Creating new options?

What is "good"? Most human answers would be considered environmentally sociopathic to an intelligent alien. Environmental realities can seem 'evil' on their face to us humans. So maybe agreeing what constitutes "good" would be a "good" place to start, and good luck with that...

And what of precautionary principles and resilience? "Greatest" could thus perhaps use a little defining as well, since on its face it might imply being at the utter bleeding edge of some yield or tradeoff.

I think we do need to question the tacit notion that it is optimal for human flesh to constitute the majority individual-species biomass. Increasingly, we are the forest, and perhaps it's in that context that forestry can be most informative to our predicament.

Inasmuch as the "greatest good" must necessarily be a human value judgement, perhaps we would be well-advised to just apply the principles of forestry to the currently overgrown monoculture of plague apes.

All we need to do is align our needs with the needs of the planet and other species so they don't conflict. Easy as that.

I think of this problem as containing a number of strands that are all inter-related, but separating them helps us humans cope with the myriad variables.

The major categories are:

1. Climate
2. Peak Energy, particularly oil
3. Pollution/Sink issues
4. Capital Markets
5. Growth, population and economic growth
6. Politics

Looking at this list is depressing. If a stated reasonable goal for sustainability (my kids have a future) is a world where a) climate change does NOT wreak havoc, humans have sufficient energy, ecological services can cope with our waste; and b) our capital markets can operate in a low/slow growth environment, we can migrate to economic growth that does not require use of natural resources beyond their replacement rate; and our political systems are no longer hijacked by special interest lobbies (eg the coal and oil sectors); then I have to conclude that there is virtually no chance of humans making any meaningful progress in these areas.

One of our senior politicians here in Australia, Barnaby Joyce, described Australia's halting efforts at controlling our prodigious CO2 output as "eco-fanaticism that will cost jobs" (sigh). That he has a voice on this issue; and people take him seriously, indicates that Australia lacks the will and imagination to grasp the opportunities present; and that we will remain followers as the world continues to implode (see Mike Rupert's latest blogs).

Others...

Greatest good for future generations?
Greatest standard of living? (for who? sustainable?)

I'm not sure that a "Greatest good" measurement is the metric that you want to use. Perhaps it is, but it is both subjective and relative, which makes it both difficult to define and to measure.

Maybe you need two types of goals. A long-term, general mission/vision (e.g., greatest sustainable standard of living for all people, or whatever), and a short-term, more specific and quantifiable metric or set of metrics that mark milestones towards the long-term (e.g., energy use, emission levels, Gini coefficient, quality of life metric... whatever makes sense given the long-term goal).

The long-term goal would be an aiming point. Being long-term, presumably it would encompass an inherently sustainable concept. Of course, the current long-term goal is growth, so sustainability is clearly NOT a requirement of long-term human planning (so far). The short-term goals provide a way to measure progress and break the Herculean into measurable and understandable metrics that people can latch onto. The short-term goals and metrics would change over time to reflect progress or lack thereof.

Now, how do you arrive at the goals, long or short? Good question. Wish I had a good answer.

Brian

What you are really asking is, What is the purpose of life? Without first defining that, it is impossible to ask your other questions; what is "good" or what the "goal" should be.

Todd

===From The Tragedy of the Commons Hardin 1968===
..."The class of "no technical solution problems" has members. My thesis is that the "population problem," as conventionally conceived, is a member of this class. How it is conventionally conceived needs some comment. It is fair to say that most people who anguish over the population problem are trying to find a way to avoid the evils of overpopulation without relinquishing any of the privileges they now enjoy. They think that farming the seas or developing new strains of wheat will solve the problem -- technologically. I try to show here that the solution they seek cannot be found. The population problem cannot be solved in a technical way, any more than can the problem of winning the game of tick-tack-to"...
===and===
"...A finite world can support only a finite population; therefore, population growth must eventually equal zero. (The case of perpetual wide fluctuations above and below zero is a trivial variant that need not be discussed.) When this condition is met, what will be the situation of mankind? Specifically, can Bentham's goal of "the greatest good for the greatest number" be realized? No -- for two reasons, each sufficient by itself. The first is a theoretical one. It is not mathematically possible to maximize for two (or more) variables at the same time. This was clearly stated by von Neumann and Morgenstern, [3] but the principle is implicit in the theory of partial differential equations, dating back at least to D'Alembert (1717-1783).

The second reason springs directly from biological facts. To live, any organism must have a source of energy (for example, food). This energy is utilized for two purposes: mere maintenance and work. For man maintenance of life requires about 1600 kilocalories a day ("maintenance calories"). Anything that he does over and above merely staying alive will be defined as work, and is supported by "work calories" which he takes in. Work calories are used not only for what we call work in common speech; they are also required for all forms of enjoyment, from swimming and automobile racing to playing music and writing poetry. If our goal is to maximize population it is obvious what we must do: We must make the work calories per person approach as close to zero as possible. No gourmet meals, no vacations, no sports, no music, no literature, no art…I think that everyone will grant, without argument or proof, that maximizing population does not maximize goods. Bentham's goal is impossible."...
===later===
..."We want the maximum good per person; but what is good? To one person it is wilderness, to another it is ski lodges for thousands. To one it is estuaries to nourish ducks for hunters to shoot; to another it is factory land. Comparing one good with another is, we usually say, impossible because goods are incommensurable. Incommensurables cannot be compared."...
===but===
"Theoretically this may be true; but in real life incommensurables are commensurable. Only a criterion of judgment and a system of weighting are needed. In nature the criterion is survival. Is it better for a species to be small and hideable, or large and powerful? Natural selection commensurates the incommensurables. The compromise achieved depends on a natural weighting of the values of the variables."...
===etc.===
http://www.dieoff.org/page95.htm

i used to think & attempt to live in terms of greatest good in a broad ecological sense; that was before i learned of peak oil- about 3 yrs. ago.

since then i now think of family/friends, & sometimes immediate local[can see, walk to, etc.] primarily in a survival sense. i have gone thru a stage of focusing on much larger community only to conclude i was not only wasting my time & energy, but it was needed by family/friends for the nastiness to come.

what i take from this post is a reminder of what my values have been & which of them applies here[pre-bottleneck] and which values i will maintain under what circumstances - in the bottleneck.

i'd love to be there post-bottleneck, but am skeptical that'll be in my lifetime. perhaps a sense of groupness that will be needed & develop in the bottleneck will also help us define & live/maintain 'greatest good'.

I agree with those that are asking for a definition of "GOOD"

I struggle daily with trying to define it for myself within the context of who we are as humans, where we came from and where we are now and why. For me the path to this knowledge is through science, art history and culture.

I submit that without going very far afield from the usual topics discussed on this site there is no way to answer it. I recently revisited these discussions by some of the brightest minds across a variety of fields and specialties. I suggest that it might be a good idea to stop and listen to these talks and accompany them on their intellectual journeys. When I first listened to these talks I hadn't yet spent any time on the Oil Drum. I'm now paying attention from a new perspective. If any of you take the time to listen to these speakers I would be interested to sit around the fire and discuss what you think.
Especially how this deeper level of understanding can be applied to enlightening all of humanity and helping us survive by understanding who we and what we really are.
Best wishes for a sustainable global society.

Greatest good for greatest sustainable long term number of people on planet?

That's it. Let's leave this place better than we found it. Hard to do now, but we can pull the plane out of the nose dive. Some could spend pages quibbling about what 'sustainable' meant, but I'll leave it at this simple statement.

I recommend the following to help provide some levity: George Carlin on saving the planet. (Spoiler: " "Why are we here?" Plastic.")

If that offends anyone ... too bad. It's supposed to, after all.

The relevance to this story?

That there is no point in trying to measure the "greatest" good. There is no such thing. There is the good each of us believes in, and it is personal to each of us. We may share a similar idea of what is good with others--or think we do--but there is no objectivity. There is no science of goodness, any more than there is a science of happiness. Maybe less so. Good is not measurable in units. Good is a value judgement, which depends upon meaning, which depends upon a mind to create it. Good is imaginary. Without human imagination, good would not exist.

We can't engineer or manage our way out of the coming crises. We can prepare ourselves, mentally and in other ways, for uncertainty and the possibility of traumatic change. We can adapt. But we can't control it.

We can organize with those who are like-minded If we organize, we can act collectively, and influence the larger world to some extent, perhaps more so than individually: in greater proportion than our numbers. Otherwise, we can watch what happens and be ready when the time comes to act. But we can't pretend to know how the world or society should or should not be.

The real proof of what you believe is good is what you do. If all you do is think, then, apparently, you believe that thinking is good. If you believe that trees, or clean water, or jobs, or money, or biomass (please!) is good, then by all means, do something to ensure the continued existence of these things. But you won't decide what is good by thinking about it. You simply know it. You feel it. And you do it.

Personally, I think that the planet (not to mention the universe) will be fine with or without humans around. I think it would be disappointing if we were to go, or even if we were reduced back to ignorant, superstitious and technically unsophisticated tribes. I think that ideas are good, and ideas require a society with lots of surplus energy, so that it can afford to pay people to sit around all day thinking. But that's just me.

I'm no cornucopian, but I think that forcing ourselves to be "sustainable" is about equivalent to saying that we should stop time, find some static way to live and just stick there. That's not going to happen. Pandora's box is open. We need more energy, not less. That's the goal. Anything else is a waste of time. We've already lived the other way (energy-poor). Let's do something different. Change is inevitable. Embrace it.

Great question(s) and response(s) posted so far.

My guess right now is that we are built to think about the good of ourselves and a small tribe in a limited area and over only a few generations at most.

We are also placed into a situation that we are not built for. We have become not only the dominant species in terms of the intended and unintended consequences of our technology, we have over-taxed our habitat in such a way as there is no place to move to and replicate what we think we want as a good life --even though there are many variations on the idea of what a good life might be.

Part and parcel of this is that we have achieved numbers such that we now compete among ourselves for diminishing resources with which to establish a good life for some of us, and maybe for the delusion that some of us can ensure that a good life is possible for our own immediate heirs, even if to the exclusion of the children of "Them" from whom we steal by force.

We have -- most of us -- been drugged and living only partly in the real world, but mostly in a delusion. We have been sleepwalking with little awareness of what we and our species are really up to.

We awaken with a kind of shock whenever we pierce the bubble of delusion created by the centers of cultural gravity within our complex knot of competing cultures and subcultures: religion, politics, and commerce being the key centers of gravity.

The more we awaken, the more tempting it is to retreat back into the mediated pseudo-reality provided by the noisy competitions for power and influence within which we were conceived and brought up -- however harshly.

What our species is up to seems to be mostly about securing food and shelter and safety, and then maximizing pleasure and minimizing pain. We like to live long with full tummies and hearts full of song and with some familiar, much-loved friends with which to grow old. We also like adventure and competition and the thrill of new discoveries.

When we interact with each other in a rational way as global citizens, we find that we are simply not equipped at all for the task, so far. We mostly act out of primal impulses and visceral longings and fears even if we have persuaded ourselves thoroughly that we are rational and logical for the most part. None of us is exempt from this at all, unless our brains lack essential parts --the brain stem and the limbic brain. Even then, I wonder.

The notion that we can manage the planet or even manage our species in groups much larger than a few hundred or so seems misguided to me at this point.

However, I do feel as though even though we are thrust into a situation for which we are not equipped by creation or evolution, we are bound to try to do the best we can. This process is likely to be a farce and a series of disasters, the outcome of which is unpredictable.

Most of our species will be bound to the Meta-Narratives of the Military-Industrial Complexes which inevitably grow to include and then dominate the religious and political and commercial centers of culture, as they clearly have in the USA. Note that this process has already occurred not so much by design as by a kind of predictable accident, just as a lightening strike can cause a forest fire.

This tendency to resort to violence as the best solution and the final solution for our problems leads me to be very skeptical regarding the survival of our own species. We will probably not only take down many species simply by destroying their habitat along the way, but by using nuclear and chemical and biological weapons before we are very far into this last resource war.

Eventually the sun burns out and the planet has trouble supporting life of any kind that we can recognize. But until then it seems to me that the good life involves full tummies, security, love and long-term friendships, along with a goodly dose of adventure. This includes nurturing the young and making up stories that give us a sense of connection with whatever this is that is bigger than we are and that helps us to feel like we will somehow live on, if only through fading memories and stories and the way our young manage to get along in the world we leave them.

We live in a time where we in supposedly advanced cultures are suddenly and shockingly robbed of any sense of security and continuity we have had for a few decades. The dominant cultural institutions try to perpetuate a false sense of security and of the continuity which is so vital to our mental health, but these institutions are rotted and rigid, and are crumbling at the shocks and stresses made by too many people competing for too few resources in a planet that is very much less hospitable as habitat for humanity than it was even 20 or 30 years ago.

We have had the rug pulled out from under us. A few people notice this directly. Most people around me are just glad that gas is cheaper than it was a few months ago. As diverse as the people around me are, they are mostly completely submerged in the dominant meta-narrative that might be loosely described as "The American Dream: Once More, With (Desperate)Feeling!"

The dream is actually over. Catabolic collapse is a process of self-devouring. We are in that process, and there is no way out of it -- not that we can make. The good life is to make the best of whatever comes our way, in terms of full tummies, shelter, friends, whatever security we can find in an increasingly volatile environment, and whatever help we can give to the young.

The outcomes are completely out of our hands.

The goal:

1. The least amount of human suffering possible (lowest number of sufferers, least suffering per person)

2. Fewest species extinctions.

"Go light, the lighter the better, so that you have the simplest material for health, comfort, and enjoyment." Nessmuk The backpacker creed. Let no one know you have passed by.

I spent many of my younger years strapped to a packframe and this always rang true. Walk lightly on the earth so that others may also.

Works for me.

Don in Maine

Greatest good for the greatest number of people?

Greatest good or the greatest number of people?

I think we can say that it will be an inverse ratio - the earth can probably support 100 Donald Trumps or 10 Billion Sao Paulo slum dwellers (let's ignore food distribution for a moment).

When ‘we’ talk of population control (for example) I am always amused to hear that this will lead to the extinction of humanity – or “who decides who to kill?”
Who did the math?:
with 3 children per couple the planet will reach 12 billion earthlings by 2100
with 2 – 9 billion
with 1 – 1 billion, apparently the population in 1804. And everyone dies a natural death. Yep, back to the stone age.
It's a striking coincidence that in 1858 when the first oil well was drilled the population was 1.3 billion

Greatest god for the greatest number of people?

Isn't this discussion what Stephen Gould thought Religion was for? If not, what does it do for us?
"Work hard & suffer and you will be rewarded in your next life"?
No need to take care of this planet 'cause This World is Not My Home.

On the other hand, I see in St Peter's what pre-oil man did when given a goal (" ad majorem Dei gloriam ") and I can't but be impressed. A trillion barrels of oil up the stack and at the pinnacle of civilization Homo petrolus has produced the iPhone.

(who I spent some time with when I was studying in Vermont...

with whom I spent some time when I was studying in Vermont...

Grammar is a servant of the greater good.

I would have to vote for "none of the above".

I believe that the ultimate goal would be: "The Greatest Good for a planet that includes a significant and sustainable population of Homo sapiens."

I feel that H sap. is an interesting and worthwhile evolutionary outcome that, properly self-controlled, could be of benefit to the planet (and perhaps Universe) as a whole.

Our greatest mistake has been our tendency to act before we think. As soon as a technology is shown to be feasible, we attempt to make maximum use of it whilst ignoring most, if not all, of the potential problems that might result. Because we can utilise fossil fuels to produce vast amounts of food, we ignore the necessity to control our population in the short term, thereby creating a huge future dilemma; how do we feed the ever-growing population vs how do we humanely reduce the population to a sustainable level?

I doubt that there is an acceptable social/political/moral/religious process that can be introduced for effective population reduction. Even a globally accepted "one child per female" regime would be too slow to reduce the catastrophic effects of our present overpopulation. Quite frankly, we are neck-high in the brown and smelly, and only the Four Horsemen can provide a positive solution.

The proportion of population reduction by various means will depend on the circumstances of each political/geographical/social region. In Zimbabwe at present the main forces are famine and (civil) war, but disease and pestilence could easily soon become predominant. A similar situation exists in Gaza.

The maximum number of H saps that a fossil-energy free globe can accomodate is a hotly debated topic. James Lovelock thinks that we have so stuffed the globe that a few hundred million people living near the poles is the likely outcome. Starry-eyed Vegans think that the planet can handle at least double our present population as long as we give up eating animal products. From several years of reading the various points of view (and the back-up data) I have concluded that a population of one to two billion would be sustainable if (and only if) a fast die-off happens. Say half a billion a year for the next ten years. Any delay in a rapid reduction would reduce the ultimate sustainable number.

This theoretically sustainable population is based on the dubious assumption that H saps are the most important part of the biosphere. I would contend that for the ultimate progress of evolution, H saps should never occupy more that half of any environmental niche. At present many countries have National Parks or other protected heritage areas. These are predominately areas of minimal commercial value, set aside to pay lip-service to environmental values. What should be protected from human alteration is at least half of every eco-niche. Half of the forests, half of the prairies, half of the coastal "fisheries", half of the wetlands, half of the mountain meadows, half of the semi-deserts, half of the fertile river-bottom pastures. Only then could the local environment be considered sustainable.

Since the end of the last Ice-age, humanity has seen many triumphs and falls, but only on a local basis. For the first time we are facing a global crisis. If humanity is to move forward with a significant part of our current knowledge/science/culture intact, then I believe that the following are essential:
1. The elimination of the concept that H saps is a special "god originated" life form.
2. The elimination of the concept that "competition" is a positive force compared to co-operation.
3. The elimination of the inane concept that any one form of government is best for all people.
4. The elimination of the concept that "Growth is Good".

The "Greatest Good" concept is in itself a highly dubious construct. Within the ranks of H saps, there would be something like 6.7 billion differing ideas. Within the whole realm of sentience the concept is immeasurable.

Finally,and sadly, I have no belief that humanity will behave in any rational manner. Let the conflict begin!

To me life was always 'good' up until a certain time frame measured in about 5 years.

Growing up at the end of the depression on the farm..good.
Moving in 1950 to the then fledgling suburbs....good.
My teenage years,dated,camped,etc............very good.
Military period, flew a lot,laughed a lot....very good.
Married life,raising children..............mostly good.
Working at a job I loved and exceeded at...very good.

Then at a point somewhere near the end of my 30 yrs of work something
changed.Somewhere around the early 80s. Suddenly the lifestyle I
saw in Raleigh,NC started to change rapidly. Huge numbers of new
people moved in and I began to notice a very different lifestyle
emerging. One of extreme hubris.One of greed and ego on a scale
I had never seen. This was the beginning of the Yuppie Age.

With it came a degrading of our culture. A lessening of our morals.
Many things changed as employers discovered that these were selfish
people and the work ethic took a tremendous hit.

My employer started to tighten the screws. I was glad to take an
early retirement window after 29 years of the Goodness ,in my job,life and other activities. I was given the Rolex watch and parties in my honor. I did not have to take the "perp walk". That soon came to be though. I escaped early enough while it was still ...........good.

I moved back to the farm........life was once more good.

However those attitudes and life changes I observed above translated into all of our society in America. A sea change occurred but was slow to morph into the outback but it has slowly made inroads.

So I am now looking at the upcoming end of my life.
Live alone. Wife desires the Yuppie Lifestyle of shopping and all the rest. My children became unrecognizable to me in their lifes actions.

Now I must tend to my dying mother.Life is not good for her.

I live a lifestyle that suits me and life is .....pretty good.
My wife's is bad. My children's is bad. My inlaws sucks.

Life is what you make it. It can be GOOD or BAD.
If you are influenced by the media and listen to the garbage that fills our airwaves and all the printed media. If you believe the Yuppie Creed of 'I want it now and I will take it all and I will give NOTHING back'.......then you will find life is eventually not GOOD.

Good to me is many things that are not relevant to most. It was to others in my past. We shared,we loved,we laughed,we fought and died.

Today its all about ME,ME,ME...

We are all dead men walking but I have 'walked' enough that I can't complain. I lived a good life by and large. I now have plenty of money and many projects that interest me.

I did not divorce.My wife does not live with me. She hates the farm and Kentucky. I give my wife money without a court decree. My children will not change. They lead fairly miserable lives and I can't change that.

What is The Greatest Good? Its what each person makes of his life and how bad or good he treats our planet. Many are a waste of human flesh , sad to say for they destroy. Many used to fight this..They gave up.They were beaten and pepper spray smeared in their eyes by force. We all saw that.It was disgusting as was the police riot in Chicago years ago when the youth wanted to witness the Age of Aquarius. A watchword for back to the land and love and hair.

I won't go into what the current youth are into but its depressing to me. We have taught them NOTHING.Our culture has raised them up. The culture took my children. It gave nothing back.

Things now for our country are BAD!!!!

Airdale

The only thing that comes to mind that really applies to the greater number of people, is fair.

One nation using 20%, or more, of everything? Not fair.

Corporations creating grossly rich by picking the pockets of the avg. and poor Joes? Not fair.

Presidents committing crimes and going free while avg. people rot in jail for even minor crimes? Not fair.

Corporations having the ears of our reps and not us? Not fair.

Americans voting against the bailout and congress for it? Not fair.

Paulson scaring congress into going along and not going to jail for it? Not fair.

Wealthy nations creating climate problems that drive poorer ones under the waves, then refusing to pay for relocation? Not fair.

Gerrymandering? Not fair.

Egalitarianism? Fair.

Planning with future generations in mind? Fair.

A job = a living wage? Fair.

Telling people only a few will ever be rich because only a few CAN be rich? Fair.

Telling the people climate change, the economic collapse and PO are going to lead to, at best, depression? Fair.

So, you want the greater good? You can't base it on religion, morality, cultural issues. There is only one measure that serves all people at all times:

Is it fair?

Cheers

My opinion on this is that we should aim for the following:

The greatest amount of happiness for the greatest number of beings, weighted by intelligence/creativity/sentience

This means that we should aim for the greatest good for all living things on earth, but with more intelligent creatures (with humans being the primary example here) being more important than less intelligent creatures. This caveat is needed, otherwise the best course of action for all living creatures on earth would probably be the extinction of humans...

Any opinions on this?

THE GOOD

I think about it every now and then. And I come up with:

First, visualize the world you would like to live in if you were alive 100 years from now

Then, work for it.

Then die happy and unexpectedly and fast.

The world I would like to live in would have a lot fewer people, and a lot more animals and other bits of nature, happily evolving with very little if any interference from people.

I would like to be “in” ( in all the meanings of that word that make sense) a group of people who share my values, and are sufficiently various to be interesting to communicate with.
These people would be smart, kind, funny, talented, skilled; feel and be safe, and have lots of opportunity to work their brains in ways amusing and helpful and not harmful to the planet’s other species. All of the other species.

These people would abhor the very idea of exploitation of the planet for merely themselves for the moment. Not a one of them would even think of blowing off the top of a mountain, dumping it into a trout stream, burning coal to get electricity to blow their hair.

These people would think of their personal death-at an appropriate time- as good- a ticket for the next kid to be born. Without that ticket, the next kid could not be born.

As one of those people, I would be able to take a walk up the hill, stick a fishing line in a lovely clear stream and pull out a trout for supper, leaving plenty and plenty more where that one came from.

Like I used to be able to do, when I was a kid.

No need to say more- my point is obvious. And,-- yes it is too, possible.

Back to work.

As others have noted, it is fairly difficult to analyze “Greatest Good” in such a general context. Here is another way to look at this idea.

As a retired computer software developer, I found the application of various modeling techniques to be very useful in developing requirements. The so called “Medical Model’ was one of my favorites. You are to imagine you have just given the doctor one of those medical Background sheets and now he/she is approaching your problem by looking at the symptoms of a rash on your arm, while trying to determine the underlying cause and then working with you on treatment objectives (available time, meeting insurance requirements, etc.). Your objective might be to get some immediate relief because you are going on vacation and then deal with a more permanent cure later. The doctor will discuss alternative solutions such as a topical cream that will give good temporary relief versus a series of radiation treatments (complete cure) that will be painful, time consuming and expensive. You may opt (Implementation) for the cream now and then, later on, radiation as your plan of action.

So, given some Background, the sequence is Problem Analysis (symptoms and causes), Objective setting, and then exploring Alternative Solutions before committing to Implementation. There are a couple of caveats – the word “problem” is often interpreted to mean an algebra problem (not just something “bad”) and the problem can also be the fear of losing an opportunity. The model also suggests an iterative approach of experiment, feedback, and refinement (if aspirin doesn’t work we'll try morphine :-) ).

The Medical Model applied to finding the Greatest Good might have a first iteration like this:

Background:
Humans live on a planet that is 4 billion years old in a known universe that is 14 billion years old. There is no information about events before the origin of the universe and therefore no information on the initial source of our existence. We do have some understanding of how we evolved from material in the cosmos and a very good idea of our evolution for the past 100,000 years or so. For the great majority of that timeframe we were just a part of the planet’s ecosystem and, for the most part, major planetary events were beyond human influence. We appear to be just another species with no extraordinary claim to the planet’s resources.

Problem:
Recently, we have dominated the planet and have used its resources with few constraints. The result is an “unnatural” balance with the rest of earth’s ecosphere. This imbalance now threatens both humans, and other parts of the ecosphere, with a potentially significant die-off. We also face serious degradation of the biological diversity that has historically enabled humans to be resilient.

Symptoms:
• One plus degree centigrade rise in global temperature which affects storm patterns, ice melting, etc.
• Wars regarding land and resources leading to high human death rates in those affected areas.
• Diseases such as AIDS which are very difficult to abate.
• Food shortages
• Abnormally high rate of extinction of other species and rapid degradation of things like coral reefs.
• Scientific evidence that many natural resources are soon going to be insufficient to maintain the current human “quality of life” – which is already very poor for half of the world’s population of humans.

Causes:
• Human population has exceeded the carrying capacity of the planet.
• Natural resources are finite and insufficient for projected consumption patterns.
• The disruption of ecosystem balances is proceeding at an unprecedented rate and therefore the planet’s normal compensation mechanisms are severely compromised.
• Although human manipulation of the ecosphere (technology) has created benefits (medicine for longer life) it has often caused equal or greater offsetting harm due to unintended consequences (air pollution shortening life).

Objectives:
• Bring the human population and its use of natural resources back into a sustainable state in a manner that does not seriously degrade the rest of ecosphere. This would be the “Greatest Good”.
• Perform the transition in the least painful manner for humans and other species.
• Set a series of measurable goals for every 5 year increment until 2050. Set some goals for the end of the century.

Some potential solutions:
• Force the decrease of green house gases to 325 ppm by 2015 by mandatory government regulation of carbon emissions for electricity generation, transportation, industrial processes, etc. Use a scientific model to prove that the US is in compliance for its share of this reduction.
• Target global human population for 2050 at 4 billion with another goal of 2 billion by the end of the century. Target US population for 2050 at 200 million and then 125 million by the end of the century. Use an aggressive education and incentive program (more children equals more taxes). Work with the United Nations for global reductions.
• Reduce world oil consumption to 25 mbd by 2025 and 5 mbd by the end of the century. Significantly raise taxes for the use of FF, especially for individual uses such as private cars. Provide incentives and funding for numerous programs for conservation, efficiency, alternative energy and mass transportation systems.
• And lots of other actions and programs as frequently outlined here on TOD.

My sample entries for each step of the model are unimportant. What is important is the process of analysis before taking any action. A “Bush” model that operates on “Gut Feelings” would be the antithesis of the Medical Model. The first steps in the model are the most important. In my example, there is no mention of any kind of supernatural element that grants humans a divine right to more resources than other species. It does not suppose that any kind of divine plan or intervention is at work. If the parties involved cannot agree on this aspect of the problem, then it is pointless to talk about implementing some plan of action. If there is no agreement on the symptoms (which should be indisputable facts); or the causes are not believed; or the objectives don’t seem achievable or relevant – then what is the point in discussing solutions?

My sample set of solutions, taken out of context, would seem insane to many people. And I would be the first to agree that it is highly unlikely that actions like those listed above would ever be agreed to by the critical mass of people required for success. My frustration is the belief that no plan of action can succeed without some rational process like the above model. On the other hand, only a few corporations I encountered actually had the discipline to work this model to a rational conclusion – so how can I expect rationality on a global scale to work? As much as I appreciate and understand the idea of people taking small steps on an individual basis – I simply can’t see that type of action will forestall a nasty future for my great granddaughter. Maybe we are just not yet ready for the idea of a “Greatest Good”.

Here is another way to look at this. Humans likely are the only species with a mental concept of good and evil. Many if not all things we view as "good" are just programs - ie. mother love is not good, it is just the specific program we have to promote our genes. But we conceive of it as good. So rather than ask what good is, we should ask why we have a concept of good. Other animals just do what they are programmed to do. It is neither good or bad to them. Killing prey to feed your young is just what a lion does. We humans don't judge that in the same way we judge ourselves.

The concept of good and evil is either a hard wired program, a culturally induced idea or more likely a combination, the culture providing the specifics, the program providing the basics. So first it seems we should examine why we got such programs, why various cultures elaborated on them. (However I am not sure that understanding that will change anything.)

It may be hubris or delusion to think we can decide on new parameters to a basic brain program. Whatever concepts get carried forward with whatever humans survive will be what is.

I would venture that action we conceive of as good has a consequence that if we look carefully at might well be conceived as evil. Instead of good and evil we could just say actions and consequences but try to think of some things that way and your mind will balk at it.

That said, I suspect each of us will feel better at the end of our lives if we act in accordance with a good that encompasses more humans and other creatures than less - to the extent that we can envision the consequences of such actions.

Nate,

The question (Greatest Good) inherently induces tunnel and funnel vision thinking.

What about the inverse polarity question: What is the Least Bad (i.e. for greatest number of people, cows, etc.) and how do we get there?

What about a multivariate question: How do we keep increasing Goodness while also reducing Badness? (In other words, a combined problem of first variable maximization and second variable minimization, assuming such a solution exists if at all.)