| Date | Title | Speaker | Speaker's Photo | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| January 31, 2023 6:30 pm | Pivoting on Climate and Depletion by Substituting Progress for Growth | John Meyer |  | John Meyer is a semi-retired small business owner with a degree in economics. He has had a number of articles published in Canada’s major newspapers dealing with a range of topics from population, immigration and the environment to the failings of GDP based metrics for social policy formation. He has also presented a paper on Energy Currency at a conference of that name in Split, Croatia. He has authored two books, “The Renewable Energy Transition, Realities for Canada and the World” and “The Post-Pandemic World, Sustainable Living on a Wounded Planet” which are published by Springer Nature.
Mr. Meyer is currently President of the NGO “Canadians for a Sustainable Society” and has just built a house which he expects to be (eventually) energy positive. His primary interests are the changes necessary to achieve a sustainable society, population cycles and the reasons for failed human social structures throughout history. | Business-as-usual will not see us through the threats which even now are beginning to seep under our front door. We need new goals and metrics. Above all, we need a healthy national conversation and the new leaders which will spring from it. What are the options and the obstacles for reaching the high ground of sustainability before the rising waters of environmental decline and social disorder overtake us? The broad issues and nuts and bolts options open to governments and individuals are discussed. |
| October 12, 2022 5:30 pm | Famine as a Mass Destruction Weapon | Dr. Nicole Morgan |  | Dr. Morgan, full professorship at the Royal Military College of Canada, was the most recent stop in a rich and varied academic life spread over two continents and subject matter specialties. The current manifestation of these comprehensive interests is a focus on the impact of globalization on human ecology, conceived not only as the bodies of human individuals but also as social and political bodies. Her most recent book, Haine froide, published in Paris (le Seuil) in 2012, is a deconstruction of the ideology of individualism and growth in the US over 50 years.
A Queen’s National Scholar, Nicole holds a doctorate in (political) Philosophy from the University of Ottawa, and a master’s degree in anthropology and sociology. She has written and published several books and many articles. She has been a public speaker in Europe and Canada and has been a friend and member of CACOR for the past seven years. | Dr Morgan will present an update of a previous CACOR conference held on October 16th 2018 “Food and Fat one of our first Forms of Energy”. She will re-cast her forecast within the chaotic geopolitical context which is the focus of her studies and publications. She will start with examining how “Putin the strategist” objectives with Ukraine goes far beyond his designs for NATO, natural gas transmission, and nationalist expansion. He wants the agricultural power of those perfectly positioned, well-drained, “black gold” soils, now and in the future. If he can steal Ukraine, he’ll have “the currency of currencies” (Lenin’s quote), the best possible hedge against inflation, and adaptive capacity in the face of climate change”. He is not the only one who has noticed that the scarcity of food, water and soil will be central to the remaking of the political planet on a scale without precedent. |