4 ms·

Strongly endorsed for middle/high schoolers introduction. I read it last year and thought it was a good introduction but will feel a little simple for the HN cr

Strongly endorsed for middle/high schoolers introduction. I read it last year and thought it was a good introduction but will feel a little simple for the HN crowd. Most of the value is in The Appendix followed by Chapters 1, 2 and 6, so you could even shorten it more. My only caveat is there's a lot of degrowther propaganda in it that you would need to caution the kids against

bmitc 2y ago
> degrowther propaganda What do you mean by that?
- MarkusQ 2y ago
  The whole book is an argument against growth (cf the title). More specifically, all the models implicitly assume that rising costs will never reduce demand (and thus consumption), drive the search for alternatives, or make increased efficiency economically viable. It like writing a book called "The limits to driving" and showing that pretty much every car on the road will quickly smash into something if the drivers are assumed to continue accelerating in their present direction, and no one is going to use their steering wheel or breaks effectively.
  - Jtsummers 2y ago
    This particular subthread is about the book Thinking in Systems, not The Limits to Growth. While related, they are not the same book.
    - MarkusQ 2y ago
      My bad. Thank you for the correction.
  - whilenot-dev 2y ago
    Thinking in Systems: A Primer is an introduction into systems thinking, about stocks (resources), flows (actions) and feedback loops. The book isn't an argument against growth, but an argument for the sustainability of systems, especially how to think about and model them. The boundaries of a modelled system are purely conceptional and won't exist in the real world like we'd wrongly assume, D. Meadows makes this more than clear. I think @arthurjj is reading something into it that just isn't there.
    - MarkusQ 2y ago
      Ah. Thank you. I misread the thread.
  - schiffern 2y ago
    *brakes. Freudian slip much? ;) If you're curious, Meadows has addresses this common counterargument about price (time stamp directly to the relevant remark, but the whole talk is excellent): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HuIoego-xVc&t=614s https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HuIoego-xVc&t=614s
- arthurjj 2y ago
  I don't have a copy in front of me but throughout the book there are many comments made against modern society and some of the examples that she gives are clearly 'set up' to be against growth. I didn't realize she also wrote Limits to Growth and according to wikipedia, used some of that work and was edited by an org called the Sustainability Institute which explains it. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thinking_In_Systems%3A_A_Primer https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thinking_In_Systems%3A_A_Prime...
  - whilenot-dev 2y ago
    You seem to conflate the term sustainability with "degrowth" which is just not the case in the book Thinking in Systems. I'm really curious where you picked that up from? In fact, a non-sustainable system is a system that is very far from any growth because it is about to collapse - only a sustainable system is able to grow, natural and artifical alike.
  - bmitc 2y ago
    But propaganda? What is the agenda, then, and what would be obtained through that agenda? There are very clear issues in both society and the environment that are both directly and indirectly caused by the obsession with growth.
_Algernon_ 2y ago
I think that when trying to determine what is propaganda, all else being equal, a good rule of thumb is that the messaging in support of the prevailing system is more likely to be propaganda than the messaging against it. This is due to the simple fact that the prevailing system (in this case growth focus / capitalism) has all societal institutions built to support it.
- _DeadFred_ 2y ago
  Hard disagree. Just because people reached a consensus on something doesn't then mean talking about that something is propaganda. Is all talk about modern medicine propaganda? All talk/technology that uses AC electrics over DC? In the modern world it seems like EVERY discussion is 'why XYZ is wrong' and there is zero defense/explanation of how/why we reached/settled on XYZ (current norms) in those discussion, just attempts to discredit xyz/norms.

bmitc 2y ago

> degrowther propaganda What do you mean by that?

MarkusQ 2y ago
The whole book is an argument against growth (cf the title). More specifically, all the models implicitly assume that rising costs will never reduce demand (and thus consumption), drive the search for alternatives, or make increased efficiency economically viable. It like writing a book called "The limits to driving" and showing that pretty much every car on the road will quickly smash into something if the drivers are assumed to continue accelerating in their present direction, and no one is going to use their steering wheel or breaks effectively.
- Jtsummers 2y ago
  This particular subthread is about the book Thinking in Systems, not The Limits to Growth. While related, they are not the same book.
  - MarkusQ 2y ago
    My bad. Thank you for the correction.
- whilenot-dev 2y ago
  Thinking in Systems: A Primer is an introduction into systems thinking, about stocks (resources), flows (actions) and feedback loops. The book isn't an argument against growth, but an argument for the sustainability of systems, especially how to think about and model them. The boundaries of a modelled system are purely conceptional and won't exist in the real world like we'd wrongly assume, D. Meadows makes this more than clear. I think @arthurjj is reading something into it that just isn't there.
  - MarkusQ 2y ago
    Ah. Thank you. I misread the thread.
- schiffern 2y ago
  *brakes. Freudian slip much? ;) If you're curious, Meadows has addresses this common counterargument about price (time stamp directly to the relevant remark, but the whole talk is excellent): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HuIoego-xVc&t=614s https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HuIoego-xVc&t=614s
arthurjj 2y ago
I don't have a copy in front of me but throughout the book there are many comments made against modern society and some of the examples that she gives are clearly 'set up' to be against growth. I didn't realize she also wrote Limits to Growth and according to wikipedia, used some of that work and was edited by an org called the Sustainability Institute which explains it. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thinking_In_Systems%3A_A_Primer https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thinking_In_Systems%3A_A_Prime...
- whilenot-dev 2y ago
  You seem to conflate the term sustainability with "degrowth" which is just not the case in the book Thinking in Systems. I'm really curious where you picked that up from? In fact, a non-sustainable system is a system that is very far from any growth because it is about to collapse - only a sustainable system is able to grow, natural and artifical alike.
- bmitc 2y ago
  But propaganda? What is the agenda, then, and what would be obtained through that agenda? There are very clear issues in both society and the environment that are both directly and indirectly caused by the obsession with growth.

_Algernon_ 2y ago

I think that when trying to determine what is propaganda, all else being equal, a good rule of thumb is that the messaging in support of the prevailing system is more likely to be propaganda than the messaging against it. This is due to the simple fact that the prevailing system (in this case growth focus / capitalism) has all societal institutions built to support it.

_DeadFred_ 2y ago
Hard disagree. Just because people reached a consensus on something doesn't then mean talking about that something is propaganda. Is all talk about modern medicine propaganda? All talk/technology that uses AC electrics over DC? In the modern world it seems like EVERY discussion is 'why XYZ is wrong' and there is zero defense/explanation of how/why we reached/settled on XYZ (current norms) in those discussion, just attempts to discredit xyz/norms.