Running head: AVOIDING DOOM 1

Avoiding Doom: The Need for Scientific Governance and Re-Design of our Global

Civilization’s Economic, Societal, and Environmental Systems in the Face of Impending

Socio-Ecological Catastrophe

Simon Proulx - 100945858

Contextual Nature of Products, IDES 3502

Dr. Alan Thibaudeau

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Abstract

This paper explores the historical causes of our present-day self-destructive societal

tendencies, with emphasis on the relationship between varying socio-economic

backgrounds and human individuality. Specifically, looking at how environmental

perception beginning in utero and leading into early adulthood induces particular

negative human behaviours. These behaviours have, in turn, materialized themselves on a

much larger scale within corporate and political structures, and ultimately characterize

our civilization; and which, over-time, have lead to the major international issues of our

current ecological landscape. Examination of these issues will be done in regards to their

negative, and hard to rectify, effects on Earth’s delicate ecosystem, with focus on the

consequences of a fossil-energy dependent global economy. The relatively recent

international acknowledgement of the planet’s finite resources has resulted in cynicism of

infinite-growth capitalism and perpetual consumerism, leading to urgent need for easily

implemented and affordable solutions. We have yet to find a perfect resolution to our

potentially civilization-ending problems. However, as a conclusion, this paper outlines

the importance of utilizing innovation, intelligent design, and most significantly the ‘ego-

less’ scientific method in effort to drastically re-structure our international civilization in

accordance with ubiquitous public interest for survival, maximum sustainability of our

ecosystem, and for the long-term continuity of our species.

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Avoiding Doom: The Need for Scientific Governance and Re-Design of our Global

Civilization’s Economic, Societal, and Environmental Systems in the Face of Impending

Socio-Ecological Catastrophe

How life in a particular socio-economical environment can affect human behaviour

and health

Biology, when taken out of context of the environment, is virtually impossible to

comprehend. One of the most dangerous and widespread notions in modern society is that

an individual’s actions are a result of pre-determined characteristics embedded into their

brains by genealogy, without any consideration for the socio-economic environment in

which that individual exists. (Joseph, Sapolsky, 2011). The ‘rigid genetics’ argument

gives us the luxury of ignoring past and present socio-economic factors that, in fact,

trigger specific human behaviours (Joseph, Mate, 2011). The new and rapidly expanding

scientific field of fetal origins tells us that our epigenome, which can be perceived as a

series of switches that dictate which parts of our genome will be expressed and which

parts wont, is exceptionally subject to our environmental experiences during our first 9

months in utero, and even more so in the few years after birth. Pre-natal and early-life

experiences our brains take in and that define our genome are carried with us throughout

our lives, and can explain our distinct behaviours and conditions as adults (Almond,

Currie, 2011, p. 2). For example, a common, environmentally triggered, early-life

epigenetic effect is the strong, lifelong sense of rejection by people who are adopted; a

result of the emotional and physical sense of abandonment embedded into their brains as

defining implicit memories (Joseph, Mate, 2011). More severely, approximately 40

million children are abused or neglected per year worldwide. On top of the immediate
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wellbeing of the child, exposure to maltreatment and extreme stress in early years can

impair early brain development and metabolic and immune system function, leading to

chronic health problems, as well as high risks of depression, suicide, drug abuse and

violent or dangerous behaviours. These situation-induced epigenetic marks forever alter

the child’s genes, altering normal biological processes throughout life (Zhao, 2013). Even

the exposure to cultural fasting in-utero can be detrimental. In Uganda, adulthood

disability, particularly mental and learning based, rates went up 20% in Muslims exposed

to Ramadan Fasting during early pregnancy (Almond, Mazumder, 2010). Pregnancy

stress, parental neglect, living with a family member who abuses a drug, amongst many

other environmental factors that a child might be exposed to, all increase the chance of

negative behaviours throughout a lifetime as a result of epigenetic marks (Felitti, 1998, p.

245). And so, early life experiences are really a sample for your brain in terms of what

type of society it is you are going live in and will help define you throughout adulthood

(Joseph, Wilkinson, 2011). Our childhood upbringing isn’t the only factor to consider

when understanding human behaviour. As we grow older, our personalities and

characteristics are continuously exposed to more and more of our environment; cultural

trends, close friends, and the socio-economic situation that surrounds us all contribute.

Over the course of our lives, our morals, opinions, and theological views are amply

shaped by the societies we inhabit. You cannot separate the neurological function of a

human being from the environment in which they were brought up, and continue to exist

in (Joseph, Mate, 2011).

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The current socio-economical landscape

From the moment they’re born, a person in a poorer socio-economic environment

is subject to more stress, early-life trauma, insecurity and discrimination than a person of

higher socio-economical status, as well as often faced with relatively more limited

(dependent on country) access to healthcare, education, and vital technologies (Graham,

2015). When mass numbers of people become victim to these inequalities and feel

inferior to other human beings, problems arise: increased violence, political issues, and

division of ethnic and social groups. In North America, we currently live one of the most

individualistic societies on Earth; capitalism enabling a climb up the pyramid of social

class, resulting in a highly divided, class-based society1. If the scientific understanding is

that equal, nurturing and cooperative environments increase overall population health and

social welfare, why does this drastic global socio-economical inequality exist? We live in

a world where 0.7% of the population controls 1% of the wealth (see fig. 1)(Graham,

Fig. 1 – Global Wealth Pyramid

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2015). This staggeringly disproportionate share of global wealth is representative of the

systemic inequality that has come as a consequence of a now widely accepted

competitive capitalist system that favors profit over human well being, environmental

sustainability, and the long-term abundance of our civilization. This systemic disregard of

our continuity as a species seems absurd, so how on earth did we get here? The answer

lies in the industrial revolution, the implementation of a fossil-energy based society and

how the appeal of western capitalism and the ‘American dream’ spread across the

developing world (Pimentel, 2008, p. 5). Until very recently, former modes of 19th and

20th century capitalism operated with no regard for the long-term viability of their

resource bases. The natural world was regarded as separate from the economy, and

available as a tool of transformation in the accommodation of products and processes

concerned with short-term profit maximization (Urry, 2011, p.49). In the early to middle

years of the 20th century, as a result of capitalist blindness to the metabolism between

nature and society, the following comprised the influential cluster of high carbon

systems; the development of coal and gas-based electric power systems; the massive

success of the petroleum car and associated roads resulting in a sprawling infrastructure;

the development of suburban developments which increased commutes; the advent of

electric consumer technologies such as telephones that accommodated connection and

geographic dispersion; and the proliferation of many specialized sites in the private sector

such as supermarkets and their dependence on a fossil-energy based agricultural system.

These high carbon systems formed a cluster that was extremely significant in the

development of major global societal change. By 1930, three-quarters of the world’s cars

and 90% of the world’s oil came from within the United States. This high-energy regime
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promised a future of inexpensive food, cheaper fuels, and limitless growth (Urry, 2011,

51-53). As the American fossil-energy based regime became re-created across the globe

over the course of the 20th century, our population numbers, as well as our metabolic

relationship with nature, experienced a huge upward shift (Pimentel, 2008, p. 40). Along

with cheap energy and population growth came pervasive consumerism: the notion that

people express their identities through brands and purchase habits. The need for

individuality accommodated the proliferation of choice that we see today; the availability

of an astonishing array of goods and services through very long supply chains made

possible by high carbon systems. Today it is estimated that if all the world’s population

enjoyed an American consumer lifestyle, it would take at least 5 planets to support that

population (Urry, 2011, p. 53). This consumer freedom has changed our local societal

environment and hence had significant epigenetic effects on individuals and on society as

a whole. Addictions resulting from available compulsive repetition have become major

social and environmental issues. Since the advent of the supermarket, global obesity rates

have skyrocketed to over 1 billion people worldwide, showing how abundance through

cheapness and availability can ridicule the consumer (Homer Dixon, 2006, p. 168).

Industries like tobacco, alcohol, processed foods, and sugar all rely on the profitability of

average individual’s genetic weakness for addiction. Addiction is any behaviour that is

associated with craving or temporary relief, with negative consequences and an

impairment to stop the addiction (Joseph, Mate, 2011). Alongside consumer-based

addictions come the addictions of those in power. Addictions that drive the continuity of

our high-carbon societal system: addictions to power, acquisition and profit. Although

these actions are far more negatively impactful on society than drug addictions, they
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seem to be respected and accepted for the sake of economic triumph. The lack of

monetary benefit in resolving Earth’s issues is alarming. An effect of this ‘profit over

social well being’ economy is that socially negative aspects of society such as war, crime

and underfunded medical research have become positively rewarded industry ventures

(Joseph, 2011). Economic growth has become the status quo of government everywhere

(Brown, 2004, p. 3). Modern civilization’s genetic addiction to oil represents a broader

societal issue. One that questions our ability to break the habit and abandon our

individual luxuries to come together as a race in a push for a change of system in the face

of international environmental disaster. The entrepreneurs, CEOs, and political leaders

that helped usher in the age of perpetual consumerism and fossil-fuel dependency did not

do so in effort to destroy the global ecosystem, at least not consciously, but did so in the

spirit the environmentally-induced addition to profit and personal gain, societal

consequences aside. Their success in climbing to the top rung of the socio-economical

ladder that society knows as success, and at a time of massive global societal change,

allowed them to become so powerful that their influence today will continuously slow the

process of implementing sustainable and low-carbon societal systems.

Outgrowing the Earth –what exactly is happening to our planet?

Since the beginning of near-total fossil-fuel dependency in 1950, our global

population has grown more than it had in the previous 4 million years, from 2.5 to 7

billion. This growing population coincides with a growing economy, but as our economy

and population grow, Earth’s life support systems remain essentially the same. While

fossil fuel burning has increased fourfold, our environment’s capacity to absorb c02 has
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changed very little. The demand for food and water has tripled and the demand for

seafood has increased fivefold (Brown, 2004, pp. 3-4). It seems that human demands are

beginning to exceed the planet’s natural capacities. The results of these excessive

expectations of our planets resources, in conjunction with our unsustainable societal

habits, have taken a massive toll on our ecosystem and threaten to change the world, and

civilization, as we know it. Evidence of our impacts throughout the environment can be

seen in rising temperatures, collapsing fisheries, shrinking forests, expanding deserts,

rising c02 levels, ocean acidification, falling water tables, melting glaciers, declining crop

yields, rising seas, and massive losses in biodiversity (Brown, 2004, p. 8). Together, these

effects can be attributed to human-induced climate change, which is now a well-

established and relatively indisputable science. Not only are these impacts severe for our

planet, but also are only expected to get worse as carbon emissions continue and global

temperatures increase.

Human population growth, alongside the systemic accommodation to the resource

demands of that growing population, have proven to be some of the biggest causes of

environmental problems. It is difficult to overemphasize the challenges we face in the

next half-century; not only are we projected to have an additional 3 billion more people

to feed, but there will also be an estimated 5 billion people seeking to diversify their diets

by moving up the food chain by switching to eating more grain-intensive livestock

products (Brown, 2004, pp. 17). Today, the productivity of agricultural and other

biological resources is being maintained in large measure by the increased input of fossil

fuel energy for fertilizers, pesticides and irrigation. Most crops depend on fossil fuels for

seeding and maintaining, for harvesting and processing, and eventually their
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transportation to market. (Urry, 2011, p. 43) Presently, nearly one-third of usable global

land area is devoted to livestock production, livestock that in turn consumes nearly 40%

of the world’s grain. It takes 10 times more fossil energy to produce a kilogram of animal

protein than of plant protein (Pimente, 2008, pp. 71-74). Despite this high-energy cost,

world meat consumption on average has doubled since the 1950’s, becoming one of the

world’s most predictable markets (Brown, 2004, p. 48). Our current system of food

production will not be sustainable for much longer if population and environmental

trends continue. Research shows that with every 1-degree Celsius of global temperature

rise, we can expect a 10% decrease in crop yields of wheat, rice and corn, meaning less

available for humans and livestock alike. Meanwhile, soil erosion, desertification and

urbanization contribute to considerable global crop loss every year (Brown, 2004, p. 85).

In the near future, rising food prices might be the first economic indicator of serious

trouble in the deteriorating relationship between the global economy and earth’s

ecosystem. In the face of our present fossil-fuel crisis, food and water security are

becoming increasingly significant. If oil shortages develop, food could be priced out of

reach for the majority of the population, and hunger could become conventional aspect of

life in every corner of the world (Urry, 2011, p. 43).. Population growth brings with it a

decrease of life-supporting resources per person. That decline, which is threatening to

drop living standards of more and more people below survival level, could lead to

unmanageable social tensions that will might escalate into broad-based conflicts (Brown,

2004, p. 26).
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The near future, what to expect.

As our dependence on fossil fuels continue, we are going to see a continuation of

the negative effects of climate change, especially in a loss of biodiversity (Petrini, 2007,

p.17). The rapid escalation of the human population and its expansion into urban areas, as

well as chemical use, the introduction of invasive alien species, pollution and climate

change have triggered a major and continuous decline in species diversity. Millions of

species of plants, animals, and microbes carry out vital functions in the biosphere,

especially for agriculture, forestry and aquatic systems. (Pimente, 2008, p. 235) Today,

we know that butterfly species have decreased by 71% during the last 20 years; bird

species have decreased by 54% during the last 20 years; and native plant species by 28%

in the last 40 years. So far, human activity has destroyed more than half of the world’s

tropical forests, and has converted two-thirds of the forest area in South America into

agricultural space for livestock production. The destruction of even one species of tree

can have cascading consequences on biodiversity. For every plant or tree species that

becomes extinct, we lose up to 1000 anthropod species, and 30 animal and microbe

species (Pimente, 2008, p. 222). These losses have distressing implications for the future

production of human food, important medicines, and other biologically sourced products.

The present rate of species loss suggests that half of all species on Earth may be lost at

the end of the 21st century.

Climate change is the greatest market failure the earth has ever seen. Nearly all of Earth’s

resources have been incredibly underpriced and undervalued by the modern day economy

(Urry, 2011, p. 8-9). The prosperity of the industrial period will most likely see a decline

as new more sustainable technologies are gradually introduced to market. The market
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collapse of 2008 has shown that private pursuit of individual gain around the world can

result in outcomes that will jeopardize the future of capitalism. People are beginning to

understand that individual market interests have created an economy that has not

accurately represented a true balance between real resources and finances. We are

beginning to realize that human and physical systems exist in states of dynamic tension

and are especially vulnerable variable instabilities that may produce widespread systemic

impacts (Urry, 2011, p. 44-45). This shift in public consciousness has been in part due to

more frequent environmental disasters with a high degree of media coverage, as well the

advent of social media, which has given the ability of broadcasting opinions, beliefs and

concerns to the masses, overall creating a more-or-less conscious consensus of what

issues are of pre-dominant importance to public interest. However, the economic staying

power of corporate fossil fuel interests, as a central point of many national economies,

will certainly slow down the progress of a technological and global shift of our main

energy source fossil fuels to renewables. This most-likely-financed delay of a shift by

corporate interests will certainly play a big part in our future, and will most likely result

in the Earth reaching the 2 degree Celcius point of disaster, said by scientists to be the

point of irreversibility of climate change’s massive effects on global civilization. If we do

not act on the crisis that our planet faces, the high-carbon civilization we live in today

will not survive (Giddens, 2011, p. 14). It is clear from the viewpoint of the 20th century

that capitalism has gone too far, consuming the very preconditions of economic and

social life and hence problematizing its own long-term viability. The 2008 market crash

demonstrated beyond doubt that capitalist economies and societies show no tendency to

move towards equilibrium; instead demonstrating significant levels of dysfunction and

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imbalance. Since the consequences are of climate change are going to be global, the only

practical socio-economic policy response must be global. Resolutions cannot be

established within a single society. In order to assure that some of the worst

consequences of climate change are not realized, various actions are urgently needed

(Urry, 2011, p. 50).

Designing for the future: the need of scientific governance in order to achieve

sustainability

To increase food supplies for current and future populations, humans must safeguard the

environment, develop new technologies, and limit human population growth.

32 pimentel 2008

Stabilizing population is the key to maintaining political stability and sustaining

economic progress. And the keys to stabilizing population are universal elementary

school education, basic healthcare, access to family planning, and, for the poorest of the

poor countries, school lunch programs.

p. 38 Brown 2004

In a world where it is becoming increasingly difficult to raise land productivity, we

have to look for alternative ways of expanding output. Devising economic incentives
to sustain multiple cropping in some countries and expand it into others could help
buy time to stabilize world population size.
P77 brown

In many cities in water-short parts of the world, it may be time to rethink the typical
urban water use model, one where water flows into the city, is used once, and then
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leaves the city – usually becoming polluted in the process. This flush-and-forget
model that so dominates urban water systems will not be viable over the longer
term in water-scarce regions.
P115 brown

Contemporary society now needs to develop a different niche of research and

enquiry, a new disciplining in order to displace dominant economic models of
human behavior. Such a sociology would be ‘resource-centered’.
New epochalism for the twentieth century that iner connects sociology with various
physical and environmental sciences.
p.37 urry