[Skybird]

[quote=UnderseaLcpl] 1) Actually, we can. For a brief period covering the entire span of human history, technology has provided the ability to do things that were impossible before. By your logic, we would all be hunter-gatherers because agricultural revolutions wouldn't solve our problems.

Nonsens, you are exaggerating. Why is it that these themes always trigger black-white-reactions? the current climate chnage takling place (as long as you do not deny it), the massive gap between the rich and the poor worldwide, the fact that we have global problems that derive from the industrialization of only the Western world, but now the much greater part of mankind claims the right to reach for the same living standard we enjoy (who can deny it to them?) gives clear signlas that we cannot continue by a principle of business as usual. Climate changes, respsurces getting thin, even food.

2) That's already happening. Consider gas for a moment. In the U.S., infamous for its' SUV's and prior to that, gun-boat Oldsmobiles and the like, people are making drastic changes to cope with rising fuel costs. But it isn't because some forward thinking environmentalist told them to do it, it's because fuel economics are hitting their wallets. Once again, the market is the determining force.

I made the finacial and economic argument to Zachstar. He called it and more like that "weired".

3) Everything WILL change for the better. All that is needed is a proper motivating force, like money. When people begin to suffer deleterious effects in terms of economics or environment they simply change the way they live and that becomes the new "standard". Examples include (insert country name here)'s industrial revolution and subsequent reforms of industry, China's resorting to "Special Economic Zones", the fall of the Soviet Union, the Great Depression, the 70's "Gas Crunch" etc etc ad infinitum.

Colunter arguments are the fact that the west for centuries has formed its wealth at the cost of the third world, Russia has formed its wealth on the backs of the famrers, then the working class and small people, and china'S massive ignoration of social suffering party'Y economic prjects causes, and especially the infamous Three Gorges Dam. You quote from the ideal theories of past economic textbooks here. reality - proves to be more than just a bit different.

Additionally, the argument that "If you want more living standard, there have to be less people." is untrue. The prosperity of some thrives at the expense of others. So, theoretically, as long as we maintain billions of deprived and/or dying people, the rest of us can live well. Increasing the number of suffering people directly translates into more of us having a first-world standard of living. As terribly heartless as that sounds, there is nothing any of you can do to change it significantly, short of eliminating competition for resources by making all resources unlimited. It's a cruel world and if you have a computer and internet access you are not part of the suffering and dying majority.

While we say the same on the fact, we could not be more apart nevertheless. maybe you are willing to accept the comndtion quo and leave it untouched for you prfit from it. I certainly must and will not agree with that attitude. It certainly is wrong.

No unlimited economic growth is not a fantasy. Who put limited dimensions on our system?

Earth, and knowledge.

The lives of those of us discussing this topic today are unimaginable by the standards of people even a thousand years ago. Once again, you underestimate the adaptability of humans, the power of science, and the omnipotent power of slef-interest.

I know that for my living standard, people are dying, and for every man living at my standards, several other men live in poverty and misery. we live on tic, and by blood diamonds in the wider meaning of the term - we all in the industrialized world(s) do.

It is true that obscene numbers of people may die from the "progress" of civilization and the effects thereof, but how is that any different from the rest of human, and natural, history?

Should that be an excuse?

5) Does cancer, at any stage, create a greater amount of order and prosperity in the body than exsisted before?

Is material esxssive wealth of the West really always for the best of people? As I see it, it corrupts a greater and greater part of our young, and brings more and more people to turening into egoists and brings out more and more sociological neurosis and psychosis all over the place. there are more items being producedk, than thirty ysears ago. But still, life has become more unpersonal, jarder, more brutal, colder.

and the gab between the few having more and more, and the many having less and elsser, becomes wider. In the US - and in Europe and Germany as well.

Granted, you can say that progress is leading us to destruction,

I have not said that, never, nowhere. Again, disagreeing with what you and part of what Zachstar said, immediately triggers black-white-thinking.

but all evidence thus far disagrees, because we are still here and have a greater number of prosperous people and countries than ever. The view that our lifestyles are leading us to imminent destruction has been around for millenia.

Last time I checked UN statistics on global populaion and their social living conditions, they disagreed with you. Democracies are in decline. More people than before live in poverty, and increasingly get exposued to climate.-chnage-caused natural desasters. We live our life you celebrate by having expoited them and their countries for long time, and still do so in many, many cases. we deny them equal chances, just look at the fights the WTO had seen abiout agriculture again.

I will agree that the "Western" world probably faces a significant downfall in the future for a variety of reasons, but humanity itself is in no immediate danger of being destroyed.

Possibly not, if ignoring some nasty pandemcis. but human civilisation is at risk very well, and if it falls, man will not be anything more than a number of bands wandering around.

6) Wishful thinking at its' worst. Yeah, if only all 6 billion of us could subscribe to a peaceful and earth-friendly lifestyle wherin the vast majority of people were not denied prosperity for the gain of others. Sounds good. On paper. Sounds like communism, and we all know how well that works out.

Now you really try hard to distort what I said and mean, do you. I refuse to honour that with a reply.

In summation, not only is continiuing on our present course our best hope, it is also the only thing that will happen.

Rome has spoken (... before it fell)

Even if one was to introduce a New World Order wherein we all lived in a peaceful and "green" society, it would promptly be destroyed by the first group to point guns at some other group's heads and say "give us all your stuff or you die"

What you are proposing, skybird, is nothing short of changing human nature. A feat which could only be acheived via genetic manipulation and artificial selection, and I have a good idea how you feel about that already.

You assume quite lot about me in recent paragraphs what I allegedly should have said or meant, but actually havent, and that makes me a bit angry now. You and me, as well as the the typical American and the typical european disagree on a lot of things, yet share we the same key genes nevertheless. the cultural climate you live in just is very different than the one we live in over here. That points at the importance of education, not only schools, but the self-understanding that is propagated. and by that, people can learn to chnage. To be more presice: they already have started it, but you seem to be unaware. many people'sliofe have chnaged in your country, they have lost homes, become poorer, others feel the increasing costs for gasoline, and chnage their habits to cope with that. awareness for environmental issues is rising, even in america, sometimes lowoly, sometimes faster. Schwarzenegger, about whom I mocked at first, has launched a number of "green" policies that have catapulted California probably into the lead of american change in this regard.

One principle thing: I tend in discussions like this to not stick to any preferred utopia of mine, and what I hope and wish (as long as i do not explicitly say so), but focus on a style that could be described as "if we do this, the consequence probably will be that, and if we don't do it, then this will be the result." I do that without morally or subjectively judging, no matter if discussing nuclear strikes against Iran, environment or cultural issues. If I think this or that option is desirable or not, is something very different. that is why all your mentioning of communism, and me hoping this or not hoping that, is pointless. You can disagree with the likelihoods I see regarding events, but I would be thankful if you leave it to that, and not worry about my alleged personal preferances and wishes and hopes and desires so much, as long as I do not mark them as that: my wishes, hopes and desires.

all in all i must reject your comfortability by which you arrange yourself with the status quo and consider it to be okay to continue like that, forever, and in ignorration of dangerous disbalances and potentials for conflicts.

Damn, time is fleeting.