Degrowth is not a reasonable idea. Humanity lives for humanity, not for the Earth. We just happen to need the Earth. Progress is the good way out, for both humanity and the Earth.
Humanity could, energy-wise, become green within a few years, were it a profitable investment. We have fresh water and food, both in global surplus. Pollution-wise, the only reason everything isn't recycled is that it's cheaper to not do so.
After we have that squared away, space mining technology is currently moving at an immense rate. It wouldn't be profitable to do so yet, but if we disregard that, it would be possible. That alone takes out most of our environmental impact outside of energy.
It's not a matter of us running out of capacity. This planet can support 10-12 billion without breaking a sweat. It's a matter of us being unwilling to move towards that goal, prioritising having constant growth in the short term over having sustainable overall growth in the long term.
Sometimes it isn't about simple capital gain, the profits made from asteroid mining are not monetary but environmental. And yet modern economics, essentialist and ossified, is so obsessed with the idea of number go up that we can't go there.
Degrowth is probably more likely than humans deciding overnight to stop optimizing for profit and short-term growth. It just might be unintended.
I'm not sure why we should seek to maximize the exploitation of the planet to optimize for total number of human beings. This "obsession with making a number go up" seems like a very unhealthy goal as a species.
That's not the point. The point of all society is to maximise human enjoyment, to satisfy the needs of humans. That's the point of an economy, it's the point of having states, it's the point of manufacture and it's the point of farming. The only "number go up" obsession that exists is making sure there is plenty in this world for humans to enjoy, and that includes keeping the Earth safe and clean.
Degrowth is nothing but a total betrayal of human values for some idea of cosmic justice for what is essentially a chaotic clockwork ball hurling through space. Not only that but it's misplaced betrayal, since while humans might hurt themselves through climate change, the Earth will certainly not be affected in the long term.
Climate change is fought for Earth, for humans. Fighting it through feudalism makes no sense, and is, at least in my view, less likely than humanity investing in long-term prosperity.
For degrowth to happen modern society has to damn near collapse. You'd have to scale back production massively, to the extent that most people wouldn't have jobs to do as there's nothing to produce without going over your production quota. You wouldn't get much enjoyment out of what you have as even a sort of upper lower class lifestyle in the west would go well over consumption goals. Life would essentially regress towards some pseudo-feudal system. Money would eventually lose all meaning as people would have to be provided for or mass starvation policies would have to be put into place. No reasonable species would accept this and giant revolts would inevitably break out.
What is far more likely is that states take increasing control of production in society and simply rationally design it to prevent excess, with markets being thrown out the window. The market system has shown itself to be fundamentally incapable of rationally planning for and preventing climate change and other excesses on a large scale.
Whether that means total abandonment of free markets or heavy regulation of corporations I do not know, but it's nevertheless far more likely than degrowth is.
Degrowth has happened many times before in human history, including last year. Almost no one wanted it but it still happened. As far as I know, total abandonment of free markets has not ever happened, despite many people saying they want it. I have a hard time believing something that has never happened is more likely than something that has happened repeatedly throughout human history and also last year.
"Plenty for humans to enjoy" is wealth. The change in wealth over time is profit. Maximizing enjoyment is maximizing profit. Whether you are talking about individual short term profit, or collective long term profit, the problems with number-going-up-obsession are ultimately the same.
> Money would eventually lose all meaning as people would have to be provided for or mass starvation policies would have to be put into place.
I'm unclear how this is different than the total abandonment of free markets. There's even historical precedent.
> You wouldn't get much enjoyment out of what you have...
It seems implicit in your argument that more wealth is more human enjoyment. I'm not so sure that is true. By virtue of being alive in 2021 and posting on HN, you are likely one of the wealthiest humans to have ever lived. Do you think you are one of the happiest?
One of the problems with the religion of numbers-going-up is that there are always bigger numbers. I think this is a pretty bad relgion honestly. Unfortunately it is very popular.
> We have fresh water and food, both in global surplus.
This is a bit misleading, if only because what matters is not necessarily the aggregate amount of food but getting it where it is in demand. It would be an incredible waste of resources to ship freshwater from the Great Lakes to Northern China, for example. And most of the countries that have food security issues have issues not only with the amount of food they have, but the means to get food in people's mouths in time before spoilage.
Humanity could, energy-wise, become green within a few years, were it a profitable investment. We have fresh water and food, both in global surplus. Pollution-wise, the only reason everything isn't recycled is that it's cheaper to not do so.
After we have that squared away, space mining technology is currently moving at an immense rate. It wouldn't be profitable to do so yet, but if we disregard that, it would be possible. That alone takes out most of our environmental impact outside of energy.
It's not a matter of us running out of capacity. This planet can support 10-12 billion without breaking a sweat. It's a matter of us being unwilling to move towards that goal, prioritising having constant growth in the short term over having sustainable overall growth in the long term.
Sometimes it isn't about simple capital gain, the profits made from asteroid mining are not monetary but environmental. And yet modern economics, essentialist and ossified, is so obsessed with the idea of number go up that we can't go there.