Do we need population reduction?

[erosoplier]

Ahh, bless that magic edit button!

[bean fidhleir]

It doesn't really matter whether people with poor motives also advocate for something sensible. Hitler, after all, mandated the Volkswagen and the excellent German highway system. That he was the one ordering them doesn't mean they were what he was!

It's a serious logical error to try to impeach an idea because some disliked person believes it.

You are joking right? I mean you just suggested the graphic I put up was no good because the U.S. was "rabidly nationalistic." I see you removed that comment though.

I see I removed it too quickly for you to remember what it was: "natalist", not "nationalistic".

Meanwhile, my point was, you suggested that we not suggest data from some rabidly nationalistic source and I am pointing out that most of these npg groups are rabidly nationalistic...

Meanwhile, there are a set of assumptions being made to support the need for npg and I am arguing that the assumptions are political, not empirical, in nature.

Natalist, not nationalistic. And again: you cannot logically impeach a position because someone you don't like holds it, even if they do hold it for reasons everyone other than they disagrees with. Who holds a position, and why, has nothing at all to do with the intrinsic worth of the position.

It conflates rate of increase with increase.

??? It's labeled "world population growth rate" not "world population". The article is clear that the population is going to increase to about 9 billion in fifty years.

And what is the visual impression you get from the chart itself? That the population problem is getting smaller, of course. Most people have a hard time getting to grips with the difference between increase in the base number and increase in the rate of change of the base number. Which is why natalist organisations such as the US govt. use the latter when they want to hide the relentless increase in population.

It projects an eventual population reduction mostly based on the AIDS plague continuing to depopulate Africa. If that stops, up goes the rate of increase again, absent some other intervention.

You are so right! Let's work together to stop research into curing AIDS!

As an attempt at sarcasm, that flops badly.

You're apparently very natalist in outlook yourself, so I'm going to guess that you're Roman Catholic. Am I right?

[Dreams End]

Eros...sleep it off man...or woman.

And what is the visual impression you get from the chart itself? That the population problem is getting smaller, of course.

I suppose...unless you read the article or look at the label of the chart. There is no mention of population decline anywhere in either.

Yeah, if you rapidly edit your posts, it might confuse me.

My religion is none of your business, though I get called a Jew a lot as well.

I have made a very clear argument that poverty and not overpopulation is the real issue. Did you want to comment on that or speculate on my spiritual heritage some more?

[bean fidhleir]

My religion is none of your business, though I get called a Jew a lot as well.

I thought so. Being an ex-RC myself, I can usually spot someone who's still in thrall.

I have made a very clear argument that poverty and not overpopulation is the real issue. Did you want to comment on that or speculate on my spiritual heritage some more?

You've confirmed your "spiritual heritage", so I need say no more about it.

As to your "very clear argument", I think the clarity might be apparent only to you.

The reality is that we humans have driven most large-mammal species to the edge of extinction, many larger ocean fish populations to the edge of extinction, are destroying the very ability of the oceans to support life, and are now somewhere very near the point of no return for changing the world's climate to something never before experienced by our kind of human.

These changes are not a function of poverty, but of overpopulation, and it's not hard to prove that to yourself with a little thought-experiment: imagine a world in which there are only, say, a thousand humans. No matter how profligately they might live, a thousand humans couldn't pollute fast enough, or deplete resources fast enough, to overcome the earth's ability to recover. But they could increase their population, and that would do it.

It's thought that the original human population of the American hemisphere was about 100 people. But in only a few generations, they'd multiplied to the point where they'd driven large North American megafauna apart from elk, bison, and bears to extinction. We're about to do it to the whole world.

[Dreams End]

bean:

Who holds a position, and why, has nothing at all to do with the intrinsic worth of the position.

bean:

"You are a catholic aren't you?"

I'm pretty sure attacks on people's religion (erroneous or no) aren't allowed on this board.

[bean fidhleir]

bean:

Who holds a position, and why, has nothing at all to do with the intrinsic worth of the position.

bean:

"You are a catholic aren't you?"

I'm pretty sure attacks on people's religion (erroneous or no) aren't allowed on this board.

How can asking for information or making a true statement ever be an "attack"? (Also, if you claim to quote me, would you please use my words, not your paraphrase? Thanks.)

The RC Church is a highly natalist organisation, is it not? I'll presume you'll answer forthrightly: yes, it is. So, since experience leads me to believe that many people who take natalist positions do so because of their RCism, I suspected you might be RC. So I asked, and interpreted your response based on my experience.

I personally believe that natalism is a terrible philosophy that's destructive on several levels and cannot be defended on any rational basis. And in consequence I don't hide my complete lack of respect for the RC church hierarchy. But that's not an "attack", it's a true statement about my views.

[Dreams End]

My religion is none of your business, though I get called a Jew a lot as well.

I thought so. Being an ex-RC myself, I can usually spot someone who's still in thrall.

How's that?

If calling me a Catholic is the best argument you have, maybe you should go back to the kiddie pool.

[bean fidhleir]

My religion is none of your business, though I get called a Jew a lot as well.

I thought so. Being an ex-RC myself, I can usually spot someone who's still in thrall.

How's that?

If calling me a Catholic is the best argument you have, maybe you should go back to the kiddie pool.

It was a question. Can't you recognise a question when you see one?

My argument is that we're making our world unliveable because there are too many of us generating too much pollution for the earth to sink and consuming the world's resources too fast for the earth to replace. The evidence I offer is the ongoing climate change and the roster of extinct and nearly-extinct species including one of our nearest relatives, the utterly inoffensive organg-utan.

The question, which I asked only out of curiosity, has nothing to do with that argument. So please, don't try to play red-herring with it, okay?

[Dreams End]

You:

You're apparently very natalist in outlook yourself, so I'm going to guess that you're Roman Catholic. Am I right?

That is a question.

Me:

My religion is none of your business, though I get called a Jew a lot as well.

That was an answer.

You:

I thought so. Being an ex-RC myself, I can usually spot someone who's still in thrall.

That is a statement.

Now that we've cleared up the grammar issues, did you have an actual argument to make or just want to continue to attempt to discredit my argument by virtue of my (perceived) religion?

My argument is that we're making our world unliveable because there are too many of us generating too much pollution for the earth to sink and consuming the world's resources too fast for the earth to replace.

Why don't you go back and actually read the thread. The point is not to prove things are bad, the point is to prove that things are bad because we have too many people and that getting rid of people is the way to solve the problem.

Most of the pollution in the world is coming from areas of low birth rates. So how does depopulation address that?

Most of the world's resources are consumed by areas of low birth rates, so how does depopulation help with that?

If the U.S. has 5% of the population and uses 25% of the resources, and if the U.S. has a low birth rate, then I would suggest reducing world birth rates isn't going to do much.

And here's a news flash...you don't have to be Catholic to see that.

[bean fidhleir]

My argument is that we're making our world unliveable because there are too many of us generating too much pollution for the earth to sink and consuming the world's resources too fast for the earth to replace.

Why don't you go back and actually read the thread. The point is not to prove things are bad, the point is to prove that things are bad because we have too many people and that getting rid of people is the way to solve the problem.

You're the only one talking about "getting rid of people". Reducing the birthrate is not "getting rid of" people. It's "producing fewer" people. Big difference.

Most of the pollution in the world is coming from areas of low birth rates. So how does depopulation address that?

Most of the world's resources are consumed by areas of low birth rates, so how does depopulation help with that?

If the U.S. has 5% of the population and uses 25% of the resources, and if the U.S. has a low birth rate, then I would suggest reducing world birth rates isn't going to do much.

Right -- as long as the low-tech countries are content to remain low-tech. Which they're not.

China and India are both on the rise as major polluters, already rivalling the US and they've hardly begun. Not long ago, travel was by bike. Now everyone wants a car.

The Ganges River - "Mother Ganges", sacred since time out of mind - is being killed by pollution. The Yangtze river is being killed by damming and pollution. "Mother Volga" is being killed by pollution. The Aral Sea is all but dead both because of pollution and because feeder rivers are being diverted. The Caspian is in serious trouble. The Amazon basin is drying up because of climate change plus clearcut logging for pulp and beef farming.

These are being driven by population pressure: too many people who have too few ways to get "the good life".

[Dreams End]

China already has a very severe population policy and a very low growth rate. What else would you demand of them?

These things you mention are a result of deliberate economic policies and choices....not an inevitable result of population. It only takes one factory to trash a river...and it only takes one corporate manipulated government to allow it to happen.

[bean fidhleir]

China already has a very severe population policy and a very low growth rate. What else would you demand of them?

China's population policy only sounds good if you don't actually look closely. In reality it's (a) badly defined and (b) not enforced properly. Sterilisation isn't part of it, so people need not stop at one and many don't. That's an acknowledged problem, even winked at, especially in the countryside.

India's policy is "policy?"

These things you mention are a result of deliberate economic policies and choices....not an inevitable result of population. It only takes one factory to trash a river...and it only takes one corporate manipulated government to allow it to happen.

I don't think you can support that. It's not one factory - the rivers can handle one, or two, or twenty. It's hundreds of factories, millions of cubic meters of untreated sewage, millions of cubic meters diverted to agriculture to feed the relentlessly increasing population that's running out of room and options. It's the relentless push for More. All driven by population pressure. The Ganges has been terrible since before industrialisation. Since industrialisation it's gone from unhealthy to disasterous. The Aral is in part the victim of Soviet irrigation policies, diverting the Amu Darya and Syr Darya source rivers to cotton farming. But now, with climate change, the glaciation and snowfall in the Pamir and Tien Shan ranges that feeds the Daryas is going to go away, which is going to completely kill the sea - once the 4th largest in the world. The Caspian sturgeon, once one of the wonders of the world and the defining source for caviar, is now "commercially extinct". Codfish at Georges Bank, 200 years ago so numerous they could be caught on the surface are now not designated "commercially extinct" only because of political pressure.

All because of overpopulation.

[Dreams End]

China's population policy only sounds good if you don't actually look closely. In reality it's (a) badly defined and (b) not enforced properly. Sterilisation isn't part of it, so people need not stop at one and many don't.

China has a growth rate less than that of the U.S.

Irrespective of winking.

But since we now see you are adding forced sterilization into the equation, we get a better idea where you are coming from. I thought I heard some whining coming from the extreme right.

As for factories:

Now, what about "overpopulation" suggests there can't be strict laws regulating factory pollution? Smog is actually less in Los Angeles than it was in the seventies, to give one example...and that's with no real movement to truly wrest control of the environment away from the corporations.

I'd rather have folks concentrate on the very real, tangible and easily definable goal of strict controls of factory emissions than rather ill-defined calls for population reduction. That is, I'd rather the government be shutting down noncompliant factories than snipping the gonads and ovaries of noncompliant citizens. But thanks for your honesty about where you stand on this issue.

[chlamor]

China already has a very severe population policy and a very low growth rate. What else would you demand of them?

China's population policy only sounds good if you don't actually look closely. In reality it's (a) badly defined and (b) not enforced properly. Sterilisation isn't part of it, so people need not stop at one and many don't. That's an acknowledged problem, even winked at, especially in the countryside.

India's policy is "policy?"

These things you mention are a result of deliberate economic policies and choices....not an inevitable result of population. It only takes one factory to trash a river...and it only takes one corporate manipulated government to allow it to happen.

I don't think you can support that. It's not one factory - the rivers can handle one, or two, or twenty. It's hundreds of factories, millions of cubic meters of untreated sewage, millions of cubic meters diverted to agriculture to feed the relentlessly increasing population that's running out of room and options. It's the relentless push for More. All driven by population pressure. The Ganges has been terrible since before industrialisation. Since industrialisation it's gone from unhealthy to disasterous. The Aral is in part the victim of Soviet irrigation policies, diverting the Amu Darya and Syr Darya source rivers to cotton farming. But now, with climate change, the glaciation and snowfall in the Pamir and Tien Shan ranges that feeds the Daryas is going to go away, which is going to completely kill the sea - once the 4th largest in the world. The Caspian sturgeon, once one of the wonders of the world and the defining source for caviar, is now "commercially extinct". Codfish at Georges Bank, 200 years ago so numerous they could be caught on the surface are now not designated "commercially extinct" only because of political pressure.

All because of overpopulation.

All because of overpopulation? That's a rather reductionist statement.

I'm not sure if I'm getting this right but are you suggesting all of the ills you list and then (possibly) by extension all of the ecological ills across the planet can be said to stem from overpopulation?

Now would you also suggest such an ecological calamity as deforestation is also caused by overpopulation?

I'm not sure how you come to the conclusion the "relentless push for more is driven by overpopulation." To come to that conclusion you have to omit an entire range of social and economic factors. Maybe you could explain how you got there.

[Crow]

I have been enjoying this debate mostly from the sidelines, and I find myself thinking that both sides are right.

But we need an answer to this dilemma that is not only ecologically and morally sound, but also one that is compatible with human nature.

Unchecked capitalism (basically, the system we have now) is immensely flawed but its single selling point is so powerful that it seems to override all other concerns. Capitalism sells a dream everyone can relate to. Its one selling point is this: No matter what your life is like now, rich or poor, black or white, fat or thin, First or Third World, here is the chance to make it better in whatever way you desire. YOU choose. Ooh, a choice! We love choices. And we love for it to be all about us.

Now that chance of a better life is slim to illusory for many people, but that doesn't matter. They'll take it anyway. To some degree or another, the dream of a better life is what gets most people up in the morning.

As Americans, we are clearly already willing to let others suffer and die so that we can have the sneakers, the video games, the gas for the SUV that goes along with the Barbie Dream House in the American Dream. We have, as a society, already made that choice. Certainly we can hope to improve upon it, but looking at the ugly reality of our collective decision is not something many people can handle. (This, as much as racism and xenophobia, contributes to the American zeal to get rid of the illegal immigrant. The immigrants remind us of the dirty underbelly we don't want to look at.)

No solution to our environmental and poverty crisis will ever work unless it accounts for this essential human...selfishness, for lack of a better word. That's why the person upthread will be mostly alone in eschewing AC and growing his own food. Most people are not constitutionally monastic.

If we want a more just and ecologically sound world, it must be in the form of a commodity. It must be better -- or at least seem better -- than the world we're already living in. Steve Jobs would probably know how to market it. Where is he when you need him?