Too many people?

[Merle]

Many scientists

Are you sure?

How many; And what are their qualifications and specialties?

Once again, here is a list of some organizations that say population is in overshoot.

At the global scale, scientific data indicates that humans are living beyond the carrying capacity of planet Earth and that this cannot continue indefinitely. This scientific evidence comes from many sources. It was presented in detail in the Millennium Ecosystem Assessment of 2005, a collaborative effort involving more than 1,360 experts worldwide.[2] More recent, detailed accounts are provided by ecological footprint accounting,[3] and interdisciplinary research on planetary boundaries to safe human use of the biosphere.[4] The Sixth Assessment Report on Climate Change from the IPCC[5] and the First Assessment Report on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services by the IPBES,[6] large international summaries of the state of scientific knowledge regarding climate disruption and biodiversity loss, also support this view.
[source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carrying_capacity]

 

[Merle]

Wish he would clarify his intent /meaning rather than keep vexing about being misunderstood.

I clarified my purpose for being here at:https://iidb.org/threads/too-many-people.27312/page-14#post-1100417

I clarified my suggested response here: https://iidb.org/threads/too-many-people.27312/page-17#post-1101367

Do you have any further questions?

 

[Merle]

His mass, converted to energy would likely wipe us all out, but then the problem would be solved, No people, no problem.

Now this forum has devolved into jokes about my weight? Will it never stop?

 

[Jarhyn]

His mass, converted to energy would likely wipe us all out, but then the problem would be solved, No people, no problem.

Now this forum has devolved into jokes about my weight? Will it never stop?

My mass converted into energy would wipe us all out.

The mass of one of my boogers would probably do it.

It was a physics joke, not a fat joke.

 

[bilby]

What do you want to do about it?

What do you want others to do about it?

Answered here.https://iidb.org/threads/too-many-people.27312/page-17#post-1101367

Not really.

If you want my solution, I propose that we heavily invest in the study of ecology and population overshoot,

To what end?

This is meant to be the solution to a problem; But you're proposing as the "solution" that we take a look to see whether the problem even exists?

That's bass-ackwards.

and heavily investigate technical solutions.

Like what?

I would like to see strong commitments to alternative energy and reducing CO2 emissions.

If you mean nuclear power, you're absolutely right that we need to do that, even if population is not a problem at all.

If you don't mean nuclear power, then I am wondering why you think we should ignore a demonstrably excellent solution to the problems caused by fossil fuel use, in favour of half-arsed non-solutions that are more popular with the ill-informed.

Regardless, population isn't a relevant factor in the question of whether or mot we need to replace fossil fuel burning with nuclear fission.

The determining factor in how much carbon dioxide ends up in the atmosphere is just how much fossil fuel we can access from the lithosphere. How big the population that's accessing it might be is completely irrelevant; When we have burned it all, the final carbon dioxide level will be much the same.

Technology will determine whether that disaster occurs, and how long that takes; Population will have very little impact even on the timescale, and none at all on the final result.

Regarding population, I want the problem to be widely known,

despite your having yet to demonstrate its existence

with solutions like empowering women, abortions and contraceptives readily available.

These things should be freely available regardless of what total world population we have. Population isn't a relevant factor in the debate over their availability.

I want women everywhere to be encouraged to limit childbirths. But I am not asking that we force them to do so.

I want women everywhere to do as they please. "Encouraging" people to do what you want rather than what they want is either an exercise in futility, or a euphemism for the use of force.

It turns out that women don't, on average, want to have children at the replacement rate needed to keep population at its current level. So we needn't "encourage" anything.

 

[bilby]

Many scientists

Are you sure?

How many; And what are their qualifications and specialties?

Once again, here is a list of some organizations that say population is in overshoot.

At the global scale, scientific data indicates that humans are living beyond the carrying capacity of planet Earth and that this cannot continue indefinitely. This scientific evidence comes from many sources. It was presented in detail in the Millennium Ecosystem Assessment of 2005, a collaborative effort involving more than 1,360 experts worldwide.[2] More recent, detailed accounts are provided by ecological footprint accounting,[3] and interdisciplinary research on planetary boundaries to safe human use of the biosphere.[4] The Sixth Assessment Report on Climate Change from the IPCC[5] and the First Assessment Report on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services by the IPBES,[6] large international summaries of the state of scientific knowledge regarding climate disruption and biodiversity loss, also support this view.
[source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carrying_capacity]

That's not a list of "Many scientists"; It's a handwave towards a few organisations.

I'm already aware that your position is popular; What I am looking for is evidence that it's true.

A quick google will unearth long lists of "scientists" and organisations that support creationism. The existence of such organisations is not evidence that their claims have merit.

 

[Jarhyn]

It turns out that women don't, on average, want to have children at the replacement rate needed to keep population at its current level. So we needn't "encourage" anything.

My thoughts are that we can encourage the things which seem to lead to that existential position of not wanting children.

Not that we need to, mind, but that we can now. Encourage education and careers and enable all the decisions that make it really easy to make that decision early and often.

Make sure nobody is charged anything for making that decision, nor told to take it, and only a few times and in specific and official locations post that it is there.

This is not encouraging (as discussed, encouraging is already veering towards atrocities), but it is turning the wheel as far as it will go before losing the road.

 

[bilby]

Encourage education and careers and enable all the decisions that make it really easy to make that decision early and often.

But there are a ton of really good reasons to do that, which have exactly nothing to do with family size or population concerns.

So why give the non-issue of population a 'leg up' in popular culture by attaching it to these unrelated good ideas?

We should give people an excellent education and opportunities to use that education in whatever way they want.

How does this fact have any relationship or relevance to the question of how many children other people would like them to have?

 

[Jarhyn]

Encourage education and careers and enable all the decisions that make it really easy to make that decision early and often.

But there are a ton of really good reasons to do that, which have exactly nothing to do with family size or population concerns.

So why give the non-issue of population a 'leg up' in popular culture by attaching it to these unrelated good ideas?

We should give people an excellent education and opportunities to use that education in whatever way they want.

How does this fact have any relationship or relevance to the question of how many children other people would like them to have?

Well, in some respects by acknowledging that, and the reasons why we do it before we are doing it, we cut off the "population is in decine!!!111" panic reactions: "yes, that's one of the reasons we are educating people, and enabling them to do these things. Not only are we aware of the consequence to the population, that is considered a benefit."

This serves a very important function of keeping people from thinking they have "discovered" something "dark": it's publicly stated. There is nothing shady there.

It also allows acknowledging that it was done in case we ever decide to reverse positions and declare the population is "high".

By acknowledging the intent, albeit quietly and only to the extent it is necessary to keep people from panicking over "unintended" consequences, we can both maintain those consequences against challenge of non-intent and against our own reversal of intent through the one lever we have to pull: how much we actually enable non-fertility and fertility treatments.

 

[Merle]

That's not a list of "Many scientists"; It's a handwave towards a few organisations.

I think I have documented that many scientists are concerned about population overshoot, and have given you documentation for why they are concerned. You think I haven't. I will leave it at that and move on.

If you mean nuclear power, you're absolutely right that we need to do that, even if population is not a problem at all.

If you don't mean nuclear power, then I am wondering why you think we should ignore a demonstrably excellent solution to the problems caused by fossil fuel use, in favour of half-arsed non-solutions that are more popular with the ill-informed.

Regardless, population isn't a relevant factor in the question of whether or mot we need to replace fossil fuel burning with nuclear fission.

Why do you ask? I have already told you that I lean strongly toward using more nuclear power (e.g., https://iidb.org/threads/too-many-people.27312/page-8#post-1099870). Do you read what I write?

Yes, we are going to have more nuclear power plants in the future. We don't really have a choice. Our current food industry burns 10 calories of fossil fuels for every calorie on the kitchen table. The cheapest fossil fuels are being depleted rapidly. As fossil fuels become more expensive, in desperation we will turn to any alternative energy we can find to keep things moving. All forms of alternate energy have problems (see https://dothemath.ucsd.edu/2012/02/the-alternative-energy-matrix/) that are probably greater than the problems with nuclear energy. So, yes, we are about to go nuclear. We don't have an option. It's coming.

Nuclear certainly has its problems, including limited availability of the fuel. I know you claim there is very much uranium available, but I suspect your figures include the uranium dissolved in the ocean, that may never be economically recoverable. If we were to power the entire world from the known uranium deposits on land, it would last for six years. ( https://dothemath.ucsd.edu/2012/01/nuclear-options/ ). That's not going to do much to shift the blue line in my previous chart to the right, which we may need to do to gain us more time.

You could also turn to thorium, but that stuff is extremely dangerous. Nobody wants to be near it in a concentrated form even with heavy shielding. Most people run away from it. Terrorists, not so much.

Of course, we could extend the life of the available uranium by a factor of 140 if we put it in special reactors known as breeder reactors that convert the inert U-238 portion of the fuel into plutonium. That plutonium can then be readily concentrated to provide additional nuclear power. It is also relatively easy to concentrate into a nuclear bomb, making it much easier for do-it-yourselfers to make their own nuclear bombs. Not good. But we probably have no choice but to use plutonium and hope for the best.

Next question: How are we going to get all the energy we need to build all those new nuclear power plants we need? See https://dothemath.ucsd.edu/2011/10/the-energy-trap/

Oh, and another thing, is it OK with you if we bury the nuclear waste in your backyard? After all, we wouldn't want to eugenically put it in some third world country, now, would we?

But yes, as cheap fossil fuels diminish, we will do everything we can to keep those SUVs driving to Walmart to get stuff from China. Here come the nukes.

All this energy will last much longer if there were fewer people, or if those people consumed less. However, it is what it is, and we will be going on with business as usual, putting our heads down and running full speed into the (blue line) wall ahead. Fun times ahead, huh?

 

[bilby]

Nuclear certainly has its problems, including limited availability of the fuel. I know you claim there is very much uranium available, but I suspect your figures include the uranium dissolved in the ocean, that may never be economically recoverable. If we were to power the entire world from the known uranium deposits on land, it would last for six years. ( https://dothemath.ucsd.edu/2012/01/nuclear-options/ ). That's not going to do much to shift the blue line in my previous chart to the right, which we may need to do to gain us more time.

Oh FFS.

I already debunked the "No Breakfast Fallacy". Do you read what I write?

https://iidb.org/threads/too-many-people.27312/post-1101395

The known uranium deposits on land are, like the known deposits of pretty much every mineral that's even vaguely difficult to locate, enough for between two and ten years, and always will be because exploration costs money, and nobody wastes money looking for more stuff when they've already found enough to last for a few years.

The lithosphere is fucking huge. Were not going to run out of nuclear fuels in timescales relevant to the Earth - the Sun will expand and render our planet uninhabitable before that happens.

By the way, something similar is also true of coal, oil, and gas. We must stop using them long before they are scarce enough to become hugely expensive, because if we burn anywhere close to that amount, our atmosphere is fucked.

The current high price of fossil fuel is, like the high prices of the 1970s, caused by political issues, not scarcity. The whole "Peak Oil" thing is just another example of the "No Breakfast Fallacy".

As for oceanic uranium "may never be economically recoverable", it has been economically recoverable for a few years. Nobody's bothering to do it though, because we already have more uranium than we need for the next several decades, and mined uranium is still fractionally cheaper.

 

[bilby]

Next question: How are we going to get all the energy we need to build all those new nuclear power plants we need? See https://dothemath.ucsd.edu/2011/10/the-energy-trap/

The low-end of EROEI for current nuclear fission technology is about 70. For some facilities it's over 140.

Fast reactors, such as the Elysium MCSFR should have far higher EROEI; Nuclear fission uses a very energy dense fuel indeed.

Energy density is everything - that's why wind and solar power are inevitably shit.

 

[bilby]

Oh, and another thing, is it OK with you if we bury the nuclear waste in your backyard?

Yes. I would happily collect the rent to have some dry casks in my backyard, and as their contents will likely become highly valuable, I'd love to own them (though I likely wouldn't be allowed to).

Nuclear power is the only industry in the history of humanity that has had its entire waste stream completely managed. As a result, it's also the only industry in human history whose waste has never caused a single injury or death.

Nuclear waste isn't the problem you have been told it is.

https://thoughtscapism.com/2017/11/04/nuclear-waste-ideas-vs-reality/

There's also very little of it, and it's incredibly useful. The "waste" here is literal - we should be using it as fuel, and for medical and industrial purposes, not letting it sit in dry casks doing nothing.

The nuclear waste "problem" is a propaganda tool.

Nobody's demanding that chemically toxic heavy metals from other industries (including, incidentally, wind turbine and solar panel manufacturing) be sequestered for geological timescales.

The fact is that we already have a completely safe storage system in place - on site storage in dry casks has been used for sixty years without anyone ever being hurt.

It's already far safer than the waste from any other power generation technology.

It's not 'green goo' - it's a boring grey ceramic solid, heavy and insoluble. Even if a cask was broken open, the materials inside aren't going to go anywhere; as long as everyone stays back a few metres, nobody's going to get hurt.

And these casks are inside the perimeter fence of nuclear power plants. Nobody's casually going to stroll up to them uninvited.

The most dangerous isotopes are the ones that decay quickly. They will be gone in a few centuries. The rest isn't particularly hazardous once it's that old - you wouldn't want to eat it, but that's true of almost any industrial waste, and unlike nuclear waste, chemical wastes remain hazardous FOREVER.

Of course, spent nuclear fuel is only hazardous because it's energetic. So the best option is to use it as fuel in fast reactors.

For example, the Elysium MCSFR (as well as various other fast reactors currently in development) can use this 'waste' as fuel, leaving a tiny amount of radioactive material with a lifespan of about three centuries before it decays to background - and then you can just landfill it.

How tiny? Well, currently a lifetimes supply of energy for an American can be generated with an amount of fuel the size of a soda can - and produces the same volume of "waste".

To get a lifetimes supply of energy from a MCSFR, you need an amount of fuel with the volume of four chocolate m&m's.

The waste is bit more - about seven m&m's for an American, over his entire life of energy use. But it halves in activity every thirty or so years, and in three hundred, it's barely radioactive at all.

Every generation technology has a toxic waste problem. Only nuclear power has solved that problem.

 

[bilby]

I warned you. But you didn't listen.

https://iidb.org/threads/too-many-people.27312/post-1099860

They never listen.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

Even if we reduce our species to living on the barest of resources possible, with the finest nuclear technology, those resources will run out eventually. We are not going to become technological Gods, in spite of what the optimists say. Conserve as much as possible, so our species and other life on Earth can survive as long as possible, and Drink the champagne.

So if we waste resources into becoming technological gods, rather than champagne... what can we lose?

If you're right, and it's pointless, humanity will go extinct anyways. No loss there.

If you're wrong, no matter how unlikely, then the technological gods have more time to ponder the same problem and/or drink their digital champagne.

Yup. If technology can't save us it almost certainly is the great filter and the answer to Fermi's Paradox. But to not try is to ensure extinction.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

No. You may think you are for moving the limit but your approach does not actually do that.

In context "moving the limit" means increasing the capacity of the Earth to support humans. I am all for this moving of the limit. I am all for technical solutions that "move the limit," that make it possible for more people to live prosperously on this planet.

No, you are against it.

The problem is research output is a non-linear function related to population and the economy because it's a portion of the surplus beyond what's needed for survival. The conservation approach will starve research. Furthermore, the higher the technological level the more resources we can obtain.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

It is never a waste of time to carefully and fastidiously explain what you mean when you are proposing an address towards one of the three levers: acceleration, deceleration (really an acceleration eithed perpendicular or opposed to the acceleration), and/or the hard stop.

Read the opening post. I am not here to discuss a solution. I am here to discuss the extent of the problem.

If you want my solution, I propose that we heavily invest in the study of ecology and population overshoot, and heavily investigate technical solutions. I would like to see strong commitments to alternative energy and reducing CO2 emissions. Regarding population, I want the problem to be widely known, with solutions like empowering women, abortions and contraceptives readily available. I want women everywhere to be encouraged to limit childbirths. But I am not asking that we force them to do so.

The path to protecting the environment is nuclear. In such a realm there's little use for renewables.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

You are missing the point.

B is under a million. It's early stone age technology. The breakpoint is flint--you have to go back to before flint tools because flint is not a renewable resource and at that tech level there's basically no mining. I would be astounded if we could cleanly descend to that point without a massive overshoot due to war.

Thus the only real survival for the human race is to advance technology to the point that a high tech society is sustainable.

No, you are missing my point.

When scientists talk about the carrying capacity of the Earth, they are not talking about what would have been possible in the stone age. They are talking about what level of population can be sustained with the best technology we can expect to have available before we find we have exhausted the cheapest supply of non-renewable resources, before we have saturated the Earth with pollutants that the Earth has not been able to process.

There is a strong basis of peer-reviewed papers that the carrying capacity is under 8 billion people. Many peer reviewed studies put it under 4 billion. See https://www.science.org.au/curious/earth-environment/how-many-people-can-earth-actually-support . As we are at 8 billion people and growing, that is a concern.

Nope. What Earth can support is a function of technology. All the green "estimates" of carrying capacity are garbage because they all involve resource depletion--they just pretend they have a solution by cutting the graph off before the crash. The highest technology we have ever had that didn't face the issue of resource depletion is early stone age--before worked stone tools.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

There is no dog that can fly.

As nobody here is suggesting active population control, and nobody here is saying that dogs can fly, why don't we stick to discussing what people have actual said?

The birth rate isn't going to change because of what you say about resources. It's a Tragedy of the commons problem--except it's not a problem because the natural level in an industrialized society is below replacement.

 

[Elixir]

What Earth can support is a function of technology

… and lifestyle. How many brains in jars can earth “support“? Maybe there’s an even less space intensive possibility, but I can’t think of it right off.