The Empty Sea: What Future for the Blue Economy? A New Book by Ugo Bardi and Ilaria Perissi

Cover of the Italian version by Viola, Ilaria's daughter, 7 years old. 

Note of January 2019 -- the Italian version of this book is a little delayed, but still in progress. But the English version is progressing very well, it will be published by Springer.  Both versions should appear more or less together this Spring.


For this Monday post, I can only put together a very short text. We (myself and Ilaria) have been very busy with the last retouched of the manuscript for our new book that we hope to be able to ship to the publisher ("Editori Riuniti") maybe tomorrow. It should be available for purchase before Christmas.

We spent a lot of time on this book, and I can tell you that we like it a lot. We hope that the readers will like it, too. I am sorry that this first version is only in Italian, but we are planning a version in English to appear as soon as possible. In the meantime, let me pass to you a text that should appear on the back cover, translated into English.

What you will learn from this book

• How humans have been gradually discovering the sea and its resources from the time of our remote ancestors
• What is the “fisherman’s curse,” why fishermen have always been poor, and they still are!
• Why humans tend to destroy the resources that make them live: how overexploitation has destroyed many fish stocks and is still destroying them
• How pollution is affecting the sea: from the great plastic gyre to the rising sea levels
• Why aquaculture may not be the magic solution to feed the world and what we can expect from the future of fisheries.
• Can we really extract minerals and energy from the sea? It may be much more difficult than the way it is sometimes described.
• What are the limits to resources of the sea and what can we realistic expect for the future?

In addition, you will learn how the Neanderthals crossed the sea on their canoes, how it was possible that five men on a small boat could kill a giant whale, what kind of oil did the virgins of the Gospel put into their lamps, how a professor of mathematics, Vito Volterra, discovered the “equations of fishing,” of the return of sailing ships for transportation, and why it has become so easy to be stung by a jellyfish while swimming in the sea. And much, much more. You will also learn how to play the “Moby Dick game,” a simple boardgame that simulates the overexploitation of natural resources.

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The story of the fisherman and of the farmer

Image courtesy of John MacDonald' "Farmers and Fishermen", 1994.

As I sit on the podium with the other speakers, I have in front of me about 30 boys and girls, around 10-12 years old; not even teenagers. They sit while the other speakers tell them of climate change and renewable energies. They are being told what we believe is good for them: that we are in danger, we need to act, we need to recycle our waste, save energy, and reduce emissions. But, at the same time, I can't avoid thinking that, out there, outside the cozy world of the school and of their teachers, there is a different reality. A world where a tree has a value only after it has been cut down and sold. A world where the measure of success is how much a person can consume. A world where the fragile thing we call "the environment" is always the least important concern. 

Are we doing to these children a favor by telling them what we are telling them? I cannot say, I can only see that they are good boys and good girls and that they are doing their best to listen to the speakers. They seem to understand that what they are being told is important for their future. And some of them seem to understand that it is not obvious that they will have a future. 

As my turn to speak approaches, I try to think. What can I tell to a group of tired (and also a little scared) children? An idea appears in my mind all of a sudden. I won't give the speech I had prepared; I'll create a new one. In ten minutes or so, I scratch a script on a few sheets of paper and when my turn comes I call for volunteers to play the script in front of the other children. They like the idea and they immediately understand how to play the respective roles, they are happy and excited to do something different than just listening. Here is the script I wrote, as I remember it.


THE FISHERMAN'S FAMILY.

Dad, dad.... We are hungry, we are hungry! We were waiting for you to come back, we were waiting for you to bring fish for us. Did you have a good catch, dad? Tell us!

Children, children, I am sorry, the catch was small. The net that I spread in the sea didn't catch so many fish. Children, I am sorry, but this is all that I can bring to you today.

Dad, is it so little? But we are hungry. We are hungry, dad, why can't you bring more fish for us from the sea?

Children, children, I threw my net in the sea many times, but there is not so much fish anymore in the sea because there are many fishermen and all of them have hungry children. And all of them try to catch as much fish as they can. And if we fish too much, there is not much fish left in the sea. But everyone does the same and if I don't do that, too, the fish that's left will be caught by the other fishermen. So, children, this is the catch that I bought today, and I know that it is not enough. But that is what I could do today and I cannot tell you that I will do better tomorrow. And that's the way of the fisherman.


THE FARMER'S FAMILY

Dad, dad.... Mom gave us some bread, but it was not so much and we are still hungry. And we saw that there is still grain stored in the house. Why can't we have that grain milled and use the flour to make some good bread for us, dad?

Children, children, I know that you are hungry and I know that there is still grain in the house. But, children, we cannot eat that grain. Your mom is giving you as much bread as she can, and I know that it is little. But you must go on with what mom can give you and ask no more.

But, dad, why can't we eat that grain that's kept stored in the house? Tell us, dad, because we don't understand this.

We can't eat that grain, children, because it the seed for the next harvest. Soon, we'll go sowing in the fields and we'll sow that grain as seed. And the seed that we sow will germinate and produce more grain, and that grain we will harvest and we will have bread for next year. And we'll keep some of the grain we harvest for the year that will follow and we'll keep doing that for the years that will come as our father and grandfathers did, and as you will do yourselves and for your children and their children. And that's the way of the farmer.


And there we are. The children who played as actors have recited their part, and they look happy and excited. Those who sat in the audience listened intently and they seemed to enjoy the performance. But did they understand what I was trying to tell them? I ask, "why can't the fisherman feed his family every day?" One of the children says, "because he fishes too much, and then there is no fish left in the sea." I ask her, "but why that doesn't happen to the farmer?" She answers: "because the farmer keeps some seed for the next harvest!" They never heard of the "tragedy of the commons" nor of the problem of fishery overexploitation, but they seem to have understood these concepts. 

So, I ask them, "but, today, are we behaving like farmers or like fishermen?" They are a little perplexed. I explain: "are we keeping some seed for the future or are we consuming everything we have?" They look at me, they understand what I said. One of them says: "like fishermen". And I tell him, "You are right, but let me explain: it doesn't matter if we are farmers or fishermen, but we must not take too much of what the land or the sea can provide so that the land or the sea have the time to re-create what we took away. Whether we are a farmers or fishermen, if we respect the land, or we respect the sea, our children will never go hungry. And if we all respect the earth, then everyone will be happy, and the earth, too!" They all nod; they seem to have understood the idea.

The workshop is over; the children move away, texting on their smartphones and chatting among themselves. Will they remember what I told them? And if they will, would that be useful to them?  I can't say. As I look at them leaving, there comes to my mind that they will be less than 50 years old in 2050, when the world will either have cut fossil fuel use by 80% or so or will face the dire consequences of not having done that. What kind of world will they see? (if they will be able to see it). I can only wish them good luck. 



h/t Marco Rustioni

Seneca's gamble: why the road to ruin is rapid

Why people can so easily destroy the resources that provide their livelihood? Fishermen, for instance, have destroyed fisheries over and over, and every time they refused to take even the most elementary precautions to avoid disaster. Eventually, I came to think that it is related to a basic miswiring of the human mind: the "gambler's fallacy". Fishermen, it seems, see fishing as it were a lottery and they redouble their efforts thinking that, eventually, they will get lucky and strike it rich. Alas, it doesn't work in this way and all what they obtain is to destroy the fish stocks and create a spectacular collapse of the fishing yields. This way of creating one's own ruin could be termed "Seneca's gamble", from the words of the Roman philosopher Lucius Annaeus Seneca who stated that "the road to ruin is rapid".

The "Martingale" is a strategy to be played with games which have a 50% chance of winning. It consists in doubling one's bet after every loss, believing that, eventually, a win will pay for the previous losses and provide a gain.

The Martingale is an example of the "gambler's fallacy". Typically, gamblers tend to think that some events - such as the numbers coming out of the wheel in the roulette game - are related to each other. So, they believe that, if the red comes up several times in a row, it is more probable that the black will come out the next spin. That's not true, of course, and the Martingale is a surefire way to ruin oneself, and to do that very rapidly. Nevertheless, many people find the idea fascinating enough that they try to put it into practice. It is the effect of a bad miswiring of the human mind..

The gambler's fallacy may explain some aspects of the human behavior that would be otherwise impossible to understand. For instance, in a previous post I was showing this figure, describing the yields of the UK fishing industry (from Thurstan et al.).

Compare the upper and the lower box, and you'll see that the fishing industry was ramping up at an incredible speed their "fishing power," just when fishing yields had started to decline. Note also how they still had a lot of fishing power when the fisheries had all but collapsed. How could it be that they kept fishing so much even when there was little or nothing left to fish?Thinking about this matter, we can only come to the conclusion that fishermen reasoned like gamblers at a betting table. In other words, they were playing a sort of "fishing Martingale", doubling their efforts after every failure.

Gamblers know - or should know - that casino gambling is a negative sum game. Yet, the gambler's fallacy makes them think that a streak of bad results will somehow increase the probability that the next bet will be the good one. So, they keep trying until they ruin themselves.

Now, consider fishermen: they or should know  that, at some point, the overall yield of the fishery has become negative. But, like gamblers playing roulette, they believe that a streak of bad luck will somehow increase the probability that the next fishing trip will be the good one. So, they keep trying until they ruin themselves.

The mental miswiring that gives rise to the behavior of gamblers and fishermen can create even larger disasters. With mineral resources, we are seeing something similar: operators redoubling their efforts in the face of diminishing returns of extraction; the story of "shale gas" and "shale oil" is a typical example. Maybe it is done hoping that - somehow - the destruction of one stock will increase the probability to find a new one (or to create one by some technological miracle). So, instead of trying to make mineral stocks last as long as possible, we are rushing to destroy them at the highest possible rate. But, unlike fish stocks that can replenish themselves, minerals do not reproduce. Once we'll have destroyed the rich ores that created our civilization, there will be nothing left behind. We will have ruined ourselves forever.

In the end, the gambler's fallacy is one of the factors that lead people, companies, and entire civilization to a rapid collapse. It is what I have called the "Seneca Cliff" from the words of the ancient Roman philosopher who first noted how "the way to ruin is rapid". In the case described here, we might call it the "Seneca gamble" but, in all cases, it is a ruin that we create with our own hands.

Sandeels: another Seneca cliff

Image from http://www.climateandfish.eu/default.asp?ZNT=S0T1O-1P192

Once you start looking for "Seneca Cliffs" in the exploitation of natural resources, you find them all over the scientific literature. This is my latest find of a production curve where decline is much more rapid than growth: the landings of sandeels. If you don't know what a sandeel is, here is one: 

In the report (2007), where I found the curve shown above, the authors discuss the causes for the collapse of the fishery, especially in view of climate change. They don't seem to arrive to any definitive conclusion and they don't use the dreaded term "overfishing". But from the fact that trawlers were used in this fishery, I think it is clear that the fish stock was being destroyed in a process similar to the one that led to the collapse of the whole UK fishing industry. The more resources were aggressively thrown at trying to maintain production, the more the fish stock was depleted. The end result was the rapid collapse observed.

So, as in several other cases, we have a classic example of the "Seneca Collapse", that is a production curve where decline is much more rapid than growth. Below, you can see the Seneca curve as shown in a simulation carried out by system dynamics that takes into account the increased capital expenditure in fishing equipment (the model is described here). 

As Seneca said, "the road to ruin is rapid", indeed.

Seneca again: the collapse of the UK fishing industry

Image from a 2010 article by Thurstan, Brockington, and Roberts. It describes the cycle of the UK fishing industry, which collapsed because of overfishing in the late 1970s.

The two graphs above (from a 2010 article by Thurstan et al.) speak by themselves. We have here a real life example of the overexploitation of natural resources; that is, of the tendency of people of destroying their own sources of wealth. Other classic examples can be found with the 19th century whaling industry and with the Canadian cod fishery.

Overexploitation typically generates the "Hubbert curve," the name given to a bell-shaped production cycle best known for the case of crude oil, but affecting all the resources which can be exploited faster than they can reform by natural processes. This behavior can be explained by means of mathematical models, but, qualitatively, it is the result of the falling profits generated by the diminishing resource stock. In the long run, lower profits discourage investments and the result is a general production decline. A particular case of this mechanism is when the industry initially reacts to diminishing returns by aggressively increasing the amount of capital invested. In this case, the stocks of the resource are depleted very fast and the result is a crash of the production rate; we still have a bell shaped curve, but skewed forward. The rapid decline that occurs after the peak is what I called the "Seneca Cliff."

There are several historical examples of the Seneca cliff; in the case of fisheries, it is especially evident in the case of the Canadian cod fishery and for the Caspian Sturgeon; but it is evident also in the case of the UK fishing industry. Note, in the figure above, the steep decline of the landings of the late 1970s, it is significantly steeper than the growth of the left side of the curve. This is the essence of the Seneca mechanism. And we can see very well what causes it: the start of the decline in production corresponds to a rapid growth of investments. The result is the increase of what the authors of the paper call "fishing power" - an estimate of the efficiency and size of the fishing fleet.

The results were disastrous; a textbook example of how to "push the levers in the wrong directions", that is, of a case when the attempt to solve a problem worsens it considerably. In this case, the more efficient the fishing fleet was, the more rapidly the fish stock was destroyed. This is a classic mechanism for falling down the Seneca cliff: the more efficient you are at exploiting a non renewable (or slowly renewable) resource, the faster you deplete it. And the faster you get into trouble.

This case, as others, is such a staggering disaster that one wonders how it was possible at all. How could it be that nobody in the fishing industry or in the government realized what was happening? In their article on this subject, Thurstan and his colleagues don't comment on this point, but we can cite an article by Hamilton et al. on the Canadian Atlantic Cod fishery, where they say "Some say they saw trouble coming, but felt powerless to halt it." That seems to be not describing not just the fishing industry, but our entire civilization.