A Tale of Two Farms: by Jared Diamond

Why do some societies thrive and others fail? What has happened to the civilizations that just randomly abandoned their city? Did they die off or migrate to somewhere else? Jared Diamond addresses the collapse of societies in the book titled Collapse: How Societies Choose to Fail or Succeed. Diamond says that collapse is partly triggered by ecological problems. “People inadvertently destroying the environmental resources on which their societies depend.” I noted the use of the word “inadvertently” destroying, which suggests that the harm inflicted was not intentional. That may have been true for past civilizations but can we really say that about our society today? We are much more aware of what we use and what its impact is on our future. Diamond suggests that we may be closer to our collapse then we think. “The environmental problems facing us today include the same 8 that undermined past societies plus four new ones.” Seeing as we face the same problems and then some of collapsed civilizations, you would think we would be a little more cautious with the ways that we survive as a society.  But just because the past yielded one result does not necessarily mean that it will yield the same result for us, our problems are similar but not the same. However, it is important to understand the reasons behind the failure of societies so as not to repeat the same mistakes.  But in the efforts to understand the past collapses Diamond says there is one major controversy. “The controversy involves resistance to the idea that past peoples( Some of them known to be ancestral to people currently alive and vocal) did things that contributed to their own decline.  Because of the fact that they are conscious of the environment, then their ancestors must have been too. But there is more knowledge about the world today, and perhaps that’s why it’s seen as bad when we harm the environment, because it’s not inadvertent anymore. People don’t like to think that their ancestors were evil and flakey with the land.  A New Guinea hunter once told Diamond; “Only those evil modern First World inhabitants are ignorant of Nature, don’t respect the environment, and destroy it.” This I highly take offense in, as it puts the problem only on one specific population of peoples. We are all human and we all take a part in living on this earth, so the responsibility is all of ours. One of the things that Diamond talks about, which first world countries have in common, is big businesses. These corporations are not seen as good for the environment, and many are seen as greedy, power hungry people. So when Diamond studies these corporations, environmentalists say he has sold out to them. He rationalizes his actions by saying “My view is that, if environmentalists aren’t willing to engage with big businesses, which are among the most powerful forces in the modern world, it won’t be possible to solve the world’s environmental problems.” Many people when they don’t like something they stay far enough away, using an emotional reasoning for it. But Diamond uses logical reasoning, and I couldn’t agree more. It’s not possible to change the world on your own, you always need a following and who larger then these corporations. Who is more likely to have power, the greedy power hungry, or the civilians? The answer is obvious that these corporations have more power than I do in swaying or creating change.  I can sit here all day long and complain about how the monetary system seems to rule everything, and the top CEO’s of these companies have more money then 1/3 of the U.S, but that won’t do anything. It is what it is, and getting these businesses to be more aware is definitely the key to environmental change. 

The Picture at the top depicts what is known as "The Venus Project." 

  

The Venus Project proposes an alternative vision of what the future can be if we apply what we already know in order to achieve a sustainable new world civilization. It calls for a straightforward redesign of our culture in which the age-old inadequacies of war, poverty, hunger, debt and unnecessary human suffering are viewed not only as avoidable, but as totally unacceptable. Anything less will result in a continuation of the same catalogue of problems inherent in today's world. Today many people believe what is needed is a higher sense of ethical standards and the enactment of international laws to assure a sustainable global society.

a link to the website can be found here http://www.thevenusproject.com/