Posts by Thomas Sawyer Hopkins
CHAPTER 8 – EVOLUTION
6.8. How might the Human Society Evolve This section presents an abbreviated discussion on the prospects for the future of our Social Capital, that are obviously beyond the scope of this section article, but the informative in this and other Chapters provide information, actions and concepts that should help as reinforcing evidence towards the ongoing…
Read MoreCHAPTER 7- SOCIAL CAPITAL
Growth Sequence that might help Human Society Evolve? 7.1a.This section presents an abbreviated discussion on the prospects for the future of our Social Capital, which is obviously beyond the scope of this article, but the information in this and other Chapters provide information, actions and concepts that should help as reinforcing evidence towards the…
Read MoreCHAPTER 6 – ECONOMY
6.1. Defining The Issue 6.1a Status From a Planetary Perspective In Chap. 1, the Earth System is described as consisting of four major internal systems: Marine, Terrestrial, Atmospheric, and Human Systems. The first three are ancient mega-systems that have survived large astronomical, physical, geological, chemical, and biological disturbances throughout the course of their evolutionary development,…
Read MoreCHAPTER 5 – ECONOMY, NATURAL CAPITAL
Why Include Natural Capital Addressing this question, Herman Daly observed: “There is something fundamentally wrong with treating the earth as if it were a business in liquidation.” 5.1a Our Wrong Assumption. From its inception, capitalism has assumed that resources would be inexhaustible and also that financial capital could replenish them—or more recently, that technology could…
Read MoreCHAPTER 4 – FINANCIAL CAPITAL
4.1. Is the Economy Truly Unstable and Unsustainable? 4 .1 YES, IT IS UNSTABLE AND UNSUSTAINABLE Since the economy is still under dispute, and since the purpose of this document is to incite arguments pertinent to a needed discussion regarding sustainability, we encourage readers to have patience for perceived errors and inaccuracies, to which we…
Read MoreCHAPTER 3 – GOVERNANCE
C.1. Do our policymakers consider sustainable Development? 1.1a Are We Improving Governance by Trial and Error? The evolution of better management of human societies has been, and still is, a very long rocky road, and it will go on being rocky. Humanity is now facing the challenge of wider-scaled instabilities in the financial, political, environmental,…
Read MoreCHAPTER 2 – COMMUNICATION
1. CAN WE IMPROVE CREDIBILITY? 1.a. Expansion of Communication. What humans communicate has remained relatively constant compared with how we communicate. For most of human existence since the development of language, communication was face to face. Methods for memorization (including all the kinds of sound patterning like rhythm, alliteration, and rhyme that mostly now belong…
Read MoreCHAPTER 1 – DEFINITIVE CHALLENGES
1. Human Predicament 1.1a Resource Debt The planet’s human societies and its ecosystems are experiencing strong destabilizing trends to which national governments are not adequately responding. The root causes of these trends are global overpopulation and overconsumption. Overpopulation is increasing the demand for consumption, and overconsumption is reducing the supply of renewable natural resources to…
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