The Talk
Most of us want more, and all the big governments are touting growth. The theory is that if we produce twice as much every dozen or so years (like in China and India recently), the poor will be better off without the affluent and the super-rich having to curtail their soaring, it’s all like a giant airplane taking off. But the Earth is the same size as during the many thousands of years when humankind was about a thousandth as big as now and the modern American way of life didn’t exist. The US president declared in 1992 (when 100+ heads of state went to Rio to talk about climate change) that “The American way of life is not subject to negotiation.” Gandhi said (in 1945) that “the Earth provides enough for everyone’s needs”, but his notion of needs was very modest and didn’t include being better off than your neighbours. What should we do now?