Convergence of Energy, Economy and Environment With Political, Religious, and Cultural Realities

Mark T. Brown

March 12, 2007

Thoughts for transition and descent

Growth …

“Growth for the sake of growth is the ideology of the cancer cell.” - Edward Abbey

The GrowthEthic…

Thoughts for transition and descent…

Transitions …

The Transition … Education

1. All education is environmental education, systems education is essential.

2. A common core of knowledge in science, arts, civics, and culture with flexibility built in for the rest.

3. Orient schools to stress different life themes…. not only to send everyone to universities.

The Transition …Information

1. TV is the global “campfire” and as such needs to focus on shared ideas, purposes, and ethics.

2. TV needs moderation and focus on broader issues with some optimal entertainment

3. Universities will need to once again become society’s storehouse of information, and its generation, testing, and selecting.

4. The world needs to share information, not hide it and make it difficult to obtain.

5. How much information is appropriate?

The Transition …Religion

1. Religion should stress the larger scale issues such as environment, capitalism, globalization, community, population growth, war

2. Service and sacrifice must replace “rugged individualism” and “growth is progress” ethic

3. We will need to include nature and the earth's energy systems in our religious ethic.

4. Sharing and a code of attitudes that includes pluralistic respect for other faiths will be important

The Transition… Environment

1. We must treat the environment not as a dumping ground, but the source of all life.

2. Recycle should become the main strategy for dealing with wastes… we must change from a consumer society to a “re-user” society

3. We will need to rebuild natural capital (forests, soils, wetlands and water) that have been neglected for the past two centuries.

4. We should better value the services from the environment and include them in our schemes for national accounting.

The Transition …Work

1. Everyone needs to feel part of the society with sufficient useful work contributing to productivity.

2. Cut wages across the board before laying off workers

3. Institute minimum and

maximum wage reform

4. Achieve full employment

of the young and old

through sliding pay scales

5. Tele-commuting and

“Flex-time” where possible

The Transition … Public Policy/Energy Policy

1. Public policy decisions should include biophysical and social constraints, not only monetary concerns.

2. We should invest in alternatives…the best of which is to reduce luxury consumption.

3. We should NOT tax energy sources…taxes will increase prices driving down productivity and increasing inflation.

4. We SHOULD tax luxury consumption.

5. We should require net energy determinations of all proposed alternative energy sources.

The Transition … Life Styles

1. Abandon the growth ethic.

2. We must learn to do more with less…”less is more”…”Small is beautiful”…”the prosperous way down”

3. Adopt simplicity rather than complexity.

4. Decrease personal living space, increase energy efficient architecture.

5. Accurately value “family work”…caring, loving, mutual support…are not valued in monetary value system.

“As sometimes attributed to past cultures, people may find glory in being an agent of the Earth. It remains to be seen whether the social mechanisms will be conscious, logical, emotional, ritualistic, regimented, or by some means we can’t imagine.”

H.T. Odum, 2001