Cary Neeper's Blog: Reviewing World-changing Nonfiction - Posts Tagged "population"

Please look at the second paragraph of "A Place Beyond Man" excerpted in My Writing here on Goodreads. I doubt if I could improve on expressing how I feel about Earth and the human dilemma. It is indeed still relevant, maybe even more so. See my web site http://caryneeper.com if you are interested in exploring ways to think about where we go from here. I may be exploring the questions here soon, if anyone is interested. Meanwhile, I would recommend "The Necessary Revolution" for a nice summary of all the good things that are happening to change the way we do things.

The End of Normal: The Great Crisis and the Future of Growth by James K. Galbraith, New York, Simon and Schuster, 2014.
This book came out at the same time steadystate.org was making a strong case that "Enough Is Enough." A book with that title by Rob Dietz and Dan O'Neill was published at the same time we released our fictional portrayal of how no-growth economics might work—the award-winner The Webs of Varok (http://archivesofvarok.com).

My shelves are full of excellent non-fiction written in the last four decades by experts in many fields that agree that we must learn to pull back, stabilize populations, and conserve resources—that economic growth is not sustainable in the long run.

Nowadays, no one dare talk about population limits, but it cannot be reasonably separated from our concern that resources are limited. We are already seeing water shortages. Surely we can now agree that classical economics is faulty in neglecting to apply resource availability and scarcity in their equations. Galbraith makes the detailed case, sharing how the equations lead to false conclusions.

He reviews the Soviet Union's demise and how it sends a shadow of parallel concerns with America's loss of post-World War II's booming economy. Things have changed, and we cannot expect to see business as usual. In the end, Galbraith preaches "slow growth," assuming that some economic growth is necessary because human greed and power drives must be assumed.

Given that assumption, I don't see much hope. I believe he is wrong. We are smarter than that. We know that nothing real grows forever. Given the chance for a decent existence, the human being is a remarkable creature, capable of selfless reasoning and brilliant creativity. Capable, even of saying, "Enough is enough."

We can understand how a population of germs can grown and prosper in a closed test tube filled with liquid nutrients. We seed the test tube with a few multiplying bacteria. We watch the population grow until the resources—the nutrient broth—is used up. We can understand why the population growth of the bacteria then slows, then drops to zero as the death rate increases. For a while a few mutants survive on the wastes, then they wink out.

Earth is our test tube, but we are know now that our resources are finite. Therefore, with willful restraint, we can keep them available over millennia by recycling and keeping count, by being watchful, resourceful and efficient in maintaining a comfortable status quo.

Already our population overload may seem overwhelming. It's true that technology will help, but only if it adds to our efficiency. It can't save us if we squander what Earth supplies. Growth—even slow growth—is not a long-term solution.

Neither is escaping to some other planet, for all but very few of us. Again, realism raises hard-to-grasp concepts. The time, energy and distances required to travel through the galaxy--even if we invent speed-of-light buses—are huge. We must take care of planet Earth, and tame our baser instincts to reproduce beyond reason.

Degrowth in the Suburbs: A Radical Urban Imagery by Samuel Alexander and Branden Gleeson, Singapore, Palgrave Macmillan, 2019.

In order to face the consequences of global warming and to find a secure, orderly future, we need to find a way for everyone (not just scientists or academicians) to understand and act on our real options. Therefore, I recommend this book, beyond page 16, as a thorough review of the causes, many of the options, and the changes needed to prevent the most tragic consequences we now face. In my lay-readers’ view, the introduction and first pages of this book were not helpful, overloaded with curt generalizations and jargon that provide no information and require careful interpretation. The rest of the book is quite readable, valuable in its urgency and thorough treatment of our current dilemma.

The reader will find the bulk of recommendations and conclusions very similar to those published by Herman Daly in the 1970’s, developed over the years, and currently presented in short articles published on steadystate.org by Brian Czech and others. Degrowth in the Suburbs provides helpful confirmation of steadystate theory and its practice, as portrayed in my series, The Archives of Varok, but Daly’s work is not cited in the long references cited at the end of each chapter.

One question arose in the first chapter. The word “neoliberal” was not defined other than relating it to neglecting “…the centrality or urbanization to the creation of value.” At the end of the book another reference was made to the “…neoliberal falacies like the ‘liveable city.’” The authors don’t provide details, but I assume they are referring to the neoliberal (?) idea that energy use per capita is or can be much smaller in large cities simply because the distance between people is less. Thus, centralized food distribution and public transport requires less energy. The authors don’t address the fact that cities are still growing and, in any case, will need to increase efficiency until they can disperse to “degrowth in the suburbs.” The authors don’t address how that major puzzle cold be solved.

Nothing else is neglected in this book’s thorough descriptions of how we can degrow and use less energy--the two major themes in the book. In chapter 2 on the “Energy Descent Future” the authors remind us why nuclear and renewable sources of energy will probably not be enough. They summarize the rise of hi-energy use in industry and agriculture, discuss the concept of Peak Oil, and suggest that it is too late for carbon sequestering. A book published in 2011 (“Life Without Oil: Why We Must Shift to a New Energy Future” by Steve Hallett and John Wright, New York, Prometheus Books) agrees.

Chapter 3 provides a nice summary of nuclear energy problems, and presents a good case that “techno-optimism is misguided.” Wind and solar energy will help, but both have storage problems, and nothing will solve our “private car addiction.” We need public transport powered by renewables and lower mobility, while transcending the “growth paradigm.” A redoing of banking is in order to ”…disconnect economic growth from energy consumption” with “…planned economic contractions, increased localization, broader distribution of wealth and judicious deindustrialization…” (Chapter 4)

The authors declare that such changes won’t be done by governments. They must be done in the “social-cultural sphere.” The authors suggest that we look at the Transition Towns Movement and the Eco-Village Movement. Chapter 5 continues by suggesting voluntary simplicity, low-impact practices, reduction of energy demand, use of solar ovens (which my daughter finds delightful in Indianapolis). Don’t fly. Don’t eat meat or dairy. Transition Initiatives mean eating local food, permaculture, and giving up cars. “Consumerism does not satisfy the human craving for meaning.”

Chapter 6 gives us a view of what 2038 could look like, given these suggestions. Water capture, waste composted and used, with food grown our your own plot would mean the end of corporations and obesity. Farming jobs would increase, as would the fix-it-yourself paradigm. Reuse and sharing would increase and local coins would be reinvented and used. Voluntary simplicity would “defeat capitalism.”

Governing policies are discussed in Chapter 7. “Principles of justice, self-limitations and ecological democracy” call for degrowth. GDP is known to be a poor measure. The use of resources would need to be limited. This should also reduce labor hours. Government should provide public transportation and health care. Forests would be revived. Banks would be regulated again. Wealth and estate taxes could provide local housing for those in need. A basic income or negative income tax of 3% could level the playing field for the poor.

If you have fretted, as I have, about how we are to make the transition to a more stable future from our current habits of energy overuse and population overgrowth, do read this book. The ideas are not new, but they echo with splendid detail the work done since the 1970s. Herman Daly and many authors, of both ficiton and non-fiction, have seen the dangers coming and now agree on many of the basics, regardless of political positions once held.

“Inheritors of the Earth: How Nature Is Thriving in an Age of Extinction” by Chris D. Thomas, New York, Hatchette Book Group, 2017.

We can only hope that the author is right about what is thriving on Earth: In spite of the damage we humans have done to our home- (and most likely only) planet, we have created new homes for other life and stimulated their evolutionary creativity.

An award-winning professor of conservation biology at the University of York, UK, Chris Thomas gives us a rare glimpse of hope for Earth’s future, in spite of the excesses of technology and human over-population. Earth was once quite warm (three million years ago) and the continents’ future coming together again will change all Earth’s species’ options eventually, in spite of any human impact.

Meanwhile, ocean-going containers move species around so that “many microbes…have near-global distribution. It makes our “neophobia” and “hatred of foreign species” in our locales seem a little silly--certainly not worth a “costly control and eradication of…alien species.”

“Life is a process, not a final product, “ the author says. Therefore, maintain flexibility for future change. Humans are as normal as anything else that lives. Accept the fact that we must “..live within our planetary boundaries.”

What to do? Read pages 230 to 242, if nothing else. There the author tells us: 1) “…accept change” and prod it in a “desired direction.” 2) “…maintain flexibility for future generations,” for we cannot imagine their world. We should encourage “as many species as possible in minimizing extinction.” 3) Our evolution and presence “are natural within the Earth system…We should encourage “as many species as possible. Genes, like species, survive because they keep track of the changing world.” Specific options are suggested on page 240, following a thoughtful discussion of whether or not to resurrect those who have recently gone extinct. 4) “…create near biological success stories by whatever means” by helping “…direct the evolutionary process.”

World on the Edge--How to Prevent Environmental and Economic Collapse by Lester R. Brown, WW Norton and Co. N.Y. 2011.

Early studies have concluded that human demands on Earth’s resources exceeded natural systems in 1980. In 2007 they exceeded Earth’s “sustainable yields by 20 percent.” In contrast, economic data in 2010 showed a “10-fold growth in world economy since 1950. The fourfold increase in world income was celebrated.

In 2011 that was good news, Lester Brown tells us. But how is it now? Earth’s recent environmental declines suggest inevitable economic and social collapse following the shrinking of Earth’s forests, soils, aquifers, and fisheries. High temperatures don’t help.

Brown’s Plan B focused on cutting global carbon emissions, stabilizing the human population at 8 billion by 2040, eradicating poverty, and restoring forests, soil, aquifers, and fisheries. Costs, he said, were 1/8 of the 2011 world military spending.

He also predicted that by 2020 up to 60 million people would migrate from Sub-Saharan Africa to North Africa and Europe. CO2 emissions should be cut to 400 ppm by 2020, so we can reduce it to the 350 ppm recommended. In 2020 a worldwide carbon tax of $200 per ton could be offset by reduction in income taxes. An additional $200 billion could restore Earth’s national systems, stabilize population and eradicate poverty--paid for by “updating the concept of national security.” How different are questions for the world now? It’s already 2020.

Brown’s ideas could still help, if we would change our focus. CO2 emissions per passenger mile on high speed trains are about 1/3 those of cars and 1/4 of planes. Must we be slaves to saving time? We have been using more solar and building more efficient buildings, but we need to do more, with simple requirements like rooftop solar, water heaters, and energy efficient building.

The oceans are filling with plastic, People are desperate for food and safety on too many places, for too many wrong reasons. In 2011 government was spending $500 billion per year to subsidize the use of fossil fuels. Oystein Bahle of Exxon Norway noted that “Capitalism may collapse because it does not allow the market to tell the economical truth.”

So, what now? Brown’s ideas are simple once fully realized. They could reverse the overuse trends we have taken on since 2011. Think wind, solar and geothermal, a tax on carbon. Raise gasoline taxes and cut income taxes. We could still do it--build a new economy--carbon free. World on the Edge: How to Prevent Environmental and Economic Collapse

Our Angry Earth by Isaac Asimov, Frederik Pohl (First Paperback Edition March 2019), Newtom Doherty Associates 1991.

There was a good reason that this 1991 book was republished in 2018. It still rings true with its 400 pages of suggestions. They’re all too familiar: carbon dioxide, CFCs, cutting down forests, rice paddies, garbage, etc. The authors saw the likelihood of an increase in violent weather and loss of water in our rivers, the breakup of Antarctic ice, the threat to island nations, more violent weather, and a “rise in sea levels.”

In all wars, it’s the environment that always loses. Species extinctions have been happening faster than ever, primarily because we humans are destroying our environment. Humans could become extinct, the authors feared in 1991, because of our “human interventions--like acid rain, the global green house warming, war, and our destruction of the environment we depend on for life” No doubt the world population is exploding alarmingly,primarily because of our “unrestrained and wasteful use of energy and resources”

Note that this quote was written before 1991, when the rate of repair was far slower than the rate at which we do damage now. Note the current effort to rid the seas of plastic extrada.

The losses are environmental at five different levels: 1) the “despoiling of national treasure,” like wild animals, plants, forests, and riversides, 2)benefits from undiscovered sources,3) pollution of benign environmental conditions, 4)greenhouse affecting warming, and 5) the extinctions of life on Earth.

In 1991 the authors blamed America for contributing “the most.problems.” Though this may no longer be true, we are still in a good, if not the best, place to do something important about the problems.”

The author lists coming problems like “sunburn, drinking water supplies, soil loss, even outer space pollution.” The last half of the book is devoted to solutions--burning waste to provide energy or using waste heat from industry, using solar power and other renewable resources
“
We would never run out of wind, waves, and subterranean heat if we depended on natural timing and power storage. Bookkeeping could help, like “imposing a carbon tax on electricity.” The biggest source of pollution is transportation, especially the car, crop rotation, and poor distribution of food. The last section of the book is dedicated to education, with hope that these kinds of suggestions will secure the future.

Tipping Point For Planet Earth by Anthony D. Barnosky and Elizabeth A. Hadly, St. Martin’s Press, N.Y., 2015.

Fifty percent of Earth’s land “…has been changed from forested prairies to farms and pavement.” This book gives us a laundry list of what to do. Now, five years after this book’s publication, as we dominate Earth’s global ecosystem…”we are seeing more of what the authors predicted--genocides, and scarcities of food, water and oil. As the globe’s complexity increases, irreversible “state-changes” become real, not just likely

The authors’ numbers tell the tale: Human populations have increased “threefold from 1950 to 2015, double from 1969 to 2011. Eighty percent “live below poverty levels, and nearly a billion have inadequate food and water. Drought and hot weather have “been going on since 2010, while rapid growth of the human population continues--but could be brought down fast with a promise of “education and economic betterment.”

The rest of the book focuses on “stuff” and storms, hunger and thirst, too many diseases and war--all ready to push us over the tipping point if not reduced or controlled. Five Earths are required for all the world’s population to enjoy the American lifestyle.

The needed shift in our thinking is obvious: 1)Level our percapita consumption, 2) Change economic modeling from growth to consistency, and 3) Encourage reuse, and design products that leave no environmental footprint.

On page 238 one finds the authors’ summary of ways to reverse our rush to the tipping point. Conserve water, consume less, educate women with economic opportunities and health care, recycle, buy experience not things, design products with low environmental footprints, use carbon-neutral energy sources, eat less meat and waste less in distribution, waste less water, produce energy from waste, use wind and solar, track vectors and minimize deforestation, and avoid war by lowering population growth and ensuring basic needs while recognizing the one “common theme that runs though all solutions: “There is no such thing as local any more.”

Lester R. BrownWorld on the Edge--How to Prevent Environmental and Economic Collapse by Lester R. Brown, WW Norton and Co. N.Y. 2011.

Early studies have concluded that human demands on Earth’s resources exceeded its natural systems in 1980 and in 2007 exceeded Earth’s “sustainable yields by 20 percent.” In contrast, economic date of about 2010 showed a “10-fold growth in world economy since 1950. The fourfold increase in world income was celebrated.

That is good news, Lester Brown tells us in 2011, until we realized that Earth’s recent environmental declines suggest inevitable economic and social collapse following the shrinking of Earth’s forests, soils, aquifers, fisheries and high temperatures

Brown’s Plan B focused on cutting global carbon emissions, stabilizing the human population at 8 billion by 2040, eradicating poverty, and restoring forests, soil, aquifers, and fisheries. Costs, he said, were 1/8 of the 2011 world military spending.

What were we thinking? He also predicted that by 2020 up to 60 million people would migrate from Sub-Saharan Africa to North Africa and Europe. CO2 emissions should be cut to 400 ppm by 2020 so we can reduce it to the 350 ppm recommended. In 2020 a worldwide carbon tax of $200 per ton could be offset by reduction in income taxes. An additional $200 billion could restore Earth’s national systems, by 2020 we should stabilize population and eradicate poverty--paid for by “updating the concept of national security. How different are questions for the world now? It’s already 2020.

Brown’s ideas could still help, if we could change our individual focus. CO2 emissions per passenger mile on high speed trains are about 1/3 those of cars and 1/4 of planes. Do we have to be slaves to saving time? We have been using more solar and building more efficient buildings, but we need to do more. The oceans are filling with plastic, People are desperate for food and safety on too many places for too many wrong reasons. In 2011 government were spending $500 billion per years to subsidize the use of fossil fuels. Simple requirements like rooftop solar, water heaters and energy efficient building.

Brown’s ideas are simple once fully realized. They could reverse the downward trend we have taken since 2011. Think wind, solar and geothermal, a tax on carbon. Raise gasoline taxes and cut income taxes. We could still do it--build a new economy--carbon free. Oystein Bahle of Exxon Norway noted that “Capitalism may collapse because it does not allow the market to tell the economical truth.

How To Give Up Plastic by William McCallum, USA, Penguin Books, 2019

It isn’t easy. It requires minute by minute awareness of how much plastic runs our lives. Photos tell the tale. The oceans are full of it, over 90% gets into birds, and the finest, toughest plastic wraps are choking small ocean dwellers. One third of plastic in the ocean is microfibers released when washing clothes!

The answer is difficult for all of us, since we rely on so many handy items.made of plastic. The hard part is to recognize the plastic item and find a substitute. Ultimately, however, its the manufacturers and waste managers who hold the ultimate keys to saving the oceans

For starters, this small book gives us a very useful list of finding plastic in our houses, room by room.
***


Coming Apart: the State of White America 1960-2010 by Charles Murray, New York, Cox and Murry, 2012-13.

In his crystal clear prologue, author Charles Murray paints a detailed portrait of America before 1963, when President Kennedy was shot. The “civil religion” that held America together after World War II began to “unravel” with rumors of a class with an “independent ethnic heritage” in the country.

Today, in 2020, it is all too clear: “…an evolution of America…has taken place since November 21, 1963, leading to the formation of classes that are different in kind--a separation from anything that the nation has ever known.” The differences “…diverge on core behavior and values.”The whys …involve forces that cannot be changed.”

Examples explored in the book include marriage, “residential segregation,” job types, industriousness, crime, honesty, and religion. After 300 pages we have a long list to support Murray’s theses, with suggestions to compare differences between parents at a school in a median income zip code and from an “elite private elementary school”.

The author suggests that the solutions require the “new upper class” to focus on restoring “what makes America different,”… “ to restore our “precious” and “exceptional…different way for people to live together…”

“A life well lived requires engagement with those around us.”

WW Norton and Co, New York, 2004.

When this book was published, 16 years ago!, climate change was “widely discussed,” the author wrote, but “…we are slow to grasp its full meaning…there is no normal to return to.”

Listening to the evening news makes it clear that we are still not grasping what we need to be doing. In 2004 Brazil was the “…only country with the potential to expand world cropland area measurably.” and now? What is happening in Brazil? Have we already outgrown the Earth and failed to recognize that fact?

In 2004, “falling water tables and rising temperatures” were already slowing the growth of world food production. Lester Brown’s list of “environmental fallout from overuse” goes on and on, on page 8.

Mortality and fertility of humans were “…essentially in balanced in some countries, and others were able to “reduce family size” quickly. Has it been enough? Have fisheries continued to collapse, as Brown saw.? Have the world’s range lands been overgrazed in 2020?

Earth’s productivity was increasing in 2004. What are we doing now to recycle plant nutrients, as we did when “the world was largely rural? Are we we using crop residues, animal manures, soil rebuilding, leguminous plants? Have we learned to avoid overgrazing and overplowing?

Have we confronted the fact that in 2004 “…waste tables are falling in scores of countries…”? Are we all being efficient by using drip irrigation? Are all our choices water-efficient? No more water wasting coal-fired power plants? Recycling urban water supplies?

Stabilizing water tables was urgent in 2004, and now as urgent as stabilizing global temperatures and atmospheric carbon dioxide. Sea levels will rise. It’s probably too late to stop that. Wind energy is being used now, but is it enough? How can we reduce our use of electricity--everywhere?

In 1991 the U.S. Dept. Of Energy concluded that three states alone could provide the entire nation’s electricity needs. As we deal with the pandemic of 2020 and plan to rebuild the future, there will be chances to rethink and reinvest more wisely the way we use Earth’s gifts. The lessons are clear in books such as this one.