The Happiness Money Can't Buy

[Xamonas Chegwé]

With life-expectancy in the teens and twenties for the most part.

I still think you're working off the model of marginalized HG societies, displaced by modern industrial society. That's not what I'm describing. Again, I'm not talking about turning the clock back. I'm talking about advancing in a sustainable, reasonable way with the knowledge and wisdom we've gained.

There is no way in the world that subsistence farming and HG can support the number of people on the planet today. How many are you planning to get rid of?

The very reason the planet's population is so absurdly large is the success of the proponents of the 'more is better' bullshit. Industrial societies marginalized and slaughtered previously sustainable HG/subsistence agriculture populations in order to acquire their natural resources, in a vain attempt to satisfy their desire for a heavenly existence of comfort and leisure. That's why the aboriginals have such short life-spans, not because the natural life is inherently "nasty, brutish and short".

Population will self-regulate to a point where it is sustainable, once we outlaw bullshit-artists like advertisers and politicians who greedily take advantage of human gullibility and tendency towards basic trust in each other. Shit, we've got how many billions on the planet and how many millions are starving now? The whole assumption that we're making progress is nonsense. With larger human population, we're still just increasing the number of poor and hungry.

Let's imagine that we manage to solve all our energy and food demands. What's going to happen next? In a nutrient-rich environment, organisms will multiply. Populations will increase. There is nothing we can do about the size of the planet, so eventually every square inch will be covered in apartment complexes and Wal-marts. Long before that, global climate change resulting from the environmental destruction required to facilitate such a population will make the planet uninhabitable, anyway. It's a dead end, and we can avoid it by learning from our mistakes and making sensible choices now.

Who this "WE" kemo sabe?

There are a number of other causes of human misery I'd like to 'outlaw' as well. Starting with anyone involved in organised religion and promoting unrestricted population growth through outlawing contraception. I'd be interested to know who's going to be doing the outlawing though. Are you proposing revolution? Good luck to you.

Feel free to outline how you think this Arcadian utopia can be achieved and maintained in more specific terms if you like. Otherwise, it is nothing but pie in the sky.

[Clinton Huxley]

The very reason the planet's population is so absurdly large is the success of the proponents of the 'more is better' bullshit.

Once agriculture was invented, as a way of ensuring food supply, the rest of civilization was inevitable, IMO. It's not like there was a plan to take over the world.

Industrial societies marginalized and slaughtered previously sustainable HG/subsistence agriculture populations in order to acquire their natural resources, in a vain attempt to satisfy their desire for a heavenly existence of comfort and leisure.

I think there is a fair amount of evidence showing that HG societies are amongst the most violent, with murder rates beyond those of modern S. Africa. The idea of of some bucolic age of peaceful HGs living in harmony with the environment is a myth.

That's why the aboriginals have such short life-spans, not because the natural life is inherently "nasty, brutish and short".

I don't know if there is any reliable data as to aboriginal lifespans prior to white settlement. Interesting to note though, that the aboriginals wiped out Australia's mega-fauna....

Population will self-regulate to a point where it is sustainable, once we outlaw bullshit-artists like advertisers and politicians who greedily take advantage of human gullibility and tendency towards basic trust in each other.

You mean, once you outlaw human nature, full-stop?

Shit, we've got how many billions on the planet and how many millions are starving now? The whole assumption that we're making progress is nonsense. With larger human population, we're still just increasing the number of poor and hungry.

Enough calories are produced to feed everyone but the will to distribute those calories equitably does not exist.

Let's imagine that we manage to solve all our energy and food demands.
What's going to happen next? In a nutrient-rich environment, organisms will multiply. Populations will increase. There is nothing we can do about the size of the planet, so eventually every square inch will be covered in apartment complexes and Wal-marts. Long before that, global climate change resulting from the environmental destruction required to facilitate such a population will make the planet uninhabitable, anyway. It's a dead end, and we can avoid it by learning from our mistakes and making sensible choices now.

If we can get fusion power and those damned nanobots to work properly, the Earth need not be all we have.


I, for one, see nothing inspiring in humans reining in their urge to explore the Universe and settle for some dreary hunter gathering existence. Turn our backs on the stars? Never!

[FBM]

Who this "WE" kemo sabe?

Sorry, which 'we' were you referring to? I used it a bunch of times, mostly referring to the collective members of our species.

There are a number of other causes of human misery I'd like to 'outlaw' as well. Starting with anyone involved in organised religion and promoting unrestricted population growth through outlawing contraception. I'd be interested to know who's going to be doing the outlawing though. Are you proposing revolution? Good luck to you.

Feel free to outline how you think this Arcadian utopia can be achieved and maintained in more specific terms if you like. Otherwise, it is nothing but pie in the sky.

No, I don't think it will or expect it to happen, and I don't think it would be a utopia if it did. Like I said earlier, it would really just be trading one set of problems for another. This whole thread has been nothing more than wishful thinking and speculation, mostly on my part. IRL, I think everything is just fine the way it is. 'What is' has developed according to natural laws, and human behavior is not outside of natural laws. There is not an atom or molecule in the universe that is out of place, and I'm not being sarcastic there. If things were 'supposed' to be different, they would be. I do see an inevitable end to the growth-based global economy and population growth, and mostly I've just been a) predicting that end, and b) suggesting a reasonable, practical and perhaps inevitable alternative. It ain't gonna happen. We're going to keep chasing our insatiable desires for more and more of more and more, getting into more and more wars over it until the planet is fucked, ecologically-speaking, and then the remaining humans will, hopefully, be a little more careful next time. Maybe future generations will decide that HG/subsistence farming is the wise choice. Maybe not. Meh. It's just another period in history. We'll get over it.

[FBM]

Once agriculture was invented, as a way of ensuring food supply, the rest of civilization was inevitable, IMO. It's not like there was a plan to take over the world.

Sure, it was inevitable, or it never would have happened.
There have been shitloads of plans to take over the world. There are some ongoing ones. They have all, to date, ended in disaster, causing more misery than they ever dreamed of curing.

I think there is a fair amount of evidence showing that HG societies are amongst the most violent, with murder rates beyond those of modern S. Africa. The idea of of some bucolic age of peaceful HGs living in harmony with the environment is a myth.

Percentage-wise, you may be correct. But in real numbers, HG societies could kill at most a few hundred rivals. Modern warfare kills millions in the same time span.

I don't know if there is any reliable data as to aboriginal lifespans prior to white settlement. Interesting to note though, that the aboriginals wiped out Australia's mega-fauna....

Sure. That's what's been happening throughout the history of life on this planet. The current situation is more of the same, but instead of having local implications, it has global ones.

You mean, once you outlaw human nature, full-stop?

Good point. Assuming that human nature is a fixed, immutable thing. If it were, improvement would be impossible. I'm suggesting improvement for survival's sake, not abolition for moral reasons.

Enough calories are produced to feed everyone but the will to distribute those calories equitably does not exist.

And if that will did exist, it would only facilitate further population growth, compounding the problem, not alleviating it.

If we can get fusion power and those damned nanobots to work properly, the Earth need not be all we have.

I'm all for exploring the universe!!

I, for one, see nothing inspiring in humans reining in their urge to explore the Universe and settle for some dreary hunter gathering existence. Turn our backs on the stars? Never!

We're not talking about the human desire to explore the universe, which I share. We're talking about figuring out how to engineer a sustainable existence on this planet. The only one we have for the realistic, foreseeable future.

[Feck]

IMHO we will never manage to survive on this planet ,esp with anything like our population numbers ,Doomed Doomed I say
and so what !I may weep for a world without Tigers but a world without people Good .

And for getting into space and colonising anywhere else I don't think that's going to happen ,in fact I find the idea slightly revolting anyway,like a leaking sewerpipe .Is this another example of Manifest Destiny ?

[FBM]

IMHO we will never manage to survive on this planet ,esp with anything like our population numbers ,Doomed Doomed I say
and so what !I may weep for a world without Tigers but a world without people Good .

And for getting into space and colonising anywhere else I don't think that's going to happen ,in fact I find the idea slightly revolting anyway,like a leaking sewerpipe .Is this another example of Manifest Destiny ?

Let me preface this by noting that you are weird. And I mean that in the most complimentary way.

I don't have the pessimistic view of H. sapiens as sewage, but I fear that some may actually see space exploration as an extended Manifest Destiny, yet another bullshit Christian-based idea. As for me, it's just adventure and curiosity. If I have any regrets in this existence, it's that I'll never set foot on another planet. Probably never leave this atmosphere.

[Feck]

IMHO we will never manage to survive on this planet ,esp with anything like our population numbers ,Doomed Doomed I say
and so what !I may weep for a world without Tigers but a world without people Good .

And for getting into space and colonising anywhere else I don't think that's going to happen ,in fact I find the idea slightly revolting anyway,like a leaking sewerpipe .Is this another example of Manifest Destiny ?

Let me preface this by noting that you are weird. And I mean that in the most complimentary way.

I don't have the pessimistic view of H. sapiens as sewage, but I fear that some may actually see space exploration as an extended Manifest Destiny, yet another bullshit Christian-based idea. As for me, it's just adventure and curiosity. If I have any regrets in this existence, it's that I'll never set foot on another planet. Probably never leave this atmosphere.

It's Ok FBM you can call me weird anytime you like , it is true (other peoples opinions of course but wierdness is a subjective thing anyway)

[FBM]

It's Ok FBM you can call me weird anytime you like , it is true (other peoples opinions of course but wierdness is a subjective thing anyway)

[Xamonas Chegwé]

If we can get fusion power and those damned nanobots to work properly, the Earth need not be all we have.

I'm all for exploring the universe!!

I, for one, see nothing inspiring in humans reining in their urge to explore the Universe and settle for some dreary hunter gathering existence. Turn our backs on the stars? Never!

We're not talking about the human desire to explore the universe, which I share. We're talking about figuring out how to engineer a sustainable existence on this planet. The only one we have for the realistic, foreseeable future.

I can't see how a society broken into small groups of hunter-gatherers and the technology required to send a man to the stars could ever co-exist. The latter requires a highly mechanised, technical-skilled and industrial society, with all of its educators, constructors, inventors, testers, and sundry ancillary staff which perforce requires some form of collective agriculture (which you eschewed as an option earlier in this thread) in order to feed it.

I spy someone trying to eat that cake that they would also like to have.

[FBM]

I can't see how a society broken into small groups of hunter-gatherers and the technology required to send a man to the stars could ever co-exist. The latter requires a highly mechanised, technical-skilled and industrial society, with all of its educators, constructors, inventors, testers, and sundry ancillary staff which perforce requires some form of collective agriculture (which you eschewed as an option earlier in this thread) in order to feed it.

I spy someone trying to eat that cake that they would also like to have.

Bullseye! You've zeroed in on the fatal flaw in all my machinations and ruminations!

[Clinton Huxley]

Curses, is this thread finished now, then? Just when it was getting interesting? Shame....

[Xamonas Chegwé]

Curses, is this thread finished now, then? Just when it was getting interesting? Shame....

I know, I hate it when they quit on me like that as well. Bloody part-time arguers!

[FBM]

Curses, is this thread finished now, then? Just when it was getting interesting? Shame....

I never really expected any sort of response to this OP, but if you want to play more...I'm still awake (barely)...

Curses, is this thread finished now, then? Just when it was getting interesting? Shame....

I know, I hate it when they quit on me like that as well. Bloody part-time arguers!

What? All I did was admit that you had a good point! Let me assure you that I can argue my ass off till the cows come home to roost!

Or something like that.

I have had a taste of soju, tho, so I can't promise my best...

[lordpasternack]

But for the love of God, I can most certainly eat my cake and have it too, if I get my way.

Certainly, not all of humanity could live in the wilderness as HGs if science, medicine, and whatnot are to continue to exist - but as an individual most certainly could - and I could potentially get a few pals along, without stepping on anyone's toes in their high-flying 9-5 lifestyle. Or at least do what FBM's done and get a low octane, fairly well-paid vocation that suits me just fine. We can create our own little niche in the sprawling morass of the "global village" if we damn well want to. We just have to put our minds to it, and work at it a little harder than they might have had to back in the day...

[FBM]

But for the love of God, I can most certainly eat my cake and have it too, if I get my way.

Certainly, not all of humanity could live in the wilderness as HGs if science, medicine, and whatnot are to continue to exist - but as an individual most certainly could - and I could potentially get a few pals along, without stepping on anyone's toes in their high-flying 9-5 lifestyle. Or at least do what FBM's done and get a low octane, fairly well-paid vocation that suits me just fine. We can create our own little niche in the sprawling morass of the "global village" if we damn well want to. We just have to put our minds to it, and work at it a little harder than they might have had to back in the day...

+1 brazillion to everything except the "work at it a little harder" part. Really, I don't think we should have to work any harder. The stress involved in the current model of human 'success' is ridiculous as it is. I'm suggesting that a more moderate lifestyle would involve less struggle, not more. After all, all paths lead to the same place: the grave. So why work harder? Moderate...find the happy median...