Jay Allan Storey's Blog

It seems that every time I go to facebook, or read the news on the Internet, or watch it on TV, there are more and more advocates trotting out reasons why Climate Change is a myth – why it isn’t really happening, or why it isn’t a serious threat. Despite decades of warnings and reams of scientific data, commentators say we’re just witnessing normal changes in weather, or cycles of the sun, or any number of other denier favourites. Climate Change has become a lightning rod, a symbol of the ‘elite’ trying to con ordinary citizens (of which, in fact, I am one) into false beliefs.

Climate Change is real, and the Climate Change deniers are liars, every single one of them. They’re not just mistaken, they’re deliberately lying. Why would anyone do that? Because they’re worried that the changes to our way of life required to combat Climate Change will interfere with their ability to make money. And guess what – on this, they are correct. But here’s the thing – even if by some miracle it was proven that the world wasn’t getting warmer, or that the change wasn’t that serious, or that it wasn’t due to human production of CO2, we would still be in the midst of an existential emergency.

I hate to burst the apologists’ balloons, but Climate Change is only one of many existential threats being inflicted on our planet by our over-consumptive civilization. Here are some more:

Mass Extinction – this hasn’t directly impacted us yet (other than the tragic loss of many of Earth’s beautiful creatures), but it will. We are dependent on the other lifeforms on this planet to live ourselves.Deforestation – plants and trees are critically important to all life on Earth. Among other things, they generate that oxygen that we breathe. And breathing is important.Over-fishing – this is related to threat #1, in that eventually it will severely deplete all life in the sea. No life in the sea, no life for us.Plastic-filled Oceans – as above.Air, water, and soil pollution – Breathing problems and medical issues will continue to increase, not only for us, but for all life on Earth.Oil Scarcity – As of this moment, the Permian basin in the USA is the last remaining major source of oil that hasn’t peaked. And it’s expected to peak by the end of this decade. From then on, as in a deadly game of musical chairs, governments will be fighting each other for this constantly dwindling resource, a resource that not everybody will be able to have. So-called ‘renewables’ can power some kind of civilization, but certainly not the one we’re living in now.Resource Scarcity – oil isn’t the only thing becoming scarce. Natural gas, phosphoros, coal, even water, face severe scarcity in the near future.Soil Depletion – the soil of most of the world’s farms has lost much of its ability to support crops. It is currently heavily supplemented with fertilizers made with Ammonia – a product created primarily from – guess what? Natural Gas.And of course, Climate Change.

There are actually many more threats, the above is only a list of some the most important ones. So here’s a message for those who cling to the belief that if they can somehow ‘prove’ that Climate Change is a myth, everything will be fine – it won’t.

We’ll still be headed for disaster.

One final note – arguing about whether or not we should make the required changes to our civilization is actually moot. Why? Because these changes are going to happen, whether we make them or not. The only question is whether we proactively make them ourselves, or whether we bury our heads in the sand until Mother Nature does it for us. If we choose to do it, we can probably engineer some kind of soft landing. If we wait, the result could be catastrophic.

Photo 4720429 ©
Steve Silver Smith | Dreamstime.com

In several of my past blog posts, I’ve tried to point out that human overconsumption is at the root of almost all of the Earth’s environmental problems: wildlife extinction, air and water pollution, plastic-filled oceans, even Climate Change.

I’m reasonably sure that, for various reasons, many people who have read those blog entries haven’t believed what I’m saying.

To that, I say – Good!

Being a skeptic, and a critical thinker, is good. I not only don’t mind if you don’t take my word, I would encourage you not to. If you’re reading this blog post, you are a human being capable of thinking for yourself and making your own decisions. You shouldn’t take my word for anything, but you also shouldn’t take the word of some hillbilly sitting at a computer in his basement spouting theories with no scientific basis whatsoever. You should use your own analytical human mind to decide if either of our points of view is correct.

There is only one image I would ask you to consider. It is very simple, not at all political, and not attached to any ideology whatsoever. It is simple physics.

Say you had an ordinary bucket full of water, and every day you removed a single cupful. What I am asking you to consider is this: would that bucket someday be empty? You shouldn’t need me to tell you the answer.

To understand our environmental predicament, the concept I just outlined is really all you need to know. If you have a finite resource (that is, one that has a limit), and you continue reducing it, eventually it will reach zero. That is true of a basket of apples, a bucket of water, a plain full of buffalo, an ocean full of whales, an atmosphere full of clean air, or a planet full of oil and minerals.

What if someone came along and claimed that the bucket would never be empty, no matter how much water was removed? Would you believe them? Would you blindly take their word as the truth, or would you use your powers of reasoning to work out the answer for yourself.

A lot of voices out there claim that environmental impact is very complex, that you shouldn’t think too hard, just take their word for the truth. It’s not. At its root, it’s very simple. It’s easy to work it out for yourself. I’m no mental giant, and there was actually a time when I didn’t understand it either, but eventually I worked it out. You can too.

So don’t listen to me. Listen to your analytical mind and your common sense. Do that and you will know the truth. And nobody, not me or anybody else, will be able to mislead you.

Photo 15795368 © Denisart | Dreamstime.com

The most common definition given in dictionaries is:

“the ways of thinking, feeling, and acting that are common to most people”

And the most common viewpoint is that ‘you can’t change human nature’, that trying to do anything that goes against it is like swimming against the tide, and destined to fail.

But what are the natural ways of thinking, feeling and acting common to most people? Modern perception is that humans are, at their core, selfish and greedy, caring little for the welfare of others, and obsessed with the acquisition of ever more money and possessions. They would never endure even the slightest inconvenience in order to benefit the world at large. That belief is currently so pervasive that few would even consider the possibility that it could be wrong.

But could that perception be wrong?

There’s an old quote: ‘History is written by the Victors’, meaning that whoever wins in a particular conflict has the power to define that conflict for the history books. Our modern history comes to us through TV, the movies, and the Internet. So, who are the ‘victors’ on those platforms? They are the people who are in a position to influence their content, either through absolute ownership, or through the supply of essential advertising. What do these people, the moguls who control what we see and hear, all have in common?

First, they’re rich, basically by definition – and in most cases not just rich – they are stupendously wealthy. They are some of the wealthiest people on Earth. You don’t get to be rich by caring about people (except as customers), or by not caring about money, and you don’t become uber-wealthy without being greedy. Some might call it ambition – but what is the focus of their ambition? Curing cancer? Running the 3-minute mile? Ending world hunger? Writing a great symphony? No, their ambition is focused on one thing, and one thing only – making money. I don’t think that anyone would claim that these people ‘need’ the billions they have. So, the only explanation for them wanting ever more, far beyond what they can actually use, is greed.

Engineered Behaviour

It’s suspicious to me that the current view of human nature corresponds exactly to what those who make money from the status quo find desirable. Of course, it could be argued that those people are merely taking advantage of a fundamental drive of humanity to ‘get ahead’. But is that a fundamental drive of humanity? For many centuries people were content to live their lives, raise their children, and feed their families. They weren’t focused on constantly increasing their wealth, getting more pigs and cows, or getting an ever bigger farm.

Maybe human beings do have an innate desire for advancement. But what does advancement mean? Buddha wanted to improve himself, but as far as I know, he never cared about money. Any monk, or artist, or musician, or athlete, or scientist, may want to improve themselves. But are they strictly focused on making more money and accumulating more possessions? Or is their goal proficiency at whatever they’re passionate about. Money and fame might flow from their proficiency, but is that their only reason for pursuing it? I’m an independent author. I would love it if millions of people suddenly clamoured to buy my books. But that’s not the reason I write. And if all I wanted was to make money, I can think of a thousand ways that would be easier than being a writer.

I submit that the people who control our media have spent decades engineering the desire for money and possessions in the general population, because:

That is their personal mindset, so they believe that everyone should feel the same way. It’s in their interest for people to be grasping and greedy, envious of others’ possessions, and constantly wanting more. If people didn’t constantly want more, the ones selling the things they ‘want’ would barely eke out a living.

Why is human nature important?

Say I showed you a bucket full of water with a hole punched in the bottom, and asked you to predict WHEN that bucket would be empty. Could you do that? You could make a wild guess, but that’s all it would be, a guess.

But what if I asked you IF the bucket would be empty at some point in the future? In that case there wouldn’t be the slightest doubt – eventually, the water WILL be gone. How would you know? Because there’s finite amount of water in the bucket, and it’s dripping out at a regular rate. It’s impossible for it not to be emptied. The only question is when.

Our planet is in the exact same predicament. We are emptying it of resources at an alarming rate, much faster than they can be replenished. Like the water in the bucket, those resources are finite. It’s an extraordinarily complex system, so we can’t predict exactly WHEN we will run out, but there is no doubt  that it WILL happen. And everything that I see around me says that it will happen soon – probably within a decade.

When it happens, we will all be in big trouble.

And that’s where human nature becomes important. Because, in the very near future, all of us are going to be forced to do with far less. It won’t be a request – the planet is going to demand it. If, as the popular sayings go, you ‘can’t change human nature’, and that nature really is to constantly accumulate money and ‘stuff’, then forcing (not asking) people to accept less will be truly catastrophic.

But what if people’s attitudes could change? What if they could be convinced to forego the superfluous fluff that most of them don’t really need anyway, for the sake of a better future? The transition would still happen, but it would be much less destructive.

So, what is the truth about human nature? That is the most important question of all.

We’re constantly bombarded with gushing declarations of how ingenious and adaptable human beings are. If that’s true, then why can’t we adapt to a world where we use fewer resources? Why don’t we have the ingenuity to think of a way to live happily without accumulating all the useless crap that’s destroying the planet?

I think we do have those qualities. Yes, at our core, we are animals – with instinctual drives and natural tendencies. But we are thinking animals. We can choose to override those drives and tendencies, to do things that at first glance might not seem to be in our own interest, knowing that in the future they will make the world in general, and our own world in particular, a better place. I KNOW I can do that, and I know there are many others out there who feel the same way.

I think what’s required is for us to get past our decades of programming, and focus on what’s really important – our beautiful planet, the living world, personal happiness, some reasonable amount of security, and love. We don’t have to give up any of those things to live with fewer demands on the environment.

And despite what the ‘Alpha’ personalities would like you to believe, they are all we need.

Photo 24909775 © Kasto80 | Dreamstime.com

We see the banners, protests, and activist stunts everywhere, with the same message: Just Stop Oil.

At a certain level, I agree with that sentiment. I consider myself an environmentalist. In fact, I consider myself a ‘deep green’ environmentalist – someone who advocates some pretty extreme measures in order to save the planet.

But the people promoting some of these ideas really need to consider what they’re saying. For anybody who might just blindly accept the ‘Just Stop Oil’ slogan as a valid short-term goal, below is a (admittedly crude) description of what the world would be like if we ‘Stopped’ oil.

By stopping oil, I’m assuming they mean stop producing it, or using it or any of its by-products. Below is a list of the most important underpinnings of civilization that would be affected if oil was ‘stopped’:

INTERNATIONAL SHIPPING

Immediate Consequences

International shipping would plunge to zero. ALL ocean-going freighters use petroleum-based products to power their engines. There may be a few highly experimental large-scale ‘Green’ ships, but they are inconsequential.

Longer Term Consequences

If you think the supply chain issues are bad now – our current woes would look like a tiny blip in comparison. There would be virtually ZERO shipping between North America and  Europe, China, Japan, Taiwan, and Korea. Kiss your TVs, cars, iPhones, and cheap clothing, virtually anything produced by those countries, goodbye.

OVERLAND TRANSPORT

Immediate consequences

Transport by land would virtually cease. ALL semi-trucks and trains are powered by petroleum-based products. Again, there are experimental electric versions that may SOMEDAY be viable, but not for a long time.

Longer Term Consequences

What the halting of ships did to international shipping, the halting of land-based transport would do to local shipping. The supply-chains would truly be dealt a death blow. Materials and parts for manufactured products would be either completely unavailable or so expensive as to be unprofitable, so all manufacturing would grind to a halt. Millions would lose their jobs. And since a lot of food and medicine is hauled by train or truck, supplies of both would be completely choked off.

FOOD PRODUCTION

Immediate Consequences

Food production would plummet – world-wide. ALL farm machinery: tractors, combines, utility trucks, and delivery trucks, run on petroleum-based products. Farmers would be forced to return to the use of horses or oxen to plow and harvest their fields. As with everything else, there may eventually be electric replacements, but at the moment, there are none.Petroleum-based products are a vital component of fertilizers. Without those fertilizers, the yield of crops will be a fraction of what it is now. It’s estimated that something like half of the world would starve without them.

Longer Term Consequences

The drastic reduction in crop yields, the difficulties in plowing, planting, and harvesting, combined with the shutdown of international and local transportation, would quickly lead to world-wide famine. Millions, possibly billions, would die.

AIR TRANSPORT

Immediate Consequences

Air travel would plunge to zero. ALL large airplanes currently run on petroleum-based products. Again, the tiny number of experimental electric versions currently available are inadequate and inconsequential.

Longer Term Consequences

There would be no air travel, no visiting other countries. Nations dependent on tourism would go bankrupt. Millions of airline workers would be unemployed. And the one avenue of shipping not choked off by the halting of ships, trucks,  and trains, would also cease. Nothing would be shipped anywhere. Note that this would include life-saving supplies such as medicine.

PERSONAL TRANSPORTATION

Immediate Consequences

More than 90% of personal automobiles would have to be parked. Since a large percentage of the electricity for many areas of the world comes from petroleum based products, many (possibly all) electric ones would have to be parked as well. Since petroleum products are still used to mine the material used in electric vehicles, and the transportation system is used to ship them to factories, electric vehicle production – in fact all vehicle production, would cease.

Longer Term Consequences

Commuters would be forced to depend entirely on walking, bicycles, or electric public transit. Again, if the electricity supply is generated by petroleum products, even public transit would be unavailable. Asphalt is made from petroleum, so the very roads that vehicles travel on, from semis to bicycles, would fade away.

FISHING

Immediate Consequences

Large scale fishing would virtually cease. ALL fishing boats run on petroleum-based products. All products taken from the sea are shipped to plants and stores in the usual way, using petroleum-based machines.

Longer Term Consequences

The availability of fish and other seafood would plunge almost to zero.  The curtailment of all shipping and the drastic cut in the productivity of farms have already cut off the vast majority of the world’s food supplies. Now you can add seafood into that mix.

INDIVIDUAL LIVES

The consequences would be highly dependent on the location where you live. Those lucky enough to have electricity not produced by petroleum products (hydro, solar, wind), might get along. Note that even those methods are highly dependent on diesel-powered trucks, cranes, bulldozers, etc. for installation and maintenance, so while they might run for a while, eventually they would have to be abandoned.

Paradoxically, some of the poorest people on Earth, those who still plow the fields with oxen and produce their own food, might experience little change.Billions of others would die, of a combination of starvation, heat, cold (much heating and cooling is done using petroleum products), or war for the tiny set of resources that are left.

In short, if we were to ‘stop’ oil, our current human civilization would quickly cease. We would enter a true dark age, plagued by war, famine, death and destruction. It’s not a scenario any sane person would wish to pursue.

THE ALTERNATIVE

So, am I saying we should blindly continue using oil until we destroy the planet? Not at all. But we need a concrete long-term plan if we’re going to salvage some kind of soft landing as we discontinue its use. What we really need is for our civilization to be dismantled and rebuilt at a far smaller scale, probably together with severe limits on population growth.

If we drastically curtail our demand for ‘stuff’, we will no longer require oil to manufacture it, store it, and ship it.If we grow our own food locally, we will no longer require that food to be transported from elsewhere.If we walk, ride a bicycle, or take public transportation to where we’re going, we will eliminate the need for cars, and therefore:the oil and gas they require to runthe oil required to mine the materials to build themthe oil required to ship those materials to the factorythe oil required to actually manufacture themthe oil required to ship the finished product to the end userthe oil required to build and maintain the massive infrastructure (multi-lane highways, cloverleafs, parking lots and parkades, and on and on) required to support their usethe oil required to create spare parts to repair themthe oil required to cart them to the dump at the end of their livesThe same applies to thousands of other personal and household goods that we now take for granted, but that we could easily do without. They all depend on the massive, complex infrastructure that is destroying the planet.

Yes, we need to stop oil, but in order to stop oil, we first need to stop a way of life that depends completely on oil – the two are intimately intertwined. That way of life is so entrenched that stopping it will be exceedingly difficult, and there are many powerful vested interests that will fight tooth and nail against it. It will be difficult, but not impossible. I believe it can be done, if we have the will. It must be done – the planet is literally at stake.

But, of course, nobody’s fighting for that to happen. It’s easier to take the simplistic approach and blame oil. Then we can pretend that somehow our current over-consuming lifestyle can continue unabated, with pixie-dust providing the energy and materials to keep it going.

 [JS1]

I am old. I’ve reached a point in my life where there’s no denying it (not that I ever denied it anyway). People offer me their seat on the bus. I get a discount at the rec center, on transit, and when I go to the movies. I get to board the BC Ferries for free.

Those are the perks. But there’s also a down side, even beyond possible declines in health. In many ways, ‘ageism’ is one of the last prejudices for society to come to terms with. People are effectively written off, ignored, and sent ‘out to pasture’, simply because of their age. In many ways, it’s like old people are invisible – the young pass us by as if we weren’t there. Are some old people incompetent? Of course, as are some young people.

One positive view of old people that hasn’t been completely abandoned, is that we are ‘wise’. Are older people actually wise? Probably not – at least not any more so than anyone else. But it seems to me that we have one ‘super-power’ that no one else has.

We have traveled to other dimensions, to alternate realities.

Old people are like walking, talking Rick & Morty episodes. Want to know what it would be like if there were no cell phones? I can tell you. And I’m not guessing – I actually know, because I lived for many years in a dimension where they didn’t exist. What about a world without computers, hand-held calculators, the internet, credit cards. Yep, I lived in dimensions where those items either didn’t exist at all, or were beyond the reach of the average person.

I’ve experienced a reality where the human population of the planet was less than 3 billion. I’ve traveled to a dimension where the Amazon rainforest was largely intact, one where the oceans contained almost no plastic, one where many now extinct animal species were still roaming the Earth, and one where throwing your possessions in the garbage just because you were tired of them was a mortal sin.

In a sense I suppose that does make me, and people my age, wise. It’s not that we’re smarter. It’s just that we’ve experienced exotic alternate realities that are hard for other people to comprehend. The good news is that we can advise people on expected outcomes if something similar comes along. We can also suggest whether it would be wise to return to a state we were in before, and what it might take to do so. Of course, no two dimensions are exactly alike, but there are enough similarities to make our observations of value.

For instance, I’m not at all shocked by the current high interest rates, because I lived through realities (more than one, in fact) where they were as high or higher than they are now. I know exactly what it was like. In fact, I lived through a dimension in the early eighties when the rates were above 20%. People with mortgages were walking away from their homes because they couldn’t afford the payments. In that reality, my own first mortgage was 11%, and that was considered a good deal.

There’s a saying that ‘Those who forget the past are condemned to repeat it’. That is equally true for those who have never experienced the past. So, if you want to be enlightened about these other ‘dimensions’ – these alternate realities that are beyond your experience, maybe you should try talking to an old person, like me.

Photo © Judah Grubb Dreamstime.com

One the first jobs I ever had, when I was 17 years old, was working on a ‘line’ survey for the Dempster Highway, in Yukon territory, Canada. A line survey is one that actually establishes where the road is going to be, so the question arises: if there’s no road, how do you get to work? Well, in our case, it was by helicopter.

Each day, the work crews would pile into a small chopper and be taken to their section of road — at the time just open muskeg. At the end of the day, they’d be flown back to camp. If it was too cloudy or windy, the choppers couldn’t fly, so we’d be unable to go. The novelty of going to work by chopper wore off quickly, and it was hard work, slogging through mosquito-infested muskeg for 10 hours.

Every morning I would look up at the sky, praying that the cloud cover would drop, or torrential rain would begin, or a howling wind would blow. This occasionally happened, but rarely. When it failed to occur, I was always depressed. I felt cheated — the respite I’d been hoping for hadn’t come.

I’m not sure exactly how long I spent making myself miserable in this way, but one day it finally occurred to me that I was putting more energy into trying to get out of work than I would actually spend working. I concluded that I would be a lot happier if I did one simple thing: accept, even enjoy, my job.

The camp where we lived consisted of a small group of trailers in the middle of nowhere. There was nowhere to go, and nothing to do. By far the most interesting activity open to us was going to work. And as a bonus we saw wolves, bears — several times I saw massive herds of thousands of caribou. I made up my mind to assume I was working every day, not to expect, or even want, the chopper to be grounded, and to do my job to the best of my ability.

From that moment on, I was much happier, and the time went much more quickly. I maintained that attitude for the rest of my career, even in some jobs that I didn’t particularly enjoy.

Through the years, I’ve met and worked with people who were preoccupied with avoiding work, as I once was. They’d take off every sick day even if they weren’t sick, do the minimum while on the job, and slack off whenever they had the chance. That actually seems to be a prevailing attitude now. There’s even a sort of smugness that somehow slackers are ‘smart’ because they’re ‘getting out of’ doing something.

I honestly feel sorry for these people. Not only are they ripping off their employer, they’re ripping off themselves. Doing a job well (or anything, for that matter), is one of the most fulfilling things in life. To waste the chance to excel, no matter what you’re working at, in order to sit and do nothing, or the cell-phone equivalent, is just sad.

There’s a wonderful film, Ikiru, by Akira Kurasawa, where a man who works as a lazy cog in the Japanese bureaucracy finds out he’s terminally ill. He quits work and goes through a series of failed attempts to come to terms with the news, drinking, partying, and trying to reconcile with his grown children, but finds that nothing works.

Until he hits on an idea — he decides to simply do his job. He goes back to work. Instead of brushing off people who need help, he becomes their champion, and finally, after battling colleagues and even his own bosses, accomplishes one simple task — converting a stinking, polluted, dangerous, empty lot into a playground for children. Having completed this task, he dies, fulfilled.

Imagine if everyone in the world was like that — imagine if their goal was to excel at their job. When you called the help line or went to customer service at the store, your contact would always be on the ball, because doing their job was important to them. When a carpenter did work on your home, he’d refuse payment until he’d fixed one small flaw he’d missed. Paving on the street in front of your house would always be done quickly and well. When you went to the hospital, the nurses would all be competent and efficient, having devoted themselves to their profession. In short, the world would be a much better place.

I truly believe that having the ultimate goal to excel benefits not only your boss, your co-workers, and your clients, but you as well. With this attitude, you will not only have a more fulfilling and enjoyable life, but you will probably be far more popular and successful.

So anyone out there who believes they’re ‘clever’, because they got out of doing their job, should take a good look at themselves. Anyone can be a slacker — it takes someone really special to excel and accomplish something.

Let’s play Albert Einstein and do a thought experiment. Your friend calls you up and asks you to come over – he’s having an emergency – his bathroom is flooding. You arrive and assess the situation. Your friend’s bathtub is overflowing. The drain is open, but he has the faucet turned on full. Several of your other friends are there. They’re all arguing. Some insist that your friend should position buckets beside the tub, to catch the water. Others argue that he should line sponges around the sides, to absorb the excess. Both sides are passionate about their positions, on the verge of coming to blows.

So, which side would you join? Buckets or Sponges?

In reality, maybe you would choose neither. In fact, wouldn’t you look at your friends and wonder why they insist on ignoring the two obvious (indeed only) solutions to the problem, which are:

Turn off, or at least reduce, the amount of water coming out of the tap.Increase the size of the drain.

Wouldn’t it be equally obvious that while both the buckets and sponges might be a temporary fix, in the end they would only delay the inevitable? As long as the amount of water coming out of the tap exceeds the ability of the drain to absorb it, any other fix is a waste of time.

Let’s apply this thought experiment to our planet. There’s an event called ‘Earth Overshoot Day’, that calculates the day of the year that human consumption equals the resources the Earth is capable of producing in one year. In order to preserve the planet, the amount we consume (the tap) in one year must be less than what the Earth can produce (the drain) in one year.

In 2021, for most developed nations, Earth Overshoot day fell in March or April. In other words, within the first 3 or 4 months, we had already extracted more resources than the Earth can produce in an entire year. Resources are being extracted at 3 or 4 times the rate they are being produced. Hence the term Overshoot.

There’s an incredible amount of noise about fossil fuels, electric cars and ‘environmentally friendly’ power production, as if those things are going to save the planet. Well, dear reader – in fact those things are the buckets and sponges. Will they help? Probably, but they certainly won’t solve the most important problem. The ‘tap’ in this situation is humanity’s runaway consumption of the Earth’s resources. Unless that consumption is drastically reduced, we are doomed, no matter how many electric cars we drive or how many solar panels we install.

So why isn’t anybody talking about the real problem – the tap being turned on full? That’s a question you, and everybody else in the world, should be asking. I believe that people in power are well aware of the situation, but choose to keep the rest of us in the dark. Our planet is at stake. Billions of people should be marching in the streets at this very moment, demanding a solution. Instead, we see a tiny few, and even they mostly talk about buckets and sponges.

It’s the true definition of a tragedy.

Advertising is brainwashing. The thinking person should do everything in their power to avoid being influenced by it.

Advertisers note – this is my relationship with advertising.

TV – When watching TV, I always have the remote in my hand (ask my wife). When an ad comes on, it is muted immediately. I would ‘mute’ the image too if I could. I pay only enough attention to the ad to know when it’s over. This applies to virtually all ads. If I’m watching TV alone, I actually switch to the PVR and play something previously recorded until the ads are over. In this case, I neither see, nor hear the ads. And of course, I often record TV shows, then fast forward through the ads.On My Computer – I actually didn’t even know there were ads  on the computer until it was pointed out to me. I completely ignore them. On Youtube, when they inject an ad ahead of what I want to watch or listen to, I use a similar technique as for TV – mute the ad until it can be skipped, then immediately skip it.Games – When Microsoft learned that I played a lot of FreeCell, they began trying to force me to watch an ad before I play. There’s a little button – ‘To disable ads, tap here.’ – This is like punching me in the face and saying: ‘let me know if you want me to stop’. It’s not a question of whether I want them to stop. I want them not to have done it in the first place. Needless to say, I’ve quit playing FreeCell.On my car radio – I have a half-dozen preset channels. When I turn the radio on, if I hear talking (an ad), I immediately switch channels. Believe me, this happens in seconds. If I hear talking on the next channel, I switch again. I continue this process until I find a channel that’s playing music. If there are none (which happens), I listen to the CD player in the car.

I’m sure I’m not typical. If I was, the advertising industry would probably collapse. Most people are happy to be continually bombarded with mind-melting drivel. I know I’m not being a good little consumer by allowing advertising companies to brainwash me. Too bad.

Does anybody actually care what I do? Probably not, but for the record, now you know.

Our planet is in big trouble. We see the increase in violent storms, the forest fires, the heat domes, the droughts and floods, the mass extinctions, the polluted lakes and rivers, the dwindling fish stocks, the oceans choked with plastic. Most people agree that we should try to ‘fix’ these problems.

The good news is, I believe the planet can be saved. Though it may be too late to put it back the way it was even a few decades ago, we can halt, or at least slow, any further damage, and begin to repair what has already been done.

The bad news is, it will require you to make some major sacrifices. Remember sacrifices? Probably not. They used to make up a regular part of people’s lives. For a lot of years now in affluent societies, the concept of sacrifice has been virtually unheard of.

Well, if you want to save the planet, it’s going to have to make a comeback.

The fact is that almost nobody is being honest about the solution to the world’s ecological problems – not businesses, not politicians, not newscasters, not even most environmentalists. Why? Because the solution involves making drastic changes to our current way of life – changes that very few are willing to accept. Those changes may seem scary, but the alternative is even scarier.

So what do we have to do?

ALL of us (not just your neighbour, or the guy across the street, or people in other countries – but you, me, and everybody) have to massively cut down on our consumption of the Earth’s resources.

What do I mean by that?

Let’s look at a few major themes. I realize that it may not be possible for you to implement ALL of these changes, but you MUST conform to them to as much as you possibly can if you want to save the planet. As I mentioned above, this will require sacrifices.

FoodEat fresh food. Eat nothing that comes in a package, a can, or a bottle. The positive side of this rule is that by doing so you will automatically be eating healthier, living longer, having a better quality of life, and using far fewer medical resources.Don’t eat at fast food restaurants. This one should be easy. These establishments’ consumption of resources and generation of garbage is massive. There is no reason why anyone ever has to eat at these places. If you continue to do so, you are effectively declaring that you don’t give a shit about the planet.If you go to a coffee shop, demand that your coffee be served in a mug, not a paper cup, lid, and sleeve that will all be thrown in the garbage seconds after you’re finished using them. If the shop can’t or won’t do that, go to another shop. And don’t take coffee to go. The same applies to all other eating or drinking establishments.Eat food that is produced within a few hundred miles of where you live (even closer if possible). This probably means that you will have very limited access to some exotic foods, and your available choices will change with the seasons. Remember what I said about sacrifices?Don’t eat processed foods – at all. Like fast food restaurants, there is no basic need for them. Cook your own food – it’s not hard. Even I can do it.Don’t buy more food at a time than you need. Use everything you buy, and as far as possible, throw nothing away.If you find it difficult to comply with the above rules (ie. Your grocery only sells food from thousands of miles away), DEMAND that they change their policies.ShoppingTo as great an extent as possible – buy nothing. Of the three Rs – Reduce, Reuse, Recycle, by far the most important is the first – Reduce. More than anything else people do, shopping is killing this planet. And the pathetic thing is, many of the things people buy, they don’t even really want.If you must buy something, buy something used. There are countless used clothing stores, thrift stores, etc., where you can buy beautiful things that have been used before. Many times they’re in perfect condition.If you absolutely must shop, shop far less often. Don’t buy a new TV every year. Buy a new TV every 10 years (or more). Of course, then you won’t have the latest model with all the new bells and whistles. Sacrifice.If something you own breaks, fix it. A few months ago the zipper broke on my cheap winter jacket. I found out that fixing the zipper would actually cost more than just buying a new jacket. I fixed the zipper anyway – one less jacket in the city landfill.Put an end to planned obsolescence. DEMAND that companies produce products that last a very long time, and that can be easily repaired. Of course, this means you will probably have to pay much more for these products. Sacrifice.Don’t shop online – period. When you try on a shirt at a clothing store and don’t like it, it’s usually returned to the rack. When you do the same online, it’s often either tossed in the garbage, or racks up thousands of additional CO2-generating delivery miles being sent somewhere else. As with eating at fast-food outlets, when you shop online, you are effectively declaring that you don’t give a shit about the planet.TravelTo as great an extent as possible, don’t travel. Planes, ships, cruise ships, and even trains, are massive polluters.If you must travel, the shorter the distance, the better. Go to a local park or a national park rather than to Europe.Don’t drive. It’s well known that cars are one of the main killers of the planet. Note that I don’t say it’s okay to drive a Tesla or other electric vehicle. Electric vehicles, while operating, don’t contribute to greenhouse gases. But in every other way (maybe even more so) they contribute just as much to the destruction of our world. The same mines that dig up the steel, copper, graphite, aluminum, etc. for a gas-powered car, are necessary for electric cars. So why do environmentalists continue to push for people to buy them? I don’t know – ask the environmentalists.The best form of local transportation is walking. And as with eating fresh food, it has the additional benefit that it will make you healthier. If you absolutely cannot walk to where you’re going, the next best is probably a bicycle. Not able to cycle? Public transit is probably next. Of course, dead last is a car.Power and WaterDo you see a pattern forming here? As above, to as great an extent as possible, use none – don’t leave lights on, and use items that consume as little as possible. Do you really need an electric can opener? If you’re 80 years old and have severe arthritis, it might be necessary. For most younger, healthy adults, I don’t think so. And like many of my suggestions, the tiny number of calories you burn opening a can by hand will be a benefit (however slight) to your health. Of course, if you followed the first rule in the Food section, you wouldn’t need a can opener anyway.Air conditioners are one of the biggest consumers of electricity. Do you absolutely have to have one? If not, don’t. If you have to have one, only use it when absolutely necessary, and at the lowest setting. I’ve been in cities where it’s 104 degrees F outside, and so cold in stores or theaters that I need a sweater. Why is that necessary?Do you really need a dishwasher? My wife and I have lived in something like a dozen different homes over the years. Every one of them had a dishwasher that we’ve virtually never used. In the time it takes to load and unload the dishwasher, I can wash most of the dishes by hand. And a side benefit is that you expend a tiny amount of energy washing the dishes instead of sitting like a lump waiting for the machine to do it for you. Don’t forget that, not only do these appliances use power themselves, they also had to be BUILT. Think about the mines, factories, transportation systems, and power generation that went into building them in the first place.

In a nutshell, what I’m suggesting is that we should all voluntarily accept a significant drop in our standard of living. The above sacrifices may sound like too much to endure. The fact is, they wouldn’t make much real difference to your life. When I was a child growing up, the world was basically the way I’m suggesting it needs to be. I very seldom got new clothes. I wore mainly hand me downs. I had very few toys, and many of the ones I had were inherited from older relatives. I remember getting my first bicycle. It was cheap and second hand, but I was incredibly excited about it. My parents had the same fridge, stove, iron, etc. for forty years. They never owned a dishwasher or an electric can opener. Note that we weren’t poor. That’s the way everybody lived.

So did I mope around lamenting how deprived I was? Believe me, I never gave it a moment’s thought. I never expected more, and I was perfectly happy with what I had. This was back in the early sixties (yes, there are people still alive who lived back then). I’ve done some research on stats from that era. The suicide rates were FAR lower than today. The violent crime rates were FAR lower than today. Apparently people back then weren’t so unhappy after all.

There’s a lot of talk today about the ‘green economy’. There’s this kind of utopian vision of us all living substantially the way we do now, only, magically, everything’s electric. Even more magically, somehow, there’s no destruction of the planet. This is complete and utter bullshit. They don’t explain what happens to the billions of fossil-fuel-burning machines that will have to be tossed in the trash heap, and the destructive mining and manufacturing processes required to replace them. And where will all the power come from to run these new electronic wonders? Remember everything will be electric: cars, trucks, intercontinental passenger jets, semi-trucks, trains, boats, container ships, cruise ships, cranes, tractors, bulldozers, tanks, fighter jets, mining machines, farm combines… And there isn’t an electricity-generation system in existence that doesn’t inflict major damage on the planet.

As I’ve already pointed out, the environmentally destructive mines and plastics factories required to build gas automobiles are equally necessary for electric ones. In fact, many additional mines will be required to make the batteries that electric vehicles need. Those batteries have a fairly short lifespan, and have to be recycled (or tossed out), and replaced by new ones regularly. The same goes for the components of so-called ‘green’ power generation. Many apologists, including many environmentalists, expect you to believe that all this green infrastructure will somehow fall from the sky – that no destruction of the planet is required to produce it. This is obviously hogwash.

In fact, if we made the changes to our lifestyles that I suggest above, it’s possible that we could continue to use fossil fuels – that the drastically smaller CO2 footprint could be safely absorbed by the earth’s ecosystem. That is exactly what happened up until recently. It’s the SCALE of use that’s important, not the type of technology used.

Notice that virtually none of the activities I’ve outlined above involve the government. I haven’t screamed for the government to act, or accused them of sitting on their hands. That’s because, not only are governments unwilling to do anything about the current crisis (though that’s true), they are unable to do anything about it. As long as our economic system is based on constant growth, and the public continue to behave like the shopping automatons they’ve been programmed to be, the environment will continue to deteriorate. There are now almost 8 billion humans on this planet. Some already live at or below the level I’m suggesting. A large fraction of the rest would have to adopt the measures above in order to save the planet. If they choose not to, nothing any government does will help.

Where the government can play a role is in defining what the new society will look like. The rape of this planet is completely ingrained into our economy.  Adopting the policies I’m suggesting would be catastrophic for our current financial system. We’ll need a new paradigm if we are to achieve any kind of soft landing. Government (and economists, and many others) will have to come up with a way of life that doesn’t depend on constant growth. I honestly believe that this can be done, but it will be a herculean task. Saving the planet will not be easy.

So, do I expect everybody to run out and make the changes I’m suggesting? In a word, no. I have no expectation that it will ever happen. And that’s too bad, because it’s absolutely necessary, and not doing it will have catastrophic consequences. As the survivors of the coming catastrophe huddle in the burnt out, smoking slag heap that was once an Earthly paradise, maybe they’ll reconsider whether they needed to buy that second jet-ski, or that extra 100 pairs of shoes. Maybe they’ll question whether the Hummer they used to drive, or the big-screen TV in the bathroom, were really necessary, and whether they really needed to buy a new iPhone every year. But other than writing this essay, and trying to practice this lifestyle myself, there’s not a lot I can do.

So do you really want to save the planet? I believe it can be done. If you actually care about it, and about a future for your children, get going. Time is of the essence.

Remember, you heard it here.

I have a literary secret weapon. In fact, it’s so good I’m reluctant to spread the word about it, for fear of giving up what I consider a big personal advantage, but I want to help out my fellow writers. And in case you think I’m selling something, rest assured I’m not. Whether you care to try it is completely up to you. And in this era of Covid 19, it’s currently too dangerous even for me.

So what is this magical secret weapon?

You probably won’t believe it – it’s sensory deprivation – floating in a body-temperature pool of water and Epson salts, with all light and sound removed.

Stuck for an ending for your novel or short story? Unclear about the motivation of one of your characters? Trying to come up with an original way to portray an event? Unsure about the plot direction of your latest masterpiece? The answers to all of the above can be solved through sensory deprivation.

How does it work? Go to the nearest flotation center (assuming you have access to one) with a mental list of things you want to work out: How does Fred escape from the shark infested pool? Why would Jane take the bus home instead of driving her car? How does Howard find the hidden door in the dungeon? Etc.

Get in, close the lid, close your eyes, and step through the questions one by one. There’s something about lying there, with no distractions, no sensory input, and nothing else to occupy your mind. It allows you to focus completely on the task at hand.

I’ve tried doing something like this at night before I go to sleep, but the problem is – guess what? I go to sleep! Floating is a bit like sleeping, or dreaming, but I’ve never actually gone to sleep. Of the half-dozen times I’ve tried it, I’ve solved every problem and answered every question I had going in. I’ve never come away without feeling like I’d made a major step forward in the book.

The methods authors use to aid in their craft are as different as the personalities of the authors themselves, but this is one that I personally find extremely useful.

I don’t doubt that it’s possible to get a similar benefit from some form of meditation, and in this Covid world, maybe that’s what I will have to try. Still, I will miss floating.