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Obsession with growth is destroying nature, 150 countries warn

politico.eu

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Re: Obsession with growth is destroying nature, 150 countries warn

#71

Post by awongh »

philipallstar wrote: post #2

> European Union members have signed off on a report that warns focusing on unchecked economic growth is contributing to the destruction of global biodiversity It would be good to know which members of the EU are currently experiencing unchecked economic growth.

The lie of Europe is that they get to launder their environmental and humanitarian responsibility through other countries. If not for their amazing growth then for the maintenance of their current lifestyles.

Sometimes just through simply getting raw materials and finished goods from the third world or china in the open market, then still claim to be "green".

Or also directly from neighbors; Looking the other way when buying Russian natural gas, or Germany buying nuclear energy from France, etc.

Or the worst, paying Libya to sweep their refugee problems under the rug.

Re: Obsession with growth is destroying nature, 150 countries warn

#72

Post by kruffalon »

It would be nice if this meant anything.

My old cynic, grumpy mind can't see this as anything but virtue signaling. I would be overjoyed to be wrong.

One corner stone of the EU is the 4 freedoms[0] that among other things denies public institutions the ability to look at anything besides the monetary cost when deciding who to contract for anything.

And as JIT[1] no longer only applies to goods but also to people noone has people working for them anymore, but contract everything out.

Obviously I haven't read the report/document so maybe there are some political steps that the signees are binding themselves to take towards a non-growth-at-all-cost system but I really doubt it.

-----

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

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lean_manufacturing

Re: Obsession with growth is destroying nature, 150 countries warn

#73

Post by projektfu »

pfdietz wrote: post #40
Arubis wrote: post #33

Folks, "Limits to Growth" was published _over fifty years ago_ ( https://www.clubofrome.org/ltg50/ ) and revisited repeatedly since, each time in so doing effectively confirming their worst-case hypotheses. Yes, their website is...unconvincing. Which is poetic in its own way. Wikipedia's take on the original report at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Limits_to_Growth is probably a better read. But we've been able to…

Back when LtG came out, there was a study of the limits imposed by resource availability. The conclusion was that, to first approximation, the only resource that we had to worry about was energy. Fossil fuels would have to go, but everything else was either available in effectively unlimited amounts or could be substituted with things that were. An example of the latter was mercury -- effectively all previous uses ha…

When is the world population expected to decline? Or are you talking about a specific country?

Re: Obsession with growth is destroying nature, 150 countries warn

#74

Post by gnarlouse »

Geee wrote: post #70

Is this a joke? Growth is caused by consumer demand, and answering to it in the best way possible. It's not an 'obsession' of the capitalist businesses or countries. Capitalism is simply an algorithm which tries to allocate resources such that a growing demand can be answered, and that everyone has their needs satisfied. There are plenty of people who don't have enough food, enough housing, or other basic needs. The…

I think the intention here is to capture and spend more time respecting the negative externalities that are associated with growth.

Re: Obsession with growth is destroying nature, 150 countries warn

#75

Post by lm28469 »

ch4s3 wrote: post #62
lm28469 wrote: post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Meanwhile we observe a 75% collapse of wildlife world wide since 1970, but yeah sure we are constantly finding new "things"! Amazing!

Most of this is in developing nations where people are expanding agriculture into wild areas rather than implementing innovations in more intensive agriculture. Developed nations are currently increasing forest cover and wild land. You're demonstrating the EXACT myopia I'm referring to.

Ah, we're holding it wrong I guess. It starts to sound a lot like the very strong "we never really actually tried real communism" argument.

Re: Obsession with growth is destroying nature, 150 countries warn

#76

Post by pjmlp »

Aurornis wrote: post #61
pjmlp wrote: post #3

Of course, the MBAs pushing for growth missed on physics class that it is impossible for everyone to growth expontentially.

> impossible for everyone to growth expontentially. Where is the population growing exponentially?

What have MBAs to do with population?

Re: Obsession with growth is destroying nature, 150 countries warn

#77

Post by yoyohello13 »

kruffalon wrote: post #72

It would be nice if this meant anything. My old cynic, grumpy mind can't see this as anything but virtue signaling. I would be overjoyed to be wrong. One corner stone of the EU is the 4 freedoms[0] that among other things denies public institutions the ability to look at anything besides the monetary cost when deciding who to contract for anything. And as JIT[1] no longer only applies to goods but also to people noon…

You know? These days I actually prefer virtue signalling to the trend of not having any virtues at all and being proud of it.

Re: Obsession with growth is destroying nature, 150 countries warn

#78

Post by awongh »

I think the main quote from the article is important but the headline misses the point:

>> Markets are failing to adequately price or value biodiversity, such as filtration of pollutants, climate regulation and pollination.

It doesn't seem immediately obvious to me that growth rate of GDP is a direct proxy for this fact. How is GDP growth rate is a consequence of this or vice versa, rather than a second or third order effect?

I think plenty of people agree that an open and fair market also tries to price in externalities, especially ones that could end all life on the planet.

Re: Obsession with growth is destroying nature, 150 countries warn

#79

Post by _2d30 »

ZenoArrow wrote: post #46
philipallstar wrote: post #2

> European Union members have signed off on a report that warns focusing on unchecked economic growth is contributing to the destruction of global biodiversity It would be good to know which members of the EU are currently experiencing unchecked economic growth.

> It would be good to know which members of the EU are currently experiencing unchecked economic growth. All of them. You can see recent stats (from 2025) on GDP growth here, all the handful of countries with negative growth are outside the EU: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_real_GDP_... You may be confusing fast growth with unchecked growth. If you see sustained YoY growth of a couple of percent…

If you're going to quibble about OP's implied definition of "unchecked economic growth", then you should at least provide a better one that isn't just "economic growth".

Re: Obsession with growth is destroying nature, 150 countries warn

#80

Post by 1718627440 »

boringg wrote: post #5
philipallstar wrote: post #2

> European Union members have signed off on a report that warns focusing on unchecked economic growth is contributing to the destruction of global biodiversity It would be good to know which members of the EU are currently experiencing unchecked economic growth.

They already destroyed all of their forest natural resources a long time ago. Maybe they are trying to warn north america of their own mistakes.

Didn't that already happen in the middle ages?
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