November 2024
climate/obesity
Submitted by stevein7 on Thu, 2007-11-29 11:55
QUESTION
Although it seems highly unlikely, is there any chance capitalism could maintain an expanding productive base and not produce CO2?could such a massive shift in production possibly occur? And is communism not based on ramping up production, freeing the productive forces from their fetters. Now, if communism could produce more, and cleanly, could capitalism not do the same? Could communism exist without expanding production massively, doing away with scarcity? Or is the only alternative a scaled down production, which would possibly be the outcome of a devastating imperialist war which would allow capitalism some temporary leeway.
REPLY
In a sense you are right to highlight the issue of the link between emissions and production and you are right that we should not be too mechanical about this. In RP40 the full argument is that capitalism is so driven by the profit motive (and the constant tendency of the reate of profit to fall) that it is hghly unlikely that all the capitalist will sit down to make new rules on this. Increasing more profitable production means that they will use the cheapest method not the most complex and everyone will manoeuvre and twist to try to make sure that any new rules can be evaded by them. They mighty do it after some devastation like a global war but then that would be a question for the victors and waht kind of settlement they might want to impose. I think (and I think this is the drift of the RP40 article) that there is already a sufficient development of the productive forces to enable us to satisfy human wants all over the planet. esp if we suppress waste production. These I think are the main fetters. We could all work less (and thus spend less time pissing about in cars etc) and still maintain productivity of essentials. Of course some inthe West might think that not having the latest mobile phone or satnav is a diminution of standards but I suspect that they will soon not even remember them. When Ahemdinejad rationed Irainians to 100 litres of petrol a month per vehicle (due to lack of investment in refineries under the mullahs) there were riots but then everyone noticed the quality of the air in Tehran had improved remarkably and acceptance followed (Vive la republique islamique!). Something similar could happen under a different and more social mode of production. If you think about it, in transport terms, capitalism has brought us to possibly the most wasteful and ridiculous situation it could (and for those of us who remember the pre-Beeching railway network it smells like another example of a decadent mode of production.> Anyway before I fully fall into nostalgia for my childhood, thanks > for that. If you have any specific word changes you'd like please sedn > them asap.
QUESTION
it is highly unlikely that ....
true
But not impossible. We should be careful when dealing with absolutes, as the most improbable, but possible scenario can invalidate the statement.
there is already a sufficient development of the productive forces to enable us to satisfy human wants all over the planet. esp if we suppress waste production. These I think are the main fetters.
Is this enough to establish the HIGHER stage of communism, without organised violence, the stateless society? That survival and beyond could be obtained already I do not dispte, but I imagined that the removal of the fetters would entail a vast leap in production. Isn't that what Marx had in mind. The almost limitless capacity of machine production . Now it would seem we have a curtailing which does not spring entirely from social relations but the capacity of the environment. Of course none of this means that the lower stages of communism cannot be realised.
I was thinking how this topic links to that other great modern scourge which some have touted as being as dangerous as climate change and which we have hardly mentioned - obesity. The same mechanism of stimulating "spurious" need for profit, the irresponsible manufacture of junk seems to be behind the obesity epedemic, which threatens to shorten life expectancy for the first time in 200 years.
Combine this with latest scientific research which shows moderate activity is useless as regards combatting diabetes, heart problems etc, and the ridiculous culture of working long hours which translate into little chance for a healthy life style embracing the necessary fitness activity levels becoming a mess phenomenon under capitalism. No doubt many long suffering workers will be more inclined to reach for the next burger or drink for immediate relief of their woes.
Pollution and the proletarian condition, two sides of the coin we pay to maintain capitalism.
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Question about "Stakhanov" and the hard work.
Question about "Stakhanov" and the hard work.
Pal Kluften.
Hello everyone. I would like to thank the IBRP comrades for making this Forum.
I would like to post two questions:
In the socalled socialist countries, the workers have been forced to work under even worse conditions, and extremely hard and under with more suffering - than in many of the western industrialised countries. I remember that in the USSR they had the "Stakhanovist" movement, and in China they had Mr. Lei Feng (as far as I can remember this was his name), who was a hero because of the hard work he did.
Does the need to develop the productive forces, make it necessary for the workers, even in a future really socialist/communist world, to work hard, or is "everything" developed to such a degree in the world today, that the "only" thing lacking for making a good world, is peace, world revolution, and soviet power?
And I would like to ask: don´t we need some kind of "inner transformation" too?...
Communist greetings,
Tullingen.
Remember that in all
Remember that in all probability there will be a large element within a new socialist society which does not want to go down the revolutionatry path, and there will be pressure from remaining capitalist powers. There will be possibly great economic dislocation and a need to rebuild (and if capitalism lasts much longer, the environmental problems could be huge).
Very likely this will be a time of great tribulation, rather than a time of ease. Hopefully such distress would be a short period.
The need for a great educational project would be pressing.
The unleashing of mass energy may well mean people work hard, but possibly feel fulfiled by their activity, unlike under capitalism where hard work is imposed as a blackmail for survival, where the work enriches the class enemy and the worker has no interest in the process.
Communist labour is freely contributed.
So communism must portray an
So communism must portray an economic system which has to be balanced and not in expansion, like some comrades think. We must want an economic system that produces as much as the peoples need and not as much as the peoples can... like capitalism does... otherwise it would end up consuming all its resources and we would face the same enviromental problems that capitalism is creating.
a young roman comrad.
POT or Communism?
POT or Communism?
Cleishbotham
IBRP
Can we first get clear that Stevein7 appears to be talking about the early transition to a socialist society whilst MAO7 appears to addressing the final mode of production once we escape from the vestiges of capitalism?
The prpoblem witthe original question posed by Tulingen is that "human beings make history but not in circumstances of their own choosing" (Marx, The 18th Brumaire). Under current production it is likely that work would diminish immediately as the productive forces are sufficiently developed but the distribution of the product ad the nature of the product are distorted by capitalist laws. However if the struggle for communism emerges from a major capitalist disaster (global war) which wipes out huge segments of the productive forces then we face an entirely different task...
Yes, its pretty much
Yes, its pretty much speculation without a concrete situation to relate to.
Obviously the present situation is deplorable to us but the situation in which revolution occurs (if it occurs) is unknown.
I would not be too quick to discount the possibilities. I think it is anarchistic and utopian to think that a revolutionary period would very quickly usher in a golden age, and that many of the tools which capitalism has created would persist for a more or less prolonged period. I think state capitalism could be the opening shots of the transformation of the economy, and that is far from ideal. Mistakes will be made and learning by experience will be costly.
I would also consider that without a very influential presence of the communist party in the power structures of the revolutionary society, the transformation will not be positive. The party will have to put forward concrete ideas on how to procede with the reconstruction of the economy and the myriad problems which will arise. The party cannot soimply act as a cherleader to the councils, it must take a leading role.
Again I think that it is utopian to do away with the authority of the party in advance, but recognise that authority can only arise from genuine workers' suport expressed through a mechanism controlled by the class.
More health concerns
More health concerns
While we are on the toic of capitalism's destruction of environment and people, I have just read a surprising report from BBC Mundo which states that the World Health Organisation have carried out a study which will appear in December's "The Lancet".
The study says night workers have almost double the risk of contracting cancer.
The problem possibly arises because the genes controlling tumor growth are sensitive to light at night.
The report states that in the West 20% of the economicaly active population are night workers.
According to the International Agency for Cancer Research (IARC) such jobs should be classified as possibly carcinogenic.
I include the original Spanish for those who can read it;
El informe, realizado por la Agencia Internacional para la Investigación sobre el Cáncer (IARC, por su sigla en inglés), analizó la incidencia del cáncer de mama entre enfermeras y azafatas. El estudio concluyó que aquellas mujeres que realizan jornadas nocturnas tienen algo menos del doble de riesgo de padecer la enfermedad, una proporción de incidencia que fue calificada de "modesta" por uno de los autores del estudio, de todas formas. Vincent Cogliano señaló que en Occidente cerca del 20% de la población económicamente activa realiza turnos por la noche. Los científicos no están del todo seguros de cuáles son las causas de este fenómeno, pero calculan que podría estar relacionado al desajuste del reloj biológico por la exposición a la luz por la noche. Este desajuste del "sistema circadiano" afectaría a los genes que controlan el desarrollo de tumores. Aquellos trabajos que lo alteran deberían clasificarse como "posiblemente cancerígenos", recomendó el IARC.
Not the first study linking night work and cancer
Not the first study linking night work and cancer
The BBC report states that this phenomenon has been researched before. In 2001 a group of scientists in Seattle observed that women working at night had 60% more likelihood of developing breast cancer than those working during the day.
Original quote
En 2001, un equipo de científicos del Centro de Investigaciones sobre el Cáncer Fred Hutchison de Seattle descubrió que las mujeres que trabajan por la noche tienen un 60% más probabilidades de desarrollar cáncer de mama que quienes trabajan de día.
an one more confirmation
an one more confirmation that our sistem is anti-human.
a reason more to be for communism
You wrote “So communism
“So communism*
You wrote
I think expansion could still be clean. Perhaps burning alcohol, solar power, water power, wind power, who knows what in the future, will eliminate many problems. My initial question regarded the ability of capitalis to do this. I still do not entirely eliminate the possibbility of expanding, clean production. Likely, production of different use values will be the case, but not necessarily restricted production altogether,
Capitalism does not produce as much as the people can. Already the means for a vastly expanded productiona are available. Automation, robots etc could produce far more. the capitalist social relations, the profit motive, is the fetter on production. The productive forces are virtually infinite.
You are right, I wasn’t
You are right, I wasn't much clear there, I meant intelligent expansion, and not expansion guided by capitalist instincts.
obesity article
obesity article
obesity and financial problems
obesity and financial problems
Almost half of British women and a third of men think their weight is "out of control", according to a poll.
And it seems the fatter people are, the less control they feel they have over other aspects of their life.
More than half (55%) of the very obese said their finances were also spiralling out of control.
The poll of 995 adults also found that 38% of adults would break their commitment to a diet if their partner simply suggested a takeaway.
The study found 46% of women felt their weight was out of control, compared with 30% of men.
As body weight increased, the percentage feeling "out of control" also increased, from 14% of those of normal weight, to 42% among the overweight, 73% of obese people and 87% of the very obese.
A quarter of people of healthy weight admitted feeling they were not in control of their money, but this rose to 55% among the very obese.
The poll was carried out for LighterLife. Its founder Bar Hewlett said: "It's alarming just how many people feel out of control of their weight and how this hopelessness affects other parts of their lives.
She added feeling "out of control" could prompt a downward spiral but said losing weight could have a major impact on the rest of people's lives. "If you start to feel more in control of one aspect, you may gain the confidence to change something else."
nice, really, i’ne never
nice, really, i'ne never thought about it :)
Rise in obesity drug
Rise in obesity drug prescriptions
Number of people using obesity drugs has passed 1milion mark
The number of obesity drugs on prescription has passed one million for the first time - eight times the number dispensed in 1999, figures show.
Two main drugs - orlistat (Xenical) and sibutramine (Reductil) - made up the bulk of the prescriptions issued by GP practices in England.
In 2006, there were 1.06 million prescription items for drugs to treat obesity, compared with 127,000 in 1999.
Orlistat is a capsule which prevents the absorption of some fat in the intestine, while sibutramine works in the brain by altering the chemical messages that control how a person thinks about food.
In 2005, the total number of obesity drugs dispensed on NHS prescription was 871,000. Other drugs on prescription include mazindol, rimonabant, phentermine and diethylpropion-hydrochloride.
The net ingredient cost (NIC) of the drugs increased from £4.9 million in 1999 to £47.5 million in 2006, while the NIC per item increased from £38 to £45, according to the study.
The report, from the Information Centre for health and social care (IC), also included new figures on heart disease.
In 2006, more than one in 10 adults aged 16 and over said they were diagnosed with a cardiovascular disease (CVD), such as coronary heart disease or angina.
The study included previously published figures on childhood obesity. It showed that obesity among those aged two to 15 increased overall from 11% in 1995 to 16% in 2006.
Tim Straughan, chief executive of the IC, said: "Information such as the large rise in obesity prescriptions paints an indicative picture of the population today and will help policy-makers and healthcare professionals plan for tomorrow."
obesity = political problem
obesity = political problem
The world needs to tackle the growing epidemic of obesity with the same sense of global urgency as climate change. The head of the international obesity taskforce, Professor Philip James, said that we needed greater political leadership at the international level. The scale of the obesity epidemic means that the world needs a global pact on the best ways to tackle it. Today, according to Professor Philip James, an expert on nutrition, obese children outnumber the malnourished by two to one. This worldwide weight gain is sparking a marked rise in some diseases - the number of people with type two diabetes is expected to double to 366 million by 2030. According to Professor James, there is no point in blaming individuals for being overweight - we need real political leadership to change the environment that is rapidly making the world fat. The fat content of food needs to be labelled clearly, advertisers must be prevented from targeting children and governments must encourage people to get out of their cars. Professor James also said that new data from Scandinavia indicates that the weight of a child at the age of 7 to12 predicts whether or not they are going to die early from heart disease or other problems.
Q+A
Q+A
Hi Nick
On the red to be green theme.
I have had a little discussion with someone who thinks that civilisation is unsustainable and that a collapse is inevitable.
One of the arguments is that agriculture has depleted the soil and the petroleum based fertilisers are going to run out, so the food supply collapses.
Essentially the argument is we're using resources at a pace which ensures collapse. This means that only some relatively primitive, small human population has a chance for the long run.
Of course there is the pollution aspect.
What are your thoughts on what level of population, what level of consumption are sustainable? I see the possibility that over a long period, billions of humans are not sustainable, but I also see the possibility of technological progress allowing for humanity to expand for many generations.
Perhaps more alarming is the fact that some believe the chance to repair the environmental damage has already passed, the chain of events leading to an extinction event is in motion.
____________
Hi Steve I think that
I think that*
Hi Steve
I think that global warming is a more serious problem than depletion of the soil. It is going to reduce the supply of water for agriculture, and therefore for sustaining human life, dramatically.
There are some in the green movement who think we are heading for a geological mass extinction which will see a large proportion of the species on earth, including homo sapiens, wiped out. They compare it with the transition from the Permian geological period to the Triassic period about 250 million years ago when 85% of all the species on earth were wiped out. Such extinctions are associated with dramatic climate change which occur relatively fast in relation to reproduction times for species which prevents evolutionary adaptation. The argument is that the warming of the earth will pass a tipping point in the next decade or so. This is what one of the speakers said in the debate at Sussex University.
I don't personally believe it is as bad as this and think that there may be a few more decades but I am not an expert. I find it difficult to believe that humanity is doomed. Marx said in the preface to the critique of Political Economy that "Mankind only sets itself such tasks as it can solve," and I still believe this is true. We have the ability to solve the problem we have set ourselves! However, it is clear that capitalism is very unlikely to be able to address these problems, and only communism can save us. We tried to hammer that home at the meeting but although some accepted it theoretically when it came to practice they showed that they did not agree. I think, though, that the green movement is an area we should keep intervening because some in the movement do actually agree with us at a deep level. I think my daughter falls into this category.
I personally think that global population will have to decrease in the future because of the pressure on resources.
Regards
N
____________________________"Red red wine, stay close to me now. All i can do i've done, but memories won't go, no memories won't go."
the main contraddiction is
the main contraddiction is between our way of production ( capitalistic ties namely ) and the environment where we all live. Not between us - the human kind - and it.
some years I've read that Fao ( one of Onu's agencies ) reported that in North America had spent every year to feed pets the same amount of money which could have fed 2 times all the people living in the so called 3°World.
Capitalism makes a lot a problem and then try to sell You his own superficial solution ( short times to eat/long time to work? Junk Food...Are U Fat?Go to Gym.By car obvoiusly.. and so).
That's 'cause is much more profitable for the whole system.
Let Produce,Consume and Die !
greets
President George Bush signed
President George Bush signed off with a defiant farewell over his refusal to accept global climate change targets at his last G8 summit.
As he prepared to fly out from Japan, he told his fellow leaders: "Goodbye from the world's biggest polluter."
President Bush made the private joke in the summit's closing session, senior sources said yesterday. His remarks were taken as a two-fingered salute from the President from Texas who is wedded to the oil industry. He had given some ground at the summit by saying he would "seriously consider" a 50 per cent cut in carbon emissions by 2050.
UK fattest in Europe.
UK fattest in Europe.
A new "fat map" of the UK shows high levels of obesity in the Midlands, Wales, North East and parts of the South East.
The map, created by Dr Foster Research, suggests the problem may be getting worse when compared with a similar map published two years ago.
Although different methodology was used, researchers said the 2008 map is now revealing pockets of obesity in previously unexpected areas. The data, from GP practices across the UK, shows that more than one in 10 patients registered with GPs in some parts of the country is obese.
Hotspots include Bexley Care Trust in London, where 9.1% of patients registered with their GP are obese, Barking and Dagenham primary care trust (PCT) where 9.3% are, and Medway PCT in Kent where 9.4% are obese.
The Shetland Isles has the highest proportion, with 15.5% of patients being obese, closely followed by many parts of Wales. The North East has a similar problem, including Wakefield District PCT where 9.3% of patients are obese, Doncaster PCT where 10.1% of patients are obese and Barnsley PCT where 10.8% of patients are obese.
The map and accompanying report were complied using data from GP practices relating to the Quality and Outcomes Framework (QOF) for 2006/07. The QOF includes keeping a register of patients aged 16 and over with a body mass index (BMI) of 30 or over in the previous 15 months.
Alex Young, senior project manager at Dr Foster Research, said: "We need to wait a few more years before we can say definitely that things are getting worse but there does seem to be a growing problem in some areas. We are seeing parts of the outlying regions being affected rather than just urban areas.
Government figures suggest that two-thirds of adults and a third of children are either overweight or obese in the UK. This could rise to almost nine in 10 adults and two-thirds of children by 2050, putting them at serious risk of heart disease, diabetes and cancer.
Estimates from 2002 show that people who are overweight or obese cost the economy £7 billion in treatment, benefits, loss of earnings and reduced productivity. By 2050, this figure could be £50 billion - almost half the NHS's yearly budget.
Too much consumption....
Too much consumption....
Press Assoc. - Tuesday, September 23 07:47 am
The world has slid into "ecological debt", having used up all the natural resources the planet can provide this year, according to the New Economics Foundation.
The think-tank said humans were using up resources such as forests and fisheries faster than they can be regenerated and producing more waste, mainly carbon dioxide, than the planet can absorb.
As a result, we have been increasingly "overshooting" nature's budget each year since the 1980s, NEF said.
Tuesday marks the date when we have exceeded the natural resources the planet can provide for this year - a day which has been creeping steadily earlier each year.
From now until the end of the year, humanity is "dipping into our ecological reserves, borrowing from the future," according to Dr Mathis Wackernagel, executive director of the Global Footprint Network.
Each year, the network calculates humanity's ecological footprint - the demands it puts on the planet - and compares it to the capacity of the Earth's ecosystems to generate resources and absorb waste.
Human beings are currently using up the capacity of 1.4 planets, and consumption is increasing.
Last year, Ecological Debt Day, formulated by NEF based on data from the Global Footprint Network, was October 6 - although new data has been taken into account this year including emissions from slash and burn agriculture and biofuels.
Incorporating the new data into last year's calculations would have put Ecological Debt Day 2007 on September 28, showing human consumption is still on the rise, NEF said.
According to the foundation, the failure to live within our ecological means is the root of many of the most pressing environmental concerns, including climate change, collapsing fisheries, declining biodiversity and factors contributing to the current food crisis.
starbucks water waste
starbucks water waste
Starbucks has today been accused of wasting more than 23 million litres of water every day.
The coffee chain, which prides itself on being green, has a health and safety policy of leaving taps running in all of its 10,000 branches worldwide it has been revealed today.
The company policy prohibits staff from turning off a cold tap behind the counter called a 'dipper well'.
This means that Starbucks is wasting roughly 23.4 million litres of water on a daily basis. That's enough water to quench the thirst of the entire population of drought-stricken Namibia.
In Britain where there are just fewer than 700 branches of the coffee shop, 1.6 million litres are wasted every day.
Starbucks bosses claim that the flow of water stops germs from festering in the taps.
Peter Robinson of environmental charity Waste Water told The Sun: "Leaving taps running all day is a shocking waste of precious water. And to claim you are doing it for health and safety reasons is bonkers."
poor kids
poor kids
A new survey for the British Heart Foundation reports that three quarters of children do not realise a poor diet can contribute to ill health.
Earlier this month the Department of Health said 90 per cent of children could be at risk of obesity-induced illnesses by 2050.
One in three English adults
One in three English adults will be obese by the time of the London Olympics, placing considerable strain on the NHS, latest projections have shown. Researchers from University College London claimed 13 million adults in England will be classified as obese by 2012, as defined by their body mass index.
The Department of Health, which said 9,000 people die every year as a result of obesity to a cost of £7.4 billion to the economy, acknowledged that obesity is the "biggest health challenge" facing the NHS.
"And many people simply just don’t know that being overweight can lead to major health problems including heart disease and cancer," a spokesperson told inthenews.co.uk.
"The UK is leading the world when it comes to facing up to the problem and tackling obesity. From this autumn we have been aiming to change the way we all live our lives.
Researchers, publishing their findings in the Journal of Epidemiology and Community Health, arrived at their findings by analysing trends in obesity between 1993 and 2004.
Analysis of the Health Survey for England, which included data on 128,000 households – including occupation and social class – found that half of those who will be obese in 2012 will be from low income and disadvantaged communities, "widening the health gap between the haves and have-nots even further".
Between 1993 and 2004 the proportion of obese men in England doubled from 13.6 per cent to 24 per cent, while among women the proportion rose by 50 per cent to 24.4 per cent.
worse than we thought
worse than we thought
Global warming 'worse than thought'
The climate is heating up far faster than scientists predicted, a top climate scientist has said.
Chris Field, a member of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), said it is being spurred on by sharp increases in greenhouse gas emissions from developing countries like China and India.
"The consequence of that is we are basically looking now at a future climate that is beyond anything that we've considered seriously," Mr Field said.
"The actual trajectory of climate change is more serious" than any of the climate predictions in the IPCC's fourth assessment report, Climate Change 2007.
He said recent climate studies suggested the continued warming of the planet from greenhouse gas emissions could set off large, destructive wildfires in tropical rain forests and melt permafrost in the Arctic, releasing billions of tons of greenhouse gasses that could raise global temperatures even more.
"There is a real risk that human-caused climate change will accelerate the release of carbon dioxide from forest and tundra ecosystems, which have been storing a lot of carbon for thousands of years," Mr Field said.
He pointed to recent studies showing the fourth assessment report underestimated the potential severity of global warming over the next 100 years.
"We now have data showing that from 2000 to 2007, greenhouse gas emissions increased far more rapidly than we expected, primarily because developing countries, like China and India, saw a huge surge in electric power generation, almost all of it based on coal," Mr Field said.
He said that trend was likely to continue if more countries turned to coal and other carbon-intensive fuels to meet their energy needs. If so, he said the impact of climate change would be "more serious and diverse" than the IPCC's most recent predictions.
Worse than we thought
Worse than we thought
You have quoted a lot from IPCC but put forward no further interpretations/strategies. Are you ready to suggest any solutions from the point of view of the IBRP? For example, if the global warming crisis was put into the control of the workers would there be a different more constructive outcome than there has been so far from the leading world governments?
xlendi
environmentalist
yes, for one simple
yes, for one simple reason:
the world leading governments must respect the needs of profit of the huge unthinkable mass of capital worldwide - a working class government, best called as Dictatorship of working class will use the huge scientifical/tecnical knowledge reached 'til nowdays ( and of course will improve it as quick as possible ) to preserve and defend the whole Earth and the Life above it.
for instance you won't need anymore to buy a car to improve the P.I.L( Gross.Int.Production in english ?- i'm not sure...) and to get to a a job //"unproductive"// ( namely not useful for the basic needs of human beings freed from profits chains... as f.i. trader, broker, insurer, ecc ) since the goals will be different.
I think there will be a massive use and improving of their rendition of renewable source of power and a general downsizing of wasting energy - you'll probably know the //"Kitegen project"// better than me and i've read somewhere into that just right now there is a small town near Munchen ( germany) which is autonoumus for their own power needs thanks to eolic/wind ecc.
greets
Dictatorship of working class
Dictatorship of working class
I wish that I could feel as confident as you do. My impression is that the global working class, comprised of the currently poorly paid and those who are unemployed (an increasing no. all the time) while well able to politicise are not necessarily widely educated enough at the moment to make the scientific and technological decisions that would turn the predicament of Earth round fast enough. At present they are profoundly steeped in the culture of consumerism and it would take precious time to change attitudes. Perhaps you will get a few very green individuals but that will be no different than things are at present where a few people are saying this is reaching a critical tipping point, or has gone past that tipping point in fact, but not enough people to wield influence on the ethos of consumption .
xlendi
capitalism rule for its own
capitalism rule for its own profit's necessity has imposed and generalized the use of mobiles worldwide into less of 15 years ( when i turned 18's no1 i knew had a mobile. Todays there are more mobiles than people in flesh and bones statistic say).
i think we could spread faster safer customs since we had got the power.
Don't forget that just today there thousands of brilliant brains working for free and associated together to develop some not profitable projects ( f.e. wikipedia, social network ecc.
If we accept that capitalism,
If we accept that capitalism, based on constant ramping up of production in order to meet the demand for ever greater profit rates, is the root cause of the climate (and obesity) crisis, then it is quite logical to assume that the only chance we have of setting the situation right is through the eradication of capitalism, which is only to be acheived through communism.
Now I am not offering water tight guarantees of success,but if that is our only possible exit from ecological catastrophe, then the argument in favour of communism receives a tremendous boost.
It is certainly true of many workers that
Revolution involves the rapid transformation of people on a mass scale, and is a result of the peaking of the various contradictions at work under the preceding period.
Capitalism is chaos, the regulations imposed on it do not coincide with the wellbeing of humanity, including our need for environmental safety. Socialism will permit only that production which is deemed conducive to human wellbeing, and the mechanism to decide this will differ from that of the capitalist State mechanism which is essentially controlled by those who control production for profit.
Could I recommend a reading of this book?
A new report in the Lancet
A new report in the Lancet puts traffic pollution as the main trigger of heart attack in a population.
In second place is physical exhaustion.
Drive to work and do overtime and youre nailing your coffin...
Several informed sources are claiming that the high carbohydrate low fat diet is a contributory factor to all sorts of "Diseases of Civilisation". Sugar, white flour and perhaps surprisingly for us who have followed the mainstream advice, grains are condemned as unhealthy. I wonder if that were to be the case, what impact it would have on a global diet which is 55% cereal based, the food industry etc.
e.g
telegraph.co.uk class=
Three in four adults are likely to suffer illnesses such as heart disease or diabetes by 2030, according to a government report which warns that the NHS will not have enough staff to cope.
It says that the impact of lifestyle diseases linked to obesity, and of people living longer with multiple illnesses, coupled with recent cuts to nursing staff, means that on current trends there will be a shortage of almost 50,000 nurses within three years, and far more by 2030.
The scale of the looming crisis is made plain amid concern about care in hospitals, after an investigation found short-staffing was endemic among those with the highest death rates.
It suggests that the long-term challenges for the NHS will be exacerbated by unhealthy lifestyles, and diseases such as heart disease and diabetes which are linked to rising obesity.
The report says: “Estimates suggest that three quarters of the population could be suffering from the effects of heart disease, diabetes and related illnesses within two decades, which is a significant jump. Furthermore, the improving trends seen in survival rates for these diseases translate into larger numbers of people needing nursing care.”
The number of adults suffering from obesity has been forecast in previous research to double by 2030, meaning that half the adult population of Britain would be obese.
Heart disease, which is linked to fatty diets, lack of exercise and smoking, is the leading cause of death in the UK. The number of people diagnosed with diabetes has risen by a third in six years, with a 57 per cent rise in prescriptions for the condition.
Tam Fry, from the National Obesity Forum, said: “The tragedy is that we have brought this on ourselves. We have failed miserably to prevent weight increases for more than two decades, so that this problem has kept creeping up on us.
“Successive governments have failed to take a firm strategy on this, and so we are left with this time bomb.”
The report says that growing health demands will be too much for a dwindling nursing population.
It says that by 2016 the NHS is likely to face a shortfall of more than 47,000 nurses, as rising pressure on services combines with job cuts enforced by hospitals trying to make £20 billion in “efficiency savings”. A worst-case scenario paints a still bleaker picture, with a shortage of 190,000 nurses in England within three years as the NHS struggles to cope with more elderly patients with multiple illnesses and younger patients suffering from lifestyle diseases.
Although the NHS budget has been protected from cuts, health authorities have been instructed to make efficiencies by 2015 in order to meet some of the extra demand.
Around 570,000 nurses are registered to work in England. The number has fallen in every part of the country except London and the south-east coast since 2009, with 5,000 jobs being lost since the election. The latest forecasts were drawn up in June by the Centre for Workforce Intelligence, in a report commissioned by the Department of Health. However they were not publicised.
Previously, reports have shown links between nursing shortages and death rates in hospitals.
Last month a report into high death rates at 14 hospital trusts found widespread short-staffing. In some cases, shortages were so extreme that inspectors felt compelled to abandon their impartial roles and step in to alleviate patient suffering. The report by Professor Sir Bruce Keogh, the medical director of NHS England, found that all of the trusts involved had “inadequate” nursing staff levels.
This latest report by the Centre for Workforce Intelligence says that the number of registered nurses has fallen in every part of the country except London and the south east coast since 2009.
Dr Peter Carter, the director general of the Royal College of Nursing, said: “The forecasts are deeply worrying and they resonate with what we are seeing on the front line – the Government’s own figures show 5,000 nursing jobs lost since the election.”
He said that too many trusts were wasting money making nurses redundant, only to end up hiring agency staff at greatly inflated pay rates, which led to worse care.
Dr Carter said: “It doesn’t make sense economically and clinically.
“We are facing a major problem and the Government needs to accept this honest appraisal, and tackle the issues, rather than try to bury bad news.”
A Department of Health spokesman said: “This report is part of our ongoing workforce planning and it does not contain any firm conclusions about the future.
“It is intended to start a discussion among NHS organisations, who are responsible for making sure they employ enough nurses to care for their patients. Relevant organisations were made well aware of its publication.”