Along with an estimated 2 billion people worldwide, I watched at least part of the Al Gore inspired July 7, 2007 Live Earth concert.
Per its web site “Live Earth is a project of the SOS (Save Our Selves) campaign (that) is using a powerful multimedia platform – short films, television and radio PSAs, an interactive web experience, books, the Live Earth concerts themselves – to provide a global audience with the tools to tackle the climate crisis.”
Opinion: Reflections on Live Earth, Save Our Selves, and ‘Limits to Growth’
The July 7 concert launched “a multi-year campaign led by the Alliance for Climate Protection, The Climate Group and other international organizations to drive individuals, corporations and governments to take action to solve global warming.”(1)
During the concert I didn’t hear population growth mentioned as a major contributor to global warming; nor does the web site mention population growth as a major contributor. However, global warming solutions cannot Save Our Live Earth unless we “tackle” population control solutions.
The most compelling world ecology book published in our era is the Club of Rome’s 1972 “Limits to Growth,” which predicts that unless exponential economic and demographic growth are curtailed at sustainable levels, our world system will suffer a catastrophic collapse in the 21st century.(2)
The book was substantially updated in 1992 with the publication of “Beyond the Limits.”(3) In 2004 its World3 computer model and predictive scenarios were further refined in “Limits to Growth, The 30-Year Update.” Its publication was delayed by the 2001 death of revered senior author Donella Meadows.(4)
The book and its Club of Rome research team were severely criticized and widely discredited by politicians, economists, corporate flacks, and especially anti-population control clerics. But 35 years later its scientific scenarios are proving to be ominously prophetic.
Indeed, global warming accelerated by unchecked global capitalism is already reaching the “overshoot” stage; and its undeniable damage is being further accelerated by unchecked population growth–which Gore and associates have virtually ignored in media events I’ve witnessed.
Per the U.S. Census Bureau, world population is projected to increase by 50 percent from 6 billion in 1999 to 9 billion in 2042.(5) That’s only 35 years from now! So unless we creatively commit ourselves to curtailing live birth, we cannot credibly celebrate Live Earth.
———-
[Please note: If any URL doesn’t link, cut and paste the title to Google.]
(1) “Live Earth”
http://www.liveearth.org
(2) “Facing the Limits to Growth”
http://www.alternet.org/module/printversion/18978
(3) “Beyond the Limits to Growth: Confronting Global Collapse, Envisioning a Sustainable Future”
http://www.context.org/ICLIB/IC32/Meadows.htm
(4) “Limits to Growth: The 30-Year Update”
http://www.mnforsustain.org/meadows_limits_to_growth_30_year_update_2004.htm
(5) “World Population Information”
http://www.census.gov/ipc/www/world.html
Comment