Well said. I just have a hard time believing humankind is capable of changing. Is any species? Our big brains take us places where our character cannot sustain us.
In the presentation Bill Rees did on ecological overshoot a little over a year ago that I recorded, he made a pretty compelling case that we are not capable of changing. Unfortunately I think I agree with him.
"Our big brains take us places where our character cannot sustain us."
And at the same time, what an exciting time to be alive, as according to evidence changing course still depends on us (David Attemborough). If we consider that there is nothing we can do, then we are really doomed. I will keep listening to the words of the hummingbird
THANK YOU for saying that your efforts to curtail development have never succeeded. I don't know anyone who has. I welcome talking about our options once we acknowledge this. What's our next step...toward discussion??
I don't know. In 2023 I organized a whole series on overshoot and invited everyone I could think of in the county who was in a position of influence. None of them attended. (Note that they had ALL attended a climate change series that happened in the weeks prior, that was about business-as-usual by alternative means.)
Right now I have an art show at the library about species loss and habitat loss. I'm hoping people talk about the issues.
I'm attending a town hall next week to plead to my local utility not to destroy more habitat with energy-making machines.
I talked to someone from the planning commission the other day; she said the only way to get the county council's attention is to put a plan together (we were discussing a degrowth, reduce energy, etc. plan) that lays out exactly what we'd have to do (what laws would have to be changed, etc.). It sounded like she might be willing to organize a group to discuss putting a plan together... but it will be a large task. I fear it will be very difficult... but worth trying.
Personally, I try to reduce as much as I can. Buying less. Living small and moving towards living more low-tech (no "smart" appliances in my house!). I'm working on being able to live for larger chunks of time without any electricity. Being aware that everything I buy will end up in landfill at some point. We have a "take it or leave it" here so I "leave" as much as I can, and "take" when I need something and it's there. I buy as much food from local producers as I can (fish, veg). I bike instead of drive as much as I can.
I also try to encourage collective action by writing articles for a local outlet. I recently wrote an article talking about overshoot and included a list of concrete suggestions of things we could do at the community level. However, most of the responses to my articles are along the lines of "We can't do that...". But I keep trying.
I attend meetings sometimes and plead against more development. I've never been successful.
You do. have a way of pitting the dots together... thanks. That's a lot of reality. I found the graphs and the graphics to be very illuminating. I particularly enjoyed the last three pieces of art at the end... is that your doing?
Global civilisation will last longer than expected but not as long as hoped for, so I am doing what I can to prevent me thinking 'I wish I'd done...' later in life when it is no longer possible.
Life is too short: do it now. There will never be another chance.
Those who care enough about the more than human world to do something for it seem to be a shrinking tribe. Distraction is always only a click away. Yeah, save what you can where you can.
Most humans care ONLY about the human world. And soaring solar does not cheer me up. More energy => more growth => more development => more destruction of the natural world.
We need many more humans to care about more than the human world, and we need far, far less energy and technology.
Do you know of any mansions that owners or others have divided to house multiple families?
I also wonder about Gaza and the West Bank...and housing the survivors of Israel's genocide. A year ago I wrote a substack about the energy and telecommunications and vegetable gardening that might work once Palestinians can create community again. They have toxic rubble to contend with, too. They have water shortage...
I follow your logic--that thinking ecologically, we would recognize the hazards of cities...and not rebuild LA. Wowsers. How could we explain this, especially to people now homeless? What options would we provide? Why should cities burn every 30-40 years? Do we recognize that people already on the planet need a place to live and create the most ecologically-sound city possible, in 2025??
To your list of toxic, flammable materials in every home and near every home, please add electronics...and lithium-ion batteries: cell site backup-power batteries, EVs (including hoverboards and scooters), EV chargers, smart utility meters, laptops, tablets, rooftop solar backup batteries, etc.
Cities shouldn't burn every 30-40 years, but chaparral does and should. So many ecosystems need to burn every few decades or centuries... burning provides habitat and releases seeds and so much more.
Pine, eucalyptus, and giant sequoia are examples of trees that need fire to germinate and grow. Black-backed woodpeckers and other cavity-nesting birds depend on snags created by fire. Fire chaser beetles are attracted to trees that have been weakened by fire.
Given that LA is *filled* with massive houses that could easily house multiple families, one option could be to co-house people together, or start splitting existing mansions into multiple apartments. If celebrities really gave a damn about people and ecosystems they would offer up their homes for this. LA could and should enact maximum house sizes and maximum electricity and water use limits.
Just found this: "In Los Angeles, single-family homes are getting bigger as apartment life shrinks. According to research from Yardi's Storage Café, the average size of a single-family house increased to 3,296 square feet, an increase of 196 square feet over the last decade."
According to the census, LA county has 3,390,254 households with an average of 2.85 people per household.
My house is 750 square feet and is very comfortable. 2 people per 750 square feet is four 2 person families for every 3,296 square foot average home, or two 4 person families.
Let's say 1 million of the 3.3 million households are about 3200 square feet. That's 6 million places to live for everyone who is now or previously homeless. This would more than accommodate the people made homeless due to the fires.
I'm inspired by the question: what laws would support and/or require degrowth? I also wonder what education would help the public understand its necessity? What processes would engage the public to create policies wherein as many people as possible have a stake? I'm working now on questions about the LA fires...and the rebuilding. These projects feel related.
If we were thinking ecologically, LA would not rebuild. LA shouldn't be there. The entire city and surrounding cities are built on land that *should* burn every 30-40 years. Of course, ultimately, no city should be here on Earth.
LA could be an exemplar for degrowth if they chose not to rebuild and instead restore ecosystems.
Another issue: the waste! I don't know what they will do with all the toxic waste left behind from the fire burning the toxic poisonous materials contained in everyone's home... it has to go somewhere. Where? Either it stays there and contaminates the land and water, or it gets hauled somewhere else where it contaminates the land and water. Best not to create that toxic nasty stuff (carpets, furniture with flame retardants, plastic clothes, chemicals under sinks, etc.) in the first place.
Thanks for compiling this data, bearing witness with eyes wide open is not easy, but it is a sacred service to honor our non-human kin in that way.
The picture of Tokyo you shared makes me think of the concept of an "ecumenopolis" which was introduced into pop-culture via the Starwars movies.
Recently, there was a Starwars tv show that depicted a planet at the center of the Galaxy (“Coruscant”) which is a planet that is completely covered in one giant city. The episode depicted two characters going to visit a sort of ‘park’ or monument which had the very highest peak on the planet poking out of a section of cement (surrounded in security railings and drones) about 3 meters, and one of the characters explained how that was the very last natural piece of the planet that is exposed, the rest is covered in city.
One of the most disturbing things for me, is that in this depiction, the city planet was not depicted as the center of evil or the empire, no, it was shown as no more than a busy planet of democracy and bureaucracy, businessmen and industrialists, all just “trying to make a living” having achieved the construction of a ‘wonderful’ civilization. The story glossed over that abhorrent depiction in a sort of trivial way, but I found it to be very chilling and it made me think of your essay.
Humans have even come up with a name for such an abomination. They call it an “Ecumenopolis” https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ecumenopolis (a planet completely covered in one giant city). Considering it is a thing that has been given a name and is depicted in lofty starwars scifi scenes it almost seems as though some humans think such a thing is worth striving towards creating.
Thanks for the excellent depiction of our current state, a picture tells a thousand words. Another inclusion could be the a graph showing how many of the best sites for easy renewable energy generation are already occupied, especially for hydro and how this equates to the energy transfer. We are already seeing the upgrading of generation especially in wind leading to massive amounts of waste rather than new builds. Thanks again
The American Armed Forces are the biggest polluters by so wide a margin it makes no difference who is in second place. The Air Force has more than 5,000 planes, many kept in the air constantly to avoid being wiped out by a surprise attack on the ground. They all use halon 1301 in their fuel tanks as a fire supressant to prevent the tanks from exploding if hit by anti-aircraft fire so the pilot will have time to bail out. Halon 1301c is the worst destroyer of the atmospheric ozone layer.
The Navy uses sonar on the same frequencies used by whales, seals, dolphins, manatees, turtles, and other sea life, interfering with their ability to find food, mates, or dangers.
The Army has fired more than 150,000 rounds of artilery shells made from reworked nuclear reactor fuel rods and contaminated all of Iraq, Afganistan, Bosnia, Syria, and parts of Australia and the United States used for target practice with radioactive dust. Iraqi doctors are seeing several thousand cases a year more than before the invasion of stillbirths, miscariages, birth defects, and childhood cancer. This will go on forever, long after the very existence of the United States Of America has been forgotten.
Anyone paying taxes to the American military government is complicit in the destruction of the ability of this planet to support life. Why are there so many environmentally aware people, concerned about the attacks on the biosphere by ordinary private individuals but seemingly unconcerned with the far greater amoubnt of harm done by the American war machine? Anyone seriously concerned about what is happening to the earth but still paying taxes to the American military rulers should consider forming a tax resister's movement.
Watching an ideology of infinite growth hit and surpass what should have been a clear "dead end" sign... I wish more people were aware of what is happening on this planet.
It's not "our" global commons. We are just one of 10 million species and we take most of the Earth for ourselves. That's the problem.
8.2 billion humans is not sustainable in any sense of the world.
Even 1 billion isn't, now that we've so reduced carrying capacity.
My guess it's less than 100 million.
If we stay on our current path, soon there will be zero humans, along with close to zero or zero large land mammals, and the remaining life on Earth will be suffering from a highly polluted Earth for eons, thanks to us.
Less, less, less is the song we should sing all day and night.
Well said. I just have a hard time believing humankind is capable of changing. Is any species? Our big brains take us places where our character cannot sustain us.
In the presentation Bill Rees did on ecological overshoot a little over a year ago that I recorded, he made a pretty compelling case that we are not capable of changing. Unfortunately I think I agree with him.
"Our big brains take us places where our character cannot sustain us."
Exactly.
And at the same time, what an exciting time to be alive, as according to evidence changing course still depends on us (David Attemborough). If we consider that there is nothing we can do, then we are really doomed. I will keep listening to the words of the hummingbird
https://www.spiralleaf.co.uk/the-hummingbird-parable-a-metaphor-for-life-by-sue-cartwright
THANK YOU for saying that your efforts to curtail development have never succeeded. I don't know anyone who has. I welcome talking about our options once we acknowledge this. What's our next step...toward discussion??
I don't know. In 2023 I organized a whole series on overshoot and invited everyone I could think of in the county who was in a position of influence. None of them attended. (Note that they had ALL attended a climate change series that happened in the weeks prior, that was about business-as-usual by alternative means.)
Right now I have an art show at the library about species loss and habitat loss. I'm hoping people talk about the issues.
I'm attending a town hall next week to plead to my local utility not to destroy more habitat with energy-making machines.
I talked to someone from the planning commission the other day; she said the only way to get the county council's attention is to put a plan together (we were discussing a degrowth, reduce energy, etc. plan) that lays out exactly what we'd have to do (what laws would have to be changed, etc.). It sounded like she might be willing to organize a group to discuss putting a plan together... but it will be a large task. I fear it will be very difficult... but worth trying.
I keep trying. It's disheartening to fail.
Maybe keeping alive the question, What do YOU do to reduce your ecological impacts?...moves us toward collective action.
Personally, I try to reduce as much as I can. Buying less. Living small and moving towards living more low-tech (no "smart" appliances in my house!). I'm working on being able to live for larger chunks of time without any electricity. Being aware that everything I buy will end up in landfill at some point. We have a "take it or leave it" here so I "leave" as much as I can, and "take" when I need something and it's there. I buy as much food from local producers as I can (fish, veg). I bike instead of drive as much as I can.
I also try to encourage collective action by writing articles for a local outlet. I recently wrote an article talking about overshoot and included a list of concrete suggestions of things we could do at the community level. However, most of the responses to my articles are along the lines of "We can't do that...". But I keep trying.
I attend meetings sometimes and plead against more development. I've never been successful.
You do. have a way of pitting the dots together... thanks. That's a lot of reality. I found the graphs and the graphics to be very illuminating. I particularly enjoyed the last three pieces of art at the end... is that your doing?
No, I've had that graphic for a while, and don't know who did it, unfortunately.
Global civilisation will last longer than expected but not as long as hoped for, so I am doing what I can to prevent me thinking 'I wish I'd done...' later in life when it is no longer possible.
Life is too short: do it now. There will never be another chance.
The only thing I'll wish I'd done is fight harder for the natural world. There is nothing I'd rather do than that.
Those who care enough about the more than human world to do something for it seem to be a shrinking tribe. Distraction is always only a click away. Yeah, save what you can where you can.
I lived for twelve years in sub-saharan Africa. Those who care about the human world are the majority! They just don't make noise.
Here I leave you a graph to cheer up a little
https://images.app.goo.gl/rkoF7tM5TdbBKmEL6
Most humans care ONLY about the human world. And soaring solar does not cheer me up. More energy => more growth => more development => more destruction of the natural world.
We need many more humans to care about more than the human world, and we need far, far less energy and technology.
Thank you, thank you for your clarity.
Do you know of any mansions that owners or others have divided to house multiple families?
I also wonder about Gaza and the West Bank...and housing the survivors of Israel's genocide. A year ago I wrote a substack about the energy and telecommunications and vegetable gardening that might work once Palestinians can create community again. They have toxic rubble to contend with, too. They have water shortage...
We need lists of communities that have "rebuilt."
I follow your logic--that thinking ecologically, we would recognize the hazards of cities...and not rebuild LA. Wowsers. How could we explain this, especially to people now homeless? What options would we provide? Why should cities burn every 30-40 years? Do we recognize that people already on the planet need a place to live and create the most ecologically-sound city possible, in 2025??
To your list of toxic, flammable materials in every home and near every home, please add electronics...and lithium-ion batteries: cell site backup-power batteries, EVs (including hoverboards and scooters), EV chargers, smart utility meters, laptops, tablets, rooftop solar backup batteries, etc.
Cities shouldn't burn every 30-40 years, but chaparral does and should. So many ecosystems need to burn every few decades or centuries... burning provides habitat and releases seeds and so much more.
Pine, eucalyptus, and giant sequoia are examples of trees that need fire to germinate and grow. Black-backed woodpeckers and other cavity-nesting birds depend on snags created by fire. Fire chaser beetles are attracted to trees that have been weakened by fire.
Given that LA is *filled* with massive houses that could easily house multiple families, one option could be to co-house people together, or start splitting existing mansions into multiple apartments. If celebrities really gave a damn about people and ecosystems they would offer up their homes for this. LA could and should enact maximum house sizes and maximum electricity and water use limits.
And yes to all you added to the toxic list!
Just found this: "In Los Angeles, single-family homes are getting bigger as apartment life shrinks. According to research from Yardi's Storage Café, the average size of a single-family house increased to 3,296 square feet, an increase of 196 square feet over the last decade."
According to the census, LA county has 3,390,254 households with an average of 2.85 people per household.
My house is 750 square feet and is very comfortable. 2 people per 750 square feet is four 2 person families for every 3,296 square foot average home, or two 4 person families.
Let's say 1 million of the 3.3 million households are about 3200 square feet. That's 6 million places to live for everyone who is now or previously homeless. This would more than accommodate the people made homeless due to the fires.
I'm inspired by the question: what laws would support and/or require degrowth? I also wonder what education would help the public understand its necessity? What processes would engage the public to create policies wherein as many people as possible have a stake? I'm working now on questions about the LA fires...and the rebuilding. These projects feel related.
If we were thinking ecologically, LA would not rebuild. LA shouldn't be there. The entire city and surrounding cities are built on land that *should* burn every 30-40 years. Of course, ultimately, no city should be here on Earth.
I would urge everyone to listen to this interview with ecologist and fire expert, George Wuerthner: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6PV5K0Edquo
LA could be an exemplar for degrowth if they chose not to rebuild and instead restore ecosystems.
Another issue: the waste! I don't know what they will do with all the toxic waste left behind from the fire burning the toxic poisonous materials contained in everyone's home... it has to go somewhere. Where? Either it stays there and contaminates the land and water, or it gets hauled somewhere else where it contaminates the land and water. Best not to create that toxic nasty stuff (carpets, furniture with flame retardants, plastic clothes, chemicals under sinks, etc.) in the first place.
Thanks for compiling this data, bearing witness with eyes wide open is not easy, but it is a sacred service to honor our non-human kin in that way.
The picture of Tokyo you shared makes me think of the concept of an "ecumenopolis" which was introduced into pop-culture via the Starwars movies.
Recently, there was a Starwars tv show that depicted a planet at the center of the Galaxy (“Coruscant”) which is a planet that is completely covered in one giant city. The episode depicted two characters going to visit a sort of ‘park’ or monument which had the very highest peak on the planet poking out of a section of cement (surrounded in security railings and drones) about 3 meters, and one of the characters explained how that was the very last natural piece of the planet that is exposed, the rest is covered in city.
One of the most disturbing things for me, is that in this depiction, the city planet was not depicted as the center of evil or the empire, no, it was shown as no more than a busy planet of democracy and bureaucracy, businessmen and industrialists, all just “trying to make a living” having achieved the construction of a ‘wonderful’ civilization. The story glossed over that abhorrent depiction in a sort of trivial way, but I found it to be very chilling and it made me think of your essay.
Humans have even come up with a name for such an abomination. They call it an “Ecumenopolis” https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ecumenopolis (a planet completely covered in one giant city). Considering it is a thing that has been given a name and is depicted in lofty starwars scifi scenes it almost seems as though some humans think such a thing is worth striving towards creating.
For more on that:
https://gavinmounsey.substack.com/p/stumbling-into-the-ecumenopolis-or
Scale it up et voila...
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dyson_sphere
Thanks for the excellent depiction of our current state, a picture tells a thousand words. Another inclusion could be the a graph showing how many of the best sites for easy renewable energy generation are already occupied, especially for hydro and how this equates to the energy transfer. We are already seeing the upgrading of generation especially in wind leading to massive amounts of waste rather than new builds. Thanks again
Stop paying taxes!
The American Armed Forces are the biggest polluters by so wide a margin it makes no difference who is in second place. The Air Force has more than 5,000 planes, many kept in the air constantly to avoid being wiped out by a surprise attack on the ground. They all use halon 1301 in their fuel tanks as a fire supressant to prevent the tanks from exploding if hit by anti-aircraft fire so the pilot will have time to bail out. Halon 1301c is the worst destroyer of the atmospheric ozone layer.
The Navy uses sonar on the same frequencies used by whales, seals, dolphins, manatees, turtles, and other sea life, interfering with their ability to find food, mates, or dangers.
The Army has fired more than 150,000 rounds of artilery shells made from reworked nuclear reactor fuel rods and contaminated all of Iraq, Afganistan, Bosnia, Syria, and parts of Australia and the United States used for target practice with radioactive dust. Iraqi doctors are seeing several thousand cases a year more than before the invasion of stillbirths, miscariages, birth defects, and childhood cancer. This will go on forever, long after the very existence of the United States Of America has been forgotten.
Anyone paying taxes to the American military government is complicit in the destruction of the ability of this planet to support life. Why are there so many environmentally aware people, concerned about the attacks on the biosphere by ordinary private individuals but seemingly unconcerned with the far greater amoubnt of harm done by the American war machine? Anyone seriously concerned about what is happening to the earth but still paying taxes to the American military rulers should consider forming a tax resister's movement.
Watching an ideology of infinite growth hit and surpass what should have been a clear "dead end" sign... I wish more people were aware of what is happening on this planet.
Whoah, impact visualized!
The biggest solution is to diligently convince people to have no children for a while.
Perhaps not the biggest solution, but rising children that fight for our global commons helps
It's not "our" global commons. We are just one of 10 million species and we take most of the Earth for ourselves. That's the problem.
8.2 billion humans is not sustainable in any sense of the world.
Even 1 billion isn't, now that we've so reduced carrying capacity.
My guess it's less than 100 million.
If we stay on our current path, soon there will be zero humans, along with close to zero or zero large land mammals, and the remaining life on Earth will be suffering from a highly polluted Earth for eons, thanks to us.
Less, less, less is the song we should sing all day and night.
More required reading from Elisabeth!