-----Original Message-----
From: martin.strid@... [mailto:martin.strid@...]
Sent: Friday, April 16, 2004 9:08 PM

Wilfred's ideas on resource depletion are interesting of course, though
neither new nor decisive.
He is generally right about much of what he says. My problem is his
perspective.

NUMBER ONE:
Any serious discussion on development issues should be based on
scientific fact and logical reasoning.

We will never ever run out of fossil fuels. Completely running out of
fossil oil and coal is physically impossible.
(This short story is based on research results from geological history,
which I think may be called scientific fact.
However, the degree of detail is abbreviated to enhance clarity of
logic).
Just consider the original atmosphere of the earth: carbon dioxide,
methane, hydrogen sulphide, nitrogen etc.
You take one breath of that mixture and you are dead.
So what happens? One tiny creature goes cyanobacterial and transforms
hydrogen sulphide into more cyanobacteria.
It has invented photosynthesis - heureka!
The chemical reaction, very simplified, is

(A) CO2 + H2S + sunrays => CH2O (the little creatures) + S (a
sulphur deposit that can be found today on all ocean bottoms)

The leftovers of their CH2O (carbohydrates), or CH2 (hydrocarbons), are
found in oil wells.
One day they run out of hydrogen sulphide. But the smartest one finds
out that if you substitute with water, you can make

(B) CO2 + H2O + sunrays => CH2O (trees etc, present-day coal) + O2

So what they do is, they finally poison the whole world, from their
ancestral cyano perspective that is.
Today we call it oxygenation. The equation of quantities would be
something like:

A + B = C + D + E

where
A = oxygen from reaction (A) above,
B = oxygen from reaction (B) above,
C = oxygen needed to oxygenate the oceans,
D = oxygen needed to oxygenate the atmosphere (supposed to make up 20%
of your next breath),
E = oxygen needed to oxygenate the ferrous soils (7 % of earth's crust
is iron).

The above equation is based on the first principle of thermodynamics,
which I do consider to be a well known and widely acknowledged (though
often forgotten) scientific fact.
(It should be remembered that calcium carbonate was not actually
produced by life forms, only extracted and "repacked" into new
geological layers).

For each and every single carbon atom that those little creatures tucked
away into underground deposits, one molecule of oxygen was produced as a
reward (quantities C + D + E).
And if we consume that carbon atom (i.e. the fossile molecule), exactly
the same number of oxygen molecules will be lost right out of the air
that we breathe.
Now, take the example of my country in 2003:
Our traffic destroyed 6 Mt of fossile fuels to produce 19 Mt of carbon
dioxide, 8 Mt of water vapour and 260 PJ of excess heat (i.e. thermal
waste. Ever heard of climate effect?).
In the process, no less than 21 million tonnes of life supporting oxygen
gas were removed from the atmosphere.
That oxygen was taken from quantity D in the above equation.

This means that before the fossile deposits are all combusted, we will
completely run out of oxygen.
And, I can assure you, long before that happens, you will be feeling
dizzy.

So the problem is not running out of fossil fuels. The short term
problem is the price of them, as they that are harder to get hold of
will remain longer.
And the long term problem, if we manage to persist that far, will be the
global air content.


NUMBER TWO:
Accusations of "moral high ground" is a fox blaming the hare of running
too fast.
Did you ever hear an economist (or anybody else for that matter) saying
that we should produce more material wealth in order to make people
lazy, fat, sick, stressed, lonely or suicidal?
Everybody wants to glorify his stand.
Why should "sustainabilitists"* be an exception?


NUMBER THREE:
What is growth anyway?
Does it mean trees growing or trees being cut down?
Where is the real value of money,except between the ears of men? Just
compare the value of a DDR mark before and after German reunion.
What would be the SI unit for money?
A tree can be measured in SI units: metres, kilograms, Joule value,
information content.
Why are the economists capable of even addressing those questions in a
scientific manner so hopelessly scarce?


NUMBER FOUR:
I am sorry, I am not really interested in living in a well guarded
museum of some 2 million beetle species. New species form all the time,
given a living environment.
But I AM interested in living a full life, physically and mentally.
A wood with five different kinds of trees, all standing neatly at even
distances, none of them falling down, with no surprises and no strange
fungi on the trunks, and where the most savage beast that you may
encounter is a roe or a badger, simply is not interesting enough. A real
forest is a very different experience. And we have managed to change the
world in such a way that only a minority of humanity today have ever
been into a real forest, be it tropical or temperate.
I used to go fishing in the Baltic Sea near home. There is a lot of
pike, perch and Lucioperca (don't know the english name) in our firth.
But what is the joy of fishing when they tell you not to eat the fish,
you will poison yourself.
Even if I don't go to coral reefs myself any more, it is a comfort to
know that they are still there, with all their astounding beauty.
And from East Africa I know a number of cases where maasai, a proud
nomad people, very poor by western standards but rich in their own eyes,
have tried European lifestyle and abandoned it. It simply didn't please
them. Just to give you one typical example: A Norwegian neighbour in
Tanzania stopped on the savannah plain near Arusha to change a tyre -
this was about 30 years ago - and a herdsman came up to watch his
doings. Wondering whether the guy, all in traditional garments with a
spear etc, would master any other tongue than maasai, he greeted him in
Swahili. To his surprise, the herdsman answered in elegant German. It
turned out that he had a degree after four years at the University of
Heidelberg. But he had found mzungu lifestyle to be worthless, so he
returned home. There is a lot more to be said on that subject, but I'll
stop here.
By contrast, my friends in Cameroon are losing their languages, their
culture, their coherence, their self esteem, their rhythm. All because
they are leading an urban life under the guiding star of colonial
culture. Of course they are proud of dressing like Europeans, of having
a car (even if it doesn't move), of watching TV programs from Brazil.
An eye cannot see itself.

This of course is a philosophical consideration which probably most
transport professionals consider totally irrelevant to our discussion.
After all, life is about efficiency, material "needs" (??) and filling
your home with practical consumer goods. Forests and savannahs are
uncomfortable and dangerous, so stick to roads.
The question "Why do we live?" should not be posed.

Sorry, forgive me, I can't help myself.

Mvh
# :-)


* Excuse me for using the English languidge in an Esperanto way. It's
just more convenient.


-----Ursprungligt meddelande-----
Från: eric.britton@... [mailto:eric.britton@...]
Skickat: den 16 april 2004 13:51
Till: The-commons@yahoogroups.com
Ämne: [The Commons] A Poverty of Reason: Sustainable Development and
Economic Growth


I leave it up to you of course to form your own ideas about this. My
own thoughts are not very pleasant on the subject - but I do always
appreciate challenges from the other side. In the event that you have
missed this one . . .

eb


A Poverty of Reason; Sustainable Development and Economic Growth Book
Review: By Ken Anderson, Apr 15, 2004, 14:30



Title: A Poverty of Reason: Sustainable Development and Economic Growth
Author: Wilfred Beckerman
ISBN: 0-945999-85-2
Publisher: The Independent Institute, Oakland

Will economic growth deplete the natural resources on which it depends?
Are we in danger of running out of energy sources? Will global warming
bring widespread devastation on the planet? Does unbridled economic
growth threaten the balance of nature?

Looking at the evidence on these questions, Oxford University economist
Wildred Beckerman finds that many of these fears are unfounded. While
billions of people around the world suffer under appalling environmental
conditions, such as a lack of clean water and sanitation, these problems
are primarily caused by poverty, not unsustainable development.

Despite the fact that so many are touting the wisdom of "sustainable
development" as though its meaning and desirability were an established
fact, there is no widespread agreement over its meaning, and its
desirability is too often not subjected to scientific, economic, and
philosophical scrutiny.

The author points out in his introduction to the book that support for
sustainable development is based on a confusion about its ethical
implications and on a flagrant disregard of the relevant factual
evidence.

The popularity of sustainable development is founded on two indefensible
propositions, according to the author:

1. Economic growth will soon come up against the limits of resource
availability.

2. Sustainable development represents the moral high ground.

It is argued that action is required in order to reduce to "sustainable"
levels the rate at which resources are used, which, Beckerman argues, is
an impossible task unless we were to stop using some resources
completely. Also, he asserts, the risk to the human race from climate
change is greatly exaggerated.

Sustainable development's place in the moral high ground is questioned,
as there are few coherent reasons to believe that sustainable
development is an ethically superior goal.

Chapter one focuses on two questions:

1. What exactly does sustainable development mean?

2. What is so good about it?

The World Commission on Environment and Development defines the term as
"development that meets the needs of the present without compromising
the ability of future generations to meet their own needs." Beckerman
contends that this criterios is not very helpful, and for a number of
reasons.

First, since not every need of the current generation is being met, why
should future generations be any different? Furthermore, he reasons that
people at different points in time or at different income levels or with
different cultural or national backgrounds differ about the importance
they attach to different needs.

Also, this injunction leaves no room for trade-offs. If it is true that
future generations will face serious environmental problems, how many of
the needs and wants of the current generation are to be sacrificed in
order to help future generations meet their needs? Do we eve know what
these needs might be?

Another concept of sustainable development relates to the conservation
of plant and animal species. What price must we pay to conserve all
plant and animal species for posterity? Is this even the natural order
of things? Given that approximately 98% of all the species that have
ever existed are believed to have become extinct already, how many of us
can truly say that we have suffered as a result?

As for the moral high ground, the idea that we have a responsibility to
maintain the environment exactly as it is today is morally repugnant.
Given the large numbers of people who are living in poverty and
environmental degradation, we cannot ignore these real human needs in
order to save every single one of the several million species of beetle
that exist.

Chapter two concentrates on finite resources and the prospects for
economic growth. Resources are either finite or they are not. If they
are, then the only way to ensure that they last forever is to stop using
them. But of course, even the most fanatical proponents of
sustainability don't go that far, and would reasonably have to admit
that the human race will eventually find ways of coping with the changes
that take place in he balance between demand and supply of resources.

In other words, you can't have it both ways. Either resources are finite
in some relevant sense, in which case even zero growth will fail to save
us in the long run, or resources are not really finite in any relevant
sense, in which case the argument for slowing growth collapses.

Actually, the author contends, not only are resources not finite in any
relevant sense, but the evidence of all past history, including even the
recent past, shows that there have been no trends toward the exhaustion
of any resources that matter. History is littered with predictions of
imminent resources scarcity that have subsequently been proven false.

In 1929, a study concluded that the world's resources of lead cannot
meet the anticipated demand. Yet for the rest of the twentieth century,
no one worried about a lead shortage. In fact, people have been more
worried that there is too much of it around.

The same 1929 study concluded that the known resources of tin do not
satisfy the increasing demand of the industrial nations, predicting that
the supply of tin would be exhausted within ten years. More than forty
years later, a 1972 report stated that tin reserves would last us for
only another fifteen years. Yet here we are in 2004, still using up that
ten year supply that we were believed to have back in 1929.

There are two chief reasons why predictions of imminent exhaustion of
resources have proven false. First, they are invariably based on
comparisons between existing known reserves and the rate at which they
are being used up. Second, they ignore the economic mechanisms that are
set in motion when any resource becomes scarce.

Even in the postwar world, with unprecedented rates of economic growth,
resources have more than increased to meet demand. In 1945, estimated
known copper reserves were 100 million metric tons. During the following
twenty-five years of economic growth, 93 million metric tons were mined,
yet the reserves were estimated at more than 300 million metric tons -
three times what they were at the outset.

Whenever demand for any particular resource begins to run up against
supply limitations, a wide variety of forces are set in motion to remedy
the situation. These forces begin with a rise in price, which in turn
leads to all sorts of secondary favorable feedbacks, including a shift
to substitutes, an increase in exploration, and technical progress that
brings down the cost of exploration, refining, and processing, as well
as the costs of the substitutes.

Sustainable development schemes do not account for the probability that,
without unnecessary economic intervention, future generations may be
much wealthier than is the current generation. That is the trend. Before
asking the present generation, including its poorest members, to make
sacrifices in the interests of future generations, shouldn't we take
account of the strong likelihood that the latter will be far richer than
the former? Where is the high ground in taking from the poor to give to
the rich?

Chapter 3 further explores the fallacy of basing predictions on current
demands. Will future generations have the same reliance on oil and
fossil fuels that we have today?

In addition to the constraints on materials such as food and energy, it
is argued that economic growth is leading to mass destruction of
biodiversity. This destruction, the proponents of sustainable
development allege, has two types of harmful effects:

1. It deprives the human race of an essential input into our
welfare, notably a source of future medicinal remedies;

2. We are depriving future generations of the environmental
inheritance that is their due.

Most of the world's biodiversity is found in tropical or semitropical
regions, which happen to be mainly in developing countries. In the past,
any loss of biodiversity caused by humans was the result of hunting, but
today it is caused almost entirely by the damage done to the habitat of
millions of species that live in forests, particularly in tropical and
semitropical regions.

These are difficult to measure because we don't know how many species
are becoming extinct each year, or even how many there are to begin
with. The recorded fact that 641 species have been certified as having
become extinct since the year 1600 does not exclude the possibility that
many others have become extinct without anyone knowing it, particularly
given that the vast majority of all species, including plants and
animals, are insects, and about 40% of these are beetles.

Beckerman argues that the most alarming features of the whole debate is
the unscientific attitude of some distinguished biologists. There is no
empirical basis for the fear that continued economic growth is
unsustainable, he says. Even with respect to food or energy supplies,
two types of resources that have been most frequently the subject of
pessimistic predictions, there is no cause for alarm. The destruction of
biodiversity also appears to be exaggerated, although the author
concedes that there are some real problems in some countries.

Yet, he argues, slower growth is more likely to perpetuate market
failures than to promote their elimination, as faster economic growth
makes it easier to compensate those who may lose out from an elimination
of market imperfections.

In Chapter 4, Beckerman takes on climate change. While environmental
groups claim that unchecked climate change will lead to catastrophic
declines in world income, requiring drastic international action to
reduce carbon emissions, particularly by the advanced nations, who are
regarded as morally responsible for the high carbon concentrations in
the atmosphere.

However, the author contends, three key points need to be established in
order to justify international action to reduce carbon emissions on the
grounds of overall benefit to the global community:

1. Predictions of significant climate change are reasonably
reliable;

2. The damage climate change might impose on the world as a whole
will exceed the costs of limiting or preventing it; and

3. The distribution of the costs and benefits among countries of
actions to drastically cut carbon emissions is accepted as reasonably
equitable.

Only the first link in the chain of argument gets any attention in the
media, perhaps because it is the only link that has any strength at all.

Even the predictions of significant climate change are probably
exaggerated by the vast scientific and bureaucratic establishment that
is heavily invested in advancing the threat of global warming.

Even assuming that the global consensus is correct and that man-made
emissions of carbon dioxide will result in an rise in average global
temperatures over the course of this century, Beckerman asserts that
there is no foundation for the second and third points concerning the
likely impact of climate change and the way it is distributed between
countries and generations.

For the world as a whole, the author argues, the beneficial effects of
moderate global warming in the range predicted by the Intergovernmental
Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) will outweigh its harmful effects chiefly
because global warming will increase food production in what are now
temperate or cold regions of the world.

With moderate global warming, some regions will be opened up for
agriculture, while growing seasons will be extended in large areas, such
as the northern portions of the United States, Canada, Russia, and
China. Higher carbon concentrations in the atmosphere will raise crop
yields.

For the world as a whole, global warming will mean more rain (or snow),
and increasing cloud cover means that many parts of the world will be
cooler during the day and warmer at night, leading to increased soil
moisture.

Given that climate change can have favorable as well as unfavorable
effects, particularly in light of the enormous obstacles to accurate
predictions of climate change for individual regions, it isn't
surprising that most experts cannot foresee the likely net damage for
the world as a whole that might result from climate change.

It is true, Beckerman admits, that the impact of climate change on
developing countries, where average temperatures are higher, soils are
poorer, and technology and infrastructures are less developed, is likely
to be harmful, yet he argues that faster economic development in these
countries will help them to adapt to the change.

A major flaw in the more gloomy predictions is that they assume that
farmers are stupid and incapable of any adaptation to climate
variations.

Chapter 5 discusses the precautionary principle established as one of
the basic principles of sustainable development.

The idea that there can be full scientific certainty about the
consequences of any change in the environment is absurd, and if it had
ever been taken seriously, we'd still be living in the Stone Age. Even
changes that the environmentalists favor, such as replacement of fossil
fuels with other sources of energy, will have environmental effects, and
it is impossible to prove that they would not have undesirable
consequences of their own.

It cannot be proven that there can never be harmful consequences to
greater exploitation of solar energy, a longtime goal of the green
movement.

Only about forty years ago, there was a widespread alarm that the world
was entering a new ice age. Had policies been put into place to prevent
this, the results may have been, as we now know, catastrophic.

Had we taken seriously past predictions of the imminent exhaustion of
fossil fuels, not only would many developments that rely on inexpensive
energy have been stifled in the interests of energy conservation, but
many technological developments that permitted a vastly expanded
disovery, exploitation, and use of sources of energy would have not have
occurred. The world would be a poorer place, without many of the
innovations we now depend upon, such as vaccines and antibiotics.

The author suggests, as an alternative to the precautionary principles
of sustainable development, waiting until we have a better idea of what
we may be dealing with. Large scale action, as suggested by the
proponents of sustainable development, could be catastrophic.

In Chapter 6, Beckerman discusses the plan for bureaucratic regulation
and protectionism.

At the 1992 UNCED, the United Nations adopted a document of several
hundred pages, known as Agenda 21, which set out, among other things,
the agreed intentions of the countries to take account of environmental
objectives in their domestic policies, to monitor their own developments
from the point of view of their sustainability, and to report on these
developments to the newly established Commission on Sustainable
Development.

In addition to the UN commission, countless other institutes, government
departments, and non-governmental organizations (NGOs), all for the
purpose of promoting sustainable development, have been established all
over the world. In the United States, even while our Legislature has
refused to ratify Agenda 21, its policies have been adopted by our
governmental agencies and departments.

One of the worst consequences of excessive bureaucratic intervention in
daily life is the bureaucratic preference for regulation over market
mechanisms to deal with social and economic problems. Clearly this is
the case in environmental protection.

The author argues that it is immoral to use public funds for the purpose
of helping plants rather than people, while reducing the future income
growth prospects of the poorest nations by promoting the growth-reducing
program of sustainable development.

Also, there is no reason why the taxpayers of wealthier nations should
contribute to an action that is in the interests of a minority who
happen to attach a high existence value to certain environmental assets.
Taxpayers in rich countries may have higher priorities. Nothing prevents
people who have a strong private preference for preserving rain forests
or their indigenous species from organizing voluntary contributions to
help such preservation in the same way that many charitable
organizations exist so that people can make donations to help starving
children overseas. Coercion to impose the environmental values of some
groups of people in the developed world on the people of other nations
is morally indefensible.

If other countries are to be punished in some way for failing to respect
universal basic values, Beckerman asserts that we should take into
consideration that many of them indulge in far worse crimes against
humanity than cutting down their trees. Yet these violations of basic
and universally accepted human rights do not seem to arouse the same
indignation among the environmental protectionists that they feel toward
the failure of governments to attach an overriding importance to the
protection of the environment.

In the same way that for some people an excessive love of animals is the
counterpart of hatred of human beings, in some people an excessive
concern with future generations is the counterpart of indifference to
the suffering of people alive today.

Chapter 7, the last of the book, discusses the ethics of sustainable
development.

Beckerman points out that sustainable development is an excuse for a new
form of imperialism. Regardless of the accuracy of the claims that are
made, sustainable development is used as a means of controlling markets
for the benefit of the few at the expense of the many. Sustainable
development has practical implications that would be morally
unacceptable even if its ethical foundations were valid in theory, which
they are not.

Even accepting the arguments of the proponents of sustainable
development, which the author does not, he suggests that the projected
wants and needs of future generations do not ethically trump those of
the current generation. The interests that they will have must take
their place in the balance together with the interests of people alive
today, many of whom live in dire poverty.

Still, he agrees that the interests of future generations shouldn't be
ignored. He surmises that future generations are on a whole likely to
enjoy much higher living standards than those prevailing today, unless
growth is successfully curtailed. A rise in living standards will not
ensure that all environmental problems will disappear, nor that poverty
will be eradicated everywhere.

The moral policy suggested by Beckerman is to weigh the interests of
different generations. The safest predication that can be made is that
people will always want life, security, self-respect, and freedom from
tyranny, oppression, and humiliation. Unfortunately, one can also safely
predict that there will always be forces in society that will threaten
these basic human wants.

In contrast with the problems of widespread poverty or acute
environmental problems, one concern will never be eradicated: the
ever-present threat to basic human rights.

Sustainable development represents one such threat.






A Poverty of Reason by Wilfred Beckerman

A Poverty of Reason: Sustainable Development and Economic Growth, by
Wilfred Beckerman. Paperback. 130 pages. Buy
<http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0945999852/kasoftsoftware0c>
from





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