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128 comments on Is Sustainable Development sustainable?
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128 comments on Is Sustainable Development sustainable?
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You exaggerate with phrases like, "a world-wide food crisis." World population did not decline in 2008 due to mass starvation.
World population is 6.6 billion in 2007
In 2008, world population is 6.7 billion
Doomer's scenarios require population decline. Get back to us when there is a real food crisis.
And maybe not greater than all the previous ones. If the K-T extinction event was caused by a meteorite impact, it probably made species extinct at a greater rate than current anthropic efforts.
The lifetime of methane in the atmosphere is about 10 years making it less of a problem than longer lived fossil CO2. Last I read humans extinguish more forest fires than nature resulting in less burned forest. Have rainfall patterns already shifted enough and been scientifically attributed to anthropic global warming (as opposed to natural variation in climate) to declare "drying soils?" Acidification of the oceans and overfishing are probably major contributers to "dying oceans."
and from overuse and overpopulation, but which are dominant?
You have not specified a timeline when such things will reach their tipping points. They could be tomorrow, next century or never for all you know. Doomers tend to ignore the timing believing doom is in the near term. When will the last tuna die? When will the last piece of coral blanch? When will the last bumble bee be photographed? When will there be no more downstream water from the melting glacier? When will 10% of the ice slide off of Antarctica into the ocean raising sea level? Will any of these happen during your lifetime?
I do not use sustainable to mean a few tweaks because the current system can not be made sustainable using a few tweaks. Luis de Souse has cherry-picked the definition of development to be synonymous with growth or progress to make his point. Development does not have to be exponential development. Development could be a sole village of 5,000 people on Earth replacing their log cabins every 50 years due to rot and termite damage. That would be sustainable development capable of persisting for the remaining lifetime of Earth, ~4 billion years.
"You have not specified a timeline when such things will reach their tipping points. They could be tomorrow, next century or never for all you know. Doomers tend to ignore the timing believing doom is in the near term. When will the last tuna die? When will the last piece of coral blanch? When will the last bumble bee be photographed? When will there be no more downstream water from the melting glacier? When will 10% of the ice slide off of Antarctica into the ocean raising sea level? Will any of these happen during your lifetime?"
When did the 90th percentile of Atlantic cod or Pacific bluefin tuna get taken from the sea?
When did the last Somali fisherman pull up his empty nets, empty because EU and Asian countries' supertanker sized trawlers had taken all his catch?
When did the last dodo bird die?
When did the last carrier pigeon die?
When did the last woolly mammoth die?
When did the last Neanderthal die?
When did the last Ohlone Indian die?
When did Lehman Brothers go belly up?
When did Chrysler and GM go bankrupt?
When did the USSR, Spanish empire, Ottoman empire, British empire, Roman empire, Khmer Rhouge and Nazi Germany disappear?
When was the last chariot raced in ancient Rome?
When did Mono Lake north of Los Angeles start receding?
When did you become a global warming denier who rejects proof of reduced polar ice volumes?
When did Michael Jackson die?
When will you die? (it will happen in your lifetime)
Ken1,
When did Chrysler and GM go bankrupt?
Which times, GM has been bankrupt three times in the last 100years, I think Chrysler only twice?
The view in hindsight is not the doomer's forte.
I am not an AGW skeptic. I accept the science behind anthropic climate change. The Arctic ice cap is melting while both the Antarctic sea ice and land ice are increasing. Even the climate models project this due to increased precipitation at the poles caused by global warming. The Arctic sea ice is melting from beneath due to increased sea temperature. You can study the data at Cryosphere Today.
I agree that an human caused extinction event is in progress, that humans are consuming natural resources at an unsustainable rate and that humans are polluting the environment in numerous ways. My arguments are against doomerism: there is no solution, don't ever bother because we can't fix it, there are no such things as sustainable, renewable and environmentally friendly human behaviors.... Ideas that are not sustainable with a human population of 6.7 billion will become so once the human population is reduced sufficiently (and I do not mean reduced to zero).
This is good, but you have some out-of-date info or misunderstandings.
Incorrect. The Antarctic is a net loser WRT the Ice Cap, with warming occurring happening across the continent, but much more precipitously on the WAIS. Accumulations in the center of the continent are no longer overriding losses.
http://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2009/01/state-of-antarctic...
http://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2009/01/warm-reception-to-...
http://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2009/02/antarctic-warming-...
http://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2009/06/on-overfitting/
Yes, but as the deniers like to say, the models were wrong. That is, they underestimated the rate of change.
As for time, either you or someone else derided the idea that time may be short. Anyone who claims to not be a skeptic on climate, but thinks there is plenty of time, still doesn't get it 100%. Rapid Climate Change is a real threat because these things happen in chaotic, non-linear ways. The record shows temperature changes of up to 7C in time periods of less than a decade. Assuming this won't happen is short-sighted, IMO, and even dangerous - particularly since we know we are adding to atmospheric CO2 and CO2e at a rate faster than most, if not all, of the climate record. Pushing a system to its limits makes it that much more likely they will be exceeded catastrophically.
Cheers
Hmmmm ...
What and where is the line between acceptance (of AGW) and denial?
The important question is why? It all seems so ... lemming- like to me!
(BTW, lemmings don't commit mass suicide, they are too smart to do so.)
As for the doomers; John Maynard Keynes had is right; "In the long run, we are all dead." How can this not drive all human behavior? If I die ... who gives a shit about anyone else?
I suppose the brink and various tipping points will be pulled away from us by economic collapse. Thank god or Yahweh or Jehovah for the mortality of economies! In the long run, economic systems are all dead. Taking away profits means taking away factory smokestacks and the puffs of CO2 that emerge from them. Even though the Chinese and the Indians and whatnot are frantically attempting to ape the USA consumer lifestyle, they cannot know that the whole idea of 'lifestyle' is kaput, replaced by the more old- school 'hard labor'. Hard labor is usually a fatal illness. Again, the human race's reach exceeds its grasp.
Demonstrating again the principal that in most ways it is better to be lucky than good.
Our stupid luck will save us from our own desperate self- immolation. It is impossible to be more lucky than this. Or ... will it? Who knows?
How does all this effect 'sustainability'? It doesn't, in fact nothing does. Sustainability is a conceit, it cannot exist anywhere because the ground rules that nature constantly adapts to are in themselves constantly changing. Since change is constant - in fact the only constant - the only iota of sustainability is effective un- sustainability. It's best to be flexible.
And prepared for disappointment.
Now ... when all in a particular market are calling for some thing ... like growth ... this signifies the end of the market for that thing. Call it a 'turning point' if you will. The existance of growth itself destroys growth because the costs of it are always higher than receipts. Our fantasy charade is we can collect some of those returns ahead of the onrushing costs which grow ever larger.
But, don't worry yourselves. Like all problems the growth issue solves itself by the simple expedient of us doing nothing or also doing something active to solve the growth problem or by outside means destroying the matrix for growth. Hmmmm ... growth is outnumbered by solutions. So is climate change. Climate change does not affect the Earth since the climate has changed over and over and will do so whether we sequester carbon or pump it up the asses of deniers and businessmen and politicians. It won't effect humans since we are all dead in the long run so who cares about our successor humans? Or, other species ... who wants to care about those losers?
(What's a 'species', again?)
It does effect our cars which we love to pieces and are defending literally to the death. If we don't care about ourselves, cannot we care about our dogs and cats?
Blue Twilight,
Maybe not for long:
"California Division of Forestry Not Paying Bills, Vendors Demand Cash or Credit Cards Upfront" [Mish Shedlock]
BT, thanks for your reply. Unfortunately, you seem to have already made up your mind firmly on certain things, perhaps for emotional reasons. I will address some of your points for those reading.
If you missed the worldwide food crisis, perhaps you were asleep last year. Perhaps the people involved in food riots in Mexico, Peru, Indonesia, Thailand, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Bolivia, Ethiopia, the Philippines, Ivory Coast, Uzbekistan, Haiti and others were just playing a joke.
globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=8877
Note that I did not say "starvation at a level that significantly reduces world population" though that is the claim you seem to be falsely attributing to me and addressing.
The KT extinction event was the result effectively of a bad afternoon. Modern industrial civilization represents a bad couple centuries, with effects that will last much, much longer.
You say: "The lifetime of methane in the atmosphere is about 10 years making it less of a problem than longer lived fossil CO2."
If you know this much about methane, you presumably also know that methane over this time span is some 70 times more powerful as a ghg than CO2, and that it breaks down mostly into CO2. Either you did know this, and you were just trying to be cute (or something worse) by describing it as "less of a problem," or you actually know nothing about the subject and are just grabbing random facts and spouting off. Either way, there does not seem to be much more reason to engage you on this particular topic.
The same seems to apply to your comment about acidification of oceans. Do you not realize that CO2 is what is acidifying them? DO you not realize that increase in acidity is killing plankton that are crucial sinks in the global carbon cycle, bringing carbon down to the ocean floor as they die.
It boggles my mind how you think weather patterns and glaciers are being affected by "overuse," but in any case, I was just pointing out that these and many other bad things are demonstrably happening, yet occr seemed to blissfully unaware of them.
Do you think that these things are not happening or that they bode well for human on non-human futures?
Timeline? Timeline????
These things are all happening right now. Open your eyes, read a little. It's not always fun, but it helps keep you from saying things that are wildly off from observed reality sometimes.
Glad to hear you have your own definition of development.
"I have my own definition of black and to me it means white, so there is no race problem."
This seems to be about the level of your logic here.
Lots of misunderstandings.
I am criticizing your sensationalistic use of the term "food crisis" to describe events that do not rise to the level of a crisis. The article, "Global Famine," by Michel Chossudovsky, May 2, 2008, at Centre for Research on Globalization is a political piece biased by its author's hatred of globalization. The author claims speculation in commodities triggers famine by increasing the price of food. He also blames the IMF, World Bank and big agro companies. In this world view overpopulation, drought, climate change, resource limits and peak oil are not factors in causing famine and affecting the price of food. This article fails to support your claim of a "food crisis."
Yes. You wrote "... dying oceans all giving up their carbon content into the atmosphere." The ocean is a net absorber of CO2 from the atmosphere. Your statement suggested that you did not understand this.
"Overuse" refers to a cause of "increasing water shortages," not to "weather patterns" and "glaciers." I was pointing out there are additional factors to the ones related to AGW.
I think most of what you listed is happening with differing magnitudes, and it does not bode well.
Have you considered how much time is available to deal with the problems? oilcompanycorporateresearch is optimistic that there is time to deal with these problems to avert disaster. Your response screams of doomerism declaring we have already passed the tipping points so there is no need to bother trying. On the Oil Drum I am labeled a cornucopian because I advocate solutions. Everywhere else I speak about peak oil I am labeled a doomer because I state there are major problems forthcoming if we do not act. There is a gaping chasm between our beliefs about how to perceive the problems and what to do about them.
"I think most of what you listed is happening with differing magnitudes, and it does not bode well."
Then we are essentially in agreement and the rest is window dressing.
"Everywhere else I speak about peak oil I am labeled a doomer..."
I guess you want to return the favor by labeling me in a similar fashion.
I was specifically addressing occr's statement that s/he didn't see any major problems.
I did not opine one way or the other on what should be done.
You once again have chosen to create a claim for me that I have not made and do not hold. I find it hard to continue dialog with people that do this sort of thing.
For the record:
I have taught thousands of people about these topics for decades
I hold seminars for other teachers
I speak in various forums
I am on my city's environmental advisory board
I am active in various ngo's and local political groups
I have planted over one hundred native species in my yard and give away seeds and plantings
I have brought my foot print (cf. www.myfootprint.org) to near one earth, giving up all air travel, most car travel, meat and most dairy, most non-local foods...
I garden at home and do much of the work to support a local community garden...
If these all sound to you like the behavior of one who believes "there is no need to bother trying," then I guess there is not much use continuing the conversation.
I happen to think that one needs to have a clear-eyed view of the enormity of the situation in order to know what actions and non-actions are appropriate for the times. Apparently you hold a different view.
Best of luck with that.
Blue Twilight, you wrote "You exaggerate with phrases like, "a world-wide food crisis." World population did not decline in 2008 due to mass starvation."
First, did countries like Ethiopia, Somalia, Iraq etc do a census last year. Even the US only does a census every 10 years. Population numbers are estimates. The population of the world could have held static or gone down last year.
Second, do you know how many people moved from getting a bit more than needed to survive to getting only what they needed to survive? Estimates are that 1 billion live on $1 a day and another 1 to 1 1/2 billion live on $2 a day or less. Perhaps that is now 1 1/2 on $1 a day and still 1 1/2 billion on $2 a day as they have moved down from $3 a day. We don't really know. We do know when food prices go up. If they go up, as much as half the population of the world has a more difficult time getting enough food even if there is more than enough around.
http://www.globalissues.org/article/26/poverty-facts-and-stats
http://www.countercurrents.org/walsh020908.htm
Huge numbers of people live in daily food crisis. A small decrease in the amount of food available or a small increase in the cost of food is a major crisis for them. Last I heard the people of Haiti were eating mud cakes to slake hunger.
http://leekfixer.newsvine.com/_news/2009/02/16/2440840-haiti-mud-cakes-b...
More fertlizer and more irrigation are NOT increasing production at the same rates that they did initially. Meanwhile ground water is getting harder to reach as we deplete fossil water supplies in many countries. http://www.earth-policy.org/Books/Seg/PB2ch03_ss2.htm
How do you get to deeper and deeper water - you use fuels to pump it - how do you get to deeper and deeper oil - you use fuels to pump it - how do you get more and more diffuse minerals out of the ground - you use fuel to mine and process it. Hmmm do we have a problem here? Everything needed to keep as going at current levels of population and consumption takes more fuel these days.
We have little slack in the world food supply - I suppose the greatest area of slack is in the overconsumption by first worlders and especially those in the USA.
http://chervil-earth.blogspot.com/2008/03/only-40-days-of-global-grain-s...
"Only 40 days of global grain stocks left
Sunday, March 9, 2008
Two days ago, the newly appointed chief scientific adviser to the UK Government, Professor John Beddington, warned of coming food shortages for the whole world. In a speech given at the Govnet Sustainable Development UK Conference in Westminster he said: "There is progress on climate change. But out there is another major problem. It is very hard to imagine how we can see a world growing enough crops to produce renewable energy and at the same time meet the enormous increase in the demand for food which is quite properly going to happen as we alleviate poverty." (quoted from The Guardian, 7 March 2008)
Professor Beddington also pointed out that as of two days ago, "global grain stores are currently at the lowest levels ever, just 40 days from running out." ...."