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Scale, scope and speed refer, respectively, to the natural size limit of human social groups, the maximum technological level of a sustainable industrial infrastructure and the speed with which humanity must undergo its transition toward a sustainable society. The authors cite 150 people as the natural size limit of a human community, a figure rooted in human cognitive capacity and known as “Dunbar’s number.” They argue compellingly for an industrial infrastructure that is technologically simpler and far less energy-intensive than today’s. As for the speed with which we must shift our society onto a sustainable path, they say we need to do so “faster than we have been and faster than it appears we are capable of.” Since ‘Brave New War’, Robb has been a go-to for those trying to apply Boyd to business, by nimble maneuver in a complex environment. They could’t quite grasp Robb saying it’s different now, that network trends toward centralization now requires alignment for reputation purposes.
An Inconvenient Apocalypse | naked capitalism An Inconvenient Apocalypse | naked capitalism
By supporting getting rid of technology which creates food production,.you and your children will starve Confronting harsh ecological realities, this book explores the roots of social injustice and offers a down-powering path to “fewer and less.” Thesis discussed. “Our thesis is that while not every individual or culture is equally culpable, the human failure over the past ten thousand years is the result of the imperative of all life to seek out energy-rich carbon.” Climate disasters may render hope for the future tenuous, but the philosophical book An Inconvenient Apocalypse asserts that working toward social justice is still purpose-giving."Too much blame on Borlaug and globalization, the problems stem from too much success in the last few 100 years. Local sourced is not always the best use of energy or the cheapest. And if plant breeders are maximizing the gene base, then adapting to limitations can happen. https://www.farminguk.com/news/flour-from-new-gene-edited-wheat-produces-less-potential-carcinogen_62063.html How did humans manage to spike the chart? Energy density for sure. We’ve been pushed by necessity to innovate for thousands of years, to think we can redirect our epigenetics to a Herman Daly steady state without transformation in the most biological sense is naïve. Great update to Limits to Growth by Gaya Herrington called 5 Insights for Avoiding Collapse, What a 50 Year Old Model of the World Taught Me About a Way Forward for Us Today. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=by5L8iFN70Q She argues Doughnut Economics is necessary among other observations and the most emphasized is systems thinking, placing human activity into the larger context and subsuming economics into ecology. https://img-s-msn-com.akamaized.net/tenant/amp/entityid/AA16H7Kl.img?w=1920&h=1080&q=60&m=2&f=jpg The authors make a crucial clarification early on in the book, namely to whom they're referring when they use the word "we" in the context of humanity's ecological predicament. They don't use it to mean citizens of high-consuming industrial nations, as many others do; instead, they use it to refer to every human alive today. They go on to explain that while the industrial world certainly is responsible for the majority of today's resource consumption and consequent environmental impacts, the path that has led us to this state of affairs is rooted in humanity's species-wide tendency to seek out ever more energy-dense fuel sources. Maybe we start by banning land ‘ownership’ by corporations? Nationalize agricultural land (National Farms?) and institute a program of long-term leases (100 years?) to small farmers? Ban the practice of separating the top layers of land and the ‘rights’ to the minerals beneath it? If that migration is to occur, it’ll happen because enough people decide it’s worth it to suffer the cost, inconvenience, and dislocation of the initial phases of E2.0. Although there can be many routes to reaching this social and community stability, “No matter how difficult the transition may be, in the not-too-distant future we will have to live in far smaller and more flexible social organization than today’s nation states and cities.”
An Inconvenient Apocalypse: Excerpt - resilience An Inconvenient Apocalypse: Excerpt - resilience
An Inconvenient Apocalypse excels at making difficult concepts easily understandable through skillful use of thought experiments. In one, we’re asked to imagine how history might have unfolded differently had the contiguous United States, rather than western Europe, been blessed with the conditions that first paved the way for the industrial revolution. In another, we’re given a scenario in which socialism, instead of capitalism, established itself as the dominant economic system of the industrial world. Both of these thought experiments make crucial points about the reality of geographic determinism in history and humanity’s susceptibility to “the temptations of dense energy,” and they do so in a simple, accessible manner. The technology has already brought us to overshoot. We are going to crash. Continuing with business as usual, especially in agriculture, only means that we will damage the Earth even further, making things harder from this point on. Relying on technology to come up with a magical solution merely delays preparing for the crash. That’s really the issue. In that it is an ideal human community, one that has become increasingly rare if not impossible in our modern neoliberal world. We humans have made a mess of things, which is readily evident if we face the avalanche of studies and statistics describing the contemporary ecological crises we face. But even with the mounting evidence of the consequences for people and the ecosphere, we have not committed to a serious project to slow the damage that we do. Those who have little or no access to wealth and power would be within their rights to object, on the grounds that the “we” diffuses responsibility. Who has made a mess of things and who has failed to act? Who’s to blame for the problems and who’s responsible for the costs? Put more bluntly, borrowing from the imagined exchange between the Lone Ranger and Tonto when they were in a tough fight with Indians, “What do you mean, we, white man?”Since ” America” is still “Conquered and Occupied Indian Country” . . . maybe the people to seek spiritual and perceptual guidance from would be the Indigenous Tribes and Nations here. Right now we don’t seem to have the inclination or the ability to structure our basic econ sub-systems (ag, energy, materials, mfg’g) such that they repair and replenish .vs. degrade and disperse. Nothing we have argued relieves individuals or societies of moral accountability for unjust and unsustainable actions. We cannot know precisely what level of determinism is at play in our lives, but we can continue to assess our choices and act according to moral principles of dignity, solidarity, and equality. But as we judge human failures—our own and of others—and take corrective action, we should remember to be humble. Apocalypse in the present context does not mean “lakes of fire, rivers of blood, or bodies raptured up to heaven.” But it does require that we change our consciousness when hope for meaningful change within the existing political culture and economy is no longer productive and we must deal with our problems dramatically different ways: “Invoking the apocalyptic recognizes the end of something…not about rapture but a rupture severe enough to change the nature of the whole game.” It is way past time to climb out of that Overton Window and look around with eyes that see. In the words of James Baldwin, “Not everything that is faced can be changed; but nothing can be changed until it is faced.” Thus, the summation from J&J:
An Inconvenient Apocalypse with Bob Jensen (Bonus episode of An Inconvenient Apocalypse with Bob Jensen (Bonus episode of
Although we are one species, there are obvious cultural differences among human populations around the world. Those cultural differences aren’t a product of human biology; that is, they aren’t the product of any one group being significantly different genetically from another, especially in ways that could be labeled cognitively superior or inferior. So why have different cultures developed in different places? Discusses the heart at the ecological crises. “At the material level, we face a crisis of consumption. In aggregate terms, the human population has too much stuff. That stuff is not equally or equitably distributed among the population, of course. But no matter the level of fairness and justice in societies, the ecological costs of the extraction, processing, and waste disposal required to produce all that stuff is at the core of our ecological crises.” Our climate is being destroyed by unadulterated, free-market capitalism – an ideology that simply cannot be sustained on a small planet with limited resources. It is a system that has no interest in the greater good and that rewards inordinate capital and the few that have it, rather than the majority who don’t. It cares nothing for the environment or biodiversity and doesn’t give a fig about the fate of future generations. In fact, it is exactly the wrong economic system to have in place at a time of global crisis. The bankruptcy of the system is especially well upheld in the grossly asymmetric partitioning of carbon emissions between the rich elite and everyone else. My definition of an “economy” is “how and from where do you get what you need to operate your household”.
Wes Jackson and Robert Jensen's
If history was not shaped by the minor genetic differences that are associated with our ancestors’ region of the world, that leaves us with geography, climate, and environmental conditions, unless we want to argue that history is directed by God/Goddess or gods/goddesses, or is simply random. We really are one species. We are in the midst of a major environmental catastrophe for which we are little prepared, but for which action is desperately needed. An Inconvenient Apocalypse seeks to engage this problem with a deep concern for social justice, equality, and reverence for us and the planet that we have so deeply scarred." — New York Journal of Books
An Inconvenient Apocalypse - Daniel Pinchbeck’s Newsletter An Inconvenient Apocalypse - Daniel Pinchbeck’s Newsletter
Size: What is the size of the human economy relative to the magnitude of the ecosphere? Too large by any reasonable measure. But the general view of our reigning political culture is that carrying capacity applies only to non-human animals in their various ecosystems. No. Although it is passing strange, the PMC (and here I am speaking of the PMC of the Classical Liberal Uniparty that comprises American politics) largely agrees with Julian Simon, who wrote The Ultimate Resource (1981, 1996). In both editions he conflates the fact that any given resource is infinitely divisible with the notion that resources are therefore infinite, practically speaking. Plus, Simon completely fails to recognize that the concept of carrying capacity applies to humans just as it does to any other animal in the ecosphere (5). He is not alone. Excellent work KLG. I’m currently writing an essay myself which may wind up being titled along the lines of “Capitalism as Mental Illness.” This essay sparks many thoughts along those lines w/r/t the ethical atrocities being raised in a capitalist society normalize us to. The task before us. “But the task before us today is far more daunting: a down-powering on a global level with the goal of fewer people living on less energy, achieved by means of democratically managed planning to minimize suffering. Daunting, indeed.”
There is nothing surprising in this list, and the implications of each are clear. If we are to deal with these problems, we must transcend the “growth economy” that seems essential but is just another fateful category mistake in a finite world with a finite ecosphere. This is nothing new. Herman Daly (1938-2022) wrote about this for more than 50 years but was ignored by the establishment for virtually all of that time (3). His Beyond Growth: The Economics of Sustainable Development (1996) and For the Common Good written with John B. Cobb, Jr. are indispensable for an understanding of “sustainability,” what it is and more importantly what it is not (virtue signaling, for example). Chas, I agree strongly. We need more small farms, tied to their communities. Problem right now is …. land. Thousands, if not millions, of the best farmland ‘owned’ by corporations and billionaires (looking at you, Bill Gates!). A great big enclosing of the commons has occurred in the USA. I am late to this great discussion (thank you, KLG!) as usual, but one observation before I move on. I few weeks ago, I was terrified when I discovered the existence of the Schelling Point. I believe it was in a link here on NC, and was in the context of an explanation of why, in so many revolutions, the military take control. On this episode, Nate is joined by ‘permaculture’ author and educator David Holmgren to discuss his experience within the movement and what it might look like for more systems to be designed using permaculture in the future.
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