Oldal 20 [20]
OCR
18 ] THE PuitosopHy or Eco-Pouirics despoiling of nature. But it was not the concept of sustainability they abused, but rather that of development itself. Whoever speaks of sustainable development claims that the development is undiminished; it is merely its continuance that causes some problems amidst the difficulties that have arisen. It automatically rules out the possibility that what we have is not development but decline, which must not and also cannot be sustained. One cannot speak of an accidental or innocent slip of the tongue when the pretext of sustainable development is used to speak ever more bravely of sustainable economic growth (which is an absurdity), sustainable consumption (under which must be understood the justification of a hopeless, degrading way of life) or sustainable wellbeing (forestalling the question as to whether being is good at all and what would make it so). The dramatic decline in the rich variety and versatility of the natural world in the wake of human intervention signifies a historical dead end. It bears witness to the predominance of self-destructive tendencies in our civilisation. As proof of this, the following are often mentioned as examples of the destructive behaviour irreconcilable with the concept of development, i.e., sustainability: : the irresponsible use and misuse of chemicals, synthetic materials, nuclear power, nanotechnology, gene manipulation and fossil fuels; radical change in our way of life induced by artificial intelligence — as well as the predominance of the methods of social organisation that warrant and require the application of the listed technologies: the overcentralisation of control, the depersonalisation of communication, the growing impossibility of communal self-organisation, the atomisation of society, the cult of wasteful consumption and extreme ethical relativism. Why should this state of affairs be sustained? Whether the motivation be innocent goodwill or intentional deception, to speak of sustainable development in the shadow of the impending catastrophe is an error with serious consequences: it prevents the search for a way out, the mobilisation of the resources of survival. It is a fact that our planet is not capable of supporting 7-8 billion or even more humans without the serious and irreversible decrease of its biological capacities, the collapse of the ecosystems. The decrease in the human population will in all likelihood be achieved by the wars and pandemics caused by extreme forms of want as well as natural disasters (species extinctions, climate change), because a global agreement on intentional self-limitation currently seems unobtainable. As for the techno-optimist fantasises about the
