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2024-11-18
Thoughts on using todays capital to slow down our inevitable technological decline.
I realized that by now I am convinced that humanity, or at least modern civilization based on technology, is doomed.
Truely realizing that the resources on earth are ultimately finite and what that means for any lifeform living an unsustainable lifestyle has been …quite a trip.
Our dependance on vast quantities of energy in the “high-tech” parts of our civilization has us deplete resources at high speed. We burn oil for its energy where it would otherwise provide us with raw materials for many products, plastics, medicine ingredients, fertilizer, …
Already prices of oil and many other resources are going nowhere but up because the easily accessible deposits are depleted.
It is on the inhabitants of the “high-tech” parts of civilization to adapt a wholistic thinking instead of an egoistic one.
Mankind as a whole would act in its own interest, in the interest of generations to come, if it would do without some of the resource-hungry but ultimately unneccessary creature comforts that we all enjoy today.
The more we take our foot of the pedal of capitalism and consumerism, the longer earths' resources will last, is is that simple.
But you've all read and heard this before, many times. Maybe I have an angle towards implementing it.
We don't need to go back to the proverbial cave for this. But we can use the wealth we have today, to make a difference. For example, when a household appliance breaks, can't be repaired and is _really_ needed, we can use our wealth to buy a more efficient and more simple replacement. Repairing an existing appliance uses less resources than buying a new one. Buying an energy-efficient and simple appliance over a blinged-out one lessens the impact at least somewhat.
We need to replace our wants, ingrained by consumerism, with actual needs. We need to replace impulse-shopping with investments into the longevity of our species.
I read that a simple prompt-reply pair with ChatGPT 4 consumes on average an amount of electricity that would power a 16 W LED bulb (equivalent to 100W incandescent), for over 12 minutes. That is utterly insane, considering the lack of complexity — or necessity — of the average prompt. Use your brain to get the answer, if you can. Or use a “traditional” search engine over AI if asking the actual people or reading a book doesn't help.
I firmly believe that the average standard of living today is already on a declining slope. Citizens of wealthy countries just don't really feel it much, yet.
We can and must use the time we have to reduce the steepness of that slope, while we have the financial capital to do so. Eventually the generations of the future will have to use all their time, money and intellect to sustain what is, and cannot invest into the future anymore. But not yet. Today we still can conserve some of what is today, for as long into the future as possible.
Future generations will likely ask “why haven't you done more to prevent the climate catastrophe?”.
I'm not convinced we have a satisfying answer.
John Michael Greer - The Retro Future
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