II am pleased to note that an ever increasing number of people are becoming conscious of the reality that our present rate of natural resource depletion, with its ancillary environmental damage, is unsustainable.
Preserving our planet’s ability to sustain life for future generations would mean giving up many freedoms. The private auto will have to go the way of the dodo. The mining of hydra carbons will have to be reduced to a level necessary to sustain only essential heating, public transport, and agriculture. The production of nuclear waste will have to be curtailed. Wasteful use of potable water will have to cease. Luxury homes will have to give way to high intensity housing. Planned obsolescence will be a thing of the past. The manufacture of consumer goods would have to be geared toward durability and necessity. Garbage will have to be reduced to a bare minimum, with emphasis on recycling.
This is to mention but a few of the drastic steps that would need to be taken. In other words, growth would have to be renounced and replaced with recession. Band-aid solutions, while resource depletion and environmental damage are allowed to intensify, will not save our planet.
I have grave doubts that humankind, especially the affluent, will ever be prepared to deviate from their present destructive course. It seems that human selfishness and greed are destined to continue to triumph over compassion and common sense.
