Other papers in this series

The following discussion on ecologically and humanly unsatisfactory features of our society today makes use of the 'Transition framework' described in this paper and depicted there in Figure 2.  

First, it is clear that human activities are interfering in a big way with the health needs of ecosystems (Box 10) Currently the most critical sign of the insensitive over-exploitation of the planet’s resources by humankind is global climate change – due to the release of greenhouse gases resulting from technological processes and deforestation. Immediate and radical action worldwide is imperative if human catastrophe is to be avoided.

However, it is important to recognise that climate change due to human activities is simply one symptom of deeper and more general social trends – especially the massive increase in resource and energy use associated with rampant consumerism and, to a lesser extent, population growth.

Other areas for serious concern include:

• massive loss of biodiversity on land and in the oceans
• thinning of the ozone layer
• global pollution of ecosystems with persistent organic pollutants and other harmful substances
• various severe forms of land degradation – involving disruption of nutrient cycles, loss of topsoil, salinisation, progressive large scale deforestation, biological impoverishment of soil
• acidification of the oceans.

The survival of civilisation will require big changes in the scale and nature of human activities.

Also posing a serious threat is the existence of weapons of mass destruction which could so easily bring about an end to civilisation.

There is also a need for big improvements in the zone of Human health needs (Box 9). The present cultural system allows gross disparities in the conditions of life and the well-being of different human groups both within and between nations. This has been commonplace since the first cities came into existence, but it was not a feature of hunter-gatherer bands or early farming societies. Today hundreds of millions of people live in abject poverty across the globe.
 
Bioinsensitive biophysical factors

This section summarises the biophysical characteristics of contemporary society that threaten the wellbeing and survival of humanity (Boxes 3-6).

Human population (Box 3)

• The number of humans on the planet (now approaching 7000 million and still increasing by well over one million a week) is greatly in excess of the optimum ecologically sustainable level. [2]

Human activities - Collective (Box 4)

Massive intensification of resource and energy use. The human species is now using about 12 000 times as much energy and emitting about 12 000 times as much CO2 as was the case when our ancestors started farming some 10 000 years ago. Ninety per cent of this increase has occurred in the past 80 years.

• The release into the environment of CFCs and certain other chemical compounds which cause destruction of the ozone layer in the stratosphere, leading to an increase in ultraviolet radiation
• Farming practices which destroy the biological integrity of the soil and lead to other forms of land degradation (loss of organic matter, soil salinisation, soil erosion)
• Failure to return nutrients to the soil in farmland, resulting in disruption of natural nutrient cycles – to some extent alleviated by the use, at considerable environmental cost, of artificial fertilisers
• Widespread chemical pollution of the natural environment (e.g. the release into the environment of vast quantities of persistent organic pollutants, or POPs, that are having toxic effects on animals across the globe, including humans)
• Massive deforestation reducing biodiversity and contributing to global climate change
• Many activities, including deforestation and over-fishing, that are resulting in massive and accelerating loss of biodiversity
• The manufacture and stockpiling of nuclear weapons. There are around 25 000 nuclear warheads in existence today.
• The ongoing conflicts across the globe involving bloodshed and resulting in immeasurable human distress.

Human activities – individuals (Lifestyles) (Box 5)

Factors adversely affecting health and quality of life

• Much preventable ill health associated with bio-insensitive behaviours (e.g. tobacco smoking, over-consumption of food, consumption of unhealthy foods, lack of physical activity)
• Overconsumption of food calories and too little physical exercise for a significant proportion of the population (in affluent countries)
• A significant proportion of the population deprived psychosocially, lacking effective social support networks or not experiencing conviviality, personal creative activity, a sense of purpose or a sense of belonging.

Factors adversely affecting the health of ecosystems

• Excessive and ever-increasing consumption of manufactured goods
• Massive personal use of polluting energy sources at home and for travelling.

Artefacts (Box 6)

• Few buildings are designed to minimise energy use and to make maximum use of clean energy sources.
• Most urban planning and most building construction still disregard ecological imperatives.

Bioinsensitive cultural factors (Boxes 1 and 2):

• Societal arrangements (Box 2)

The dominant culture (Box 1)

Cultural evolution has served to separate us, mentally, from the rest of the biosphere. Instead of feeling part of nature, humans tend to see themselves separate from, and even as in some way superior to, the rest of the living world. This mindset effectively blocks societal reform aimed at achieving ecological sustainability.

Consequently our dominant culture has lost sight of the reality that we are biological beings – products of nature – and totally dependent on the processes of life, within us and around us, for our very existence.

The dominant culture of our society embraces some powerful assumptions that are completely incompatible with the achievement of biosensitivity and therefore the survival of civilisation. Especially important is the ideology of ever-moreism – the ecologically and biologically absurd notion that human well-being necessarily requires continual economic growth involving ever-increasing consumption of material resources and energy.

It is this cultural delusion, combined with the population explosion, that is leading to human activities of a kind and on a scale that now threaten the integrity of the living systems on which we depend.

Linked with ever-moreism is the implicit faith in the market as the panacea for all societal problems.

Perhaps one day people will look back on ever-moreism as having been as ill-conceived and wrong as we now view slavery and military imperialism which were widely accepted as normal and entirely appropriate only a few generations ago.

Notes

Papers in this series
1. Prologue
2. Biological background
3. A vision for the future: biosensitivity
4. What’s wrong today - a thumbnail sketch (this page)
5. The transition to a biosensitive society
6. Some crucial perspectives
7. A transition framework

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2. The actual number of humans that the biosphere can support in the long term will depend on their patterns of resource and energy use. Many ecologists consider that the planet could support around 1000 million people indefinitely if their technologies were biosensitive (e.g. using clean, non-polluting sources of energy and protecting biodiversity and the biological integrity of soils)
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For a description of the famework and a depiction of it, go to paper 7 in this series.