Joseph Tainter, Sustainability What does moving toward sustainability really entail? Joseph Tainter's article on "Social Complexity and Sustainability" makes a crucial distinction at the outset, differentiating sustainability from resiliency. Sustainability entails a society's ability to continue along in current patterns or modes of existence, whereas resiliency is a society's ability to adjust and reorient itself during conditions of change. It is possible that unsustainable policies or activities may have put is in a position where drastic changes are to be expected, and where resiliency may be something we all require -- but as Tainter notes, "the goal of human groups is more often sustainability or continuity than resilience" (Tainter 92). Yet the concept of resiliency is important to understand Tainter's insight that "Given the role of complexity in both sustainability and collapse, 'success' consists substantially of staying in the game." I would like to consider Tainter's insight while ultimately pondering the question of what...
But the basic sense is that complexity is the most profound and adaptable human tool for dealing with environmental challenges -- in Tainter's economic definition, societies invest in complex strategies (such as complex technologies) as a technique of problem solving, and the shared economic benefit ultimately outweighs the initial investment. In Tainter's definition, however, the idea of complexity is by no means limited to environmental challenges -- he shows how the idea of complexity can be applied to systems of information, such as the educational establishment or the current U.S. health care system. But his reliance on an economic definition of complexity is important to establish that, at a certain point, complexity may reach a point of diminishing economic returns, and might even begin to cause problems rather than solve them. This is important because in our…
Guns, Germs, and Steel Jared Diamond, in his book Guns, Germs, and Steel: The Fates of Human Societies, explains how he went from being a biologist, studying birds in New Guinea, to developing an entirely new theory on the evolution of human societies. It began in 1972, when a native New Guinean asked him "Why is it that you white people developed so much cargo and brought it to New Guinea,
The Italian cities prospered from the transport of Crusaders. Trade passed through Italian hands to Western Europe at a large profit that created a commercial power, which served as the economic base for the Italian Renaissance (History World Int., 2007). More recently, organized religion led al-quaeda to fly two passenger jets into the world trade centre, because those involved were promised eternal life after death. Originally, organized religion united society,
9. Wild almonds contain cyanide: a person can die from eating only a few dozen of them (Diamond, p. 114). They taste bitter due to the presence of amygdalin, the precursor to cyanide. The chemical serves as a defense mechanism for the almond, deterring animals (and people) from eating them and better ensuring the propagation of the almond plant because the nut is its seed. As Diamond points out, if
What are the symbols of group identity in the United States? Are they good or bad in your opinion? Symbols of group identity often pertain to foodstuffs (such as the critical evolution of wheat, corn, and the animals consumed) and cultural symbols such as literacy. What one eats, where one lives, and how one expresses one's self-reflects one's cultural associations -- whether a society was a hunter-gatherer or agrarian in ancient
Then, in 1000 a.D., Polynesian farmers colonized New Zeeland -- the group would break into two tribes, the Maori and the Moriori, who would later on collide (Diamond). In 1500 a.D., Portuguese explorer Pedro Alvares Cabral discovered Brazil and claimed it as a territory for his country. The period also represented an ascension in arts, as numerous works, such as sculptures and cathedrals, had been completed. Books were being printed;
Till the period up to 11,000 BC every individuals remained Stone Age hunters/gatherers. Nearly that time, the roads of growth of human societies on various continents started to move away in a large scale. (Guns, Germs, and Steel- the Fates of Human Societies: (www.2think.org) During that period, when Stone Age hunter-gatherers comprised the total human population, a big segregation happened in the proportion that the human societies progressed. In
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