inconvenient Truth, I was struck by a few aspects of the film.

1. The biographical sketches of Al Gore seemed gratuitous to me at first, then I realized they made a good "breather" from what could have been an unrelentingly depressing message.
2. The movie ended with a commissioning of sorts for the viewer. "Here's what you can do, now, go do it."

I think it's highly unlikely that we can reverse the damage we've done at this point. However, I believe, and (a key part of James Hansen's message seems to be) that we can lessen the worst effects through actions we take today and time is of the essence.

The danger I fear we face is creating a sense of "It's hopeless, so there's no use in trying to do anything."

Even in the worst case scenarios, I don't believe humanity as a whole will die off.—We've survived some pretty wretched conditions in the past. (Think ice ages, black death, small pox, influenza, even world wars...) "War, Conquest, Pestilence and Death" have been our companions throughout our history.

I don't think the whole of our knowledge will be lost to future generations (although I do think it would be good to start printing a great deal of it on mylar pages. CD-ROM's may be next to useless to future generations.)


Developing alternative energy sources (especially solar) is a worthy endeavor regardless of what the future brings, whether it is large scale social collapse, or hard times, or even smooth sailing. (If we're really, really lucky, maybe we can turn things around, but at the very least, we can make things a little less miserable.)

What we need is leaders (especially in the US) who are willing to tell the people the truth; and to take bold, decisive action at a national level. To quote Edwards, “We need a president that asks Americans to be patriotic about something other than war.” (The uncoordinated actions of individuals, I fear, are not sufficient.)

[ramapo]

46. Possible but no way

I think that even with the bloated population of 6+ billion, that humans could sustain a decent and comfortable life for all societies. To do so would mean immediate, far-reaching changes that don't have a chance in hell of occurring.

These include: Immediate population freeze, immediate change in resource consumption, immediate move away from polluting technologies, immediate "toning down" of western lifestyles to get options two and three off the dime.

Realistically, we will continue on the current trajectory. No politician is brave or dumb enough to suggest the changes that need to occur to have any effect on the outlook. Few people really want to hear about living a lifestyle more in keeping with a less consumptive era.

One day, we'll walk off a cliff and there will be hell to pay.

[NickB79]

48. I'm optimistic that I won't die from starvation, disease and exposure

But that's more because most of my family is composed of small family farmers and I live in the Midwest US.

Optimistic that there won't be a mass die-off in my lifetime, to the tune of several BILLION people? Not a snowball's chance in hell.

[cedric]

51. How old are you

?

[NickB79]

52. 28

I'm hopeful that I can live to see 70. The one thing I have going for me is that my greatgrandfather worked the family farm until he was 90, and my grandfather worked his own farm until he was 80, so I at least have good genetics :)

[Champion Jack]

55. There is nothing wrong with the earth

she just has a bad case of the humans.

[Deja Q]

57. Well, when will you support the earth and die?

No, that's not aimed as a personal insult. I just think it's hilarious people say "Well, humans are the problem" and expect everyone else to do the dirty work. :7

I was green before it became a fad... there are ways to continue getting green, without becoming sick (a different sort of green...)

[Deja Q]

56. Recycling, solar power, telecommuting... dozens of reasons to refuse your D&G...

Doom & Gloom.

We humans can do anything... D&G should not be accepted as a viable option, please forgive me.

[GliderGuider]

58. "We humans can do anything"

OK, you've got 15 years to learn to fly without mechanical assistance. Let us know how it goes.

I always thought there was only one entity in the universe (or many, or none, depending on your point of view) that was omnipotent.

Irrational optimism is at least as great an impediment to effective problem solving as despair. For example, how much of an incentive to action is the following sentiment? "Humans can do anything. While I may not have a clue how to unfuck this cluster, I don't worry -- I'm sure someone will fix it."

There are indeed reasons to be hopeful, but I don't think recycling, solar panels or telecommuting are going to keep civilization from going through the radical transformation that's looming.