Research for the End of Your 'Normal' Everyday Existence

Contents

Note: Breaking with our usual ‘no linking’ convention, for this edition of WEIRD, each of the article headings contains a list of the academic studies referenced in it for you to download & read.

☮ Introduction: Introducing the science for the end of your 'normal' everyday existence

We are not in a situation of having ‘problems’ with ‘possible solutions’; we are in a ‘predicament’ with only a few, mostly unwelcome ‘outcomes’ to choose from.

☮ History file: Bill Devall – ‘The Deep Ecology Movement’

Published in 1980, this tract was the first to outline the split between ‘eco-reformers’ & ‘deep ecologists’.
References:

• Journal of Natural Resources: ‘The Deep Ecology Movement’, Bill Devall, Spring 1980.

☮ “It's the economy, stoooopid!”

Environmentalism uses tech. as a sticking plaster; research says it’s affluence driving destruction.
References:

• Nature Communications: ‘Scientists’ Warning On Affluence’, vol. 11 art. 3107, 19^th June 2020;
• Oxfam: ‘Extreme Carbon Inequality’, December 2015;
• PNAS: ‘Tracking the Ecological Overshoot of the Human Economy’, vol. 99 no. 14, 2002;
• Journal of Industrial Ecology: ‘Environmental Load from Dutch Private Consumption – How Much Damage Takes Place Abroad?’, vol. 9 no.1/2, 2005.

☮ ‘Are humans a virus?’

In these times of disruptive pandemic, it might be interesting to figure how all other life on Earth looks at us.
References:

• Ecological Economics: ‘Ecological economics for humanity’s plague phase’, vol. 169 art. 106519, March 2020;
• Ecological Economics: ‘Economics for the Future – Beyond the Super-organism’, vol. 169 art. 106520, March 2020;
• Energy Research & Social Science: ‘Energy transitions or additions? Why a transition from fossil fuels requires more than the growth of renewable energy’, vol. 41 pp.40-43, 2019.

☮ “...a felt need for increased efficiency”

The fatal flaw at the heart of the mainstream debate over efficiency and ecological impact – the ‘rebound effect’.
References:

• PLOS One: ‘Is Decoupling GDP Growth from Environmental Impact Possible?’, vol. 11(10) art. e0164733, 14th October 2016;
• Nature Climate Change: ‘Pathways of human development and carbon emissions embodied in trade’, vol. 2 pp.81-85, February 2012;
• Frontiers Energy Research: ‘The Rebound Effect and the Jevons' Paradox – Beyond the Conventional Wisdom’, vol. 7 art. 90, 10th September 2019;
• Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews: ‘Energy efficiency and economy-wide rebound effects – A review of the evidence and its implications’, vol. 141 art. 110781, March 2021.

☮ ‘Consumption is a temporal illusion’

There is a religious zealotry amongst those who ‘worship’ technology; they will form a lobby resistant to change.
References:

• Global Environmental Change: ‘Providing decent living with minimum energy – A global scenario’, vol.65 art.102168, November 2020;
• Nature Energy: ‘Large inequality in international and in-tranational energy footprints between income groups and across consumption categories’, vol. 5 pp.231–239, March 2020;
• Global Sustainability: ‘Unequal distribution of household carbon footprints in Europe and its link to sustainability’, vol. 3 art. E18, 6th July 2020;
• Sustainable Development: ‘Creating Sustainable Identities – The Significance of the Financially Affluent Self’, vol. 18 pp. 123-134, March 2010.

☮ ‘The Party is Over... Time to Clean-up’

Study after study has mapped the coming crash of human consumption. It’s time for the willing to make lifeboats.
References:

• Global Environmental Change: ‘A comparison of The Limits to Growth with 30 years of reality’, vol. 18 no.3 pp. 397-411, August 2008;
• Journal of Industrial Ecology: ‘Update to limits to growth – Comparing the World3 model with empirical data’, vol. 25 no.3 pp. 614-626, June 2021;
• Frontiers in Conservation Science: ‘Underestimating the Challenges of Avoiding a Ghastly Future’, vol. 1 art. 615419, January 2021;
• Energies: ‘Through the Eye of a Needle – An Eco-Heterodox Perspective on the Renewable Energy Transition’, vol. 14 art. 4508, July 2021.

☮ ‘The problem IS affluent society’

Ideas to solve the ecological crisis take industrial society as an ‘invariant factor’. It’s time to change that.
References:

• Nature Urban Sustainability: ‘Radical changes are needed for transformations to a good Anthropocene’, vol. 1 art. 5, February 2021;
• Nature Communications: ‘Renewable energy production will exacerbate mining threats to biodiversity’, vol. 11 art. 4174, 1st September 2020;
• Nature Sustainability: ‘The importance of resource security for poverty eradication’, vol.4 pp.731-738, April 2021;
• Nature: ‘A safe operating space for humanity’, vol.461 pp.472-475, 24th September 2009;
• Ecological Complexity: ‘Social complexity and sustainability’, vol.3 no.2 pp.91-103, June 2006;
• Globalisations: ‘What does de-growth mean? A few points of clarification’, 4th Sept. 2020.

☮ ‘We must embrace in a new relationship with the land’

The only certain way to reduce global impacts is to re-establish that relationship to the land and natural systems.
References:

• PNAS: ‘People have shaped most of terrestrial nature for at least 12,000 years’, vol. 118 no. 17 art. e2023483118, April 2021;
• Journal of Agricultural and Food Chemistry: ‘The Nexus of Food, Energy, and Water’, vol. 65 pp.6255-6262, June 2014;
• Journal of Cleaner Production: ‘Agriculture and degrowth – State of the art and assessment of organic and biotech-based agriculture from a degrowth perspective’, vol. 197 no. 2 pp. 1823-1839, 1^st October 2018;
• Journal of Peasant Studies: ‘Degrowth and critical agrarian studies’, vol. 47 no. 2 pp. 235-264, 2020.

☮ Numerical Ramblings: ‘The zombie pro-nuclear lobby’

Why do the advocates of nuclear power refuse to die, or at least see statistical reason?