once again, the messaging from nate and the guests he speaks with continuously go banger after banger, 10 for 10 on issues that nourish parts of me that don't get sunlight elsewhere, and few ppl in my life open up about. important and beautiful, just a thank you to anybody reading this and to nate. we are all connected (cringe but also idc), hopeful we can find one another as we continue to exist. much love, and more.
Greetings from Norway. I remember back in the 70’s we talked about sustainability … then in the 80’s it became sustainable growth … but the last many years it’s has turned into just growth! Even all the plans for “The green transition” is heavily sold as a unique possibility for GROWTH(new jobs etc..)
@@BartAnderson_writer I see an ideological lock-down in the word "earn" here. Once we switch to the position that everybody is entitled to living decently, and realize that we collectively have enough of wealth for all, the "earn" part becomes ridiculous and completely market-constructed. Sustainability can simply *be* a living.
@@BartAnderson_writer I agree on that. The problem is that it is likely impossible to redistribute wealth "transitionally" and according to some plan - the "elites" will never be complicit, particularly dark triads.
If you looked at sustainability in the eyes of the indigenous people who opted out of mixing with the so called Civilized World we'd get a better understanding of the natural function of humanity. I'm not saying we abandon all our technologies but in their World everyone has a purpose and isn't that what we are looking for. Can we not find ways to implement our technologies in an constructed manner..?
I'm basically in the 7th group. Unfortunately, the longer we try to grow the more likely the sudden collapse scenario comes. And so far it seems we are hell bent on the growth. I don't wish for a doom but I see the "sudden" collapse scenario as very plausible.
Same here. I can’t see our current system doing anything other than charging ahead after growth until it inevitably crashes down. My hope, though, is for pockets of stability and sanity in the midst of the collapse. That’s what I’m fighting to create for my children and grandchildren.
Hoping for collapse is like the USA idiots hoping for a civil war or Christians hoping for revelation. I hope this is gradual and we get down to 2 billion people living much simpler lives like Professor William Rees espouses. Great video Nate.
This is a really terrific point. It’s hard to have conversations about what to do, with people who aren’t looking at the same map of what has happened, is happening, and what’s about to happen. If you can’t agree on that you really can’t agree on solutions.
The issue is how to get to the consensus point of view and what that would be. By the time you convince your opponent/collaborator-to-be, the world may end.
Clear and distinct model Nate, and a good contribution to the discourse. I resonate with 6 and agree with you that 7 will happen. Thanks for your continued thought leadership.
I am somewhere between philosophies 4 and 7. Most of us following this podcast know that growth is coming to an end in the not-so-distant future. The question is what steps do we need to take to adapt to a post-growth future.
Whenever the topic comes up or when somebody asks me (which they almost never do) I recommend that people should get out of debt. That would make less consumption and less income more palatable. If we can get out of debt, moving "backwards" to a consumption level of, say, 50 years ago would be feasible. I am relatively old (55). I could be happy by consuming back at a mid-1970s level. When I was growing up, I was middle class and it was just fine.
At a recent birthday party for a cousin who turned 70 I was talking to her husband about the damages to the biosphere source of all life. They have a daughter and five grandchildren. They're a very devout Catholic family. The husband proclaimed that obviously this is God's plan and doing. My reply was the identical God of creation he worships gave us the brains to recognize we're undermining creation. He was unmoved to say the least. When reminded that pope Francis has written multiple documents calling for respect for 'our sister earth' and has priests trying to convince dioceses to act on climate his reply was Francis should stick to morals and ethics not nature. This interaction just another reminder of how much damage the Christian faith has inflicted on the world. In a nutshell life on earth sucks. The good times come when you're dead and in heaven playing an organ while staring into the eyes of God for an eternity. Old protestant tune sung in chirches for centuries goes something like this. Oh the good times are coming be they ever so far away.....
I don’t disagree, but let me just say that there are different levels (depths) of understanding among Christians, including among the devout Catholics you speak of. Please don’t give up on those who profess a faith in Christ. There are many wise men and women in this group, and I’ve had the good fortune to cross paths with some. I hope you have that opportunity, too.
@jennysteves thanks for your thoughtful reply. Mom and dad were both one of 12 children in a large Catholic family. I and my three sisters were raised Catholic and attended Catholic schools. In our times Christianity was reeling due to the decades of misery and suffering countless deaths created by two world wars and the great depression. People of faith asking where is god in this suffering? The focus in our parish was on the image of Christ as the Prince of Peace. Most sermons featured the sermon on the mount. Unfortunately in order to survive Catholicism made a hard right turn hoping to hold onto members that were jumping on board the prosperity gospel of radicalized evangelical protestants. Where we live now Catholic parishes are on board with guns, forcing women to bear children under the boot of law enforcement regardless of who impregnated her, her health or the condition of the fetus. Homosexuality is condemned. Here in Ohio these zealots own state government. So far this year over $1 billion secular tax dollars has been given to religious kooks homeschoolers and other organizations with zero oversight. In the meantime public schools are in decay. We live in a prosperous growing suburb that needs new schools and remodeling of old schools. The voters turned down a minor increase in taxes. College enrollment in Ohio is down 10%. Colleges closing or consolidating in an effort to survive. In 2006 Ohios education system was #6 in the nation today its 35th. Biden dumped billions into our state for chip plants etc. Unfortunately the companies cannot find qualified graduates to operate the plants. Yes there are well intended Christians. We have many as friends. When I ask them does your pastor speak about the destruction of creation and our responsibility to care for earth from the pulpit they have no reply.
@PinkPanda-Zx no disagreement with you! Yet they breathlessly listen to their orange god as he worships the golden calf. At one time we had a collective vision and understanding of God that included all. That understanding was replaced with a personal one on one relationship with God by religious charlatans decades ago. I dontneed to talk to anyone! God and I we know what's happening.... Deity abuse in service to the non-existent self
Nate I think you along with others badly mischaracterize group number five. I would say the vast majority of doomers or those expecting inevitable collapse do not *want* it to happen, but basically see the writing on the wall... or at least believe they see it. And just because some have that view does not mean they are not still trying and hoping to avoid that outcome and are doing all they can to help soften whatever landing awaits them and their fellow beings, both human and nonhuman. So the statement that this particular outlook serves no purpose is simply not true. Don't be hating on the doomers bro 🤨
Change will be forced upon us. Wife and I are clearly in number 7. There is another philosophical category perhaps where the consequences do not matter because they believe in eternal salvation.
I lean towards 7 and that’s why I’m here 🙏🌞 I was raised by a Wiccan Grandma and immersed in new age philosophy at a young age and I have found myself drawn more and more to channeling and psychics on TH-cam who have many hopeful predictions for the very near future including a benevolent alien intervention within the next few years. I used to call that sort of stuff “hopium” but all of the cutting edge science around consciousness, black holes, dark matter and artificial intelligence (which is breaking down and offering serious challenges to physical materialism as a viable model of reality) is nudging me in the direction of taking it more and more seriously. My wife thinks I’ve gone off the deep end. Maybe I have… but I am happier and more optimistic.
Sorry to say but your wife is correct, especially when you start talking about a “benevolent alien”. While there are certainly other intelligent beings in the universe, physics is very clear that it is 100% impossible for any alien civilization to reach earth.
I think the best-case scenario at this point would be somewhere between a disastrous collapse and an intentional degrowth transition to a less industrial society. Preventing collapse was possible 50 years ago when Limits to Growth was published but not anymore. I agree that it doesn't even matter whether continued growth would be a good thing because it's not going to happen, no matter what we do. I think category 1 is the largest. The video had pictures of poor people but I think it's largely a matter of personality too. Some people are just more inclined to think about big picture issues in a systematic way than others.
I believe Nate is predicating his bend but not break philosophy on wising to remain a bit hopeful. I agree with you. Being ready to die and feeling the pain of continued wreaking of the living planet are the wise choices of the large number of folks with enhanced awareness. The rest will muddle along, be ready to fight to hold on to their privileges and join others in blaming any number of targets as things devolve.
Thank you, Nate. It was exciting to see your 7 philosophies. When I recall interactions with people from time to time especially considering climate impacts, I have come across people having some of these views.
Excellent and helpful "Frankly" - and a sublime example of left brain and right brain working in harmony. Obviously Philosophy No.7 is optimal - but I have just watched again your talk with Ian McGilchrist, and I see that although he (like you) is trying to prepare humanity for De-Growth and thus hoping to decelerate Growth's onward march, he does say at one point that things have gotten so tangled and messy that some sort of catastrophic meltdown (as in Philosophy No.6) might be the only thing that forces us to reconfigure how we live and earn a "Right Livelihood". [By the way, I watch McGilchrist a lot, in various settings, and he really shines in your setting, because your input is clearly optimizing his output. McGilchrist is a great listener, so his output is not always the same - he responds to external stimuli, without over-reacting but in a measured way.] "Deserts on the March" by Paul Sears was written in 1935; "Our Plundered Planet" by Fairfield Osborn Jr and "Road to Survival" by William Vogt were published in 1948. Nothing has changed, except that the plundering has accelerated - especially in the sanctimonious "Third World" which has copied the First World with knobs on. Lone voices in the Third World argue against Growth - Arundhati Roy, for instance, in "The God of Small Things". But they are completely overwhelmed (as John Muir, Malthus and Darwin were in the 19th century) by rapid industrialization, which brings so many creature comforts and delightful Freedoms - ranging from the basic Freedom from Hunger to vast Freedoms to publish and communicate, to travel the world, and to buy more than the staples of Life. Paradoxically blinkered and shackled by these massive Freedoms, we dismiss serious Ecologists like Sears, Osborn and Vogt (and later on Rachel Carson and Garrett Hardin and Paul Ehrlich) as "Apocalyptic Environmentalists". Yet Apocalypse just means Revelation - a tearing away of the veils that dim our vision, a rather brutal experience in some ways, but ultimately the only one that will work. I absolutely dispute the notion that horror and tragedy and crisis cannot be healing - just as a surgeon would dispute that his violent incisions cannot be healing and often life-saving. Sometimes only horror and tragedy can heal both individuals and Nations. The history of all humans is studded at intervals with things like the Hundred Years War and is exceedingly bloodstained. Why would that change? Humans are part of Nature, and Nature can be brutal in the extreme. If A.I. replaces all of us bar a Remnant of about 2 billion, there won't be so much violence. But there probably won't be so much beauty either (though a lot of the Remnant will be freed up to go back to being artisans of some kind, and houses and furniture for instance will start to look lovely as they once used to look, in the hands of very "ordinary", often illiterate, craftsmen). There will be less plundering, as A.I. only needs energy and water and the minerals used to make the hardware. What are A.I.'s waste products? - I don't know, but they won't be anything like the waste products of 8 billion humans and their livestock. I reckon this is what COULD or MIGHT happen - it is the only alternative to humanity's overwhelming power to destroy and ravage i.e. to Scenario 6. It still entails losing 6 billion humans - but gently and gradually. Already, there is a steep decline in fertility in both men and women, which added to voluntary limitation of births could be all that is needed - though whether it will occur in time to prevent a sudden brutal Collapse is not known. As a Catholic I abhor abortion and medical contraception (there are many natural ways of preventing conception, though they are not fail-safe). But abortion and efficient contraception have not in any case offset the ill effects of increased consumption and increased longevity on the Plundered Planet. In fact they seem to have made things a lot worse. Instead, it seems to be the unintended consequences of endocrine disruptors that are going to work, coupled with the increasing unaffordability of founding a family - a Human Right, but a lot of Human Rights have become a bit iffy since the 1948 Universal Declaration on Human Rights, due to Humans going into general Overshoot. When Liberty becomes Licence, Rights take a nosedive - every time.
I see myself in many of these groups, but I must admit, even now, I haven't let go of the dream of #3 - the idea that humanity will not reach beyond our own planet is among the most depressing things I can think of.
I have given up on that idea, and that was a bummer... I love the thought of people travelling to other systems, exploring etc etc. But now I dont see that ever happening. For us it would be in thought anyway, I would not be here to witness any of it, so I just have it as a pleasant, exiting thing to think about. Not all dreams needs to come true, they could just be dreams :D Playing Elite Dangerous is the closest thing at the moment...
First attempt, seems to have been censored, so I'll try again.... There are size and complexity power laws that are known in many different fields of science, all worked out independently of each other, so it appears to be a physical law of the universe as much as all the laws of thermodynamics. Even stars follow these size complexity laws. Anyone can do a search on 'stars size complexity laws'. None of the large complex systems, whether stars, storms, ant colonies or civilizations reach a peak and ‘degrow’ gently. The largest systems all collapse at the end of their lifespan, with available energy depletion being the cause. Because we have used all the easy to get metals and minerals, we are left to gather the deeper, harder, more remote, lower grade ore bodies of every non-renewable resource. We require increasing complexity and energy to do this. What’s often forgotten is that 97%-99% of all materials are used to maintain the existing system, with the 1%-3% being the ‘growth’ component. Entropy never sleeps. ‘Degrowth’, as in nice and gentle downslope, is a physical impossibility, because of our need for maintenance of the existing system even on a gentle downslope. Entropy and dissipation work their magic on all built systems, including the complexity of large stars, and certainly on our enormous civilization, magnitudes larger than any prior one. Any attempt at degrowth, means that complexity also unwinds, making the gathering of all the materials needed just to maintain a degrowing system is impossible. The most complex aspects of our civilization are the ones to unravel fastest, and these are the most important ones for gathering and distributing materials (and energy) throughout the rest of civilization. “Degrowth” is a nice catchy buzzword for anyone that doesn’t want to understand how large complex systems actually work. We have had many prior civilizations of humans that all collapsed at different rates, but a common element was that the complexity became too great to continue given dwindling resources, mostly energy resources being food, animal power, slaves. The largest civilization to ever exist is likely to have the fastest collapse, just like large stars collapse faster than small ones. The internal complexity has to unwind very quickly due to lack of energy, which cause massive feedback loops because of internal complexity. Systems within systems all unwinding at the same time. Collapse compared to all the other ‘beliefs’ in the latest ‘Frankly’ is not a belief, it’s a mathematical and physical law based certainty.
@@Gnevnyj In cities around the world where now over 50% of the total population lives, we have to maintain the roads, sewers, gas lines, water lines, electricity grid, communications, trains , buses, ports, airports etc, etc. In a world of decline, this doesn't get much lower than present, unless you deliberately cut off areas of the city. As all the materials suffer from entropy and the energy cost to replace them continues to grow, it's a physical impossibility to work in a world of less energy and much less materials. Then there is all the complex transport routes between cities across the world that also have to be maintained as no city in the modern world is an island. The shear complexity of the entirety of our civilization totally relies upon the 6 continent supply chain to operate normally. In a world where these links start to break down because of 'less', then the chaotic nature of feedback loops failing that no longer allow normal function means the system breaks. There is zero chance of lower population and lower complexity having a nice gentle descent. It doesn't matter if the 'less' is energy, materials or people, the large complex system of civilization is the size and complexity it currently is. Exactly like a super giant star when the energy is depleted the structured complex internal system breaks down under it's own gravity and collapses.
9 here. We are dead man walking. Obviously, there is a conviction that we cannot bear this terrible news. *We ourselves don't think we have the courage!* Instead we are hard working to test the frontier from the other side. "How much can we save of what we have?" I got that right - **7** is the one who will still have pants on? Ask an 8 what he/she thinks.... ------- No not just kidding. Numerology, Ennegram is accepted in modern Psychology for good reasons. Thank you.
Please, please, please, please, please, please, please, please, please have Jason Hickel on the podcast to discuss how democratically agreed & planned degrowth can be achieved with citizens assemblies 🙏🌍🌱
As a Nate Hagenite, I think I'm a hybrid of 4th & 7th Category. My permitted active via media influencers are Rafael Nadal, Christopher Hitchens, Noam Chomsky, Nate Hagens, Guy McPherson. These guys may speak for me. Influencers of yesteryear, rock-n-roll 60's,70's. Namely: John Lennon - All You Need is Love, Paul McCartney - The Love You Take is Equal to The Love You Make, Ronnie Van Zant - Be Something You Love And Understand. Give a Hootion mitigate your pollution. Peace
yesterday had an revelatory bioregional food co-op meeting with the original back to the land movement people from the 1970s with the current flush of back to the landers with very different values. It appears that here in the ozarks the back to landers stayed on the land unlike in other regions and help to build OOGA which was the predecessor of the USDA organic standards. Just an observation of the current back to the landers being energy blind and much more inclined towards human exceptionalism.
Degrowth by disaster or regrowth by design. It's a cultural choice that will need to be guided by a different 1% - those in the 7th category. The challenge is shifting from conversation to action and properly triggering the public's limbic.
Many thanks Nate! The challenges we face are very well explained and laid out by you. My question is: How do we engage conventional economists in this discussion - beacuse they are in key positions everywhere and are the ones who could help change direction. But they are extremely passive. Btw, is not it strange that we are guided by the same economic model today as we were hundred years ago - when population was 1/4 of today and the world economy 1/100 of today?!
Diogenes was a legendary ancient Greek philosopher who was known for wandering the daytime streets of Athens with a lighted lantern while looking for an "honest man". Does that sound familiar? Thanks. Nate.
Excellent insight and advice: awareness of varying frameworks on this topic --how people imagine the Future reflect decisions on daily life --could help dialogue!! Thank you.
The spread is indicative of uncertainty, therefore none of the views are certain, therefore "belief" in one or another is a big "hope" choice, and there is potential that the chosen belief will be falsified in the future. Note: while a few of these thought patterns involve urgency and imply impending changes, none really specify a timeline, in part because we are still stumbling in the dark when it comes to match prediction models and the unfolding of time. Best you can do, I figure, is be true to your beliefs as best you can and have the humility to realize the future may not turn out that way. Ideally, be willing to adapt to new information, instead of holding on to whatever you're thinking even in the face of contradicting evidence. This is all very challenging as society has sped up so nobody has the time for nuance & deep thought. Hoping there's a few up to the challenge. :)
Very useful, as always. Thank you, Nate. Personally, I'm in favor of dropping the current media-pushed game of prophesizing the future, and spending more time thinking about how best to plan for the constantly shifting range of possibilities the future actually is. I enjoy travelling with you immeasurably, Nate, because you help me better perceive, in the moment, the depth, breadth and detail of what it is I'm experiencing. That time is moving in a single direction is a particular perspective born of two human eyes mounted face forward above regularly expanding and contracting lungs, and a rhythmically beating heart squeezing blood and oxygen through the highways of our arteries and veins. Spacetime is actually more akin to a heaving sea of possibility stretching in all directions around us, and we humans being are all afloat in the middle of it, bobbing about like corks riding the tossing waves. From this perspective all seems random, directionless and pointless. Notice, however, that some waves may collide and combine to be larger and more powerful than others, carrying all they encounter in the direction of the impetus that arose to set them into existence. For a period of time, before these dis-integrate back into a range of smaller, more temporary and chaotic waves, the crests of these bigger waves present the possibility of seeing further and traveling farther in a particular direction than do others. If you can learn to maneuver yourself toward the crests of the waves around you rather than remaining stuck down in the troughs, the possibility of catching one of these waves and settling upon a course to somewhen just may arise... For us the course we set will have meaning and poignancy born in part of the wave with which we travel. But we will do well to remember that the sea itself will always remain, and be, just the sea. In this way, we ourselves will remember who and where we always are. 💦🐬💦
I am closer to the perspective of degrowth 4, wherein the most important way I can contribute to the well being of the future is to impart the right wisdom that I can obtain from the classical, feudal, enlightenment, industrial revolution, finally into the modern period that I think will end in the next 50 to 100 years. There will be people living beyond that that I feel must know a story of how they came into a torn up world, and I want that to be intentionally understood from some elements of true things.
What makes you think the growth philosophy will change, when future elected or appointed, leaders will continue to be sociopathic and narcissistic left brain dominant achievers, not right brain visionaries (such as your good self)? Mission impossible to change the ruling class structure of our disjointed world - there is no collective "we" to make sensible change, philosophical or practical. Still, I admire your efforts to align worldly thinkers with your viewers.
Thank you for these frameworks that we can keep in mind as we navigate new conversations. I'm going to make a poster of that final shot of all the philosophies together, so they embed in my long-term memory. I've been studying "Nine Levels Of Increasing Embrace In Ego Development: A Full-Spectrum Theory Of Vertical Growth And Meaning Making" by Susanne R. Cook-Greuter, and I wonder where each of these philosophies fit amongst those levels of ego.
I find elements of these in myself, particularly 3, 4 and 7. I still believe that with a focused effort the out-of-Earth future is possible even with degrowth, we just need to focus on the right things. I would completely agree that's naive, but the thought of knowledge, sentience and life itself ending with the planet's habitability and not continuing indefinitely is the ultimate existential catastrophe in my eyes.
As always, I think you should consider the possibility of technolgical advances in all fields as not just a mitigating factor, but a transformative one. There are so many entrenched players who will resist change til doomsday that the solutions before us will not come to fruit. I fully admit that. They might unintentionally destroy our planet in a Holocaust in a vain attempt to hold onto their legacy. But your degrowth scenario is even more implausible, albeit well-meaning.It would require a complete re-making of our geopolitical nation state perpetual struggle for dominance (Mearsheimer, et al) and a change in consciousness of 8 billion individuals or a large fraction thereof. Given that, it's the Garden of Eden. But I think any idea that we can go back to the Garden is even more perilous than mine that technology can save us and our planet. But thank you. You are very wise.
Thank you for your continued work on this. I recently came across Tony Seba and his predictions. They're quite interesting and might show a way out of this. I don't know if he incorporates the full picture in his predictions. He seems to go by the price of things. But interesting nonetheless. Maybe a good guest for a podcast?
I'm in the 7th group, which I'm sure most of your listeners are too, but it is a minority group in global society. I think there is a shift going on, but it is frustratingly (and terrifyingly) slow.
Nate, I think you misrepresent the “collapse” philosophy. What you describe is actually accelerationism or nihilism. I identify as a collapse-nik, but I sure as hell am not rooting for social collapse - quite the contrary! I scour the news and public opinions looking for hope. But instead I often find a lot of pollyannaish “hope-ium” where people acknowledge the seriousness of the problems in the polycrisis, but then do a lot of blustery hand wavy “somehow it will work out”… it just feels intellectually dishonest., and it’s very unconvincing… I have developed my own philosophy I think of as “eco-stoicism”: on the basis of the data and 50+ years observing human nature, I think we’re likely doomed, but I think we are morally obligated to act like our polycrisis problems are solvable, and to seek those solutions. This is not a perspective that is common or particularly appealing in some ways; it brushes up too closely to “doomer-ism” or nihilism for many people. But I’m insistent: I think collapse of multiple Earth systems is nearly inevitable at this point, but we must look for solutions nonetheless, if for no other reason than it’s morally dignified. Giving up is craven and despicable, and even if success is just .001%, it definitely drops to zero if you quit. So don’t give up! Fight! “Rage, rage against the dying of the light…” Giving in to despair is simply morally wrong. Fighting until the bitter end, because we owe it to our fellow living organisms, to the future generations, to each other… that is an honorable moral posture, and it doesn’t require me to deny the data of how grim things may look.
...I find people are more worried if at all with the immediate... like here in Mexico, insecurity, dismantling of the judicial power, dubious interpretation of how a majority is attained in leading to a rubber stamp congress, money exchange rates, inflation...etc. etc. I really don't think people worry much about a couple generations up ahead....on the other hand I have struck a few chords when talking to people like you can't manufacture renewable energy gadgets with renewable energy...and other say, you won't be around by then so why worry!
Does yeast in a petri dish operate on philosophy or stimuli? Collapse is just pointing out the obvious, if you can set anthropocentricism aside. Limits to Growth used 1970's tech and data to easily predict the result of exponential growth yet it may as well have been a guide map rather than a warning. Nevertheless, it's been said that a small rudder can change the course of a large ship
From my first analysis posted Feb 2001 accurately projected GFC, and the current decline in global production of oil but missed the tight oil from the USA. So was a decade early. Without fossil fuels which will all be largely depleted this century and oil production declining rapidly within a decade supporting both food production and the global economic activity let alone economic growth will be increasingly challenging.
Perhaps we know that a gradulist de-growth is being actively pursued when a "right to repair" is enshrined in law on the major corporations, so many consumer items have to be replaced that being able to repair a dishwasher recently became a major achievment. Also recently was a passenger on an electric bus service in North Wales (T22 from Blaenau Ffestiniog to Porthmadog), lovely quiet ride, but made me realise that no diesel needed to be delivered to the bus depot, less oil needed refining or transported around the globe, less maintenance required on the bus, all things that shrink the economy. It is possible plus found out that Pine Martins now seem to be in permanent residence in a forest near home.
Great topic! I feel like the term “degrowth” needs a lot more study though. It’s at best ambiguous, and in some contexts maybe altogether inaccurate . I’d love for the terminology you’re working with to be more specific, considering that the opposite of growth holds multiple meanings. There are versions that forecast death, like decay and collapse. But there are also cyclical and sustainable notions like CONTRACTION or RETREAT. Whereas there’s not much to do about the former, there’s plenty of ways to move “forward” when considering the later.
Thank you Nate, for this brilliant classification of philosophies to look on the world. The only thing i wonder is labeling the y-axis of the diagrams with growth. Shouldn‘t it be something like „size“. Considering the scenario you described with no growth suggest in the diagram a constant growth? Or do i get the message wrong?
I call people who think space is some sort of promised land "space nutters". They basically have a religion that started with Russian Cosmism. And the decades of sci-fi that followed.
I struggle to understand your position. We only know one example of life, here on Earth. That life, particularly its complex flavors and intelligence and knowledge, all will become extinct without space colonization once the Earth leaves its habitability window. This is not some kind of religion, but the current scientific understanding. That's one part of it, the rational and the bigger one. The other part is emotional, the innate curiosity to see far lands with our own eyes. I'd say this is one of the components at the very core of what makes us humans.
@@Gnevnyj I struggle to understand why you think that's a problem. I also struggle to understand why you think space is your rescue. Is it atheist heaven? A deadly radiation-blasted vacuum with nothing in it is your idea of what's going to save us? Really. I think you don't understand the size of just the Earth-Moon distance. What innate curiosity to see other lands with your own eyes have you satisfied right here? How many stamps in your passport? What is it you think you will see on other planets? It's same periodic table of elements a billion light years away as right under your fingers right here. How many physics and chemistry books have you read with your own eyes? Perhaps examine your biases and sci-fi-fed fantasies. The universe doesn't owe you anything. Besides, evolution (you believe in it, yes?) is still happening, there won't be any humans in a million years in any case, why do you care? And if you care, do you care about the humans right here right now? Can I see your charitable donation tax receipts? And if you care so much about humanity, how do you propose to achieve any of the sci-fi fantasies with a life-form that has, at best, 20 years of peak life? You're going to colonize the universe with middle-aged people with bifocals and bad backs? Or without warp drive... oops. That's the end of the story. You're not going anywhere. I'm not going anywhere. Your children aren't going anywhere, and their children will be lucky to take a plane once in their lives, never mind going to a spa resort on Mars.... eyeroll...
there no way that a life form that cant cultivate its home and destroy it with ignorance,will be wise enough to turn stars that are wastelands,for its nature into a garden. you are selling your self the drug,because you do not wish the effort of a chang,and by doing so,making sure the change will be brutal.
@@Gnevnyj Is it atheist heaven? A deadly radiation-blasted vacuum with nothing in it is your idea of what's going to save us? Really. I think you don't understand the size of just the Earth-Moon distance. What innate curiosity to see other lands with your own eyes have you satisfied right here? How many stamps in your passport?
We should distinguish between what we wish would happen versus what we think will happen. I’d love to see option 7 come to pass, but that just doesn’t seem to be in the cards. I propose option 8: we are unable to stop our runaway thirst for oil, which will lead to multiple small catastrophes. Given how poorly COP28 and COP29 turned out, it is clear that Big Oil is going to stick around for a long time. Many small catastrophes have already happened, such as mass coral bleachings and multiple developing countries becoming unlivable. As the temperature rises, the catastrophes will become larger, interfering more and more with the developed nations. This cycle can’t continue forever, but it is impossible to guess what will happen. What ever it is, it won’t be pretty.
Every "Philosophy on the future" is androcentric save one. The "fanatical" one. The one that allows "consciousness" to come to terms with the reality of extinction. The reality of impermanence. Anicca (Pāli). Wanting to be the exception to the rule, namely that 99% of all life forms ever to exist on earth have gone extinct, are NOT permanent, is the fanatical position that has "psychological" reasons. Impermanence is fact. Anicca (Pāli).
Nate, are you familiar with the New Political Map from around 15 years ago? I assume so. You might hover between Communitarian, Existentialist and Dark Mountaineer. As do I, depending on the day.
@@danielfaben5838 I seen several people teach this for those in the city. Mother Earth News has a women who teaching how to build a pond using an old carpet with a lining. Even though she in a city she draws in frogs, and dragon flies. Even in the small you can create a smaller version, don't have room for many trees their are dwarf varieties and lots of edible bushes In Buffalo a group took control of empty lot building a farm their. The city tried to shut it down so they contacted the News stations and now these urban farms are spreading and the city is supporting them. Those in apartments can grow from any south facing window or even mushroom if none face south and lettuce needs less sun. Further if all else fails buy into a local farm or find the closest farmers market. Push for local stores to buy more local produce. There is much one can do, being in a city only forces one to be more creative.
What would you call growth in restoration? It’s not degrowth. More like regrowth. Certainly dirty growth needs to be curtailed. But regenerative activities supported.
The problem with the 'to the stars' view is that if the current space vehicle, which can hold ten people if you put three of them in overhead luggage compartment, could be expanded in size to hold ONE MILLION people (good luck getting the resources to build more than one of those)... well, eight billion minus one million equals... eight billion. 'Some' humans might colonise space. But it won't make any difference down here. So problem not solved.
Seems to me one optimal way to at least temper growth or maybe find a softer impact is (easy to say but...) strive for efficiency. Imagine what our global technologically dependent civilization would be if we were to reach 95% efficiency in such areas as land use, agriculture, food production and consumption, transportation, manufacturing, renewable energy, etc.. It would not correct for the impoverishment we've already inflicted on the biosphere but maybe it would help level off the arc and grant us a bit more time. One major problem with capitalism is that it rewards bad behavior and makes heroes out of sociopaths. I've heard a number of economists say that capitalism and free markets promote efficiency, but the evidence says otherwise. In the current system efficiency only applies to any operations which increase profitability; for example demographic marginalization and fragmentation, political corruption, strip mining, ignoring uncapped oil wells, clear cutting forests across entire regions and manufacturing everything out of f*cking plastic. Today efficiency is all about consolidating as much wealth and resources as quickly and as inexpensively as possible.
I think there might be different ways to approach degrowth. I don't think centrally organized degrowth (if even possible) could avoid a collapse of civilization. However, any intentional choosing of local, ecological, resilient solutions over high-tech GDP favored ones might soften the crash/landing ever so slightly. Would front loading some hardships be the right thing to do for future generations?
Hey Nate, comment didn't go through so trying again... I think you badly mischaracterized group number five, the doomers. I would basically describe this group as expecting the worst but hoping for the best. And I would definitely argue that the vast majority don't *want* collapse.
Yes I agree. I think there are different categories of doomers 1-The fraction of doomers who actually want collapse I’ve heard referred to as accelerationalists. I suppose because they want to ‘speed up’ to a finish line. 2-Another group of doomers could be the surrenderers perhaps because they feel like the machine is just too big to go up against. 3-Another percentage of the doomers I like to call the “go-down-in-flames” group. This might be the biggest group. Although we know we will be crushed, we won’t stop trying until the results of the giant machinery have us smashed like pancakes. There are probably other categories and divisions, but these three groups of doomers are from my limited observations.
Thanks Nate, this really does frame the conversation in a very clear and skillful way. I could see this or something similar being the starting point for ongoing dialogues, aiming for more light than just heat. The poet, Robert Frost one said, “poems, are momentary stays against the confusion.” In this way, a podcast can become poetic…
Category 8: Logistic growth. Seems the most likely to me. Of course, trees do not grow past the sky. Continued growth forever is impossible. De-growth implies carrying capacity overshoot. It may happen, but it hasn't happened yet.
Without growth we're deleting each other so the most likely solution will be virtual markets and placeholders for value. Since the status-for-survival game is a permanent fixture we'd need to dematerialize / dephysicalize the place in which that's happening at least so far as it pertains to who has the bigger bank account (athletic competition and health maintenance would still be physical world things although E-sports would be part of the panoply as well). The only difficulty though - the money obviously wouldn't buy a lot in the physical world, just online.
we have another problem now, how to deal with trumpland? i fear to have friends from America, this is a question about our future and trump is a catalyst and symptom of changing times. so please stop the most powerful and destructive people from harming everyone and everything.
I can't help but think the philosophy 7 relies far too much on rationality and unselfishness - two things the human race are not really known for. My expectation, sad as it may be, is that people will get increasingly violent and fight eachother for the diminishing resources in order for the powerful to maintain their current lifestyle as long as possible, while treading all over everyone else. To some extent we've seen this all along in the way the west has obtained ever increasing wealth by taking advantage of weaker/poorer countries. As to your 7 philosophies, i guess this is somewhere between 4 and 5.
It takes thorough examination to define the problem, to determine a probable, if not multiple solutions. But, one can never have an attachment or expectation of a specific outcome. Only be open, and to respond accordingly to whatever happens. The narrative that’s brought humanity to this point, has failed. Change the narrative, change the outcome.
First thing is first: Change what you CAN. EARN the right to whine. Sure, no one can achieve perfection. That's no excuse for not trying nor being a hypocrite. Start worrying about the consequences for OUR own actions. BTW, unsustainable growth is aka CANCER. This is our only home. The earth is a finite space, had finite resources, grow up and be accountable for your own actions. This is simple science. Simple fact. What we've done to this planet could literally not just wipe us off the planet, but mass populations of life in the ocean and you know what happens after that? WE have already wiped out numerous species in our lifetime. What could be a greater sin than this, idk...but no one actually "loves" their kids. Growth ISN'T POSSIBLE. Sustainability, however, IS. PLEASE GROW UP AND ACT LIKE AN ADULT!
No one asked me, but: I have one foot in the "Growth As Natural Law" camp and one foot in the "Collapse" camp. But I operate from the "Growth Is No Longer Possible" vantage point. Life has no interest in being incinerated during the death throes of its nearest star (A very unpopular opinion in this community. I invite your critique). We (earth life) are the only known sentients in the cosmos and I'll be dammed if I'm gonna let this chapter end here on Earth. We have to expand terrestrial life beyond this locust, or else. I give life a 1% chance of making it to the stars. I think there is a 99% chance humans will go extinct this century from our own hubris: an industrial accident, or exceeding planetary boundaries. If we were sober enough to consider biophysical limits, we would be much better poised to become interplanetary in the coming century or two (again, I invite your criticism). Humans are the thread of mycelium reaching from Earth towards the stars. Life must not end here. (I am bracing to be verbally attacked right now. Please be gentle)🙏
On the contrary, personally I agree literally with everything you said. It's actually incredibly refreshing to see a real human that shares my values! Such a position seems so obvious if one's centered on nature and ecosystems, and yet it is incredibly rarely adopted by people. Perhaps some simply do not know about Earth far future trajectory, others are excited for humans to go extinct, seeing the species as a "cancer" and either anticipating another, more sensible intelligent species to arise post-human extinction (very unlikely to start a new space program due to the lack of easily obtainable mineral resources for industrialisation), or being totally OK with life ending - which then begs the question, is there much difference in their eyes between humanity ending complex life in a mass extinction and the complete and final extinction of life itself due to natural causes. But in all honesty, I don't really know why being pro-life and pro-space at the same time is easy for both of us but not for others, I never asked people myself. Although, I can understand the one position that there is simply not enough time to develop everything (from transportation to any way of surviving different gravity, to which the human body seems ill-adopted), and we ought to give *some* time to complex life instead of shortening it in a mass extinction for our ambition. To which I'd say, I still hold some hope (like you), and, second, our space ambitions are currently miniscule compared to literally any other industry - media, cosmetics, you name it - and it doesn't contribute anything to our (and the biosphere's) demise.
@@danielfaben5838 Cosmos is not sentient, there is nobody to appreciate or not. It is very likely to be a lot of empty bodies devoid of meaning. There is nothing "imperial" about spreading life across the Universe, it is a moral imperative if life is seen as a value.
Nope. A world of renters and slaves, who own digital assets of much of anything at all, and can’t afford anything else. If AI means anything, it’s further diffusion of power, autocracy. Or. Intelligent people feeding on others who can’t compete. The main resource has always been people (and their resources), and it seems they’re being run out and down.
I don't believe in growth as the metric. perhaps an alternative y-axis could be 'well-being' and the ideal trajectory is an s-curve, implying that there is, from a resource efficiency perspective, there is an optimum amount of dissatisfaction we should aim for, given some law of diminishing returns. new questions then arise including: can well-being go up while "growth" (i assume GDP) goes down? what is the coupling between growth and well-being, where are there inverse relationships, what is the functional unit of well-being? on so on.. Fundamentally, we need to change the metrics for success. While i love this podcast, this video has a secondary (I think, unintentional) effect of validating growth as a measure. Gross national happiness is an example, and i suspect each country will need to decide on its own indicators, once they realise that resources are necessarily finite, and then we will see the borrowing of strategies from one place to another. Ideally this would result in a race to the top, but i won't be holding my breath.
News no one talks about... China owns, to my knowledge, the entire supply and supply chain for TiO2 and has placed sales restrictions on it. I'll let you Google what it's function is in the world. I think de-growth is inevitable if supplies are constrained.
once again, the messaging from nate and the guests he speaks with continuously go banger after banger, 10 for 10 on issues that nourish parts of me that don't get sunlight elsewhere, and few ppl in my life open up about. important and beautiful, just a thank you to anybody reading this and to nate. we are all connected (cringe but also idc), hopeful we can find one another as we continue to exist. much love, and more.
Greetings from Norway. I remember back in the 70’s we talked about sustainability … then in the 80’s it became sustainable growth … but the last many years it’s has turned into just growth! Even all the plans for “The green transition” is heavily sold as a unique possibility for GROWTH(new jobs etc..)
Unless sustainability has a way for people to earn a living, it will go nowhere
@@BartAnderson_writer I see an ideological lock-down in the word "earn" here. Once we switch to the position that everybody is entitled to living decently, and realize that we collectively have enough of wealth for all, the "earn" part becomes ridiculous and completely market-constructed. Sustainability can simply *be* a living.
If you need to provide food and a place to live for your family, a utopian vision is not enough. We need a definitive transition plan.
@@BartAnderson_writer I agree on that. The problem is that it is likely impossible to redistribute wealth "transitionally" and according to some plan - the "elites" will never be complicit, particularly dark triads.
If you looked at sustainability in the eyes of the indigenous people who opted out of mixing with the so called Civilized World we'd get a better understanding of the natural function of humanity.
I'm not saying we abandon all our technologies but in their World everyone has a purpose and isn't that what we are looking for. Can we not find ways to implement our technologies in an constructed manner..?
Spot on. Great work. Keep going. Don't stop.
I'm basically in the 7th group. Unfortunately, the longer we try to grow the more likely the sudden collapse scenario comes. And so far it seems we are hell bent on the growth.
I don't wish for a doom but I see the "sudden" collapse scenario as very plausible.
Same here. I can’t see our current system doing anything other than charging ahead after growth until it inevitably crashes down. My hope, though, is for pockets of stability and sanity in the midst of the collapse. That’s what I’m fighting to create for my children and grandchildren.
Hoping for collapse is like the USA idiots hoping for a civil war or Christians hoping for revelation. I hope this is gradual and we get down to 2 billion people living much simpler lives like Professor William Rees espouses.
Great video Nate.
@@mikeecker146Who maintains 440 Nuclear power plants then?
They all meltdown elsewise. The vision of a breakdown and refresh fails here.
This is brilliant framing
Thanks so much for your work ❤️
This is a really terrific point. It’s hard to have conversations about what to do, with people who aren’t looking at the same map of what has happened, is happening, and what’s about to happen.
If you can’t agree on that you really can’t agree on solutions.
The issue is how to get to the consensus point of view and what that would be. By the time you convince your opponent/collaborator-to-be, the world may end.
Clear and distinct model Nate, and a good contribution to the discourse. I resonate with 6 and agree with you that 7 will happen. Thanks for your continued thought leadership.
I am somewhere between philosophies 4 and 7. Most of us following this podcast know that growth is coming to an end in the not-so-distant future. The question is what steps do we need to take to adapt to a post-growth future.
What we do to the earth we do to ourselves. What we’ve done to the earth we’ve done to ourselves.
Thank you Nate for keeping us informed. Very interesting and helpful.
Whenever the topic comes up or when somebody asks me (which they almost never do) I recommend that people should get out of debt. That would make less consumption and less income more palatable. If we can get out of debt, moving "backwards" to a consumption level of, say, 50 years ago would be feasible. I am relatively old (55). I could be happy by consuming back at a mid-1970s level. When I was growing up, I was middle class and it was just fine.
It is primarily a matter of expectation.
Very helpful!
At a recent birthday party for a cousin who turned 70 I was talking to her husband about the damages to the biosphere source of all life. They have a daughter and five grandchildren. They're a very devout Catholic family. The husband proclaimed that obviously this is God's plan and doing. My reply was the identical God of creation he worships gave us the brains to recognize we're undermining creation. He was unmoved to say the least. When reminded that pope Francis has written multiple documents calling for respect for 'our sister earth' and has priests trying to convince dioceses to act on climate his reply was Francis should stick to morals and ethics not nature. This interaction just another reminder of how much damage the Christian faith has inflicted on the world. In a nutshell life on earth sucks. The good times come when you're dead and in heaven playing an organ while staring into the eyes of God for an eternity. Old protestant tune sung in chirches for centuries goes something like this. Oh the good times are coming be they ever so far away.....
I don’t disagree, but let me just say that there are different levels (depths) of understanding among Christians, including among the devout Catholics you speak of. Please don’t give up on those who profess a faith in Christ. There are many wise men and women in this group, and I’ve had the good fortune to cross paths with some. I hope you have that opportunity, too.
I would argue that such people are merely using their faith as a shield, and the real problem is their own apathy
@jennysteves thanks for your thoughtful reply. Mom and dad were both one of 12 children in a large Catholic family. I and my three sisters were raised Catholic and attended Catholic schools. In our times Christianity was reeling due to the decades of misery and suffering countless deaths created by two world wars and the great depression. People of faith asking where is god in this suffering? The focus in our parish was on the image of Christ as the Prince of Peace. Most sermons featured the sermon on the mount. Unfortunately in order to survive Catholicism made a hard right turn hoping to hold onto members that were jumping on board the prosperity gospel of radicalized evangelical protestants. Where we live now Catholic parishes are on board with guns, forcing women to bear children under the boot of law enforcement regardless of who impregnated her, her health or the condition of the fetus. Homosexuality is condemned. Here in Ohio these zealots own state government. So far this year over $1 billion secular tax dollars has been given to religious kooks homeschoolers and other organizations with zero oversight. In the meantime public schools are in decay. We live in a prosperous growing suburb that needs new schools and remodeling of old schools. The voters turned down a minor increase in taxes. College enrollment in Ohio is down 10%. Colleges closing or consolidating in an effort to survive. In 2006 Ohios education system was #6 in the nation today its 35th. Biden dumped billions into our state for chip plants etc. Unfortunately the companies cannot find qualified graduates to operate the plants. Yes there are well intended Christians. We have many as friends. When I ask them does your pastor speak about the destruction of creation and our responsibility to care for earth from the pulpit they have no reply.
@PinkPanda-Zx no disagreement with you! Yet they breathlessly listen to their orange god as he worships the golden calf. At one time we had a collective vision and understanding of God that included all. That understanding was replaced with a personal one on one relationship with God by religious charlatans decades ago. I dontneed to talk to anyone! God and I we know what's happening.... Deity abuse in service to the non-existent self
Nate I think you along with others badly mischaracterize group number five. I would say the vast majority of doomers or those expecting inevitable collapse do not *want* it to happen, but basically see the writing on the wall... or at least believe they see it. And just because some have that view does not mean they are not still trying and hoping to avoid that outcome and are doing all they can to help soften whatever landing awaits them and their fellow beings, both human and nonhuman. So the statement that this particular outlook serves no purpose is simply not true. Don't be hating on the doomers bro 🤨
Change will be forced upon us. Wife and I are clearly in number 7. There is another philosophical category perhaps where the consequences do not matter because they believe in eternal salvation.
I lean towards 7 and that’s why I’m here 🙏🌞 I was raised by a Wiccan Grandma and immersed in new age philosophy at a young age and I have found myself drawn more and more to channeling and psychics on TH-cam who have many hopeful predictions for the very near future including a benevolent alien intervention within the next few years. I used to call that sort of stuff “hopium” but all of the cutting edge science around consciousness, black holes, dark matter and artificial intelligence (which is breaking down and offering serious challenges to physical materialism as a viable model of reality) is nudging me in the direction of taking it more and more seriously. My wife thinks I’ve gone off the deep end. Maybe I have… but I am happier and more optimistic.
Sorry to say but your wife is correct, especially when you start talking about a “benevolent alien”. While there are certainly other intelligent beings in the universe, physics is very clear that it is 100% impossible for any alien civilization to reach earth.
I think the best-case scenario at this point would be somewhere between a disastrous collapse and an intentional degrowth transition to a less industrial society. Preventing collapse was possible 50 years ago when Limits to Growth was published but not anymore. I agree that it doesn't even matter whether continued growth would be a good thing because it's not going to happen, no matter what we do.
I think category 1 is the largest. The video had pictures of poor people but I think it's largely a matter of personality too. Some people are just more inclined to think about big picture issues in a systematic way than others.
I believe Nate is predicating his bend but not break philosophy on wising to remain a bit hopeful. I agree with you. Being ready to die and feeling the pain of continued wreaking of the living planet are the wise choices of the large number of folks with enhanced awareness. The rest will muddle along, be ready to fight to hold on to their privileges and join others in blaming any number of targets as things devolve.
Thank you, Nate. It was exciting to see your 7 philosophies. When I recall interactions with people from time to time especially considering climate impacts, I have come across people having some of these views.
Excellent and helpful "Frankly" - and a sublime example of left brain and right brain working in harmony. Obviously Philosophy No.7 is optimal - but I have just watched again your talk with Ian McGilchrist, and I see that although he (like you) is trying to prepare humanity for De-Growth and thus hoping to decelerate Growth's onward march, he does say at one point that things have gotten so tangled and messy that some sort of catastrophic meltdown (as in Philosophy No.6) might be the only thing that forces us to reconfigure how we live and earn a "Right Livelihood".
[By the way, I watch McGilchrist a lot, in various settings, and he really shines in your setting, because your input is clearly optimizing his output. McGilchrist is a great listener, so his output is not always the same - he responds to external stimuli, without over-reacting but in a measured way.]
"Deserts on the March" by Paul Sears was written in 1935; "Our Plundered Planet" by Fairfield Osborn Jr and "Road to Survival" by William Vogt were published in 1948. Nothing has changed, except that the plundering has accelerated - especially in the sanctimonious "Third World" which has copied the First World with knobs on. Lone voices in the Third World argue against Growth - Arundhati Roy, for instance, in "The God of Small Things". But they are completely overwhelmed (as John Muir, Malthus and Darwin were in the 19th century) by rapid industrialization, which brings so many creature comforts and delightful Freedoms - ranging from the basic Freedom from Hunger to vast Freedoms to publish and communicate, to travel the world, and to buy more than the staples of Life.
Paradoxically blinkered and shackled by these massive Freedoms, we dismiss serious Ecologists like Sears, Osborn and Vogt (and later on Rachel Carson and Garrett Hardin and Paul Ehrlich) as "Apocalyptic Environmentalists". Yet Apocalypse just means Revelation - a tearing away of the veils that dim our vision, a rather brutal experience in some ways, but ultimately the only one that will work.
I absolutely dispute the notion that horror and tragedy and crisis cannot be healing - just as a surgeon would dispute that his violent incisions cannot be healing and often life-saving.
Sometimes only horror and tragedy can heal both individuals and Nations. The history of all humans is studded at intervals with things like the Hundred Years War and is exceedingly bloodstained. Why would that change? Humans are part of Nature, and Nature can be brutal in the extreme. If A.I. replaces all of us bar a Remnant of about 2 billion, there won't be so much violence. But there probably won't be so much beauty either (though a lot of the Remnant will be freed up to go back to being artisans of some kind, and houses and furniture for instance will start to look lovely as they once used to look, in the hands of very "ordinary", often illiterate, craftsmen). There will be less plundering, as A.I. only needs energy and water and the minerals used to make the hardware. What are A.I.'s waste products? - I don't know, but they won't be anything like the waste products of 8 billion humans and their livestock. I reckon this is what COULD or MIGHT happen - it is the only alternative to humanity's overwhelming power to destroy and ravage i.e. to Scenario 6. It still entails losing 6 billion humans - but gently and gradually. Already, there is a steep decline in fertility in both men and women, which added to voluntary limitation of births could be all that is needed - though whether it will occur in time to prevent a sudden brutal Collapse is not known.
As a Catholic I abhor abortion and medical contraception (there are many natural ways of preventing conception, though they are not fail-safe). But abortion and efficient contraception have not in any case offset the ill effects of increased consumption and increased longevity on the Plundered Planet. In fact they seem to have made things a lot worse. Instead, it seems to be the unintended consequences of endocrine disruptors that are going to work, coupled with the increasing unaffordability of founding a family - a Human Right, but a lot of Human Rights have become a bit iffy since the 1948 Universal Declaration on Human Rights, due to Humans going into general Overshoot. When Liberty becomes Licence, Rights take a nosedive - every time.
I see myself in many of these groups, but I must admit, even now, I haven't let go of the dream of #3 - the idea that humanity will not reach beyond our own planet is among the most depressing things I can think of.
I have given up on that idea, and that was a bummer... I love the thought of people travelling to other systems, exploring etc etc. But now I dont see that ever happening. For us it would be in thought anyway, I would not be here to witness any of it, so I just have it as a pleasant, exiting thing to think about. Not all dreams needs to come true, they could just be dreams :D Playing Elite Dangerous is the closest thing at the moment...
First attempt, seems to have been censored, so I'll try again....
There are size and complexity power laws that are known in many different fields of science, all worked out independently of each other, so it appears to be a physical law of the universe as much as all the laws of thermodynamics. Even stars follow these size complexity laws. Anyone can do a search on 'stars size complexity laws'.
None of the large complex systems, whether stars, storms, ant colonies or civilizations reach a peak and ‘degrow’ gently. The largest systems all collapse at the end of their lifespan, with available energy depletion being the cause.
Because we have used all the easy to get metals and minerals, we are left to gather the deeper, harder, more remote, lower grade ore bodies of every non-renewable resource. We require increasing complexity and energy to do this. What’s often forgotten is that 97%-99% of all materials are used to maintain the existing system, with the 1%-3% being the ‘growth’ component. Entropy never sleeps.
‘Degrowth’, as in nice and gentle downslope, is a physical impossibility, because of our need for maintenance of the existing system even on a gentle downslope. Entropy and dissipation work their magic on all built systems, including the complexity of large stars, and certainly on our enormous civilization, magnitudes larger than any prior one.
Any attempt at degrowth, means that complexity also unwinds, making the gathering of all the materials needed just to maintain a degrowing system is impossible. The most complex aspects of our civilization are the ones to unravel fastest, and these are the most important ones for gathering and distributing materials (and energy) throughout the rest of civilization.
“Degrowth” is a nice catchy buzzword for anyone that doesn’t want to understand how large complex systems actually work. We have had many prior civilizations of humans that all collapsed at different rates, but a common element was that the complexity became too great to continue given dwindling resources, mostly energy resources being food, animal power, slaves.
The largest civilization to ever exist is likely to have the fastest collapse, just like large stars collapse faster than small ones. The internal complexity has to unwind very quickly due to lack of energy, which cause massive feedback loops because of internal complexity. Systems within systems all unwinding at the same time.
Collapse compared to all the other ‘beliefs’ in the latest ‘Frankly’ is not a belief, it’s a mathematical and physical law based certainty.
What about stagnation and then degrowing together with the population contraction? (due to sperm counts and possible antinatalist policies)
@@Gnevnyj In cities around the world where now over 50% of the total population lives, we have to maintain the roads, sewers, gas lines, water lines, electricity grid, communications, trains , buses, ports, airports etc, etc. In a world of decline, this doesn't get much lower than present, unless you deliberately cut off areas of the city. As all the materials suffer from entropy and the energy cost to replace them continues to grow, it's a physical impossibility to work in a world of less energy and much less materials.
Then there is all the complex transport routes between cities across the world that also have to be maintained as no city in the modern world is an island. The shear complexity of the entirety of our civilization totally relies upon the 6 continent supply chain to operate normally. In a world where these links start to break down because of 'less', then the chaotic nature of feedback loops failing that no longer allow normal function means the system breaks. There is zero chance of lower population and lower complexity having a nice gentle descent.
It doesn't matter if the 'less' is energy, materials or people, the large complex system of civilization is the size and complexity it currently is. Exactly like a super giant star when the energy is depleted the structured complex internal system breaks down under it's own gravity and collapses.
9 here. We are dead man walking.
Obviously, there is a conviction that we cannot bear this terrible news. *We ourselves don't think we have the courage!*
Instead we are hard working to test the frontier from the other side.
"How much can we save of what we have?"
I got that right - **7** is the one who will still have pants on?
Ask an 8 what he/she thinks....
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No not just kidding. Numerology, Ennegram is accepted in modern Psychology for good reasons. Thank you.
Please, please, please, please, please, please, please, please, please have Jason Hickel on the podcast to discuss how democratically agreed & planned degrowth can be achieved with citizens assemblies 🙏🌍🌱
As a Nate Hagenite, I think I'm a hybrid of 4th & 7th Category. My permitted active via media influencers are Rafael Nadal, Christopher Hitchens, Noam Chomsky, Nate Hagens, Guy McPherson. These guys may speak for me. Influencers of yesteryear, rock-n-roll 60's,70's. Namely: John Lennon - All You Need is Love, Paul McCartney - The Love You Take is Equal to The Love You Make, Ronnie Van Zant - Be Something You Love And Understand. Give a Hootion mitigate your pollution. Peace
Very helpful information thanks Nate.
yesterday had an revelatory bioregional food co-op meeting with the original back to the land movement people from the 1970s with the current flush of back to the landers with very different values. It appears that here in the ozarks the back to landers stayed on the land unlike in other regions and help to build OOGA which was the predecessor of the USDA organic standards. Just an observation of the current back to the landers being energy blind and much more inclined towards human exceptionalism.
Thanks for your viewpoint,
We need more of that!
I liked these thoughts Nate. Thanks.
Degrowth by disaster or regrowth by design. It's a cultural choice that will need to be guided by a different 1% - those in the 7th category. The challenge is shifting from conversation to action and properly triggering the public's limbic.
Many thanks Nate! The challenges we face are very well explained and laid out by you. My question is: How do we engage conventional economists in this discussion - beacuse they are in key positions everywhere and are the ones who could help change direction. But they are extremely passive.
Btw, is not it strange that we are guided by the same economic model today as we were hundred years ago - when population was 1/4 of today and the world economy 1/100 of today?!
Diogenes was a legendary ancient Greek philosopher who was known for wandering the daytime streets of Athens with a lighted lantern while looking for an "honest man". Does that sound familiar? Thanks. Nate.
Excellent insight and advice: awareness of varying frameworks on this topic --how people imagine the Future reflect decisions on daily life --could help dialogue!! Thank you.
Great Nate! More please.
The spread is indicative of uncertainty, therefore none of the views are certain, therefore "belief" in one or another is a big "hope" choice, and there is potential that the chosen belief will be falsified in the future. Note: while a few of these thought patterns involve urgency and imply impending changes, none really specify a timeline, in part because we are still stumbling in the dark when it comes to match prediction models and the unfolding of time. Best you can do, I figure, is be true to your beliefs as best you can and have the humility to realize the future may not turn out that way. Ideally, be willing to adapt to new information, instead of holding on to whatever you're thinking even in the face of contradicting evidence. This is all very challenging as society has sped up so nobody has the time for nuance & deep thought. Hoping there's a few up to the challenge. :)
Very useful, as always. Thank you, Nate. Personally, I'm in favor of dropping the current media-pushed game of prophesizing the future, and spending more time thinking about how best to plan for the constantly shifting range of possibilities the future actually is. I enjoy travelling with you immeasurably, Nate, because you help me better perceive, in the moment, the depth, breadth and detail of what it is I'm experiencing.
That time is moving in a single direction is a particular perspective born of two human eyes mounted face forward above regularly expanding and contracting lungs, and a rhythmically beating heart squeezing blood and oxygen through the highways of our arteries and veins. Spacetime is actually more akin to a heaving sea of possibility stretching in all directions around us, and we humans being are all afloat in the middle of it, bobbing about like corks riding the tossing waves.
From this perspective all seems random, directionless and pointless. Notice, however, that some waves may collide and combine to be larger and more powerful than others, carrying all they encounter in the direction of the impetus that arose to set them into existence. For a period of time, before these dis-integrate back into a range of smaller, more temporary and chaotic waves, the crests of these bigger waves present the possibility of seeing further and traveling farther in a particular direction than do others. If you can learn to maneuver yourself toward the crests of the waves around you rather than remaining stuck down in the troughs, the possibility of catching one of these waves and settling upon a course to somewhen just may arise...
For us the course we set will have meaning and poignancy born in part of the wave with which we travel. But we will do well to remember that the sea itself will always remain, and be, just the sea. In this way, we ourselves will remember who and where we always are.
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Brilliant
I am closer to the perspective of degrowth 4, wherein the most important way I can contribute to the well being of the future is to impart the right wisdom that I can obtain from the classical, feudal, enlightenment, industrial revolution, finally into the modern period that I think will end in the next 50 to 100 years. There will be people living beyond that that I feel must know a story of how they came into a torn up world, and I want that to be intentionally understood from some elements of true things.
8. We can't grow for much longer, but we're not going to be particularly intelligent about this. Whatever is going to happen, is going to happen.
What makes you think the growth philosophy will change, when future elected or appointed, leaders will continue to be sociopathic and narcissistic left brain dominant achievers, not right brain visionaries (such as your good self)? Mission impossible to change the ruling class structure of our disjointed world - there is no collective "we" to make sensible change, philosophical or practical. Still, I admire your efforts to align worldly thinkers with your viewers.
He knows what's coming, he is optimistic by choice
Thanks Nate!
Thank you for these frameworks that we can keep in mind as we navigate new conversations. I'm going to make a poster of that final shot of all the philosophies together, so they embed in my long-term memory. I've been studying "Nine Levels Of Increasing Embrace In Ego Development: A Full-Spectrum Theory Of Vertical Growth And Meaning Making" by Susanne R. Cook-Greuter, and I wonder where each of these philosophies fit amongst those levels of ego.
In 1970 I read the book Limits to Growth. It was part of my engineering degree course.
I find elements of these in myself, particularly 3, 4 and 7. I still believe that with a focused effort the out-of-Earth future is possible even with degrowth, we just need to focus on the right things. I would completely agree that's naive, but the thought of knowledge, sentience and life itself ending with the planet's habitability and not continuing indefinitely is the ultimate existential catastrophe in my eyes.
As always, I think you should consider the possibility of technolgical advances in all fields as not just a mitigating factor, but a transformative one. There are so many entrenched players who will resist change til doomsday that the solutions before us will not come to fruit. I fully admit that. They might unintentionally destroy our planet in a Holocaust in a vain attempt to hold onto their legacy. But your degrowth scenario is even more implausible, albeit well-meaning.It would require a complete re-making of our geopolitical nation state perpetual struggle for dominance (Mearsheimer, et al) and a change in consciousness of 8 billion individuals or a large fraction thereof. Given that, it's the Garden of Eden. But I think any idea that we can go back to the Garden is even more perilous than mine that technology can save us and our planet. But thank you. You are very wise.
Thank you for your continued work on this.
I recently came across Tony Seba and his predictions. They're quite interesting and might show a way out of this. I don't know if he incorporates the full picture in his predictions. He seems to go by the price of things. But interesting nonetheless. Maybe a good guest for a podcast?
I'm in the 7th group, which I'm sure most of your listeners are too, but it is a minority group in global society. I think there is a shift going on, but it is frustratingly (and terrifyingly) slow.
Nate, I think you misrepresent the “collapse” philosophy. What you describe is actually accelerationism or nihilism. I identify as a collapse-nik, but I sure as hell am not rooting for social collapse - quite the contrary! I scour the news and public opinions looking for hope. But instead I often find a lot of pollyannaish “hope-ium” where people acknowledge the seriousness of the problems in the polycrisis, but then do a lot of blustery hand wavy “somehow it will work out”… it just feels intellectually dishonest., and it’s very unconvincing… I have developed my own philosophy I think of as “eco-stoicism”: on the basis of the data and 50+ years observing human nature, I think we’re likely doomed, but I think we are morally obligated to act like our polycrisis problems are solvable, and to seek those solutions. This is not a perspective that is common or particularly appealing in some ways; it brushes up too closely to “doomer-ism” or nihilism for many people. But I’m insistent: I think collapse of multiple Earth systems is nearly inevitable at this point, but we must look for solutions nonetheless, if for no other reason than it’s morally dignified. Giving up is craven and despicable, and even if success is just .001%, it definitely drops to zero if you quit. So don’t give up! Fight! “Rage, rage against the dying of the light…” Giving in to despair is simply morally wrong. Fighting until the bitter end, because we owe it to our fellow living organisms, to the future generations, to each other… that is an honorable moral posture, and it doesn’t require me to deny the data of how grim things may look.
...I find people are more worried if at all with the immediate... like here in Mexico, insecurity, dismantling of the judicial power, dubious interpretation of how a majority is attained in leading to a rubber stamp congress, money exchange rates, inflation...etc. etc. I really don't think people worry much about a couple generations up ahead....on the other hand I have struck a few chords when talking to people like you can't manufacture renewable energy gadgets with renewable energy...and other say, you won't be around by then so why worry!
Haha, yes Nate. Spiral Dynamics world view/belief system map offers an interesting orientation to such analysis
Does yeast in a petri dish operate on philosophy or stimuli? Collapse is just pointing out the obvious, if you can set anthropocentricism aside. Limits to Growth used 1970's tech and data to easily predict the result of exponential growth yet it may as well have been a guide map rather than a warning. Nevertheless, it's been said that a small rudder can change the course of a large ship
From my first analysis posted Feb 2001 accurately projected GFC, and the current decline in global production of oil but missed the tight oil from the USA. So was a decade early. Without fossil fuels which will all be largely depleted this century and oil production declining rapidly within a decade supporting both food production and the global economic activity let alone economic growth will be increasingly challenging.
Analyzing all seven philosophies I see merit and concerns in all seven that will need to be addressed, so I can't firmly put myself in any one camp...
Perhaps we know that a gradulist de-growth is being actively pursued when a "right to repair" is enshrined in law on the major corporations, so many consumer items have to be replaced that being able to repair a dishwasher recently became a major achievment.
Also recently was a passenger on an electric bus service in North Wales (T22 from Blaenau Ffestiniog to Porthmadog), lovely quiet ride, but made me realise that no diesel needed to be delivered to the bus depot, less oil needed refining or transported around the globe, less maintenance required on the bus, all things that shrink the economy. It is possible plus found out that Pine Martins now seem to be in permanent residence in a forest near home.
Great topic! I feel like the term “degrowth” needs a lot more study though. It’s at best ambiguous, and in some contexts maybe altogether inaccurate . I’d love for the terminology you’re working with to be more specific, considering that the opposite of growth holds multiple meanings. There are versions that forecast death, like decay and collapse. But there are also cyclical and sustainable notions like CONTRACTION or RETREAT. Whereas there’s not much to do about the former, there’s plenty of ways to move “forward” when considering the later.
Thank you Nate, for this brilliant classification of philosophies to look on the world. The only thing i wonder is labeling the y-axis of the diagrams with growth. Shouldn‘t it be something like „size“. Considering the scenario you described with no growth suggest in the diagram a constant growth? Or do i get the message wrong?
i don't think we can be entirely sure which one it'll be but i'm leaning towards the 7th
I call people who think space is some sort of promised land "space nutters". They basically have a religion that started with Russian Cosmism. And the decades of sci-fi that followed.
I struggle to understand your position. We only know one example of life, here on Earth. That life, particularly its complex flavors and intelligence and knowledge, all will become extinct without space colonization once the Earth leaves its habitability window. This is not some kind of religion, but the current scientific understanding. That's one part of it, the rational and the bigger one. The other part is emotional, the innate curiosity to see far lands with our own eyes. I'd say this is one of the components at the very core of what makes us humans.
@@Gnevnyj I struggle to understand why you think that's a problem. I also struggle to understand why you think space is your rescue. Is it atheist heaven? A deadly radiation-blasted vacuum with nothing in it is your idea of what's going to save us? Really. I think you don't understand the size of just the Earth-Moon distance.
What innate curiosity to see other lands with your own eyes have you satisfied right here? How many stamps in your passport?
What is it you think you will see on other planets? It's same periodic table of elements a billion light years away as right under your fingers right here. How many physics and chemistry books have you read with your own eyes?
Perhaps examine your biases and sci-fi-fed fantasies.
The universe doesn't owe you anything.
Besides, evolution (you believe in it, yes?) is still happening, there won't be any humans in a million years in any case, why do you care? And if you care, do you care about the humans right here right now? Can I see your charitable donation tax receipts?
And if you care so much about humanity, how do you propose to achieve any of the sci-fi fantasies with a life-form that has, at best, 20 years of peak life? You're going to colonize the universe with middle-aged people with bifocals and bad backs?
Or without warp drive... oops. That's the end of the story.
You're not going anywhere. I'm not going anywhere. Your children aren't going anywhere, and their children will be lucky to take a plane once in their lives, never mind going to a spa resort on Mars.... eyeroll...
there no way that a life form that cant cultivate its home and destroy it with ignorance,will be wise enough to turn stars that are wastelands,for its nature into a garden.
you are selling your self the drug,because you do not wish the effort of a chang,and by doing so,making sure the change will be brutal.
@@Gnevnyj I struggle to understand why you think that's a problem.
I also struggle to understand why you think space is your rescue.
@@Gnevnyj Is it atheist heaven? A deadly radiation-blasted vacuum with nothing in it is your idea of what's going to save us? Really. I think you don't understand the size of just the Earth-Moon distance.
What innate curiosity to see other lands with your own eyes have you satisfied right here? How many stamps in your passport?
We should distinguish between what we wish would happen versus what we think will happen. I’d love to see option 7 come to pass, but that just doesn’t seem to be in the cards. I propose option 8: we are unable to stop our runaway thirst for oil, which will lead to multiple small catastrophes. Given how poorly COP28 and COP29 turned out, it is clear that Big Oil is going to stick around for a long time. Many small catastrophes have already happened, such as mass coral bleachings and multiple developing countries becoming unlivable. As the temperature rises, the catastrophes will become larger, interfering more and more with the developed nations. This cycle can’t continue forever, but it is impossible to guess what will happen. What ever it is, it won’t be pretty.
Every "Philosophy on the future" is androcentric save one. The "fanatical" one. The one that allows "consciousness" to come to terms with the reality of extinction. The reality of impermanence. Anicca (Pāli). Wanting to be the exception to the rule, namely that 99% of all life forms ever to exist on earth have gone extinct, are NOT permanent, is the fanatical position that has "psychological" reasons. Impermanence is fact. Anicca (Pāli).
Please interview John Michael Greer!
Nate, are you familiar with the New Political Map from around 15 years ago? I assume so. You might hover between Communitarian, Existentialist and Dark Mountaineer. As do I, depending on the day.
Regenerative growth is the only growing that healthy, growing a premaculture farm that can feed a village is growing isn't it?
Great for villages. Not so much for megacities. Humans have a problem of scale at this point. You have the right idea post-doom.
@@danielfaben5838 I seen several people teach this for those in the city. Mother Earth News has a women who teaching how to build a pond using an old carpet with a lining.
Even though she in a city she draws in frogs, and dragon flies. Even in the small you can create a smaller version, don't have room for many trees their are dwarf varieties and lots of edible bushes
In Buffalo a group took control of empty lot building a farm their. The city tried to shut it down so they contacted the News stations and now these urban farms are spreading and the city is supporting them.
Those in apartments can grow from any south facing window or even mushroom if none face south and lettuce needs less sun.
Further if all else fails buy into a local farm or find the closest farmers market. Push for local stores to buy more local produce. There is much one can do, being in a city only forces one to be more creative.
What would you call growth in restoration? It’s not degrowth. More like regrowth. Certainly dirty growth needs to be curtailed. But regenerative activities supported.
The problem with the 'to the stars' view is that if the current space vehicle, which can hold ten people if you put three of them in overhead luggage compartment, could be expanded in size to hold ONE MILLION people (good luck getting the resources to build more than one of those)... well, eight billion minus one million equals... eight billion.
'Some' humans might colonise space. But it won't make any difference down here. So problem not solved.
Seems to me one optimal way to at least temper growth or maybe find a softer impact is (easy to say but...) strive for efficiency. Imagine what our global technologically dependent civilization would be if we were to reach 95% efficiency in such areas as land use, agriculture, food production and consumption, transportation, manufacturing, renewable energy, etc.. It would not correct for the impoverishment we've already inflicted on the biosphere but maybe it would help level off the arc and grant us a bit more time.
One major problem with capitalism is that it rewards bad behavior and makes heroes out of sociopaths. I've heard a number of economists say that capitalism and free markets promote efficiency, but the evidence says otherwise. In the current system efficiency only applies to any operations which increase profitability; for example demographic marginalization and fragmentation, political corruption, strip mining, ignoring uncapped oil wells, clear cutting forests across entire regions and manufacturing everything out of f*cking plastic. Today efficiency is all about consolidating as much wealth and resources as quickly and as inexpensively as possible.
Greetings Nate!
I think there might be different ways to approach degrowth. I don't think centrally organized degrowth (if even possible) could avoid a collapse of civilization. However, any intentional choosing of local, ecological, resilient solutions over high-tech GDP favored ones might soften the crash/landing ever so slightly. Would front loading some hardships be the right thing to do for future generations?
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So much dog hair on Nate's hat today
Hey Nate, comment didn't go through so trying again... I think you badly mischaracterized group number five, the doomers. I would basically describe this group as expecting the worst but hoping for the best. And I would definitely argue that the vast majority don't *want* collapse.
Yes I agree.
I think there are different categories of doomers
1-The fraction of doomers who actually want collapse I’ve heard referred to as accelerationalists. I suppose because they want to ‘speed up’ to a finish line.
2-Another group of doomers could be the surrenderers perhaps because they feel like the machine is just too big to go up against.
3-Another percentage of the doomers I like to call the “go-down-in-flames” group. This might be the biggest group. Although we know we will be crushed, we won’t stop trying until the results of the giant machinery have us smashed like pancakes.
There are probably other categories and divisions, but these three groups of doomers are from my limited observations.
Nice hat
Good taxonomy. I'm seeing 3+6 opposing 4+5.
Thanks Nate, this really does frame the conversation in a very clear and skillful way. I could see this or something similar being the starting point for ongoing dialogues, aiming for more light than just heat. The poet, Robert Frost one said, “poems, are momentary stays against the confusion.” In this way, a podcast can become poetic…
Category 8: Logistic growth. Seems the most likely to me.
Of course, trees do not grow past the sky. Continued growth forever is impossible.
De-growth implies carrying capacity overshoot. It may happen, but it hasn't happened yet.
So then?
Without growth we're deleting each other so the most likely solution will be virtual markets and placeholders for value. Since the status-for-survival game is a permanent fixture we'd need to dematerialize / dephysicalize the place in which that's happening at least so far as it pertains to who has the bigger bank account (athletic competition and health maintenance would still be physical world things although E-sports would be part of the panoply as well). The only difficulty though - the money obviously wouldn't buy a lot in the physical world, just online.
Avoid Mad Max, ✅.
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we have another problem now, how to deal with trumpland?
i fear to have friends from America, this is a question about our future and trump is a catalyst and symptom of changing times. so please stop the most powerful and destructive people from harming everyone and everything.
you live in trumpland,and im in bibihell.
I can't help but think the philosophy 7 relies far too much on rationality and unselfishness - two things the human race are not really known for. My expectation, sad as it may be, is that people will get increasingly violent and fight eachother for the diminishing resources in order for the powerful to maintain their current lifestyle as long as possible, while treading all over everyone else. To some extent we've seen this all along in the way the west has obtained ever increasing wealth by taking advantage of weaker/poorer countries. As to your 7 philosophies, i guess this is somewhere between 4 and 5.
Isn't de-growth part of growth... Why tie it to old banal (binary) stories? (PS. You should have Tiokasin Ghosthorse and David Abram on your podcast.)
It takes thorough examination to define the problem, to determine a probable, if not multiple solutions. But, one can never have an attachment or expectation of a specific outcome. Only be open, and to respond accordingly to whatever happens.
The narrative that’s brought humanity to this point, has failed. Change the narrative, change the outcome.
First thing is first: Change what you CAN. EARN the right to whine. Sure, no one can achieve perfection. That's no excuse for not trying nor being a hypocrite. Start worrying about the consequences for OUR own actions.
BTW, unsustainable growth is aka CANCER. This is our only home. The earth is a finite space, had finite resources, grow up and be accountable for your own actions. This is simple science. Simple fact. What we've done to this planet could literally not just wipe us off the planet, but mass populations of life in the ocean and you know what happens after that? WE have already wiped out numerous species in our lifetime. What could be a greater sin than this, idk...but no one actually "loves" their kids. Growth ISN'T POSSIBLE. Sustainability, however, IS. PLEASE GROW UP AND ACT LIKE AN ADULT!
No one asked me, but: I have one foot in the "Growth As Natural Law" camp and one foot in the "Collapse" camp. But I operate from the "Growth Is No Longer Possible" vantage point. Life has no interest in being incinerated during the death throes of its nearest star (A very unpopular opinion in this community. I invite your critique). We (earth life) are the only known sentients in the cosmos and I'll be dammed if I'm gonna let this chapter end here on Earth. We have to expand terrestrial life beyond this locust, or else. I give life a 1% chance of making it to the stars. I think there is a 99% chance humans will go extinct this century from our own hubris: an industrial accident, or exceeding planetary boundaries. If we were sober enough to consider biophysical limits, we would be much better poised to become interplanetary in the coming century or two (again, I invite your criticism). Humans are the thread of mycelium reaching from Earth towards the stars. Life must not end here. (I am bracing to be verbally attacked right now. Please be gentle)🙏
Good for you! If it were possible to expand, would the cosmos appreciate our "infection" of the next imperial project after the failure of this one?
On the contrary, personally I agree literally with everything you said. It's actually incredibly refreshing to see a real human that shares my values! Such a position seems so obvious if one's centered on nature and ecosystems, and yet it is incredibly rarely adopted by people. Perhaps some simply do not know about Earth far future trajectory, others are excited for humans to go extinct, seeing the species as a "cancer" and either anticipating another, more sensible intelligent species to arise post-human extinction (very unlikely to start a new space program due to the lack of easily obtainable mineral resources for industrialisation), or being totally OK with life ending - which then begs the question, is there much difference in their eyes between humanity ending complex life in a mass extinction and the complete and final extinction of life itself due to natural causes. But in all honesty, I don't really know why being pro-life and pro-space at the same time is easy for both of us but not for others, I never asked people myself. Although, I can understand the one position that there is simply not enough time to develop everything (from transportation to any way of surviving different gravity, to which the human body seems ill-adopted), and we ought to give *some* time to complex life instead of shortening it in a mass extinction for our ambition. To which I'd say, I still hold some hope (like you), and, second, our space ambitions are currently miniscule compared to literally any other industry - media, cosmetics, you name it - and it doesn't contribute anything to our (and the biosphere's) demise.
@@danielfaben5838 Cosmos is not sentient, there is nobody to appreciate or not. It is very likely to be a lot of empty bodies devoid of meaning. There is nothing "imperial" about spreading life across the Universe, it is a moral imperative if life is seen as a value.
@@danielfaben5838 We cannot infect the cosmos; because we are* the cosmos.
arts🥐🎨 time 💗time ✍to live 🫶 rather than buy 🛒💄
Nope. A world of renters and slaves, who own digital assets of much of anything at all, and can’t afford anything else. If AI means anything, it’s further diffusion of power, autocracy. Or. Intelligent people feeding on others who can’t compete. The main resource has always been people (and their resources), and it seems they’re being run out and down.
I don't believe in growth as the metric. perhaps an alternative y-axis could be 'well-being' and the ideal trajectory is an s-curve, implying that there is, from a resource efficiency perspective, there is an optimum amount of dissatisfaction we should aim for, given some law of diminishing returns. new questions then arise including: can well-being go up while "growth" (i assume GDP) goes down? what is the coupling between growth and well-being, where are there inverse relationships, what is the functional unit of well-being? on so on..
Fundamentally, we need to change the metrics for success. While i love this podcast, this video has a secondary (I think, unintentional) effect of validating growth as a measure. Gross national happiness is an example, and i suspect each country will need to decide on its own indicators, once they realise that resources are necessarily finite, and then we will see the borrowing of strategies from one place to another.
Ideally this would result in a race to the top, but i won't be holding my breath.
News no one talks about...
China owns, to my knowledge, the entire supply and supply chain for TiO2 and has placed sales restrictions on it.
I'll let you Google what it's function is in the world.
I think de-growth is inevitable if supplies are constrained.
Food colouring? I know China commands much of the world's solar panel supplies, but this would be the icing on the cake.