Nature Can't Take Unrestrained Growth
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- pjacobs51
- added this
Charles, next-in-line to succeed Queen Elizabeth, said a new economic model must be found because the Earth can no longer support the demands of a growing "consumerist society" where growth is an end in itself.
People must realize they are not "the masters of creation," rather just one part of a fragile natural world, he added.
Just as our banking sector is struggling with its debts... so Nature's life-support systems are failing to cope with the debts we have built up there too," Charles said at a BBC lecture at St James's Palace in central London.
"If we don't face up to this, then Nature, the biggest bank of all, could go bust.
"That is the challenge we face, it seems to me -- to see Nature's capital and her processes as the very basis of a new form of economics."
Charles, the former husband of the late Princess Diana, has long campaigned on the environment.
His own farm went organic in the 1980s, he publishes details of his estate's annual carbon emissions and has developed a sustainable village in western England called Poundbury.
"Our ability to adapt to the effects of climate change...depends on us adapting our pursuit of unlimited economic growth to that of sustainable growth," he said.
While conceding that industrialization had brought benefits such as better education, prosperity and higher life expectancy, the future king said that progress had come at a price.
Consumption has grown so much in the last 30 years that demands on natural resources now exceed the planet's capacity for renewal by a quarter each year, he added.
By 2050, the world's population will swell to about 9 billion people, from the current 3.3 billion, and a higher proportion will expect Western levels of consumption.
Modern farming methods that use fertilizers and pesticides that have helped feed a growing population have taken a "huge and unsustainable" toll on ecosystems, he added.
"Our current model of progress was not designed of course to create all this destruction," Charles said. "However, given the overwhelming evidence from so many quarters, we have to ask ourselves if it any longer makes sense or whether it is actually fit for purpose."
Economic growth has failed to end poverty, stress, ill health and social tensions, he added. A reformed economy must give more weight to the environment and local communities.
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24French
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I think we realize we're one part of a fragile world as we lay dying. We're pretty predictable this way. As soon as we get the diagnosis and feel the lump. Otherwise, it's the trumpet blare of solipsistic egotism just about nonstop.
- 2 years ago
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24French
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claybird121
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The human population is over 6 billion this moment, going on 7 billion. It was 3 billion only fifty years ago. That's more than a doubling of the human population in little over half a century. It took our species millions of years to get to 1 billion in the 1800s.
Read "Ishmael" by Daniel Quinn.
- 2 years ago
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claybird121
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ThoughtNu
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Bankers and Merchants aren’t being held accountable .
A hundred years ago , one would have to actively seek an advertisement for goods and services in papers and magazines . The general population would be exposed to fewer advertisements in a lifetime than a modern person is exposed to in a week from a variety of media, merchandise and services.
It is a fact that the more one is exposed to; a lie , a service , a product; that individual will begin to consider what is being presented as having merit . How many times you have seen a particular commercial in a lifetime? Over time it becomes a form of conditioning . The end result ...? To willingly exploit your own ego .’ Keeping up with the Jones’ syndrom . Yet entire countries are vilified for such activity ( USA )
The bankers and merchants that have conditioned the people their entire life through a variety of media, clothing and merchandise, a few minutes at a time, five to six times an hour; to want the ‘new’ or ‘better’ or ‘smarter’ , tangible and intangible product is overlooked.
Television for instance , I was watching the ‘news’ and hearing people speculate how high prices would rise for petrol ; then without missing a beat , a financial ‘reporter’ states that petrol companies are reporting record profits. Afterward s the commercials (sponsors) were of those very petrol companies...
Even social stereotypes are exploited by networks which have as a majority of their sponsors (paying to re-enforce stereotypical behavior year after year) are bankers and merchants .
Look at the political machine . Can you name a politician that doesn’t use merchants and bankers money ?What are conventions full of... Just who’s interest will a politician defend....the one paying the bills? Odd isn’t it , the names of the people that make up ‘corporate America’ without their company name when they are paying for corporate recognition .IMO
Merchants and bankers are NOT being held accountable for their influence on the public ; yet various countries peoples are being vilified for government actions that clearly only benefit the money changers , not it's people.
No it isn't all bad , but for it to be better , responsibility should be placed on the shoulders of those that can effect change in the 'personality and process' of the masses...the money changers ability to condition the masses is greater than any governments...go to a sports game and try not to see a logo. The people have not had control in their own long term conditioning outside of religious belief , for some time now.
I may be grasping at straws but it adds up to me. I realize that this issue is really a global one . I was just approaching it with an American perspective .
How do we combat greed? Remove the benefits of hoarding to increase value... by redefining ' All forms of money'; like a 'governor' lets say ; 'monies' lose ALL value after a period of time; a 'shelf life' of 90 days... In order for capital to continue to develop worth, it must be put back into circulation(spent / re-invested)....
Solvency would have to be worked out as well as many other issues but over all the flow of capitol would increase by multitudes. It might just be able to wipe out poverty with the deluge of ‘old’ money that would have to be returned to the ‘global economy’.
Technology,food, resources would have fewer cost restrictions to the public... but merchants and bankers (business) would never allow it to happen without a fight.
Should bankers and merchants be held accountable by 'changing money'... for their reckless pursuit of unlimited profit by conditioning various populations,through daily advertising effecting subliminal value; paying to re-enforce negative images that imprint on our children , corrupting our forms of governments to the point of various wars ;their influence on the public needs a reckoning ;the system AND PLANET is gasping for breath.While governments around the world focus on the 'ark of poli-tricks'. Perhaps.. money should help, not hurt
- 2 years ago
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ThoughtNu
