According to a growing body of data, increasing per capita consumption of limited natural resources, a seemingly endless expansion of production capabilities in a finite world, and the skyrocketing rise in absolute global human population numbers are occurring synergistically on the surface of Earth and could be patently unsustainable at their current scale and rate of growth.
Because the global growth of human over-consumption, overproduction and overpopulation activities are a source of continuously deepening concern, and occasionally awaken me in the middle of the night, I have been regularly sending dozens of letters to editors, hundreds of missives into the blogosphere and thousands of e-mails into cyberspace. Always the theme is the same. It is simply this: Earth's body is finite, its resources are limited, and its ecosystem services capable of irreversible degradation by the huge scale and anticipated growth of human over-consumption, overproduction and overpopulation activities, the ones we see rampantly overspreading the surface of our planetary home in our time. Earth does not resemble a mother's teat at which the human species may forever suckle. Despite the assurances of many economists and politicians, Earth is not a cornucopia. No possible way.
The unbridled growth of the human species presents a colossal challenge to the family of humanity. The Earth as a constant, seemingly endless provider of whatsoever human beings desire is a fantasy ... a widely shared, consensually validated, distinctly human product of wishful and magical thinking ... a chimera spawned from economic expediency, political convenience and human greed, I suppose.
Because the global growth of human over-consumption, overproduction and overpopulation activities are a source of continuously deepening concern, and occasionally awaken me in the middle of the night, I have been regularly sending dozens of letters to editors, hundreds of missives into the blogosphere and thousands of e-mails into cyberspace. Always the theme is the same. It is simply this: Earth's body is finite, its resources are limited, and its ecosystem services capable of irreversible degradation by the huge scale and anticipated growth of human over-consumption, overproduction and overpopulation activities, the ones we see rampantly overspreading the surface of our planetary home in our time. Earth does not resemble a mother's teat at which the human species may forever suckle. Despite the assurances of many economists and politicians, Earth is not a cornucopia. No possible way.
The unbridled growth of the human species presents a colossal challenge to the family of humanity. The Earth as a constant, seemingly endless provider of whatsoever human beings desire is a fantasy ... a widely shared, consensually validated, distinctly human product of wishful and magical thinking ... a chimera spawned from economic expediency, political convenience and human greed, I suppose.
