I read this from Resilience, it's an excerpt from Chapter 1 of the book Creating a Sustainable and Desirable Future. I don't really want to talk about the specific vision the book lays out, more on what your vision of a desirable world might look like. But I do want to steal some of the excerpt (buy the book here http://www.worldscientific.com/worldsci ... .1142/8922)
$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'C')reating a shared vision of a sustainable and desirable future is the most critical task facing humanity today. This vision must be of a world that we all want, a world that provides permanent prosperity within the Earth’s biophysical constraints in a fair and equitable way to all of humanity, to other species, and to future generations.
Society is currently at a critical turning point. There is significant uncertainty about how environmental, social, and economic problems can be solved. However, there is growing consensus that the decisions we make as a society at this critical point will determine the course of our future for quite some time to come.
There is a tendency in thinking about the future to simply extrapolate from past trends. For example, if we have been getting materially richer in the past, then the future would be more of the same; if the environment has been deteriorating, then it will continue to do so. But one of the lessons we can learn from history is that trends often do not continue smoothly. There are tipping points and discontinuities that are impossible to predict from past trends. Many past civilizations have collapsed. The dissolution of the Soviet Union, the Berlin Wall being knocked down, attitudes changing toward smoking, and landing a man on the moon are recent examples of changes that were difficult or impossible to foresee.
PeakOil is You
The Vision Thing
The Vision Thing
by Pops » Wed 30 Apr 2014, 11:30:18
So your task is to describe a desirable and sustainable future . . .
The legitimate object of government, is to do for a community of people, whatever they need to have done, but can not do, at all, or can not, so well do, for themselves -- in their separate, and individual capacities.
-- Abraham Lincoln, Fragment on Government (July 1, 1854)
-- Abraham Lincoln, Fragment on Government (July 1, 1854)
-
Pops - Elite
- Posts: 19746
- Joined: Sat 03 Apr 2004, 04:00:00
- Location: QuikSac for a 6-Pac
Re: The Vision Thing
by KaiserJeep » Wed 30 Apr 2014, 12:10:44
I don't believe in any desirable and sustainable future with 7+ billion humans inhabiting the Earth. If we indeed actually have a future, it resembles that of the Terminator films, with human skulls underfoot in the ruins.
After the great die-off, it's of primary importance that nobody have more than the number of kids who are required for a steady-state population. Of course, the best way to do that is to use enforced sterilizations, and making having an extra child a capital crime. The bounty hunters who are gunning for some poor woman with a bulging pregnancy are the reality show of the future.
Long range travel ends for everyone except the wealthy, so everyone else is reduced to public transportation and shapes their life around the bus and train schedules. You can afford one trip per week and you can carry a week's worth of food on your back - and are frightened because the burden is lighter every week.
Television is small screen, even personal-sized via eyeglass displays that consume less than 3 watts of power. Everyone is watching video from the Golden Age of plenty and cursing our present generation as resource hogs, the cause of the prolonged misery of generations to come.
Have a nice day.
After the great die-off, it's of primary importance that nobody have more than the number of kids who are required for a steady-state population. Of course, the best way to do that is to use enforced sterilizations, and making having an extra child a capital crime. The bounty hunters who are gunning for some poor woman with a bulging pregnancy are the reality show of the future.
Long range travel ends for everyone except the wealthy, so everyone else is reduced to public transportation and shapes their life around the bus and train schedules. You can afford one trip per week and you can carry a week's worth of food on your back - and are frightened because the burden is lighter every week.
Television is small screen, even personal-sized via eyeglass displays that consume less than 3 watts of power. Everyone is watching video from the Golden Age of plenty and cursing our present generation as resource hogs, the cause of the prolonged misery of generations to come.
Have a nice day.
KaiserJeep 2.0, Neural Subnode 0010 0000 0001 0110 - 1001 0011 0011, Tertiary Adjunct to Unimatrix 0000 0000 0001
Resistance is Futile, YOU will be Assimilated.
Warning: Messages timestamped before April 1, 2016, 06:00 PST were posted by the unmodified human KaiserJeep 1.0
Resistance is Futile, YOU will be Assimilated.
Warning: Messages timestamped before April 1, 2016, 06:00 PST were posted by the unmodified human KaiserJeep 1.0
- KaiserJeep
- Light Sweet Crude
- Posts: 6094
- Joined: Tue 06 Aug 2013, 17:16:32
- Location: Wisconsin's Dreamland
Re: The Vision Thing
by GHung » Wed 30 Apr 2014, 12:30:30
From the excerpt : "This vision must be of a world that we all want....".
That would be a fantasy. There is no "we", except in the sense that 'we' are all screwed as overshoot plays out. What follows will be a forced version of who gets what they need, and who doesn't. Mother Teresa didn't have the same vision of "a world that we all want" that Hitler had. I don't see that changing.
That would be a fantasy. There is no "we", except in the sense that 'we' are all screwed as overshoot plays out. What follows will be a forced version of who gets what they need, and who doesn't. Mother Teresa didn't have the same vision of "a world that we all want" that Hitler had. I don't see that changing.
Blessed are the Meek, for they shall inherit nothing but their Souls. - Anonymous Ghung Person
-
GHung - Intermediate Crude
- Posts: 3093
- Joined: Tue 08 Sep 2009, 16:06:11
- Location: Moksha, Nearvana
Re: The Vision Thing
by jedrider » Wed 30 Apr 2014, 14:24:53
Weird response, Kaiser. While there is NO sustainable future in sight until probably multiple die-offs, some future vision of dealing with resource limitations would be helpful. I think climate change will offer crushing blows in sequence. What we do in the meantime, we should have some vision it seems to me. Dante's Hell, perhaps.
Wait, I just found this:
http://investigations.nbcnews.com/_news/2013/05/14/17588942-cruel-or-necessary-the-true-cost-of-wild-horse-roundups?lite
I believe we humans are nothing more than animals and animals are no less than us, so this is certainly one vision of the future.
Wait, I just found this:
http://investigations.nbcnews.com/_news/2013/05/14/17588942-cruel-or-necessary-the-true-cost-of-wild-horse-roundups?lite
I believe we humans are nothing more than animals and animals are no less than us, so this is certainly one vision of the future.
-
jedrider - Intermediate Crude
- Posts: 3107
- Joined: Thu 28 May 2009, 10:10:44
Re: The Vision Thing
by Pops » Wed 30 Apr 2014, 14:54:10
I think a desirable world is one where most people's basic needs can be met with a little to spare. Of course that entails regulating our population, unfortunately something we've never been that good at doing. Although there are processes, i.e. if a female is hunger stressed she may become temporarily infertile but that isn't all that pleasant as a lifestyle. Too bad humans can't use their brains to be a little more self aware now that our main method of coping with hunger - moving - is not really working.
Sustainable of course means non-consumptive in the basic sense - not some jiggered up marketing pamphlet version of unsustainable PV panels and windmills. But too, sustainable means population control of some sort and there are big ancient traditions directly in the way of that path.
I think Ibon's vision of a new religion is probably the best hope for long term sustainability. Perhaps the gospel of Ibon turns out to be along the lines of
$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', '&')quot;God created Nature in his own image so go forth and protect it that you'll have everlasting life in your childrens' children hearts - and not be eaten in your old age."
Sustainable of course means non-consumptive in the basic sense - not some jiggered up marketing pamphlet version of unsustainable PV panels and windmills. But too, sustainable means population control of some sort and there are big ancient traditions directly in the way of that path.
I think Ibon's vision of a new religion is probably the best hope for long term sustainability. Perhaps the gospel of Ibon turns out to be along the lines of
$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', '&')quot;God created Nature in his own image so go forth and protect it that you'll have everlasting life in your childrens' children hearts - and not be eaten in your old age."
Bumper sticker version:
"Don't mess with Mother Nature"©
The goofed up agendas of the leading religions we are now saddled with put all the incentive in birthing and dominating and human-centeredness and place all the reward in another life in some other place. That's OK I guess as a palliative if you're a slave with little power and a small population and want to overcome but not so good if you're a master, with lots of power and an already big population on the verge of overshoot.
Obviously sea change religions don't happen easily, I'd not expect it to happen without pain this time. The parable of the 400 year flood without rain might do it, don't know, maybe when the new eucharist is a ritual of actual bones and blood that comes to be known as the Soylent Mass or maybe a "Donner Party".
Of course I'm pretty sure the idea in the book I linked is to make lofty goals and work to them but as Ghung said we all have different goals, or actually we all have the same goal: "Me". In fact there are lots of people who are pretty scared right now and lofty goals are pretty well at the bottom of their agenda. Not sure how to get passed that without lots of hurt.
The legitimate object of government, is to do for a community of people, whatever they need to have done, but can not do, at all, or can not, so well do, for themselves -- in their separate, and individual capacities.
-- Abraham Lincoln, Fragment on Government (July 1, 1854)
-- Abraham Lincoln, Fragment on Government (July 1, 1854)
-
Pops - Elite
- Posts: 19746
- Joined: Sat 03 Apr 2004, 04:00:00
- Location: QuikSac for a 6-Pac
Re: The Vision Thing
by KaiserJeep » Wed 30 Apr 2014, 16:10:49
What has religion got to do with the Hell on Earth that man has created?
Religion at best gives us a plan for living, and as you have noted, all the present religions have been obsoleted by circumstances, mainly population overshoot.
For the record, I still do not believe in a climate driven by mankind's carbon dioxide emissions. I do believe in a world that has been warming for 10,000 years and will continue to warm for roughly another 12,000 years, quite naturally until the Climatic Optimum of the present inter-glacial period is reached. I think that fanciful tales of Climate Change are being told to us because some politicians believe that the power they will gain in the name of "reversing Climate Change" will enable them to dominate miserable suffering populations in the First World countries.
I believe we will run out of cheap fossil energy, and I believe that will precipitate the die-off. The die-off will unevenly fall on Third World and Second World countries, newly swollen populations kept alive by the food surplus caused by mechanized agriculture and fertilizers and pesticides.
The quality of life in the First World will fall until it more resembles that of the Third World. Uncomfortable means of population control will be imposed upon us by those same politicians that the rest of you empowered to save us from Climate Change.
No knowledge will be lost. In fact we will gain new understanding of the human mind and the human soul in the crisis ahead. I have no clear vision of what that future may be, but I am certain that it is something that we simply cannot imagine today, never having had any similar circumstances in the history of mankind. The perfect clarity of digital memory will reserve the misery to come for all time. We will never again have the luxury of a past obscured by the passage of time.
Not a Brave New World, but forever more a Cowardly Old World.
Religion at best gives us a plan for living, and as you have noted, all the present religions have been obsoleted by circumstances, mainly population overshoot.
For the record, I still do not believe in a climate driven by mankind's carbon dioxide emissions. I do believe in a world that has been warming for 10,000 years and will continue to warm for roughly another 12,000 years, quite naturally until the Climatic Optimum of the present inter-glacial period is reached. I think that fanciful tales of Climate Change are being told to us because some politicians believe that the power they will gain in the name of "reversing Climate Change" will enable them to dominate miserable suffering populations in the First World countries.
I believe we will run out of cheap fossil energy, and I believe that will precipitate the die-off. The die-off will unevenly fall on Third World and Second World countries, newly swollen populations kept alive by the food surplus caused by mechanized agriculture and fertilizers and pesticides.
The quality of life in the First World will fall until it more resembles that of the Third World. Uncomfortable means of population control will be imposed upon us by those same politicians that the rest of you empowered to save us from Climate Change.
No knowledge will be lost. In fact we will gain new understanding of the human mind and the human soul in the crisis ahead. I have no clear vision of what that future may be, but I am certain that it is something that we simply cannot imagine today, never having had any similar circumstances in the history of mankind. The perfect clarity of digital memory will reserve the misery to come for all time. We will never again have the luxury of a past obscured by the passage of time.
Not a Brave New World, but forever more a Cowardly Old World.
KaiserJeep 2.0, Neural Subnode 0010 0000 0001 0110 - 1001 0011 0011, Tertiary Adjunct to Unimatrix 0000 0000 0001
Resistance is Futile, YOU will be Assimilated.
Warning: Messages timestamped before April 1, 2016, 06:00 PST were posted by the unmodified human KaiserJeep 1.0
Resistance is Futile, YOU will be Assimilated.
Warning: Messages timestamped before April 1, 2016, 06:00 PST were posted by the unmodified human KaiserJeep 1.0
- KaiserJeep
- Light Sweet Crude
- Posts: 6094
- Joined: Tue 06 Aug 2013, 17:16:32
- Location: Wisconsin's Dreamland
Re: The Vision Thing
by Subjectivist » Wed 30 Apr 2014, 16:13:32
$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Pops', 'I') read this from Resilience, it's an excerpt from Chapter 1 of the book Creating a Sustainable and Desirable Future. I don't really want to talk about the specific vision the book lays out, more on what your vision of a desirable world might look like. But I do want to steal some of the excerpt (buy the book here http://www.worldscientific.com/worldsci ... .1142/8922)
$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'C')reating a shared vision of a sustainable and desirable future is the most critical task facing humanity today. This vision must be of a world that we all want, a world that provides permanent prosperity within the Earth’s biophysical constraints in a fair and equitable way to all of humanity, to other species, and to future generations.
Society is currently at a critical turning point. There is significant uncertainty about how environmental, social, and economic problems can be solved. However, there is growing consensus that the decisions we make as a society at this critical point will determine the course of our future for quite some time to come.
There is a tendency in thinking about the future to simply extrapolate from past trends. For example, if we have been getting materially richer in the past, then the future would be more of the same; if the environment has been deteriorating, then it will continue to do so. But one of the lessons we can learn from history is that trends often do not continue smoothly. There are tipping points and discontinuities that are impossible to predict from past trends. Many past civilizations have collapsed. The dissolution of the Soviet Union, the Berlin Wall being knocked down, attitudes changing toward smoking, and landing a man on the moon are recent examples of changes that were difficult or impossible to foresee.
$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'C')reating a shared vision of a sustainable and desirable future is the most critical task facing humanity today. This vision must be of a world that we all want, a world that provides permanent prosperity within the Earth’s biophysical constraints in a fair and equitable way to all of humanity, to other species, and to future generations.
Society is currently at a critical turning point. There is significant uncertainty about how environmental, social, and economic problems can be solved. However, there is growing consensus that the decisions we make as a society at this critical point will determine the course of our future for quite some time to come.
There is a tendency in thinking about the future to simply extrapolate from past trends. For example, if we have been getting materially richer in the past, then the future would be more of the same; if the environment has been deteriorating, then it will continue to do so. But one of the lessons we can learn from history is that trends often do not continue smoothly. There are tipping points and discontinuities that are impossible to predict from past trends. Many past civilizations have collapsed. The dissolution of the Soviet Union, the Berlin Wall being knocked down, attitudes changing toward smoking, and landing a man on the moon are recent examples of changes that were difficult or impossible to foresee.
So your task is to describe a desirable and sustainable future . . .
My vision of a sustainable desirable future is for people to turn away from using fossil fuels as quickly as they possibly can. I believe we could with a lot of permaculture and much more garden style hands on agriculture sustain our current population long enough for the sigmoid curve to play itself out and naturally decline. Both hunter gatherer and animal early mechanical agricultural societies were able to constrain their own populations. One strategy is for the culture to actively discourage child bearing until a woman is later in life, naturally reducing the number of children she will have. Of course the lack of basic sanitation and high infant mortality rate were also factors but we do not need them to limit population if we adopt a cultural paradigm of replacement birthrate as the goal instead of infinite growth.
The most equitable method I have seen explored in fiction is for ever person to have a birthright, the right to have a baby to replace themselves. Birthrights would be your personal right, but you would have the legal right to sell your birthright if you had not already used it. Organizations desiring to lower the world population could buy birthrights from people willing to sell them and not use them, naturally lowering the number of humans in the next generation. People who sell or use up their birthright would be given a tubaligation/vasectomy for free to prevent accidental excess birthrights being used. Sure wealthy people could buy a few extra birthrights, but judging by historical examples not very many would have more than three or four children. The other aspect is the morality of hiring people to sell you their right to genetic reproduction, something religion has not really touched upon at this point in our culture.
II Chronicles 7:14 if my people, who are called by my name, will humble themselves and pray and seek my face and turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear from heaven, and I will forgive their sin and will heal their land.
- Subjectivist
- Volunteer
- Posts: 4705
- Joined: Sat 28 Aug 2010, 07:38:26
- Location: Northwest Ohio
