Make less garbage.

[bennelson]

Hello friends,

I'm trying to make less garbage.

Here's the first video in what is likely to turn into an interesting series.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tOsCfAxMSto

[MetroMPG]

Take 'n' bake pizza seems to be a common theme in a whole bunch of your threads here, Ben.

[Frank Lee]

#1 thing people can do to reduce garbage generating is to reduce the # of offspring they have. TRUE!!!

Goes for energy/gasoline use too. How many times have people said they would bike somewhere but no, they can't because the offspring have to be carted here, there, and everywhere?

Back to garbage: I started a thread on household garbage not too long ago.

[RobertSmalls]

Yes, Frank, but the whole point of conservation is to save resources for the future benefit and enjoyment of other people. In the absence of intelligent, self-aware people, it doesn't matter whether the planet becomes as arid as Mars or as hazardous as the surface of the sun.

If you can raise above-average offspring, or perhaps even if your offspring are merely self-aware and moral enough to support the desires and goals of their peers, then it's morally right to breed. Consequently, Frank, it's morally wrong to deprive the world of your would-be offspring.

That is, unless you really believe your offspring would bring enough harm to the world to bring more suffering than joy.

[bennelson]

Originally Posted by MetroMPG

Take 'n' bake pizza seems to be a common theme

Said the guy who drives the "electric umbrella" to get take-out!

I admit. I like pizza.
Where I live, the take and bake place is the best compromise of price/convenience/taste.

In all seriousness, transportation, food, and waste are all directly connected. It's what? 1500 miles or so that the average American food travels before you eat it?
When you think of physical pollution, what do you think of? Birds with their head's stuck in six-pack soda/beer rings? Birds doused in oil from an oil spill? Aluminum can's and fast food drink cups on the side of the road?

We invented the car, the fast food restaurant, the drive-in movie theater, the Chinese takeout container, and the suburb.

Now we have to find a way to deal with that culture that we created. It's FAR too easy to just keep doing things the way that we do. It's SO CONVENIENT! It's SO EASY. Unfortunately we just ship our waste off, never to be seen again. Out of site, out of mind.

In the background, landfills fill up, garbage scows dump waste in the ocean. Coal miner's die every day, because we leave the TV on while we aren't even watching it.

ARRRGgg! I digress and have gone negative. But that's not all bad. When we SEE the bad things, we can think about it. We can CHANGE the bad things that we don't want any more. As long as we are AWAKE, instead of sleep-walking through life, simply accepting all things without question.

Anyone ever see the movie, THEY LIVE ?
It's a terrible B-movie, but with a great concept. Our hero finds a pair of sunglasses. When he puts them on, he sees the world as it actually is. Billboards simply say CONSUME. He sees that the rich and powerful are actually ugly aliens in charge of the place.

There are days where I feel like the guy wearing the sunglasses. Like I'm the ONLY guy wearing the sunglasses.
And I gotta do something about it. Gotta Gotta Gotta do something.

How'd all this start? Oh yeah. Pizza.
See - Most people just see a pizza. I see a hundred million empty pizza boxes going into a land-fill.

Well, at least tonight, there was one less.

That's a start.

[Frank Lee]

Originally Posted by RobertSmalls

In the absence of intelligent, self-aware people, it doesn't matter whether the planet becomes as arid as Mars or as hazardous as the surface of the sun.

Whoa, that's rich!!!

Egomania running wild! I wonder what the rest of the Earth's inhabitants would say about that...

P.S. I Love pizza!

[RobertSmalls]

Originally Posted by Frank Lee

I wonder what the rest of the Earth's inhabitants would say about that...

I'll admit, it's an overstatement to assert that the life of a sheep has exactly zero value because it can not formulate "cogito ergo sum". But still, you're avoiding the real issue of whether creating more intelligent observers to enjoy their existence would be an improvement or not.

[bennelson]

Overpopulation is a big issue. It is something we should consider.

However, that's the sort of thing we each have to think about BEFORE we start running around reproducing.

In this case though, I am thinking more about personal pollution creation, or per capita pounds of garbage.

While there are more than enough people in the world, some of us use far more than our fair share of everything, and create a disproportionately large amount of waste.

If the average American used as much electricity as the average European or ate as much meat as the average Asian, are part of the world would be very different than it is.

[Ryland]

I've heard of one environmental science class that had all the students carry all the trash that they produced with them for a week, another way to do that is just to dump out your trash can and take a look at what you are tossing out, you will most likely find that it's full of the things you also spent the most money on.

[dennyt]

So this is why people are putting pizza pans on their wheels... I'll take 15" pepperoni with a side of brake dust, thanks!