โ Scribed by Sackman, Douglas Cazaux
No coin nor oath required. For personal study only.
We are all consumers. As living organisms, human beings must find the energy our cells require. We do so by eating the plants, animals, and fruits of modern chemistry that provide us with the nutrients that our bodies need. As mammals, we also must maintain a constant body temperature. So in cooler climates or seasons, we need the assistance of food, clothing, shelter, and heating to stay warm. These requirements make all humans consumers and connect all of us to the natural world. We take from the natural world to meet our needs, and we manipulate it to better serve our taking. Whether we are hunter-gatherers, farmers, or hedge fund managers, humans have always been consumers. And we will remain consumers, dependent on the natural world and, consequently, impacting it, so long as we survive as a species.
Economics is the study of how human beings organize their activities to feed, clothe, and shelter themselves. The solutions that the natural world offers to meet these needs are not normally at our fingertips. We must expend time and energy -work -to find them and to prepare them for use, if necessary. In all places and times most humans have had to work for most of their adult lives to meet their basic consumption needs. In modern developed economies that are based on the division of labor most of us have a specialized job that someone pays us a money salary or wage to do. We then exchange the money that we earn as producers for the things we need to consume to stay alive. We also do so for some things that we just plain want.
Production and consumption are the complementary halves of economic activity. Both produce unwanted, unneeded, or superfluous by-products in the form of gaseous, liquid, or solid wastes. Physical products eventually reach the end of their lives when they are no longer functional or desired. Whether in the form of human waste, midden heaps, or landfills, waste
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