Well, it would be nice to read some Wilber, but there's way too much "genius" and "remarkable" and "brilliant" and "wilber says" for my taste. I'm not really into touching the hem of the robe of the great one, but go on, what should I read ?
agitating prop wrote:
I'm not anti-human but as a species people seem like an out of control rodent problem. Rats with bulldozers.I used to think this way, but not so much anymore. The reason for that change is not because I don't think that if we continue on our current path we are essentially f---ed. No, I believe that even more now. The reason that I don't see us as "rats with bulldozers" is that there are growing instances of using tools like bulldozers and earthmovers to precipitate amazing and accelerated levels of ecological regeneration and restoration.
I just finished taking Geoff Lawton's online Permaculture Design Course, and he has shown countless instances of using large earthmoving equipment to install landform features that help rehydrate landscapes, build soil, and bring degraded land into more abundance than we can possibly imagine.
Then, there's this documentary by John D. Liu – that profiles ecological restoration in Ethiopia as well as an area larger than the entire country of Belgium in the Loess Plateau in China. The latter at a cost of only $600 per acre, starting with one of the most degraded landscapes in the world that was transformed into abundance in only a decade's time, at a grand cost of $600 per acre.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4R-a55FiQv8
The problem isn't that we have too big and destructive of a footprint. The problem is that we have not discovered how to increase our handprint in working with natural systems. Whether or not this can support the world's current population is an open question, but it certainly offers a better alternative than BAU or just surrendering to the notion that we are incapable of being anything but self-destructive.
Instead of demanding that Chris jump to your tune, one still unsubstantiated by anything but your opinion,...You're very confused, Adam. It's not my opinion. The Congressional Budget Office (CBO) of the U.S. government has estimated that, circa 2077, the U.S. GDP will be about $70 trillion (in year 2013 dollars).
Chris Martenson (Bachelors in biology, PhD in…Pathology? Something related to Neuroscience? Worked in the pharmaceutical industry…) then asked, "Does that make any sense to anybody at all?"
The answer, obviously, is that it makes sense to the CBO. The CBO is widely respected as a non-partisan expert evaluator of economic issues. Furthermore, as I pointed out, the CBO projections are in no way controversial. I provided links to blogs of economists across the broad political (Democratic, Republican, libertarian) and philosophical (Keynesian, Monetarist, Austrian) spectrum, and invited him to ask those economists whether they thought the CBO was right or Chris was right.
So the answer is that the CBO–and probably the overwhelming majority of the economics profession–thinks that the CBO projections make sense.
It is up to Chris (and you, if you agree with him) to explain why the CBO projections don't make sense, and why the U.S. GDP could never equal the present world GDP.
Mark,
To me the CBO chart looks like a pure interpolation in the future of the past growth. Before doing this graph, have they really asked themselves where we will be in the energy, natural resources and environment stories in 2077? Or they just assumed somehow we’ll figure it out? Or maybe they just assumed the real world doesn’t matter? How can you possibly be so confident about the future knowing all the fundamental challenges that we are going to face in the real world over the coming decades?
Fred
It goes without saying that bulldozers can also be used for beneficial purposes. But nothing beats just simply leaving Mother Nature alone, in the first place.
We've left footprints all over her house, fowled her water and wrecked her climate. Now she's angry. Mother Nature has become a Gaiian Mommie Dearest – and sending a crew with bulldozers over to her house to 'help make things right' when her home encompasses the entire globe, is not going to touch the central problem.
And what with the law of unintended consequences, increasing our hand print might look a lot like sending a kindergarten class with grape jelly covered hands over to clean her windows.
I think it's short sighted to think that the government produces facts and figures without a bias. At the end of the day the government wants growth of the economy because ultimately it's what gets politicians (re) elected!The CBO is widely respected as a non-partisan expertevaluator of economic issues. Furthermore, as I pointed out, the CBO projections are in no way controversial.
I would be very careful about blindly accepting the CBO's forecasts, facts and figures. If they seem too good to be true especially when logical data or arguments are presented against such figures, such as here at PP, they probably are. You know what they say about forecasts…they are always wrong.
Is the cbo taking externalities into account or simply extrapolating from current trends? If it is not taking into account, for example, the effect of wwater shortages, climate change, all kinds of environmental problems, it's not worth quoting. It is boneheaded and does require scientific facts to anchor it in reality.
I honestly believe that to simply leave nature alone at this point would be one of the worst things that we could do, almost as bad as trying to continue with BAU. Why? Because when we get down to it, we are a part of nature. Implying that we can somehow leave her alone is based upon the assumption that we are somehow apart from her.
It's this concept of separation that is at the heart of most of the problems we currently have. It's a good part of what got us to the point that we currently find ourselves. Only by abandoning that false conception of the world, and realizing that our purpose in nature, as humans, is to use the gift of intellect we have been given to work in harmony with nature. It is in the healing of ecosystems that we will heal ourselves. So long as we stay away from that, we will continue to be wounded, flailing about and striking out as hurt and wounded people typically do. As the saying goes, "Hurt people hurt people."
Furthermore, if we are to save ourselves, it may be the only choice we have. Watching the documentary I posted was one of the most inspirational things I've ever come across. It helped me realize that I could use my academic training and professional experience as a civil engineer, and instead of feeling shame for all of the destruction my profession has caused and continues to cause to ecosystems and watersheds, I could instead pursue a path where that knowledge was applied toward positive, restorative ends. Now that's what I devote myself toward in my spare time, with the goal of making it my paying gig as a business venture. It takes nature hundreds of years to generate an inch of new topsoil.
Through conscious interacton and intervention, we can help her to create it in only a couple of years. I fail to see how leaving her alone in this instance is somehow "better."
Finally, I reject the concept of focusing on the entire globe, because I don't have to necessarily fix the entire globe. What I do have to do is to focus on living within the limits of my watershed and bioregion, and to apply my gifts toward making it better. If that leads me to the opportunity to engage in projects in other watersheds and bioregions, and to help teach others how to make their homes better (like Geoff Lawton has been able to do), then all the better.
I'd much rather start with the question of, "How can I do something to make things better?" instead of, "How do I get myself and others to be less bad?"
The current economics profession (and the central banks that espouse it) have in large part brought the world to the edge of an unmitigated disaster. The CBO might as well be a parrot.
Growth, Dave, we need Growth.
I have no words…
Probably not...Is the cbo taking externalities into account or simply extrapolating from current trends?
A further caveat is that CBO’s long-term projections are not predictions of what CBO thinks is likely to happen. Instead, CBO uses simple assumptions to represent aspects of current policies and then projects what would happen if those policies were mechanically followed into the future. SourceThis is a biggie worth watching over the coming years...
If current laws governing taxes and spending stayed generally the same—an assumption that underlies CBO’s 10-year baseline budget projections—source
CAH,
To live as part of nature, we would have to expose ourselves to nature. No antibiotics, no prenatal care, no agriculture, particularly modern methods. We have all kinds of barriers that set us apart from the viccisitudes of the natural world.
When we take hikes through the wilderness and feel 'at one' with the forest, that feeling is predicated on a massive infrastructure that has manufactured the steel water bottle we pack water in (from China). The REI duds, incorporating Lycra, which is oil based and cheap labor, which is morally repugnant. If you drive to that little piece of paradise…??
We can't restore lost biodiversity. When animals become extinct they are just that … Done.
As far as people being bad. People are willfully ignorant, blind and can be just plain stupid. Morally speaking there are actually a few very bad people out there. I think that what people actually need and what they will get, is to be scared out of their wits by climate events.
I am glad you have hope and a job that supports it. I am hoping for an epic climate event that will shake humanity to its foundations.
I am not an economist. I am not an historian. I can't read this whole thing and parse out the true from the false. Maybe I should not trust this source. But here is what they came up with.
CONCLUSION The CBO’s budget projections are widely followed by economic policymakers, investors, and other financial participants. In this paper, we analyze 34 years of CBO budget projections in an attempt to determine the extent to which policymakers and the public should rely on such projections. It is not our intent to malign the CBO. Rather, our purpose is to ascertain whether the process that produces the baseline budget projections yields reasonably accurate results, given the constraints they face. Our results suggest several conclusions. First, and not surprisingly, projections for longer horizons are considerably worse than those for shorter horizons.Obviously there is more they say...
Source (2012, quoted material from p. 17)
And other examinations are available through your favorite search engine.
Great points CAH. I am presently doing what you are doing…
focus on living within the limits of my watershed and bioregion, and to apply my gifts toward making it better. If that leads me to the opportunity to engage in projects in other watersheds and bioregions, and to help teach others how to make their homes better (like Geoff Lawton has been able to do), then all the better.
I think that we have to maintain a sense of hope about the future. Not the kind of empty, saccharine hope that was used as a marketing slogan in the 2008 election, but the kind of real hope where we trust that if we stay true to our higher calling, and spread our gifts into the world, that we can achieve positive things in the future.
I do not have a job that supports my hope. Rather, I am endeavoring to create a livelihood around it. I know that it will likely not be anywhere close to as financially rewarding as my current job. But I also am confident that if I am able to pull this off, that my life will become richer and more abundant in countless ways. Maybe I will make it work, maybe I won't – but the important thing is that I have to give it a go.
I am hoping for an epic climate event that will shake humanity to its foundations.Sorry, I can't join you in that "hope."
I am unsure about what you mean by 'our gifts'. If I understand you correctly, you mean we should all employ our talents to restore the environment? How do you see this happening in a substantial way without popular support? The popular support required by taxing the wealthiest appropriately would require something that scared them. To the Koch brothers the environment is something to be raped, for example. The climate is fighting back. But she has to fight HARDER. You can't appease monsters with your hope.
When I say "our gifts," what I am referring to is the need to approach the world and our fellow man from a spirit of service, rather than trying to get what we can out of the interaction. Now, that being said, I have no control over what anyone else does in response – all I can do is try and influence them through my example.
I can't waste time on worrying about what the Koch brothers think, nor do I think that any strategies involving centralized authorities taxing the very elites who control those centralized authorities have a snowball's chance in hell of working. I have control over one thing – my own actions. And by living my life in a way that demonstrates an alternative to BAU, those in my immediate neighborhood might look at what I'm doing and start making similar, positive changes in their own lives and the way they show up in the world. And so on.
Is any of this rapid change? No? Is it a long, slow, slog? Absolutely. But I think that the desire for immediate change to "fix" things is what got us in this mix to begin with. I have no intention of appeasing anyone or anything with my hope. I'm just determined to show up in the world and do whatever I can to make my corner of it a little better of a place. Ultimately, I'll take that over doomer fantasies or appeals to convert everyone to a certain way of thinking seven days a week and twice on Tuesday.
A sensible fellow who knows he is part of nature.
MB-
So CBO projections are interesting, but they assume no recessions, and like most economists, no limits on growth - population can grow infinitely, energy use infinite, resources are infinite, etc. If they do speak of such things - can you please include a reference?
While I'm not hobbled by a PhD in Economics, my review of GDP growth and its inextricable link to energy production growth tells me that if we're generally not growing our liquid fuel supplies over the next 60 years, the Hirsch Report suggests we're going to have a very hard time staying even, much less growing at the "standard" rate of 2.5% per year, assuming no business cycle.
If we assume that a miracle occurs - LENR might be one, zero point energy, intervention by space aliens (hey, could happen) - then I believe the CBO ends up being right. Assuming population keeps growing, and we figure out a way to rebuild our soil before we starve.
But CBO doesn't mention energy. Neither do the mainstream economists. From what I can tell, they just postulate that more resources appear from "somewhere" as a result of price signals. Seems like a flaw in logic that ends up only biting them once - once a peak resources condition manifests, when no more resources can possibly appear because they simply don't exist at economical concentrations any longer.
Its a logic flaw I've never heard any mainstream economist talk about. Perhaps resources will appear from the asteroids given the correct price signal - but I'd like the mechanism explained in greater detail, since I'm used to designing actual systems that have to work in the real world, and this is one of those "known unknowns" that I'd like to get nailed down before we actually commit to the schedule.
Space travel, mining asteroids, if all that happens due to a new energy discovery, we're golden. Short of that…CBO will be wrong. Laws of physics, etc.
If it (the CBO) is not taking into account, for example, the effect of water shortages, climate change, all kinds of environmental problems, it's not worth quoting.That's not how science works. The CBO produced estimate of U.S. GDP through the 21st century. The graph basically predicted a GDP (in 2013 dollars) of about $72 trillion in the year 2080 (i.e., approximately equal to the present gross world product). An approximate tabular version of the CBO graph is:
Year –> GDP (in 2013 dollars) –>Annual growth rate in interval (% per year)
2013 –> $17 trillion
2020 –> $20 trillion –> 2.3%/year
2040 –> $30 trillion –> 2.1%/year
2060 –> $49 trillion –> 2.5%/year
2080 –> $72 trillion –> 1.9%/year
2090 –> $90 trillion –> 1.2%/year
To which Chris responded: "By 2080 when this is supposed to take place, the entire world will be past the peak of all known sources of energy. And Phosphate. And soil. And fresh water. And oceanic fish biomass. And who knows what else."
Now you say the CBO prediction needs to take into account, "for example, the effect of water shortages, climate change, all kinds of environmental problems."
Well, whatever. That isn't science. Einstein didn't say that Newton was wrong, and clocks aboard a satellite would not read the same as clocks on earth. Einstein said how much different they would read, and why.
So if Chris thinks "peak soil" (or "peak phosphate" or "peak fresh water"…or whatever) has some sort of big impact on the future economic growth of the U.S., he needs to show how the curve of U.S. economic growth in the U.S. in the 21st century actually will look, given whatever things he thinks are important.
And you need to either take what he has and add your own stuff, or accept his curve as the best guess. It's not science to say, "their graph is wrong, but I can't tell you what the right graph is."
When someone says a scientific (e.g. economic) prediction is wrong, the burden of proof is on the person saying the prediction is wrong to provide a better prediction. Then people in the future can look back and see who was right and who was wrong. (Or perhaps both the CBO predictions and Chris's/your predictions will be much too low.) (Or perhaps a very large meteor will unexpectedly strike earth and kill 90% of the population, and everyone will understand that such an event wasn't expected, and so neither the CBO nor Chris's/your predictions can be faulted.)