Curmudgeon I do believe you are sincere when you say you cannot see that anything needs to change so there is nothing more to say. There are a great deal of very good articles 'out there' in all the respected US and UK news and magazine sources. It would say a lot about your ability to have an objective opinion if you have failed to read any of these critiques.

It does seem dismissive and patronising of you to suggest that all the critiques of capitalism as an economic system add up to, "I don't like it because some people are richer than me".

An amusing riposte? Perhaps, but I saw it as your brain reassuring you that you are a righteous and valuable member of 'the good tribe'.

Read something funny and applicable here I think. "I came prepared for a battle of wits but you appear to be unarmed".

Carry on boys.

The author may not have put the case very well, but can we extend our vision to a future which may only be a mere figment of that which we now enjoy - if we just keep enjoying regardless of the potential consequences? No set timetable, just the future.

Looking at basics, ours and the planet's future will require clean air, water, food, energy and materials, hopefully in an harmonious balance. Food and materials availability will continue to rely on abundant energy, and clean air and water on an absence of irreversible destructive pollution. Are there any challenges to ensure a viable and enjoyable future for all?

Perhaps this is a perception issue, but, doomsday prophecies aside, are there things we could and should be doing better or differently now?

Energy may be abundant now, but its extraction and transport is at ever increasing environmental risk - save for solar, wind and even coal. Eventually 'sustainable' or nuclear will remain our only reliable options - unless you believe in technological fairy tales. But, we remain reluctant to embrace renewables, though at some stage oil and diesel will have to be produced almost exclusively using plants or algae, for example. We may similarly be forced to reduce our greenhouse gas emissions, but remain hesitant to act voluntarily.

I can see a future where we all wear the same clothes, where only businesses can run vehicles and nearly all private travel will be by public transport, where air travel will be an absolute luxury, and most people will live in modular accommodation, and arable land will be held only in a public/private partnership. Civil liberties will be severely restricted, work mandatory, and child rearing allocated by ballot or screening. We could avoid the worst if we were to reduce our excesses now, but of course, we are only 'human'.

Peter McMahon like most of the AGW alarmists are limited by their own lack of imagination and resolve.

Our humanity has achieved incredible advances in the last 150 yrs.The Universe is a lot bigger than Peter McMahon's imagination and most of our can do nothings,who want to oppress our humanity with visions of poverty.

Very cogent, well argued and rational article!
We certainly cannot continue with an economic growth model, that relies on endless population growth, or a highly flawed one that just widens the gap between the haves and the have nots! All while shrinking the actual haves and exponentially growing the have nots!
Part of the reason we are in so much difficulty, is the change in the share/stock market?
In its original conception, people bought and sold shares to share the risk; and generate income from dividends, rather than capital gains!
More investment, less gambling!
More inherent integrity and deals settled with a handshake, less ponzi schemes and or vastly overvalued over-leveraged assets!
Stock markets that were not massively manipulated by complex computer programs, that all but steal mum and dad investors' nest eggs!
We are in an economic train, the metaphorical driver dead at the controls; and, one that seems to be accelerating toward a economic cliff!
The light at the end of the tunnel could be the economic train wreck heading in our direction!
What to do?
Well casting your biblical pearls before biblical swine is not one of them?
What should happen is Romney wins the US elections, and then as he has promised, reduce tax and massively increase spending. Ditto Abbott! [The Regan formula?]
Forget the maths, they don't matter, after all, it's other poeples' money, and the real name of the real game is the wielding of power, for its own sake!?
As expected and predicted, when formerly well-to-do find themselves penniless and roaming the woods/streets, searching for shelter and food/handouts, in significant numbers!
We might finally see a genuine mood for real change, kick started by the occupy wall street movement!
The poor already quite massively outnumber the better off. And if they simply had the smarts to stop listening to the BS, organise and vote as a block, they could usher in/engineer massive changes and or reform/bloodless revolution.
Leaving the Lunatics in charge of the asylum, is not an option, nor is doing what you've always done, all while expecting a different outcome!
Rhrosty.

A very well-intentioned piece that deserves better than the cheap shots fires on the first page of comments, which are a clear example of the truth of the writer's assertion that right-wing media barons have successfully dumbed down the majority of the population.
The suggestion that...'the key to using communications technologies effectively and changing our lives generally lies in changed perceptions of what really matters.' is what wise men have been urging us to do for at least two hundred thousand years - but few agree on what matters. Surveys show that this current model of civilization has not made most people healthier, happier, or more contented.
It's obvious that we're in dire straits with climate change, increasing pollution, running out of food and water... but only Rhosty mentions population control. Just as we can't expect the planet to provide the resources for an ever expanding economy, so it also can't provide space for an ever increasing population without hastening the eventual catastrophic collapse of civilization.
The proposed 'solution' to the problems facing us is a nice idea, but humans are just animals with a brain that can imagine and invent. We haven't escaped our evolutionary instincts, and they're what will destroy us. I don't imagine any other life form will mourn our passing any more than humans regtretted the elimination of plague from their cities.

God what a bunch!

Molly I think you'll find Curmudgeon has read somewhat more deeply then a few "respected magazines", of the type you would read. Propaganda Mags are not his style.

Saltpetre an old cliche I know, but as they say, the stone age did not end because they ran out of stones. I realise you may be too pessimistic to believe it, but the same will apply to the hydrocarbon age. Once we no longer use them, we may have to find another way of augmenting CO2, as it will be needed to promote plant growth.

Rhrosty I hope you're right about Romney. If you are the US will come roaring back, harvesting it's resources, generating so much wealth even the poor will be happy again. Just getting rid of Obama's crony capitalism, & his radical greeny stupidity will fix most of the US poverty.

Ygbirp I agree we should stop population growth. But then we should stop wasting taxes on people like this author, & get rid of the global warming scam & lock up the promoters of the scam. Then we might even be able to make you pessimists happy. I doubt it, but there is a small chance.