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Quote from the article : "There is a third option. It is likely and it is ugly. Even a technological wonderland can create a pernicious society. Technological

by tiatia 11y ago

Quote from the article : "There is a third option. It is likely and it is ugly. Even a technological wonderland can create a pernicious society. Technological progress can create dystopia even if ecological disaster is avoided. What if the benefits of productivity gains are monopolized by the top one percent, as they largely have been for most of the past 30 years? This is the world of Margaret Atwood’s Oryx and Crake, a terrifying, but familiar world of gated communities and genetic engineering, with generalized poverty for everyone outside the corporate elite." That is an interesting idea but not likely to happen in the long run, but maybe during an intermediate state. Taking historic events as an indicator, the "upper 1%" see little incentive to try to prevent a coming collapse. It is not their children not getting jobs, only the children of the other 99% are not getting jobs and not getting opportunities. So the disaster will grow slowly through all ranks. The "top 1%" will fall last, but fall they will. "Human and nature dynamics (HANDY): Modeling inequality and use of resources in the collapse or sustainability of societies" http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0921800914000615 http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0921800914...

tiatia 11y ago
From the article I quoted: "In scenario 5.3.2, with a larger depletion rate, the decline of the Commoners occurs faster, while the Elites are still thriving, but eventually the Commoners collapse completely, followed by the Elites. It is important to note that in both of these scenarios, the Elites – due to their wealth – do not suffer the detrimental effects of the environmental collapse untilmuch later than the Commoners. This buffer of wealth allows Elites to continue “business as usual” despite the impending catastrophe. It is likely that this is an important mechanism that would help explain howhistorical collapseswere allowed to occur by eliteswho appear to be oblivious to the catastrophic trajectory (most clearly apparent in the Roman and Mayan cases). This buffer effect is further reinforced by the long, apparently sustainable trajectory prior to the beginning of the collapse. While somemembers of societymight raise the alarm that the system is moving towards an impending collapse and therefore advocate structural changes to society in order to avoid it, Elites and their supporters, who opposed making these changes, could point to the long sustainable trajectory “so far” in support of doing nothing.

by tiatia 11y ago

tiatia 11y ago

From the article I quoted: "In scenario 5.3.2, with a larger depletion rate, the decline of the Commoners occurs faster, while the Elites are still thriving, but eventually the Commoners collapse completely, followed by the Elites. It is important to note that in both of these scenarios, the Elites – due to their wealth – do not suffer the detrimental effects of the environmental collapse untilmuch later than the Commoners. This buffer of wealth allows Elites to continue “business as usual” despite the impending catastrophe. It is likely that this is an important mechanism that would help explain howhistorical collapseswere allowed to occur by eliteswho appear to be oblivious to the catastrophic trajectory (most clearly apparent in the Roman and Mayan cases). This buffer effect is further reinforced by the long, apparently sustainable trajectory prior to the beginning of the collapse. While somemembers of societymight raise the alarm that the system is moving towards an impending collapse and therefore advocate structural changes to society in order to avoid it, Elites and their supporters, who opposed making these changes, could point to the long sustainable trajectory “so far” in support of doing nothing.