Coronavirus has brought the economies of the world to a grinding halt. There is a small, but rising chorus of hopeful speculation that the increasingly apparent deficiencies of our growth-obsessed economic system make it ripe for this crisis to shock it onto a more sustainable path.
Posts Tagged ‘overshoot’
Is GrowthBusters a Good Earth Day Movie? (podcast episode 40)
8 Years Later, Community Screenings Still Strike a Nerve
The documentary, GrowthBusters: Hooked on Growth is guaranteed to provoke conversations. Over eight years after it originally premiered, it’s still being screened. Is it still relevant? What kind of conversations does it spark? After he first watched, famed Stanford biologist Paul Ehrlich wrote, “This could be the most important film ever made.”
You may want to screen the film in your community around Earth Day this year.
It sparked such a spirited discussion as part of an Earth Day screening attended by filmmaker Dave Gardner in 2019, that he invited one of the audience members to join him in the studio to discuss his response. This conversation was recorded nearly a year ago; it just kept being pushed aside as more time-sensitive topics and guests arose. Finally, we’re sharing it now. Erika had not yet joined the podcast when we recorded this.
You Have to Stay Poor – I’m Having a Steak (podcast episode 39)
On a full planet, where human civilization is already in overshoot and in the process of crippling life-supporting ecosystems, it’s unfortunately not possible for the world’s poor, en masse, to rise out of poverty and live as richly as the even the average family in the industrialized world. There’s not enough biocapacity for 8 billion people to live high on the hog, and technology has not changed that. But “reputable” economists and technology Pollyanna’s like Andrew McAfee routinely fail to recognize this.
A Finer Future? (podcast episode 37)
According to the four scholars who wrote A Finer Future, we are already experiencing some of the dramatic changes our system must undertake in order for our planet to meet the needs of future generations. This episode features a conversation with L. Hunter Lovins about the wellbeing economy and how sustainable behavior makes good business sense.
Don’t Make Me Stop this Spaceship! (podcast episode 36)
When the world’s scientists are concerned enough about something that they issue a warning – to the world, you might think we’d all take notice. Once you get to three warnings, however, well, you start to wonder just how intelligent we humans really are.