Creating A Sustainable And Desirable Future: Insights From 45 Global Thought Leaders Insights from 45 Global Thought Leaders

The major challenge for the current generation of mankind is to develop a shared vision of a future that is both desirable to the vast majority of humanity and ecologically sustainable. Creating a Sustainable and Desirable Future offers a broad, critical discussion on what such a future should or can be, with global perspectives written by some of the world's leading thinkers, including: Wendell Berry, Van Jones, Frances Moore Lappe, Peggy Liu, Hunter Lovins, Gus Speth, Bill McKibben, and many more. Readership: Undergraduates, professionals, researchers, and anyone interested in what a sustainable and desirable future might look like. Contents 6 Preface 12 Acknowledgments 14 About the Editors 16 About the Contributors 18 Part 1: Introduction 32 Chapter 1 Why We Need Visions of a Sustainable and Desirable World 34 The four parts of this book 36 References 39 Chapter 2 Envisioning a Sustainable World 40 Chapter 3 Why Everyone Should Be a Futurist? 46 Vision 46 The future we want 51 References 53 Chapter 4 Think Like an Ecosystem, See Solutions 54 Conditions that elicit our best 56 Leverage points to change a system 57 References 60 Part 2: Future Histories: Descriptions of a Sustainable and Desirable Future and How We Got There 62 Chapter 5 What Would a Sustainable and Desirable Economy-in-Society-in-Nature Look Like? 64 Worldview 65 Built capital 67 Housing 67 Transportation 69 Energy 70 Industry 70 Human capital 72 Social capital 75 Natural capital 77 Acknowledgments 80 Chapter 6 Vision Statement for the Planet in 2050 82 Chapter 7 Scenes from the Great Transition 86 Mandela city, 2084 86 What matters 86 One world, many places 87 Governance 89 Economy 91 The way we live 93 Chapter 8 Environmental History Exam 2052: The Last Half-Century 96 The first decade 96 The second decade 97 The third decade 98 The fourth decade 101 The fifth decade 101 Chapter 9 A Virtual Visit to a Sustainable 2050 104 Chapter 10 Reflections on a Life Lived Well and Wisely 110 Chapter 11 The Great Turnaround: How Natural Capital Entered the Economy? 116 Deeper problems in 2011 118 A beacon of light 119 The new Bretton Woods 120 The big leap 121 Author’s note 123 Chapter 12 How New Zealand Became a Green Leader? 124 Reference 128 Chapter 13 The New New York: 2050 130 New York city, 2050 132 Looking back: two stories 133 Samira, Queens, New York 133 Evan, Westchester County, New York 133 What was wrong: in a nutshell 134 2050: a new world view 134 Epilogue: can it happen? 138 Part 3: Pieces of the Puzzle: Elements of the World We Want 140 Chapter 14 Sustainability and Happiness: A Development Philosophy for Bhutan and the World 142 Chapter 15 Flourishing as a Goal of International Policy 144 References 147 Chapter 16 What Else? 148 Chapter 17 Let Us Envision Gender Equality: Nothing Else is Working 152 Chapter 18 Another World: Finally Her(e) 156 Chapter 19 Policy Reform to 350 162 Chapter 20 The Great Transition to 350 166 Chapter 21 On Baselines That Need Shifting 170 Reference 172 Chapter 22 The Future of Roads: No Driving, No Emissions, Nature Reconnected 174 Two giants: transportation and nature in uneasy embrace 175 The netway system 177 Pods, vehicles, and energy 179 Structural characteristics common to all netways 181 Elevated ways 184 Earthways 186 Features at ground level along netways 188 Fitting netways to the land for nature 190 Timing, costs, and opportunity 193 A future for transportation and our land 196 Acknowledgments 197 References 197 Chapter 23 The New Security 202 Chapter 24 Green Accounting: Balancing Environment and Economy 206 GDP-bashing is not the solution 207 Accounting for sustainability: a practical step toward redesigning the economy 208 Further work 212 References 214 Chapter 25 A Vision of America the Possible 216 Part 4: Getting There 220 Chapter 26 The Way Forward: Survival 2100 222 Coming to grips with reality 223 Survival 2100 224 Essential steps forward 226 Conclusions: can survival 2100 fly? 229 References 230 Chapter 27 An Integrating Story for a Sustainable Future 232 The cosmological context: evolution and extinction 234 The American museum of natural history: universe and earth evolution 235 Cosmological stories 237 The goal: providing an integrating story 238 References 239 Chapter 28 It Is Time to Fight the Status Quo 242 Reference 245 Chapter 29 Can We Avoid the Perfect Storm? 246 References 252 Chapter 30 Sustainable Shrinkage: Envisioning a Smaller, Stronger Economy 254 What to shrink? 255 Population must shrink 255 Consumption must shrink 255 How to shrink? 256 Supply the right incentives 256 Switch from consumption to maintenance 256 Build to last 256 Control shrinkage instead of letting it control us 257 Decline need not mean fall 257 The coming transformation 258 Privileging density and conservation 259 Rediscovering our social roots 259 Encouraging population stability 260 Restoring nature 260 Redefining a healthy economy 261 Chapter 31 How to Apply Resilience Thinking: In Australia and Beyond? 264 Acknowledgments 268 References 269 Chapter 32 Endangered Elements: Conserving the Building Blocks of Life 270 References 277 Chapter 33 Well-Being, Sufficiency, and Work-Time Reduction 280 References 284 Chapter 34 Millennium Consumption Goals (MCGs) at Rio+20: A Practical Step Toward Global Sustainability 286 References 292 Chapter 35 Happiness and Psychological Well-Being: Building Human Capital to Benefit Individuals and Society 294 Relationships 295 Spirituality 295 Strengths 296 Some suggestions 296 References 297 Chapter 36 Time for a Bold Vision: A New, Green Economy 300 Three principles of the next American economy 301 Alternative to suicide: green and clean economy 303 The new, improved “red scare” is green ... but just as bogus 304 Funding the transition to America’s next economy 305 Carbon tax or carbon trading 305 Other policies to jump-start the green economy 306 Final thoughts 307 References 308 Chapter 37 A World That Works for All 310 The challenges 310 The solutions 312 References 317 Chapter 38 Fighting Poverty by Healing the Environment 324 Ecological restoration in practice: China and Rwanda 324 Restoration opportunities 326 References 328 Chapter 39 Re-Engineering the Planet: Three Steps to a Sustainable Free-Market Economy 330 Ecological bookkeeping 332 Extracted value tax 332 Repairing the damage 333 Assigning values 333 On objections to change 333 Earth Inc.’s shareholders 334 Chapter 40 Raising Gross National Happiness through Agroforestry 336 Acknowledgments 339 References 339 Chapter 41 Building Bridges between Science and Policy to Achieve Sustainability 340 References 346 Chapter 42 Bringing Mozart to the Masses: Venezuela’s Music Revolution 348 References 351 Chapter 43 Creating the Schools of the Future: Education for a Sustainable Society 352 Systems thinking and learner-centered education 354 Education for sustainability 355 Youth engagement and youth leadership 356 Building schools as learning communities 357 The real question 358 Acknowledgments 359 References 359 Chapter 44 A Values-Based Set of Solutions for the Next Generation 362 Some possibilities for action 366 Voluntary simplicity 366 Mindfulness meditation 367 Time affluence 367 Advertising 367 Alternative indicators of progress 368 Challenging corporations 368 Conclusion 368 References 369 Chapter 45 Teaching a University Course in Sustainable Happiness 372 Author note 376 Chapter 46 The Time Has Come to Catalyze a Sustainable Consumerism Movement 378 A green-gilded life 380 Start with the developing world’s emerging middle class 381 The China Dream 382 Crafting a different dream 383 Go big, go quickly 384 Learning from Hollywood 385 Nudging behavior through policies 385 To China and beyond (or, it is time to collaborate or croak) 386 References 387 Index 390 The ever-pressing challenge for the current generation of mankind is to develop a shared vision that is both desirable to the vast majority of humanity and ecologically sustainable. Creating a Sustainable and Desirable Future offers a broad, critical discussion on what such a future should or can be, with global perspectives written by some of the world's leading thinkers, namely Wendell Berry, Van Jones, Frances Moore Lappe, Peggy Liu, Hunter Lovins and Gus Speth. This monograph reviews the role played by TFS in masking, pitch perception, speech perception, and spatial hearing, and concludes that cues derived from TFS play an important role in all of these. Evidence is reviewed suggesting that cochlear hearing loss reduces the ability to use TFS cues. Also, the ability to use TFS declines with increasing age even when the audiogram remains normal. This provides a new dimension to the changes in hearing associated with aging, a topic that is currently of great interest in view of the increasing proportion of older people in the population. The study of the role of TFS in auditory processing has been a hot topic in recent years. While there have been many research papers on this topic in specialized journals, there has been no overall review that pulls together the different research findings and presents and interprets them within a coherent framework. This monograph fills this gap The ever-pressing challenge for the current generation of mankind is to develop a shared vision that is both desirable to the vast majority of humanity and ecologically sustainable. Creating a Sustainable and Desirable Future offers a broad, critical discussion on what such a future should or can be, with global perspectives written by some of the world's leading thinkers, namely Wendell Berry, Van Jones, Frances Moore Lappe, Peggy Liu, Hunter Lovins and Gus Speth. Sample Chapter(s). Chapter 1: Why We Need Visions of a Sustainable and Desirable World (51 KB). Contents: Introduction: Why We Nee