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permaculture - Re: [permaculture] Lovelock

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  • From: Ben Martin Horst <ben.martinhorst@gmail.com>
  • To: permaculture <permaculture@lists.ibiblio.org>
  • Subject: Re: [permaculture] Lovelock
  • Date: Thu, 06 Jul 2006 11:27:25 -0700

webmaster@pfaf.org wrote:
We're not all fucked! Certainly those of us in the west are going to be
more protected from the effects than Bangladesh and other poorer
countries. Its also possible that permaculture plots may be more
resilient to the changes than conventional growers. Both Gaia theory and
permaculture suggest that a more diverse eco-system will be less fragile.

I would argue that those of us in the "West" (ie, those of us with relative wealth) are not going to be "more protected" from the effects of climate change, although we may perhaps be more able to escape the effects of individual climate-change-related disasters. Meaning, Florida and Long Island will be just as soggy as Bangladesh and Bikini, even if Floridians have more means to escape individual flooding events than the average Bangladeshi. Then again, the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina may indicate that USonians really won't be that much better off.

In the long run, accumulated monetary wealth is going to have a negligible impact on survival. Much more important will be adaptability and networks of friends, kin, or like-minded people ... characteristics that are arguably lacking in much of the "West." And long term, networks and adaptability are going to be much more valuable in the promulgation and success of permaculture than monetary wealth. I suspect that five hundred years from now, the descendants of today's "Third World" populations will have coped with climate change at least as well as Westerners.

Ben




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