We are at the end of an age, the age of expansion - and we need a new narrative for the next step. The limitations of our earth collide with the reality and necessity of rapid social development. If one accepts that both are harsh realities, then we face a real dilemma of limitation and dynamism. The desperate, albeit understandable, call for renunciation and reflection is helpless and not very effective, because it does not resolve the dilemma. The mathematical principle of convolution could provide this solution, because it allows infinite movement in a finite world through growth in diversity. Not growth into more, but growth into diversity. And not theoretically, but very practically.
Many have now understood that the unchecked consumption of resources and the pollutants produced with it, such as carbon dioxide and microplastics, will drive our earth to the edge of habitability.
It is evident that climate change must be stopped and that this is only the beginning of the solution to our sustainability problem.
We live on a finite planet with finite resources.
This is clear to most of the people, and not just Fridays for Future, but the vast majority of the population are calling for solutions.
Two needs collide
It is absolutely essential, however, that the solution of an important secondary condition must be committed: We must develop further and must maintain and further improve social achievements such as the rule of law, democracy, equality and the reduction of poverty, which have been fought for over the past centuries. Sustainability has to be progress, not regression, if it is to serve people. The argument that there are other social necessities in addition to limiting climate change is just as correct as it is trivial. It has been used by brakemen for decades and is therefore tainted with dishonesty. But it has a core that is just as true as the threat posed by carbon dioxide: our society must be able to develop continuously.
On the one hand, because we are still a long way from achieving everything that is necessary. There is still hardship and enormous injustice in the world, and the sustainability problem itself is always forcing new innovations beyond the climate. In fact, the reason is much deeper, because society must be able to move in order to be stable. Movement and stability are not a contradiction in terms;