I would have to disagree with that statement, I think that the most efficient government today would have a hard time replacing just Florida's infrastructure for $10 trillion.
You're right. The numbers probably don't add up exactly. Look how much has evaporated in the Iraq rebuilding. But to argue with the numbers misses the point. The point is that the government is eagerly willing to spend $10 trillion on chest-puffing exercises that amounted to nothing (okay you could argue it amounted to security, but I'm not going there); yet it complains that it would be too expensive to replace the infrastructure necessary to clean up our act. That equation doesn't add up for me. Hawken's is saying that if we reorient our priorities, the money will suddenly be very accessible. And as for the actual amount, we wouldn't have to replace every farm, hospital, roadway, etc. to make a dent in this problem. But we do need to commit to it with the same vigor we committed to the Cold War.
This is especially interesting in light of the recent announcement by the UK gov't (report written by senior gov't economist). My prediction: there will be new (even if barely measurable) industrial and govt interest in global warming. Suddenly we're talking about deferred financial costs and not "save the whales". Old men in 3 piece suits understand that language even if they care whit about the whales.
There has actually been quite a lot of research on how well the earth's homeostatic mechanisms will compensate for our waste. And those studies are not encouraging. Read Paul Hawken's The Ecology of Commerce. He cites quite a few studies. The book was written in 1993, so I would assume there are more now as well.
A few quotes are below because he says it so much better than me. Despite the somber tone of these quotes, Hawken's is remarkably optimistic and offers a long list of suggestions for reversing our current trend -- such as taxing waste. If waste were taxed (the manufacturer taxed, not the consumer), it would be amazing how quickly corporations found ways of recycling and reusing old versions of their products. And what is fascinating is that if corporations did this voluntarily, it could actually increase their profitability, not cut it into it. If AOL had been taxed for every 1,000 Hours Free CD that ended up in a landfill, our natural landscape would have survived the stripmining it has suffered. And perhaps, AOL would have been forced to come up with a business model that actually worked. Enough, on to quotes:
"For those who say times are tough, that we can ill afford sweeping changes because the existing system is already broke or hobbled, consider that the U.S. and the former U.S.S.R. spent over $10 trillion on the Cold War, enough money to replace the entire infrastructure of the world, every school, every hospital, every roadway, building and farm" (p 58).
"If, as predicted, our population doubles sometimes in the next forty or fifty years, we will usurp 80 percent of the primary production of the planet, assuming no increase in the standard of living. If our standard of living doubles in the next forty years--the accepted projection--we will quadruple our impact, a physical impossibility" (p 22).
"The global economy has already exceeded carrying capacity--that point beyond which further growth will decay and effectively destroy its host....the earth is stable. It does not grow.... No technology in the world can change this equation" (p 32).
My god. Reading all the comments to this question is as scary as the original question. On the other hand, I shouldn't be surprised given all the misinformation floated around our society.
Rather than reply to the individual responses (we'll muddle along, technology will take care of it, it's all doomsday predictions), I'll focus on one reply.
So, we've managed through the last 100 years and thus, by shear force of logic, we'll manage through the next 100 years. Now that's an interesting argument. Try the same on yourself: "I've lived the last 10 years, so I'll live through the next 10 years." Then apply the logic again and again. Surely you see the logic flaw in this argument.
Quoting from Paul Hawken's "The Ecology of Commerce", "...one species--our own--out of 5 to 30 million species...is directly and indirectly claiming 40 percent of the earth production for itself....If, as predicted, our population doubles sometime in the next forty or fifty years, we will usurp 80 percent of the primary production of the planet, assuming no increase in the standard of living. If our standard of living doubles in the next forty years--the accepted projection--we will quadruple our impact, a physical impossibility."
We are living the result of the Industrial Revolution. We continue to focus on growth. Some are saying indirectly in their replies that growth is infinite. That, or they care about nothing beyond the 100 year timeline. Yet we know growth is not infinite. We run up against resource limitations. Technology will not solve this, not according to the application of technology today. Technology will certainly play a part in the eventual solution, but it is not itself the solution.
Pages and pages, reams, of data show that we are close to reaching the resource limitation if we have not already. In answer to those who look soley to technology, consider this: our ability to produce ever more crops on the same amount of land using technology or chemicals has reached the point of diminishing return. It takes more and more effort to get out less and less gain. It will soon become economically unfeasible to support the current trend.
Which takes us to the issue of waste -- both physical and toxic. Excepting the recycle bins you put out by the front door, everything we consume including food and material goods, produces extraordinary mounds of waste to create it and becomes waste when we're done with it. The process of creating goods pushes stunning amounts of toxins into the air, soil, and water. Every system known to man has "carrying capacity" -- the ability to absorb energy output and turn it into something else. By all measures we will reach the earth's carrying capacity in the next 40 years (not 100) and some suggest we've already passed that mark. The result of surpassing carrying capacity is devastating. Things don't stabilize; they crash.
To those who say it is all doomsday talk. I suggest you research the data and spend some time thinking over the outcome of the status-quo, rather than towing the party line. Stephen Hawking has spent his life understanding systems, including the birth and demise of systems. If he asks the question "How are we going to survive the next 100 years?", don't make the mistake of categorizing it as an academic curiousity. He's much smarter than all of us, and frankly in his shadow, those who yell "doomsday" appear childish.
So what's the answer to his question? Education, yes. Awareness, yes. Ultimately, it is mimicking those systems which have survived for thousands upon thousands of years. We must switch from a linear, cancerous pattern in which resources are assumed to be limitless, and instead we must devise cyclical patterns in which everything we create can in some way, at some point, be fed back into the system as energy (meaning "not waste but material for consumption by another element in the cycle"). I honestly don't know the answer more than that or even how we are going to break our linear pattern in favor of a cyclical one. But I do believe that if we don't solve it in our lifetime (yes, that soon), then we can expect a dire future.
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I would have to disagree with that statement, I think that the most efficient government today would have a hard time replacing just Florida's infrastructure for $10 trillion.
You're right. The numbers probably don't add up exactly. Look how much has evaporated in the Iraq rebuilding. But to argue with the numbers misses the point. The point is that the government is eagerly willing to spend $10 trillion on chest-puffing exercises that amounted to nothing (okay you could argue it amounted to security, but I'm not going there); yet it complains that it would be too expensive to replace the infrastructure necessary to clean up our act. That equation doesn't add up for me. Hawken's is saying that if we reorient our priorities, the money will suddenly be very accessible. And as for the actual amount, we wouldn't have to replace every farm, hospital, roadway, etc. to make a dent in this problem. But we do need to commit to it with the same vigor we committed to the Cold War.
This is especially interesting in light of the recent announcement by the UK gov't (report written by senior gov't economist). My prediction: there will be new (even if barely measurable) industrial and govt interest in global warming. Suddenly we're talking about deferred financial costs and not "save the whales". Old men in 3 piece suits understand that language even if they care whit about the whales.
Natural Capitalism for those that don't already know it, is also by Paul Hawken. Published in 1999.
There has actually been quite a lot of research on how well the earth's homeostatic mechanisms will compensate for our waste. And those studies are not encouraging. Read Paul Hawken's The Ecology of Commerce. He cites quite a few studies. The book was written in 1993, so I would assume there are more now as well.
A few quotes are below because he says it so much better than me. Despite the somber tone of these quotes, Hawken's is remarkably optimistic and offers a long list of suggestions for reversing our current trend -- such as taxing waste. If waste were taxed (the manufacturer taxed, not the consumer), it would be amazing how quickly corporations found ways of recycling and reusing old versions of their products. And what is fascinating is that if corporations did this voluntarily, it could actually increase their profitability, not cut it into it. If AOL had been taxed for every 1,000 Hours Free CD that ended up in a landfill, our natural landscape would have survived the stripmining it has suffered. And perhaps, AOL would have been forced to come up with a business model that actually worked. Enough, on to quotes:
"For those who say times are tough, that we can ill afford sweeping changes because the existing system is already broke or hobbled, consider that the U.S. and the former U.S.S.R. spent over $10 trillion on the Cold War, enough money to replace the entire infrastructure of the world, every school, every hospital, every roadway, building and farm" (p 58).
"If, as predicted, our population doubles sometimes in the next forty or fifty years, we will usurp 80 percent of the primary production of the planet, assuming no increase in the standard of living. If our standard of living doubles in the next forty years--the accepted projection--we will quadruple our impact, a physical impossibility" (p 22).
"The global economy has already exceeded carrying capacity--that point beyond which further growth will decay and effectively destroy its host. ...the earth is stable. It does not grow.... No technology in the world can change this equation" (p 32).
My god. Reading all the comments to this question is as scary as the original question. On the other hand, I shouldn't be surprised given all the misinformation floated around our society.
Rather than reply to the individual responses (we'll muddle along, technology will take care of it, it's all doomsday predictions), I'll focus on one reply.
So, we've managed through the last 100 years and thus, by shear force of logic, we'll manage through the next 100 years. Now that's an interesting argument. Try the same on yourself: "I've lived the last 10 years, so I'll live through the next 10 years." Then apply the logic again and again. Surely you see the logic flaw in this argument.
Quoting from Paul Hawken's "The Ecology of Commerce", "...one species--our own--out of 5 to 30 million species...is directly and indirectly claiming 40 percent of the earth production for itself. ...If, as predicted, our population doubles sometime in the next forty or fifty years, we will usurp 80 percent of the primary production of the planet, assuming no increase in the standard of living. If our standard of living doubles in the next forty years--the accepted projection--we will quadruple our impact, a physical impossibility."
We are living the result of the Industrial Revolution. We continue to focus on growth. Some are saying indirectly in their replies that growth is infinite. That, or they care about nothing beyond the 100 year timeline. Yet we know growth is not infinite. We run up against resource limitations. Technology will not solve this, not according to the application of technology today. Technology will certainly play a part in the eventual solution, but it is not itself the solution.
Pages and pages, reams, of data show that we are close to reaching the resource limitation if we have not already. In answer to those who look soley to technology, consider this: our ability to produce ever more crops on the same amount of land using technology or chemicals has reached the point of diminishing return. It takes more and more effort to get out less and less gain. It will soon become economically unfeasible to support the current trend.
Which takes us to the issue of waste -- both physical and toxic. Excepting the recycle bins you put out by the front door, everything we consume including food and material goods, produces extraordinary mounds of waste to create it and becomes waste when we're done with it. The process of creating goods pushes stunning amounts of toxins into the air, soil, and water. Every system known to man has "carrying capacity" -- the ability to absorb energy output and turn it into something else. By all measures we will reach the earth's carrying capacity in the next 40 years (not 100) and some suggest we've already passed that mark. The result of surpassing carrying capacity is devastating. Things don't stabilize; they crash.
To those who say it is all doomsday talk. I suggest you research the data and spend some time thinking over the outcome of the status-quo, rather than towing the party line. Stephen Hawking has spent his life understanding systems, including the birth and demise of systems. If he asks the question "How are we going to survive the next 100 years?", don't make the mistake of categorizing it as an academic curiousity. He's much smarter than all of us, and frankly in his shadow, those who yell "doomsday" appear childish.
So what's the answer to his question? Education, yes. Awareness, yes. Ultimately, it is mimicking those systems which have survived for thousands upon thousands of years. We must switch from a linear, cancerous pattern in which resources are assumed to be limitless, and instead we must devise cyclical patterns in which everything we create can in some way, at some point, be fed back into the system as energy (meaning "not waste but material for consumption by another element in the cycle"). I honestly don't know the answer more than that or even how we are going to break our linear pattern in favor of a cyclical one. But I do believe that if we don't solve it in our lifetime (yes, that soon), then we can expect a dire future.