 We're back here on Friday the 14th. Sustainable Hawaii is the name of the show and we're talking about sustainability. We're talking about whether sustainability is still possible. We're talking about that with Eric Acidurian who's a fellow at WorldWatch on the mainland and he came at the suggestion of two professors at the university to come and speak to a number of groups about his views of things. Welcome to the show, Eric. Thank you very much for having me. Nice to have you here and we have somebody to introduce Eric and that is Travis Idle. Travis is one of those two professors and he's an associate professor at Tropical Forestry at UH Manoa and your job should you decide to accept Travis is to introduce Eric to our audience. Do my best. So I'm not just a professor at University of Hawaii. I'm working with the Wataata Lecture Committee this year. The Wataata Lectures are an endowed lecture ship out of actually Church of the Crossroads here in Honolulu. It's endowed by the Wurfel family to focus on issues of peace, justice and sustainability. So this year we brought in Mr. Acidurian to talk to folks in Hawaii about this issue of sustainability, what it means globally and hopefully what it means locally as well. So he had a talk last night at University of Hawaii focusing on education. He'll be speaking at Church of the Crossroads tomorrow Saturday at 7 p.m. on the provocative title is sustainability still possible and then he'll also be giving the homily on the Sunday service at Church of the Crossroads on the 16th. So we're glad to have him here. It's been stimulating and a good discussion so far. So thank you very much for having us on the show. Oh sure Travis. We like this kind of discussion because we want to get all kinds of points of view. Eric can you tell us your background and how you got into this subject in the first place? Sure. I actually have a background in psychology and religious anthropology and it was actually some studies in moral education and cross-cultural moral development that exposed me for the first time back as an undergraduate many years ago into this sustainability crisis. Growing up in an American consumer culture a lot of it's hidden from view but only when you step out and see kind of the rapid globalization and consumerization of the world where I really saw it and redirected my academic career to focus on this looming sustainability crisis. Where are you based now in WorldWatch? WorldWatch is based in Washington D.C. which is where I live as well. And so as a fellow what do you do for them? So I've done a variety of things. I've actually directed now I guess six reports books we have an annual book called State of the World and another one called Vital Signs. Yeah it is. But we try to grab some of the key topics that are facing us. So a lot of where I focus is on the consumer culture because that is the root cause of the sustainability crisis. And so we've looked at topics of that nature sustainable. The 2013 report is on this question of is sustainability still possible? And the new one that I'm working on the 2017 report is on earth education. Rethinking education for a changing planet. What has to change considering all these crazy changes that are coming in the education that we're providing our children today? Education. What's your website that people can look up? WorldWatch.org. Okay and it's a 501c3 nonprofit. So you came and you spoke last evening and you had a group discussion this morning and you'll have you'll do the homily at Church of the Crossroads on Sunday is it? And Saturday yes. So they're really keeping you busy. They are. Are you surfing yet? No. But I hope to get to the beach this afternoon. I hope you do. Travis. I'll point him in the right direction. So let's talk about, you know, the two principal issues you mentioned, consumer, the advent of a sort of consumer world. What is happening? Can you tell us the sea change on that over the period that you've covered it? Yes. And it's not looking good. I mean, if you actually look at the projections, we are a population now of 7.4 billion people. It's going up to 9.9 billion people by 2050 barring some sort of massive epidemic set stabilized. But just the momentum of our population growth is bringing us there. And projections often celebrated rather than mourned of the growth of the consumer class are just as quick. I mean another billion people will join the consumer class by 2025. And while that's good for business that's selling all these unsustainable consumer products, long term it's going to drive us even faster toward the brink. And so, you know, whether we're talking about, you just picked the product and there's growth in it, right? The growth of cars in India and China, disposable diapers, pet ownership, meat consumption, refrigeration, all these things are putting huge tolls on the earth's systems even as it provides these consumer benefits to the population. So we have to really rethink this whole consumer system if we're going to get serious about sustainability. When you say consumer system and consumerism, what are you saying? We want consumer goods. We want unbridled access to consumer goods. If we see it in the advertising, we want it, whether we can afford it or not. We always want it. We want to surround ourselves with the best and brightest consumer goods that we see on TV. Is that what it is? Well, yes, there's a bigger culture that really pushes us to want it, right? So is the default really that humans are unrelenting consumers or is it because of the systems that we've been born into, the cultural system that really celebrates consumerism? Just look at advertising, right? $500 billion every year spent worldwide to tell us that we want these things. And this is not happening just to rational adults but there's a lot of marketing towards children and there's a lot of research that says that children can't distinguish between media content and advertising until they're about eight years old. So we're from babyhood on. We're priming children to covet or to want more and more stuff. And that's just not a good idea. Ecologically speaking, even health-wise, right? We have two-thirds of Americans are now overweight or obese. And that's partly the main reason is because of the consumer diet. So if we are pushing on to children, soda and fast food and all these other things with the help of friendly clowns and tiger cartoons, right, then you're going to have children who eat unhealthy, especially when they also don't have access to traditional knowledge like how to cook, how to grow their own food and all that, and that's all repressed. It sounds like there's three elements in that. I'd like to comment on it. One element would be, as you mentioned, the PR world. And I'd better if I asked you whether the PR world had expanded, you know, you said 500 billion on PR in this country. Actually, that's just commercial advertising. Public relations is a much bigger thing. But it's all part of the same continuum, isn't it? So if I asked you, you know, how much that has expanded in the past, say, 10 or 20 years, you would probably tell me it has expanded by multiples in the past 10 or 20 years. And therefore, it governs more of what we do. It tries to reach us, you know, where we live with every kind of media that you can imagine, those guys are being paid to sell us stuff. Yeah, I mean, here's a perfect example. So I'm in the process of editing this new state of the world. And there's a chapter on commercialization of childhood. And there's a nice box in there about Pokemon Go, right, at all the rage right now. And it seemed pretty harmless. People advocate that, oh, it's actually even getting children out outside and playing in the parks, right? But the company that produces Pokemon Go has already sold rights to have more Pokemon showing up in places like McDonald's, right? So that's actually a tool now to bring children into fast food joints and to priming them to buy more stuff. So really, every vehicle, media vehicle, is being utilized, whether websites, apps, YouTube videos, or more traditional marketing, even schools. Schools are complicit now in having advertising, whether through outlets like Channel One, which is a school based channel that actually is force fed to children in schools and includes advertising. Meaning that many schools in the United States have agreements with Channel One. Channel One gives them free computers and TVs, but in exchange, you have to show as a school the program, Channel One programming. And 25% of that programming. Well, it's insidious because, you know, some of its news, some of its fake news, right, about, you know, new trends of new products or celebrities, and then there's advertising. So to have a sacred space like a school spoon feeding children advertising and not, you know, critically debunking that saying, hey, we shouldn't actually be watching this or let's deconstruct this, that's really, again, priming children to be consumers. Part of that, if I can just comment, extend a little bit, part of that is the technology. 20 years ago, we didn't have the internet, or at least not in this form. We didn't have social media. We didn't have television to the extent we have it now. So if I'm a PR person and I want to sell something, I have lots more media that I can use more effectively to say nothing about all the research they have about exactly how you reach people psychologically and sell them stuff. And that has happened kind of at the same time, maybe part of the same process. And that's of even greater concern, because then that every stroke they do, every penny they spend, it's more effective all the time in reaching their target. And, Morgan, this is getting scary. Yeah, it is scary. I mean, there's a great documentary by Morgan Spurlock, who did Fast for Nation, or did Supersize Me. But he looked at product placement and actually even kind of met a joke in this documentary, was he actually had product placements paying for this documentary. But he at one stage in the documentary goes into a functional MRI machine to track his brain waves as he's watching the newest movie trailers. And so that's happening now, right? For the blockbuster movies, subjects are being exposed to the possible trailers, the final cuts, and seeing which one is most effective at priming them to really want to go watch that movie. It's scary. It is. And then when you take that one step further, and this goes to, you know, our world politically and our, well, our world in general, you're not only selling widgets or ice cream, you're selling ideas. And you can sell ideas to millions and billions of people using the same techniques. In fact, it's part of the same profession, PR, you know, advertising, advertising an idea. And you can, and that's what ISIS is doing. ISIS is using the same techniques that it found were being used in our consumer society. So you can, you know, you can be a demagogue and affect everyone. That's scary. And that's happening parallel or part of the process you're describing, no? Yeah, yeah. I mean, there's just a real convergence of different tools that can drive us to be consumers and effectively make us consumers. That's actually some of the focus of my work is this idea of of cultural transformation, right? But not in the direction of making us more into consumers, but the opposite, right? But I've leaned on and looked at consumerization as a case study, in a sense. You know, whether whatever product you look at, there is a lot more effective use in making us into loyal customers of those products. Then, you know, the sustainability community isn't using those same strategies very effectively, right? Maybe it should, Travis. I'd take these same tools and turn it around, use it on your side of the equation, what do you think? Yeah, I think, you know, in some of the movements that have been most effective, you think about Bill McKibbin and 350.org, it was sort of building a community, but it was building a community of young people who could use these technologies and get the word out. And I think what's, you're seeing some of the effects of that kind of in the opposite direction. You know, you look at what's happening in North Dakota with the pipeline protests, people coming from all around, you know, that kind of utilizing those same tools and strategies to bring people together around an alternative narrative is exciting. But, you know, there's nowhere near $500 billion being spent on those kind of efforts. So it's, you know, it's a David and Goliath battle for sure. Yeah, but, you know, you could, you could take those tools and put them in favor of the pipeline, and then make it appear we're actually have all the people agree by using those tools that pipelines are good. And the environment's not so important. And so what happened to our government here? What happened to our education system? We have to cover those points before the break. What happened to education? You talk about these kids that are what, less than eight years old, they really can't make their own determination. What's the countervailing power there? What's the who's pushing back on that? They're vulnerable. And yet, there's nobody telling him, Hey, you got to use your own kepi here, you got to think it through yourself, you can't just take all these ads and become objectified. Who's telling the kids? Speaking of David and Goliath, I mean, this is this is a classic case where I mean, the FCC has relinquished control of that. In the 80s, they stopped really regulating advertising very effectively. And so we have small groups like the campaign for a commercial free childhood that is trying and you know, has some successes now and again to try to stop the most insidious cases. Scholastic had a, you know, who is really a prominent bookseller in the in the educational market, had a partnership with the coal industry, selling giving these coal educational booklets in schools that were completely lopsided, no mention of climate change, no mention of the mining problems and all that. And so groups like the CCFC speak up and try to push against that and did successfully stop Scholastic's partnership. But that's one small case. And they're, you know, a group of five or six people. And so they can only do so much there really needs to be a heavier regulation over the commercialization of childhood, but also then start pushing for a sustainability centric educational model. And there are small examples of that really happening. The best examples, I think, you know, Finland is always celebrated for its, its focus on good elementary school education. And part of that is because they don't really prioritize academics in those early years. It's a very place centric model. You know, the reading is not even taught until six or seven years old. And that's a real different model than the United States really, it's about focusing on socio emotional learning and the basics of being a good human early on. And there are neat kind of pathways to even bring that even further, right? The forest school movement is a really exciting one where the kids today, 1000 schools in Germany, over 100 in Scandinavia are going to the forest for their first two years of education. They're not going into the classroom, nothing, they just go out into the woods, whether it's raining, snowing, really hot outward bound. Yeah, we're bound, but but 200 days a year in all different climates and really focusing about just connecting them to nature. Walden Pond. Walden Pond without the failure to grow peas, perhaps. We're gonna take a short break, gentlemen. We're gonna come back. We're gonna talk about how this affects our democracy. We're gonna talk about whether democracy is suited to deal with these new factors that have arisen for us. And we'll talk about what we can do about it, either in education or in government or in personal approach. I'm sure you have some ideas. We'll be right back after this short break. Hey, stand the energy man here. I know you're bored this summer. You're just sitting at home, figuring out what to do, go to the beach, spend some time with Think Tech Hawaii, spend the time thinking about how you can contribute to Hawaii and making it a better place to live and start watching some of the programs on Think Tech, including stand the energy man. Well, you'll learn all about everything energy, especially hydrogen and transportation. So we'll see you every Friday at 12 o'clock noon. Stand the energy man here on Think Tech Hawaii. Aloha. Aloha, I'm Kirsten Baumgart Turner, host of Sustainable Hawaii. Thanks for watching Think Tech this summer. We have a lot of terrific shows of great importance. And I hope you'll watch my show too every Tuesday at noon as we address sustainability issues for Hawaii. They're really pertinent as the World Conservation Congress approaches in September and the World Youth Congress that's focusing on sustainability next year as well. Have a great summer and tune in at noon every Tuesday. We're back. We're live. We're here again to wrestle with even more difficult questions. Eric Osidurian and Travis Idol are from UH and from WorldWatch. Very important discussion. OK, so it sounds like to me that these new things that have popped up in our lifetime in the past 10, 20 years and have taken root, you know, based on fairly mean considerations like money, there's there's a mercenary quality to PR and to the way we, you know, undermine the vulnerability, take opportunistic approach on the vulnerability of our kids and consumers. And this affects ultimately our thinking. This affects ultimately our democracy. It affects us where we vote, where we live, how we engage with our government. Our government is us and we are our government. However, we don't like our government. And we are disenchanted with our government and we fight against our government and the thing is screwed up. So question, where does government fit in all of this that you're describing? And is government a solution? Government when working well is an essential solution. So my work, again, on transforming cultures, it breaks it down into how do we change culture intentionally. And that there are six institutions that are key. Business, education, government, the media, social movements and traditions. Right, so government is one of those six key tools. And they can be pushing us to be consumers or they can be pushing us to be sustainability, you know, citizens. And what does that mean? I mean, there are so many different tools in the government's toolbox, but I think the one I really like to focus on most is choice editing, because it's happening all the time. What is that? So choice editing is a fancy way of saying all the different little nudges that happen without us even paying attention. Speed bumps on a road to calm traffic. So we're not, you know, driving really fast because there's lots of pedestrian. That's a very subtle choice edit. There are many edits in the other direction, right? Free on-street parking encourages us to drive. But free buses or, you know, buses that are effective, shared bicycles, all these things are effective ways to encourage us not to drive. Right, so finding the ways to use government, you know, again because it's such a broken system right now, you know, the nudges are actually probably going to be much more effective than banning of light bulbs. Right, when we tried to ban incandescent light bulbs there is a stink that happens, right? You're taking away our freedom. But gentle nudges, in D.C. we had a five-cent plastic bag tax. And that was very effective at reducing plastic bag consumption. If we had tried to ban plastic bags there would have probably been a very different reaction. So finding those ways to use government in ways that get through the opposition is one short term way to help start. You say use government and indeed, I mean, I think it points out a problem. Somebody has to come to government and say, no, you should do this. You should regulate this and not regulate that. You should tune up the system and therefore the culture. But so often it doesn't come from government. It comes from, you know, pressure groups. It comes from organizations whose job it is to try to convince the government to do one thing or another. And sometimes those organizations are the very organizations, the very same entities that take advantage of kids. It's for a buck. It's what it is. And, you know, wouldn't you rather see government come up with these solutions itself? The problem is the election cycle and the kind of thinking we have seen in the national campaigns lately, which is not thinking at all. It's irrational and the people who follow that are irrational. How are we going to fix that? Because I submit, you can disagree. I submit we're not going to be able to fix it until we can make government rational and government suesponte come up with its own solutions. Yes, that is true. I mean, we have a huge amount of lobbying dollars pushing us in the wrong direction. So an advocacy group based on values is probably not going to be able to out voice somebody on the other side of the same question. Yeah, several industry groups that are all guaranteed that it will. Yeah, two advocacy groups and you don't know which one is going to prevail. Right. So it's a very broken system, right, between the lobbying, between, you know, the corporate, the campaign finance reform that's really made this about money to get into Citizens United. Yeah, exactly. So how do we go through that? And there's no real good answer in the short term. I don't think we really have to keep pushing for reform of governance, which is a whole kind of step before we can actually start solving the problems. And time is not on our side with that. I mean, sustainability crisis. Don't you agree that it's a crisis? Which part? The campaign or the way government is today? Whole thing. Yeah, the whole thing, sure. If you have to put it that binary, okay. Sorry. Travis, you've been quiet. What would you add to this? You know, I think from the governance side, we've talked a little bit about this since Eric's been here. And I think building community is a way around that a workaround. And the more we can devolve decision making or self, you know, encourage self reliance for building community, I think is a way to get around that. And I think the more local governments who are much more directly connected to the citizens in the communities, I think is also a way to counter the national dysfunction, maybe that we see, you know, I'm appreciative of groups like World Watch in Washington, D.C. at the national level. But I think building community at the local level, especially in Hawaii, can be very effective. Yeah, why do I feel this is core for your trip here? Is it building community at the local level? Absolutely. I mean, I think the only when you have these integrated networks of change agents, are you going to actually become effective enough to combat the groups or the lobbyists and the other working for the other future? So what do we do, Eric? Give us a pass. That is not for me to say for the state of Hawaii. But, you know, even just in the short time I've been here, I've had great conversations that referenced the Hawaii 2050 plan and new efforts to really think about, about Hawaii's future. And Hawaii is unique as far as the states go as far as thinking about the self reliance of this country's this nation system or this state system, where if you really think about 2050 where the global population is much higher, climate change is already probably up to 2.3 degrees Celsius projection, probably almost a meter of sea level rise by then there are going to be massive changes looming. Major refugee population shifts over over the course of the world. And Hawaii is going to have to be more self-reliant. You're going to have to be more focused on growing your own food, which is scary at one level, but it's also a real opportunity to transform the economy away from this globalized system that puts a lot of pain on people and builds a real level of community, a level of self-sufficiency, a level of pride that food is being grown, that energy is being supplied locally and that Hawaii has shown a different path for the future. Well see that camera over there, that's number one. And we have lined up all the millennials in the state who are now all watching you. Can you give them some advice on how they get there? What should their mindset be? What should their action points be? You're talking to a guy who just for the last two years was trying to promote a reality television show, really aimed towards the millennials called yard farmers. And for me, the idea that we're going to have a consumer economy that's going to survive the life of the millennial generation is just unrealistic. And yet at the same time right now, the fifth largest crop in America is the yard, the lawn. And 40 million acres of lawns are being squandered, you know, mowed, all this petrochemicals and fertilizers and pesticides are being used to sustain green monocropped grasses and not the smokable kind for the millennials. But so if you could actually transform that massive amount of agricultural opportunity into livelihoods, into community based farms, it's going to it's going to change the world. So that would be a priority right there. Well, it has secondary effect as multiple secondary effects. I mean, one, it pulls millennials out of the unsustainable consumer economy. It takes these unsustainable suburban houses and actually brings a multi generational multi generational living has been proven over the over the centuries to be more resilient than that. That's the human condition. Yeah, that we've always lived multi generational until recently became the nuclear family. Yeah. And so if you actually those two are just done on resilience over the long term and sustainability benefits. But it also is dealing with the obesity epidemic as we're growing real healthy food again, community resilience, right as as global food chains break down in this in this era of instability upcoming. If you're growing some of your own food locally, that's going to be key to to sustain a level of, you know, well being for the community. Now I understand why you brought Eric in. Yeah, well, and I think that one of the important messages Eric brings is that we want to try to do this intentionally. We don't want to do it as a response to a crisis. And as we're talking this morning, an analogous type of crisis happened in Cuba in the early 1990s when the Soviet Union collapsed and all the subsidies for fertilizers for tractors diesel fuel collapsed. They found themselves having to grow their own food again for their own use. I mean, they were an export agriculture economy as well. And they were able to do it, but it was painful. But they built a community around that, not just food systems. And so we want to we want to be able to do that as an intentional action, not as a response to collapse. In order to do that, you've got to get the word out. So education is so important at every level, including small children. Eric Asadourian, thank you so much for coming down Travis Idol. Thank you for arranging this. I wish you well on your trip and a good trip back.