A look at various indicators for measuring welfare showed that there are already many alternative assessment methods to GDP. One result of the discussion was that a debate of values in society is required - which is perceived as "highly political" -  in order to serve as a basis for decision-making.

Our guest Prof. Walter Ötsch from the Hochschule für Gesellschaftsgestaltung Koblenz gave a cultural-historical review of three time horizons for the discussion of the ecological crisis: as a problem of neoliberalism (from the 1970s), the Industrial Revolution (from the last third of the 18th century) or the Project of Modernity (from the beginning of the modern era). Another facet of the topic was presented by our guest Prof. Dirk Battenfeld from the Alanus University of Arts and Social Sciences, who outlined the allocative and distributive failure of the market. He hypothesized that a public debate about the underlying moral considerations is needed before any debate about technologies which can be used as solutions to today's challenges.