Tom Ellis
2 min readDec 9, 2023

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This is utterly delusional. Your underlying assumption is that infinite expansion of resource extraction, production and consumption of commodities, and consequent need for population growth are possible in a finite world; hence that all regulation is bad because it puts curbs on the "rising tide" that lifts all boats.

Well, guess what? Infinite growth of production and consumption on a finite planet leads directly to overshoot and collapse, especially when the energy bonanza that made that growth possible (fossil fuel extraction) is (1) heating and destabilizing our global climate at unprecedented, accelerating rates; (2) polluting our land, air, and water alike; (3) already past its peak of productivity and is inevitably declining, causing the prices of everything to rise relentlessly.

But that's not all. As long as we could assume that the resources of the planet were infinite, the "rising tide" of technological innovation and free-market consumerism did seem to "lift all boats"--more or less. But on a finite planet (like the one we actually inhabit) a zero-sum money-based economy inevitably leads to a kind of feeding frenzy, where wealth concentrates into progressively fewer hands, as the vast majority grow poorer and poorer. In other words, put simply, a money-based zero-sum economy on a finite planet (with finite energy resources) follows the exact same rules as a Monopoly game. And Monopoly has only one possible outcome: the Winner (the super-rich) owns everything and all the Losers (the rest of us) have nothing at all, and are hopelessly in debt to the Winner(s) for our houses and hotels! In short, your argument is pure balderdash.

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Tom Ellis
Tom Ellis

Written by Tom Ellis

I am a retired English professor now living in Oregon, and a life-long environmental activist, Buddhist, and holistic philosopher.

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