Author: Rob Mielcarski

Is Austerity Rational? I Think So

There is no painless solution to our overshoot. Our only choices are do we want to fall from a higher elevation later, or climb down from a lower elevation sooner?

I advocate for conservation and population reduction, despite knowing that these policies would result in an economic depression, at best, and much hardship.

Am I being rational? I think so.

Imagine being in a plane at 30,000 feet that is running low on fuel with no runways in range. The pilot has two options.

The first option is to not inform the passengers and do nothing. Everyone will remain calm enjoying their meals and in-flight entertainment until the plane falls out of the sky and everyone dies. Except perhaps a few crazy doomers that were wearing parachutes :).

The second option is for the pilot to explain what is going on, ask everyone to buckle up tight, save their meals because they will be hungry while waiting for help to arrive, and brace for impact, while he drops to a low elevation and makes a best effort to crash-land in a clearing. Many people will probably be hurt or killed, but many may survive.

The correct choice seems obvious.

Now consider a second scenario.

You and your tribe are climbing a steep mountain because you believe there are gold and jewels at the peak. Part way up you feel a tremor which you know from experience in this region presages a large earthquake.

If you stay where you are and get thrown off the mountain by the earthquake some people will be injured and die.

If you continue to climb higher, more people will be injured and die.

If you start to climb down, fewer people will be injured and die.

The correct choice seems obvious.

The equivalent of elevation for our civilization is debt and the overshoot it is temporarily enabling.

What I find really interesting is that I am the only person I know of that is overshoot aware and that thinks we should raise awareness of the problem and try to encourage a voluntarily elevation reduction.

I know and respect a lot of smart and aware people who think we should simply enjoy life and wait for the system to collapse. I’ve been trying to understand why these people think we should do nothing. Possible explanations might include:

  1. They think our current elevation is so high that no one will survive even if we start to climb down.
  2. They think inherited human behavior will prevent most from voluntarily climbing down and they do not want to sacrifice while most people are enjoying drinks in the Titanic’s bar.
  3. They are hoping for some divine or technological intervention.

These possible explanations imply that they are willing to give up on something rare and precious without even trying, or that they are in denial.

I would love to hear from readers who disagree with my logic and think we should continue to increase our elevation.

I wrote more on this issue here.

Good Guys in Denial: It’s Everywhere and Deep: On Kevin Anderson

The layers and layers of denial, even among the good guys, is amazing!

Take Kevin Anderson for example. He’s one of the good guys. Kevin is a world leading climate scientist that has been persistent and aggressive at calling out the hypocrisy, dishonesty, and denial among his colleagues for pretending that 2 degrees is still an achievable target, for focusing on optimist and ignoring realistic emission scenarios, for not walking the talk, for telling politicians what they want to hear, etc., etc. Good on him!

On the other hand, Kevin Anderson is in denial on the implications of reducing CO2 emissions. He understands that we need to contract the economy but thinks we can do so without crashing it. He knows we need to reduce our consumption in the short term but thinks we can resume the good life after we build out renewable energy. Neither of course is possible.

Denial is everywhere, and deep.

Here is a talk by Kevin Anderson titled “Delivering on 2°C: Evolution or Revolution”.

Yuval Harari’s Sapiens

I thought I found some support for Varki’s denial theory in a new book by Yuval Harari titled Sapiens.

Harari makes the case that humans dominate the planet because we cooperate and we cooperate because we are uniquely able to construct and believe fictional stories.

This is no doubt part of the story but misses the bigger picture and lacks a satisfying explanation for why.

We dominate for many reasons. Cooperation yes, but also sophisticated symbolic language, ability to manage many relationships, forward planning, analytic skills, long term memory, learning ability, etc. All of these things fall under the umbrella of CPU power.

The important question to be answered is, why did only one small group of one species in Africa evolve this higher CPU power, despite many similar species being exposed to the same selection pressures?

Varki provides a plausible answer. Harari does not.

And of course, why with this exceptional CPU power do we believe in wacky economic theories and even wackier religions but not climate change or peak oil or almost anything that matters?

Again, Varki provides an answer. Harari does not.

Here is an EconTalk interview with Harari:

Yuval Harari on Sapiens

Here is Harari’s TED talk titled Bananas in Heaven.

A Summary of Our Predicament: Overshoot Is a Bitch

Here is my understanding of the current situation. I think this is the most accurate and concise summary you will find anywhere.

1) 2 degrees rise is already certain and we are on a path for 4-6 degrees in the lifetimes of our grandchildren.

2) 2 degrees will be a disaster for human civilization and many other species, 4-6 degrees will be worse.

3) Wealth is proportional to energy consumption.

4) Wealth (at the current high level we enjoy) is enabled with debt which requires economic growth or else the system will crash.

5) Over 90% of our energy is fossil carbon which emits CO2.

6) Renewable energy does not have the density or qualities necessary to replace fossil carbon energy and maintain our current lifestyle.

7) We and other species cannot afford carbon capture technology and it will not scale.

8) Low cost fossil carbon energy is depleting rapidly and current economic problems are largely due to this fact; economic contraction is imminent even if we reject voluntary conservation.

9) Geoengineering at best will buy us a little time.

10) Self-reinforcing feedback loops may have already taken over from human emitted CO2 as the primary drivers for climate change.

 

Therefore, we cannot mitigate climate change without reducing total wealth, and we cannot reduce wealth without crashing the system.

If we choose not to voluntarily reduce wealth we will be forced to do so. By volunteering we might be able to control the contraction, rather than being controlled by the contraction.

Unfortunately, even when wealth does contract it may be too late to avoid unacceptable climate change.

Nevertheless, I think we should try to make the future less bad for our children with conservation and population reduction policies. More people and more consumption will make the future worse. Less people and less consumption will make the future better.

I doubt however that we have the ability to override our genes’ desire to maximize resource capture, nor our inherited denial of reality filter.

Overshoot is a bitch.

Canadians Are In Denial

Canadians think we elected the liberals because we are decent and tolerant when in fact we voted for the party that promised the most stuff with the least inconvenience to our privileged lifestyles.

If this were not true, why did we reject the same party when they made climate change their top priority 7 years ago?

Thermodynamics trumps Keynesian economics. There is no free lunch.

The increased debt we just voted for will not fix anything and will only delay the day of reckoning and made that day much more painful when it comes.

Given that a dollar of debt now produces less than a dollar of income, it’s time to have an adult conversation and shift our strategy to conservation and population reduction.

Many people are saying they are happy the Liberals won because they will do more to address climate change than the Conservatives. I’m sure the Liberals have better intentions however the fact that they plan to increase debt and public expenditures means they will emit more CO2 than the Conservatives.

But let’s not let facts spoil our good feelings.

Liberals Won: Party On

We elected the party that promised more debt to help us live even further beyond our means.

We rejected the same party 7 years ago when they promised to do something about climate change.

They learned from that mistake and this time focused on more stuff for everyone with no promises of substance on climate change.

For those that wanted Harper out (for good reasons) there were two other choices, one with a focus on living within our means (NDP), and the other with a focus on the environment (Greens). We chose more debt and more stuff.

Our choice might work for a while but the cliff just got higher.

Time to party on like there’s no tomorrow because there likely isn’t one.

Canadian Election Choices

The Canadian election choices seem to be…

1) growth at the expense of the rich (Liberals)
2) growth at the expense of social harmony (Conservatives)
3) growth pretending to be socially responsible (NDP)
4) growth pretending to be sustainable (Greens)

All of these platforms will harm the future of our children and accelerate the collapse of our planet’s ecosystem.

Not one party is promising less now so that we step back from the cliff.

Not one party is promising population reduction policies which are needed to maintain a decent lifestyle for future generations and survival for many other species.

All of the parties see the painful symptoms of limits to growth and think that the policies of the other parties are to blame.

How can you construct a useful platform when you do not have a clue what is going on?

World’s Largest Sovereign Wealth Fund Is Forced To Begin Liquidating Assets (Zero Hedge)

Wow.

One of the richest sovereign wealth funds in the world is starting to draw down their assets.

Peak oil hasn’t even come off the simmer yet and they are starting to spend the savings that were set aside for future generations.

How come we never consider voluntary conservation and austerity so that the next generation has something left?

World’s Largest Sovereign Wealth Fund Is Forced To Begin Liquidating Assets

The Big Question: Can We Climb Down?

Is it possible to reduce our debt, and as a consequence shrink the economy, in a controlled fashion such that standards of living contract smoothly in step with declining net energy?

Or is a violent crash inevitable because existing debt cannot be sustained without growth, which is not possible without increased energy consumption, which is not possible without additional debt, which is not possible without increasing incomes, which is not possible with declining net energy, which is inevitable due to depletion of a non-renewable resource?

I suspect the design of our monetary system necessitates a crash, but it would be nice to be proven wrong as this would give us something worthwhile to lobby our leaders for.

Those of us fortunate to live in the developed world consume much more than we require to survive. Our standard of living must contract soon due to fossil energy depletion. If we can figure out a way to contract in a planned and controlled fashion, then we might be able to maintain social order and avoid war and unnecessary hardship.

Note also that a smaller economy emits less CO2 which might make climate change less bad provided that self-reinforcing positive feedback loops have not already taken over.

Planned contraction is one of the most important questions we should be exploring. I have not yet read enough to know if it is possible.

This article provides a flavor of the debt problem.

Waiting for Collapse: USA Debt Bombs Bursting