Talk:Club of Rome

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Opinions

All statements of opinion by the author of an article and and broad irrefutable generalizations shall be deleted unless supported by an adequate citation.

Out of Context Information

After looking at the book The First Global Revolution, it appears to me that whoever cited it hadn't read it, and was getting their information from some "quote" website. Take a look at this sentence from the article:

"According to the club's publications, the common enemy of humanity is man, so democracy may not be well suited to the tasks ahead. However, the threat of pollution, global warming, water shortages, and famine can be used to fulfill humanity's need for a common adversary."

It makes it appear as if the Club of Rome is anti-democracy. But compare it to the real paragraph from the book[[1]]:

"Democracy is not a panacea. It cannot organize everything and it is unaware of its own limits. These facts must be faced squarely, sacrilegious though this may sound. In its present form, democracy is no longer well suited for the tasks ahead. The complexity and the technical nature of many of today's problems do not always allow elected representatives to make competent decisions at the right time. Few politicians in office are sufficiendy aware of the global nature of the problems facing them and little, if any, awareness of rhe interactions between the problems. Generally speaking, informed disucssion on the main political, economic and social issues take place on radio and television rather than in Parliament, to the detriment of the latter. The activities of political parties are so intensely focussed on election deadlines and party rivalries that they end up weakening the democracy they are supposed to serve This confrontational approach gives an impression that party needs come before national interest. Strategies and tactics seem more important than objectives and often a constituency is neglected as soon as it is gained. With the current mode of operation. Western democracies are seeing their formal role decline and public opinion drifting away from elected representatives. However, the crisis in the contemporary democratic system must not be allowed to serve as an excuse for rejecting democracy." page 71-72 (emphasis mine)

Similarly, there is this quote in the article:

"In 1993, it published the The First Global Revolution. According to this book, "It would seem that humans need a common motivation...either a real one or else one invented for the purpose....In searching for a new enemy to unite us, we came up with the idea that pollution, the threat of global warming, water shortages, famine and the like would fit the bill. All these dangers are caused by human intervention, and it is only through changed attitudes and behavior that they can be overcome. The real enemy then, is humanity itself.""

This is one of the most absurd quote-mines I have ever seen. It tries to make it seem as if the Club of Rome is for the idea of inventing threats to create a common enemy. But the sentence "either a real one or else one invented for the purpose" is taken from a completly different page and is talking about how historically countries have invented scapegoats. The rest of it is mined from this paragraph:

"In searching for a common enemy against whom we can unite, we came up with the idea that pollution, the threat of global warming, water shortages, famine and the like, would fit the bill. In their totality and their interactions these phenomena do constitute a common threat which must be confronted by everyone together. But in designating these dangers as the enemy, we fall into the trap, which we have already warned readers about, namely mistaking symptoms for causes. All these dangers are caused by human intervention in natural processes, and it is only through changed attitudes and behaviour that they can be overcome. The real enemy then is humanity itself." page 75

I will rewrite these parts of the article.--Grandthefttoaster (talk) 19:35, 4 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Why the name: Club of Rome

I shall give five earth pounds to the first man who can explain, briefly, in the article, why this German-based think tank is called "The Club of Rome".-Ashley Pomeroy 12:07, 16 August 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Though rhetorical in nature, the question certainly begs for an answer. Having conferred with various professors of history specializing in the time period in question, (yes yes, original research, but this is a talk page)I have two similar answers.

First, regardless of the current case of the Club of Rome, it was founded by Peccei, an Italian, and King, a Scot. The other four members of the inner group were French, Austrian, Swiss, and Dutch. Why not Rome? The Italian Peccei probably decided that "Club of Rome" had a better ring to it than "Club of Turin" or "Club of Edinburgh."

Second, and probably more importantly, Rome has (in modern times, at least) been associated with greatness, progressive concepts, and culture in general. Mussolini, for instance, built a rather impressive scale model of Imperial Rome, hoping to emulate it in his rule, mainly because of the eternal quality to the Roman Empire that he saw. Basically, the choice of Rome as the object was probably intended to convey an idea that the Club was a reputable association of cultured people, which it was.

Hope that was brief enough. Ourai 00:46, 20 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Predictions

I have seen criticism of the "Limit to Growth" saying that it made predictions that were not true. This should be included as a criticism. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Cs16 (talk • contribs) .

If you can provide a link to the criticism, or a citation if it's in print, be bold and add a summary of it. Tom Harrison ^Talk 22:24, 1 February 2006 (UTC)[reply]

It's not even a subjective criticism, Tom - have you read the book? They predict, for example, a world population of 7 billion by 2000, which we can prove is untrue.

It definitely should be stated that the predictions of the "Limit to Growth" were made on assumptions which proved to be wrong. It is therefore not surprisingly that the predictions were also disproved by the facts. What needs an explanation is why the credibility of the Club itself has not been affected. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Linda2zh (talk • contribs)

I don't particularly have a dog in this hunt, but my guess is that people regard the Club as a group attempting to apply scientific methods to address concerns about resources. Part of science is that sometimes your predictions are wrong. --Orange Mike 13:36, 21 September 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Removing memetics category

I am removing the memetics category from this article since you learn no more about the article's contents from the category and v.v. Since so many things may be memes we should try to keep the category closely defined in order to remain useful. Hope you're okay with that. The link to meme would be enough I suggest. Facius 10:46, 23 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Criticism

There used to be criticism that the Club of Rome promotes two mutually contradictory theories, those of Peak Oil and Anthropogenic Global Warming. Peak Oilers say there isn't enough oil in the ground to produce the amount of global warming claimed will happen over the 21st century. The article now seems like a promo whitewash...97.94.189.111 (talk) 20:56, 4 January 2010 (UTC)[reply]

The criticism section leaves a lot to be desired IMO. There are definitely points in the argumentation of the Club of Rome that are open to criticism but IMO the biggest part of the criticism is directed towards the Clubs predictions and economic models not stuff such as it being an elitist club (it started as a group of scientists so who do you think they should include?) or even that it may be linked to such nonsense as the New World Order by some conspiracy theorists (for which I would like to see a quote by the way). And since when is Michael Crichton an expert on global economics and system theory?

Also to link the Club of Rome to the neo-conservativ think tank Bilderberg Group isn't exactly very fortunate either.

IMO this section needs to be cleaned up badly. Hadoriel 11:33, 29 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Isn't it the case that if you exclude ad hominem attacks, that most of the criticism is really directed at "Limits to Growth", and not the Club of Rome? Given that "Limits to Growth" has it's own Wikipedia page, is there much of a need for a section on Criticism at all (other than perhaps to link to the LTG page)? Ericy (talk) 02:42, 17 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Idries Shah

I read somewhere (Lessing?) that Idries Shah was a founding member. Any further info on this? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 163.1.74.1 (talk) 23:58, 30 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Idries Shah's obituary in the Daily Telegraph mentioned this, but it appears to have been written by a Shah propagandist. One of Shah's students, Augy Hayter, writes in Factions and Fictions (p. 262): "To a certain extent, one can say that a good deal of the literature put out by Shah and friends under various pseudonyms was designed to act as a decoy. It occupied would-be students and opponents alike, and inflamed critics to quite amazing degree. A lot of it was fake: Shah knew perfectly well that he was not a founding member of the Club of Rome; he was a member for a short time and was politely asked to leave because he didn't turn up to meetings; but this mythology around Shah's public personage was necessary in order to provide the dream-lie without which no truth can exist, because a student must always have a choice." There is no mention of Shah on the Club of Rome website: [2] --JN466 14:05, 28 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Paragraph 2

States that three original members and contributors to the COR, left in 1970 because the COR adopted a "mechanistic and elitist methodology for an extrapolated future." No reference is cited. The language sounds like the POV of a contributor to the article--unless a suitable citation is produced! —Preceding unsigned comment added by Tapered (talk • contribs) 04:40, 14 May 2008 (UTC) There is also the problem that a few paragraphs down one of the departed members is back. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.165.168.91 (talk) 05:07, 12 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Members

Hans-Peter Dürrs membership is at least documented here: [3]. Gabriel Kielland (talk) 05:23, 17 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]