"The historical range of effects does not necessarily disclose the potential
range of effects." --Jonathan Nelson
I suppose that an infinite number of feedback loops might be resolved into
some "average," but that would be useless or marginally useful, or radically
misleading depending upon the values used in the calculation, the position
of the observer, and the effects of the loops on themselves or their
antecedents at infinitely multiple scales. It may be that all "we" can do is
to guess at the degree of our ignorance, in an infinitely cyclic process
that defies our attempts to "regulate" it.
WT
PS: Food is hardly the only focus that results in ecosystem degradation.
Diamond rings, for example, have little utility, yet the ecological cost is
very high.
Non-local food is an extreme case of robbing one system to feed the desires
and excesses of other systems. Local food that is cultivated must displace
organisms that are functional subsets of ecosystems. That a lot of wild food
"goes to waste" because of a prejudice for cultivated food is not the whole
story, but it is part of it.
----- Original Message -----
From: "Jonathan Nelson" <eco...@phossie.com>
To: <ECOLOG-L@LISTSERV.UMD.EDU>
Sent: Wednesday, September 23, 2009 12:00 PM
Subject: Re: [ECOLOG-L] Population control
The larger point I am trying to explore is the idea that many of the most
important aspects of "quality of life" are features of material situations
rather than the materials themselves. For example, take food. Food is an
important aspect of quality of life. But it is not a yearly total that
matters most, nor is it a daily average. Once adequate nutrition is
available, it's the variation that counts. Boom and bust cycles make for
high stress levels. My argument is that we don't need fast food
restaurants
on every corner to validate the idea that quality of life has improved. We
need a measure of assurance that people will not be malnourished. There is
more than one level of disconnect between the two concepts of "quality".
Once basic needs are accounted for, I suspect it's the volatility and
response characteristics of the system that influence the way we react.
Yet again, I can't help thinking about granaries. We develop agriculture
and
live on its variables. It is frequently painful but it is often better
than
before. We develop the granary and build one. We stockpile. We expand into
the new steadiness. The grain ferments, the granary explodes. Catastrophe.
We think about granary design and we build more than one.
And this cycle will continue, becoming more and more abstracted. Because
stockpiling - buffering - has proven better than not stockpiling, we
collect
everything we can. We grow to the limit. Because we only pay attention to
the character of the fluctuations, we are repeatedly punished by the low
extremes. Because the low extremes are always a shock when they arrive, we
react by trying to build a larger stockpile.
Once the larger stockpile is there, the 95% lows start to look pretty
manageable, so we consume more. But the span of time, the number of
conditions, the number of dependent variables... the potential variation
of
system output... all increase as we try to derive the greatest benefit
from
the least effort.
We need to learn to consume the knowledge we stockpile (not a scarce
resource). In particular, I hope we begin to model our systems - which
could
be directly investigated - rather than the effects of our systems. The
historical range of effects does not necessarily disclose the potential
range of effects.
My point about education is that we do not deplete our stockpile of
information and knowledge in times of need.
My point about the correlation between quality of life and resource
consumption is that we simply don't operate, as a species, in an
enlightened
way. I agree that increased consumption and increase quality of life are
associated; I disagree that the difference is *necessarily* "vast". It
*is*
vast the way we have done it so far.
But indulge me. Imagine a world where we do not overconsume out of
nervousness. Where we understand something about the limits of our system
and the buffers we require to remain comfortable.
We can choose this outcome. And so I think it is not useful to assume that
our high standards of living must be satisfied by massive resource
depletion
and systemic degradation - not just environmental, but in every aspect of
life. These are probably the causes of the miseries we still experience.
On Wed, Sep 23, 2009 at 9:20 AM, <as...@bio.miami.edu> wrote:
"If I remember correctly, improving quality of life often decreases the
population growth rate. Correction or refinement of that belief would be
welcome.
"
yes it does; unfortunately an improved quality of life is also
accompanied
by a vastly increased consumption of resources. Which explains the much
higher per capita resource usage in developed nations, and increasingly
amidst the middle classes in the urban third world. So there seems to be
no
easy way out.
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