I am thrilled to the point of tears, that the big brain and the sincere heart of Nate Hagens is being more broadly recognized. From my limited point of view, his thoughts and efforts represent the veritable antithesis of our contemporary geo-political and bio-physical "metabolism". Sense-making, truth-telling and balance seem to be his focus, contrary to the geo-political dynamic that is undermining human civilization now.
Fantastic presentation Nate. Your work has helped inspire my young family to sell our suburban home, build a tiny home, learn about solar ovens, embrace HomeBioGas, begin permaculture gardens, become 100% debt free, collect rainwater, move from high-regulation metro area to a low-regulation rural area, and begin our own great simplification before our hand is forced. I've been wanting this lifestyle for a decade, and your work validates my gut feeling to live more simply. KEEP GOING NATE!
Thank you Nate. As a public speaker working as a geospatial analyst I have made a pivot to sharing these ideas on the stages where I am invited. I bring the ideas of Mario Giampietro, Geoffrey West, Art Berman and of course Daniel Schmachtenberger along as well--thanks to your big conversations.
Nate this was really fantastic. I am going to send it around to colleagues. My sense is they(Oceanographers, Atmospheric Scientists, Polar Scientists, Physicists, Engineers) know the problems well but are just like everyone else and live a business as usual life. Modernity is a subtle trap, and so is the hyper-competitive grant process. I often feel we are simply recording the decline rather than making real change or breaking free. Non-scientists may have suspicions of our work and see it as a WEF conspiracy to eat zee bugs. I do not know how to avail them of these beliefs but you have made significant inroads. You have my gratitude and thanks!
I guess that there we're talking about two separate things here. The first is you and your colleagues sterling scientific work outlining the problem, and the second is the response to that problem. There has been a significant push to co-opt the solution to climate change (and, to a lesser extent, ecological collapse), and point it towards the best interests of already rich and powerful people (bugs, own nothing and be happy etc). The proposed "solutions" leave people - already disenfranchised - feeling that they have no agency; that a top-down solution is being imposed on them. They fail to realise that they are already in a system that is a top-down, domestication for most humans, recognising their material objects such as large cars and big houses as a source of freedom, rather than questioning why they need such things in the first place. This causes a circular backlash, where they shoot the original scientific messenger, rather than contemplate reality. I believe that the way to avail people of those beliefs is to offer them agency. Ask for their help, and ask for their sacrifice. That doesn't, and will never, come in the form of asking them to purchase an electric car, rent a self-driving car, buy a processed vegan meal or whatever. I haven't seen or heard a politician within our system (I'm in the UK, but the same could be said for the US or anywhere in Europe) present the positive case for less consumption for example. The mechanisms for them to do so don't exist in that political system.
The point you make about hyper-competition is an issue for any pursuit starting as a child. I think this extreme is causing too many issues for the mental and physical well being of our children and therefore society as a whole.
I'm amazed by the depth of your presentation and how you simplyfied topics such as energy and our economics. The link and interactions of all these different fields is something I never really figured out, but your video gave me a this very much needed explanation. As a student myself, who was already aware some ways of this direction our civilisation is heading, this video really helped me find meaning in my studies. Even though many people may not be ready for the reality presented in this video, I still think it very important that as many schools and universities possible are shown this video, including my own. I really appreaciated your human and realistic point of view.
Great audiobook. Can’t wait for the print edition! You’ve packed a lot of information & ideas into one presentation, but it never gets old. At its core is your conception of energy, which I find most compelling. In fact, it’s brilliant & original. The interdisciplinary systems approach is greatly needed in a world of specialists who remind me of the parable of the blind men trying to identify the elephant based on their respective experience with different parts of the animal's body. Your concept of simplification is much preferable to “degrowth,” but essentially you are advocating degrowth - at least as I understand your message. Your approach avoids ideological jargon that can be so off-putting & that is refreshing. Hopefully it means a larger audience will be receptive rather than defensive & dismissive. All in all, it’s a cohesive & compelling argument for fundamental change.
"Advocating for degrowth" doesn't quite describe The Great Simplification, Mr. Stump. Rather, Dr. Hagens observes that degrowth is already happening, and will accelerate as fossil depletion proceeds. What I think Nate advocates is getting out in front of the curve. It is much less agonizing to EXERCISE AGENCY in How you degrow than to have degrowth FORCED UPON YOU by the laws of physics and the biosphere. He summarizes this philosophy in his oft repeated meme, "Simplify now and avoid the rush."
This is what I was waiting for. Thanks Nate. It's obvious you have spent an extraordinary amount of time and energy trying to move us forward > toward changing our trajectory. This trajectory begins with our human understanding of the complexity of the issues. You laid it out. Gracias.
Thank you, Nate, for bringing me to tears, and for weaving together this bird’s eye view of our current predicament. Thank you for the solutions and suggestions as well.
Great video, it's perfect for sharing as it sums the metacrisis up for people asking for a comprehensive explanation with facts accompanied by numbers and graphs, something impossible to provide at a short chat with colleagues, family members or friends when trying to give them a full picture of how many things are completely wrong and to what extent we have already destroyed our only home... Thanks a lot again for you awesome work Nate!! :)
Excellent! Nothing will happen as the rich and powerful who could do something won't as they feel they will be the last to suffer and they are probably right.
I understand your point, but at 45 :12 Nate makes the point that the rich and powerful are not at fault here, it is the market driving us all. Manufacturers produced stuff and I purchased stuff. I cannot put all the blame on their shoulders. We are all going to have to change and work together for a better future.
It's more like of one guy steps down from a very profit making but polluting enterprise, his place will be taken over almost immediately by another dude picking up that particular bad business. It's much like a mafia racket, if one gets shot or locked up, his big competitor takes over. You then think "let policy make laws to protect us". But policy is merely a replacement of the old ways, when the big rich families appointed the members of the govt councils to make decisions in their interests. Middle class and poor folks never had much influence, except maybe some time mid- late 20thC. After the 1980s is rich folks ruling all over again, and they will not step down voluntarily, or get replaced by even more greedy types like them tech billionaires
Thanks. The key is to foster altruism by raising awareness about the concept of fundamental emotional needs. Once everyone understands that practically everyone will be a benefit to society if all their needs have been met since conception AND that absolutely everyone will become a burden or a danger to all if their needs aren't met at any point in their life.
The first time I ever heard the term "tree hugger" was 27 years ago. A co-worker called me that for hanging a beautiful poster of sea creatures on the wall of my office cubicle. How anyone could possibly react negatively to such an awesome poster completely mystified me. I never wanted to raise children so never had any, but this guy had two young daughters he loved very much. Sometimes when I see videos like Nate's, I think of him and his daughters and wonder: does he still think people who care about our oceans are just a bunch of stupid tree huggers?
Thanks, good talk. It was a little heavy on the patos, but maybe that's just a cultural thing. Jason Hickel has similar ideas, but he's less pessimistic. Btw,, a bit of gardening advice: If you allready have ducks, employ them, they are good workers. Let them graze the weeds in your potato patch. They won't touch the poisonus potato leaves, but they love the juicy annuals and the worst weed of all, grass.. This is a well proven method. they also work great as weeders in rice fields.
A Swiss federal report on plastics in the environment, published on September 23, 2022, found that tire and road wear is one of the leading causes of microplastic pollution in the country. The resulting particles are made up of 60% rubber, 30% soot and 10% heavy metals. Over 13,500 metric tons of these particles are generated in Switzerland every year, and some 8,900 metric tons of that amount are released into our air, soil and water. (How many electric cars, which are heavier than conventional, are going to still generate more pollution than we are already. Its not exhaust but its still pollution)
I have a thirteen year old electric car (Nissan Leaf). I reckon I can probably get another 2-3 years out of it on the existing battery for my use case (not applicable to others of course). After that point, I have looked into changing the battery, but have come to the conclusion that it isn't worth it. The chassis is beginning to show signs of rust, and there is a lot of work needed to the car in general (both in other maintenance, plus upgrading to things like AC system, in-car electronics etc) that could make it cost prohibitive. I am quite hands on, and would be happy to take on the task of switching out the battery myself, but the battery is still expensive and difficult to come by (at the moment, it appears that second hand batteries from write-offs are the best source, but that comes with risk attached). Whilst I was a very early adopter of an EV, there is still no real market for battery switching. Moreover, the entire industry is reliant on there not being a market for switching. It is a market designed around people changing their cars with regularity, and cars lasting around 10-15 years before being scrapped. It wouldn't surprise me if newer cars with "auto-pilot" features have planned obscelescence built into their software. Of course, that could completely change, with legislation to force manufacturers to make cars that last (say) 50 years, but even then that is a small period of time in the scheme of things (and extremely unlikely to happen!). In short, EVs fall into the nebulous category of "more sustainable", which is just a bollocks term to allow business as usual to continue without addressing the fundamental issues of a particular problem.
And they are tiny, a french study found that I can't find now, had hundreds of thousands of microplastics, per gram of food. Some people/countries eat 15 grams a month, so 10 kilograms over 60 years. All the bread wrappers, food containers etc, single use, all have bits of plastic falling off. I used to leave coffee in the bag until i shone a torch through the bag one day and could see all the internal silver was coming off each time i unwrapped the bag, we really are leaving a layer of oil all over the place, even in us.
I read last week that each 1 km of travel in a motor vehicle produces 1 trillion microplastic particles, and that in some areas of the world's oceans, the majority of microplastics actually seem to originate from the tire wear you mention, which washes into the sea via watersheds.
@@antonyjh1234 An Italian study from 2020 entitled "Micro- and nano-plastics in edible fruit and vegetables. The first diet risks assessment for the general population" found microplastics in fruits and vegetables (especially apples and carrots, whose roots are more porous) ranging between between 52,050 and 233,000 particles per gram (!) of fruits or vegetable.
@@dbadagna Thanks, that was the one, I got the country wrong. I think they found carrots to have the largest pieces which would make sense. These particles are falling on the land 24-7 and each rain washes them further down, if they can enter our blood stream they can go up the roots of a tree. With crops being half of the chemical damage done to our bodies through sprays, how much more is done ingesting plastic. Wild.
Wauw, such deep respect for this men. Our trajectory is daunting and I deeply belief that the goodness that you can see in the eyes of Nate is really what we need in the world right now.
Wow! One of the greatest presentations on the complexity of our modern day world including the steps we can start to take right now. Really grateful for your work, thank you!
I keep introducing you to people - this is another great (sad, scary, overwhelming, hopeful...) understandable overview of where we are, why, and where we need to go....merci.
Fantastic job, Nate. We need to talk, though, about how common it is in nature for growth systems to overshoot and-sometimes-respond in the right way. That's by repurposing their resources previously for compounding to instead devote to care and coordination instead. That's easily verified as nature's main successful way of ending growth and maturing rather than destroying what grew.
This is essentially The Great Simplification’s Bingo Card. You really do cover so much of your work in this one presentation. I am making efforts to try and break these concepts up for folks in my area who have no background in environmental studies, and this presentation will be a massive help. I think a lot of “regular” people know something is wrong but can’t conceptualize it while they are also trying to survive in the modern world. Thank you so much for what you do, Nate. Your work inspires me to keep going in an increasingly depressing world.
This was wonderful. Truly wonderful. It’s worth clarifying some limitations of the theory of cognition you proposed. Although I’m not suggesting you are wrong per se, cognition doesn’t occur exclusively ‘in the head’. This is where 4/6E cognition is so powerful (cognition is variously embodied, embedded, enacted, extended, emotional and exapted). Worthwhile having someone like John Vervaeke on the podcast. Thanks for all your work, Nate.
I think a lot of people say they want to support the green transition but when they have to give up their travel to italy they are willing to wait to next year for saving the planet.
@@derekmiller8564 Nate's visit was a medical emergency. Without the limbic reset, we might have lost him, at least from his vital public role, if not from life itself. While we still have fossil sunlight in circulation, let's use it wisely, and distinguish between travel for health, family emergencies, and potentially productive meetings from travel for pleasure and status.
@@derekmiller8564 Excerpt from Laura K Kerr, PhD "At Times Hypocrisy is the Best We Can Do" follows: In "My Green Manifesto", nature writer David Gessner shared of paddling down the Charles River with environmentalist Dan Driscoll as Driscoll spoke of the need for hypocrites in the green movement: “We nature lovers are hypocrites of course,” Dan says. “We are all hypocrites. None of us are consistent. The problem is that we let that fact stop us. We worry that if we fight for nature, people will say ‘But you drive a car’ or ‘You fly a lot’ or ‘You’re a consumer, too.’ And that stops us in our tracks. It’s almost as if admitting that we are hypocrites gets people off the hook. We need hypocrites who aren’t afraid of admitting it but will still fight for the environment. We don’t need some sort of pure movement run by pure people. We need hypocrites!” Gessner promotes a sloppy environmentalism - “An army of flawed and sloppy hypocrites” - one that lacks the drama of saints and villains and instead fits the contradictory nature of humankind. Hypocrite has several meanings, including a person whose behavior opposes their stated beliefs (Driscoll Gessner’s notion), or someone who carries a false appearance of being virtuous. Yet it is the original meaning given by the Greeks - a deficiency in a person’s ability to decide - that is the kind of hypocrite I believe would benefit from sloppy environmentalism. This latter concept of hypocrite describes many of us as we try to care for nature while fulfilling other responsibilities, desires, and needs. We need a sloppy environmentalism, because frankly, given the demands taxing our green choices, sloppy may be the best many of us can do.
@@derekmiller8564well, it depends on the other activities that Nate does. In general everyone should have some kind of feedback on their emissions, which could be through some sort of emission/carbon fee. It would be useful to see how different lifestyle choices compare in the long run.
@@poockoo Would this not give humans a 'carbon budget' and therefore not really solve the issue of additional energy usage required to sustain our economic growth globally? This in regard to what currently classify as developing countries aspiring the same extravagant wealth levels as developed countries have now. I am hinting at a quick fix vs a system change.
Hi Nate, I’ve been following you and Schmachtenberger and a few others in this space for a couple of years now. This is an excellent synthesis of so much work and sense making that I recognize from many previous podcasts. Thank you! Can you maybe provide references and citations in the notes to this video? This is such a difficult discussion to effectively disseminate. I will personally go to bat with this video in hand, but people will push back. So I would love to map this out with underlying data folded into it.
I don't believe academics are ignorant of the ramifications of 1st world living and are "energy blind." Be an interesting experiment to set up a website where anonymity was assured and construct a survey to find out what the scope and depth of the general academic understanding of the metacrisis is and what fears and apprehensions academics have with respect to "coming out" and moving some of these ideas forward. I suspect a conflict of interest with endowments and those consequences would be high up on that list.
A tank of diesel has as much energy as a total australian summers electrical use with the air con going 24-7, actually a little more at 3.5 months. We are all energy blind if we use this energy to go skiing for instance, people I know still think planning a driving holiday is a great idea. How many people believe that in 26 years they will have reduced their consumption 90 percent, very few people I know do and academics have the greatest responsibility to teach the truth and seem by their actions, to be doing the least. If endowments and coming out about the truth is where they at then what is the point of academia? If they are not ignorant, then does that make them more complicit to maintain the current system, and should not be called academics but businessmen?
@@antonyjh1234 Maybe a big issue here is that because especially professors teaching the 'good' Nate speaks of in the video think they do exponentially good through leverage, they deserve the wealth they acquire by partaking in the paper mill that is academia.
@@RubenKemp The only leverage they have done is lever more people into debt and the professors have not made an ounce of change except promote a corrupted system. To think people deserve wealth for this, we will have to agree to disagree.
Thank you, Nate! It's awesome to hear your lastest presentation of the big picture in one go! I love the clearer articulation of ideas on where to go forward. Please don't forget that self-care is community service!
I smile and imagine an old hickory standing over-watch on a field of young veggies, it's trunk grinning at the magic and wonderment of all the life growing at its feet when I hear Nate. He provides his assessment of current existence and challenges us to be realistic and encourages us to act for our collective behalf. I fear, however, that my experience of the great simplification will be of little impact and far too late. But, I'll try anyway. Thanks Nate.
What a blessing this talk again (while all topics are known for me after listening all the stuff of Nate..) What a delight Kira was there.. Next stop: Kira in the podcast of Nate...
Thanks for this roundup of your teachings. I am still fumbling between this viable series of options and the view of Tom Murphy, who stresses more the 'ecological context' angle. I see no way out for us using his logic, try as I might, but there is more hope for appropriate technology in yours. Maybe you could do a talk together looking at the long term ecological context and whether evolution will allow us to survive.
Hello! Great work, at about 1 hour 10 min in I would really love to see you improve your discourse around India and China as the need for power has much more to do with global power than fans and ACs. Thank you!
Remember realizing this full story of the importance of energy and oil for the whole of economy and modern lifestyle to it's full extent during peak oil heyday around 2006. Oil was of extreme importance as the trigger factor pushing subprime mortgage holders over the edge when it went up to a 150$ a barrel. You're not going to pay your down payments of the choice is to heat your house or drive to the supermarket on your last dollar
Thanks Nate. Really enjoyed the conversation. I never bought into Jevons paradox. If humans were actually intelligent and had a true conscience, they would understand the reason why they shouldn't travel any farther than they can walk.
Disagree! Sailing with non-fossil fuel inputs is fine, as is going on horseback or etc. Going to far places is great for mixing DNA, which creates hybrid vigor, and learning new ideas. And trade.
🙏SHARE 🤝Best Revelation of how our competitive consumption mindset Must Change for a Sustainable Future for our children 👪 Do not fight mother Nature...she will Win🌻 All Must live in harmony with each other & develop a new Sustainable Energy Lifestyle with our Earth 🌅🐢
Four Scales for Intervention - “One thing that I don’t know how viable it is to do right now… to add a tax to anything that is not renewable in nature.” (Carbon, but also copper, lithium, aquifers, or anything like that - give signals to consumers but also to inventors and innovators about the real cost of depleting anything that isn’t renewable.) Given the very high correlation between energy consumption and the rest of the economy, to envision the number of “energy slaves” that support our lifestyle can be thought of as a first approximation about the scale, the order of magnitude of this endeavour. Worldwide average was at approximately 200 “energy slaves” per capita; developed countries were near the 400 “energy slaves”, and I’ve heard figures of around 600 “energy slaves” per capita to support the good old ‘American way of life’ - the thing president Biden said was not to be put in the balance. Given that renewables shift the burden from ‘carbon’ to ‘minerals’ and given that this ‘tax scheme’ would cover “anything that is not renewable in nature”, I see no “emergency exit” bar a technological miracle or a hefty decrease in population to achieve the required reduction. In fact, what we are talking about (indirectly), is a Kaya identity applied not only to carbon, but to “anything that is not renewable in nature.” Such a generalized Kaya identity would expresses “anything that is not renewable in nature” usage rate (ANR) as the product of population (Pop), per capita gross domestic product, GDP/Pop, primary energy intensity, NRG/GDP, and the non renewable factor (ANR/NRG): ANR = Pop × (GDP/Pop) × (NRG/GDP) × (ANR/NRG), which - upon rearranging the denominators - boils down to the obvious ANR = 1 × 1 × 1 × ANR. The differential of which is ΔANR = ΔPop + Δ(GDP/Pop) + Δ(NRG/GDP) + Δ(ANR/NRG). So you have four levers to lower ANR: a) lower the population, b) lower GDP per capita (lifestyle), c) have a total decoupling in the energy usage to produce GDP (free the 400 or 600 or whatever “energy slaves”) - but recycling will not take you anywhere near, d) have a technological miracle that will drastically reduce the amount “anything not renewable” per energy unit (*reduce*, not *displace* from one ‘not renewable’ impact to another => no unaccounted for “externalities”. “c)” will take you somewhere ‘round 20% given that ‘things’ are redesigned, have penetrated the market after the end of useful life of the current stuff, and that consumers’ habits have changed (now how many decades will that take). “d)” has historically progressed at the rate of ~1 %/Yr (~2 %/Yr for short periods of time - and was that really “free of externalities” or just pretending?). So bar a true miracle, and going full steam world wide starting tomorrow, it will take 50 to 100 years. The question then becomes, “given that we’re already flirting with tipping points” - example: given that the West Antarctic ice sheet has been shown to have reached its ‘point of no return’ 6 to 10 months ago (publication), so really 18-24 months ago (scientific finding, analysis done), so really some 30-36 months ago (data gathering) - “what are the chances the train hasn’t already left the station while we were having a party at the hotel?” To dampen / reduce? Maybe, if we’re swift enough worldwide. To avoid?… 😆😂🤣🤪
James Hansen calls this the Faustian Bargain. When all human fossil combustion ends, the earth will continue to warm as it rectifies the energy imbalance in the atmosphere (Hansen's latest Warming In the Pipeline paper) and as heat transfers back to the atmosphere from the ocean. We need to reforest, restore prairies and wetlands, and restore ocean life from sea grass and kelp forests to coral reefs to sequester carbon as much as possible as heat flows to restore balance.
The question is do we want to face the aerosol masking effect now when we have resources and a culture, or latter when everything has gone to hell. Now at the present level of ecological "health" or latter when they are further decimated. Converting to rocket stoves for heating and cooking might help slow the effects.
Really many good ideas. But renewables are less bad as you think and redraw CO2 from the air and sequester it in the soil etc is really laborious. So we need the energy transition really urgently. We need to reduce overproduction really fast and improve the fair distribution. We need restrictions and better taxes. ❤ Thank you very much! ❤
Thank you for the apology for the horror you analyzed. And thank you for the beauty of condensing all these strands into a whole view. Your broad and deep intelligence could understand my book, Pluvicopia, which offers a powerful solution to many of the issues you demonstrate. Please read it and tell me if I am crazy. The book includes contact information.
Really wonderful presentation Nate! Wow. I mean that. Sincerely. Our species is going to lose all of its habitat because of temperature increase in the next couple of years no matter what we do. Unless you fudge the baseline yet again, we haven't seen +1.5°C in well over a year, and we never will again. The temperature increase is accelerating as we speak. Good Luck, Be Well.
While i realy agree with most of the presentation, after learning so much of it over time, My question was, what people who disagree feel and respon to this.
Had to replay a section at around 9:20 when you said 100 million, barrel of oil equivalents of energy and thought that's not right but when i looked at the slide i saw it was in fact 100 billion so, i'll give you that as an honest slip in the narrative.
sorry - I spent all my energy creating the slidedeck - i was running on fumes! Yes - thanks for pointing out the mistake - we use 100 million barrels of oil per day, but 100 BILLION barrel of oil equivalents of oil/coal/NG per year. Thanks
18:43 Acorns and chickens are not "renewable energy" they are derivatives of sunlight which is also not renewable, but, seemingly, without limit; because of our short lifetimes. This is an important distinction to make.
Additionally, the natural processes are able to replicate with a positive system growth until at least one of their constraints are met. No one would plant wheat for only a single grain per stem.
1:11:27 If you add a tax, you will cost people out of living in the quality of life they have become accustomed to, and they will World War Z you. One of the reasons religions persist is despite all the wisdom of Hitchens, et al, everything was about taking away, simultaneously, the current belief system, and the freedom to choose, while replacing it with nothing but perceived cost. Your opposition, those in power, have already taxed the populace to death using stealth with inflation and importing illegal labor. You can't imagine Rex Tillerson and his peers are ignorant of declining EROEI. They're reducing consumption by demolishing the birth rate by promoting unsustainable dating strategies and sowing doubt and fear among men about women and among women about men, neutering children for "equality," saddling teens with student and credit card debt to reduce their purchasing power; among many other demand destruction marketing campaigns alla the Bernays Method. Albert Bartlett gave you the right side of the list in his arithmetic presentation. Have you seen that the average age of a Ukrainian fighter is over 45? How's that for a tax?
For centuries, Canada has been pushing for the clearing of the north west passage. Can we postpone our efforts for a sustainable future until we have melted the ice? How can Canada and Russia make the most from our relative advantage?
Huh? and Meh! There is no legitimacy whatever to the Brrritisch North American colonialists aspirations for a full-scale assault on the polar regions Yikes! Whoooosh! The sound of the core points flying overhead..
Oh the Cuckoo, She's a pretty bird. She warbles as she flies. She brings us good tidings. And she never tells a lie. How often, do I wonder Why women, love men And I look back, and I wonder Why men, are men.
Regarding 4 horsemen: have you given any thought to a solution set of responses that might satisfy both a Green Growth Economy and the Great Simplification scenario concurrently? I can imagine a future humanity that contains a small fraction of GGE (maybe in the form of a few massive “utopianesque” epicenters) en route to a predominantly GS paradigm.
Nate since I first got glowed to your podcast in the beginning of this year was approximately about 20 thousand podcasts I can not express why your easy understanding of what our true implications that shall challenge our ways of not only of stress but more so so to be truly prepared for what our future challenges behold Thank you so endearingly for your wise learnings from your incredibly wise guests 🕊🌏😇❤️
Hey Nate, would love to see Simon Michaux back on. There is a German company CMBlu that builds metal free batteries (Redox Flow) and I wonder whether his conjecture still holds in light of this technology that is already on the market!?
Excellent, but the perplexing omission is albedo. It is likely that the physical darkening of the world (by 2% so far this century) will cause system collapse through accelerating feedbacks.
Each of these sections could have been its own 2 hour presentation - especially the climate/environment one. My hope is this is reasonably functional as a “hologram” to get more people aware, concerned and involved
The problem is Nate, you're not telling people what they want to hear - so they'll just continue to ignore you, I'm afraid. Drill, baby, drill. Dig, baby, dig etc. I've been following this stuff since the 70s - What difference has been made ?
Hi Nate, great presentation again. And hopefully with a profound multiplier effect regarding your audience. You mentioned that our multiplier effects may be more important than our individual behavior changes. From my point of view, however, I only get the perspective of true mental health when my personal lifestyle (at least its basic building blocks) could principally be copied and pasted to 10 billion humans on this planet (Kant’s categorical imperative applied) . Otherwise you continue to exist in cognitive dissonance. So my advice would imply much more simplification in a much shorter timespan than most people in the West might imagine as „doable“ right now (e.g. no flying, no car, no fossil applications generally, small flat, vegan diet, no pets etc.). Yes, I know……. In my view the observable right shift in Western politics has a lot to do with the fact that academics (and other leading figures in society) present the global predicament but as individuals do not act according to their own analyses.
A very ambitious presentation--perhaps somewhat too much to take in at one go, but congratulations for putting it all in one place. Education at the university level, and especially in the humanities, needs to change so has to create communities of young scholars who bounce ideas off each other and their mentors while providing the community support needed for long, hard thought on the issues we face. It's time to junk the lecture as the main form of education at that level and turn to discussion within a community context.
My municipality is about to create a new ten year comprehensive plan. I wish to influence the process to draw on the lessons of the Great Simplification and the healing of energy blindness. The mayor demands an elevator pitch, but the shortest presentations on youtube consonant with this message take 50 minutes. The chair of the environment committee is such a committed techno-optimist that he referred to a diagram I passed around to elected officials as neither informative nor thought provoking, and responded to Alice J. Friedemann's book, Life After Fossil Fuels: a Reality Check on Alternative Energy with the words, "I'm in favor of nuclear." End of story. Please help me with a 3 minute elevator pitch!
Nate, as always, I am deeply grateful for your work - I believe it is vital to our shared future. 🙏 Are your presentation slides publicly available? I often find myself longing to study them more closely and contemplate them more slowly.
Responses… I think responses won’t be effective until after the catastrophe. Providing people are around to respond. There are just too many people in the grip of the zombie world economy, and so little time.
@@Cpt_JaK No, it does not. The energy return on investment (EROI) of current agricultural calories is in the 0.01-0.3 range. Traditional agriculture based on human and draft animal labor has an EROI of about 3 for grains. The EROI of renewable electricity is up to 15.
As far as change, the top 25% of people are going to fall the most, may be hard for the top 40% but there could be a great settling as we age as a population. 25% of people don't have bank accounts, maybe the middle class if they own their home will be fine once they turn their lawns into gardens.
About relatedness. Humans are more related to mice than cats so numbers 85% and 90% cant be true probably inverse numbers are more reasonable. Cats are more related to cows (both in group Laurasiatheria) than to any species of Euarchontoglires (rodents and primates). And fruit fly is less related than chickens, so both at 60% cant be true . These numbers which i assume are from Bussiness Insider article are constructed using different metrics from diffferent studies on different cases (for a cat similarity of genes, for a fruit fly disease causing genes etc.)
thank you - you are correct - this slide was hastily put together from another of my college lectures and the %s got transposed. (core point remains though!). thanks for the catch
Ahhh... the declining rate of profits, the scourge of the socioeconomic system which has seen its days, and which should be rightly abolished, in order to bring ALL of Humanity out of poverty, and as well, ensure the global environment is kept in such a state which ensures the survival of ALL of the planet's life. We as a species OWE it to the remaining species to bring in a new and better mode of Human endeavor. We can start by eating the rich, then building more rail lines with that massive windfall...
Because otherwise I would cry. This is a fantastic presentation, thank you Nate. On the sperm counts dropping and insects crashing, it’s not just PFAS but many petrochemicals used to make stuff and grow food. It’s all related. We have to change the way we’re doing everything.
I am thrilled to the point of tears, that the big brain and the sincere heart of Nate Hagens is being more broadly recognized. From my limited point of view, his thoughts and efforts represent the veritable antithesis of our contemporary geo-political and bio-physical "metabolism". Sense-making, truth-telling and balance seem to be his focus, contrary to the geo-political dynamic that is undermining human civilization now.
The Rich ain't going to pay more they will end up gutting the middle class... It will be tax breaks for the wealthy and austerity for everyone else
Yes I recommend him to everyone I contact with any concern about future
Same.
likewise
My primary source of information ❤
Fantastic presentation Nate. Your work has helped inspire my young family to sell our suburban home, build a tiny home, learn about solar ovens, embrace HomeBioGas, begin permaculture gardens, become 100% debt free, collect rainwater, move from high-regulation metro area to a low-regulation rural area, and begin our own great simplification before our hand is forced. I've been wanting this lifestyle for a decade, and your work validates my gut feeling to live more simply. KEEP GOING NATE!
Great move -- do you have a public blog or side to your work as @LandLabs?
every middle school and high school student should watch this at least once a year.
u first!!
Thank you Nate. As a public speaker working as a geospatial analyst I have made a pivot to sharing these ideas on the stages where I am invited. I bring the ideas of Mario Giampietro, Geoffrey West, Art Berman and of course Daniel Schmachtenberger along as well--thanks to your big conversations.
Nate this was really fantastic. I am going to send it around to colleagues. My sense is they(Oceanographers, Atmospheric Scientists, Polar Scientists, Physicists, Engineers) know the problems well but are just like everyone else and live a business as usual life. Modernity is a subtle trap, and so is the hyper-competitive grant process. I often feel we are simply recording the decline rather than making real change or breaking free. Non-scientists may have suspicions of our work and see it as a WEF conspiracy to eat zee bugs. I do not know how to avail them of these beliefs but you have made significant inroads. You have my gratitude and thanks!
I guess that there we're talking about two separate things here. The first is you and your colleagues sterling scientific work outlining the problem, and the second is the response to that problem. There has been a significant push to co-opt the solution to climate change (and, to a lesser extent, ecological collapse), and point it towards the best interests of already rich and powerful people (bugs, own nothing and be happy etc). The proposed "solutions" leave people - already disenfranchised - feeling that they have no agency; that a top-down solution is being imposed on them. They fail to realise that they are already in a system that is a top-down, domestication for most humans, recognising their material objects such as large cars and big houses as a source of freedom, rather than questioning why they need such things in the first place. This causes a circular backlash, where they shoot the original scientific messenger, rather than contemplate reality.
I believe that the way to avail people of those beliefs is to offer them agency. Ask for their help, and ask for their sacrifice. That doesn't, and will never, come in the form of asking them to purchase an electric car, rent a self-driving car, buy a processed vegan meal or whatever. I haven't seen or heard a politician within our system (I'm in the UK, but the same could be said for the US or anywhere in Europe) present the positive case for less consumption for example. The mechanisms for them to do so don't exist in that political system.
The point you make about hyper-competition is an issue for any pursuit starting as a child. I think this extreme is causing too many issues for the mental and physical well being of our children and therefore society as a whole.
I'm amazed by the depth of your presentation and how you simplyfied topics such as energy and our economics. The link and interactions of all these different fields is something I never really figured out, but your video gave me a this very much needed explanation.
As a student myself, who was already aware some ways of this direction our civilisation is heading, this video really helped me find meaning in my studies. Even though many people may not be ready for the reality presented in this video, I still think it very important that as many schools and universities possible are shown this video, including my own.
I really appreaciated your human and realistic point of view.
Great audiobook. Can’t wait for the print edition! You’ve packed a lot of information & ideas into one presentation, but it never gets old. At its core is your conception of energy, which I find most compelling. In fact, it’s brilliant & original. The interdisciplinary systems approach is greatly needed in a world of specialists who remind me of the parable of the blind men trying to identify the elephant based on their respective experience with different parts of the animal's body. Your concept of simplification is much preferable to “degrowth,” but essentially you are advocating degrowth - at least as I understand your message. Your approach avoids ideological jargon that can be so off-putting & that is refreshing. Hopefully it means a larger audience will be receptive rather than defensive & dismissive. All in all, it’s a cohesive & compelling argument for fundamental change.
"Advocating for degrowth" doesn't quite describe The Great Simplification, Mr. Stump. Rather, Dr. Hagens observes that degrowth is already happening, and will accelerate as fossil depletion proceeds. What I think Nate advocates is getting out in front of the curve. It is much less agonizing to EXERCISE AGENCY in How you degrow than to have degrowth FORCED UPON YOU by the laws of physics and the biosphere. He summarizes this philosophy in his oft repeated meme, "Simplify now and avoid the rush."
Nate has a book called Reality Blind
An Invitation to Academia. ❤
This is what I was waiting for. Thanks Nate. It's obvious you have spent an extraordinary amount of time and energy trying to move us forward > toward changing our trajectory. This trajectory begins with our human understanding of the complexity of the issues. You laid it out. Gracias.
Thank you, Nate, for bringing me to tears, and for weaving together this bird’s eye view of our current predicament. Thank you for the solutions and suggestions as well.
I've listened to parts of this multiple times, I can already tell this is going to be a go-to reference going forward. Thanks, Nate!
Great video, it's perfect for sharing as it sums the metacrisis up for people asking for a comprehensive explanation with facts accompanied by numbers and graphs, something impossible to provide at a short chat with colleagues, family members or friends when trying to give them a full picture of how many things are completely wrong and to what extent we have already destroyed our only home...
Thanks a lot again for you awesome work Nate!! :)
Excellent! Nothing will happen as the rich and powerful who could do something won't as they feel they will be the last to suffer and they are probably right.
I understand your point, but at 45 :12 Nate makes the point that the rich and powerful are not at fault here, it is the market driving us all. Manufacturers produced stuff and I purchased stuff. I cannot put all the blame on their shoulders. We are all going to have to change and work together for a better future.
It's more like of one guy steps down from a very profit making but polluting enterprise, his place will be taken over almost immediately by another dude picking up that particular bad business. It's much like a mafia racket, if one gets shot or locked up, his big competitor takes over.
You then think "let policy make laws to protect us".
But policy is merely a replacement of the old ways, when the big rich families appointed the members of the govt councils to make decisions in their interests. Middle class and poor folks never had much influence, except maybe some time mid- late 20thC. After the 1980s is rich folks ruling all over again, and they will not step down voluntarily, or get replaced by even more greedy types like them tech billionaires
Thanks. The key is to foster altruism by raising awareness about the concept of fundamental emotional needs. Once everyone understands that practically everyone will be a benefit to society if all their needs have been met since conception AND that absolutely everyone will become a burden or a danger to all if their needs aren't met at any point in their life.
The first time I ever heard the term "tree hugger" was 27 years ago. A co-worker called me that for hanging a beautiful poster of sea creatures on the wall of my office cubicle. How anyone could possibly react negatively to such an awesome poster completely mystified me. I never wanted to raise children so never had any, but this guy had two young daughters he loved very much. Sometimes when I see videos like Nate's, I think of him and his daughters and wonder: does he still think people who care about our oceans are just a bunch of stupid tree huggers?
This is just spectacular. One day society will hopefully erect statues to you and heroes like you, Nate.
Thanks, good talk. It was a little heavy on the patos, but maybe that's just a cultural thing. Jason Hickel has similar ideas, but he's less pessimistic.
Btw,, a bit of gardening advice: If you allready have ducks, employ them, they are good workers. Let them graze the weeds in your potato patch. They won't touch the poisonus potato leaves, but they love the juicy annuals and the worst weed of all, grass.. This is a well proven method. they also work great as weeders in rice fields.
A Swiss federal report on plastics in the environment, published on September 23, 2022, found that tire and road wear is one of the leading causes of microplastic pollution in the country. The resulting particles are made up of 60% rubber, 30% soot and 10% heavy metals. Over 13,500 metric tons of these particles are generated in Switzerland every year, and some 8,900 metric tons of that amount are released into our air, soil and water. (How many electric cars, which are heavier than conventional, are going to still generate more pollution than we are already. Its not exhaust but its still pollution)
I have a thirteen year old electric car (Nissan Leaf). I reckon I can probably get another 2-3 years out of it on the existing battery for my use case (not applicable to others of course). After that point, I have looked into changing the battery, but have come to the conclusion that it isn't worth it. The chassis is beginning to show signs of rust, and there is a lot of work needed to the car in general (both in other maintenance, plus upgrading to things like AC system, in-car electronics etc) that could make it cost prohibitive. I am quite hands on, and would be happy to take on the task of switching out the battery myself, but the battery is still expensive and difficult to come by (at the moment, it appears that second hand batteries from write-offs are the best source, but that comes with risk attached). Whilst I was a very early adopter of an EV, there is still no real market for battery switching. Moreover, the entire industry is reliant on there not being a market for switching. It is a market designed around people changing their cars with regularity, and cars lasting around 10-15 years before being scrapped. It wouldn't surprise me if newer cars with "auto-pilot" features have planned obscelescence built into their software. Of course, that could completely change, with legislation to force manufacturers to make cars that last (say) 50 years, but even then that is a small period of time in the scheme of things (and extremely unlikely to happen!).
In short, EVs fall into the nebulous category of "more sustainable", which is just a bollocks term to allow business as usual to continue without addressing the fundamental issues of a particular problem.
And they are tiny, a french study found that I can't find now, had hundreds of thousands of microplastics, per gram of food. Some people/countries eat 15 grams a month, so 10 kilograms over 60 years. All the bread wrappers, food containers etc, single use, all have bits of plastic falling off. I used to leave coffee in the bag until i shone a torch through the bag one day and could see all the internal silver was coming off each time i unwrapped the bag, we really are leaving a layer of oil all over the place, even in us.
I read last week that each 1 km of travel in a motor vehicle produces 1 trillion microplastic particles, and that in some areas of the world's oceans, the majority of microplastics actually seem to originate from the tire wear you mention, which washes into the sea via watersheds.
@@antonyjh1234 An Italian study from 2020 entitled "Micro- and nano-plastics in edible fruit and vegetables. The first diet risks assessment for the general population" found microplastics in fruits and vegetables (especially apples and carrots, whose roots are more porous) ranging between between 52,050 and 233,000 particles per gram (!) of fruits or vegetable.
@@dbadagna Thanks, that was the one, I got the country wrong. I think they found carrots to have the largest pieces which would make sense. These particles are falling on the land 24-7 and each rain washes them further down, if they can enter our blood stream they can go up the roots of a tree. With crops being half of the chemical damage done to our bodies through sprays, how much more is done ingesting plastic. Wild.
Wauw, such deep respect for this men. Our trajectory is daunting and I deeply belief that the goodness that you can see in the eyes of Nate is really what we need in the world right now.
Wow! One of the greatest presentations on the complexity of our modern day world including the steps we can start to take right now.
Really grateful for your work, thank you!
I keep introducing you to people - this is another great (sad, scary, overwhelming, hopeful...) understandable overview of where we are, why, and where we need to go....merci.
Fantastic job, Nate. We need to talk, though, about how common it is in nature for growth systems to overshoot and-sometimes-respond in the right way.
That's by repurposing their resources previously for compounding to instead devote to care and coordination instead. That's easily verified as nature's main successful way of ending growth and maturing rather than destroying what grew.
Still trying to get my head around the volume of trends charted by Nate. Thanks Nate for the effort and the inspirational effect. ❤
An excellent overview. Something I can share with those who are ready to hear the message. Namaste, Nate 🙏
This is essentially The Great Simplification’s Bingo Card. You really do cover so much of your work in this one presentation.
I am making efforts to try and break these concepts up for folks in my area who have no background in environmental studies, and this presentation will be a massive help. I think a lot of “regular” people know something is wrong but can’t conceptualize it while they are also trying to survive in the modern world.
Thank you so much for what you do, Nate. Your work inspires me to keep going in an increasingly depressing world.
Thank you Nate, a great job compressing this large teaching into one large bite.
This was wonderful. Truly wonderful. It’s worth clarifying some limitations of the theory of cognition you proposed. Although I’m not suggesting you are wrong per se, cognition doesn’t occur exclusively ‘in the head’. This is where 4/6E cognition is so powerful (cognition is variously embodied, embedded, enacted, extended, emotional and exapted). Worthwhile having someone like John Vervaeke on the podcast. Thanks for all your work, Nate.
Impressive research and presentation! It's also a really important area of study.
I think a lot of people say they want to support the green transition but when they have to give up their travel to italy they are willing to wait to next year for saving the planet.
Exactly
Including Mr. Visit India Nate H.
@@derekmiller8564 Nate's visit was a medical emergency. Without the limbic reset, we might have lost him, at least from his vital public role, if not from life itself.
While we still have fossil sunlight in circulation, let's use it wisely, and distinguish between travel for health, family emergencies, and potentially productive meetings from travel for pleasure and status.
@@derekmiller8564 Excerpt from Laura K Kerr, PhD "At Times Hypocrisy is the Best We Can Do" follows:
In "My Green Manifesto", nature writer David Gessner shared of paddling down the Charles River with environmentalist Dan Driscoll as Driscoll spoke of the need for hypocrites in the green movement:
“We nature lovers are hypocrites of course,” Dan says. “We are all hypocrites. None of us are consistent. The problem is that we let that fact stop us. We worry that if we fight for nature, people will say ‘But you drive a car’ or ‘You fly a lot’ or ‘You’re a consumer, too.’ And that stops us in our tracks. It’s almost as if admitting that we are hypocrites gets people off the hook. We need hypocrites who aren’t afraid of admitting it but will still fight for the environment. We don’t need some sort of pure movement run by pure people. We need hypocrites!”
Gessner promotes a sloppy environmentalism - “An army of flawed and sloppy hypocrites” - one that lacks the drama of saints and villains and instead fits the contradictory nature of humankind.
Hypocrite has several meanings, including a person whose behavior opposes their stated beliefs (Driscoll Gessner’s notion), or someone who carries a false appearance of being virtuous. Yet it is the original meaning given by the Greeks - a deficiency in a person’s ability to decide - that is the kind of hypocrite I believe would benefit from sloppy environmentalism. This latter concept of hypocrite describes many of us as we try to care for nature while fulfilling other responsibilities, desires, and needs. We need a sloppy environmentalism, because frankly, given the demands taxing our green choices, sloppy may be the best many of us can do.
@@derekmiller8564well, it depends on the other activities that Nate does. In general everyone should have some kind of feedback on their emissions, which could be through some sort of emission/carbon fee. It would be useful to see how different lifestyle choices compare in the long run.
@@poockoo Would this not give humans a 'carbon budget' and therefore not really solve the issue of additional energy usage required to sustain our economic growth globally? This in regard to what currently classify as developing countries aspiring the same extravagant wealth levels as developed countries have now. I am hinting at a quick fix vs a system change.
Hi Nate, I’ve been following you and Schmachtenberger and a few others in this space for a couple of years now. This is an excellent synthesis of so much work and sense making that I recognize from many previous podcasts. Thank you! Can you maybe provide references and citations in the notes to this video? This is such a difficult discussion to effectively disseminate. I will personally go to bat with this video in hand, but people will push back. So I would love to map this out with underlying data folded into it.
There are refs on bottom of most slides but I’ll see what I can do
Man. The carbon pulse graph really hits hard. The implications are absolutely terrifying. There should be an entire documentary just on this topic.
@@magrooster ua-cam.com/video/3JB2-6S4SSM/v-deo.htmlsi=Bo5-ZM9n9kahYEKX
@@thegreatsimplification lol…well…I meant like an Inconvenient Truth level documentary narrated by Morgan Freeman.
I don't believe academics are ignorant of the ramifications of 1st world living and are "energy blind." Be an interesting experiment to set up a website where anonymity was assured and construct a survey to find out what the scope and depth of the general academic understanding of the metacrisis is and what fears and apprehensions academics have with respect to "coming out" and moving some of these ideas forward. I suspect a conflict of interest with endowments and those consequences would be high up on that list.
A tank of diesel has as much energy as a total australian summers electrical use with the air con going 24-7, actually a little more at 3.5 months. We are all energy blind if we use this energy to go skiing for instance, people I know still think planning a driving holiday is a great idea.
How many people believe that in 26 years they will have reduced their consumption 90 percent, very few people I know do and academics have the greatest responsibility to teach the truth and seem by their actions, to be doing the least. If endowments and coming out about the truth is where they at then what is the point of academia?
If they are not ignorant, then does that make them more complicit to maintain the current system, and should not be called academics but businessmen?
@@antonyjh1234 Maybe a big issue here is that because especially professors teaching the 'good' Nate speaks of in the video think they do exponentially good through leverage, they deserve the wealth they acquire by partaking in the paper mill that is academia.
@@RubenKemp The only leverage they have done is lever more people into debt and the professors have not made an ounce of change except promote a corrupted system. To think people deserve wealth for this, we will have to agree to disagree.
Thanks Nate!
Nate this one is so awesome, thanks all the way from the south of New Zealand. Appreciate The great simplification so much! Massive inspiration 👏. 😊
I've said a million billions times..."An economic system that worships endless growth in not going to work on a finite planet".
Great presentation, spot on
54:00 - 5 Horsemen
54:16 - 1st Horseman , Financial 54:55 - 55:07 - 55:15 - 55:29 -
56:00 - 2nd Horseman , Geopolitics 57:55 - 2rd Horseman , Complexity
58:31 - 4th Horseman , The Social Contract 59:11 - 5th Horseman , Ecological Damage
Thank you, Nate! It's awesome to hear your lastest presentation of the big picture in one go! I love the clearer articulation of ideas on where to go forward. Please don't forget that self-care is community service!
I smile and imagine an old hickory standing over-watch on a field of young veggies, it's trunk grinning at the magic and wonderment of all the life growing at its feet when I hear Nate. He provides his assessment of current existence and challenges us to be realistic and encourages us to act for our collective behalf. I fear, however, that my experience of the great simplification will be of little impact and far too late. But, I'll try anyway. Thanks Nate.
What a blessing this talk again (while all topics are known for me after listening all the stuff of Nate..) What a delight Kira was there.. Next stop: Kira in the podcast of Nate...
I haven’t seen your shows pop up on my feed for months just assumed you were having a break! Boy was I wrong .
ore grade is a lot like EROI. Will listen to this one today. thanks Nate !
Although i disagree with your solutions, you hit the nail on the head with the problems
Thanks for this roundup of your teachings. I am still fumbling between this viable series of options and the view of Tom Murphy, who stresses more the 'ecological context' angle. I see no way out for us using his logic, try as I might, but there is more hope for appropriate technology in yours. Maybe you could do a talk together looking at the long term ecological context and whether evolution will allow us to survive.
Here for it. Thanx Nate.
Nate, that was informative and inspirational. The world is a better place with you in it!
Thank you, Nate.
Hello! Great work, at about 1 hour 10 min in I would really love to see you improve your discourse around India and China as the need for power has much more to do with global power than fans and ACs. Thank you!
Remember realizing this full story of the importance of energy and oil for the whole of economy and modern lifestyle to it's full extent during peak oil heyday around 2006.
Oil was of extreme importance as the trigger factor pushing subprime mortgage holders over the edge when it went up to a 150$ a barrel. You're not going to pay your down payments of the choice is to heat your house or drive to the supermarket on your last dollar
Nate, I've just started the video but I want to thank you again for the content you're giving us for free. It's inspiring and deeply insightful.
1:18:40 . Biochar is not new, it has been used for thousands or years. Terra preta.
Thanks Nate. Really enjoyed the conversation. I never bought into Jevons paradox. If humans were actually intelligent and had a true conscience, they would understand the reason why they shouldn't travel any farther than they can walk.
Disagree! Sailing with non-fossil fuel inputs is fine, as is going on horseback or etc. Going to far places is great for mixing DNA, which creates hybrid vigor, and learning new ideas. And trade.
Sailing is a pretty cool way to get around ,overshoot is the problem, probably bestto keepyourdna to yourself@@マリアン木村
🙏SHARE 🤝Best Revelation of how our competitive consumption mindset Must Change for a Sustainable Future for our children 👪 Do not fight mother Nature...she will Win🌻
All Must live in harmony with each other & develop a new Sustainable Energy Lifestyle with our Earth 🌅🐢
to learn more about regenerative agriculture, its benefits, look into AEA Advancing Eco Agriculture.
Four Scales for Intervention - “One thing that I don’t know how viable it is to do right now… to add a tax to anything that is not renewable in nature.” (Carbon, but also copper, lithium, aquifers, or anything like that - give signals to consumers but also to inventors and innovators about the real cost of depleting anything that isn’t renewable.)
Given the very high correlation between energy consumption and the rest of the economy, to envision the number of “energy slaves” that support our lifestyle can be thought of as a first approximation about the scale, the order of magnitude of this endeavour. Worldwide average was at approximately 200 “energy slaves” per capita; developed countries were near the 400 “energy slaves”, and I’ve heard figures of around 600 “energy slaves” per capita to support the good old ‘American way of life’ - the thing president Biden said was not to be put in the balance. Given that renewables shift the burden from ‘carbon’ to ‘minerals’ and given that this ‘tax scheme’ would cover “anything that is not renewable in nature”, I see no “emergency exit” bar a technological miracle or a hefty decrease in population to achieve the required reduction.
In fact, what we are talking about (indirectly), is a Kaya identity applied not only to carbon, but to “anything that is not renewable in nature.”
Such a generalized Kaya identity would expresses “anything that is not renewable in nature” usage rate (ANR) as the product of population (Pop), per capita gross domestic product, GDP/Pop, primary energy intensity, NRG/GDP, and the non renewable factor (ANR/NRG):
ANR = Pop × (GDP/Pop) × (NRG/GDP) × (ANR/NRG),
which - upon rearranging the denominators - boils down to the obvious
ANR = 1 × 1 × 1 × ANR.
The differential of which is
ΔANR = ΔPop + Δ(GDP/Pop) + Δ(NRG/GDP) + Δ(ANR/NRG).
So you have four levers to lower ANR:
a) lower the population,
b) lower GDP per capita (lifestyle),
c) have a total decoupling in the energy usage to produce GDP (free the 400 or 600 or whatever “energy slaves”) - but recycling will not take you anywhere near,
d) have a technological miracle that will drastically reduce the amount “anything not renewable” per energy unit (*reduce*, not *displace* from one ‘not renewable’ impact to another => no unaccounted for “externalities”.
“c)” will take you somewhere ‘round 20% given that ‘things’ are redesigned, have penetrated the market after the end of useful life of the current stuff, and that consumers’ habits have changed (now how many decades will that take).
“d)” has historically progressed at the rate of ~1 %/Yr (~2 %/Yr for short periods of time - and was that really “free of externalities” or just pretending?).
So bar a true miracle, and going full steam world wide starting tomorrow, it will take 50 to 100 years.
The question then becomes, “given that we’re already flirting with tipping points” - example: given that the West Antarctic ice sheet has been shown to have reached its ‘point of no return’ 6 to 10 months ago (publication), so really 18-24 months ago (scientific finding, analysis done), so really some 30-36 months ago (data gathering) - “what are the chances the train hasn’t already left the station while we were having a party at the hotel?”
To dampen / reduce? Maybe, if we’re swift enough worldwide.
To avoid?… 😆😂🤣🤪
Great presentation! Please include women though in your pictures of the elders we need.
Thank you Nate for your so precious work! This allows me to share your comprehensive presentation on this hard topic.
But if we don’t burn fossil fuels or have fossil fuels to burn then that’s industry gone. So then what of the aerosol masking effect?
Well ...
Deep dive your whattaboutism
and report your findings ...
James Hansen calls this the Faustian Bargain. When all human fossil combustion ends, the earth will continue to warm as it rectifies the energy imbalance in the atmosphere (Hansen's latest Warming In the Pipeline paper) and as heat transfers back to the atmosphere from the ocean. We need to reforest, restore prairies and wetlands, and restore ocean life from sea grass and kelp forests to coral reefs to sequester carbon as much as possible as heat flows to restore balance.
The question is do we want to face the aerosol masking effect now when we have resources and a culture, or latter when everything has gone to hell. Now at the present level of ecological "health" or latter when they are further decimated.
Converting to rocket stoves for heating and cooking might help slow the effects.
Yes, sustainability courtesy of Chinese solar panels, who start up a new coal-fired power plant roughly every week.
Really many good ideas. But renewables are less bad as you think and redraw CO2 from the air and sequester it in the soil etc is really laborious. So we need the energy transition really urgently. We need to reduce overproduction really fast and improve the fair distribution. We need restrictions and better taxes. ❤ Thank you very much! ❤
Thank you for the apology for the horror you analyzed. And thank you for the beauty of condensing all these strands into a whole view. Your broad and deep intelligence could understand my book, Pluvicopia, which offers a powerful solution to many of the issues you demonstrate. Please read it and tell me if I am crazy. The book includes contact information.
Really wonderful presentation Nate! Wow. I mean that. Sincerely.
Our species is going to lose all of its habitat because of temperature increase in the next couple of years no matter what we do.
Unless you fudge the baseline yet again, we haven't seen +1.5°C in well over a year, and we never will again. The temperature increase is accelerating as we speak. Good Luck, Be Well.
Don't forget the 500-600 dead zones in the oceans!
thank you!!!!!!!!
While i realy agree with most of the presentation, after learning so much of it over time,
My question was, what people who disagree feel and respon to this.
Nate have you considered interviewing Dr Zach Bush M.D ? I think he dovetails well with your projects and audience of seekers
Bienvenu
Had to replay a section at around 9:20 when you said 100 million, barrel of oil equivalents of energy and thought that's not right but when i looked at the slide i saw it was in fact 100 billion so, i'll give you that as an honest slip in the narrative.
sorry - I spent all my energy creating the slidedeck - i was running on fumes! Yes - thanks for pointing out the mistake - we use 100 million barrels of oil per day, but 100 BILLION barrel of oil equivalents of oil/coal/NG per year. Thanks
18:43 Acorns and chickens are not "renewable energy" they are derivatives of sunlight which is also not renewable, but, seemingly, without limit; because of our short lifetimes.
This is an important distinction to make.
Additionally, the natural processes are able to replicate with a positive system growth until at least one of their constraints are met. No one would plant wheat for only a single grain per stem.
1:11:27 If you add a tax, you will cost people out of living in the quality of life they have become accustomed to, and they will World War Z you.
One of the reasons religions persist is despite all the wisdom of Hitchens, et al, everything was about taking away, simultaneously, the current belief system, and the freedom to choose, while replacing it with nothing but perceived cost.
Your opposition, those in power, have already taxed the populace to death using stealth with inflation and importing illegal labor. You can't imagine Rex Tillerson and his peers are ignorant of declining EROEI.
They're reducing consumption by demolishing the birth rate by promoting unsustainable dating strategies and sowing doubt and fear among men about women and among women about men, neutering children for "equality," saddling teens with student and credit card debt to reduce their purchasing power; among many other demand destruction marketing campaigns alla the Bernays Method.
Albert Bartlett gave you the right side of the list in his arithmetic presentation. Have you seen that the average age of a Ukrainian fighter is over 45? How's that for a tax?
For centuries, Canada has been pushing for the clearing of the north west passage. Can we postpone our efforts for a sustainable future until we have melted the ice? How can Canada and Russia make the most from our relative advantage?
Huh?
and Meh!
There is no legitimacy whatever to the Brrritisch North American colonialists aspirations for a full-scale assault on the polar regions
Yikes!
Whoooosh!
The sound of the core points
flying overhead..
Oh the Cuckoo, She's a pretty bird.
She warbles as she flies.
She brings us good tidings.
And she never tells a lie.
How often, do I wonder
Why women, love men
And I look back, and I wonder
Why men, are men.
Regarding 4 horsemen: have you given any thought to a solution set of responses that might satisfy both a Green Growth Economy and the Great Simplification scenario concurrently? I can imagine a future humanity that contains a small fraction of GGE (maybe in the form of a few massive “utopianesque” epicenters) en route to a predominantly GS paradigm.
Thanks Nate for your great work!
Thank you for this work and presentation.
Nate since I first got glowed to your podcast in the beginning of this year was approximately about 20 thousand podcasts I can not express why your easy understanding of what our true implications that shall challenge our ways of not only of stress but more so so to be truly prepared for what our future challenges behold Thank you so endearingly for your wise learnings from your incredibly wise guests 🕊🌏😇❤️
Brilliant presentation, Nate. Well done
Hey Nate, would love to see Simon Michaux back on. There is a German company CMBlu that builds metal free batteries (Redox Flow) and I wonder whether his conjecture still holds in light of this technology that is already on the market!?
I can't help but wonder if Nate is a fan of Isaac Asimov's Foundation. 🤔
Excellent, but the perplexing omission is albedo. It is likely that the physical darkening of the world (by 2% so far this century) will cause system collapse through accelerating feedbacks.
Each of these sections could have been its own 2 hour presentation - especially the climate/environment one. My hope is this is reasonably functional as a “hologram” to get more people aware, concerned and involved
Walkable neighborhoods, with necessities nearby would reduce carbon emissions because people would not have to drive cars so much.
Thank you Nate!!!!
Thanks so much, Nate! This was great!
THIS IS IT
The problem is Nate, you're not telling people what they want to hear - so they'll just continue to ignore you, I'm afraid. Drill, baby, drill. Dig, baby, dig etc. I've been following this stuff since the 70s - What difference has been made ?
Hi Nate, great presentation again. And hopefully with a profound multiplier effect regarding your audience.
You mentioned that our multiplier effects may be more important than our individual behavior changes. From my point of view, however, I only get the perspective of true mental health when my personal lifestyle (at least its basic building blocks) could principally be copied and pasted to 10 billion humans on this planet (Kant’s categorical imperative applied) . Otherwise you continue to exist in cognitive dissonance.
So my advice would imply much more simplification in a much shorter timespan than most people in the West might imagine as „doable“ right now (e.g. no flying, no car, no fossil applications generally, small flat, vegan diet, no pets etc.). Yes, I know…….
In my view the observable right shift in Western politics has a lot to do with the fact that academics (and other leading figures in society) present the global predicament but as individuals do not act according to their own analyses.
Forced anything never works.
thank you very much !!
A very ambitious presentation--perhaps somewhat too much to take in at one go, but congratulations for putting it all in one place. Education at the university level, and especially in the humanities, needs to change so has to create communities of young scholars who bounce ideas off each other and their mentors while providing the community support needed for long, hard thought on the issues we face. It's time to junk the lecture as the main form of education at that level and turn to discussion within a community context.
My municipality is about to create a new ten year comprehensive plan. I wish to influence the process to draw on the lessons of the Great Simplification and the healing of energy blindness. The mayor demands an elevator pitch, but the shortest presentations on youtube consonant with this message take 50 minutes. The chair of the environment committee is such a committed techno-optimist that he referred to a diagram I passed around to elected officials as neither informative nor thought provoking, and responded to Alice J. Friedemann's book, Life After Fossil Fuels: a Reality Check on Alternative Energy with the words, "I'm in favor of nuclear." End of story. Please help me with a 3 minute elevator pitch!
thank you for this... I am ready to add my efforts to help. Work at the local level?...
Nate, as always, I am deeply grateful for your work - I believe it is vital to our shared future. 🙏
Are your presentation slides publicly available? I often find myself longing to study them more closely and contemplate them more slowly.
Responses… I think responses won’t be effective until after the catastrophe. Providing people are around to respond. There are just too many people in the grip of the zombie world economy, and so little time.
Best invention is the solar-charged electrical velomobile, much more efficient than the food calorie powered upright bicycle.
depends on the sourcing of the materials of either & the sourcing of the food that powers the cyclist.
@@Cpt_JaK No, it does not. The energy return on investment (EROI) of current agricultural calories is in the 0.01-0.3 range. Traditional agriculture based on human and draft animal labor has an EROI of about 3 for grains. The EROI of renewable electricity is up to 15.
As far as change, the top 25% of people are going to fall the most, may be hard for the top 40% but there could be a great settling as we age as a population. 25% of people don't have bank accounts, maybe the middle class if they own their home will be fine once they turn their lawns into gardens.
About relatedness. Humans are more related to mice than cats so numbers 85% and 90% cant be true probably inverse numbers are more reasonable. Cats are more related to cows (both in group Laurasiatheria) than to any species of Euarchontoglires (rodents and primates). And fruit fly is less related than chickens, so both at 60% cant be true . These numbers which i assume are from Bussiness Insider article are constructed using different metrics from diffferent studies on different cases (for a cat similarity of genes, for a fruit fly disease causing genes etc.)
thank you - you are correct - this slide was hastily put together from another of my college lectures and the %s got transposed. (core point remains though!). thanks for the catch
Ahhh... the declining rate of profits, the scourge of the socioeconomic system which has seen its days, and which should be rightly abolished, in order to bring ALL of Humanity out of poverty, and as well, ensure the global environment is kept in such a state which ensures the survival of ALL of the planet's life. We as a species OWE it to the remaining species to bring in a new and better mode of Human endeavor. We can start by eating the rich, then building more rail lines with that massive windfall...
Great, thank you 🙏
Please let us know how Academia RSVPs.
lol Tiger Woods and the peacock, I’m going to be laughing about that all day
Because otherwise I would cry. This is a fantastic presentation, thank you Nate. On the sperm counts dropping and insects crashing, it’s not just PFAS but many petrochemicals used to make stuff and grow food. It’s all related. We have to change the way we’re doing everything.
@@stacymalkan7430 I just read that driving an automobile 1 km creates 1 trillion microplastic particles (from the friction of the tires on the road).
What happens when we drain all the oil from the earth and we have an asteroid impact and the earth plates have no lubricant to bear the impact?
It just bounces off
Banana peels
Hopefully it happens soon so there might be a few lifeforms that survive to regreen the planet until the sun burns out.
🌞🤝🌞🤝🌞
Hi. im here to discuss these issues.