Implementing Democracy 1.01 in Iran

[Undertoad]

Ali, would it surprise you to learn that, worldwide, obesity now affects more people than hunger?

1 B people are thought to be obese.
800 M people are thought to be starving.

Things are changing fast as the productivity changes that made the west, are exported to the east. This includes not only inventions and innovations -- China didn't invent the train, car, plane etc but it sure has them now. It also includes ideas: the barely-sustainable systems of the last century are abandoned for the freedom-oriented ideas that generate wealth.

This planet can, unquestionably, sustain everyone at the same level of comfort that people in western societies enjoy. It can't sustain everyone driving SUVs, granted.

Until, that is, another round of innovation improves batteries, and another round of innovation improves power generation. The battery round is well under way.

What's really exciting, though, is what will happen (not what MIGHT happen) if all those humans start to become as educated and relatively free as the west. At that point, all their innovations will start to enter the stream as well.

Even a heavily political Nobel Prize committee has really only granted prizes in physics, chemistry, economics to western-educated people. But a lot of the east has now woken and they have a ton of people, some of whom I'm sure are very bright. The revolution has just begun.

Because wealth is most certainly *generated*, not cut up like some big pie. The most useless and available raw material on the earth, sand in the deserts, is now converted into silicon chips that run our lives and glass fibers that connect them. The chips and fibers constitute much more wealth than the sand particles. This is how wealth is generated - useful items spring from almost nothing. Wealth is generated when order displaces disorder, when government sets up useful systems that permit people to interact, not to control people.

When cultures decide to not fight each other and build schools instead, wealth is generated out of nothing. When cultures decide to allow their women to make their own choices and become productive, wealth is generated out of nothing. Most cultures are only just now figuring this out. The revolution has just begun.

[Aliantha]

Acording to the world health organization there are 1B people overweight with 300mill of them being classed as obese.

852 Million people are hungry. 16 000 children die of hunger every day.

These are facts and undeniable.

UT, as persuasive as your argument is, it's just simply not correct. This planet does not have the resources to support life all at the same level...even basic western standard levels.

We are consuming ourselves to death. There are no limitless supplies. Once they're all gone, they're all gone. The current rate of consumption, even taking into account new technologies, has doomed the human race and everything else with it.

People have to change the way they think before we even have a hope of changing this course and unfortunately, scientific studies are telling us it's simply too late. Forget about the sun going supernova. We'll be extinct long before that happens.

[Urbane Guerrilla]

There are no limitless supplies, true -- but that is the one thing above all else that drives innovation.

Five billion years from today, the sun won't be exactly gone, but it will be a frightfully inconvenient red giant star, and the Earth, toast. Toast containing about a quarter of the U238 it began with and a lot more lead.

Flint, more and more efficiently exploited, then replaced in tools by bronze.

Bronze, strategically limited by availability of tin, replaced by the more plentiful but harder to extract iron.

Whale oil for lighting, replaced wholly by kerosene.

Pay phones will be almost entirely replaced by portable cell phones.

You can come up with two dozen more off the top of your head.

[Aliantha]

That's true UG, however, the fact still remains that our consumption levels even as they are now are greater than our ability to develop innovations to counteract our use of resources.

At current rates we have I believe (need to get a fact on this. Will get back with confirmation later) less than 300 years to go.

We're already running way low on oil as we all know. This is just the begining.

[Undertoad]

My mistake, 1B overweight.

Predictions of shortages and unresolvable problems - I've heard them all. I remember the terrifying predictions they made decades ago. None has come true.

Market forces deal with shortages in interesting ways. The economists understand this, and very few others do.

http://www.overpopulation.com/faq/Pe...ian_simon.html

In 1980, economist Julian Simon and biologist Paul Ehrlich decided to put their money where their predictions were. Ehrlich had been predicting massive shortages in various natural resources for decades, while Simon claimed natural resources were infinite.

Simon offered Ehrlich a bet centered on the market price of metals. Ehrlich would pick a quantity of any five metals he liked worth $1,000 in 1980. If the 1990 price of the metals, after adjusting for inflation, was more than $1,000 (i.e. the metals became more scarce), Ehrlich would win. If, however, the value of the metals after inflation was less than $1,000 (i.e. the metals became less scarce), Simon would win. The loser would mail the winner a check for the change in price.

Ehrlich agreed to the bet, and chose copper, chrome, nickel, tin and tungsten.

By 1990, all five metals were below their inflation-adjusted price level in 1980. Ehrlich lost the bet and sent Simon a check for $576.07. Prices of the metals chosen by Ehrlich fell so much that Simon would have won the bet even if the prices hadn't been adjusted for inflation.

[Aliantha]

The cost of these sorts of materials has been lower over recent decades due to improved refining techniques etc. You don't need me to tell you that. I'm not arguing that point in any way. Yes I agree that we'll continue to be able to utilize natural resources which were previously unavailable due to poorer or less developed technologies etc.

My point still remains that these natural resources are being depleted slowly but surely and soon they will not exist. By soon I don't mean tomorrow. Maybe they'll last 100 more years or even a thousand, but that's a very small period of time in comparison to how long this planet has been inhabited.

I don't understand why it's so difficult for people to realize that unless they change right now, there will be no future. Yes we'll develop different ways of living. Maybe one day everyone will be the right weight and no one will be pigging out while someone else starves. Maybe one day we wont rely on fossil fuels. Maybe one day solar power will be a realistic option. Maybe maybe maybe. What about what we know as fact?

[Clodfobble]

Originally Posted by Aliantha

I don't understand why it's so difficult for people to realize that unless they change right now, there will be no future. Yes we'll develop different ways of living.

Different ways of living sounds like a future to me.

My point still remains that these natural resources are being depleted slowly but surely and soon they will not exist.

Conservation of matter says that the resources are not being destroyed, they are merely being converted to other resources (like, for example, carbon dioxide.) 5,000 years from now someone may be screaming that our lifestyles are using up all the precious carbon dioxide gas in the atmosphere, and creating useless byproducts like diesel fuel.

[9th Engineer]

Ali, could you be a bit more specific in what resources you are refering to, and the how dire you think the condition is of the most pressing cases. The reason I would ask is because I think I might agree with you, but you jump around to much for me to pinpoint exactly what sort of consumption you really mean. You're references to 'comfort' are too vauge for me to tell if you mean fuel, food, timber, metals, or are just lumping everything into one giant doomsday senario. Whatever you are refering to you seem to think its depletetion will actively kill us off rather than just making us drive tiny cars or put on an extra sweater.

[Aliantha]

Clodd, while it's true that everything we began with is still here in some form or another, I don't think the gasses we create via pollution are going to be of any use to anyone in the future. I don't think the plastic products modern society is so fond of will be of any use to anyone other than as landfill. In theory your argument might work, but in reality, you must acknowledge that we are not using our resources in a sustainable manner, and even if we do start right now, in all likelihood we will not be able to create enough new technologies to counteract the damage done during the 20th century.

9th...I'm talking about non renewable resources such as fossil fuels, metals and minerals. I'm also talking about environments such as rainforests and rivers. The things we destroy during the process of living which we will not be able to replace during our lifetimes nor those of our children or grandchildren. When it all comes down to it, if we destroy all of our natural environments, then the simple process of cleaning our air will not occur. So to answer you question, while I don't necessarily believe we're actively killing ourselves off, I think the chain reaction in place because of our lifestyle is/will.

[Undertoad]

My grandparents lived in New Hampshire, which is a very foresty sort of area.

When the new world started came to the US, New Hampshire was something like 97% forest.

By the early part of this century it was more like 50% as wood was the main fuel and main constuction material used to build the new world.

Today it is like 90%.

The things we destroy during the process of living which we will not be able to replace during our lifetimes nor those of our children or grandchildren.

The things we create during the process of living will give our children and grandchildren wealth, knowledge, and the ability to address and overcome problems. The nature of progress is that first we consume what we have to - then we become productive - then we consume less raw materials per head. It's inevitable because productivity literally means doing more things with less goods. Although you can't see it, most knowledge workers in a productive economy are trying to figure out how to get more out of less. From the marketers who package less to be more, to the engineers who try to figure out an easier and cheaper way to manufacture, to the cost accountants who try to figure out what the cost per item exactly is so it can be reduced.

There are environmental issues, no question about it, but if we work in a market-friendly way these things can be addressed without seriously reducing overall wealth or lifestyle.

[headsplice]

Originally Posted by Undertoad

There are environmental issues, no question about it, but if we work in a market-friendly way these things can be addressed without seriously reducing overall wealth or lifestyle.

That's based on the assumption that people aren't greedy bastards that will do anything they're allowed to (and sometimes that they aren't) to get ahead in the game. Further, it's based on the premise that the people in power are okay with change and will allow market forces to, potentially, push them out of power.

[Undertoad]

No solution will work unless it works with and not against market forces. Government, in order to be effective, has to paddle with the current to accomplish what it needs to accomplish.

This means using tools like tax credits, incentives, taxation based on usage such as BTU tax, deed restrictions, effective enforcement of environmental laws, pollution licenses, citizen lawsuits, careful use of public land. As opposed to brute-force approaches like treaties, eminent domain, zero tolerance.

The economics of the matter don't disappear because government gets involved. The power behind the matter is tied to the economics.

[headsplice]

Originally Posted by Undertoad

No solution will work unless it works with and not against market forces. Government, in order to be effective, has to paddle with the current to accomplish what it needs to accomplish.

This means using tools like tax credits, incentives, taxation based on usage such as BTU tax, deed restrictions, effective enforcement of environmental laws, pollution licenses, citizen lawsuits, careful use of public land. As opposed to brute-force approaches like treaties, eminent domain, zero tolerance.

The economics of the matter don't disappear because government gets involved. The power behind the matter is tied to the economics.

I misread what you were trying to get across. My apologies.

[Undertoad]

My fault for using a loaded term like market-friendly without mentioning any details.

[Aliantha]

UT...for the sake of future generations I wish your fantasy had a hope of being a reality. Unfortunately, it's highly unlikely, but you never know.