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The World3 model - macfadden - 03-09-2013
World3
The World3 model was a computer simulation of interactions between population, industrial growth, food production and limits in the ecosystems of the Earth. It was originally produced and used by a Club of Rome study that produced the model and the book The Limits to Growth. The principal creators of the model were Donella Meadows, Dennis Meadows, and Jørgen Randers.
The model was documented in the book Dynamics of Growth in a Finite World. It added new features to Jay W. Forrester's World2 model. Since World3 was originally created it has had minor tweaks to get to the World3/91 model used in the book Beyond the Limits, later improved to get the World3/2000 model distributed by the Institute for Policy and Social Science Research and finally the World3/2004 model used in the book Limits to growth: the 30 year update.
The model consisted of several interacting parts. Each of these dealt with a different system of the model. The main systems were
the food system, dealing with agriculture and food production,
the industrial system,
the population system,
the non-renewable resources system,
the pollution system.
Criticism of the model
![[Image: 512-uVdXnZL._SL500_SX240_.jpg]](http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/512-uVdXnZL._SL500_SX240_.jpg)
Hailed by some as an "intellectual bombshell" and decried by others as unprofessional sensationalism, The Limits to Growth has created a stir throughout the world. Dennis L. Meadows, its main author, and his mentor Jay Forrester are MIT system analysts whose work represents the most ambitious attempt so far to bring together forecasts of population growth, pollution, resource depletion, food supply, and industrial output into a general model of the world's future.
Models of Doom, by an interdisciplinary team at Sussex University's Science Policy Research Unit, examines the structure and assumptions of the MIT world models and a preliminary draft of Meadows' technical reports. Based on computer runs, it shows that forecasts of the world's future are very sensitive to a few key assumptions and suggests that the MIT assumptions are unduly pessimistic. Further, the Sussex scientists claim that the MIT methods, data, and predictions are faulty, that their world models--with their built-in Malthusian bias--do not accurately reflect reality.
Quote:Peakniks and doomers
Books making drastic claims of impending doom and disaster unless humanity drastically reduces its activity or population are perennial favorites in the environmental section, and most of those predictions made in the past have turned out to be painfully premature or just plain wrong. A partial list of failed predictions would certainly begin with Thomas Malthus; in the modern era, The Population Bomb by Paul Ehrlich and The Limits to Growth by the Club of Rome should be mentioned. Dozens of recent books of the same sort can be found in the Ecology section today.
The peak oil theory has become an apocalyptic fad at the present, spawning a cottage industry of scary books predicting the end of civilization as we know it. The terms "peaknik" and "doomer" refer to such believers who are in no way optimistic about the prospects for the future, and expect widespread starvation, ecological collapse, and economic collapse to sweep the earth very shortly. Peak oil is often combined with an excessively pessimistic view of both overpopulation and global warming, and "peak-everything-else" theories like "peak coal" and "peak uranium". Some peakniks have turned to survivalism, others to radical hard green views. Notable doomer and peaknik authors are Albert Bartlett, James Howard Kunstler, Paul Roberts, and Richard Heinberg, among others.
http://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Hard_green#Peakniks_and_doomers