Global Catastrophes and Trends: The Next Fifty Years (MIT Press)
Vaclav Smil
Language: English
Pages: 320
ISBN: 0262518228
Format: PDF / Kindle (mobi) / ePub
Fundamental change occurs most often in one of two ways: as a "fatal discontinuity," a sudden catastrophic event that is potentially world changing, or as a persistent, gradual trend. Global catastrophes include volcanic eruptions, viral pandemics, wars, and large-scale terrorist attacks; trends are demographic, environmental, economic, and political shifts that unfold over time. In this provocative book, scientist Vaclav Smil takes a wide-ranging, interdisciplinary look at the catastrophes and trends the next fifty years may bring. Smil first looks at rare but cataclysmic events, both natural and human-produced, then at trends of global importance, including the transition from fossil fuels to other energy sources and growing economic and social inequality. He also considers environmental change -- in some ways an amalgam of sudden discontinuities and gradual change -- and assesses the often misunderstood complexities of global warming. Global Catastrophes and Trends does not come down on the side of either doom-and-gloom scenarios or techno-euphoria. Instead, Smil argues that understanding change will help us reverse negative trends and minimize the risk of catastrophe.
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Unrealistically static. But trends are finite: they weaken or deepen suddenly; they can be reversed abruptly. Population forecasts provide pertinent examples of these failed anticipations. A comparison of the revision for 2004 (United Nations 2005) with the 1990–2025 global population forecast (United Nations 1991) shows a difference of about 600 million people, a reduction about 10% greater than today’s entire population of Latin America. Thus even forecasts that deal with given biophysical.
Must be suspect because all the “data” have complex, multiattribute dimensions and eventual outcomes do not always conform to the expectations of a zero-sum game. Rising global interdependence on resources (mineral or intellectual) and a shared dependence on the biosphere’s habitability preclude that. Consequently, the following appraisals respect the multifaceted nature of rising or falling national fortunes, do not attempt quantitative international comparisons, do not aim at definite rankings,.
Nowadays the kow-tow is to the managed market system rather than to a single individual like Mao” (E. L. Jones 2001, 3). Unfolding Trends 131 50,000 40,000 GDP $(2003) 109 China 30,000 20,000 India USA 10,000 Japan Germany 0 2000 2010 2020 2030 2040 2050 Fig. 3.16 China’s rapid GDP growth would make it the world’s largest economy perhaps by the 2020s. Plotted from data in Wilson and Purushothaman (2003). Continuation of high growth rates would make China the world’s largest.
Democratic dictatorship led by the working class and based on the alliance of workers and peasants. The socialist system is the basic system of the People’s Republic of China. Sabotage of the socialist system by any organization or individual is prohibited. Those who laud the new China might re-read this a few times. And anybody familiar with today’s China knows how eagerly the Chinese people themselves imitate U.S. ways even as they profess nationalistic, anti-American fervor. This brings me to.
Concluded that after taking into account the global equilibrium consequences of an unwinding of this deficit, the likelihood of the collapse of the dollar appears more than 50% greater than their previous estimates. And Fallows (2005) used the term meltdown. Unfolding Trends 145 In contrast, others see this deficit as a sign of economic strength. Dooley et al. (2004) believe that a large current account deficit is an integral and sustainable feature of a successful international monetary.