"The challenge with any alternative futures lies not in our capacity to imagine alternatives or even our capacity to implement them; no, it lies with those who wish to remain cocooned in the convenient fiction that there is no need to change."

So, can we do it?

As John Töns suggests, lets start sharing ideas. It's about time we got off the negativity train.

Thanks to the author for eloquently cutting through this farcical non-debate about climate change and energy choices.

On energy choices, the bald fact is that energy consumption in our society is doubling every 25 years. In China and India (although they are starting from a very small per capita base) the growth rate is even faster.

We are perversely trying to ignore this bald fact as if building wind farms or nuclear power stations can somehow be a solution.

The bald fact is we are living way beyond our means, and all the argy bargy about energy choices is a cover for the fact we are afraid to address the core of the problem.

If energy usage continues to expand at the current rate, then our choices are not between different energy options, we would have to develop ALL of them, we would have to dam every last creek, we would have to burn all our garbage, cover all our landscapes with wind generators, use every last ounce of uranium... and we still wouldn't have enough.

As an environmentalist I break ranks with many of my colleagues because I believe renewable energy options are only a solution if we first stabilise consumption of energy. It is insanely stupid to build wind farms so that we can power giant plasma televisions and the like, just as it is stupid to do the same with nuclear power.

We need a much more centred debate about how energy fits in with our cultural values.

So thanks again.

A good article John.

I think the main challenge is to organise concern in the community and meld it into a politically powerful force.

There is a large and rapidly growing amount of concern about how horribly out of kilter our current political direction is with sustainability.

We desperately need a sustainability-based party.

The Rudd government is shaping up to be worse than I could have imagined. But maybe this can be a good thing, if it helps galvanise concern in the community about the utter absurdity of even higher immigration, a higher birthrate, and an overall greater rate of human expansion than under Howard.

Thanks John. It's good to see a bit of sanity, after dealing with the contrarians who seem to be so abundant on this site (and on many others of course).

Amen to the need for a new political force.

Just one point. If we choose to change our direction, we are an example to the world. So we *can* play an important role. And of course everyone has to shift, including us. But we can do it because it's good for us anyway, and I think that's your main point.

Mr. Ton's reference to what China is doing should give everyone a good laugh. His opinions are probably sincere and well-meaning, but there is very little, if anything, people can do about climate change. We have to adapt to climate change, not knock ourselves up with naive ideas for stopping climate change.

Ludwig's population comment is the only sensible one, and both major parties are big populaton growth fanatics who will not adopt or even discuss a population policy.

Whatever is foisted on us by ignorant politicians is what will happen - not what OLO posters and contributors say - and it will be a costly dog's breakfast which will make no difference whatsoever during the time we have to wait for the climate to change again.

“Our real challenge lies in developing a 21st century lifestyle that enables us to cope with global warming in a sustainable manner.”

The article is another wasted opportunity.

It is all just window dressing which ignores the elephant in the room.

As Ludwig observed, “Sustainability” is significantly influenced by population numbers.

Maybe we could start with a complete ban on migration and mandatory abortions for women who lack the means to support their “unsustainable” lifestyle and seek public welfare instead.

"Ever wondered what went through the minds of the Easter Islanders as the last tree was cut down?"

Well since the last tree was never cut down, since the claimed total deforestation of Rapa Nui is just another eco-myth, we'll never know what the islanders would have said if what didn't happen had happened.

http://www.americanscientist.org/template/AssetDetail/assetid/53200?fulltext=true&print=yes

I apologise for being one of those contrarian denialists but the facts do matter to some of us. But I understand the warm inner glow some get by genuflecting at the twin gods of Gaia and sustainability.

We are constantly told that our resources are finite. But a resource only becomes a resource when we make it so. Oil was just a sticky gluck that oozed out of the ground until we made it a resource via our ingenuity. And our ingenuity is a truly unlimited resource.

Thought exercise - name three resources we've ever run out of.

You don't run out of resources, they just become less available and vastly more expensive. Who can afford to can survive okay, so long as the economy just not do a complete flip.

As for scaremongering and warm inner glows, we can only afford to hold elitist positions because we are not victims of climate change or oil depletion. Yet.

But please do ask the people of Tuvalu or New Orleans or drought affected Australian farmers, or managers of international insurance companies - or perhaps even the Burmese cyclone victims - about a warm inner glow.

For these people sustainability has become absolutely real.

I don’t want my great-great-grandchildren living as troglodytes!
I would much rather picture them living comfortably: with civilized amenities and assured continuance of them; In a world of rich diversity, with none of the present apartheid which develops according to the accident of where one is born. A world where both competition and co-operation are employed towards genuine progress.
I interpret John’s article as being from a similar standpoint. But I disagree with his “the planet can support all of us provided we recognize its limitations.” The current 6.7 billion can’t be supported at any reasonable lifestyle, other than temporarily. The projected 9 billion – if ever reached – will have even less than reasonable lifestyles, and emphatically be temporary.
“Our real challenge lies in developing a 21st century lifestyle--” John says. But, if we don’t want our progeny to be troglodytes, more – much more – is needed.
A necessary first step is to give women, whatever their social affiliations throughout the world, the right and the necessary education and empowerment to limit their own fertility. As was agreed to by world congress at Cairo in 1994. Unless the brakes are put on the population train, there will be one hell of a thump at the end of the line exiting from our present economic nirvana.
Reducing energy usage by 66 per cent over a five-year period sounds fine, and is probably necessary – energy use is a determinant of consumption of essential environmental resources, and of pollution. But, with population increase (in Australia) jumping from 1.3 per cent last year to now at about 1.9(?) that 66 per cent saving will be diminished to 50 per cent in five years time. In 27 years the population, at present rate of increase, will be 66 per cent larger.
The good work of frugality with energy use is necessary – but should it be directed at no more than enabling more sardines to be squashed into the tin? I want my offspring to have better prospects than sharing a joint in a cave.

mhaze -
Thanks for the Easter Island link. Interesting article. However it was still the people that brought the rats that did the deforestation in this version of the story.

I'll name two things we are running short of that technology has done nothing about.
1. Food. It all comes from other living things, and there is only so much available carbon, and biomass. We just keep diverting more of it to humans, not increasing it. Currently around half the total global photosynthetic product is diverted to humans, and the rest of creation is showing the stress.
2. Fresh, clean water. Cleaned for free by the biosphere, brought to us by a climate system we've adapted our brittle civilisation to.
You can dream about technological solutions to those shortages, but they're not much use to the vast majority of humanity. The survival imperative is to live within the means provided by the planet.

Geoff,

"I'll name two things we are running short of that technology has done nothing about.1. Food...2.water"

Well that just isn't true. The so-called Green Revolution used technology to massively increase food production on the same acreage. Over the coarse of the 20th century, despite the increase in human numbers by some 500% the amount of calories available per person increased by approx 100%. And this was done by technology. And in our time GM foods promise the same level of expansion without placing any further calls on the alleged finite resources of the planet - provided the fear-mongers allow it to.

As to water, well I'd like to see any data that we are running out of it. Of seen lots of predictions about what will happen in the future but Malthusian predictions are invariably astray. And in any case, if it were the case, the technology to resolve that issue is already with us what with desalination and recycling

Mhaze,

Jared Diamond has replied to the paper you cited in a paper published in the magazine Science:

http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/full/317/5845/1692

"This hypothesis does not account for all those palm stumps cut off at the ground and burned, nor for the larger number of palm nuts burned rather than gnawed, nor for the disappearance of the long-lived palm trees themselves (with an estimated life span of up to 2000 years) (16). If rats were responsible, they were unusual ones, equipped with fire and hatchets. Thousands of other Pacific islands overrun by introduced rats were not deforested, and many other tree species that survived on other rat-infested islands disappeared on Easter (16)."

The rats undoubtedly did contribute to environmental damage, as they did on other islands, but people brought them.

It is true that the Green Revolution doubled or in some cases tripled the amount of grain that could be grown from a plot of land, but grain production per person peaked in 1984. It is not clear if the agricultural scientists can pull off a similar feat again, as there are physiological limits. Wheat and chickens are enormously more productive than in 1900, but race horses can't run much faster, and not for want of trying.

Where do you propose to get the energy to run the desalination plants and to pump the water to where it is needed?

MHaze I do agree with your view that “human ingenuity” will prevail.

It is the most underutilised resource we have.

Divergence your question to MHaze “Where do you propose to get the energy to run the desalination plants and to pump the water to where it is needed?”

As you know (or should) it don’t work like that.

What we should support is the sort of social order and government which encourages the innovative mind.

Therefore, government which leaves the “reward” for those who successfully risk and innovative

Is more likely to produce the “silver bullets” to solve present problems and future challenges than

The sort of government which taxes individual reward to fund some kind of “safety-net” for the less innovative.

So that is what I expect of responsible government,

A small, hands off approach, rather than the big-bureaucratic, meddlesome and interfering approach.

The price of equality is mediocrity (both for ourselves and future generations)

mhaze, just to clarify when you say “name 3 resources that “WE’VE” ever run out of,” the “WE” you are talking about are rich people like most of us living in Australia, not poor people. I guess the billion people who don’t have access to clean drinking water would say they have run out of water. When you say “WE” haven’t run out of food, the implication is that as long as you are alive you are getting exactly the kind of food you’d like. Billions might disagree with that.

And to clarify on the definition of resources, are ecosystems a resource? If we lose a hectare of a natural forest or wetland does that count as a resource lost or since we have saved some of it, then it is still okay? If we used to have a million eagles and now we have a thousand, is that a lost resource? If 70% of all the fisheries in the world are overfished, is that a lost resource? If a plant or animal goes extinct, is that a lost resource?

I suppose, though, that the concept of running out of things and what technology will do for us in the future isn’t really that critical. If we try to live more sustainably and we do get a new amazing energy source through improved technology and unlimited human ingenuity, then we would just all be more prosperous than we would have been.

What is our goal as a society? Is it to cram as many humans on to the earth as possible, regardless of their standard of living?

I agree human ingenuity has been remarkable and I think it will continue to solve many problems. I’d just rather see human ingenuity focussed on curing cancer, diabetes, multiple sclerosis; learning how to live together and pulling people out of poverty; rather than trying to figure out how to get more food off the ever-dwindling available farmland, more water out of diminishing available supplies in rivers and groundwater and removing the pollution from our air, water and soils.

Divergence,
Yes I'm aware Diamond responded - he could hardly do otherwise given that his entire premise was based on his (mis)reading of Easter Island. But you should note that there a large number of papers and authors similar to that which I linked - this was just the one I had to hand. And Diamond basically misses the point. Peiser isn't saying that the whole thing is caused by rats, only that they were a major factor. But more importantly, he is refuting Diamond's claim that the society collapsed due to environmental vandalism and this is the point that Diamond avoids. He says agriculture collapsed due to soil loss due to deforestation, and the mounting evidence is contrary to that.

ericc,
I was refering to us - humans, (wo)mankind. Leaving aside the assumption that we are loosing forest coverage (which I'd dispute) I don't think converting a forest to a field is the loss of a resource. If we cut down all the trees then yes, but that patently is not happening. Equally fishing, even alleged overfishing doesn't result in the loss of a resource - only if that resource is exhausted - and that hasn't happened. The logical conclusion to your point would be that converting oxygen to CO2 is a resource lost but I wouldn't hold my breathe on that one.
You ask.."What is our goal as a society?". It is to allow each to live as they like and to provide as much comfort and well-being as possible. Making society wealthier reduces population and the call on resources.It is only, ONLY, wealthy advanced and advancing societies that can address the issues you say should be addressed. Societies worried about where the next meal is coming from tend not to devote resources to the fight against MS.

Let's not get too excited too quickly on desalination plants dotted around the nation.

Our oceans are already trashed by industrial chemicals and the Kwinana desalination plant in WA has been forced to operate at one sixth capacity due to the ocean's low levels of oxygen.

Through the wisdom of our esteemed leaders, this desal. plant was established in the industrial estate of Kwinana - the most polluted area in WA.

http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2008/05/14/2244970.htm

A national survey also revealed that residents of Kwinana/Rockingham have more cancers etc than any other community.

In addition does anyone know how many desalination plants we can afford to construct without affecting marine life?

http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2007/10/26/2070871.htm

http://www.desline.com/articoli/4864.pdf

Posted by mhaze, Tuesday, 20 May 2008 2:12:01 PM

Wind. There are still sailboats despite our love affair of fossil fuel engines.
Solar. Some people heat their houses with nothing other then passively captured solar radiation. The heathens!
Geothermal energy. Curse the New Zealanders, Greenlanders and Danish for using abundant geothermal heat to heat their homes. How dare they!!

Posted by Col Rouge, Wednesday, 21 May 2008 3:22:09 PM

Col, there is plenty of human ingenuity being presented right now to help with various issues brought about by global overpopulation, climate change being one. The problem is the ingenious human solutions keep getting Pooh Poohed! I'm looking at you Col.

T.Sett “The problem is the ingenious human solutions keep getting Pooh Poohed! I'm looking at you Col.”

I suggest you identify which “ingenious human solutions” keep getting pooh-poohed by me.

When you have the grace to specify what I have “solutions” I have supposedly “pooh-poohed” , I will challenge your reasoning

From my post on that day, you might be assuming “big government” will solve anything.

My own opinion and that of many millions of eastern Europeans and Russians, is: big, centralist governmental systems prove they are the worst option for both the people they “govern” and for innovation (too many vested political interests).

but until you are more specific, you leave myself and everyone else to assume you are just expressing the written vent of an empty bucket.

"Thought exercise - name three resources we've ever run out of."

1 Clean air
2 Clean water
3 Clean soil

dickie,

While these things may not exist where you live that's not the same as saying the resource has been exhausted. All three exist where I live - outside the big cities. Just because we no longer mine sandstone in The Rocks doesn't mean we've run out of the stuff.

Besides, it is water that is the resource, and despite the hype we aren't running out of it

On different planets:
mhaze - yes, there is plenty of water indeed. The ocean will never run dry.
dickie - undoubtedly there is a shortage of clean fresh water available for human needs in most parts of the globe. I do confess that there is no shortage of either water or continental space for present human numbers in the Antarctic, but neither are available in the form people would find acceptable.

Mhaze,

Jared Diamond has not conceded that erosion due to deforestation didn't happen. From the paper I cited

"Deforestation also forced changes in horticultural practices (3-6). Easter's early farmers planted crops between the palms, which provided fertilizer, shade, and protection for the soil. In that first phase, erosion was negligible, and horticulture was sustainable (3). Around A.D. 1280, the islanders began felling the palms, removing the trunks (presumably for timber), and burning the debris, as shown by a radiocarbon-dated charcoal layer, burned roots and palm nuts, and burned palm stumps chopped off near the ground, but no large pieces of trunk wood at these sites (3). The loss of the palm canopy exposed soil to heating, drying, wind, and rain. The resulting sheet erosion proceeded uphill at 3 m/year, removing fertile topsoil and burying down-slope settlements and gardens (3). Palm burning and sheet erosion have been studied especially at Poike but also appear elsewhere until A.D. 1520.

Faced with lower crop yields as a result of deforestation, the islanders responded around A.D. 1400 by occupying the formerly little-used uplands, and by introducing the remarkable labor-intensive gardening method of "stone mulching" on a vast scale (3-6). That meant covering half of the island with more than a billion stones averaging 2 kg in weight (6). In experiments, stone mulching decreases soil water evaporation, protects against wind and rain erosion, and reduces daily temperature fluctuations (7). Pulverized stones may also raise soil fertility by slowly releasing nutrients (8). That function would have been valuable, because nutrient levels (especially phosphorus) often limit tropical plant growth. Phosphorus levels in most Easter soils are low today, and the islanders' extermination of former seabird colonies eliminated phosphorus input in guano (9)."

Maybe environmental vandalism does happen, but it is hard for some folk to entertain the idea.

mhaze

Reading between the lines, I think dickie is putting emphasis on *clean* air, water and soil. I know it might seem very esoteric, but she is correct. If where you live you have an abundance of the *clean* elements of life, that is great, savour and respect it – many in the world can’t and don’t.

As far as fish resources go, have you not noticed the *new* fish species in the shops, have you wondered why, and what used to be sold in abundance, is either not there or very expensive?

As far as deforestation and land management practices go. We are ‘taking out’ forests with gay abandon; this is contributing to our escalating GHG emissions. It would not be so bad if we re-plant with trees or other carbon sink resources … but worldwide, we don’t. We plant the deforested areas with corn crops … not to feed people … but to feed the biofuel industry – a ‘dirty’ inefficient fuel that without strict regulation, compounds the problem of pollution and AGW (aerosols and CO2).

And don’t get me started on what the corn/biofuel industry is doing to world grain (resource) prices and the effects that is having on national security.

Deforested areas turned into ‘biofuel silos' change the local weather patterns (exasperating integrity of water supply) and require fertilising by guess what, nitrogen stuff that further compounds our GHG emissions and the run-off nutrients all of which contaminates our water resources.

We are putting huge pressures on our natural resources, we have one planet and it’s your so called wealthy or developed societies that consume and consume … stuff. We need 5 Earths to sustain that kind of consumption. We have to find a better way, don’t you think?

mhaze

I too am from the country but perhaps you don't have pollutant industries in your area.

Presently I'm incarcerated in Perth. When one drives down Albany Highway with the window down (no A/C and the dog likes it), in bumper to bumper traffic - a sea of chaos, stopping, starting and sassin' -"Ah'm from the country, Brother", then that's what I call deprivation of "clean" air. One should resort to a wearing a gas mask.

And if anyone says that vehicular carbon emissions don't heat the atmosphere, they must surely be in La La Land?

I do not know the protocols about making comments about your own article but having read the various comments I think I am justified in clarifying my own position.
Population. Stephen Lincoln in his book Challenged Earth estimates that the global bio capacity per person is 2.1 hectares. In 2006 we were using 2.8 hectares. Hence we are in the middle of our very own tragedy of the commons – he highlights that in the developed world the amount of biocapacity being used ranges from 4.1 hectares per person in France to 10.3 in the USA (we use up 9 hectares.) We face some stark choices – we will need all of our human ingenuity to ensure that future generations can enjoy the benefits of a 21st century lifestyle without living beyond our means.
In developing ideas for the future we need to understand the present. I attempted to move the debate beyond global warming to sound a warning that many of the features that Diamond has found that caused various societies in the past to collapse are present on a global scale. All of the societies he described survived their collapse. The price those societies paid was a severe reduction in population, often civil unrest as well as that each of these societies lost what progress has been made.
How long would any of our cities survive if all transport stopped tomorrow? The fact that this will not happen overnight does not detract from the fact that about 3- 4 billion people on this planet are dependent on food being trucked in. As peak oil begins to bite food will become more and more expensive – does it therefore not make sense that we begin by creating largely self sustainable communities around the globe?

Cont.
Our ingenuity can enable us to have a prosperous future – as long we are mindful of the fact that we will not be able to exercise that ingenuity if all of our energy is devoted to getting the where withal to merely survive. It may well be that those of us who are concerned are unnecessarily worried – that it will not come to that – the cavalry will come at the last moment and save us. But does it not make sense to start shaping a future where we will not need to rely on the cavalry?
For those who argue that we could not possibly afford it then perhaps think on this. The war in Iraq has cost the US three trillion dollars. Those 3 trillion dollars could also have been spent on future proofing the globe – we need to rethink our priorities

Colinsett “but neither are available in the form people would find acceptable.”

Humans are adaptable and the inventive nature of man could reasonably resolve how to make what appears presently un-acceptable, acceptable. After all, Australia 200 years ago was considered fit only for convicts.

Mhaze I agree with you. Some posters here seem to have a vested interest in painting the darkest picture possible, probably the beneficiaries of secure government niches, far away from where real people work.

Col,

I am surprised that you are taking the side of a growthist, as elsewhere you seem to understand very well that an ever increasing population will trash the environment (and also the personal freedom that you value very highly). I was trained as a scientist, and I have worked with a lot of other scientists and engineers who are trying to come up with technological solutions to some of our energy problems. It is extremely difficult, and there are a lot of blind alleys that look promising at first. I haven't ever met a scientist or engineer who was a cornucopian. That seems to be reserved for economists and the like.

Go back to the science fiction and popular science articles of the 1950s and 1960s and see what they were predicting for now: Cure for cancer. The ability to regrow amputated limbs. Colonies, or at least bases, on the moon and Mars. Giant space stations that rotate to simulate gravity. Electricity from nuclear power plants that is too cheap to meter. An end to poverty and hunger. 20 hour work weeks and so much leisure that we won't know what to do with it. The list could go on. (Of course they also had no idea of some of the things we can do. Robert Heinlein had his 24th century people using slide rules.)

To me, our first concern has to be coming to terms with the natural world, which is often intractable and is indifferent to human concerns. Economists often see the world like a picture of Mickey Mouse, with the economy the face and the society and environment the less important ears. Actually they are concentric circles. If you trash your environment you trash your society and economy as well.

Divergence “I am surprised that you are taking the side of a growthist,”

I am taking the side of the individual.

I recognize the “world” has a lot of problems.

I recognize the only way out of them is through the unfettered efforts of individuals, not government.

“It is extremely difficult, and there are a lot of blind alleys that look promising at first.”

Of course but it is only through following them all along that one finds the “openings”

“To me, our first concern has to be coming to terms with the natural world, which is often intractable and is indifferent to human concerns.”

Agree and individuals are a part of that and yes, the “world” does not care.

Economists are theorocrats who cannot agree with one another, let alone find consensus.

A world run by economists would achieve nothing because they are measurers of the activity of others, not the innovators who will produce the solutions.

Ultimately “growth” in the future may well be in life quality terms (which is my primary motivator). The problem is “quality of life” is 90% beyond the realm or reasoning of economists.

Col –

I think that designing society so that the individual is unfettered in his desire to do just about whatever he pleases, should be one of the primary goals of our democracy. I disagree with many of my friends in environmental groups on this. On some issues sustainability and freedom go hand in hand. For example, scrapping the baby bonus would improve freedom by saying that government does not want to encourage or discourage people from having children. That decision is left completely to the individual. Eliminating subsidies to oil, coal and natural gas would balance the playing field for more sustainable sources of energy.

On other issues a strong government is needed.

For example, can we achieve net zero immigration with only the unfettered effort of individuals? If we want individuals from other countries to have those freedoms, then they may say it is only natural that we welcome anybody who wants to come to live in Australia. That kind of individual freedom would see millions of immigrants coming to Australia every year. It seems to me that government must control immigration. No individual effort will be suitable.

Will we protect natural lands from use by private individuals without government? Will we be able to make the best use of water without government intervention? Will individuals pollute the common water, land and air that we all use without government?

Free enterprise has been successful because it is a natural system. If it is run properly, it puts everyone around the table and lets them freely choose the goods and services that they want and the price they are willing to pay. That is the way your brain works. We have been programmed to choose the things that will make us happiest and balance the effort we are willing to expend to get those things, ever since we were babies.

continued

The downside, is that only the people around the table get to bid for the goods and services. Future generations are not around the table bidding, so they don’t get to buy things. We have to buy things for them and then put them aside. We have done that with National Parks, our education, political and justice systems, but we aren’t doing that with oil, natural gas, coal, old growth forests, wetlands, most wild animal habitats, etc.

How can we save things for future generations without government? What ways can unfettered individual effort lead to a world where our descendants have the same advantages as we had?

What would the Easter Islanders have said as the last tree was cut down? Based upon new research, it would have been something like: "Why did we ever allow rats to be introduced to the island?" It seems that exotic rats ate all the young tree seedlings and even seeds before they germinated, resulting in a lack of recruitment to replace the trees that died of old age or were cut down for human usage.
So, while it may have been a human being who cut down the last tree, in fact the trees on Easter Island were doomed once introduced rates became established.
A sober lesson on the dangers of exotic species!

Ericc

I applaud your well balanced and thoughtful posts. Agree entirely.

Cheers

Ericc “On some issues sustainability and freedom go hand in hand.”

Of course ericc. And freedom is a responsibility.

The unfree cannot be held accountable or responsible for anything.

A system which makes the individual responsible for sustainability when he has no freedom of influence is an abomination

Only the individual who can make choice can choose to be sustainable or not.

No freedom, no individual responsibility for sustainability.

The other thing is the market system, despite all its failings, at least adjusts to unsustainable usage (and things get more expensive).

There is always a need for some government, if only to balance the weakness of an individual against strong monopolistic influences and to fund those institutions which cannot be private, such as courts, the military, parliament and elections (not the exhaustive list just a few examples).

But we do not benefit from setting up government monopolies for schools or health or transport or many other things which current governments have a hand in. I believe a plural system is better than a government monopoly system where a desire not to leave everything just to the private system exist.

“Free enterprise has been successful because it is a natural system. If it is run properly,”

Exactly, hence my comments re monopolies

“What ways can unfettered individual effort lead to a world where our descendants have the same advantages as we had?”

Even if we left a world, virgo-intacto, so to speak, who knows what might happen.

I have no desire to deprive my children of a good life and will hopefully leave them with innovations which improve their life quality and recycle and preserve resources, which were not available to me or my parents but I also know my children will take up thier role in the world with the same desire and energy to face the challenge and contribute to humanity’s common constraints and one way of doing that is to be free and responsible for the numbers of children they have (just as their dad has been).

Ericc and Col, yep we need both good government and healthy private enterprise. But how the hell do we get a government that will actually work towards sustainability, before they are shocked by some huge crunch event into doing so?

“…can we achieve net zero immigration with only the unfettered effort of individuals?”

No. Can we achieve it with the current government or the next one when the other half of the brothers grim wins power? Um…no.

“Free enterprise has been successful because it is a natural system”.

Well, it’s been successful in building our nation. But it is still being ‘successful’ in promoting continuous rapid expansionism in an era when it desperately needs to stop….and it is producing enormous resistance to us reaching an end to this insane momentum.

We need a considerably stronger more socialistic government – one that is capable of effectively tempering this expansionistic madness. The balance needs to swing strongly away from power lying with big business and towards power being vested in the community, through their elected representatives who will genuinely place their best interest first.

Or perhaps it will be big business that sees the light first and actually drags our Ruddy government towards a sustainability-oriented path? (mmmMMMMmmm, yes, flying pigs are circling my head!)

Col, you might be interested in this http://forum.onlineopinion.com.au/thread.asp?discussion=1828#36473

Ludwig –

I think a socialist-style government would be a giant step backward. The chances for corruption and inefficiencies are far too great.

I think there are ways that we can be more sustainable with a free market society and a democratically elected parliament. First, we can go to net zero immigration. Second, scrap the baby bonus. Right now "OUR" government is making a conscious effort to increase the population. A socialist government could have exactly the same policies.

We can change the taxation system to reward the consumption of renewable products. Government can purchase a higher recycled content. Governments purchase about a third of the nation's goods and services. If federal, state and local governments all set a policy of using increasingly more renewable energy and recycled materials we would gradually get more sustainable, and gradually produce more efficient markets for the general public. In many cases, government departments are behind private industry in adopting newer recycled products, because nobody in the bureaucracy wants to stick his neck out and buy a different product that wasn’t specified 30 years ago.

I’m not saying it will be easy to make these changes. I’m just saying it will be easier, and we will end up with a better society, than if we get more socialist.

I’m not as pessimistic about big business as you. I don’t think big business is any less enlightened than the man in the street. In many cases, business does lead government. [See Coal miners and Kyoto protocol] I don’t think we should expect business to drag governments kicking and screaming towards sustainability, but we also shouldn’t blame business for holding “OUR” government back. The average voter, radio call back caller and internet poster has to take responsibility, as well.

Fractelle - Thanks for your kind words. - Eric

Ericc, I’m not advocating socialism, as per China. I’m suggesting that a democratic government with a considerably stronger social focus, as compared to an economic or big-business-pandering focus, is what we need. In other words, just a much stronger government of the sort that we have, that actually upholds its basic duty of care to the community, both now and well into the future.

This entails things that you suggest, such as changing our tax system to encourage recycling and the development of renewable energy sources, and generally controlling the business sector, or the profit motive, a whole lot better.

I’m sure there will be a change in the business community, even if our government continues on its current path. But it will only go so far, with large sections still chasing short-term profit and not worrying about the consequences.

“I don’t think big business is any less enlightened than the man in the street.”

No less enlightened, but handicapped by their primary motive of ever-bigger profits for their bigknobs and shareholders.

“The average voter, radio call back caller and internet poster has to take responsibility…”

Absolutely. And they are. Concerns about sustainability, high immigration, oil, water, etc are being voiced more and more. In fact, the message that I’m reading and hearing on OLO, in letters to the editor, and on talk-back radio is by and large similar to our concerns….and at stark odds with the direction that our government is taking us in.

A more socialistic government would for me be one that hears this message from the average person and acts accordingly instead of running with the strongly vested-interest business sector.

Challenging ideas Ludwig.

However, have you not wondered why those (prolific posters) that you have challenged have not engaged in the OLO link you have given?

Col:
"I have no desire to deprive my children of a good life and will hopefully leave them with innovations which improve their life quality and recycle and preserve resources, which were not available to me or my parents but I also know my children will take up thier role in the world with the same desire and energy to face the challenge and contribute to humanity’s common constraints and one way of doing that is to be free and responsible for the numbers of children they have (just as their dad has been)."

Nope, I won't say it.

Nor me.

Ericc “I think a socialist-style government would be a giant step backward.”

Lenin’s words were “communism is the goal of socialism” and even with the most benevolent “socialist” you build up the structures which facilitate the corruption called communism and if you want to see non-sustainable government, look at what happened around the Aral sea to see “environmental degradation" at its worst.

My view to reducing government consumption is simple, make government smaller.

Anyone who thinks adding a bureaucrat to the supply chain makes anything more efficient, effective or sustainable has to first explain who makes the savings needed to feed the bureaucrat.

Ludwig.. I see your thread – I will look maybe contribute there directly later cheers

I can see three truths which needed to be adopted before anyone can suggest a solution to sustainability

1 population numbers are the primary driver

2 individual innovation, in terms of energy sources, recycling, personal lifestyle choices, combined with the reduced demand of fewer people with improve sustainability

3 governments of any hue or persuasion will not improve sustainable living in any way what so ever. All government does is regulate the freedoms and choices of the people who elect them to act, supposedly in their best interests. Anything else is dictatorship and a horror.

Q&A “Nope, I won't say it.”

Good, then we will not be bewildered by its asinine irrelevance

Still waiting for your quotes to my misguided statements or have they become just another fraudulent claim by Q&A

Dickie “Nor me.”

Ahhh, that is 'me', short for “mini me”

Can you list where I have supported cartels dickie or are you still dumb struck as well as being a movie dwarf?