I think all these big issues come together as follows: Environmental problems are caused by: 1) human population growth, and 2) our growth-based economic philosophy.
The problems caused by these factors are problems of exploitation (resource extraction above the long-term sustainable level), and problems of environmental degradation (pollution, habitat destruction, etc. above the natural capacity for renewal) - so basically we have input problems and output problems. Peak Oil is probably the biggest input problem facing us now, and Global Warming is probably the biggest output problem (though there are many problems of both kinds). All these problems occur because we have pushed the limits of the planet so we could grow well above carrying capacity (probably). The reason I think Peak Oil is so important is that it is primarily the excess cheap energy supplied by oil that has allowed the human population to get so huge. When the oil decreases, what happens to the human population? And what happens to ecological systems when humans react to the change? For anybody who doesn't know this quote: "The greatest shortcoming of the human race is our inability to understand the exponential function." - Albert Bartlett, U. Colorado Boulder Emeritus Professor of Physics. Joe __________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Tired of spam? Yahoo! Mail has the best spam protection around http://mail.yahoo.com
