THE TOP FIFTY

Fifty Ways......

You can't blow your nose or go the the grocery without planning ahead. But to most people, planning ahead usually means days or months. Few people plan years ahead. And beyond that, in the range of decades, we rely upon experts and institutions. But they, of course, are just people like you and me.

The Lighthook Top Fifty is about planning ahead, waaay ahead. Seven generations would be nice. Fourteen would be better. But to start with I'll just go for 104 years. That's only three generations! Many of us know people who will see the year 2100, who'll know how the future was treated by you and me.

The Top Fifty is a list of the top 100 human priorities (in no particular order) for the next 104 years. Why? Because if you and I don't think about these things, someone else will have to, and they just might not be interested in the same things you and I are. My part is finding fifty for you to review/think about/argue with. Your part, if you care to join in, is to suggest others (via the link following the list). My fifty will no doubt show my U.S. citizenship, but don't let that bother you. We all have to be somewhere, and there's more than enough to go around.
If you don't think there's good reason to think ahead, ponder these three items:
By the year 2000, there will be 2 billion (yes, billion) youth between 10 and 21, mostly in poor countries. There will be no employment for most of them.

Wed, 29 May 96: LONDON(Reuter): "More than half the world's people will be living in urban areas in 10 years time, underlining the prospect of ever more crowded, violent and unhealthy cities, the United Nations Population Fund said in a report Wednesday. Of the global population of 6.6 billion in 2006, 3.3 billion will inhabit towns and cities, and the biggest increase in urban populations will be in developing countries where the pressure on resources will be greatest. UNFPA said that the world's urban population currently totaled 2.6 billion and that 600 million of these people did not have the means to meet their basic needs. The number of "megacities" with populations of over 10 million increased from just one in 1950 - New York- to 14 in l994, and another 13 are expected to be added to the list by 2015."

"If today is a typical day on planet earth, humans will add 15 million tons of carbon to the atmosphere, destroy 115 square miles of tropical rainforest, create 72 square miles of desert, eliminate between 40 to 100 species, erode 71 million tons of topsoil, add 2700 tons of CFCs to the stratosphere, and increase their population by 263,000. Yesterday, today, tomorrow. By year's end the total numbers will be staggering: an area of tropical rainforest the size of the state of Kansas lost; seven to ten billion tons of carbon added to the atmosphere; a total population increase of nearly 90 million. Looking further into the future, three crises are looming. The first is a food crisis evident in two curves that intersect in the not too far distant future: one showing worldwide soil losses of twenty-four billion tons, the other a rapidly rising world population. The second crisis on the horizon is that caused by the end of the era of cheap energy. We are in a race between the exhaustion of fossil fuels, global warming, and the transition to a new era based on efficiency and solar energy. The third crisis, perhaps best symbolized by global climate change, has to do with ecological thresholds and the limits of natural systems. We can no longer assume that nature will be either bountiful or stable or that the earth will remain hospitable to civilization as we know it." --From Ecological Literacy by David W. Orr

Now hold on to your hat, here we go.

  1. Replacements for the internal combustion engine.
  2. Seed banks for endangered plant species.
  3. Population stabilization and reduction.
  4. High valuation of ecosystems.
  5. Long term storage of radioactive waste.
  6. Reduction of the number of manufactured chemicals.
  7. Apprehension of information as dynamics rather than facts.
  8. Replacements for wood, steel, and concrete building materials.
  9. Development of dispersed drinking water purification mechanisms.
  10. Reduction of mass of personal surface transportation by a factor of four.
  11. Dispersed economies.
  12. Development of small scale economic units.
  13. Reduction on the reliance upon transportation of goods.
  14. Replacement of physical travel by electronic or other "travel".
  15. Replacement for the incandescent light bulb.
  16. New source of electricity.
  17. A decrease of individual anonymity.
  18. The death of the infallibility of science.
  19. Development of conflict resolution.
  20. The dispersal and reformation of the educational system.
  21. The rebirth of the village.
  22. A new perspective on the conflict between individual and collective rights, which guarantees increased rights for both.
  23. "Greening" of desert areas while reducing water consumption.
  24. Reforestation of deciduous forests.
  25. Replacement of economic yardsticks of "success" by ecosystem yardsticks.
  26. A definition of what is enough.
  27. Incorporation of non-gregarious and non-technological people into "society".
  28. An expansion of the definition of "long term planning".
  29. Oceanic life recovery.
  30. Reformation of the legal system to a) accomodate virtual property; b)provide limitations on precedent.
  31. Widespread adoption of lifecycle product responsibility by manufacturers.
  32. Significant reductions of the financial burdens, limitations on creativity, and virtual regulatory impact of insurance businesses.
  33. Establishment of new boundaries between medical ethics, law, and individual freedom.
  34. Reformation of the US political structure.
  35. Reduction of use of pesticides and fertilizers by 80%.
  36. Preservation of rainforest ecosystems.
  37. Development of low cost housing that minimizes use of materials with high embodied energy.
  38. Expantion of the definition of the Endangered Species Act.
  39. Replacement for the steel wheel/air filled rubber tire used on most transportation (re-inventing the wheel).
  40. Perception of intact natural ecosystems as greater than the aggregate sums of the resources contained therein.
  41. Replacement for lead acid and nickel-cadmium batteries.
  42. Development of small scale, vegetable based fuels for agricultural use.
  43. Constitutional amendment to establish and maintain a national surplus.
  44. Development of alternatives to wood products for paper.
  45. Adherence to treaties with indigenous peoples.
  46. An increase of interactive recreation (as opposed to passive recreation).
  47. Development of new, small footprint light rail mass transit which reduces total mass (weight) of the current light rail norm by a factor of eight.
  48. Develop regenerative braking and co-generation for transitional personal surface transportation.
  49. Re-define the Presidential term length to six years and prohibit re-election.
  50. Begin national dialog on two hundred year national goals.
  51. Establish tiered highway speed limit and lane allocations to promote smaller, more efficient personal surface transportation.
  52. Prohibit drawdown of deep aquafers to less than 1% per year.
  53. Enhance local creativity and self-reliance.

OK, I gave you some freebies. You may not agree with some, and others may make you laugh. Now it's your turn. You won't be graded; this is very much a pass/fail situation. When you get ten new priorities (less than that wouldn't be a challenge), e-mail them to me and I'll add them to the list.

"Fear less, hope more;
eat less, chew more;
whine less, breathe more; talk less, say more;
hate less, love more;
and all good things will be yours."
--Swedish proverb

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James Lux, January 12, 1996