The Crash Course: The Unsustainable Future Of Our Economy, Energy, And Environment

Technology is a means of exploiting energy more efficiently and effectively, but it is not a source of energy

The big story is this: The world has physical limits that we are already encountering, but our economy operates as if no physical limits exist. Our economy requires growth. I don’t mean that growth is “required” as if it’s written in a legal document somewhere, but it is “required” in the sense that our economy only functions well when it’s growing. With growth, jobs are created and debts can be serviced. Without growth, jobs, opportunities, and the ability to repay past debts simply and mysteriously disappear, causing economic pain and confusion.

Our current system of money was unsustainably designed—and it was destined for failure; I just didn’t know when.

The only world in which conventional economics makes any sense is in a world without limits, one where no resource constraints exist.

The primary question is whether we want our future to be shaped by disaster or by design.

All truth passes through three stages. First, it is ridiculed. Second, it is violently opposed. Third, it is accepted as being self-evident.
—Arthur Schopenhauer (1788–1860)

I don’t think we need new technologies, or revolutions, or dramatic breakthroughs in thoughts or ideas; we already have everything we need, save one thing: political will.

continued economic growth is both absolutely essential and also impossible: Essential because our economic system was designed to grow and performs horribly when it cannot, and impossible because nothing can grow forever. The implications are profound and numerous.

To calculate how long it will be before something doubles, all we need to do is divide the percentage rate of growth into the number 70. So if our investment were growing at 5 percent per year, then it would double in 14 years (70 divided by 5 equals 14).

Just as we don’t have to understand molecular biology in order to “know” about the process of aging, we can assess the trends in the economy, energy, and environment without having to know every detail.