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how long can our unsustainable way of life continue?
According to many conservative estimates, at current consumption levels we now have a maximum of one hundred years of oil reserves left. Climate change is now so abject that even insurance companies have predicted dire consequences for the human race. There is a fair chance that the Amazonian rainforests will be completely eradicated within our lifetime; with the current level of rainforest destruction resulting in the unforgivable daily extinction of countless species of wildlife. A populace of six billion is currently causing this level of destruction. Yet in thirty years time this figure is set to double. Can Gaia cope with this strain? And, more importantly, can it be stopped at all, I mean, is there any possibility that we can change our destructive habits?
To the first question, I am not alone in unequivocally answering, "NO!" We have now reached a point, a critical one at that, where we actually have the ability to destroy this world of ours. To answer the second question I recommend that you read the book "Silent Springs" by Rachael Carson. This was the first book to illustrate the dangers of the herbicide/pesticide DDT to the environment and it provoked an outcry immediately after its release. You should consider the date that it was published - the 1960’s. You should then finally consider the contemporaneous worldwide usage of DDT- it’s now used more than ever before, and shows no sign of decreasing.
The only question that I am now see worthy to be asked is "How long can our unsustainable way of life continue?".
Message was edited by: sedition
Submitted on Sat, 2004-03-06 17:17
Re: how long can our unsustainable way of life continue?
This is of course the key question that the right and left both ignore whilst arguing about how best to destroy planet and people.
If the Middle-East question is about oil, and oil is no longer the driver of our economy but its destruction, how unrealistic and how backward must all those involved be? Bush has now been told by his own long-term planners in the Pentagon that this is the case, yet short-termist internal populism and re-election seems to be of more concern. Cynicism and petty point-scoring abound and good faith is to be found nowhere.
Unless we start to take the welfare of the poorest and the life-support systems that underlie all of our existence seriously, our civilisation does not deserve to be defended.
See you in the next life?
Re: how long can our unsustainable way of life continue?
I think that you just about hit the nail on the head there. I totally agree with your comment that it our governments short term agenda's that are responsible for most of our planets expliotation.
You see, I think that our pseudo-democracies are all too focused on re election for the current governing power. Some people in office are even so self-centred that they think only of how they can improve their own lives-to hell with future generations. Is it sadly too late to reform things however? I wonder have we, as Macbeth said:"Waded in blood so far that to return were as tedious as to go o'er"?
Re: how long can our unsustainable way of life continue?
I took a seminar last year by the head of the UCSD Engineering Department and he said that after the oil runs out we will have enough coal for 1000 years, and "Shale oil" or something like that for even longer. He also said that oil "may" cause gobal warming and that nuclear reactors would be safe because we could just drop the waste in certain spots in the ocean where the earth's crust has been proven not to budge an inch. Also, solar and wind will not be enough to support our American lifestyle for all $6 billion people, unsuprisingly. If only they build a fusion reactor. . .
Re: how long can our unsustainable way of life continue?
One of the fundamental problems is the definition of environmental sustainability. If one chooses the accepted, yet loose, definition of 'resource use for the world's current population without compromising environmental quality for future generations', it could be easily argued that we shouldn't even be alive right now. Yet, the human popluation continues to increase and develop. There is also little consideration within the definition established at the UNFCCC Summit in Rio (1992) regarding improvements in technologies, intensification of resource use (ie., getting more from less), or substitutions from alternative sources or technologies.
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