By Gordon Kubanek, member CACOR Board of Directors.
Your Future in a Climate Changed World
Preface
The Miracle Planet is a documentary I watched together many times with my kids [46]. It shows how life has suffered disaster upon disaster, and yet every time life has bounced back faster, stronger, larger, faster, smarter and more adaptable then before. This was an inspiration for me because it helped me see that life truly is a miracle and every day I give thanks for partaking in this miracle called life on Earth. Yet, today, as in so many times in the past, it seems that we are on the brink of unimaginable catastrophe. My message here is not to focus on the catastrophe part of the story but rather the miracle part in which life and joy and wonder and beauty unfold ever more vibrant after the dark days of this miracle planet we live on.
Introduction
Life on Earth and humans in particular has suffered death on a massive scale many times over. These mass extinction events, or, in the case of humans, cultural extinction events, come with a regularity that is astounding. I say astounding because we prefer to think of them as rare – so as to avoid the ugly reality that life on Earth has cataclysm as a normal part of its story. Given that we are now living through, and are the cause of, the 6th mass extinction I find it both interesting for its own sake and useful to accept the reality that we moving headlong into another unpleasant extinction/collapse event. More important for you is the fact if you can accept that it is coming you can prepare for it. First the bad news: I accept that any changes we are making will in all probability not going to stop the collapse of our industrial civilization as we know it. Now for the good
news: all life, and humanity in particular, has a knack for surviving disaster by evolving to adapt to new realities. I am confident that, after the initial collapse of our unsustainable civilization, a new and invigorated humanity will not only survive but continue to evolve into a ‘homo sapiens’ worthy of that name. Most of the following is simply to ‘into the mood’ as my experience with this issue is that coming to the realization that while there are traumatic changes ahead there is simultaneously the opportunity to help forge a better world for all life on Earth by learning from our mistakes. Believe it or not these writings are meant to be good news, in this way: as these events unfold before your eyes you can still live a rich and full life with a new and help create a better civilization out of our current mess.
Past: Extinction/Collapse Events
To put our current collapse in perspective here are a few past extinction/collapse events. The message: life goes on…
717 million years ago: Snowball Earth
The Sturtian glaciation, as this event is known, was no ordinary Ice Age but one so extreme that it caused the Earth to become a giant snowball for at least five million years. Life, barely, survived deep in the rocks and along the ocean/land interface. Some scientists think this event spurred the evolution of multi-cellular life. [2]
440 million years ago: The Permian Mass Extinction
The end-Permian mass extinction, which took place 251.9 million years ago, killed off more than 96 percent of the planet’s marine species and 70 percent of its terrestrial life—a global annihilation. After this dinosaurs and mammals evolved. [3]
65 million years ago: An Asteroid Wipes Out the Dinosaurs
Almost all the large vertebrates on Earth, on land, at sea, and in the air (all dinosaurs) suddenly became extinct about 65 Ma, at the end of the Cretaceous Period. At the same time, most plankton and many tropical invertebrates, especially reefdwellers, became extinct. Just two million years after the extinction, most of the species that had survived the mass extinction were more common than ever. Not only that, several new species had evolved, creating an “explosion” of diversity after the extinction. It is probable that mammals [ie. you!] would never have become the dominant large life forms without
this event. [4]
70,000 years ago a volcanic eruption almost made humans extinct
Around 70,000 B.C., a volcano called Toba, on Sumatra, in Indonesia went off, blowing roughly 650 miles of vaporized rock into the air. The world was having an ice age and all that dust hanging in the atmosphere caused the average temperature dropped 20-plus degrees in some spots. The great grassy plains of Africa may have shrunk way back, keeping the small bands of humans small and hungry for hundreds, if not thousands of more years. So we almost vanished: falling to a world-wide population of roughly a thousand reproductive adults. However, this is also around the time we ‘modern’ humans spread around the world.[5]
410 AD: The Fall of Rome
The fall of Rome simply came because the barbarians took advantage of difficulties already existing in Rome – problems that included a decaying city (both physically and morally), little to no tax revenue, overpopulation, poor leadership, and, most importantly, inadequate defense. To some the fall was inevitable. On the last day of the empire, a barbarian member of the Germanic tribe Siri and former commander in the Roman army entered the city unopposed. The one-time military and financial power of the Mediterranean was unable to resist. The good news is that is ended [mostly] slavery in Europe. [7]
900: Collapse of the Mayan Civilization
A study by a cluster of climate researchers at the University of Cambridge and geologists at the University of Florida concluded that a massive drought, with a decrease in annual precipitation of between 41-54%, occurred at the end of the classical period (ca. the 9th century CE), devastating crops and making the land of the Mayans all but uninhabitable. However, social and political instabilities were key factors in their inability to adapt to the new reality according to Dr. Anderson as the severe drought doesn’t account for the problems in linking the drought to a prolonged 200-year decline – a period that’s far too long for just 1 thing to be the cause. Most likely, it was a number of factors that caused the decline, with the environment being only 1 of them. However, the Mayans as a people survive in their millions to this day. [6]
1258: The Mongols Destroy Baghdad and End the Golden Age of Islam
It took just thirteen days for the Ilkhanate Mongols and their allies to bring the Golden Age of Islam crashing down. Eyewitnesses reported that the mighty Tigris River ran black with ink from the precious books and documents destroyed along with the Grand Library of Baghdad, or Bayt al Hikmah. Nobody knows for sure how many citizens of the Abbasid Empire died; estimates range from 200,000 up to 1,000,000. In two short weeks, the seat of learning and culture for the entire Muslim world was conquered and ruined. However, from the ashes of this destruction would rise the eventual Islamisation of the entire Mongol Empire, outside of China and Mongolia. [8]
1347: The Black Death Comes to Europe
The Black Death struck Europe in 1347, killing up to 50% of the European population in six violent years. It wasn’t a oneoff epidemic: it signalled the start of the second plague pandemic in Europe that lasted for hundreds of years and only slowly disappeared from the continent after the Great Plague of London in 1665. It is probable that a reborn Renaissance Europe would never have happened as it would have been trapped in a Medieval social model without the plague. [9]
1492: Christopher Columbus brings Mass Death via Disease to the Americas
It was not mainly war, but rather disease, that resulted in the annihilation of the natives of the Americas: the death rate from diseases like smallpox was staggeringly high—about 87 percent of the Native population died in a short period. And yet the aboriginal populations of the Americas still exist and are making a slow and painful comeback. [10]
1650: The End of Easter Island Civilization
The careless use of resources was the primary contributor to Easter Island’s collapse. The Rapanui were so intent on their projects that they underestimated the extent of their resources. Trees were cleared to make pathways for moai [giant stone heads] transport, which required a number of logs for rolling. Furthermore, the Rapanui cultivated wide expanses of land for harvesting crops and felled even more trees to build deep-sea fishing canoes. What was once an untouched, verdant paradise became a treeless wasteland. Without the protection of sturdy trees and their roots, rain washed away topsoil. The land began to erode. Crops couldn’t grow in these conditions. And now, there were even more Rapanui to sustain: Population peaked at 10,000. There was no hope for the Rapanui — they didn’t even have wood to build canoes to escape the island. The Rapanui then turned against each other. The ariki mau, head chief, had long governed the island, but now the Rapanui split into factions that fought for proprietary rights to still-fertile land. These factions were led by matato’a — warrior leaders. Archaeological evidence shows that the spears and daggers, or mata’a, on the island were crafted during this dark hour. Others, defeated, crept into caves, where they spent the rest of their days. [44]
1919: The Smallpox Epidemic kills up to 100 million Worldwide
It is estimated that about 500 million people or one-third of the world’s population became infected with this virus, and the number of deaths was estimated to be up to 100 million worldwide with about 675,000 occurring in the United States. The pandemic was so severe that from 1917 to 1918, life expectancy in the United States fell by about 12 years. This disaster spurred on research that led to the discovery of antibiotics, the saviour of millions. [11]
So what does all this have to do with you and me?
I think the take away from the above events is twofold: first – disaster is a normal part of life on Earth [yuk.], second – life somehow survives these disaster and is often more successful afterwards because life that survives had to be smarter or stronger or faster and was able to adapt more quickly to sudden changes [yeah!] Many people, including me, see that we heading towards a similar scale of disaster: only this time not only is it a disaster of our own making, but it is one that we can see coming before it happens which should, theoretically, make it preventable. However, even with all the knowledge that we have to overcome the inertia of our current dominant social-political-industrial-capitalist system [this includes China, which is only communist in name] seems currently to be impossible. Even if we tried to change direction [which we aren’t]
significant change within a short period is physically an impossibility. And that short period is very short: according to IPCC climate scientists’ latest report (14) if we do not reduce our net carbon emissions to zero by 2055 we will increase the global average temperature by at least 2°C (other scientist believe this is an understated value and that we currently heading for a +5°C hotter world, the so called ‘Hothouse Earth’, 15) Given that since the Paris Accord was signed by most nations in 2015 global GHG emissions have increased, even this significant, but not fatal, increase, looks like it is out of reach and the “Hothouse Earth” scenario seems to be more likely every day. Below are three possible futures: which will we choose?
Business as Usual Scenario
You can that this scenario, after examining the graphs below, is clearly unsustainable, even if most people cannot admit to it.
World Scientists 2nd Warning to Humanity [39]
Transition Scenario: A new Industrial Capitalism Arises from Environmental Degradation and Climate Change Pressures “Capitalism as we know it is over. So suggests a new report commissioned by a group of scientists appointed by the UN secretary general. The main reason? We’re transitioning rapidly to a radically different global economy, due to our increasingly unsustainable exploitation of the planet’s environmental resources and the shift to less efficient energy sources. Climate change and species extinctions are accelerating even as societies are experiencing rising inequality, unemployment, slow economic growth, rising debt levels, and impotent governments. Contrary to the way policymakers usually think about these problems these are not really separate crises at all. These crises are part of the same fundamental transition. The new era is characterized by inefficient fossil fuel production and escalating costs of climate change. Conventional capitalist economic thinking can no longer explain, predict or solve the workings of the global economy in this new age. “Economic activity is driven by meaning – maintaining equal possibilities for the good life while lowering emissions dramatically – rather than profit, and the meaning is politically, collectively constructed. Well, I think this is the best conceivable case in terms of modern state and market institutions. It can’t happen without considerable reframing of economic-political thinking”[12]
Collapse Scenario: We do not Change in Time, Failed States become the new Normal and Millions Die from Hunger and Disease
“Virtually every past civilization has eventually undergone collapse, a loss of socio-political-economic complexity usually accompanied by a dramatic decline in population size. Some, such as those of Egypt and China, have recovered from collapses at various stages; others, such as that of Easter Island or the Classic Maya, were apparently permanent. All those previous collapses were local or regional; elsewhere, other societies and civilizations persisted unaffected. Sometimes, as in the Tigris and Euphrates valleys, new civilizations rose in succession. In many, if not most, cases, overexploitation of the environment was one proximate or an ultimate cause. But today, for the first time, humanity’s global civilization—the worldwide, increasingly interconnected, highly technological society in which we all are to one degree or another, embedded—is threatened with collapse by an array of environmental problems. Humankind finds itself engaged in what Prince Charles described as ‘an act of suicide on a grand scale’, facing what the UK’s Chief Scientific Advisor John Beddington called a ‘perfect storm’ of environmental problems. The most serious of these problems show signs of rapidly escalating severity, especially climate disruption. But other elements could potentially also contribute to a collapse: an accelerating extinction of animal and plant populations and species, which could lead to a loss of ecosystem services essential for human survival; land degradation and land-use change; a pole-to-pole spread of toxic compounds; ocean acidification
and eutrophication (dead zones); worsening of some aspects of the epidemiological environment (factors that make human populations susceptible to infectious diseases); depletion of increasingly scarce resources, including especially groundwater, which is being overexploited in many key agricultural areas; and resource wars. These are not separate problems; rather they interact in two gigantic complex adaptive systems: the biosphere system and the human socio-economic system. The negative manifestations of these interactions are often referred to as ‘the human predicament’, and determining how to prevent it from generating a global collapse is perhaps the foremost challenge confronting humanity. The human predicament is driven by overpopulation, overconsumption of natural resources and the use of unnecessarily environmentally damaging
technologies and socio-economic-political arrangements to service Homo sapiens’ aggregate consumption.” [50]
Easter Island, where over 90% of the population died of famine, war and disease [38]
“There have been seven disasters since humans came on the earth, very similar to the one that’s just about to happen. I think these events keep separating the wheat from the chaff. Eventually we’ll have a human on the planet that really does understand it and can live with it properly. That’s the source of my optimism.” [James Lovelock, 49]
Part II: Current News
You may now think: “That was the past or what could be; what about right now? What is happening at this moment that can convince me that it is as bad as you say? What follows are just a random environmentally related news reports that makes it clear that we face many challenges, all of our own making. This is in no way a complete snapshot of the state of the stresses we face, but just a wake-up call to the fact that what were once considered future problems are happening now. I chose not to focus on climate change news because it should be considered the result of all our other destructive activities and it can only be addressed when the other self-destructive behaviours of our current industrial civilization are changed. We are producing half the sperm our grandfathers did; we are half as fertile. The Hebrew University/Mount Sinai paper was a meta-analysis by a team of epidemiologists, clinicians, and researchers that culled data from 185 studies, which examined semen from almost 43,000 men. It showed that the human race is apparently on a trend line toward becoming unable to reproduce itself. Sperm counts went from 99 million sperm per milliliter of semen in 1973 to 47 million per
milliliter in 2011, and the decline has been accelerating. But some chemicals, including phthalates and BPA, can change the way genes are expressed without altering the underlying genetic code, and that change is inheritable. Your father passes along his low sperm count to you, and your sperm count goes even lower after you’re exposed to endocrine disruptors: that is why there’s been no leveling off even after 40 years of declining sperm counts—the baseline keeps dropping. [29]
Milder and shorter winters continue to decimate moose populations in New England The killer has been the winter tick, parasites that are attaching themselves to moose — sometimes in the tens of thousands — and sucking the lifeblood out of them, killing calves that can’t sustain the blood loss, and making it harder for cows to bear calves. In the last decade, moose populations in Vermont and New Hampshire have plummeted, and this autumn, as a consequence, moose hunting permits in both states will be at historic lows. As of now, said one moose biologist, the future looks grim. “This whole thing is being driven by climate and our climate is changing and not in a way that’s conducive to moose,” said Kristine Rines, lead moose biologist with the N.H. Fish and Game Department. “This is a whole new ball game. If we have drought in the fall consistently, moose might be able to stabilize for a while at this level, but if temperatures continue to rise and winters get shorter, we will be host to a large number of parasites and diseases that moose have simply not evolved with.” [16]
‘Hyperalarming’ study shows massive insect loss Insects around the world are in a crisis, according to a small but growing number of long-term studies showing dramatic declines in invertebrate populations. A new report suggests that the problem is more widespread than scientists realized. Huge numbers of bugs have been lost in a pristine national forest in Puerto Rico, the study found, and the forest’s insect-eating animals have gone missing, too. In 2014, an international team of biologists estimated that, in the past 35 years, the abundance of invertebrates such as beetles and bees had decreased by 45 percent. In places where long-term insect data are available, mainly in Europe, insect numbers are plummeting. A study last year showed a 76 percent decrease in flying insects in the past few decades in German nature preserves. [30]
Plastic waste disintegrates into nanoparticles that can enter brain cells to effect behaviour Calculations have shown that ten per cent of all plastic produced globally ends up in the sea. Is there a risk that this plastic waste disintegrates to the extent that nanoplastics are released? “We have been able to show that the mechanical effect on the plastic causes the disintegration of plastic down to nano-sized plastic fragments,” says Tommy Cedervall, chemistry researcher at Lund University.The study relates to the larger issue of what happens to plastic in the environment and how plastic can affect animals and humans. Plastic nano-sized particles are a few millionths of a millimetre, i.e. extremely small particles, so small that they have been shown to reach far into living organisms’ bodies. Last year, in an earlier study from Lund University, researchers showed that nano-sized plastic particles can enter the brains of fish and that this causes brain damage which probably disturbs fish behaviour. [31]
In Florida, the uncontrolled growth of an alga known as “red tide” has the state in emergency The red tide occurs naturally, but scientists believe that human action worsens the problem. Year-round, K. brevis can be found in concentrations of 1,000 cells per litre of water. According to Mr Bartleson, who navigates every day around Sanibel beaches to monitor the K. brevis, a concentration of one million K. brevis cells per litre of water “kills everything”. In recent measurements, he has found up to 50 million K. brevis cells per litre of water. “We have never seen numbers likes this before,” he says. “When the concentration of red tide is high it kills everything,” says Dr Rick Bartleson, research scientist at The Sanibel Captiva Conservation Foundation Marine Laboratory (SCCF). This exaggerated growth of algae has been linked to water contaminated with fertilisers used in agriculture, which reached the sea through several canals that pump residues on the west coast of Florida. [32]
The new normal in Miami [37]
Rising Seas Flooding Miami Regularly Beyond the damage to homes, roads, or other infrastructure, the flooding also threatens drinking water and plant life. Ultimately, of course, it means large parts of the city could become permanently uninhabitable. Pedraza lives in Shorecrest, a northern Miami neighborhood that faces flooding so regularly it happens even when it hasn’t rained. All it takes to fill the streets to knee-high depth on those days is a full moon. There are 3 reasons why flooding is so bad in Miami. The first is sea-level rise. Because of ocean currents and Miami’s location, sea levels are rising in and around the city and Miami Beach faster than in most of the world. The second problem facing South Florida is a vexing geological one. “Our underlying geology is like Swiss cheese,” said Obeysekera. The third whammy, the effect of future
storms, is still an unknown. The consequences of a warmer world on hurricane season are uncertain, but many scientists agree that we can expect storms to be more intense, which could mean higher storm surges and more rainfall. [33]
One of the Largest Aquifers in the World Is Disappearing Every summer the US Central Plains go dry, leading farmers to tap into groundwater to irrigate sorghum, soy, cotton, wheat, and corn, and maintain large herds of cattle and hogs. As the heat rises, anxious irrigators gather to discuss whether and how they should adopt more stringent conservation measures. They know that if they do not conserve, the Ogallala Aquifer, the source of their prosperity, will go dry. The Ogallala, also known as the High Plains Aquifer, is one of the largest underground freshwater sources in the world. It underlies an estimated 174,000 square miles of the Central Plains and holds as much water as Lake Huron. It irrigates portions of eight states, from Wyoming, South Dakota, and Nebraska in the North to Colorado, Kansas, Oklahoma, New Mexico, and Texas
in the South. But the current drought plaguing the region is unusually strong and persistent, driving farmers to rely more on the aquifer and sharpening the debate over its future. As more pumps were drilled into the aquifer to capture its flow, some started to come up dry, which led to more drilling and pumping. Between the late 19th century and 2005, the US Geological Survey estimates irrigation depleted the aquifer by 253 million acre-feet — about nine percent of its total volume. And the pace is accelerating. Analyzing federal data, the Denver Post found that the aquifer shrank twice as fast from 2011 through 2017 as it had over the previous 60 years. [34]
Scientists warned this weedkiller would destroy crops. EPA approved it anyway. Joyce leans against the greenhouse he’s building, hands in the pockets of his overalls, peering at the field where he started nearly 800 tomato plants in the spring. It was early August when the telltale signs of trouble emerged. The plants’ broad, flat leaves shriveled and curled, their branches twisted and buckled. Then blossom rot set in. Joyce knew they couldn’t be saved. He climbed onto his tractor and mowed down his bestselling crop — for the third year in a row. The plague that struck Joyce’s farm in Malden, Missouri, was not a natural disaster, but a man-made weedkiller called dicamba. The EPA ignored scientists’ warnings and extensive research that showed dicamba would evaporate into the air and ruin crops miles away, according to documents obtained through public records requests and lawsuits. Instead, the EPA’s approval was based on studies by the companies that manufacture dicamba, which independent scientists say were seriously flawed. One scientist called the studies “shockingly insufficient.” The agrochemical giant Monsanto Co. orchestrated the massive deployment of dicamba on tens of millions of
acres of crops in the Midwest and mid-South when it lobbied the EPA to allow the chemical to be used on its genetically modified seeds for cotton and soybeans. The seeds — which the company engineered so that farmers could use dicamba to kill invasive weeds without hurting their crops — were worth $3 billion last year. [35]
Lyme disease is thriving thanks to climate change Rising temperatures are creating new habitats for ticks. Climate change already has amplified the range of invasive insects that devour crops, destroy homes, and spread disease. “Tick-borne diseases are an important public health concern and the incidence of these infections is increasing in the United States and worldwide. “Lyme disease is a classic example of the link between environmental factors and the occurrence and spread of
disease.” [36]
In spite of all this gloomy news I remain convinced that human ingenuity and our ability to cooperate when we must, will, after significant pain and suffering (read – many people will unnecessarily die of starvation and disease), allow life to recover, just as it did after the Black Death. Yes, life as we know it is over, but life, and human life in particular, is not. Think of it as just another lesson learned. After the Black Death we eventually learned about the connection between disease and cleanliness, now we may learn that we so totally part of our environment that nothing we do can be considered as separate – every one of our actions impacts not only the people around us, not only other species of plants and animals around us, but even the chemistry and geology of the planet itself. Furthermore there is also lots of good news as Scientists and Engineers
create new technologies and approaches to resource/energy use that will, when used on a mass scale, allow us to live in a way that does not damage the environment as much as we do now.[45] This will be a hard lesson to learn, but we can all learn.
Not only that, given that the future is yet to happen, there is still much that you can do in your life to prepare for this future. No, I am not saying prevention of wrenching societal change is possible, but I am saying that you can increase your chances of survival – even living with some joy and satisfaction – if you start preparing for the changes ahead. So, next are my thoughts on ways that you, the young, can prepare for life in a Climate Change world. This is not a recipe, because the details of the new world are yet to be determined, but these ideas will, I hope, give you food for thought and spur you into action.
The Only Thing Stronger than Fear is Hope, if it followed through with Intelligent Action
Part III: Your Preparations
Predicting the details and timing for any future event is a fool’s errand, however, the general direction for the future can be clearly seen, if you want to look. These are only a few of the changes coming your way:
-the wrenching change in technology {AI, robots, block-chain, genetic engineering, etc.17]
– use of internet connectivity and data to control whole populations [Chinese social credit score,18]
– population pressures on food supplies [most world fisheries in decline, world’s largest aquifers to be dry within 20 years,19]
– accelerated species extinction rates [70% decline in French songbirds, 70% decline in European insect population,20]
– 50% in North American sperm count since WWII [21]
– abrupt climate change towards a “Hothouse Earth” [ice free Arctic ocean, melting permafrost, weak jet streams, slowing down of world ocean conveyer – especially the gulf stream, continued failure to reduce GHG emissions,22]
-cyber attacks that can bring down the grid, hospitals or entire cities are now everyday event [43]
You had better be ready for unexpected ‘surprises’. Now, to be sure, some of the surprises will be good news. Especially in the area of renewable energy and new technologies positive breakthroughs are happening almost every day. [23] So Although I refuse to predict the details of the social-political-environmental shifts the near future will bring there are some simple, common sense choices you can make to reduce the risk that you will be among the first climate refugees. Think of this as accelerated change in a complex system that is going to go through some nasty bumps on the highway of life, these ideas are just your seatbelt and air bag to get you through the rough moments, but, always remember, there is light at the end of the tunnel!
Minimum Prep
Your Attitude & Social Network
-stay positive, but realistic, no matter how bad things get
– find and maintain strong relationships with like-minded people
– stay informed about various points of view
– don’t judge others, it doesn’t help you in any way
– find and read/watch positive inspiring news eg. https://www.goodnewsnetwork.org/
Transport & Where you live
-stay away from living in/on mega-cities, coastlines, hurricane/tornado/flood-plain/desert zones [24]
-live as close to work as possible
-of you must drive have/share an electric car
-only fly if you absolutely must
Your Job/Skills
-educate yourself in a career that is ‘real’; meaning not pure marketing and speculation, eg. Selling perfume or stocks [25] and is not prone to replacement by AI or robots
-love your work
Your Home’s Energy and Food
-your home/apartment & transport should be net zero carbon [26]
-if you must have a car it must be electric
-eat as close be vegetarian as is healthy for you, grow as much of your own food as is reasonable
– no food waste or garbage and as close to zero use of plastic as possible
-have backup up power for the inevitable loss of power along with an independent heat source [27]
– have at least 1 month supply of food & water; include some neighbours in the amount you calculate [28]
‘Maximum’ Prep
Your Attitude & Social Network
-build a team that live close together and can support each other in every way
-set time aside each day for reflection and giving thanks for all the good things in your life
-have your neighbours as part of your team and be ready so share with them
-communicate with those who are not being realistic or are scared about the unfolding changes
-get married, have kids and train them to help find solutions to this crisis
Transport & Where you live
-stay away from any large cities [but don’t be totally isolated either]
-stop flying
-LOVE where you live
Your Job/Skills
-on your closest circle of family/friends have people trained in medicine, mechanical repair, building, farming
-have the skills & resources to grow your own food & heat/repair your own house
Your Home’s Energy and Food
-have 1 year’s supply of food/energy/access to water
-set up your living space to be able to function without external energy/water for the long term if needed
As you can see I have no magic recipe for you to prepare. Having practical mechanical and medical skills will of course be essential but the essence of preparation, aside from the basics mentioned above, will be to recognize quickly changes in society and respond before most people do. So noticing trends is going to be your most essential skill – especially noticing uncomfortable realities that will shift your life in a unexpected directions. Just be ready and respond intelligently and life can continue to be fully of joy, for even on a rainy day there is a rainbow.
What’s next?
After the initial shock of finding out that our form of civilization no longer functions what’s next? Well, nothing that hasn’t happened before: a search for and the formulation of a new form of a social-political-economic model that will work for the long haul. “Right now we appear to be as “culture trapped” by and within’ Modernity’ as a form of civilization as the Roman Catholic [RC] Church was trapped within its pre-Modern worldview in 1450. As was the RC Church then, we are both disinclined and unable to take a corporately self-critical meta-reflexive perspective on Modernity as a form of civilization and assess its adequacy against the deep changes occurring within and among us. It is the case that as of today we neither imagine nor entertain the notion, much less explore it, that our long litany of troubles are signs and symptoms of civilizational overshoot.
The thought that our form of civilization may be the root of our crises is simply not on our agendas, but it should be. If we are already past “Peak Modernity” and well into a civilizational-scale overshoot, then we are pursuing a wholly inappropriate aspiration. Rather than seeking to make Modernity sustainable, our core work in the 21st
Century is to learn to out-grow our Modern selves and cultures and let them go as we learn the new work of nurturing the next form of civilization into robust being.” [40] There are several such nascent models out there, for example permaculture communities [41], described here: An Eco village is a type of intentional community where individuals and families come together to try and find ways to live more sustainably. People who have chosen to live in Eco villages, often believe that the multiple crises that we collectively face as a species are directly related to the civilizational paradigm that is defined by industrial production, alienated individuals whose sole purpose in life is to consume, and an economic system whose dependence on unlimited growth is destroying the earth. Eco villages seek to challenge this paradigm by creating new ways of living within the ecological limitations of place. Concretely, Eco villages are usually small groups of anywhere between 30 and 300 people whose goal is to find ways to live more economically, socially and ecologically sustainable lives. As Buckminster Fuller once said, “in order to change an existing paradigm you do not struggle to try and change the
problematic model. You create a new model and make the old one obsolete.” [42]
As a counterpoint to all this wonderful dream is the following statement by one of my hero’s, James Lovelock, who came up with the Gaia hypothesis [48] and is famous for being an environmental contrarian:
Humanity is in a period exactly like 1938-9, he explains, when “we all knew something terrible was going to happen, but didn’t know what to do about it”. But once the second world war was underway, “everyone got excited, they loved the things they could do, it was one long holiday … so when I think of the impending crisis now, I think in those terms. A sense of purpose – that’s what people want.” [49]
In conclusion, we are about to experience what Charles Dickens called “It was the best of times, it was the worst of times”. [he described the struggles of people around the time of the French Revolution] Then, as now, the old world was dying and a new one was being born. Clearly, it was a difficult birth. Just as asking anybody then if they thought things were getting better they would have thought you mad, for clearly, when immersed in the turmoil of the moment, things were getting worse. However, in hindsight and having a long term view, life did improve for most people [who survived]. I consider our challenges today similar in kind, if not in degree. Clearly, what we are about to experience will be more gut wrenching than the French Revolution, but, just as despair then was not helpful so will despair today only doom you: your only sensible option is realistic optimism. I wish you all well on your journey into a future that is still unfolding.
“To me, all this knowledge about abrupt climate change doesn’t lead me to be fearful, it leads me to feel responsible. It leads me to feel that we need to be more informed.”
– quote by Scott Wing, Geologist studying the PETM [47]
References
1.Picture: The Fall of Constantinople https://seanmunger.com/2015/05/29/byzantium-didnt-fall-in-a-day-some-thoughts-on-the-end-ofempires/
2. Snowball Earth https://newatlas.com/snowball-earth-sturtian-glaciation/48389/
3. Permian Mass Extinction https://phys.org/news/2018-09-end-permian-extinction-earth-species-instantaneous.html
4. Dinosaur Extinction http://www.ucmp.berkeley.edu/education/events/cowen1b.html
5. near human extinction https://www.npr.org/sections/krulwich/2012/10/22/163397584/how-human-beings-almost-vanished-fromearth-in-70-000-b-c
6. Rome and the Classic Maya: Comparing the Slow Collapse of Civilizations. By Rebecca Storey, Glenn R Storey
https://www.forbes.com/sites/matthewgabriele/2018/08/10/drought-mayan-civilization-we-already-knew-that/#574437ef69ae
7. Fall of Rome https://www.ancient.eu/article/835/fall-of-the-western-roman-empire/
8. The Mongols Destroy Baghdad https://www.thoughtco.com/the-mongol-siege-of-baghdad-1258-195801
9. The Plague https://www.iflscience.com/environment/plague-outbreaks-ravaged-europe-centuries-were-driven-climate-changes-asia/
10. Christopher Columbus https://phys.org/news/2016-01-aftermath-native-american-depopulation-impacted.html
11. Smallpox Epidemic https://www.cdc.gov/features/1918-flu-pandemic/index.html
12. Industrial Capitalism https://www.independent.co.uk/news/long_reads/capitalism-un-scientists-preparing-end-fossil-fuels-warningdemise-a8523856.html https://irena.org/publications/2019/Jan/A-New-World-The-Geopolitics-of-the-EnergyTransformation?utm_source=All+IRENA+contacts+except+GSO%2FCoalition&utm_campaign=88dad767beEMAIL_CAMPAIGN_2019_01_11_10_14_COPY_01&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_29b5801035-88dad767be-36979277
13. Picture Columbus run aground https://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2011/12/111205-native-americans-europeanspopulation-dna-genetics-science/
14. 2018 IPCC report https://www.ipcc.ch/
15. Hothouse Earth https://www.pnas.org/content/115/33/8252
16. ¸ https://www.caledonianrecord.com/news/as-moose-populations-decline-hunting-permits-at-historic-lows/article_eff65e5e-3c76-
5fa5-a7da-8b5cf7229a01.html
17. https://blogs.cfainstitute.org/investor/2018/05/21/the-robots-are-coming-the-robots-are-coming/
18. https://www.businessinsider.com/china-social-credit-system-punishments-and-rewards-explained-2018-4
19. https://www.undercurrentnews.com/2018/07/10/fao-state-of-worlds-fisheries-is-declining/
20. https://www.theguardian.com/world/2018/mar/21/catastrophe-as-frances-bird-population-collapses-due-to-pesticides
21. https://www.gq.com/story/sperm-count-zero
22. https://www.stockholmresilience.org/research/research-news/2018-08-06-planet-at-risk-of-heading-towards-hothouse-earth-state.html
23. https://www.xyleco.com/ https://motherboard.vice.com/en_us/article/vbngmd/decentralized-microgridding-can-provide-90-of-aneighborhoods-energy-needs-study-finds
24. https://collections.unu.edu/eserv/UNU:2385/nLib9280809873.pdf
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2018/sep/24/climate-change-where-to-move-us-avoid-floods-hurricanes
25. https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2015/12/how-will-climate-change-affect-jobs/
26. https://climateone.org/audio/net-zero-living
27. https://www.tesla.com/support/energy/learn/powerwall/backup-power
28. https://www.familysurvivalplanning.com/support-files/the_complete_book_of_prepping_lists.pdf
https://www.familysurvivalplanning.com/food-storage-for-beginners.html
29. https://www.gq.com/story/sperm-count-zero
30. https://www.washingtonpost.com/science/2018/10/15/hyperalarming-study-shows-massive-insectloss/?noredirect=on&utm_term=.5d66ab3e8489
31. https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2018/12/181219115557.htm
32. https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-45288774
33. https://www.businessinsider.com/miami-floods-sea-level-rise-solutions-2018-4
34. https://www.inverse.com/article/48142-ogallala-aquifer-conservation-measures-us-drought-farm-irrigation
35. https://thefern.org/2018/11/scientists-warned-this-weedkiller-would-destroy-crops-epa-approved-it-anyway/
36. https://www.popsci.com/lyme-disease-climate-change#page-4
37. https://e360.yale.edu/features/flooding-hot-spots-why-seas-are-rising-faster-on-the-u.s.-east-coast
38. https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2018/10/181009114946.htm
39. http://scientistswarning.forestry.oregonstate.edu/sites/sw/files/Ripple_et_al.%20_7-31-17_scientists_warning.pdf
40. private letter from Ruben (Butch) Nelson
41. http://permaculture-hawaii.com/ https://ourecovillage.org/about/
42. https://permaculturenews.org/2017/09/14/revolutionary-civilizational-paradigm-eco-villages/
43. http://www.bbc.com/future/story/20190108-the-cyber-attack-that-sent-an-alaskan-community-back-in-time
44. Easter Island https://adventure.howstuffworks.com/easter-island3.htm
45. good news on renewable energy
46. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4HnhwDRAz5Q
47. https://nationalpost.com/news/world/how-an-ancient-global-warming-catastrophe-holds-vital-clues-about-the-earths-future
PETM: Paleocene Eocene Thermal Maximum
48. http://www.gaiatheory.org/overview/
49. https://www.theguardian.com/theguardian/2008/mar/01/scienceofclimatechange.climatechange
50. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3574335/
If you act like an animal Nature will treat you like an animal Instead be human: look ahead, be proactive, act before you are forced to.
And no, what is happening is NOT personal.
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