…and this was all avoidable if we used the brains we have….
we have not developed any system that has the smart ones in charge instead of the stupid, meaning being short sighted instead of thinking in 7 generations.
By collapse, I mean a breakdown of social institutions like governments and economies, followed by a dramatic decline in the human population. I realize that’s still kind of vague, so here’s a more specific definition I found in the book, How Everything Can Collapse.
It says, “A collapse is the process at the end of which basic needs (water, food, housing, clothing, energy, etc.) can no longer be provided [at a reasonable cost] to a majority of the population by services under legal supervision.”
As society breaks down, life will get simpler and simpler. By the late 21st century, people will be living the way they did in the early 19th century.
How do I know this? Let’s start with humanity’s biggest problem. No, it’s not climate change. It’s something most people have never even heard of.
1. Overshoot
Although I’ve listed overshoot as just one of the many problems humanity is facing, I could argue that it’s the only problem we’re facing because every other problem on this list is the result of overshoot. Let me explain…
If you’ve never heard of ecological overshoot, it’s what happens when an organism uses up an ecosystem’s resources faster than they can regenerate. This happens all the time in nature.
For example, let’s say a herd of deer are placed on an island with no predators and plenty of grass. The deer eat as much grass as they want, and the herd grows exponentially.
As their numbers grow, they eat the grass faster and faster until there is almost no grass left. The grass starts to grow back, but it gets eaten right away, and the deer even eat the roots of the grass, stopping it from growing back at all.
Now the population of deer has overshot the island’s carrying capacity. There are too many deer and not enough grass, so most of the deer starve to death. The grass finally gets a chance to start growing back, but the carrying capacity of the island has been reduced.