RE: Patterns of Society. How Permaculture can prevent overpopulation of the planet.
I first heard about the relationship of population growth with stability / resources in an interview with Geoff Lawton. It had never occurred to me before so it was quite eye opening but at the same time it makes perfect intuitive sense! I agree with your theory that stability can be achieved with adequate resources and even abundance. That would be an ideal middle ground. Although I think with permaculture we can achieve abundance, but even with abundance we can learn to use only what we need having more appreciation for what we have, being less selfish and sharing the rest with each other or back with nature.. and therefore abundance = adequate as you stated, instead of over supply. I am idealistic that it's possible but not so optimistic that this would be achieved globally anytime soon! But we can do it in the home and community level :)
Dear @sagescrub.
I also learnd about these connections through Geoff, as he was my teacher for my 2017 7 months online PDC. The whole course was the ride of my life!
About your concerns:
In 32 years we have 2050 and 10 billion people on earth and I think in that time we will be very very close to a global permaculture solution. We will have been through so much instability and our current systems will have been close to crashing or collapse so often, that out of every instability moment more and more people and of course also enterprises will switch over to sustainable permacultural approaches. Some becauese of the new world they want to build and some because they want their money safely invested. I guess it is a natural behaviour of us humans to learn from our mistakes and in the global community, communicating via internet our local mistakes are having big impact on solutions across the planet.
Wow I really hope you are right! I am also idealistic about our future but I don't see the passion for permaculture solutions in the desire of mainstream ideals. I think if it does happen the shift will likely be when technology makes it easy for a culture to adopt green ways of living, so that it does not take any effort for the masses. If that were possible a shift would happen because it would be the right thing and also it would be a fad. Then if the masses shifted to permaculture through convenience a fundamental shift of ethics could follow. That's the most likely way this would happen in my opinion, but I'd like to be wrong and the masses gain a more active interest in sustainability!