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Author Topic: We are consuming more than the world can produce.
Cougyr
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posted 28 November 2004 12:51 PM      Profile for Cougyr     Send New Private Message      Edit/Delete Post  Reply With Quote 
We are living beyond our means.
quote:
The human race is plundering the planet at a pace that outstrips its capacity to support life, according to a report by WWF. The world is consuming some 20 percent more natural resources a year than the planet can produce. October 22, 2004
There are several articles on this site which deal with this.

Unfortunately, nature has a solution for this situation, and it's not pretty.


From: over the mountain | Registered: Nov 2002  |  IP: Logged
fuslim
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posted 29 November 2004 02:12 AM      Profile for fuslim     Send New Private Message      Edit/Delete Post  Reply With Quote 
There is another discussion about 'peak oil' on another thread, but it's not just oil, it's everything.

The whole thing fills me with overwhelming sadness...


From: Vancouver BC | Registered: Apr 2004  |  IP: Logged
Cougyr
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posted 29 November 2004 12:37 PM      Profile for Cougyr     Send New Private Message      Edit/Delete Post  Reply With Quote 
quote:
Originally posted by fuslim:
The whole thing fills me with overwhelming sadness...

Yeah, I share your dread. There was a CBC lecture on Ideas last week dealing with our over consumption and the inevitable mass die off. The author's biggest problem is: What do we do when our leaders refuse to recognize the problem?


From: over the mountain | Registered: Nov 2002  |  IP: Logged
Mandos
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posted 29 November 2004 12:42 PM      Profile for Mandos   Author's Homepage     Send New Private Message      Edit/Delete Post  Reply With Quote 
Oh, well. I guess we can just pray that Julian Simon was right.
From: There, there. | Registered: Jun 2001  |  IP: Logged
West Coast Greeny
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posted 29 November 2004 12:51 PM      Profile for West Coast Greeny     Send New Private Message      Edit/Delete Post  Reply With Quote 
quote:
Originally posted by Cougyr:
The author's biggest problem is: What do we do when our leaders refuse to recognize the problem?

Get new ones.


From: Ewe of eh. | Registered: Sep 2004  |  IP: Logged
dillinger
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posted 29 November 2004 02:28 PM      Profile for dillinger   Author's Homepage     Send New Private Message      Edit/Delete Post  Reply With Quote 
agreed, although the problem isn't the leaders as individuals per se, although that can certainly exacerbate the problem. the main thing is the socio-economic system that produced them.

so let's get a new one.


From: Toronto | Registered: Nov 2004  |  IP: Logged
paxamillion
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posted 29 November 2004 02:34 PM      Profile for paxamillion   Author's Homepage     Send New Private Message      Edit/Delete Post  Reply With Quote 
quote:
Originally posted by dillinger:
so let's get a new one.

Sounds good, ideologically, doesn't it? However, capitalism has human greed at its base, amongst other things. Any other system plugged in where the old one left off must either address greed or be corrupted itself by it.


From: the process of recovery | Registered: Jul 2002  |  IP: Logged
lagatta
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posted 29 November 2004 02:41 PM      Profile for lagatta     Send New Private Message      Edit/Delete Post  Reply With Quote 
No, pax, human greed is no more innate than human generosity is. Many societies emphasised sharing available resources - this was certainly the case in many Aboriginal societies here. The problem of how to correct the ingrained individualist mindset is real, however. For example, we are in the habit of purchasing things like tools and appliances for each household - now often only one person - instead of sharing them or renting them out at a nominal fee.

Dillinger, I suggest you might want to take a look at some of the current Marxist environmentalist thought. A particularly interesting book is Joel Kovel's "The Enemy of Nature: the End of Capitalism or the End of the World?" It corrects some of the positivism and faith in progress in certain strands of classical Marxist thought - inevitably so, in the 19th-century context.


From: Se non ora, quando? | Registered: Apr 2002  |  IP: Logged
paxamillion
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posted 29 November 2004 02:53 PM      Profile for paxamillion   Author's Homepage     Send New Private Message      Edit/Delete Post  Reply With Quote 
Thanks for that helpful distinction, lagatta.
From: the process of recovery | Registered: Jul 2002  |  IP: Logged
Contrarian
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posted 29 November 2004 03:26 PM      Profile for Contrarian     Send New Private Message      Edit/Delete Post  Reply With Quote 
lagatta, your point about tools and appliances is a good one. In the farming area where I grew up, the farmers were involved in several types of co-ops, including one for buying farm machinery:
Circle Eight Co-op, pp. 365-367 It sounds like it took a fair bit of work and trust to run, but I suppose farm machinery needs more maintenance work than household tools would.

From: pretty far west | Registered: Jul 2004  |  IP: Logged
Cougyr
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posted 29 November 2004 06:20 PM      Profile for Cougyr     Send New Private Message      Edit/Delete Post  Reply With Quote 
quote:
Originally posted by dillinger:
. . . the main thing is the socio-economic system that produced them.

Yes. I often think that one of the most damaging aspects of our system is the 90 day balance sheet. The company that I worked for abused it mercillously. Each financial quarter was treated as unique and had to produce on its own merits. The result is virtually no commitment to long range goals. I saw sales people who had excelled in one quarter fired in the next for poor results. Customer service was often slashed just as customer demand went up, because of corporate inability to see beyond year end. Five year plans were rare, and fragile; ten year plans non-existant.

The same is true of government. How many governments plan for anything beyond the next election? Global warming needs a 50 - 100 year commitment; a serious and expensive commitment. Can you see heads of state sitting down and agreeing to the kind of actions required to stop environmental degradation, and then following through? Most of them can't even get with the Kyoto proposal, and that's just a start. Politically, it's just easier to pass the buck to the next generation.


From: over the mountain | Registered: Nov 2002  |  IP: Logged
lonecat
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posted 30 November 2004 01:21 AM      Profile for lonecat   Author's Homepage     Send New Private Message      Edit/Delete Post  Reply With Quote 
Yes, this is very depressing, especially since everyone in the world is contributing to this tragedy, and no one in a position of power and influence in the world appears to be doing anything to reverse this trend.
I fully support the Kyoto Protocol, but we have to go much, much further if we want to get serious about healing our planet.

From: Regina | Registered: Apr 2004  |  IP: Logged
Geneva
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posted 30 November 2004 05:11 AM      Profile for Geneva     Send New Private Message      Edit/Delete Post  Reply With Quote 
time for another anti-Malthusian, Julian Simon wager (Google: Ehrlich Simon wager resources population )

Premises : we are always short of resources, always have been, always will be, that's their nature; otherwise they would not be worth digging up at great expense

but catastrophic shortages a false alarm,
I bet

here is a good account of the original bet:
http://tinyurl.com/5ql7r

Julian Simon's Bet With Paul Ehrlich
In 1980, economist |Julian Simon| and biologist Paul Ehrlich decided to put their money where their predictions were. Ehrlich had been predicting massive shortages in various natural resources for decades, while Simon claimed natural resources were infinite.

Simon offered Ehrlich a bet centered on the market price of metals. Ehrlich would pick a quantity of any five metals he liked worth $1,000 in 1980. If the 1990 price of the metals, after adjusting for inflation, was more than $1,000 (i.e. the metals became more scarce), Ehrlich would win. If, however, the value of the metals after inflation was less than $1,000 (i.e. the metals became less scare), Simon would win. The loser would mail the winner a check for the change in price.

Ehrlich agreed to the bet, and chose copper, chrome, nickel, tin and tungsten.

By 1990, all five metal were below their inflation-adjusted price level in 1980. Ehrlich lost the bet and sent Simon a check for $576.07. Prices of the metals chosen by Ehrlich fell so much that Simon would have won the bet even if the prices hadn't been adjusted for inflation. (1) Here's how each of the metals performed from 1980-1990.

[........]

[ 30 November 2004: Message edited by: Geneva ][B][/B

[ 30 November 2004: Message edited by: Geneva ]


From: um, well | Registered: Feb 2003  |  IP: Logged
dillinger
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posted 30 November 2004 12:09 PM      Profile for dillinger   Author's Homepage     Send New Private Message      Edit/Delete Post  Reply With Quote 
lagatta: Thanks for the tip! I've been doing some research in that direction for the last little while. Monthly Review has an excellent interview/review here on the same topic.

Pax: true, greed can be something innate to humans, however I'd prefer to see it more in the sense of rational self interest. however, how that self interest expresses itself depends on the society in which one lives. under capitalism, self interest (at least in a very immediate sense, not long term) means being competitive, screwing over your fellow worker and getting as much money as you possibly can to ensure your own future security. but if you manifested the same behavious in an early communal society or later socialist society, that would get you bounced out of the collective pretty quickly. you would still have that sense of self interest, but would express it in a way that contributes to the collective of which you are also a part because that is also in your own personal material best interest.

[ 30 November 2004: Message edited by: dillinger ]


From: Toronto | Registered: Nov 2004  |  IP: Logged
Chris Borst
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posted 30 November 2004 02:00 PM      Profile for Chris Borst     Send New Private Message      Edit/Delete Post  Reply With Quote 
quote:
Originally posted by Geneva:
Simon offered Ehrlich a bet centered on the market price of metals. Ehrlich would pick a quantity of any five metals he liked worth $1,000 in 1980. If the 1990 price of the metals, after adjusting for inflation, was more than $1,000 (i.e. the metals became more scarce), Ehrlich would win. If, however, the value of the metals after inflation was less than $1,000 (i.e. the metals became less scare), Simon would win.

Yes yes. This "test" proves nothing. The price of anything is determined by the supply coming to market relative to demand, not by the total supply relative to demand. All one needs to do is burn through our resources faster and, *presto!* falling prices.

The planet is finite. It can't contain an infinite quantity of any mass. When it's gone, it's gone - with whatever effects on the ecosystem. Capitalist submorons talk about mining colonies on the moon, Mars, asteroids, etc. But things like hydrocarbons, water and air are Made on Earth™ or nowhere.

The relevant test is the effect of human resource exploitation on the ecosystem's ability to sustain itself - including, rather than excluding, us.


From: Taken off to the Great White North | Registered: Jun 2001  |  IP: Logged

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