catalysiS…

The butterfly effect

Novembro 16, 2008 at 1:40 am Publicar um comentário

Worldwide. Everybody is feeling the mess. Some more than others.
Now it’s Citigroup… 50 000 people to lose their jobs. In general this is the result of business being run without any concern for ethics or for a very simple and beautiful concept. Something that is a product of nature, that humankind should put in place. A concept that I like in particular. Sustainability

We think we have everything figured out. Well… we don’t. Nature is giving us all the signs. Even the principles in which we base our economies are starting to show us that something is terribly wrong. We are pushing the limits. Signs from nature couldn’t be more worrying. Polar bears eating polar bears due to hunger (something never seen before by scientists).

To this point the reader of this post should be asking: “What have polar bears to do with job cuts and worldwide recession?”. There’s something called the butterfly effect in which the flap of a seagull’s wings could change the course of the weather forever. An example that tries to show the very basic principle of the theory of chaos as described and shown by the mathematician Edward Lorenz.

Current worldwide economies are based on unsustainable principles. Commodities are scarse and will get more and more expensive while worldwide population keeps expanding. That is the reality. It is happening now. However, companies and economies are analysed on the basis of their growth, compared with the growth of the year before which was benchmarked against the growth of the previous year. That growth does not stand for itself. Not only one has to increase revenue and profit, but also grow more than the competition while commodities continue increasing price, while wealth gets more localised, while population continues to expand. Planet Earth is uno. We cannot drill the Moon for oil or grow vegetables on Mars. All we have is on this beautiful blue pearl called Earth. Our development as rational animals should take nature into consideration. Continuing this path risks our own existance and well being. The planet has shown geologists that nature is fully able of completely erasing specific species. I do believe we are earning that result if we keep ignoring the most basic principles of nature.

As a sign of hope, the world has a new American president. One that showed capability and capacity during the campaign trail. Inteligence and discerning judgement. The less positive aspect was the continuous discussion around race. I got tired of watching channels argue who were the hispanic voters choose, or maybe the white voters would change their mind once the moment would come and choose Mcain due to colour affiliation. The United States of America as shown once again how great a country can be. How great a people can be. Voters decided for change, independent of colour or religion. I wish all the best to President Obama. I hope he’ll be able to put change in motion. We need it all around the world and the USA is the best place to start it. The USA has now the best person to start it.

As a closing sentence to this long post, I would like to leave a native Indian saying that encloses on itself the very basic principle of Sustainability… A phrase I like particularly.

“Only when the last tree has died, the last river poisoned and the last fish caught, only then will Man realise he cannot eat his money.”

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