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Re: Ecological Economics and Entropy



Mike Pelletier wrote:

> >Why don't you watch the movie?  They are
> >tossing dead babies into a dump truck.
> >
> >This is what you call "progress".
> 
> And I suspect you're being disingenious to say that this is solely due
> to environmental, Earth-carrying capacity issues, rather than the fact
> taht it's really hard to plow a field and plant food when you're being
> shot at and when your field is littered with landmines.

Here is my working definition of carrying capacity:

"Carrying capacity is the maximum load that can be exerted
 on a life support system by a population of animals without
 damaging the system itself.  When a population exceeds
 carrying capacity it is known as 'overshoot'."

It follows that carrying capacity can not be raised by a
technology that either results in a net draw-down of
non-renewable resources or pollutes sinks faster than they
can be naturally cleansed. (I think this includes nearly
all technology.)

Instead of actually raising carrying capacity, technology
"temporarily" allows more animals to survive.  At some
point, populations MUST fall to (or below) carrying
capacity. (Populations MUST fall because of the way
carrying capacity is defined.)

Here is a particularly important point to remember --
 it gets right to the heart of your question:
 
 CARRYING CAPACITY IS CALCULATED IN A SPECIFIC REGION
 USING ACTUAL ANIMALS ACTING AS THEY NATURALLY DO --
 NOT SOME  HYPOTHETICAL SET OF ANIMALS THAT MIGHT BE
 SUBSTITUTED FOR THE ACTUAL ONES.

In other words, if humans are greedy, stupid and violent
now, then science must assume that they will remain so.

Conversely, if humans actually DO manage to somehow
change their behavior for the better, then carrying
capacity goes up.  For example, Earth might be able
to support 6 billion Amish.

Jay



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