12 Aug '09 11:29>2 edits
Originally posted by whodey[/b]Define "harm mankind", please. E.g. do you feel a harm is done to you if you can't buy a Hummer? Is the lack of a hairspray harming you in any way other than your hairstyle?
What the evironment can take and cannot take is not always a clear cut matter. In fact, it reminds me of a documentary on Mount St. Helens after it erupted years ago. After the eruption scientists said that the immediate areas would remain desolate for years to come, however, the immediate area bounced back to life with amazing ease and left them spell boun d until it engulfs this tiny little planet and it will all happen "natrually". Go figure?
Look, I won't get into a minimalist discussion, taking an example as a rule, or how the river next to your town had no fishes and now salmons swim and dance there.
Rather, let's talk about it at principle level. The estimation is that 20% of the world population consumes 80% if the world's resources, and any production process implies some sort of destruction. To keep pace of production to provide goods for the developed countries makes no sense at principle level. It is impossible!
Moreover, there's the global trend of everybody 'developing', and few stop to think that developing countries will never catch up with developed ones, for the simple reason that the developed countries have a handicap of years over the developing ones, and their wealth was built on quite some abuse to the environmental, social and cultural diversity, which the developing ones cannot do... because there's no New World for them to discover and plunder.
So the limits are being pushed, no doubts. Of course, if your idea of development is evolutionist, economicist, and individualist, we can't agree on anything.