9 Comments

The elites are to blame for their cockamamie schemes.

But as William R. Catton Jr. advises, no one is to blame for ecological overshoot. It was over before we had the wisdom to realize it.

Expand full comment

Overshoot is an ecological thing. It happens to any animal in the presence of an abundance of energy/food, deer, rabbits, rats etc. If the energy is no longer available, such as for deer in a winter with very deep snow, the population will crash.

Of course science has known that for a long time. Many recognized that in the 60's and 70's, when global population was half what it is. It was something of a social discussion. Our elites decided resources would be treated as infinite, and not that many people objected. Now those elite have decided resources are not infinite and treating them as such has dire consequences, while denying they had essentially taught that growth could be infinite. Their prescriptions about what is to be done about that however are even more pathological than telling people there are no limits to growth.

Expand full comment

Now they're telling people that growth can be sustainable - while trying to implement policies that a) have no chance of succeeding or b) are about political control rather than ecology.

Believing in that narrative and those policies, is a choice. Or maybe it is a sociological phenomenon. Or a symptom of cognitive biases. Who or what is the culprit?

Expand full comment

Also their idea of sustainability is still thinking the resources for their electric dreams are infinite.

Expand full comment

The culprit, if there is one, is that we are far removed from the earth, and we don't know how to make it home again.

Expand full comment

In your view, is there a better way to promote real environmentalism than robust and well enforced property rights? I'm operating under the assumption that our legal system could get us there, but only with a dramatic cultural shift. The suckering of environmentalists with good intentions into atmospheric carbon monomania will make such a shift difficult, but I'm hoping the obvious failure of mRNA vaccines might be a wedge issue to promote the cultural values necessary to meaningfully conserve the environment. That is, assuming we can overcome the Gell-Mann amnesia.

Expand full comment

That is an excellent question. It won't work by coercion. I imagine a lot of support could be found for a new kind of Homestead Act, to facilitate young people who are interested in returning to the land to farm, especially as global food shortages arise. Food resilience is an easier sell than taking care of pollinators, though pollinators would thrive in a more resilient, ecologically responsible system. That could go a long way in strengthening rural communities too.

That would require the current corn and soybean regime, neither plant requiring pollinators btw, to cede some ground.

Empowering young people to build a farm and family, would be a nice living contrast to the ecologically empty zealotry of the climate activist. Probably the more these climate mono-ideas are seen to contribute to food insecurity, the more people would be open to those young people living responsibly and productively, and speaking for the land and pollinators.

I'm certain there are no shortage of young people who would be excited about such an opportunity.

Thank you for the question.

Expand full comment

I think you're right. I have a close friend that spent a number of years, perhaps a decade doing sustainable agriculture. Near the start of those efforts he turned me onto Joel Salatin who helped me understand the ubiquity of decay and inefficiency that always accompany dirigism with his book "Everything I Want To Do Is Illegal." If the state could quit subsidizing practices that are environmentally destructive and legalize environmentally supportive innovation, I think there is hope to address some of these issues. I don't know that there would be anything wrong with a new Homstead Act to develop poorly maintained federal lands into Salatin-esque homesteads. Far from being politically attainable in the near term, but with what I predict to be a coming protracted insolvable era of stagflation I believe that could change in the medium to long term. The problem is, they've even hijacked the word sustainable to the point that it makes people think of wind and solar energy. Fossil fuels would definitely be critical to dampen the downward pressure on standard of living that reality will force us to face one way or another. Is beekeeping something that can be done/facilitated by entrepreneurs looking to forestall the ecological catastrophe that we will face in the event that the populations of pollinators continue to dwindle?

Expand full comment

A resilient food system would be fractal, blossoming out, businesses starting and flourishing, value adding the produce of the local farms, distributing it and so forth. Bee keeping would definitely be a part of that, for honey and value added as say, mead fermentables. But of course honey bees are suffering from the same systemic toxins as native bees and butterflies.

I have that book and loved it. More and more people are beginning to think, the main impediment to the restoration of the land is the administrative State. As example, I am planning to restore 80acres and farm it (of a sort). But to live there I will have to install a $30,000 septic system, for my organic piss and poop. But the aquifers are already polluted such that you cannot shower in the water, because farmers forced to compete to sell globally, are allowed to pollute with near impunity.

Expand full comment