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Why societies collapse | Jared Diamond

One of the reasons why societies collapse is if there is a conflict between the short term interests of the elites and the long term interests of the society as a whole, says Jared Diamond.
We could give as an example the elites that control the fossil fuel industry. Their short term interests definitely are in conflict with the long term interests of the rest of us.

Chat on Enormous Risks of Rapid Climate Disruption: 1 of 3

Is President Donald Trump a Vogon?

Is President Donald Trump a Vogon?
The time has come, unfortunately, when we need to ask that question, even though it might seem like a joke, science fiction or a satire by Jonathan Swift
It is however, a serious question – deadly serious.
For those not familiar with the term, the Vogons are a fictional extraterrestrial species found in Douglas Adams’ “The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy” series of books.
In the first book, the Vogons destroy planet Earth to make way for a hyperspatial express route.
The demolition orders for planet Earth had been posted on Alpha Centauri for 50 Earth years.
“What do you mean you’ve never been to Alpha Centauri?” one of them asks. “For Heaven’s sake, mankind, it’s only four light-years away. I’m sorry, but if you can’t be bothered to take an interest in local affairs, that’s your lookout.”
“Energize the demolition beams.”
Of course, those in the White House (or the nanobots controlling them) likely aren’t making room for a hyperspatial express route.
Far more likely would be they are sterilizing the Earth for a real estate development.
Let’s say that there is an interstellar civilization (that we’ll call the Kzintzi) looking for a new planet to settle.
A planet such as Earth, with all it its diverse life forms and ecologies, might be interesting to observe for a while, but it really wouldn’t do as a place to live.
Newcomers almost certainly would have little or no resistance to Earth’s millions of bacteria, viruses and other forms of life (read “War of the Worlds” by H.G. Wells).
Far better to sterilize it or, better yet, get compliant (and not too bright) Earthlings to do it for you – fewer legal complications with the Galactic Federation’s First Directive that way.
So, what would the members of that interstellar civilization, the Kzinti, do?
Perhaps they would hire interstellar real estate consultants (that we’ll call Vogons) to go ahead of their migration fleet and “clear the land” for them – for a sizeable fee, of course.
The Vogons would seek out planets occupied with a species advanced enough to burn fossil fuels but not quite advanced enough to control the greenhouse gases emitted.
The Vogons do a few subtle psychological manipulations here and there, the greenhouse gases increase beyond control, the oceans boil off and the planet is left totally lifeless, with even the hardiest microbes killed.
A few years later the Kzintis' interstellar fleet arrives at the sterilized planet (“Too bad, so sad”) and they cool it down to make it livable again – a trivial problem for a space-faring civilization.
We human beings have spent many years and hundreds of millions of dollars unsuccessfully searching the galaxy for signs of life.
By any reasonable calculation there should be hundreds if not thousands of advanced civilizations out there. Why haven’t we found any?
The standard answer is they aren’t there.
A possibly more realistic answer might be that the universe out there is much like it is here on Earth – a dangerous place.
Perhaps there are hundreds or thousands of advanced civilizations in our galaxy but they keep their existences secret because there also are out there, as here on Earth, predators, parasites and other unpleasant creatures ready to prey on the weak or unsuspecting.
Human beings are altering the Earth’s environment. We are close to expanding off of our planet. We are about to develop artificial intelligence. In other words, we are dealing with a crisis the like of which has never occurred in the history of our planet.
How likely it is that this crisis would attract the interest of interstellar predators, parasites or real estate developers is, to borrow a phrase, “an unknown unknown.”
What should we do?
The cover of The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy has good advice. It reads: “Don’t Panic.”
– Keith McNeill
READ MORE: Stephen Hawking: We are close to the tipping point

Prime minister Justin Trudeau should call for a worldwide referendum on global carbon fee-and-dividend at the COP21 climate change conference in Paris.
The conference will start on Nov. 30 and will last until Dec. 11.
The general consensus is that, while it will make some progress, it won't make the breakthrough we need.
A worldwide referendum on carbon fee-and-dividend would be that breakthrough.
James Hansen, the man who many consider the dean of climate scientists, has called for carbon fee-and-dividend many years and with some success.
Carbon fee-and-dividend is elegantly simple – charge a fee on fossil fuels at source, similar to a carbon tax. Unlike a typical carbon tax, however, the money would not go into general government revenue but be distributed in equal dividends to everyone.
For those on the right, it's a small government solution. Most governments already collect some kind of tax or royalty from fossil fuel production, and so little additional bureaucracy would be needed to collect the fee. Similarly, people would only need to prove that they are human beings and of a certain age to collect their dividends, meaning minimal bureaucracy on the distribution side as well.
For those on the left, carbon fee-and-dividend would tend to re-distribute income, helping to correct the world’s growing economic inequality. According to Citizens' Climate Lobby – Canada, two-thirds of people would receive more in dividends than they would spend in fossil fuel fees. The bottom 20 per cent of earners could expect to receive 150 per cent more than they would pay.
Many economists agree that carbon fee-and-dividend would be our most powerful tool in dealing with climate change. In fact, it is hard to imagine a successful approach that does not include carbon fee-and-dividend as its central pillar.
Here are some ballpark figures.
According to Wikipedia, the world produces about 30 billion tonnes per year of carbon dioxide through the burning of fossil fuels. A fossil fuel fee set at the same level of B.C.'s carbon tax of $30 per tonne of carbon dioxide would therefore raise about $900 billion per year. Assuming that the dividends would only go to adults, and that 5 billion of the 7 billion people in the world are over the age of 18, then that would mean every adult human being on the planet would get a dividend of about $180 per year.
Carbon fee-and-dividend might be our most powerful tool, but to have a hope of being effective it would need to be global.
National programs, even if they involve major emitters such as the United States or China, are simply not going to cut it.
Put a fee on fossil fuel use in one jurisdiction and certain industries will move to another. If the fee rises high enough, there would be the danger of creating a black market for untaxed oil and coal. Both outcomes could be minimized by global carbon fee-and-dividend.
Going global implies going through the United Nations. Implementing global carbon fee-and-dividend would justify and require reforming that organization. A good place to start might be by creating a United Nations Parliamentary Assembly.
Here in Canada, as in many other nations around the world, we sometimes put important questions to the people in a referendum. One example would be the referendum on transit held last spring in B.C.'s Lower Mainland.
Organizing a worldwide referendum on carbon fee-and-dividend would be a difficult but not impossible task. The United Nations has organized successful votes in war-ravaged locations such as Kampuchea and East Timor.
Human-caused climate change is a global problem and requires global solutions. A worldwide referendum on global carbon fee-and-dividend would be a good next step, and Canada should lead the way.
– Author Keith McNeill is the editor of the award-winning Clearwater Times newspaper. Last spring, McNeill, age 65, and his friend, Jean Nelson, age 81, cycled from Toronto to Ottawa to promote an online petition calling for a Canada-wide referendum on carbon fee-and-dividend.