Too many people?

[Merle]

How many times do I need to repeat this? Just like I said throughput this thread, I am empathically opposed to genocide.

As many times as you say overpopulation is not a problem, or near to it. You should lead with it, or lead into it.

I think this is what some might call "tone setting".

Flapdoodle.

To illustrate, I am an Eagles fan. Are you going to demand that I change that to, "I did not throw snowballs at Cowboys, but I am an Eagles fan"?

I am of European descent. Are you going to demand that I change that to, "I am not a White Supremacist, but I am of European descent"?

I am a vocal defender of the fact of evolution (e. g. https://mindsetfree.blog/dare-to-question/did-we-evolve/ ). Are you going to demand that I change that to, "I am a vocal defender of the fact of evolution, but I disagree with those who think evolution supports eugenics"?

No!

It is small minority of people that threw snowballs at Cowboys, that support White Supremacism, that use evolution to support eugenics, or that use ecological overshoot as justification for genocide. If I need to apologize for the snowball incident every time I mention the Eagles, for instance, it implies that I consider this a legitimate connection that people should make to being an Eagles fan. It is not. So no, I do not mention that every time I talk about the Eagles.

So far you have offered no actual evidence that any scientist concerned about ecological overshoot or population overshoot is using that as justification for genocide. Zero. Zilch. Zip. Nada. Would it be too much to ask for evidence before you fly off into a panic?

And no, simply pointing out that a proposed policy would not be fair to all is not evidence that the person who proposed the policy is racist. After all, ecological overshoot is a very complex issue. It is impossible to come up with a policy to address it that would be completely fair to all. So is the solution to scream at all who attempt to suggest a policy? No. If we think a suggested policy is not completely fair, then we should suggest a policy that we think would be more fair.

It is easy to sit on the sidelines and scream "Racist!" every time somebody tries to address the issue. It is far harder to actually address the problem and propose a solution that is considered fair, moral, and effective.

If ecological overshoot is indeed as serious as the links I posted indicate, and your solution is to ignore it and do nothing, that solution is extremely unfair to certain people groups that will be affected more by the results of an ignored overshoot.

I would not think about calling a person racist simply because they suggested we do nothing. I would just ask that we put our heads together, and try to come up with a better suggestion that is fair, moral, and effective.

What's good for the goose is good for the gander. Should I now demand that you say, "I am not racist, but I recommend we do nothing about population overshoot," every time you mention it?

You have seen how a Creationist responded to what he saw on this thread. He assumed that it is just normal to attack science by calling science racist and therefore ignoring science. We try to tell Creationists that is not a valid argument. But if atheists are also going to use that tactic, and pull out the race card every time they want to ignore science, don't be surprised if Creationists do the same thing.

Why can't we be friends? Why can't we just talk about these difficult issues, without nonsensical cries of genocide and racism against each other with no justification? What can possibly be wrong with a decent, civil conversation about these difficult issues without all the personal attacks?

Yes, I know that was a long response, but please read it before dashing off a response. These are complex issues that require complex thought. We cannot discuss all that is involved in this issue in a post the size of a tweet.

 

[Politesse]

How many times do I need to repeat this? Just like I said throughput this thread, I am empathically opposed to genocide.

As many times as you say overpopulation is not a problem, or near to it. You should lead with it, or lead into it.

I think this is what some might call "tone setting".

Flapdoodle.

To illustrate, I am an Eagles fan. Are you going to demand that I change that to, "I did not throw snowballs at Cowboys, but I am an Eagles fan"?

I am of European descent. Are you going to demand that I change that to, "I am not a White Supremacist, but I am of European descent"?

I am a vocal defender of the fact of evolution (e. g. https://mindsetfree.blog/dare-to-question/did-we-evolve/ ). Are you going to demand that I change that to, "I am a vocal defender of the fact of evolution, but I disagree with those who think evolution supports eugenics"?

No!

It is small minority of people that threw snowballs at Cowboys, that support White Supremacism, that use evolution to support eugenics, or that use ecological overshoot as justification for genocide. If I need to apologize for the snowball incident every time I mention the Eagles, for instance, it implies that I consider this a legitimate connection that people should make to being an Eagles fan. It is not. So no, I do not mention that every time I talk about the Eagles.

So far you have offered no actual evidence that any scientist concerned about ecological overshoot or population overshoot is using that as justification for genocide. Zero. Zilch. Zip. Nada. Would it be too much to ask for evidence before you fly off into a panic?

And no, simply pointing out that a proposed policy would not be fair to all is not evidence that the person who proposed the policy is racist. After all, ecological overshoot is a very complex issue. It is impossible to come up with a policy to address it that would be completely fair to all. So is the solution to scream at all who attempt to suggest a policy? No. If we think a suggested policy is not completely fair, then we should suggest a policy that we think would be more fair.

It is easy to sit on the sidelines and scream "Racist!" every time somebody tries to address the issue. It is far harder to actually address the problem and propose a solution that is considered fair, moral, and effective.

If ecological overshoot is indeed as serious as the links I posted indicate, and your solution is to ignore it and do nothing, that solution is extremely unfair to certain people groups that will be affected more by the results of an ignored overshoot.

I would not think about calling a person racist simply because they suggested we do nothing. I would just ask that we put our heads together, and try to come up with a better suggestion that is fair, moral, and effective.

What's good for the goose is good for the gander. Should I now demand that you say, "I am not racist, but I recommend we do nothing about population overshoot," every time you mention it?

You have seen how a Creationist responded to what he saw on this thread. He assumed that it is just normal to attack science by calling science racist and therefore ignoring science. We try to tell Creationists that is not a valid argument. But if atheists are also going to use that tactic, and pull out the race card every time they want to ignore science, don't be surprised if Creationists do the same thing.

Why can't we be friends? Why can't we just talk about these difficult issues, without nonsensical cries of genocide and racism against each other with no justification? What can possibly be wrong with a decent, civil conversation about these difficult issues without all the personal attacks?

Yes, I know that was a long response, but please read it before dashing off a response. These are complex issues that require complex thought. We cannot discuss all that is involved in this issue in a post the size of a tweet.

Your taking of personal offense is irrelevant to resolving the issues you claim to be primarily concerned about. If you want to talk science, talk science. No one can resolve your feelings for you.

I do, in fact, teach young people about evolution as part of my job, and we do, in fact, cover Social Darwinism pretty early on in the instruction, carefully explaining what the eugenicists believed and why we now believe that they were wrong. Trying to sweep history under the rug does not erase it. Neither does taking personal offense whenever someone wants to address the elephant in the room.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

You are clearly not edging towards "do nothing", and while you keep saying "not monstrous" you also keep failing to say what you find monstrous.

Flapdoodle. I have addressed this many times. See, for instance https://iidb.org/threads/too-many-people.27312/page-21#post-1102262

You addressed it... After 20 pages of argument from me that you started needing to address it, and that you need to address it every time you claim that there is a problem for which one of the more popular solutions proposed is "genocide".

Because there is no actual solution this way. Lowering consumption merely delays the inevitable.

 

[Merle]

I do, in fact, teach young people about evolution as part of my job, and we do, in fact, cover Social Darwinism pretty early on in the instruction, carefully explaining what the eugenicists believed and why we now believe that they were wrong. Trying to sweep history under the rug does not erase it.

I agree. One should educate people about Social Darwinism and responses to Social Darwinism. That was not my point.

My point was, if you see somebody on the Internet arguing for the existence of evolution or population overshoot without introducing the subject of his opposition to genocide, that gives us no basis to conclude that this person is for genocide. Do you agree?

 

[Merle]

If you want to talk science, talk science.

Yes!!!!!!!!!!!!!

See https://iidb.org/threads/too-many-people.27312/page-23#post-1103803 .

 

[Jarhyn]

I do, in fact, teach young people about evolution as part of my job, and we do, in fact, cover Social Darwinism pretty early on in the instruction, carefully explaining what the eugenicists believed and why we now believe that they were wrong. Trying to sweep history under the rug does not erase it.

I agree. One should educate people about Social Darwinism and responses to Social Darwinism. That was not my point.

My point was, if you see somebody on the Internet arguing for the existence of evolution or population overshoot without introducing the subject of his opposition to genocide, that gives us no basis to conclude that this person is for genocide. Do you agree?

If I see someone arguing online about overpopulation without providing a direction to break from there, yes, I suspect them of advocating for genocide.

I've seen enough people gaslight "overpopulation" towards some kind of genocide that I will generally early and often present opportunities to contextualize and if they refuse for too long, I trust them less and less.

It's a really charged topic.

It's like someone bringing up "whether a fetus is a person", and expecting, knowing they are eventually going to break towards some argument against autonomy. They could prevent that by contextualizing.

 

[Merle]

If I see someone arguing online about overpopulation without providing a direction to break from there, yes, I suspect them of advocating for genocide.

I've seen enough people gaslight "overpopulation" towards some kind of genocide that I will generally early and often present opportunities to contextualize and if they refuse for too long, I trust them less and less.

It's a really charged topic.

It's like someone bringing up "whether a fetus is a person", and expecting, knowing they are eventually going to break towards some argument against autonomy. They could prevent that by contextualizing.

Fine. If you think a person may be promoting genocide, even though he has not said that, ask.

If the person insists that he is against genocide, as I have persistently done throughout this thread, then drop it.

It is wrong to repeatedly make lies about people when you have no evidence of the accusation, and the person you are accusing repeatedly says he is not saying what you claim.

There is a huge difference from mistaking a person's intent, and repeatedly lying about a person.

 

[DBT]

Personally, based on personal space, sheer livability/elbow room, minimal congestion, vast tracts of fallow land, vast wilderness, thriving ecosystems, minimal pollution and resource use, space to shift populations of people in case of natural disasters like sea rise, super volcanos, etc, a world population of no more than two billion is sufficient.

 

[bilby]

Personally, based on personal space, sheer livability/elbow room, minimal congestion,

I'm highly skeptical that anyone who inhabits a town or city can even detect any of these things "personally" at the global scale.

They're all symptoms of crowding not population, and would have been far worse in London or Paris in 1850 with a world population of 1.2 billion, than in London or Paris today with a world population of 8 billion.

If you want elbow room, you can move to Winton, and share thousands of square kilometres of emptiness with 856 townsfolk. Or any of hundreds of similarly small and remote communities in Australia, or millions of such communities in the world.

There's more wilderness worldwide today than there was two hundred years ago, because people have mostly moved to big cities. Big, crowded cities are great for the environment, bit perversely give their inhabitants the false impression that the wilderness is vanishing - it's not vanishing, people just don't visit it as much as they used to.

The local phenomenon of (over)crowding has exactly fuck-all to do with the global phenomenon of (over)population.

 

[TomC]

If you want elbow room, you can move to Winton, and share thousands of square kilometres of emptiness with 856 townsfolk. Or any of hundreds of similarly small and remote communities in Australia, or millions

Ew, "Winton"?

One of those places where up is down and winter is summer? Of course nobody wants to live there.
Tom

 

[Merle]

It's a really charged topic.

I found that out the hard way.

This morning I was checking out a site that describes how people practicing genocide talk of overpopulation. I had never heard of that. I suspect their talk of overpopulation was just an excuse to justify genocide, but it could be they were really trying to do what they thought was right to control population and it went horribly wrong.

At any rate, my concern is strictly for the welfare of all, especially the next generation. I think we are in severe ecological overshoot. Technological improvements will definitely help, but those improvements will probably be overwhelmed with many people seeking increased prosperity, and thus cancelling out gains from technology. I see that there are fair and moral voluntary ways to limit population more, and that should be an important part of any plan.

But be assured, all of my comments here are based on an honest attempt to help us all. I am open to other viewpoints. But in no sense is any thing here in any way motivated by thoughts of genocide or targeting of specific people.

 

[Tigers!]

If you want elbow room, you can move to Winton, and share thousands of square kilometres of emptiness with 856 townsfolk. Or any of hundreds of similarly small and remote communities in Australia, or millions

Ew, "Winton"?

One of those places where up is down and winter is summer? Of course nobody wants to live there.
Tom

Penong is better

 

[DBT]

Personally, based on personal space, sheer livability/elbow room, minimal congestion,

I'm highly skeptical that anyone who inhabits a town or city can even detect any of these things "personally" at the global scale.

They're all symptoms of crowding not population, and would have been far worse in London or Paris in 1850 with a world population of 1.2 billion, than in London or Paris today with a world population of 8 billion.

If you want elbow room, you can move to Winton, and share thousands of square kilometres of emptiness with 856 townsfolk. Or any of hundreds of similarly small and remote communities in Australia, or millions of such communities in the world.

There's more wilderness worldwide today than there was two hundred years ago, because people have mostly moved to big cities. Big, crowded cities are great for the environment, bit perversely give their inhabitants the false impression that the wilderness is vanishing - it's not vanishing, people just don't visit it as much as they used to.

The local phenomenon of (over)crowding has exactly fuck-all to do with the global phenomenon of (over)population.

Personally, visiting capital cities like Brisbane, Melbourne, etc, over the decades, there has been a huge, noticable increase in traffic, congestion and impact on surrounding bushland and ecosystems...which are now being transfomed into houses and growing suburbs.

 

[lostone]

You can also go to places such as Beaufort county , NC, home of some 37K people since time began; been that way, for many years. Not an isolated desert, but neither growing nor shrinking. Backwaters of the world.

 

[DBT]

Of course there are places that aren't growing, but that wasn't the point. Which is overpopulation in desirable regions, mostly on the coast and the overall impact of that concentration. People generally don't move to outback towns for good reasons. And if they should, the same issues arise.

 

[bilby]

Personally, based on personal space, sheer livability/elbow room, minimal congestion,

I'm highly skeptical that anyone who inhabits a town or city can even detect any of these things "personally" at the global scale.

They're all symptoms of crowding not population, and would have been far worse in London or Paris in 1850 with a world population of 1.2 billion, than in London or Paris today with a world population of 8 billion.

If you want elbow room, you can move to Winton, and share thousands of square kilometres of emptiness with 856 townsfolk. Or any of hundreds of similarly small and remote communities in Australia, or millions of such communities in the world.

There's more wilderness worldwide today than there was two hundred years ago, because people have mostly moved to big cities. Big, crowded cities are great for the environment, bit perversely give their inhabitants the false impression that the wilderness is vanishing - it's not vanishing, people just don't visit it as much as they used to.

The local phenomenon of (over)crowding has exactly fuck-all to do with the global phenomenon of (over)population.

Personally, visiting capital cities like Brisbane, Melbourne, etc, over the decades, there has been a huge, noticable increase in traffic, congestion and impact on surrounding bushland and ecosystems...which are now being transfomed into houses and growing suburbs.

Yeah, but all those people are coming from somewhere, and are now having an impact on already spoiled suburban and urban environments, and no longer impacting rural and wilderness areas.

Crowded cities are a good thing. They mean people are only damaging a small area.

 

[DBT]

Personally, based on personal space, sheer livability/elbow room, minimal congestion,

I'm highly skeptical that anyone who inhabits a town or city can even detect any of these things "personally" at the global scale.

They're all symptoms of crowding not population, and would have been far worse in London or Paris in 1850 with a world population of 1.2 billion, than in London or Paris today with a world population of 8 billion.

If you want elbow room, you can move to Winton, and share thousands of square kilometres of emptiness with 856 townsfolk. Or any of hundreds of similarly small and remote communities in Australia, or millions of such communities in the world.

There's more wilderness worldwide today than there was two hundred years ago, because people have mostly moved to big cities. Big, crowded cities are great for the environment, bit perversely give their inhabitants the false impression that the wilderness is vanishing - it's not vanishing, people just don't visit it as much as they used to.

The local phenomenon of (over)crowding has exactly fuck-all to do with the global phenomenon of (over)population.

Personally, visiting capital cities like Brisbane, Melbourne, etc, over the decades, there has been a huge, noticable increase in traffic, congestion and impact on surrounding bushland and ecosystems...which are now being transfomed into houses and growing suburbs.

Yeah, but all those people are coming from somewhere, and are now having an impact on already spoiled suburban and urban environments, and no longer impacting rural and wilderness areas.

Crowded cities are a good thing. They mean people are only damaging a small area.

True, but these huge population centres need to be serviced, the citizens fed, clothed, entertained, many of them may want to go fishing, hiking, camping, touring, et-cetera. More roads, farms, resorts, tour operators, hiking tracks.....the impact being far wider than the boundaries of the city.

 

[bilby]

Personally, based on personal space, sheer livability/elbow room, minimal congestion,

I'm highly skeptical that anyone who inhabits a town or city can even detect any of these things "personally" at the global scale.

They're all symptoms of crowding not population, and would have been far worse in London or Paris in 1850 with a world population of 1.2 billion, than in London or Paris today with a world population of 8 billion.

If you want elbow room, you can move to Winton, and share thousands of square kilometres of emptiness with 856 townsfolk. Or any of hundreds of similarly small and remote communities in Australia, or millions of such communities in the world.

There's more wilderness worldwide today than there was two hundred years ago, because people have mostly moved to big cities. Big, crowded cities are great for the environment, bit perversely give their inhabitants the false impression that the wilderness is vanishing - it's not vanishing, people just don't visit it as much as they used to.

The local phenomenon of (over)crowding has exactly fuck-all to do with the global phenomenon of (over)population.

Personally, visiting capital cities like Brisbane, Melbourne, etc, over the decades, there has been a huge, noticable increase in traffic, congestion and impact on surrounding bushland and ecosystems...which are now being transfomed into houses and growing suburbs.

Yeah, but all those people are coming from somewhere, and are now having an impact on already spoiled suburban and urban environments, and no longer impacting rural and wilderness areas.

Crowded cities are a good thing. They mean people are only damaging a small area.

True, but these huge population centres need to be serviced, the citizens fed, clothed, entertained, many of them may want to go fishing, hiking, camping, touring, et-cetera. More roads, farms, resorts, tour operators, hiking tracks.....the impact being far wider than the boundaries of the city.

But still FAR lower than it was when those people were doing all those things, but in a much more spread-out way.

 

[Merle]

There's more wilderness worldwide today than there was two hundred years ago, because people have mostly moved to big cities.

I disagree. People are moving out of cities into the suburban sprawl. Wild lands are disappearing. See:

Urban sprawl - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

and

Deforestation

Deforestation is the intentional clearing of forested land.

education.nationalgeographic.org

 

[T.G.G. Moogly]

But still FAR lower than it was when those people were doing all those things, but in a much more spread-out way.

Maybe. I'd like to see some kind of data to support that claim. If the food and resources are being shipped from great distances there would seem to be more of an environmental impact as opposed to getting things locally.