Down to the wire : confronting climate collapse / David - Index of

late-night thoughts about democracy S 79
are often ignorant of the victims of our actions, and so there are
moral limits on what we should do as well. To think about consequences
over time requires, further, that we know how things are
linked as systems and understand that small actions can have large
consequences, many of which are unpredictable.
Around the fi rst Earth Day in 1970, there was an effl orescence
of brilliant thinking along these lines. In different ways, it was
mostly about the things we could not do. Rachel Carson’s Silent
Spring (1962), for example, launched the modern environmental
movement with the simple message that we could not carelessly
spread toxic chemicals without causing damage to animals and
eventually to ourselves. The book was attacked by proponents of
what she called “Neanderthal biology,” most of whom—then and
now—with a great deal of money and/or reputation invested in
the petrochemical business.
Other books making the same point addressed unlimited
growth of population, economies, technology, and scale. However
prescient and true, most of the wisdom was quickly forgotten.
Now, however, we live in “the age of consequences” and have
good reason to rethink many ideas, and the systems of ideas called
paradigms. Perhaps this is what educators describe as a “teachable
moment” and inventors refer to as the “aha” moment. Assuming
that it may be so, I have some suggestions for those assigned to
rebuild the U.S. and global economies.
The fi rst is the old idea that we cannot build a durable
economy that is so utterly dependent on trivial consumption.
In 2007, for instance, Americans spent $93 billion on
tobacco and another $83 billion on casino gambling, but only
$46 billion on books. Another example is from the recent
SkyMall catalog found in the seat pocket of commercial airplanes,
which announces that it is “going beyond the ordinary.”
To do so, it offers those burdened with money and credit
such items as a “startlingly unique” two-foot-high representation
of Big Foot, to be placed in the garden where it will
no doubt amaze and delight, available for only $98.95. “The
keep your distance bug vacuum,” equipped with a 22,400rpm
motor, is available for $49.95. And for just $299.99 cat
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