Aldous Huxley - Brave New World

As Mustapha Mond points out in Aldous Huxley’s 1931 dystopian novel Brave New World,

 

“industrial civilization is only possible when there’s no self-denial. Self-indulgence up to the very limits imposed by hygiene and economics. Otherwise the wheels stop turning”.

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aldous_Huxley

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brave_New_World

 

Richard Adrian Reese - What is Sustainable?

"We can move toward sustainability directly and mindfully, or we can stumble through all of the unsustainable alternatives first, causing even more unnecessary destruction first. Returning to a sustainable way of life will be a long and turbulent journey, but we have nothing to lose – except for a ridiculous way of life, an abusive relationship with the biosphere and a highly questionable future for mankind."

 

American author Richard Adrian Reese in his 2011 book What is Sustainable.

http://www.wildancestors.blogspot.co.uk/

Herman Daly - Essays towards a Steady-state Economy

A policy of maximising GNP is practically equivalent to a policy of maximising depletion and pollution.

 

The American ecological economist Herman Daly in the introduction of his 1973 Essays towards a Steady-state Economy.

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Herman_daly

 

http://www.rightlivelihood.org/daly.html

http://dalynews.org/learn/blog/

 

Wendell Berry - Faustian Economics : Hell hath no limits

 

'To recover from our disease of limitlessness, we will have to give up the idea that we have a right to be godlike animals, that we are at least potentially omniscient and omnipotent, ready to discover “the secret of the universe." We will have to start over, with a different and much older premise: the naturalness and, for creatures of limited intelligence, the necessity of limits. We must learn again to ask how we can make the most of what we are, what we have, and what we have been given. If we always have a theoretically better substitute available from somebody or some place else, we will never make the most of anything. It is hard enough to make the most of one life. If we each had two lives, we would not make much of either. One of my best teachers said of people in general: “They’ll never be worth a damn as long as they’ve got two choices."'

Wendell Berry in a  2008 article - Faustian Economics : Hell hath no limits

http://harpers.org/archive/2008/05/faustian-economics/

 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wendell_Berry