Yabby, you have no fight with me over population control, so please don't try to make one.

Keep that one for the xtians and others on OLO who feel the need to keep rooting-for-gods.

As for this, "*And yes, on the aircons and bike riding.* TBC, I'm not sure what you mean there. So would you ban air conditioners and enforce bike riding by law? "

No, I was merely agreeing with you that there are calls to ban airconditioning, which is a mixed bag as far as I can see. There is no excuse to design and build a modern workaday building in Australia, for instance, with airconditioning, but I can think of many poorly designed buildings, our local hospital for instance, where to withdraw that machine would be to go back 50 years for no good result.

As for riding a bike, no, I would not 'require' it at all but I would make it easier to undertake, as I am engaged in now, so more can safely cycle for a variety of good reasons, and purposes.

I'd take a softpower approach, not a head-on assault.

And... "if it crashes a bit earlier or a bit later, hardly
matters in the bigger scheme of things", that's true, and Stern really doesn't care if the world goes to Hell in a hand basket now, and in fact, that does not really matter either, but it might be a bit sad for people who hope to populate the Earth for a while yet, on the surface and not living a Dr Who existence in underground vaults, evolving into blind moles....part 2 ahead...

Part 2

But in the scheme of things, if one does not believe there is a 'god given purpose' to life, then yes, it really does not matter whether we are here or not, today, tomorrow, the next day or hereafter.

Runner et al., might disagree, and I would prefer to see us 'keeping on', but only due to my irrational and silly attraction to my life so far, not because I think the cosmos needs humans, or that we serve any useful purpose in the non-scheme of life.

Life, after all, is but a hobby: something to do between birth and death. It serves no other useful function. Along with the entire human race.

*Keep that one for the xtians and others on OLO who feel the need to keep rooting-for-gods.*

TBC, I am not trying to convince you that it is a problem. I am
trying to convince you that whilst it is a problem, all your
peddling and frugal living, frankly won't make much difference,
when it comes to the future of humanity. Apart from making you
feel good, of course.

Now lets take Grim's philosophy. We'll go and deal with that evil
Mr Gates, confiscate 20 billion $ of his wealth and send the poorest
1 billion people a cheque for 20$ each. What would happen in the
real world? 20$ would buy them quite a bit of food each, they
would live it up, who can blame them? They'd all have sex as humans
passed puberty are genetically programmed to do, most don't have access
to family planning, so your net result would be even more poor
people to feed next year! Grim might feel better about having ripped
off that evil Mr Gates, but we have a larger problem then we started
with. So my point is, we have to separate feelgood solutions from
those which actually make a difference.

*I would not 'require' it at all but I would make it easier to undertake*

Well there we agree. Encourage people by all means, but I have a real
problem with those control freaks who want to compel people to follow
their agenda by law, no matter how nutty the concept.

I bought an LED tv this year and I admit, I really enjoy it. Now
in other ways I live quite frugally, far more frugally then I could
afford, despite being one of those "evil capitalists". My point
is, if Poirot or others can show me how humanity will survive if
I give it up tomorrow, I will take notice. So far, they have done
no such thing, other then provide feelgood solutions, whilst largely
ignoring the 250'000 extra mouths to feed on our planet, every time
the sun rises.

> I don't know what a "Marxist" is, I mean apart from the bogey-man you're so eager to invoke.

Strike one. assuming bad faith; mind-reading.

>… Marx was charismatic, you say? … Can you elaborate on his charisma please?

I said his writing is charismatic; the man himself was a curmudgeon.

I think his charisma is that, if one has *not* read the refutations of his theory, it seems at first persuasive.

>Point 1:
Yes I am genuinely eager to learn, even to be corrected; though please bear in mind that I have not spoken of alternatives, indeed I've admitted to not having one. The socialist alternative you (hysterically)

Strike two. Personal insult; suggesting psychological disorder

>allude to consists only in your presumptive imagination.

>The only claim I've made is that capitalism is unsustainable and unethical.

Well even if it is, if there’s no alternative, what is the relevance in practice?

>I am happy to defend these propositions. Can you please elaborate on the circularity of my argument?

Yes. I said you have assumed but not established that capitalism involves endless growth on a finite base. To which you replied that you haven’t assumed it; it just *is*. That is circular.

>Point 2: First of all I refer you to your own posts; can you defend them as anything more than inflamatory diatribe?

Strike three: personal insult; assuming bad faith.

> I agree, however, no dirty tricks(?).

So what happened? Unaware of doing it? Just can’t help yourself?

It’s not enough to *disagree* with my arguments; you need to be able to *refute* them.

> Please enlighten me where I've got it wrong?

Where you’ve got it wrong is
a) capitalism is keeping alive and healthy many millions of people who in traditional societies died, usually in infancy, or in socialist societies died, mostly by starvation from politically-caused famines.

(cont.)

b) If you do not or cannot propose any alternative to capitalism, then your opinion that it is unsustainable or unethical is irrelevant for all practical purposes.
c) To say that it is unethical when there is no alternative in practice, is to say that human society itself is unethical. But ethics has no other origin or purpose than in human society. So if your opinion comes to: human society is unethical but there’s no alternative, that opinion also is irrelevant for all practical purposes.
d) It is therefore also irrelevant in theory, because ethics concerns human action.
e) So far as the alleged unsustainability of capitalism comes from the tendency of human beings, like all living things, to seek vitality and reproduction, then your argument is with human life, not capitalism per se.
f) You rightly admit to having no alternative. Consistent with avoiding mass starvation, there is none.
g) Any notional alternative must either provide for the same human demands for food, clothing, shelter, transport, medicines, communications, entertainment etc., or not.
h) If it does not, ie if it contemplates large numbers of people should just die or sicken by political decision, then that is not morally superior to capitalism.
i) If it does try to provide for the same human wants, but without private ownership of the means of production, it *cannot* do so as economically as capitalism because of the economic calculation problem that Mises pointed out. It will lack the means of economic calculation, which require prices, which require markets, which require private ownership of the mean of production.
j) Therefore any alternative that does not retain the core capitalist institution of private ownership of capital will necessarily use *more* natural resources, other things being equal, and therefore be more unsustainable, in your terms.
k) It will also have to substitute the initiation of aggression rather than peaceful exchange based on private property, as the basis of social co-operation, and therefore will be more unethical.

Dear TBC,
thanks for providing those links to the work of Tim Jackson; they make me feel utterly vindicated in the stance I've adopted above. Since he elaborates the prognosis I've been making, I'm now keen to look at his idea of a cure.
On the question of "does capitalism drive climate change"; the answer could possibly be that once the capitalist culture reaches a state of unsustainable glut, population growth stabalises. This is not good enough as that concomitant state of glut and tailoring off population growth means that "vital" economic growth must go elsewhere, like raising disadvantaged populations to the same unsustainable levels. We know this to be a material impossibility, but even if it were achievable, the same problem of supply outstripping demand would inevitably apply.
Thanks again, I hope the other posters will check out the links.