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Are we on the road to civilisation collapse? (2019)

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Re: Are we on the road to civilisation collapse? (2019)

#181

Post by phendrenad2 »

Isinlor wrote: post #125
no_wizard wrote: post #8

Perhaps not entire civilization collapse, pending nuclear arsenals unleashed, but I think we are edging ever closer to massive social upheaval, what shape of this I am unsure about. To quote an adjacent article that was mentioned in this one: How Western Civilization Could Collapse > Eventually, the working population crashes because the portion of wealth allocated to them is not enough, followed by collapse of the e…

The world is better off today in basically every way than it was 100 years ago, and almost unimaginably better than it was 200 years ago. The worst 10% today do about as well as majority of West was doing back then. And the condition of the poor is improving rapidly. The places were it is not true, it is due to wars. But well, this is perspective of a Polish person. My country lost 25% of the population during wars w…

This is because we've more efficiently exploited the poorest people on Earth. As we run out of human resources to extract, surely something will change. Perhaps we'll reach an equilibrium, at least until jobs start to become automated by Google machine learning and Boston Robotics drones.

Re: Are we on the road to civilisation collapse? (2019)

#182

Post by Isinlor »

another_story wrote: post #161
Isinlor wrote: post #125

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The world is better off today in basically every way than it was 100 years ago, and almost unimaginably better than it was 200 years ago. The worst 10% today do about as well as majority of West was doing back then. And the condition of the poor is improving rapidly. The places were it is not true, it is due to wars. But well, this is perspective of a Polish person. My country lost 25% of the population during wars w…

People are better off, but not our arable land, the fish in our oceans, the soil we grow our crops in, the animals in our forest, the forest themselves, etc... We're in a sports car hitting the gas as we head towards a cliff and you're talking about how much better the interior is on this new model compared to the last.

Reduction of global child mortality from near 50% to below 4% is not "talking about how much better the interior is" ...

The past was an ongoing disaster worse than any westerner can imagine.

Re: Are we on the road to civilisation collapse? (2019)

#183

Post by pcrh »

OneTimePetes wrote: post #175
pcrh wrote: post #152

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Majority of millennials have never seen a time of economic prosperity in their lifetimes. It is the complete opposite to what their parents experienced. This exaggerated view is unfortunately quite common. It completely ignores the crises that previous generations had to go through, from WWII and the Korean War, to Vietnam, to depopulation of rural areas, to the Oil Crisis, to massive pollution in modern cities, to…

Yes, but those "previous generations" had oxygen in the tank, as in financial assets stored away from the good times, to survive the bad times. Millenials go pearl diving.

Try telling that to all those laid off in the 1980's, or those who had to abandon family farms in the 1960's and 1970's, etc, etc.

Ordinarily it is the older generation that looks to the past with rose-tinted spectacles. Millenials must be one of the few times when it is the younger generation that does so.

Re: Are we on the road to civilisation collapse? (2019)

#184

Post by pcrh »

nebula8804 wrote: post #168
pcrh wrote: post #152

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Majority of millennials have never seen a time of economic prosperity in their lifetimes. It is the complete opposite to what their parents experienced. This exaggerated view is unfortunately quite common. It completely ignores the crises that previous generations had to go through, from WWII and the Korean War, to Vietnam, to depopulation of rural areas, to the Oil Crisis, to massive pollution in modern cities, to…

Oh wow this comment is packed with so many unrelated events spanning multiple generations. You fail to see that going into the 70s and 80s the societal structure shifted to a far conservative view in terms of taxation, regulation and other governmental actions. This leads to a direct correlation to the outcomes for Gen X, Y and Z which have had their upbringing in the decades since post-Nixon. If you look at the raw…

>so many unrelated events spanning multiple generations.

That's the point; the world has always been turning. In terms of post-WWII economic history, the current "crisis" in the west is neither special nor very great.

Re: Are we on the road to civilisation collapse? (2019)

#185

Post by hoseja »

bob_roberts wrote: post #120
torstenvl wrote: post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In my view, the primary reason we are edging toward a new civil war is that politicians have decided to wield the law as a weapon in the growing urban/rural cultural divide. Classical liberalism is a necessity for pluralism, and pluralism is necessary for a country as diverse as the United States to survive. As soon as you drop "live and let live" as a fundamental principle and start trying to micromanage personal ch…

> traditional pronouns Nobody is banning traditional pronouns.

Yet. And somebody certainly is.

Re: Are we on the road to civilisation collapse? (2019)

#186

Post by ZeroGravitas »

no_wizard wrote: post #8

Perhaps not entire civilization collapse, pending nuclear arsenals unleashed, but I think we are edging ever closer to massive social upheaval, what shape of this I am unsure about. To quote an adjacent article that was mentioned in this one: How Western Civilization Could Collapse > Eventually, the working population crashes because the portion of wealth allocated to them is not enough, followed by collapse of the e…

I'm generally of the opinion that the solutions to climate change also help global inequality. As a simple example, the equator now has access to the cheapest energy in human history, and in a very democratic way that can't be controlled by a small elite.

But it seems common to claim that dealing with it will make this worse. Is there any actual reasons behind this or is it just "renewable energy will kill birds" again, a sociopathic attempt to use peoples empathy against them?

Re: Are we on the road to civilisation collapse? (2019)

#187

Post by esarbe »

no_wizard wrote: post #8

Perhaps not entire civilization collapse, pending nuclear arsenals unleashed, but I think we are edging ever closer to massive social upheaval, what shape of this I am unsure about. To quote an adjacent article that was mentioned in this one: How Western Civilization Could Collapse > Eventually, the working population crashes because the portion of wealth allocated to them is not enough, followed by collapse of the e…

Let me paint the shape of the calamity to come:

Our predatory exploitation of our biological life-support system and the massive reconfiguration of the climatic setup will cause enough disruption so as to lead to a breakdown in global cooperation. The damage wrought by pollution and over-consumption of natural resources will finally lead to a breakdown local ecosystems and to famine. Huge waves of refugees will (rightfully) demand a place to live sheltered from the calamities of climate change and they will be denied. Global commerce will stall and then stop, as refugees from failing states and countries turn to banditry and piracy. This will disrupt global cooperation and lead to regional conflicts that turn will lead to war over resources.

At least that's my best guess.

The sad thing is that we probably all see it coming, but we are in denial of it's reality. At least as a civilization. We're still chasing profit margin where where should gear for a fight for survival.

Classic Greek tragedy!

Re: Are we on the road to civilisation collapse? (2019)

#188

Post by Isinlor »

polytely wrote: post #170
Isinlor wrote: post #125

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The world is better off today in basically every way than it was 100 years ago, and almost unimaginably better than it was 200 years ago. The worst 10% today do about as well as majority of West was doing back then. And the condition of the poor is improving rapidly. The places were it is not true, it is due to wars. But well, this is perspective of a Polish person. My country lost 25% of the population during wars w…

But isn't all this progress bought with the destruction of our environment? It isn't sustainable at all and we are basically betting we can switch to a sustainable model before everything starts breaking down.

Climate change is no good, and we have to do better, but the past was even worse.

Try to imagine near 50% child mortality on a global scale in 1800.

That's the past. Today even the poorest regions in Africa have "only" ~15% child mortality.

Re: Are we on the road to civilisation collapse? (2019)

#189

Post by esarbe »

qsort wrote: post #149
rmchugh wrote: post #144

Earlier quoted context omitted.

it's not about financial games, but rather externalities. There are significant external costs of our way of life that are borne by others. That new car emits CO2 that contributes to global heating. The steaks we eat come from cows that have been fed with soy beans from cleared rainforests. etc etc. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Externality#Negative

It frankly still is a stretch to claim that living conditions would revert to even just 1950s levels if we reduced emissions to a sustainable level. Again, most of those improvements have been in real terms. We are simply more productive.

The problem is not that we could not revert to even just 1950 levels.

The problem is that it's advantageous for everyone to continue to externalize the costs and let everyone else pay the bill[0].

Since everyone is doing the externalizing, no one is paying the bill. Since no one is paying the bill, the resource will be exhausted sooner or later.

The resource in question is the resilience of our own biological life support system; we're wrecking it, both by by our predatory over exploitation and by pollution. We're destroying the foundations of our own survival.

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tragedy_of_the_commons

Re: Are we on the road to civilisation collapse? (2019)

#190

Post by esarbe »

wyager wrote: post #60
no_wizard wrote: post #8

Perhaps not entire civilization collapse, pending nuclear arsenals unleashed, but I think we are edging ever closer to massive social upheaval, what shape of this I am unsure about. To quote an adjacent article that was mentioned in this one: How Western Civilization Could Collapse > Eventually, the working population crashes because the portion of wealth allocated to them is not enough, followed by collapse of the e…

The quote you inlined strikes me as total nonsense. First, there is no local mechanism by which having too small of a fraction of the total wealth that exists everywhere will cause a group to “crash”. Groups “crash” (assuming a sane interpretation of that word) usually due to local effects, like not having enough money to buy food, and not because they’re poor compared to someone else somewhere else. Obviously relati…

No, the crash will come from a total systemic collapse, caused by the ecosystem destruction we are wrecking.

Climate change by greenhouse gas emission is just the cherry on top. The knife to the eye, so to speak.

Since the middle of the 20th century, we've lost about 75% of biomass and roundabout the same in biodiversity. Our biological support systems are collapsing all around us. System shaped by natural selection are extremely resilient. That has prevented much of the damage to manifest itself in clear signals. But now the damage has become so big that even nature's resilience cannot cope with it anymore and we start to witness more and more systems fragment and fail. See the Great Barrier reef.

This is just the start. Water is beginning to get critically scarce in many regions of the world. The political upheavals caused by the effects of predatory over exploitation and pollution will bring down nations.

And so forth.

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