Seriously underrated talk. I have recently started studying this paradigm and it's inspiring

I wish I could sign a petition for more people like Miklos... Don't stop, Miklos... You are the voice of millions...

@louisrifat2647

6 жыл бұрын

second that!

@APerson-ui5zq

5 жыл бұрын

yes yes

That is one great talk and a brilliant presentation. Thank you Mr. Antal for sharing this with us. The world needs more people like you, and more people need to hear this!

Very well structured and impressively performed presentation. Congratulations, Miklós!

now this is a proper n sane economic talk unlike other Ted talks.

8 years have passed since this talk. Yet, the world is still on this destructive economic path. I will prepare to do another TEDx talk to bring this to the spotlight.

Such an informative and mindblowing speech. Thank you so much, TED for bringing Miklós Antal on this stage.

It requires a lot of maths and imagination to shoot such a perfect shot in our dark life! Hands down bro!

Great Ted talk !

If we don’t change there will be no world for our children and theirs. Social and ecological responsibility should be the new currency in which we try to expand

Excellent talk. Thanks

Loved the talk!!

Really insightful talk.

Excellent talk

Brilliant!

This man seems to live his words ❣👌🏼

Very inspiring and challenging insights, but how to make this possible in the times of economic difficulties caused by the pandemic?

So good.

Higher workers wages and incomes always results in declining corporate profits. Businesses always maximizes their profits by cost efficiency measures like depressed low starvation wages, shrinking their employee payroll through layoffs/ automation/ outsourcing, reducing worker's hours, and reducing human labor costs

We needed such discussions 60 years ago when capitalism was recapturing its avarice. It now has a momentum that is not easily reversed or slowed. Nor is there any appetite for those who have accumulated Billiones to see the demerits of accumulationtion. I am not a pessimist; just a realist. A New England poet once wrote: "Two roads diverged in a yellow wood,.... I chose the one less travelled by, And that has made all the difference."

@maxgamxr

2 жыл бұрын

Robert Frost!🥰

thank you you are my voice

The problem was well articulated, as is always the case. What was the plan B? We need propositions.

@homayounshirazi9550

4 жыл бұрын

Too late for propositions! At best we have seen the enemy and "them is us!"

@s._.ushitrash

2 жыл бұрын

Degrowth. Working hour reduction, redistribution, UBI is the key

Been saying this since I was 4 years old. Abc's of LIFE.

Miklós Antal, Is there a transcript of your talk? I would like it. I think you and I should be working together to actually solve these problems.

@miklosantal1177

4 жыл бұрын

Yes, there is a transcript somewherre. I will look it up. Please write an email to antalmi [at] gmail [dot] com

@Texas.wildflower1

3 жыл бұрын

@@miklosantal1177 amazing talk. That minds like yours exist gives me hope for the future.

@johnmanno2052

3 жыл бұрын

@@miklosantal1177 Sir, I cannot thank you enough for this talk, and your work. I restructured my life decades ago because of "The Limits to Growth". I live on less than $10,000 per year, I have no car, don't travel, don't eat meat, etc etc. I'm very very very glad someone out there is talking about the danger of economic growth!!

The paradox of the market capitalist economic system is that it justifies it's existence through scarcity.. Then later turns around and promotes "infinite consumption" and "infinite economic growth". And in the advent of automation and technological unemployment. Productivity and efficiency has increased. Providing such abundance. But unfortunately, under the constraints of the inherently exploitative predatory market economy, abundance is only for those who can afford it through monetary exchange. And the more scarce resources and goods are. The more they raises prices and costs.

@Len_J_

3 жыл бұрын

True. All the problems of capitalism. Right. But - your plan B is..?

OECD could plan an economic growth cap?

I thought it sounded crazy when he said he didn’t want any more mining, but it’s possible I was being close-minded. No more mining ON EARTH. Space is the future.

So what's the plan B?

@miklosantal1177

4 жыл бұрын

We are working on elements of the solution. My current projects are about the working time - energy relationship.

Came to this video after watching 'Planet of Humans' and reading through many of its critics. This could have been the scientific foundation/structure of Michael Moor's documentary but it was not, and therefore this documentary is not so great. As for the critics, they should respond to this 6 year old TED talk.

Going back to subsistence living and farming is the obvious but unattractive way towards sustainability.

Proof we're doomed, not saved. Because all his good ideas will, NEVER happen. NOTHING will change.

My pitch: build the capability to industrialize space.

The map certainly does have more than one path but the choices might not be defined by growth or not-growth. Limiting the choices in this way is the tragedy of the green movement who for four decades have cast themselves into self-exile by equating growth and consumerism and opposing both. Politicians need growth as armour against their inability to actually solve the problems. They've discovered that growth tends to go up whether they make smart or dumb decisions and irrespective of most events. So if you want a plan B you either leave politicians out of it or show them how to get growth by radical decoupling - which means actually reversing or solving the problems that previous growth has created. This is not particularly difficult to plan or to do but it can't be done if our thinking is fixed on politically-doomed no-growth proposals. The debate about growth or no growth has the attraction of reducing the complexity of multiple interlocked unsustainable patterns into a single simple binary choice. However linear thinking is always misleading, whether pro or against growth. A small effort with systems thinking reveals numerous options to get absolute decoupling at a speed and scale beyond what has been seen historically. We just need to use our imagination and intelligence to create these possibilities not to sit there arguing against them.

@miklosantal1177

10 жыл бұрын

I think it is overly optimistic - and very risky - to focus exclusively on decoupling as an environmental strategy. With all those difficulties mentioned in the talk, I think it is a bold statement that "A small effort with systems thinking reveals numerous options to get absolute decoupling at a speed and scale beyond what has been seen historically". I don't think that our problems are mainly caused by our inability to think in terms of systems (although I don't exactly know what you mean by this). Of course I am not against fast decoupling and I do participate in efforts to make that happen (and not "sit there arguing against them"), I just don't think this will be enough. Moreover, I see many opportunities associated with a path on which growth is not a binding condition. If you think it is not particularly difficult to reverse or solve the problems that previous growth has created, then you need to tell us how this could be feasible. Just use the example of the three broad problems I mentioned in the talk (energy, materials, land use). I am curious.

@JamesGreyson

10 жыл бұрын

Miklós Antal If your preferred strategy is to reduce impacts BY reducing growth then isn't this precisely what hasn't worked and hasn't happened for the 42 years that it's been tried? Given that many looming problems should have been resolved decades ago, further flogging of this dead horse seems risky to me. Growth is of course not a binding condition. Or even a necessary feature of a sustainable future. As described above, it's just a feature of current governance that happens to be non-negotiable. I predict that if we do perceive and enact system chance then future leaders will have many other positive and useful indicators to talk about. They will no longer need the 'armour' of growth, whether or not GDP growth is happening then. Bold is good I hope? Another bold statement: I think growth is ridiculously easy to get when systemic solutions are used. The most obvious example is my 'policy switch 7' where austerity can be ended by unprivatising the creation of money in economies. KZread doesn't like links but please find peer-reviewed published proposals for the issues you mention on my BlindSpot Think Tank site. See the project 'Circular Economy 4 Real'. I can only really manage one social media platform so would be grateful to continue chat on twitter if that's ok?@blindspotting and @climate_rescue

@miklosantal1177

10 жыл бұрын

***** Of course the goal is not to reduce growth, that's a consequence of strategies that limit environmental impacts and excessive consumerism. And it hasn't really been tried yet, so I'm not sure what you wanted to say in the first paragraph. I agree with you that changing indicators is important, but I think "enacting system change" is very difficult. By bold I mean that it sounds good but it's almost surely false. If you think changing the money system is easy, then we certainly don't agree. Okay, let's finish the discussion here on youtube.

@JamesGreyson

10 жыл бұрын

Miklós Antal :-) Have tweeted to you, "GPD growth from #systemchange is easy, but the #systemchange needs some effort."

@nathanbrown9714

5 жыл бұрын

Why do we need to grow? Aside from stoking the growth dependent aspects of the economic system that we designed and own. Why not change the economic system rather than the laws of physics.

There is a plan B. Just ask. There are a number of us working on it.

I was hoping to hear a plan B, same old dooms day report.

@magoldtube

4 жыл бұрын

I'm afraid you might have missed an important point. There is no a plan B, we desperately need one, but we're doing F-all about it. Expecting a viable alternative plan that replaces a 200 year old entrenched system, worked out by one person and presented in a 15min Ted talk is somewhat unrealistic i'd say.

@gordontully5458

3 жыл бұрын

@@magoldtube Totally agree. Terrifying to contemplate what is likely to come. It is SO refreshing for someone to point to the elephant in the room.

After 9 years, still no map with other routes..... humanity is not capable to change until nature stops them

YES!!! THIS is the answer I've been seeking! I've been aware for some time that global warming is a farce, and confused as to why authorities continue to push it while falsifying data, as limiting CO2 growth can only come at the very real expense of poor countries who need to industrialize in order to grow out of poverty. Policy makers had already decided, and nearly 100 years ago, that global warming will be Miklos Antal's alternative solution to this unsustainable global economic growth: limit the economic growth to those countries already developed. Those populations behind at this point will stay behind to balance the global resource cost of the wealthy. In addition, they have already dumbed down the populations, so now they are pushing for socialism that will destroy and "reset" economies, while reducing populations through starvation and executions, and yet still allow the wealthy and connected to ride high. Its the perfect plan and it will, unfortunately, work perfectly.

Prout is the only solution

Another reason we need growth is demographics. But even without it, if economic growth stops, then you are condemning millions of people to a perpetual state of hunger and poverty. It's basically telling poor people they will never have the chance to escape poverty. And redistribution of wealth is not a solution because if you understand the basics of finance, we are able to create capital thanks to mathematical models that allow risk to be subdued and credit to be created for ourselves from future growth. If not for growth then the models would not work and thus we wouldn't have those resources to redistribute in the first place Or even build our society for that matter. Because by economic growth, we are really talking about the creation of value. Historically the development of finance was the primary motor of human development ever since the Renaissance. We would be giving up on civilization alongside scientific and technological advances, since it's thanks to the mathematical framework of finance that we have been able to create a modern economy propelling human capital which begets intellectual capital which begets science, innovation, and technological revolutions. The issue of economic growth is the issue of the development and evolution of human civilization in general. The solution is not to commit civilizational suicide, rather use the advances of civilization to create radical solutions that will allow us to continue our evolution as a species.

@miklosantal1177

7 жыл бұрын

If economic growth slows down or stops in rich countries, then "a perpetual state of hunger and poverty" is not a direct consequence. The question is how we could afford slowing down without creating problems. And this is crucial because slowing down in rich countries might be necessary to make room for poor people to consume more and for all of us to have stable environmental circumstances (e.g. a stable climate).

@joshuacovarrubias6147

7 жыл бұрын

today in the U.S. for example aprox. 80% of the economy is service based, which means very little hard resource consumption. Today's economy is about adding value, not subtracting resources. The same would apply to other developed economies. This economic growth is not linked with heavy industry and massive resource consumption as it was many many years ago. So there is no need to slow down the economy in order to slow down resource consumption. Markets have already done that. Modern Finance means developing countries are free to expand their financial sectors creating new sources of growth and investment opportunities. As I said, economic growth depends on financial expansion, so its all about the mathematical structure of finance, not the availability of resources. People need to understand the economic model that has been developed over the last 20 years does not resemble the old model people are used to thinking about when it comes to how the economy performs.

@miklosantal1177

7 жыл бұрын

There are two major problems with this argument: 1) Hard resource consumption is not "very little" in service based economies. Roughly speaking, the shift towards a service-based economy led to constant domestic materials use and emissions, not the steep reduction that is needed (see, e.g., the graphs shown in the talk or globalcarbonatlas.org/en/CO2-emissions and www.unep.org/resourcepanel/decoupling/files/pdf/decoupling_report_english.pdf). Strong environmental policies would impact the pollution-intensive sectors, and their decline could easily impact overall GDP negatively. This is what we have to prepare for. 2) People working in the service-based economy use their money to consume resource intensive products made in other countries. Therefore, consumption-based environmental effects improved much less or even continued to rise in rich countries (see, e.g. globalcarbonatlas.org/en/CO2-emissions and www.pnas.org/content/112/20/6271.full). Lower consumption in these countries would reduce materials use and emissions in other countries as well, helping to reach vital global sustainability goals. A closer look at the numbers shows how unlikely it is to reach, for instance, the 2C climate target without departing from the economic paradigm: drive.google.com/file/d/0Bwx3-Iat5AMmNlRKVWViWmJGalE/view?usp=sharing And why should we not explore this if certain strategies (like working time reduction) could even directly increase the well-being of people?

@bishoymorkos7052

4 жыл бұрын

"The solution is not to commit civilizational suicide, rather use the advances of civilization to create radical solutions that will allow us to continue our evolution as a species". Civilization was the end of true evolution. The problem with the idea of propagating technology to solve all our issues is that it's path is dictated by the incredibly limited human imagination, rather than allowed to play out to the unconceivably complex equillibrium that is natural order. It's human ego that will be our downfall.

And Plan B was... ?

the other ted talk i watched showed completely different graph on same things these mofos are highly skilled in bending the stats according to their narrative

I recomend the TED TALK of Javier Milei as a response.

The MAIN DRIVING FACTOR behind the requirememt for growth is population growth . If the East and Africa follow the suit of countries like Germany and Japan and reduce population growth or actually reverse it , almost all issues will get solved naturally . For a flat , stable economy , the population has to be flat and stable ( As we see in countries like Lichtenstein )

@aoeu256

7 жыл бұрын

What if reducing population growth doesn't reduce resource usage, but causes the few to use up more natural resources on average? People in rich countries cause 4-20x more enviromental degredation PER PERSON than people from poor countries. Also the more people the more taxes, the more taxes the more research can be done, for example, nuclear fusion is a clean energy that needs funding, and if there are fewer people there are fewer taxes to fund the research(economics of scale). We need to reduce resource usage ourselves, not blame other people for having children! Other suggestions: give potential high-school dropouts loans to get cheap vasectomies; increase taxs the burning of fossil fuels and other things that cause enviromental degredation; improve VR technologies so that workers and students travel less; reduce meat consumption by 50%

@ChrisMadesh

4 жыл бұрын

Coming from Africa, I disagree. African countries are not overpopulated. They just have bad leadership and predatory capitalism, all in the governments. In deed, countries with 'stable populations' are actually inviting immigrants because of reduced manpower resulting in declining production and thus slow economic growth.

ironic how they messed it up and now propose to fix it

@miklosantal1177

6 жыл бұрын

ironic that you use the word "they" as if you knew anything about my role in messing anything up ;)

We need to have a basic income which will cause people to reducing work hours to 5-20/hrs per week. We can give poor people needed low interest loans for people if they get a injection of a vasectomy gel. High-school dropouts have 3 children vs 1 child for college graduates.

no problem to decrease dependence on growth, but... all people want growth because everyone want's to live better, especially the poor ones. green growth is very possible - all the governments of the world need to do is green tax on external cost like pollution and environmental damage. You say the oil and materials for energy are less abundant now, but what will happen if there will be developments in nuclear energy - that can provide million times more power for a mass unit of fuel = BIG GROWTH with little environmental price, just this leap can sustain population of trillion humans, and from there we got a huge nuclear reactor in the sky - the sun - that can sustain almost infinite growth in economy and population.

Once again, I come away from a talk or article on this subject feeling disappointed with the content. All they do is outline the problem, and give no tangible solutions. He said himself, nobody is woking on creating an alternative to our economic system. Why doesn't HE work on it and come up with something?? Why don't all of the journalists come up with an alternative?? Maybe I should sit down for a few months and work on something. Nobody else seems to be doing it.

@miklosantal1177

2 жыл бұрын

You know, it was not so easy in 2014 to obtain funding for research on issues like this... At the moment, I have a research group focusing on working time reduction, which I think is an important piece in the post-growth puzzle. Please do not criticize me without knowing what I am actually doing. Obviously, you can't solve all problems of the world in one talk. I felt that this message was really important. And I am doing my best to do what I am calling for.

@ohwhatworld5851

2 жыл бұрын

@@miklosantal1177 I feel like you and all other people who are trying to solve these issues are trying to make a square block fit into a round hole. Have you heard the term 'Trying to polish a turd'?. That is what is happening. People are trying to polish a system that is based on debt, infinite growth, inequality, tax avoidance, I could go on and on. A system so inherently flawed that you will never be able to make that square block fit into that round hole. We need innovative thinking to create a new system. I also want to say I am not personally attacking you. I appreciate what you are doing and can see how you want to help improve our world. I just believe we need to think bigger.

Good luck telling poor African countries to give up on growth. I understand what he’s saying, but most countries around the world aren’t as well-positioned to weather reduced consumption like the US and UK. And some might say redistribute wealth from the the 1% to he rest of us. Sounds good until we realize that most wealth is focused in the US, and why would any American give part of their paycheck to someone doing an identical job to them in a poor country but getting paid less. It sounds altruistic, but we know it wouldn’t go over well. My view is that we’re well past ramping down the global economy. People have worked too hard to get to where they are to just give it up. Even the poor people in poor countries that are wealthier than their parents a few generations ago. What we need is a substitute that can keep society on the upwardly mobile arc of progress our society is so well accustomed to. This substitute is precisely what the push toward green industries is trying to solve. But it’s like the speaker said: our planet has finite resources and a sensitive ecosystem, and when we try to do good (like making solar panels for billions) there are always unintended consequences (like increased demand for metals leading to more mining and ecological destruction). We all need to thing long and hard about possible solutions that don’t degrade our lives but protect our home planet from getting consumed in the wake of climate change. My idea for a sustainable solution is to accept that Earth has been kind to us, but we need to come to terms that it won’t last forever. Earth has been a wonderful cradle of humanity. But we can’t live in a cradle forever. We need to venture beyond Earth, and industrialize our activities off-planet. Space exploration and industrialization is like the wild, Wild West, and although it doesn’t seem like it, space will play a highly critical role in the sustainability of our terrestrial ecosystems. This is where companies like SpaceX come in. And where you can come in to, if you’re driven enough to create ventures that get us doing things in space at the kind of scale that starts to make a difference on Earth. What do you think?

@Mad_Intalect

3 жыл бұрын

I think that, a habitable planet Earth will be long gone before that type of technology is at a level capable of sustaining life on other planets, or even mining them for resources. Another 100 years (at most?) with the current rate of planetary destruction and exploitation. I am however, more of a pessimist than optimist.

@ozzyfromspace

3 жыл бұрын

@@Mad_Intalect your pessimism isg warranted. We’re not making the collective progress we ought to be. Hopefully this doesn’t negate our aspirations of using the high bounties of space to service the comforts of Earth

@joela.4058

2 жыл бұрын

Off world resource extraction and widespread automation is definitely the path forward, but as someone already pointed out that won’t come soon enough to avoid catastrophe

How are you going to tell this to the billions of poor people who still live in abject poverty?

@miklosantal1177

4 жыл бұрын

They need to consume more. That is why the rich world must consume less and differently.

Reduce human population.....

This guy wants to condemn us to poverty!

@miklosantal1177

4 жыл бұрын

I think you have misunderstood the message of the talk.