6 Comments

I'm glad to read this article because I think it is important to call out "greenwashing". I don't understand what a modern version of a low energy lifestyle would be - if such a thing exists or its back to cave-dwelling?? Have also wondered how people hustling to make ends meet can be effective in either calling for change and living the change? Or maybe cynically/realistically, how many people really want to give up their cell phones which I think might be prioritized over food and shelter in our current society.

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blowing up mountains? that's not how you get lithium. it's extracted from desert salt flats with electricity... which can be green, lots of sun in the desert.

furthermore.. a huge breakthrough with graphene (made from carbon from hemp waste) makes aluminum ion batteries possible. 3x the storage per weight!

so batteries for everything would be made from unexotic, unmined carbon (from hemp waste) and aluminum. a plentiful easily recyclable metal.

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Jul 19, 2021Liked by Thomas Neuburger

Let's hope graphene/aluminum batteries develop into production soon!

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I have read the book. Prior to that I had read articles on the individual subjects discussed in Bright Green Lies. However, the book by uniting the data provided delivers a disastrous but correct narrative. I think the authors’ inner argument is for the extinction of the human animal because of its destructiveness. All of nature is symbiotic. Humankind alone of all species takes more from nature than it returns: it is anti-symbiotic. Absent that they clearly advocate reducing human society to small unconnected small groups. However, history of the last 10,000 years demonstrates that the competitive and ingenious nature of the human brain is determined to “defeat” any competitor to its existence whether virus, animal, nature as a whole or last but not least, other humans. So ...what is to be done?

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I agree with the authors' view that humanity will not voluntarily switch to a more sane and sustainable way of life, and so therefore the imperatives are to 1) stop the destruction whenever and however we can (preferably with a well-formed organization and well-thought-out strategy) and 2) try to save as much as we can of wild nature that is left so that there is something rather than nothing after we're gone. I've participated in direct actions, in legal efforts, in policy efforts... the latter, most recently by attempting to amend my county's charter with a Bill of Rights recognizing the Rights of Nature, and despite support for this by the county commission (and a recommendation that it be added would then go to the voters) this effort was shut down by the county prosecutor who said that it wasn't within the commissioners remit to make this recommendation -- even though it would go to the voters, and we have a home rule charter. And even if it had passed, how does one enforce such a thing? It is absolutely clear to me that legal and policy changes are FAR too slow, because we are at a crisis point.

I would prefer that humanity come to its collective senses and decide to make a plan to humanely de-growth human footprint on this Earth. We have massively overshot the carrying capacity for the human species on Earth, and, as William Catton so aptly says in Overshoot (another book I would urge *everyone* to read), we are living on "ghost acreage". A humane plan to de-grow and shift back to simpler, less consumptive ways of living would at least be a start. But do any of us here believe that humanity will voluntarily do that? That some global agreement will be made to do that? When all the global agreements related to the environment so far have utterly and completely failed? I do not.

Therefore that leaves us with few options, all of them unpleasant, but our only hope short of another more deadly pandemic, which obviously is absolutely NOT a humane way to go about reducing human footprint!

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author

Good question, Ric. Still sorting that out. The authors, or a set of people that includes the authors, has material under "dark green resistance," which I'm checking out now. Initial scanning contains some disquieting recommendations, which, of course, don't have to be agreed to even if the analysis makes sense.

This is the start of a series. I'll have more and I learn more. Thanks for the comment.

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