One hundred years ago April 15, the Titanic disappeared beneath the icy waters of the North Atlantic. Several have marked this anniversary by noting the similarities between the Titanic and human civilization. In Titanic: The Final Word with James Cameron, on the National Geographic channel, James Cameron, director of the blockbuster film, Titanic, aptly turned the event into metaphor:

“Part of the Titanic parable is of arrogance, of hubris, of the sense that we’re too big to fail. There was this big machine, this human system, that was pushing forward with so much momentum that it couldn’t turn, it couldn’t stop in time to avert a disaster. And that’s what we have right now.”  He continues, “We can’t turn because of the momentum of the system, the political momentum, the business momentum.”* . . .

For a month now I’ve been urging people to take our Pledge to Think Small. And I’ve been asking supporters to spread the word and encourage others to take it. I’ve been stupefied by the response. A measly 177 pledgers so far. That is very disappointing. No one likes to admit defeat, and all my corporate spin experience over the years tells me not to be honest about this failure.

In order to be effective, however, I’ve got to be authentic and honest. So today I will lay my soul bare and admit – at least so far – that the Pledge to Think Small is a big bust. I’m not giving up. I still think it’s a good idea. But I’m open to learning from my mistakes. . . .

Greetings from New York City, where GrowthBusters hits the big screen this Thursday. Yesterday was the first day of the SOHO International Film Festival, and it was quite exciting to meet other filmmakers, just as committed to their vision as I am to mine. Get your tickets now to see the New York City premiere of GrowthBusters at 3:30 Thursday.

The theater was packed last night for the screening of The Night Never Sleeps. This is a narrative cop film with Eric Roberts and Armand Assante in supporting roles, made on a shoestring, and quite engaging. The bad guy, played by Russ Carmada, was one of the all-time greats. You really wanted this guy to get his due. My compliments to Fred Carpenter and Russ Carmada for pulling this off. . . .

Saturday, 14 April, marks the 100^th anniversary of the Titanic striking an iceberg in the North Atlantic. This happened late in the night. A few hours later, on the 15^th of April, the unsinkable behemoth went down. The GrowthBusters project is proud to partner with the Club of Rome in using this anniversary to inspire our civilization to change course.

Like the Titanic, we think we are indomitable and unsinkable. So even now, as we’ve faced a growing plethora of evidence we’ve outgrown the planet, it’s full-speed ahead.

We’re busy rearranging the deck chairs, ever certain there is nothing wrong with our compass heading. We ought to be abandoning our pursuit of perpetual economic growth and our fear of strongly advocating an early end to population growth. Instead we campaign to distribute wealth more equitably, avoid fracking in our backyard, stop an oil pipeline, or end suburban sprawl. Deck chairs. . . .

As our series honoring the 40th anniversary of The Limits to Growth study (and best-selling book) continues, I thought we should review our progress in the exponential growth demonstration experiment started with this post on March 11 . Please don’t forget to take the Pledge to Think Small, and to join our Worldwide GrowthBusters House Party on Earth Day weekend (April 20-22).

The exponential growth demonstration is very simple, something you should try at home with your family, or at work with your colleagues. It’s guaranteed to stimulate some interesting conversation. It’s based on this story:

In the GrowthBusters film, I share a few moments from retired physics professor Al Bartlett’s world famous lecture about exponential growth: . . .