|
The Systems Thinker
|
Jeff Miller
|
Dec 16, 2005 12:02 PST
|
Pegasus Communications is one of my favorite publishers... they get a
fair bit of my resource business. Longtime readers of this list may
recall the Leverage Points newsletter which is a terrific (free)
resource..... find it at:
http://www.pegasuscom.com/sustainablefuture.html
They are also providing a free download of the Systems Thinker
newsletter. The information on it is provided below.
Be well.... /jeff
-------------------------------
Special Issue of The Systems Thinker--Moving Toward a
Sustainable Future (including a chapter from "Limits to
Growth: The 30-Year Update," Chelsea Green Publishing,
2004, by Donella Meadows, Dennis Meadows, and Jørgen
Randers; and excerpts from a talk by Dennis Meadows)
With the tragic impact of the recent natural disasters and
the growing evidence of global warming, climate change has
come to the forefront as a major concern and challenge for
the world's citizenry. While the realization of the scope
of the problem is new to many, system dynamicists have been
documenting the troubling trends for more than 30 years. In
1972, a group at MIT created a computer model that
projected the alarming consequences of continued unchecked
growth. The resulting book, The Limits to Growth (Universe
Books, 1972), shocked the world and became an international
best seller.
Authors Donella Meadows (deceased), Dennis Meadows, and
Jørgen Randers recently published a third edition, Limits
to Growth: The 30-Year Update (Chelsea Green Publishing,
2004). In updating the model and book, they found that the
trends documented three decades ago were largely unchanged
and that humankind continues on a path toward environmental
and social collapse. But rather than offering a series of
grim prospects for the future, the authors conclude the
book with an optimistic call to action and a surprising set
of "tools" for making the transition to a more sustainable
way of living on the planet.
Thanks to the generosity of Chelsea Green Publishing, in
the November 2005 issue of The Systems Thinker, we
published Chapter 8 of "The Limits to Growth: The 30-Year
Update" in its entirety. We also included recent comments
by Dennis Meadows about the role of collaboration in
finding and implementing solutions to big problems. Because
any large-scale change effort requires a critical mass of
engaged and interested people working together, we are
making this special issue of The Systems Thinker available
free of charge. We would like to encourage you to forward
it to your colleagues, friends, members of community groups
and religious organizations-anyone you can think of who
might respond to the call to action. True change begins
when each of us decides to do something differently.
Download/read the complete issue at
http://www.pegasuscom.com/sustainablefuture.html. This
special issue of the newsletter is free. Please forward it
to your friends and colleagues.
Subscribe to The Systems Thinker at
http://www.thesystemsthinker.com.
Visit Chelsea Green Publishing at
http://www.chelseagreen.com.
|
|
 |
|
