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251 sats \ 1 reply \ @denlillaapan 13 Dec \ on: Let's talk growth, baby #13 BTC teacher in Fiat Madland alter_native
edit: ok, this got long. Soz
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  1. For somebody approaching growth and the environment (=_reality) from a climate change/nature/geography/resource-use point of view, I'd start with Andrew McAfee's More from Less. (self-promotion, here's my review of the book).
It's a little dated (2019) so there exist better and updated figures ofc, but on the upside google tells me the book exists in German: https://www.amazon.de/-/en/Mehr-aus-weniger-%C3%BCberraschende-Geschichte/dp/3421048460 If nothing else, I stole a couple of graphs (and probably McAfee has made them available via MIT too) that you can use.
  1. there are plenty of resources(!) showing energy use and resource extraction in relation to GDP. Either those things are positively correlated, like with energy use (=read, fossil fuels). There's a chapter in Deaton's book too about it (The Great Escape), but perhaps more on happiness/well-being -- don't recall.
Goods and services do not miraculously appear on store shelves or in Amazon warehouses. Energy is used along with other inputs to transform natural resources into goods and services. It is not surprising therefore that there is a general positive relationship between energy use per capita and GDP per capita. (Boston University, "Visualizing Energy", https://visualizingenergy.org/what-is-the-relationship-between-energy-use-and-economic-output/)
...or we get more economic bang for our resource bucks:
In 2023, global energy consumption increased at a slower rate than the global GDP (+2.2% and around +3%, respectively) (Enerdata, which I believe used to be the widely used BP Statistical Review of World Energy)
  1. I would use the widely compiled and aggregated numbers and charts in Superabundance.
Just reading the intro chapters there make it abundantly(!) clear that economic growth and standards of living increase with resource use -- that is, Malthus has been wrong for two-hundred years. Or listen to any of Elon's population takes recently: we need more people, not fewer.
  1. For a clash-of-visions take here, I'd go with Charles Mann's The Wizard and the Prophet.
Tons of interviews online (highly recommend the Freakonomics ones). Doesn't look like it exists in German, but there probably is a high-profile German magazine take on it.
  1. oh, yes exercise for the Stackers too: land use.
Look up Hannah Ritchie's graphs, and have the class _calculate out the amount of arable/livable land in the world, and what portion of them are currently used for what.
If you come to the conclusion that we, somehow, don't have enough land you failed both math and basic humanity.
Tl;dr -- kids, tell those other teachers to ROYALLY FUCK OFF. They are uneducated imbeciles, don't pay attention to them.
Now, perhaps Mr. @Shugard is trying to fool you -- who knows? Then don't trust, but go freakin verify.
Keep an open mind that it COULD BE that all these schmucks are wrong about something, big or small.
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10 sats \ 0 replies \ @Shugard OP 13 Dec
tell those other teachers to ROYALLY FUCK OFF.
This is the advice I'm going to give out of context :D Take the 100 sats for reminding me that I have "More from Less" on my bookshelf!
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