As you may have noticed, we are living in an increasingly consumerist world, and while certain quantifiable criteria of economic progress have become more prevalent than in any other time in history, and (as Matthew Taylor recently argued in his talk about 21st century enlightenment), the principles of individualism and novelty have come to take center stage in our lives, even to the paradoxical point of diminishing human flourishing and potential (by making us forget other important principles, such as those of social cohesion).In the following important presentation, Tim Jackson demonstrates that the economic principles responsible for delivering the kind of world to which we have become accustomed are not indefinitely sustainable. In the process, he provides some examples of the kinds of incremental changes we might want to adopt in order to finally stop feeding the problem and start investing in our collective future.
And if you want to get an idea of how unsustainable materialist consumerism is, check out The Story of Stuff.
.