Natural Humanists believe that the best possible use should be made of the world’s natural resources, with as little duplication, waste and irresponsible consumption as possible.
They believe that only products which are produced in environmentally-responsible ways, and which have the longest possible lifespan, should be consumed at all, for example, no ‘throwaway’ fashion or single-use plastics.
They believe that it’s usually better to share ownership of something, and that private ownership is often inappropriate, selfish, inefficient and wasteful.
They believe that no product should be allowed to be manufactured, exported or imported, anywhere in the world, unless an attempt has been made to maximise its longevity, produce it using the greenest suitable materials and processes and, where possible, to allow it to be upgraded to allow for future technological advancements, without having to throw it away.
They also believe there should be a detailed plan for the recycling or responsible re-use of every product that’s ever manufactured in the world, before it’s allowed to be manufactured or sold at all.
They believe that the full cost of efficiently collecting and recycling products, or safely and responsibly disposing of them, at the end of their useful life, should be met by the product’s manufacturer, by charging a higher retail price when selling the product to customers. This would also ensure that if two different products did similar jobs, then the product which was easier and cheaper to recycle, would also be more likely to be cheaper to buy, making it more popular, which would gradually reduce the existence of unnecessarily over-engineered or unrecyclable products on the market.
They believe that as many as possible of the component-parts of every product ever sold should be replaceable individually, and ideally should be interchangeable with parts from other manufacturers, if they fail and can’t be repaired, and that each component part and raw material, within every product, should also be fully recyclable or reusable and, to facilitate this, these parts should be as easy as possible to identify and separate into individual components and materials, such as plastics, metals, paper, etc.
As non-materialists, Natural Humanists try to avoid consuming things that are unnecessary, or are over-engineered, or are unnecessarily large, or wasteful of natural resources, given how each user intends to use that product. They also recognise that the smaller the number and size of products, the less vehicles will be needed to transport them during their manufacture, wholesale and retail, thereby further reducing congestion and pollution, and reducing our species’ collective carbon footprint.
In short, to Natural Humanists, when it comes to possessions, ‘less is always more’.