4 environmental 'heresies' | Stewart Brand
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- čas přidán 12. 07. 2009
- www.ted.com The man who helped usher in the environmental movement in the 1960s and '70s has been rethinking his positions on cities, nuclear power, genetic modification and geo-engineering. This talk at the US State Department is a foretaste of his major new book, sure to provoke widespread debate.
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Unlike many environmentalists, including other famous ones like David Suzuki, Stewart Brand lacks the ugly misanthropic vibe that they give off. Often their environmentalism is a channel for a discomfort with people and modernity that stems from other psychological issues or an ego trip about how awful we all are. The feeling that we need to 'pay' for what we have done also stems from similar sources.
Brand, however, seems to genuinely like people and want us to prosper. We didn't plan on putting ourselves in such a bind, all we wanted was to create better lives for ourselves and our children through material prosperity. That drove the Industrial Revolution and modernity. A lot of people don't realize how wretched life was for most of society before the Industrial Age. We wanted to change that.
can you give me any links to that microreactor you were talking about in the lines above?
Yes I'm well aware of breeding, grafting, etc. That occurs within a certain temporal evolutionary framework.
I mean to point out that even subtle changes can have drastic results in the end product. I only hope we fully comprehend what we are doing, and are asking the ethical questions.
I am reminded of a vine which grows nearby. The form which twists clockwise is innocuous and safe to eat.
The form with twists counterclockwise has a much higher concentration of toxic compounds and is unsafe to consume.
The difference genetically being very small.
This makes me ponder GM. Do we comprehend the strings attached to GM modification?
Just something to ponder.
anyone knows how to get that video from the train in bangkok?
Brand is a clever guy with sound demographic and technical analysis. What I admire about him most though is his sheer patience. He never resorts to disgusted invective when faced with the sheer ignorance and lack of realism evident in mainstream environmentalism, not to mention the ageist and misandrist backlash against his personality. I was once the sort of Green who thought guys like Brand were creeps, capitalistic, pale male corporate shills and what have you. There are still legitimate debates to be had about the political hue of green modernity but its technical form has now simply been finalized in the minds of the informed and lucid. Urbanization, nuclear, GMOs and geoengineering all have their roles to play in it.
+ffffffffffff I don't see misandrism regarding Brand. Ageism to some degree maybe. But most famous environmentalists are men, and most of the founders of the various environmental organizations are men. By far the biggest backlash against Brand is due to his Bright Green thinking and avoidance of fatalistic and *misanthropic* (huge difference) diatribes.
Finally! A sane environmentalist! Listen to this guy, y'all^^
Stew is a great speaker and has lived a long and interesting life.
I think the least controversial method of geoengineering is the direct removal of CO2 from the atmosphere using giant filters, algae beds, or other methods. All we would be doing is taking out what we put in in the first place. The catch is that it is expensive and requires a source of clean energy to power the process, or it is a self-defeating proposition.
Beautiful talk; well done TED, as always!
Whole Earth Catalog. I owned one from about the age of 11 and it made me appear very cool at school.
at 4:24 why did he make a point of the music and videos being pirated? Copyright is on the way out anyway.
@1:11 Is that Hans Rosling in the first row? :)
@polymath7
He once called Rand an "exciting figure" who had influenced his thinking.
He is a significant founding figure in the environmental movement.
He is also the founder of "TED talks".
That kind of intellectual honesty is enough to make any partisan's head explode.
A lot of food for thought here. Stewart Brand is an iconoclastic thinker and he's also on the cutting edge of things. I'm looking forward to this book.
It may be the lesser of many evils, but it is still "evil" nonetheless. For one, we havent even decided (in the US) on where to put the nuclear waste. Politics chose the worse place possible based on no scientific evidence and now it has been determined it is not ideal for nuclear storage. So now all the nuclear plants store their waste on site. I would not want to live near a nuclear reactor, especially one that has nuclear waste on site. Subsidies attempt to make them cheap, to no avail.
We haven't decided because of radiophobia. Here are the facts. Over 96% of nuclear "waste" will be reusable in advanced Gen IV reactors to produce energy for a thousand years with no more need for mining.. There has been ZERO fatalities from nuclear waste. The amount of nuclear waste on the entire planet could fit on a football field. The idea that the radiation levels of nuclear waste will be dangerous for thousands of years is untrue for the simple reason that, the longer the half life, the less the radiation intensity.
My main crop goal would be sustainability.
The primary purpose to feed people. Not just "fill their bellies" but really, actually feed them. Nutrient rich food, which can sustain human life. Corn is not nutrient rich. Soy is, but cannot sustain life by itself, and is difficult to digest.
So, I recommend something more dynamic. We have a whole planet full of edible plants that can grow in a variety of conditions. This is our resource for the future.
Solar charges batteries for the night. One of the big problems we have is that so few house and office surfaces collect energy. This would mean we'd all run on home power in the day or store it when away. But at night network power boosted by stations (solar, nuke, wind, whatever) keep us going without worry.
Great quotes at the end. We have to all take responsibility of our power as an entire species.
Nice tie!
Your statement about the great depression perfectly reflects your conviction, that mankind could only prosper by using up its finit resources as fast as possible and that overpopulation was a local phenomenon. Prosperity is measured per capita and not by total numbers. In my "dream world" last borns don't have to leave their families' farms to go to the city and work in a sweat shop or prostitute themselves. Why? Because they will not be born. We need more education, not more people.
@JohnnyRawhide I used to think urbanization and and slums were problems that we had to fix. I thought that the farmers were tricked into moving to the cities and then stuck in poverty. After reading Brand's book I've learned not to fear those words. He never argues that slums are "ideal", he just points out that they grow for very natural reasons (not due to greedy rich people), and that they bring some new challenges with them.
Anybody else at 11:43 think "wait 1.2 gigawatts... that's almost 1.21 GIGAWATTS!!!!"
@flamifer1 There have been two periods in human history when mankind's energy consumption have gone down: The great depression and the bubonic plague. The kind of world you dream of isn't anywhere people would want to live.
This was 12 years ago. And the fuel prices are going higher.
Yes, I agree. The other part that will be a hassel about Nuclear waste is disposing it. From what I have read that for a safe and effective nuclear waste site there must be a clearence of at least a 1/2 mile or close to a kilometer radius around the site. Also that site can never be developed because toxic waste as far as we know lasts forever. So basicly we are loosing land because of this. Now the obvious solution is just send all the waste towards the sun but that is expensive...
Great Video 5/5 stars
I wouldn't use corn or soy. Corn requires too much nitrogen to be a feasible drought area crop.
For dry areas, I would use Pigeon Peas and Moringa trees. These offer far better nutrition, and are long lived. All parts of moringa are edible too.
I would also recommend many edible hibiscus species, as well as a quinoa or amaranth which are more draught tolerant than soy.
These companies know this. They stick with soy for the demand of the market, not the versatility of the species / product.
Putting nuclear on he same page as coal shows your gulf in understanding of thermodynamics. Granted solar panels are getting better, but the problem is the relative output. Yes the sun is free, but the number of panels you'd have to make to match the output of even a small nuclear reactor is phenomenal, and definitely wouldn't be free... And there will always be your problem! x
Far better than than many who criticize them would imagine. Humanity has been creating GM organisms for thousands upon thousands of years using a slower and more round-about method of directed selective breeding rather than single generation direct changes to the genetic code. We lacked the tools to do it ourselves - so we waited on nature to do it, then promoted those species with genes and traits we desired.
It's nothing new, but the understanding of how it works is.
backup? I'm interested in reading about rogue genes.
Yes his comparison of waste per capita was plain wrong.
He only counted the two cans of nuclear waste and NOT the huge amount of carbon that comes with processing the waste in a safe way.
this video needs to be updated. it hasn't played well for quite some time.
"What does the companies backing bio-engineered crops have to do with the crops themselves?"
are you serious? thats like saying what does mcdonalds have to do with making fake food.
id rather have free power during the day when 90% of energy is being used.
here in CA people are converting to solar fast. to be off the grid is just one of many advantages of this.
in fact some electric companies are leasing peoples rooftops for solar power stations.
As for GM, the yields would be achievable by regular agriculture, but would use a far greater area of land. If people are going to keep shagging, we need to feed them whilst impacting as little of the land surface as possible. It's thesame reason they grow tomatoes in greenhouses... The more land we leave undisturbed for natural ecosystems, the more chance the Earth has to fight back using it's own mechanisms. This is the same reason why wind farms aren't viable: Too much land stolen from naure!
Pigeon peas are a small tree. Moringa is not very tropical, it's subtropical, I grow it here in southwest FL, but it is grown in GA year round. It begins to die back at temps around 26F. It is dried- root, beans & leaves.
Moringa = not an option in undeveloped nations? But that's where it comes from! It is widely recognized in India and Africa as an ideal food tree as it is so versatile. There are standing plantations.
Kenaf hibiscus is also another species thats prolific, edible, versatile.
"if you still are choosing to live a "gmo" free life, I'm afraid you'll be stuck with just wild mushrooms and berries, as well as maybe deer, or squirrel..."
I have to disagree with this caricature. There is prolific food in nature if one knows how to properly identify and/or prepare it. If I walk out my door right now I will find sorrel, wild lettuce, purslane, cranberry hibiscus, & wild muscadine. It's a matter of what you know.
This is why I stress both education, and a diversity of plants.
Terrestrial supply means nothing.
What matters is how much is accessible at a reasonable cost.
Also, your estimate is probably based on the assumption that consumption rates stay constant.
On the other hand, the estimates I read (a long time ago, and that I can't remember precisely) probably hadn't factored in the increased efficiency of 3rd gen power plants.
Still, price of uranium went from 14$ (Inflation adjusted) to 45$ in 15 years, and the 100$+peak means it can get high fast.
natetruth, Almost every food crop we grow today is a "genetically modified" organism, bred over centuries by farmers to produce higher yeilds. Many of them are diploid and tetraploid strains. If we had to depend on naturally occuring root stocks, agriculture as it exists would not be economic or possible. GM shorcuts the process by centuries, moving pre-existing genes from plants to plants lacking them. That process happens in nature too, via mutation, it just takes millenia and is more random.
Yes; I already use some brown kelp extracts. Phenomenal science to be had from algae & seaweeds. Mineral dense.
One of the few things that will stabilize the chlorophyll in this beach-sand soil I have to work with. Excellent stuff.
Energy storage is an unsolved problem and an achilles heel of solar.
You either lose most of the energy you attempt to store(hydrogen+fuel cell), pay through the nose and use up precious rare earths(batteries), function only in a few specific locations(pumped hydro), can't cope with large scale storage(SMES, capacitors), can't make the economics work without natural gas(CAES) or can't scale fast enough to matter(flywheels).
It's unfortunate that he doesn't mention the negative implications of spreading sulfur compounds in the atmosphere - acid rain from sulfuric acid is hard enough on our health, crops, infrastructure, and surrounding ecology in the levels we have it now (and coal power plants are a major contributor so lessening coal power generation will help enormously).
do some more homework on this guy. he does more good than most people on this earth.
Not encouraging people to collect wild food; only saying there is a diversity of prolific crops ecumenically; resources to be tapped. We are only familiar with corn & soy.
Yes, GM also threatens biodiversity -- the lesson of biology is that diversity ensures the adaptability of a species. Monoculture does not seem like the wisest path to go down, in fact I would recommend more area-specific practices, with attention paid to keeping the gene pool intact.
We can also breed all sorts of things from heirloom seeds. Mankind already has. They always leave that point out. These companies want a cutting edge product which they can patent.
Yes. It is cumulative. The US hasn't done many serious studies on the subject.
The skeptic in me says "well, there are plenty of perfectly organic, naturally occurring toxins as well..." Which is true, of course.
However, I err on the side of health with this one. It's too crucial to be careless with my health. This is why I grow my own food. It's better for you, you learn about nature & resources, and you are in control every step of the way.
Yet another fluffy TED talk romanticizing the devastating situation of the poor. If it's so good and hopeful why don't you join them??... Sometimes it is OK (and more helpful) to feel bad for fellow human beings as opposed to trying to put a positive spin on every miserable thing to make ourselves feel better about our fortunate lives.
Yes, that is a fact to take in consideration.
But nuclear is really the only "green" energy source we have, next to hydro, but not everyone can have hydro power. So, until the technology comes along, we really have no choice.
"We need to get some broad based support,
to capture the public's imagination...
So we have to offer up scary scenarios,
make simplified, dramatic statements
and make little mention of any doubts...
Each of us has to decide what the right balance
is between being effective and being honest."
- Prof. Stephen Schneider,
Stanford Professor of Climatology,
lead author of many IPCC reports
Many costs for nuclear power have been deliberately underestimated by government and industry such as the costs for the permanent disposal of nuclear wastes, the "decommissioning" (shutting-down and cleaning-up) of retired nuclear power plants, and nuclear accident consequences. In January, 1994, Commonwealth Edison acknowledged that it had to nearly double its estimate for reactor decommissioning -- from $2.3 billion to as much as $4.1 billion! see N.E.I.S.
On the "financial crisis"
If we don't overthrow capitalism, we don't have a chance of
saving the world ecologically. I think it is possible to have
an ecologically sound society under socialism.
I don't think it is possible under capitalism"
- Judi Bari,
principal organiser of Earth First!
"Isn't the only hope for the planet that the
industrialized civilizations collapse?
Isn't it our responsiblity to bring that about?"
- Maurice Strong,
founder of the UN Environment Program
Yes; chiefly I speak of efforts toward long-term sustainability. In that, we can't keep mining phosphorous from the earth, it's already very depleted, and most of it mined in the US is sold to China. Nor can we rely so much on corn which demands higher nitrogen and water, grown in an area of the US where water tables are lowering year after year. Needless to say we're due for some problem solving, and I hope it will be conceived in a sustainability-oriented sort of thinking.
What can be any safer than solar panels on every house's roof?
It's yet not very efficient or stable, but possibly because it's not used massively yet.
That's ridiculous. Free energy is available right now. And he gave a very one-sided explanation of genetic engineering. It's a red flag anytime you hear a word like heresy in relation to science. And let's make sure not to change what we're doing, no, let's just put SO2 into the air to compensate and continue on the our current unstastainable path. What will the long term effects be for putting a billion dollars worth of SO2 in the air?
The earth is changing.
I only wish corporations were not in control of this endeavor. There is a conflict of interest here, where money is being made in contracting to feed hungry people. A great potential for future tyranny, and for shortsight.
They had better know damn well what they are doing, be adamant about the details, and be asking the ethical questions. We have a lot of people to feed, and an uncertain future ahead of us.
That would increase my approval of what these biotech companies are doing considerably.
precisely. people confuse aesthetics with pollution too.
Yes; developed nations is a different story. Though with "undeveloped" we have a chance to design/model more dynamic & diverse farming practices. Monoculture in any form needs to be more sustainable in terms of where the fertilizers come from. It's a bubble economy, needing to be re-sourced, re-thought. I'm sure there are people working on it. We do have good scientists here, I just wish it wasn't all so tangled with profitability is all.
Yes; I know.
I envision the future taking advantage of a dynamic farming ecosystem, not monoculture, but rather a mixture of plants whose biological activity supports the growth of the other, as well as nutrient cycling in the soil.
This is entirely feasible, given what we know. The only hurdle is changing the momentum of the market. The market is determining that people are to eat "corn" or "soy" ... and that we are to grow it with the industrial age methods.
I think we're smarter than this.
Corn and soy are successful for their ease of growth, and their yield in a certain farm setting.
I'm thinking differently. People wouldn't have to buy pigeon peas or moringa. They can be planted practically anywhere to provide food. It is as important to spread education as it is to spread genetic material to feed people.
Is the answer more soy & corn farms? Or more farmers and a diversity of crops for a diversity of conditions?
I guess this is the question on my mind.
Because fossil fuels, nuclear and hydro don't need any storage to provide reliable power.
I can't post links so I'll PM you a link to the graph of wind power aggregated over the entirety of Germany.
LOL @ Bangkok. Fantastic. We should do that in the UK. Our trains never turn up...
1. Solars price drops at least Three-fold every decade, and has been doing so since 1970,
2. This year solar power reached parity with grid-delivered retail electricity to residential and commercial users if produced on large-scales, ie not just on your familys roof, where it costs twice as much.
3. By or before 2020, Solar will be as cheap as or cheaper than Coal, Oil, Nuclear, or natural Gas (King CONG), even at point of production utility grade wholesale electricity
Nuclear is the lesser of many evils. The waste is minimal, and radiation doesn't kill people in the way people think. Sites of natural radioactivity actually have more biodiversity than would otherwise be expected, hence Chernobyl has already reforested itself, and there's talk of making it into a National Park to make some money back through tourism. Even if you lived there, the increased radiation exposure would take roughly 7 days of your life expectancy, as opposed to 7 years if you smoke...
You'r assuming previous technological efficiency, when nanoscaling and other method are already a reality.
Solar plants are already powering 13% of LA.
The very need for batteries only pertains to off grid installations, and the size of the battery has to do with it's energy density, which again is distributed.
Even today we are not even close to the efficiency of photosynthesis, and this ultimate solution will keep on getting better still.
"I believe it is appropriate to have an 'over-representation' of the facts
on how dangerous it is, as a predicate for opening up the audience."
- Al Gore,
"It doesn't matter what is true,
it only matters what people believe is true."
- Paul Watson,
co-founder of Greenpeace
"Unless we announce disasters no one will listen."
- Sir John Houghton,
first chairman of IPCC
"The common enemy of humanity is man.
In searching for a new enemy to unite us, we came up
with the idea that pollution, the threat of global warming,
water shortages, famine and the like would fit the bill. All these
dangers are caused by human intervention, and it is only through
changed attitudes and behavior that they can be overcome.
The real enemy then, is humanity itself."
- Club of Rome,
premier environmental think-tank,
consultants to the United Nations
Очень интересно, спасибо.
Not if the nuclear waste is handled well, which is expensive and takes carbon again.
Lots of energy made by a nuclear plant is wasted on it's expensive deconstruction. Promoters of nuclear energy tend to forget that.
Well if anything, the next decades are going to be very interesting.
Well well well...
I think simple electric accu replacement systems are starting to look great now.
Sure you can't travel long distances with it, but most people don't really do that, they drive from the same spot to the same place every day.
Not twisting your words man. Your point is sound, so apply it: Abundance makes things free, so how do you make so many cheap solar panels that they will out perform a nuclear reactor?
people against nuclear power please explain your reasoning because I have not heard 1 good argument against it.
I can see slums being encouraged in the assumption that they can improve to sustainable communities that can still manage to have a high living standard. This may be possible with government/industry aid.
"until governments make it (coal and oil) expensive, it won't change" Has he never heard of the invisible hand of free markets? I usually find that academics such as this guy thinks of populations and people in mass. Rather than giving credit to individuals making life better by trade and opportunity.
I like the idea of solar and wind power because it is renewable. Rich countries, like the United States, could create so much wind and solar power plants that electricity could be free.
It won't be, but it could be.
@geezzerboy Freedom is so crazy isn't it
"No matter if the science of global warming is all phony...
climate change provides the greatest opportunity to
bring about justice and equality in the world."
- Christine Stewart,
former Canadian Minister of the Environment
The data doesn't matter. We're not basing our recommendations
on the data. We're basing them on the climate models.
- Prof. Chris Folland,
Hadley Centre for Climate Prediction and Research
please change "not irrevocable" into "irrevocable"
and you're back to holding your own. Nice development.
credibility is a very complicated equation. One would look for extraordinary accomplishments, but people don't know which ones are important. What we do now is that most people have nothing to say, and even those who do have something to say, it is often incomplete. To make matters worse, no one ever asks me.
*Brand is just engaging with ideas of the future and
when are the micro reactors coming? :(
Ontario?
"GM foods? which have not been thoroughly evaluated!"
--crimson
That is not 100% true. It used to be that GM foods were waved by by the FDA. However, nowadays you need to go through the same level of rigorous testing that medicine goes through when you want to market a new GM strain.
thinking things people would rather shy away about and deny ahem climate change and the link with fossil fuels.
This is pretty sweet.
Really? A major new report on the French reprocessing program from the International Panel on Fissile Materials finds that it does not reduce volume of radioactive waste and would have to be half its current cost to be economically competitive with storage of the waste, thus undercutting the Bush administrations major arguments for reprocessing. May 14, 2008.
ipfmlibrary rr04.pdf
Anti-genetic engineering has always struck me as being particularly irrational. Humans have been redesigning biological systems for THOUSANDS of years through artificial selection. We've simply found a faster way to do it now.
Are we interested in feeding people edible, nutritious food... or just corn and soy? Ecosystems are diverse and there is a plethora of edible plants right out in everyone's backyard. Everywhere you go in the world.
The crops you grow today are the product of thousands of years of selected breeding by farmers.
Its the same thing, the farmers got a lot smarter.
Sure.. but instead of driving a car, I can go by bike or walk. So I wouldn't risk to damage my environment. The current situation is to go by bus: For a high amount of people there are less drivers but with better experience and maintenance than each of the people's cars would have. And you are mostly as fast as a general car. The best way would be to take your bike with the bus and the bus filters the air before emitted, or might 'simply' use H2 instead of benzine or diesel!? How would that be?
So the small reactor is as dangerous as a big one.
cities mean supply lines, which are vulnerable and inefficient.
Yep. The Corporation was a scary ass movie. Really, the patents on life are, in my opinion, is what's really going to fuck us up.
Nuclear energy is looking better these days ( considering the options ). finding an alternative fuel for cars is still a big issue. CZcams " LIFE: laser initial fusion energy system.
it's too bad that people are writing you off as crazy. You're grammar isn't great and that detracts from your message. Keep working at it, we need people like you.
"the fuel is practically free compared to coal, oil, and gas."
It's still depleting quite fast... the price of uranium will rise.
On the other hand... there's loads of nukes lying around.
everything can be harmful if mishandled, thats where government regulations kick in. there are far too many benefits to be riped from GMO's as too be freaking out over crooked corporations. and up to date, it has done much more good than harm. its not so much a gamble as you present it to be.
informal economy = the free market
and if you want to know how it works, study austrian economics.
Basically what he says is, that we either have the choice between:
building nuclear power stations (for which we do not have the fuel), genetically altered food and a life in slums
or
birth control, solar energy, natural food and a life in a house with garden and swimming pool
I will go for birth control, thank you