The Pernicious Myth of Perpetual Economic Growth

Nothing grows forever. The myth the economy can is destroying the biosphere.

By Dr. Glen Barry

The present human condition is predicated on one of the biggest lies ever – that the economy can grow indefinitely. In a self-serving logical contortion, economists in service to the oligarchy measure the well-being of a society by how fast the economy grows, with little regard to the state of natural capital, human inequity, the welfare of ecosystems and other species, or the extent to which people and society are happy. Natural capital is defined as Earth's stocks of natural assets including ecosystem services which make all life possible, which is unmeasured and thus undervalued by indices of economic growth.

Measures such as Gross Domestic Product utterly fail to tie increases in economic output to human and natural well-being. Spending on militaristic drone attacks and the rich's conspicuous over-consumption are equated with social expenditures to meet basic human needs. Clearcutting old-growth forests for toilet paper is of equal worth as providing homes and food for the poor. Ravaging Earth's last natural ecosystems for every last drop of oil is deemed economically beneficial (despite being terribly inefficient as externalities remain unpriced), while we are told restoring natural ecosystems is unprofitable because of large discounting of future benefits.

Living as if Earth's nature has no worth other than to be liquidated for consumption degrades ourselves and ecosystems, and can only end in utter ruin as first society, then the economy, and finally the biosphere collapses. It is blatantly obvious that infinite growth on a finite Earth is impossible. Yet we run our economy with this goal.

Earth is everything. Without ecology there can be no economy.

Economic growth is worshiped as if it were holy and divine, rather than acknowledging that growth can come at enormous economic, social, and environmental costs. There is little understanding of ecological overshoot and the limits to growth, as we seek ever more material possessions at the expense of all else, systematically degrading not only our habitat, but also our future resource base and potential for broad-based community advancement.

Growth appears to be benign and pleasant, iPhones and foreign travel are intoxicating, yet perpetual economic expansion comes at an unknown price whose deleterious impacts sneak up upon you. Such is the nature of exponential growth. The exorbitant costs of an exponentially growing economy are best illustrated by imagining a pond whereby the extent of lily-pad coverage doubles in extent every day, on the 30^th day fully covering the water. On which day is the pond half covered? When is it a 10% covered? We shall return to this question.

By falsely equating exponential growth with societal well-being, capitalism may well be irredeemable. Its foundational idea of people coming together in markets to exchange their surplus has been bastardized to suggest that creating something of worth and selling it is the same as every manner of speculative financial trickery. Yet for markets to serve human's and nature's well-being, there are some basic out-right lies that need to be addressed now.

Firstly, growth cannot fully measure economic well-being; we need a richer measure that determines the extent to which economic activity is sustainable and widely beneficial. A much richer measure is the rate of economic growth per unit of natural capital (drawn down or replenished), and by the extent to which economic advancement is equitably shared. Such a truly green economy is said to be at a steady state, whereby both population and consumption are stable at a sustainable level. How dense are we to not understand that Earth is everything, and that without ecology there can be no economy?

Given the current state of ecological overshoot – as terrestrial ecosystems, climate, water, oceans and biodiversity are collapsing – achieving a steady state economy would require decades of degrowth and redistribution of wealth. Urgent measures would have to be taken to provide incentives that cap both population and disparities in consumption, even as aggregate draws upon natural capital are reduced to below replacement levels to allow for decades of ecological renewal.

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On Ecology and Going Back to the Land

Life begets life, making Earth livable. — Dr. Glen Barry

Grow your own food as you restore ecology

Not much new land is being made, yet land’s well-being is central to the well-being of human and all life. On land, in a miraculous act of biological emergence, plants and animals have naturally evolved and self-organized to form ecosystems and ultimately the biosphere. Yet existing land and its ecology have has been treated incautiously and with great malice for centuries.

Land ensconced in natural vegetation is the living membrane that encompasses Earth and mediates energy and material flows between air and water. Naturally evolved terrestrial ecosystems are a majestic miracle, provider of life, and humanity’s habitat home. Over countless eons pulsing lifeforms emerge and radiate creating the panoply of a living Earth.

Life begets life, making Earth livable.

The history of natural land destruction is largely synonymous with human settlements and agriculture. The disease of ecological colonialism radiated from Europe, utterly decimating land and its productive capacity globally. As the myth of a perpetual growth economy has been universally embraced; about 90% of Earth’s original old-growth forests have been pillaged, 50% of top soil has been lost, and about half of global land cover no longer remains in a natural condition.

The global ecological system has percolated from a state of human settlements enmeshed within a sea of life-giving natural ecosystems, to a sea of unnatural human endeavors surrounding islands of nature. Such ecological overshoot is not sustainable and this terrestrial ecosystem loss is collapsing our one shared biosphere.

Rarely has a species gone so rogue and utterly lost their place within the natural world.

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Embrace the Coming Ecological Inflection Point and Great Transition

Environmental awareness must soon reach a critical mass, whereby massive societal resources are re-allocated to scale up solutions in a great ecological transition; before biosphere, social, and economic collapse become unavoidable. An approaching ecological inflection point reflects a narrow band of opportunity to repair fragmented, quivering nature, clearly at its breaking point, before it is too late.

By Dr. Glen Barry

After 25 years of ecological advocacy, I can say with certainty that I have never seen as much genuine environmental concern as I do now. This has generally not led en masse to required action such as personal dramatic emission cuts and refusal to buy all products from old-growth forests. But for the first time ecological decline including climate change is visibly apparent to a degree that it is readily known by the educated and it can't be denied by anyone of good faith and character.

Concurrently trend lines for atmospheric and ecosystem decline are more perilous than ever. Humanity is putting the biosphere at great risk, as rampant industrial pollution and clearing of natural vegetation results in abrupt climate change occurring far faster than envisioned, and natural ecosystems are failing to provide the surrounding matrix of natural services which makes life possible. The natural family's only hope is that an ecological inflection point occurs, whereby the impacts of biosphere collapse become so evident – perhaps as millions die from extreme storms and other depredations – while there is still time to implement sufficient solutions. At that point the human family will howl for the necessary measures to be taken to protect and restore natural ecosystems, and end fossil fuels, on an accelerated emergency basis.

The only questions are whether as ecosystem collapse becoming apparent, will we squabble for what remains as we deny ecologism, or will we remain free as we begin in earnest a great transition to green liberty? And will we have identified and prototyped, and be ready with sufficient ecological solutions, to meet human needs while maintaining a living Earth? The ecological inflection point is a narrow band of opportunity to repair fragmented, quivering nature before it is too late. We must be ready with templates for ecological sustainability, which can employ billions, as a program of ecological restoration and energy conservation are rapidly scaled.

What hope remains for humanity and her habitat as ecological awareness and collapse converge in such a manner, is whether we are able to ramp up fast enough the plethora of ecological solutions we all know about but don't support enough. These efforts may be abetted by deep wells of global ecological resilience of which we are unaware, as the Earth is a living organism that has self-regulated for 3.5 billion year, yet whose workings remain largely unknown to her peoples.

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Stop Being Afraid, Work Together to Make Things Better

Things could be so much better

Things could be so much better, if we want them to be. There are tremendous benefits to be realized by coming together to make peace, promote equity and justice, protect natural ecosystems, and end fossil fuels. But it requires us to reject religious fanaticism, think freely and generously, help the poor to live upon the land, demobilize standing armies, stop spewing filth into the air and waters; and go back to the land to create worth from nurturing soil and vegetation, earning a righteous livelihood from the strength of our minds and bodies. A green and free future of sustainability and abundance – based upon living within an encompassing matrix of organic permaculture, and natural and regenerating ecosystems – awaits us. For the present outrageous state of the Earth and the murdering of its inhabitants to end, mostly we just need to start loving each other and nature, and to share.

“Tolerance and freedom of thought are the veritable antidotes to religious fanaticism.” – Paul-Henri baron d’Holbach

“It is forbidden to kill; therefore all murderers are punished unless they kill in large numbers and to the sound of trumpets”. – Voltaire

“Some day the earth will weep, she will beg for her life, she will cry with tears of blood. You will make a choice, if you will help her or let her die, and when she dies, you too will die.” – John Hollow Horn, Oglala Lakota

“I would like to see every single soldier on every single side, just take off your helmet, unbuckle your kit, lay down your rifle, and set down on the side of some shady lane, and say, nope, I aint a gonna kill nobody. Plenty of rich folks wants to fight. Give them the guns.” – Woody Guthrie

“War is murder. I would rather be blown to pieces is a low-probability terrorist attack than forever give up my liberties and nature to oppressive big government and corporate exploitation.” – Dr. Glen Barry

I am absolutely appalled at humanity’s and nature’s condition over the last several years. I am filled with infernal rage and nausea, and particularly irked, that in the 21st century we witness in the Middle East the continuing waging of holy war in the name of various absent gods; as a plethora of social inequities and ecological crises threaten our very existence. Things could be so different if we embraced ecology, truth, justice, and equity as life’s meaning.

The world is ending as the biosphere collapses, preceded by the human family’s descent into a neo-dark age.

In this short essay I intend to identify the threats posed by religious extremism, corporate ecocide, stifling government, and nationalistic power-mongering. Existing solutions will be highlighted to humanity’s global problems, integrating many themes developed in more depth in my earlier writings.

Rather than fully embrace the last century of hard fought social, technological, and ecological knowledge, we continue to allow big government to wage religious perma-war for a small rich oligarchy at the expense of the poor and Earth. For a mortgaged house, a shiny car, and a cell phone the vast majority of the middle class turn a blind eye to the suffering their way of life causes to their human family and environmental habitat. Modern industrial livelihoods kill nature for illusory comforts for some for awhile.

As climate and ecosystems collapse, neo-fascist imperialism and local insurgencies arise to control dwindling resources. As I watch Muslim terrorists slaughter innocents, and Christian terrorists bomb innocents, over and over again; I am reminded of the danger of religious fanaticism and why I am an atheist and free-thinker. There is no god and religious fanaticism is god pollution that is destroying the Earth.

Ecology is the meaning of life. Renewable energy, a carbon tax, and energy conservation – along with an end to destruction of natural ecosystems and old-growth forest restoration – will solve climate change and avoid biosphere collapse. More natural ecosystems have already been lost than the biosphere can bear, and there is much work to be done regenerating ecosystems, creating sustainable permaculture agro-forests, and most people growing and locally exchanging their own organic food. Humanity must remain within the nurturing embrace of functional ecosystems.

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