Chapter 1
Earth
in Transition
Humanity faces serious environmental threats.
What kind of future can we have?
There is nothing
more difficult to take in hand,
more perilous to conduct,
or more uncertain
in its success, than to take
the lead in the
introduction of a new order of things.
– Niccolo Machiavelli, The Prince
|
A |
ccelerated change is a
defining characteristic of human life today. Because of human interception into
nonhuman life processes, this change has become a defining moment for all life
on Earth. Together, we face serious challenges on many fronts. Overpopulation
and the attendant assault on the natural environment provides
the primary driving force for some very serious challenges. We see the
beginnings of major social, economic, environmental, and spiritual upheavals,
most stimulated by environmental losses. The “new order of things” which is
likely to emerge, is by no means clear.
Optimism - Pessimism
“The sky is falling!” cried
Chicken Little. “The world is coming to an end,” say a few radical
environmentalists. “Human beings are causing the extinction of species on the
order of the mass extinctions that wiped out the dinosaurs 65 million years
ago,” says a group of botanists1. Serious additional warnings are
offered by many of the world’s most eminent scientists, including ecologists
and paleontologists who study Earth matters closely.
“Things are just fine, going along well. The future looks
bright,” say most industrial economists, and political and business leaders.
They argue that the cries of alarm coming from the “tree-huggers” are misplaced
and destructive.
Who is right? What is
the real future of humanity? And who cares anyway?
Many reasons are offered not
to care. “It’s far into the future and I’ll be dead anyway,” is a common
sentiment. Most people care most about what happens tomorrow, or next year, but
not much about the next several decades. We work hard just to get through each
day with a semblance of vocational satisfaction, personal contentment, and some
pleasure. We don’t have much time or interest in pondering the distant future.
Is this a surface manifestation of our hectic industrialized lifestyle?
Down deep nearly all of us are
concerned about the future, but our worries and concerns are unfocused and
indistinct. We deal with adversities as they come, and try to live for the
moment—protecting ourselves from too many unpleasant thoughts or depressing
possible future realities. To some, this is human nature. To others it is
debilitating denial, avoiding the truth because it is unpleasant.
Few of us are in any position, nor do
we have the motivation, to alter our behaviors radically, especially if the
reasons for change are not strong, compelling, or immediately evident in our
lives. Hearing about some remotely perceived future threat—like the random
collision of a giant asteroid—fails to stir us into serious action or personal
change.
Industrialized Happiness?
Those of us living in the
industrial world look at our lives as moderately comfortable. At least most of
us do. We see things as generally going well—with economic growth continuing in
a usually positive manner, with our incomes rising, if slowly, and with our
savings expanding too. We believe we are well off, at least in comparison with
poor people in less developed countries. (This is a fallacy, of course. Many of
these “poor” people lead perfectly satisfying lives. And there are wealthy in
the
On the other hand, we do know this picture comes with many
caveats, including the huge numbers of
Joanna Macy described our hectic lifestyles: “The corporate mergers characterizing the advanced state of the
Industrial Growth Society rob people of employment, make them scramble for
jobs, and feel highly insecure in those they still manage to hang on to.
Moonlighting, they rush from one job to another, to piece together a living
wage. Most young families, in order to pay the bills, need both parents to work
for pay, or try to. The pace accelerates, taking its toll on every spare
moment, every relationship. As employment benefits are cut, and social health
and welfare programs decimated, economic anxiety mounts. The world narrows down
to one’s own and one’s family’s immediate needs. There’s little time to contemplate
the fate of the world, or let it sink in. If a free hour is left at the end of
the day, one prefers to zone out with a beer in front of the television–and the
packaged fantasies of the Industrial Growth Society.”2, p. 33
The strongest motivation most of us have for protecting the
future is the bond of love and responsibility we feel for our children and
grandchildren. We want a healthy world for them to grow up in. And most of us are concerned. It is difficult to avoid some worry, with all the reports of
environmental, health, and economic problems we see regularly in the media. Now
we have domestic terrorism to worry about.
Though a terrible and demonstrably real threat, terrorism is
unlikely to result in the extinction of the human species. Some of the
environmental threats facing us could do just that. This amazing possibility could come from a
rampant new viral strain infecting, and killing, all humans. It could come from extreme global warming
coupled with human-induced extinction of critical species upon which humanity
depends, or species on which those species depend.
The potential for annihilation following a large thermonuclear
exchange between countries, the danger of massive global war, and the results
of famine and disease are all real and serious threats, but they are not the
focus here, except to the extent that they result from the pressures of
overpopulation and environmental degradation, because they do not have the
potential for eradicating human life on Earth.
Real Threats
Unlike the false alarm of
Chicken Little, real environmental alarms are provided almost daily by
knowledgeable scientists, scholars, educators, and religious leaders. The
strength and directness of the relentless warnings from our most brilliant
scientists are nothing short of astonishing. We would be foolish to ignore
them. So address them we must.
Addressing them now, as a species, is a major purpose of this book.
Through the ages, many people have spoken out about the future
of humanity. Fear of disaster is nothing new, of course. The Bible speaks of
Armageddon and apocalypse. The World Future Society publishes a magazine of
articles by a variety of authors on many aspects of predicting the future.
Though most are optimistic, some are not.
Michio
Kaku has written a fascinating book, Visions, about the expected impacts of
science and technology in the 21st century3. Many of the
predicted developments seem sure to make our lives easier and more interesting.
Some will make life more dangerous and precipitous. He warns that a degree of
wisdom will be required to avoid the pitfalls of powerful technologies. Without
that wisdom, humans may become just another extinct species. Sorting through
the alternatives is one of the most important tasks to face us.
Viewpoints
In reading the literature on
this subject, three different points of view keep popping up.
The
fatalists. These believe the future will just happen. There’s not a
lot we can do to alter it much, nor should we even try. The idea is that we
have reached our current status by evolutionary processes. Whatever happens to
us in the future is thought to be a natural consequence of that evolution.
Animals have become extinct naturally over Earth history. The
fatalists believe there is no reason to expect humans to have any special
immunity from extinction. As far as we know, none of the previously endangered
species were aware of the threat nor able or willing to take any action to
prevent it. In this view, modern humans are considered to be in the same category.
Even though we can think of the
future and see dangers ahead, the fatalists say we are essentially unable as a
species to alter the future, so we should just make the best of the present
while we can.
The Cornucopians. Another view is that we do have control, and we can and will
anticipate the future and make it a better one for humans. In this view, there
are no limits to growth (or they are far into the future) and resources are and
always will remain abundant (or we can find, or make, substitutes forever). We
have advanced technologies, and new ones on the horizon, which can solve every
problem, and we have and will create constantly improving democracies capable
of watching over these developments, protecting the rights and needs of humans
along the way. This thoroughly anthropocentric (human-centered) perspective
generally claims that only humans really count and have rights. Another name
for this viewpoint is technological
optimism, the belief that technology can solve any problem.
The
Holists. A third view claims that the anthropocentric argument is
too narrow. Other creatures, here before us, have equal rights to (species if
not individual) existence. It recognizes that the futures of all species of
life on Earth are inextricably linked together. We must protect the whole to
protect humanity.
There is a quasi-anthropocentric component to the holist
belief. It follows from the fact that humans depend upon plants and animals for
most of the essentials of life, so their needs matter to us and have
importance, if only for selfish reasons. The holist philosophy says that we
should take actions today to insure a viable future for all living creatures on Earth tomorrow.
It is left to the reader to choose which of the above
viewpoints is best able to protect our future. In my view, if you value the
flora and fauna of this Earth, in the mountains, plains, brooks, streams,
rivers, lakes, and oceans, if you care about what happens to them now and after
you are gone, and if you care about having a viable world environment in which
humans can prosper, then you should be concerned with the viability of the
whole Earth. To a great extent, this book is dedicated to proving the point
that protecting humanity’s future means protecting Earth’s future. If you have
difficulty accepting this conclusion, please take it as a premise, and see if
the remainder of what is written adequately supports the conclusion.
Spaceship Earth
The massive growth of human
population on the planet and the powerful new technologies placed into its
hands have put the human species in charge of, and now responsible for, the
operation of Spaceship Earth. Our home is just that, a relatively tiny
spaceship in the vastness of the universe, pursuing an elliptical course around
our mother star, the Sun. The solar system is tiny compared to the huge galaxy
in which it resides, and which itself is microscopic in the unimaginably vast
extent of the universe.
When the term “Spaceship Earth” was coined by Buckminster
Fuller, its usefulness was almost immediately apparent. Photographs of a tiny
Earth from space taken by the Apollo astronauts drove home the message, an
immediate image of a self-contained system. Today, with what we now know about
our Earth, the analogy seems too mechanical, too manmade. Spaceships are
technological inventions of humans. Earth is almost infinitely more complex and
beautiful. It is bigger than humans. It is organic, not merely mechanical. It
is with no sense of denigration, however, that I call Earth a spaceship. I
think the analogy aids those of us brought up in a largely materialistic and
mechanistic culture to understand this one important dimension of a
multi-dimensional Earth: It really is our life-support system.
That life support is provided by Earth’s biosphere, the thin
layer of air, water, topsoil, and below-ground aquifers covering the habitable
regions of our planet. The organisms in the biosphere, and the chemical,
physical, and geological systems on which they depend, provide us with, and
replenish and purify, the air we breathe and the fresh water we drink. The
plants and animals provide us with food, clothing, and shelter. Though it
strains credulity, we might agree with Earth ethics guru Thomas Berry that
Earth has come off of “autopilot” and is now being “operated” “manually” by
humans.
When we discovered the fossil remains of plants and animals
beneath the surface of the planet—deposited as coal, oil, and natural gas over
millions years—we started a program of exploitation that seems bent on
continuing to exhaustion. This is but one component of the operation of planet
Earth which we have taken over and are trying to bend to our seemingly total
control. We have supplemented our daily budget of energy from the sun (and the
other renewable resources available to us) with a huge variety of products made
from the fossil resources.
Our use of these non-renewable resources has grown to the point
where we can clearly see their continuing decline in availability. At that
point we will have no choice but to begin returning to sole reliance on the
non-fossil, renewable sources, radical resource use efficiency, and vigorous
population stabilization. It is doubtful that the current human population can
be sustained without fossil fuels. So, according to this reasoning, a major
die-off of human population may accompany the exhaustion of our fossil energy
resources. Increased public funding to continue extracting those resources at a
faster rate can only hasten this depletion, and ultimately the human
consequences. (Hopes of nuclear power and other technological innovations to
make the die-off more gradual, or even non-existent, may be too illusory to
count on. Do we want our very survival
to depend on what might happen in the
future?)
Failing Life-Support
The more we try to provide
the material things humans seem to think essential for living, and the more
human population grows, the more pressures we place on our life support system.
Though most people are concerned about it and understand these threats, others
do not, or feel the problems are over-blown or nonexistent.
We have learned that the industrialized human societies, and
the less developed ones which emulate them (also generally desiring
industrialization), are together producing serious, growing, and lasting environmental
consequences. The process can only be described as one whereby modern civilization is systematically taking
apart the life support system of Planet Earth. Population biologist Alan Thornhill of
Daniel Quinn adds that we are, in essence, mining species,
since in order to feed a growing human population we are killing off species
left and right, at the approximate rate of 200 every day.4
These strong statements deserve elaboration. The “systematic
taking apart of the life support system of Planet Earth” refers to habitat
destruction due to human expansion and land development, to the continued
warming of our atmosphere (by so-called “greenhouse gases” and the resulting
alteration of weather and climate), to the polluting of air, soil, and water,
and to the resulting extinction of species and ill health of humans and
animals. These consequences are growing
worldwide, faster than our remediation efforts. If we do not change the basic
structuring of our society,
it is difficult to see how
the current course can lead to anything other than growing environmental
disasters and increased human suffering, most probably a collapse of human
population. Not all human life will quickly disappear from the planet, but we
may be reaching a point where the natural restorative capabilities of the
planet will take more time than we have to avoid a major human population
die-off. Though extinction of humanity is not a necessary consequence of such
changes, it is a possible one.
How Did It Happen?
If you accept the truth of
these strong statements, your next question may likely be: “How did we get to
this place?” How did humanity reach the point of destroying the very systems
which make human life possible? Additional questions also come to mind: Now that we have discovered the serious
nature of the problem, why do we continue our destructive course? If humanity
were as gifted, organized, and in control as believed by the Cornucopians, then wouldn’t stronger measures be in place
now for reversing the disastrous trend? If it is so obvious what we are doing
to our Earth, and ultimately to ourselves, then why isn’t everyone talking
about it? Why aren’t we on a crash course to save the future and make our
civilization sustainable?
Our lack of concern is not unlike the famous story of the
Emperor’s new clothes. It was obvious to the little boy the emperor was naked
(or at least was going around in his skivies). But
everyone else was afraid to accept this obvious fact, so continued the pretense
of believing the Emperor to be fully clothed. Breaking through the deception
and denial is an important beginning step. Along the way toward that goal, it
is helpful to avoid some common misconceptions.
Clarifying Terms
Three terms are frequently
confused in discussions of social reform.
1) Material standard of living is defined as the quantity of goods and
services consumed by an individual, per unit time.
2) Quality of life is the degree of enjoyment, satisfaction, and
fulfillment achieved by an individual in the process of living.
3) Lifestyle is the general pattern of daily behaviors followed by an
individual.
From these definitions we
see that “material standard of living” is inherently materialistic while
“quality of life” is not. It is a mistake to confuse these two terms, as is so
often done—especially in
The word “standard” may seem a misnomer; it actually was
intended to mean the average affluence level in a country. In other contexts
“standard” means the lowest one is permitted to go. A standard is seldom the
ideal in such applications, only the lowest or least value allowed. But in the
above context, and in generally materialistic
There is, of course, one way in which affluence level does equate to quality of life, and that
is at the below-poverty level. If one’s basic material needs are not satisfied,
or if they are so low as to produce ill-health, it is clear that good life
quality is not possible. Above some minimum level, however, it is my contention
that quality of life and material standard of living become less and less
coupled as the material standard of living increases. The average standard of
living for most industrialized nations is so high that these two concepts are
completely decoupled, in spite of our protestations (and materialistic behaviors)
to the contrary. The point is that we do not need to continue our consuming,
earth-depleting lifestyles to be happy—to have a high quality of life. We do need major shifts in our values and
behavior patterns before we will be able to achieve a higher quality of life at
a lower material standard of living—to live better with less. Paul MacCready calls it “Doing More with Less”:
A necessary, but
not sufficient, strategy for achieving a desirable, sustainable world as growth
impacts limits is to raise the priority on efficiency and restraint. This is
not the principle on which the
It is tempting to think that
lifestyle is also independent of the other two concepts—that your pattern of
living does not inherently affect your quality of life or material standard of
living. However, some affluent people choose lifestyles requiring high material
standards of living, and others are able to live simply with less. The
difference lies in their value systems. There are other ways in which lifestyle
is linked to standard of living and quality of life. Many would say that
freedom to choose different lifestyles is an important prerequisite to quality
of life.
Another term bandied about rather freely is sustainability. Al Bartlett, retired
professor of physics at the University of Colorado, points out that the term
was drawn from the concept of “sustained yield” which is used to
describe agriculture and
forestry when these enterprises are conducted in such a way that they could be
continued indefinitely, i.e., their yield could be sustained.
The introduction of the word
“sustainable” provided comfort and reassurance to those who may momentarily
have wondered if possibly there were limits. So the word was soon applied in many areas, and with
less precise meaning, so that for example, with little visible change,
“development” became “sustainable development,” etc. One would see political
leaders using the term “sustainable” to describe their goals as they worked
hard to create more jobs, to increase population, and to increase rates of
consumption of energy and resources.
In the manner of
Sustainability has to mean
for a very long time compared with a human lifetime—for millennia.
First
Law. Population growth and/or growth in the rates of consumption of
resources cannot be sustained. A population growth rate less than or equal
to zero and declining rates of consumption of resources are necessary
conditions for a sustainable society. Unsustainability
will be the certain result of any program of “development,” whether or not it
is said to be “sustainable,” which ignores the problem of population growth and
that does not plan the achievement of zero or a period of negative growth of
populations and of rates of consumption of resources. The term “sustainable
growth” is an oxymoron.
The Good Life
It is a common misconception
that affluence equals happiness, or at least a degree of personal security and
contentment. Having a high quality of life is not assured by affluence, nor
does a lack of affluence preclude leading a quality life. Since high material
standards of living contribute strongly to the environmental crisis, defining
“quality of life” is important. The question is this: what is it that people need
to live well, to live “the good life,” so sought by everyone? If we can find
non-material ways to achieve what we really need, then having them won’t have
to come at Earth’s expense.
One can postulate a number of measures of “life goodness.” To a
great extent, the one each of us chooses is largely shaped by the culture and
value system in which we live, by our family (which frequently tells us,
directly or indirectly, what to want) and by our own personal experiences.
Contentment, peace of mind, anonymity, laughter, personal and family security,
the absence of psychological pathologies, and a rewarding vocation are some
non-material measures of “life goodness.”
For most of us it is the non-material, non-tangible things that
matter most. For example, to be fully balanced and “happy” in their lives, most
people want or need: 1) strong family closeness and support, 2) the
companionship and love of a significant other person, 3) a rewarding vocation,
4) warm and supportive friends and acquaintances, and 5) some time for
themselves in pursuit of creative, meaningful, and self-improvement activities.
In addition, a life filled with humor and fun is a
obviously beneficial too. None of these is inherently Earth-impacting. In some zen Buddhist cultures, it is the absence
of cravings for money, power, prestige, and notoriety which are most prizeda.
Colin Campbell says it is a great illusion that
non-materialistic people are unhappy. “Has the affluent fraction of Americans
been alone in finding happiness over recorded history,” he asks. “We are the
victims of mass advertising and the baleful influence of television, which
denies us the happiness of simple things, such as old men sitting on park
benches.”b
References to a better life that can come from restructuring society
to make it more sustainable, gentler toward Earth, and kinder to Earth’s people
rely on the non-material definitions of life-goodness.
Restructuring Society
If you accept even part of
the strong claims so far made, it must be astonishing to contemplate what might
be needed to reverse the trend. The problems are extensive and the actions
needed to overcome them nearly overwhelming. It is clear that two major
transformations will be needed. First will be a substantial reduction in
population and second is a drastic restructuring of industrialized society, a
rebuilding from the ground up. The latter of these will be complicated,
difficult, and problematic. The former is at least much simpler, if not easier.
Any strategy for reform that is realistic will include both simultaneously.
Before addressing the task of restructuring, more must be said
about the nature of our problems, how we fell into them, and how we might start
figuring out what must be done. Parts I and II of this book are devoted to that
task.
The subject is difficult to approach for many reasons. One is
the question of how to deal with people’s preconceived views concerning what we
are doing to our world. Most are concerned, but not that worried, being
encouraged that steps are being taken to at least partially ameliorate the
adverse consequences of human action. Others are not so optimistic, accepting
that we are at a terribly important turning point and that if we do not make
drastic changes in our ways of living soon, we will become an endangered
species—without intervention headed for disaster.
With both viewpoints there is much confusion concerning how we
get out of the mess without compromising the great things humans have achieved
through industrialization. I call this the extrication
question. I would like to get right to the answer, devoting the remainder
of this book to finding it. But I cannot.
The first reason is that many do not yet realize the
seriousness of the problem and the short time we have to act. It is important
first to make the case for the claim of imminent failure of Spaceship Earth’s
life-support system. Only then can one take seriously the claim that the future
of humanity is in doubt.
The second reason is the difficulty we have in understanding
answers to the extrication question without fully understanding the problem
leading us to it. I hope you find this search for answers as challenging,
stimulating, and exciting as I.
References
1. Peter Raven, “Botanists Warn of Mass
Extinction,” Reuters News Service, Tuesday
August
2. Joanna Macy and Molly Brown Young. Coming Back to Life. New Society:
3. Michio Kaku.
Visions: How Science Will Revolutionize
the 21st
Century. Anchor/Doubleday:
4. Daniel Quinn “A New Renaissance,” (Speech), 2001, to Ross
McCluney,
5. Paul B. MacCready, Unleashing
Creativity, in Symposium on The Inventor
and Society,, Jerome and Dorothy Lamelson Center
for the Study of Invention and Innovation, Smithsonian National Museum of
American History, 1995.
6. Albert A. Bartlett. “Democracy Cannot Survive Overpopulation.” Population and Environment: A Journal of Interdisciplinary Studies. Vol.22, no. 1 (2000): September 2000, 63-71.