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This is good news. Economic growth has an inverse relationship with sustainability. In the natural world we see ecosystems that exist in balanced cycles of equ
by crimsonalucard 11y ago
This is good news. Economic growth has an inverse relationship with sustainability.
In the natural world we see ecosystems that exist in balanced cycles of equilibrium because the ecosystems that consume unsustainably have destroyed themselves. Natural selection selects that which is stable over that which is fit.
Modern civilization is an unsustainable ecosystem. It will not last and it will eventually be selected for self termination.
What will be left in the end are societies that do not grow but remain in equilibrium with the natural world. Keep in mind that we as modern humans living in a modern civilization are use to continuos compounding economic growth. The reality of the world is that growth is actually a temporary and very unnatural anomaly. The true state of the world is one of zero growth and total equilibrium.
The final question is, are we living in a sustainable society today? Or at least will the society we live in today be able to transform itself into a sustainable civilization before it inevitably self terminates as a result of uncontrollable growth?
- smaddox 11y agos/equilibrium/steady state/g Equilibrium and steady state are two very different things. Strictly, the path we eventually want to tread is not even steady state, since internal variables can change dramatically (e.g. switching from fossil fuels to nuclear/solar/wind). Only the large-scale metrics need to be steady state. To give an analogy, the earth's climate is far from equilibrium (same temperature everywhere), but it is fairly close to steady state (same average temperature over long periods of time).