This article is a welcome change of pace and attitude for On Line Opinion. Thankyou. It puts things into perspective to take a deep breath and see how materialistic we are.
The clarification I need is how Shakti will keep us warm on a cold winter's night. It seems we must burn some kind of fuel to do this.

Good article.
Now, sit back and watch OLO's resident dumbnuts and wingbats tear it to shreds.

Ah yes, consider the poor…
equality for all.

Ignore the benefits of industrialization… such as western medicines which have eradicated many “population balancing” diseases and improved birth mortality rates in the third world, as well as the first.

Presume living the lifestyle of an Indian peasant has some benefits… but go try it for a decade before you attempt to impose it upon me.

If you want to improve “the lot of humanity” start by stopping the poor from breeding like rabbits beyond the level of resources they need to exist.

If you want the benefits of modern medicines, modern communications and the freedoms of contemporary society you cannot separate them from the economies of scale which are only possible from modern commerce and modern industry.

Pretending the developed countries are the source of the problem is to ignore the benefits the developed countries have brought to the underdeveloped countries.. like medicine, agricultural productivity, communications, social development … the list is endless

Pretending there is a future in forcing everyone to live like peones and peasants is the sort of stupid fallacy which most “socialist” thinking is based upon.

Interesting .. now wait for the sneering and name calling to start.

Oh .. too late, Q&A already here, the rest of the intolerant team can't be far behind ..

Online Opinion prints far too much of this sort of thing but it is always fun to point out the problems, even if there are some other contributors who cannot believe there can be contrary opinions.
The business about using agricultural land to grow fuel is stupid, I agree but the idea comes from some bizarre union of greens and agricultural interests. End it immediately! We will know when the alleged shortage of fossil fuels has become serious to indulge in that sort of nonsense - it will be when they start exploiting the shale oil deposits in Queensland. As it is the arguments about peak oil - whether its occured, or is some decades away - it bears no relevence to the issue. Only a fringe of peak oilers believe its about any end to energy supplies. To the rest its about short term price changes.
As for a sustainable economy as suggested by this rather odd, fluff-filled article, a few diehards may go to a farm at say, Nimben, and practice something like it but for the economy as a whole its a waste of breath to suggest it. More energy efficiency? Sure! Improved fuel efficiency for cars? Bring it on. Living on a commune and toiling in the fields? Hell would have to freeze over.

Good Lord, this is what passes for intellectual rigor in the environmental movement these days, is it?

It must be intellectual - it uses the word "paradigm" a lot!

It's like being in a timewarp, really: one used to read this sort of fluff in student newspapers all the time in the 70s; but at least then they had the excuse of being stoned out of their gourds.

With all due respect to Vandana Shiva, what is needed are some practical suggestions for getting us on the road to sustainability. Unfortuneately when you start getting into specifics it gets too boring (check the Health care debate in America), and nobody wants to read a boring article with specific ideas for getting sustainable. I assume Vandana's full book has some, but you certainly wouldn't know it by this "edited extract."

I've got a couple but nobody may care. Perhaps Vandana herself is checking up and can comment.

All for Australia. We don't have the right to tell anybody else how to be sustainable. Let's get our ship in order, then we can show by example that living sustainably is the best way. We can't shove sustainability or any policy down another country's throat (not that we have that power anyway).

1. Net zero immigration (easy to do and results obvious).
2. Carbon tax. Low ($20/tonne) to start then building up depending on conditions. Petrol wouldn't even go up by the weekly fluctuations in Sydney (<2%). Electricity up by 3 to 10% depending on peak time or not.
3. Mandatory percentage (3% of total expenditure?) of recycled products for all government purchases or they payinto a federal govt fund that produces renewable energy.
4. 10% of Government vehicles that don't travel long distances (How often does a Sutherland Shire Council vehicle go to Broken Hill?) must be electric powered. % to increase every year.
5. Slow increase of total renewable energy generation from 2% to 5% over the next 8 years.

What else can we do that is practical that would get us sustainable? I hope Vandana Shiva is checking

"Climate chaos, brutal economic inequality, and social disintegration are jointly pushing human communities to the brink. We can either let the processes of destruction, disintegration, and extermination continue unchallenged..." etc, etc, etc...

Isn't it just a little surprising to you that while all this has been going on we have been able to support the largest human population on earth ever, increase life expectancy worldwide, lift billions of people out of poverty, and produce a happy and productive society, led by a West in where crippling ill-paid work has been largely outlawed, and most people can look forward to a long and satisfying old age? But that's OK -- never let the facts get in the way of a good old rant.

Well said clownfish (and thank you for the recent reminder of the great works of the people's poet.)

Well said Jon J.

Q&A, so much for me thinking you were a scientist.

If this article is meant to be satirical, it is genius - Trey Parker and Matt Stone could incorporate the meaningless waffle into one of their scripts, although, I confess to stopping half way through - I had to go outside for a breath of reality.

Jon J,

A graph of human wellbeing against time tends to look like a rollercoaster, not a steeply rising curve. There are big jumps in prosperity when important technological advances occur, more productive new crops are introduced, or the number of human competitors are drastically reduced, as with the Black Death. After one of these peaks, there is then a slow decline back into misery, as mismanagement occurs and the number of mouths expands to consume the resources available. See, for example, what happened to real wages in Europe between the Black Death and the Industrial Revolution.

http://www.paolomalanima.it/default_file/Articles/Wages_%20Productivity.pdf

http://www.ata.boun.edu.tr/faculty/sevket%20pamuk/publications/pamuk-black_death-final.pdf

Average heights also decreased over this period, a sure indicator of malnutrition during childhood.

http://researchnews.osu.edu/archive/medimen.htm

No doubt the folk back in 1420 also thought that the prosperity would go on forever, just like you.

If everything is so rosy, why is the UN Food and Agriculture Organisation saying that there are more hungry people in the world, in both absolute and relative terms? Why are world grain stocks at their lowest level in more than 40 years?

http://www.fao.org/fileadmin/user_upload/newsroom/docs/Press%20release%20june-en.pdf

So some think that Vandava can be dismissed as a nit-wit dreamer.
All I can say is check out her CV on Wiki---very impressive indeed.

She also won an Alternative Nobel Peace Prize for her advocacy of the small is beautiful alternatives to the dominant inherently destructive paradigm of more and always bigger---a system in which EVERYONE loses, including the so called winners.

Col
I think you are misinterpreting what Vandana Shiva's article is all about.

rpg
So, you have nothing to say about the article - are we to assume you concur with the author?

Mark
<< The business about using agricultural land to grow fuel is stupid, I agree but the idea comes from some bizarre union of greens and agricultural interests. End it immediately! We will know when the alleged shortage of fossil fuels has become serious to indulge in that sort of nonsense ...>>

Hmmm
Were you aware that the Bush Administration was subsidising some South American countries to adopt policies to clear rainforests and plant corn crops? This was not done for food production but for feedstock to the US biofuel industry. It turns out that to fuel the US transportation sector alone requires an area the size of India. Somehow, I don't think George W and Co were all that "green".

Canada is already doing the tar sands and shale oil thing - do they know something the rest don't?

Clownfish
Could it be that Shiva is just trying to impress on people that we (all of us) have to find better ways of doing things? Or that we shouldn't be taking the same actions that have caused so many problems in the first place - you know, business as usual?

Jon J
We have some very serious global issues to deal with, we have to take our blinkers off - there is no magic pudding.

Fungo
Our problems are not about the science, really. It is about ideology, economics and socio-cultural differences - but you knew that. I'm bemused why Col hasn't brought forth his "socialism by stealth" mantra - maybe we can tease it out of him :)

Ho Hum and others
Some think that by adopting better ways of doing things means we are going to live like neanderthals again - these people lack vision, ingenuity and creativity. They have their head buried in the sand and their feet stuck in the mud.

Yaaaaaawn!

Q&A .. just because I do not pass positive or negative comment on the article does not mean I agree or disagree, I merely find the article "interesting".

I see that does not meet your approval, you will have to live with the fact your bullying has no effect in this case.

I do find your latest attempt at censorship dreary though, even before people post you proclaim anyone who dares to disagree as .. what was it, dumbnuts and wingbats .. exercising your scientific tolerance again were you?

Clearly you are not as open minded as you try to portray, your attitude precedes you.

rpg

Yep, my attitude is close minded to dumbnuts and wingbats - some of who replied on cue to an obvious provocative taunt - well done.

Scientists have been the brunt of bullying from those who feel their comfort zone is threatened.

I use a pseudonym so that I can freely express my opinion without the likes of you sending me hate mail or abusive phone calls (at work or at home) - my family and I have suffered because of the delusions of dumbnuts and wingbats.

You don't like it - tuff titties.

Q&A, Shirley MacLaine and Deepak Chopra want us to do things differently, too; that doesn't make their bullsh!t any more profound.

Finding better ways of doing things is all fine and dandy, but this is the sort of fluff that only seems to impress the sort of people like Mrs. Costanza from "Seinfeld", who think that something can only be truly wise if it's said by someone foreign, preferably Asiatic. If they're peasant-like, even better!

"I thought I was gettin' advice from a Chinese woman!! She's not Chinese; I was duped!! I'm not taking advice from some girl from Long Island!!"

"my attitude is close minded to dumbnuts and wingbats - some of who replied on cue to an obvious provocative taunt - well done."

Cheap thrills, Quacko.

Q&A, I'm sorry to hear your personal life has been troubled by reactions to your intolerance and provocative behavior.

No one should have to go through that.

It's unheard of in the engineering world, but then we deal with facts and are not morally challenged as to ego, grants and tenure.

Some people just seem to be slow learners as to cause and effect.

Good luck with that scientific open mind thing.

While I long for the Beyond Zero Emissions 10 year plan off fossil fuels to be enacted immediately, I can't help but disagree with some of the sentiments above as tarnishing green energy with hippie philosophy?

"A renewable-energy economy will only be built through the renewable energy of free and self-organised citizens and communities."

So China is not currently MANDATING from the top-down some of the largest wind farms and THE largest hydro dam in the world? In many ways I think China will adapt to peak oil faster and better than we will simply BECAUSE it can COMMAND certain things to happen, NOW, and projects will not get stuck in endless COAG meetings.

EG: Can we all say "Murray-Darling?"

I don't really care if the world leaves fossil fuels bottom-up or top-down, as long as it does so. I think we need activism in both areas.

Yes rpg, I am intolerant to dumbnuts and wingbats, but as we have seen, some are tolerant (fungo, Col and the Dalai Lama come to mind).

My other undergrad was chem eng, so I understand where you are coming from. I would assert that engineers have as much ego as scientists, and it is sheer folly (for wont of a better word) to imply scientists don't deal with facts.

I agree, some people just seem to be slow learners as to cause and effect.

Oh yeah, that "open mind thing" ... it goes both ways - but the dumbnuts and wingbats can't see that.

"Open your mind too much and your brains will fall out." - someone said it

Yep, this piece is "too hippie" even for me, and I'm a New Urbanist committed to fighting overpopulation, peak oil, global warming, biodiversity loss, "peak everything" and acting for general sustainability.

But as I said, if China can legislate more renewable energy than Western Countries can, then why does it have to be back to voluntary communities? Many voluntary communities, pardon the technical language, "suck!" Do you want us to wait for your redneck hillbilly gun-toting tobacco chewing Moose shooting Sarah Palin & Joe Sixpack types to deal with climate change VOLUNTARILY!?

I'm sorry, but that's just too much pipe weed, can I have some? ;-)

Or are we going to wait for the "people's choice" of the so called "free energy market" to decide to fix it for us? Oh, that's right, with all the disgusting subsidies to the fossil fuel giants I don't know who still really thinks there IS such a thing as the free energy market!

Or are you just like "Neil" off the 1980's "Young Ones" saying, "Yeah, lets all go live in a teepee!" Broomshanka!

Sorry, I'm a greenie. I want the world off fossil fuels and in particular, off oil.

I want worldwide adequate standards of living to enable "the demographic transition"... which results in empowered educated women that generally have careers, a say in society, and *less children*.

I want "bright green" cities that are beautiful, modern, but *more* (not completely) car free, with highly disciplined use of motor vehicles.

But the only way we're going to save species and the planet is through a "bright green" Industrial ecosystem, NOT through everyone reverting to hunter-gatherer lifestyles where we'd wipe out entire ecosystems, still not have enough to eat, and finally just dieoff.

Ain't gonna happen!

Eclipse Now, your seeming admiration for the Chinese dictatorship's ability to "get things done", as it were, sends shudders down my spine.

Read a political history of the 1920s: a great many people were tired of democracy's seeming inefficiency and paralysis, and greatly admired the new political movement, fascism, and its abilitiy to "get things done".

Even in Australia.

Prominent conservative politician Sir Wilfred Kent Hughes declared that Fascism was the "spirit of the age", and publicly proclaimed his admiration for fascism, in articles written for the Sun newspaper, with such titles as "Why I am a Fascist" and who declared "I am a Fascist without a shirt". Kent Hughes was no fringe looney either; he went on to be a founding light of the Liberal Party, and a minister in the Menzies cabinet.

So, the next time you grow tired of democracy, and voluntary communities' ability to "get things done", think for a moment about the alternatives.

Clownfish

Things have moved on since 1920, the rest of the world acknowledges this.

Sure, there are political, economic and socio-cultural differences in adrressing the issues of climate change, but they must be addressed.

It may be provocative, but the dumbnuts and wingbats do not want to address these issues ... they don't even want to acknowledge there is an issue.

Fwiw, China is doing far more to adapt to climate change and mitigate GHG emissions than we are, notwithstanding their sheer numbers make this task difficult. China knows this, as does the US Administration.

India is another story.

You're a numbnut.

Q&A, when I read some of the material written on this forum by what I would generalise as "the Climate lobby", and by groups such as Sustainable Population, I really wonder if some people have learnt any lessons for the past.

As much as it galls me to agree with John Howard on anything, he was spot on, a few days ago, in pointing to the absolute inability on the part of the media in general, and the ABC in particular, to countenance any view that diverges in any way from what is to all intents and purposes the dogma of the Climate lobby.

I particularly recall a debate broadcast on the ABC early this year, "That climate change is the only issue". Less than half, but a sizeable portion still, of the audience disagreed. Exact numbers elude me, but 20% or 40% rings a bell.

What really chilled me, though, was the statement from a listener: "Who are these (40?)%? We must seek them out. They need to be re-educated."

This is the language of the gulag, not democratic debate.

Similarly, when I see spokespeople for Sustainable Population (and I must say that I *generally* sympathise with their aim) openly promoting one-child policies and radical reductions in population, I also get nervous.

What people need to learn from the Dark Valley of the 1920s and 30s is not such trite assertions as the monstrosity of the Hitlers and Mussolinis, but the extraordinary level of popular support they and their philosophies enjoyed in the Western world.

Because they were seen as decisive leaders able to tackle the pressing emergencies of the day by fiat, and dictate those necessary reforms that tired, inefficient democracies were unable to.

Clownfish, some good points - but it's late.

Q&A “Yes rpg, I am intolerant to dumbnuts and wingbats, but as we have seen, some are tolerant (fungo, Col and the Dalai Lama come to mind).”

Don’t worry Q&A, unlike you, I will remain am open minded about the knuckle dragging obsessive rants of the likes of Q&A and others poised, with mouths open and ready, to suck in the tax-payer funded grants and largesse expected by the priests of the climate change fraud.

Q&A exemplifies the notion that a fool demonstrates his stupidity by his words.

Q&A, your lack of intellectual prowess or rigor is confirmed by your bullying attitude, intolerance and contempt for those who happen to disagree with you.

Rather than challenge their view you automatically go straight to being .. as you have confessed here “intolerant”

Your self confessed absence of tolerance speaks volumes about your lack of values, absence of ethics and your inability to hold your own position in a debate (basically you are a first round knock down and out)..

I guess on the plus side you are at least a constant….

Constantly intolerant
Constantly wrong
Constantly a legend in your own lunchtime

Some things never change
Q&A is one of them… aspiring to position and authority above his actual achievement or worthiness.

rpg… I loved your post (Thursday, 6 August 2009 10:37:05 AM).. quotable stuff…

And I still don't think aspiring to the lifestyle of an Indian peasant is the way I want to go.

Some of us achieve better by our own efforts..

Not sure about Q&A though...

He seems to work best when it is someone elses "effort"...

Clownfish

The implication that there's an analogy between religious dogma and 'climate science' is a distortion.

There are fundamentalist extremists on both sides of the climate conundrum, however, science is not a religion (contrary to what many so called ‘denialists’ assert). Therefore the analogy is moot – but this does not stop the claim being made.

You may agree with Howard’s opinion, I do not. The media are just reporting on the weight of evidence - there is far more published research, reports and press releases that give credence to AGW than do not. The 'sceptical' ones that do make it through are very likely to have been sourced from an ideological perspective.

If anything, I would say genuine investigative journalists (not media shock-jocks or ideologically challenged popular columnists/bloggers) are out there questioning the science. They just haven’t found anything to seriously dent the evidence, yet. They certainly will get much kudos, cap feathers, awards and financial security if they can give weight to debunking AGW, or exposing a worldwide conspiracy theory – and all power to them if they do.

I did not see that ABC debate, but let’s be brutally honest here. If the worst of the IPCC projections are correct (I am not saying they are, by the way), societies around the world are in for some very nasty surprises (regardless of what any ABC audience poll says) – the world’s leaders know this and are trying to develop policies accordingly. Again, AGW ‘alarmists’ need to get off their cloud, and ‘deniers’ need to extract their heads from the sand, their feet from the mud ... a less severe IPCC projection is bad enough.

Education is important (not "re-education" and all that implies) – but tell me Clownfish, how do you propose that be done, particularly with respect to the very real threats posed by global warming?

Do you get nervous about countries like China “promoting” one-child policies?

One thing is certain; we do need real leaders to guide us through increasingly troubled times.

_____

Col,

I am intolerant of misguided fools all the more.