"The long-term prosperity of the human population on the planet is both a political and a moral challenge."

I don't know about the prosperity of the planet, but I know the best way to ensure the prosperity of my children is to educate them about the dangers of environmentalist scams -- like the ones that have helped bring Europe and the US close to financial disaster. Do you seriously think that you should be putting, say, Spain, Italy or California forward as examples of our Glorious Future?

And for those who haven't heard, by the way, a new round of Climategate emails has been released. They expose a good deal of venality and double standards among 'climate scientists', to say the least. Perhaps you should explain why you trust these people, Graham.

Jon. J,

"....dangers of environmental scams - like the ones that have helped bring Europe and the US close to financial disaster..."

More like it's been a marathon game of pass-the-parcel between bankers, speculators and governments.

Here's an interactive view of the debt connections:
http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2011/10/23/sunday-review/an-overview-of-the-euro-crisis.html

Graham Harris construed a few odds and ends from the public debate into a shift away from the pursuit of growth and profit. Nothing of the sort is occuring. I would urge Graham to get out of his ivory tower and start talking to business people, or examine social trends. Can he find anyone who wants less profit next year, or is prepared to take a wage cut? While there are people he will find they are few and far between.

What he will find if he takes the trouble to examine social trends is a shift towards family life and lifestyle. People are less willing to swap money for time away from their families. That does not mean they take less money, but they have to be offered more inducements to, say, work an eight day on-six day off, fly-in fly-out roster at a mine in the outback. There is a similar trade off for the environment but activists are now beginning to realise that its very much smaller than the family trade off. If money is coming out of their pocket, people quickly lose interest in the environment.

Graham needs to get out more and do some research.

Our sin along with Israels enemies will ensure this planet experiences extreme climate change. This fact is based on reliable sources rather than the pseudo sceince fantasy of man made gw. Those humble enough will be like Lot or Noah and escape. Bow the knee to Your Saviour or face the consequences of your sin. I know what I will be doing.

The anti-pops are masquerading as touchy feely love children of the fundamentally back to the earth socialist che guevara (he was a Catholic!) dawning of the age of Pol Pot zero growth ZPG and god only knows what thrown in but the root of their barking mad propositions they hate three things:

capitalism
markets
women

In that order.

They remind me of the awful smell of young men, sitting together in a darkened room playing online war games for days on end. They'd like to read books on market theory, modern capitalism and even meet some women, but it's just too hard and the world is an awful, awful place.

Graham has managed no mean feat in making his article as silly as its title.

Who but the 10% minority of Australians sufficiently deranged to vote green, would tolerate his proposition that we should continue pursuing the cause of “sustainable” energy into bankruptcy? It has been done in Europe, and there is no basis for us to follow suit.

His description of his visit to “a small printing company in northern England” reminds one of the visits of the lefties to communist Russia. They came back reporting that they had “seen the future”.

The true story of the disaster of communism took years to surface, but I am sure that Graham’s nonsense would take little research to expose right now. It no doubt relates to some insane subsidy for wasting time and money on solar power.

Our prosperity arises from mineral wealth and occasional good economic management, the latter being something which is completely lacking in the current government.

There must be some useful roles you have the ability to perform, Graham. Writing about a topic which you do not understand is not one of them.

Leo Lane states 'Our prosperity arises from mineral wealth and occasional good economic management, the latter being something which is completely lacking in the current government'.

Wrong, our prosperity arises from our ability to utilise cheap energy that then permits wealth leverage from mining, agriculture, fishing, business and a wealth of other economic activities.

Without cheap energy you cannot have growth, the laws of thermodynamics and physics guarantee this.

We have used most of the 'low hanging fruit' (energy) and as such we are now in the process of transitioning into a lower energy future, ergo, economic activity and so called wealth will diminish over time.

Simple, yet so many of you fail to grasp this basic concept.

I venture that perhaps you should read the recently released International Energy Agencies 'World Energy Outlook' and maybe Richard Heinberg's recently released book 'The End of Growth - Adapting to our new economic reality'.

This little Black Duck says hooray for Geoff.

Plus why not Google the topic environmental tipping points.
And the book World on The Edge by Lester Brown, especially the Amazon review by Robert Steele, and all of Roberts reviews.
Of course Brown's work will be dismissed by the usual techno-barbarian suspects that dominate this forum.

Leo Lane. I have been contemplating/struggling to find a suitable responce to that which I endured in reading Graham's post. your opening sentence said it all!! Well said, right to the 'pith' as it were, made me smile.

"techno-barbarian suspects that inhabit this forum"

Bbbwwwhahahah!

As one of the techno-barbarians suspects who insist on throwing cold, hard facts at Graham's dream of civilisation, I'll have to think of a suitable counter-label.. what about loonie-leftie or squishy-leftie (squishy instead of bleeding heart)??

Curmudgeon,
to keep it short & simple just use the term Morons.

The growthists like to crow that Malthus was wrong, even though Haiti and the genocide in Rwanda are pretty good evidence that he was right, but ignore the Cornucopians who also got it wrong, at least in the time frame they had in mind. Lewis Strauss was the head of the United States Atomic Energy Commission and had this to say in a speech in 1954

"Our children will enjoy in their homes electrical energy too cheap to meter... It is not too much to expect that our children will know of great periodic regional famines in the world only as matters of history, will travel effortlessly over the seas and under them and through the air with a minimum of danger and at great speeds, and will experience a lifespan far longer than ours, as disease yields and man comes to understand what causes him to age."

There are numerous examples of societies that outbred their resources and overexploited their environment before collapsing, but there are no long-term examples of a Cornucopian utopia. We have been receiving numerous warnings from the scientific community, which the Cornucopians are determined to ignore. The German military analysts have predicted civilisational collapse in the medium term

http://www.energybulletin.net/stories/2011-06-13/review-bundeswehr-report-peak-oil-section-22-tipping-point-nov-2010

Link to official English translation of whole Bundeswehr report here:

http://baobab2050.org/2011/09/04/bundeswehr-peak-oil-report-now-officially-translated-in-english/

As the report says (p. 91)

"Psychological barriers cause indisputable facts to be blanked out and lead to almost instinctively refusing to look into this difficult subject in detail."

Jeremy Grantham, the expert on commodities, also offers a dose of reality in his firm's newsletters

http://www.gmo.com/websitecontent/JGLetter_ResourceLimitations2_2Q11.pdf

"Anyone who believes you can have infinite exponential growth on a finite planet is either a madman or an economist.” Kenneth Boulding ...

Children believe what they want to believe, and respond with emotion and anger when those beliefs are challenged. Adults face up to reality, even if it is unpleasant or threatens a cherished ideology.

*More like it's been a marathon game of pass-the-parcel between bankers, speculators and governments.*

More like politicians behaving like the mafia, Poirot.

All those mums and dads in Europe lending to banks, who lent
to Govts. The silly assumption was that Govts would actually
pay their debts. How wrong they were.

In typical dismissive arrogant fashion Curmudgeon advises Graham to get out of his ivory tower into the real world.

Never mind that he knows zilch about Graham's life, how he does his research, his private life outside of the academy including any community action groups etc etc that he participates in.

Never mind too that world-wide there are countless thousands of environmental action groups with millions of members, all of whom understand to one degree or another that business as usual is not an option.

Daffy, or would you prefer DD - I was judging Graham by what he wrote, which shows that he knows little about about how the real world operates. His claim was that we are moving away from profits and growth and so on - but even a glance at the real world indicates that we are doing no such thing. The trends and problems are as I pointed out in the original post.

The millions of environmentalists you point to will also be unwilling to trade off income for green advantage - they want the trade off to apply to others, not to them..

Curmudgeon - you are at it again.

You presume to know and state what motivates the actions, and what, if any, changes or life-style sacrifices that millions of environmentalists are prepared to make.

And that they are therefore all calling or proposing that everyone else, other than them, should be forced to change and/or down-size the way in which they live.

Geoff of Perth and Daffy Duck have at least taken a responsible and reasoned approach to the thrust of Graham Harris' article, and I have to concur with most of what they have posted; though I'm not sure I approve of Daffy's "techno-barbarian" barb. I also absolutely agree with Prof. Harris' article, and its message - which demands the most serious attention in its implications for the future of humankind and the world as a whole.

The bias and narrow-mindedness demonstrated by the many contra-thinking 'individualists' on this thread is both illuminating and disturbing. Prior to this I would have been reluctant to accept Graham's postulation of the dimension of the divide between the individualistic and communitarian viewpoints at the base of so much competition within our supposedly advanced and progressive society.

Some have sought to reduce the discussion to an argument against AGW theory, and others simply vie against any intrusion on or threat to their comfortable lifestyle and mindset - and rejecting any possible efficacy of a more environmentally responsible and sustainable future.

Whilst we sit arguing the minutiae, China and much of the developed world is buying up Africa and South America, and investing heavily in the Pacific basin. Therein, there is a move afoot which threatens to make the decimation of the North American indigenous tribes seem like a sunday picnic, but with a difference. The disposession of the native inhabitants of these regions will not be fast, by the bullet, but will be a slow disintegration into poverty, starvation, or a new kind of slavery. And, what will inevitably be the consequences for those environments? I shudder to think; but you may forget about diversity and wildlife.

Though some here may react against the dire possibilities of 'business as usual', we would all be wise to consider the implications of Prof. Harris message, and shake ourselves out of our bliss.

Cheryl,

Don't know where you're at, but get a grip.