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If you think the earth is over-populated, would you rather...

Which would you rather happen?

  • Reduce life expectancy

    Votes: 2 3.8%

  • Reduce birth rate

    Votes: 51 96.2%
  • Total voters
    53
That article does not take account of the fact that we can (and do) increase the size of resources through energy use.

Desalinated drinking water is already as cheap to produce in Australia as conventionally harvested rainwater in dams. There is no reason for a society of people at a European level of wealth to be concerned about water security, as long as the oceans have water in them, and power is affordable - and power IS affordable for people with that level of wealth, without burning fossil fuel to get it.

Of course we don't currently have enough fresh drinking water for everyone to use it like Europeans do - not everyone is as wealthy as a European (yet). Once people in the third world are that wealthy, they will no longer be dependent on aquifers as their only source of water.

It is disingenuous to claim that a European lifestyle for all is impossible with current resources; the question is whether it is possible with the resources of a world full of people as wealthy as the current Europeans.

There is a HUGE industry out there dedicated to the anti-humanitarian 'overpopulation' lie. Finding propaganda is easy; finding real facts about real resources which will really be in short supply is hard.
 
European nations have huge incomes from manufacturing, resources like gas and coal and the know how to exploit these resources. Countries like Nigeria or most Sub Sahara nations depend on the First world for aid and technology etc.
Desalination plants are fine but most depend on fossil fuels to create fresh drinking water and it's nowhere near the price of rain water which is free. The cost comes later in building the storage facilities.
By the way, at least one desalination plant was built because the idiot Tim Flannery stated and was believed by politicians that South Eastern Australia would never see rain in the amounts needed to fill existing dams again because of "Global Warming" which now has reverter to "climate change" so as to be more credible.
The following 24 months the whole of South Eastern Australia was flooded. And so far this year has had more than the average rainfall.
 
angelo atheist said:
European nations have huge incomes from manufacturing, resources like gas and coal and the know how to exploit these resources. Countries like Nigeria or most Sub Sahara nations depend on the First world for aid and technology etc.
Desalination plants are fine but most depend on fossil fuels to create fresh drinking water and it's nowhere near the price of rain water which is free. The cost comes later in building the storage facilities.
By the way, at least one desalination plant was built because the idiot Tim Flannery stated and was believed by politicians that South Eastern Australia would never see rain in the amounts needed to fill existing dams again because of "Global Warming" which now has reverter to "climate change" so as to be more credible.
The following 24 months the whole of South Eastern Australia was flooded. And so far this year has had more than the average rainfall.
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European nations were not created rich ex nihilo; and Nigeria has extensive oil reserves. And while the third world is poor, we need not worry whether the world has the resources to support them as though they were rich.

I refuse to worry too much about a problem that is specified in an internally inconsistent way. Are we trying to find resources for 10 billion rich people; or are we worried about many of those 10 billion not being able to afford things? You can't have it both ways.
 
Out of the present world pop of roughly 7 billion, only 3 of those 7 billions are well fed or well housed. The situation can only get much worse by uncontrolled population explosion. It's estimated that by 2050 the population will be 10 billion, with the lions share of that explosion in the third world, or in developing countries. Will those countries be able to support all these extra mouths to feed or house? OK, Nigeria has extensive oil reserves, so who's benefiting from this oil wealth.
 
angelo atheist said:
Out of the present world pop of roughly 7 billion, only 3 of those 7 billions are well fed or well housed. The situation can only get much worse by uncontrolled population explosion. It's estimated that by 2050 the population will be 10 billion, with the lions share of that explosion in the third world, or in developing countries. Will those countries be able to support all these extra mouths to feed or house? OK, Nigeria has extensive oil reserves, so who's benefiting from this oil wealth.
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Royal Dutch Shell.

There is no "explosion". From 7.5 to 10 is only a 1/3 increase - and the projection for 2100 is also about 10 billion.

Population growth is over, apart from demographic lag, which will add about 30% to world population in the next three or four decades.

Explosion. :rolleyesa:

Paul Ehrlich was wrong. Everything he predicted for the 1970s, '80s, '90s, and '00s was wrong. There is no reason to think that his predictions for 2050 (or those of his disciples) are any better.

The overpopulation doomsday cult is a religion with no God, and seven and a half billion devils. It is bullshit. And like all religions, it diverts people's effort from genuinely useful endeavour.

Stopping people from burning oil, coal or gas might help humanity. Stopping those of them who want to from having kids is cruel and needless.

As soon as the contraceptive pill was developed in the 1960s, the Population bomb was defused. Taking a few decades to notice is, perhaps, excusable; but taking over sixty years is wilful ignorance of the kind normally expected of religious organisations.
 
When the "Earth is Overpopulated!1!!1!" crowd starts killing themselves in order to help alleviate the perceived problem I'll start taking them seriously.
 
The fact is that population is the goal of problem solving efforts, not a problem in need of a solution.

When the oxygen tank in the Apollo 13 Service Module exploded, NASA didn't consider reducing the population of the spacecraft as though it was a viable solution to their resource problems; they looked for ways to solve the problems based on the number of crew they had.

"Reduce the population" is not a solution. It is always proposed that "they" should reduce their population; never that the reductions should come from "us". As Ksen says, the time to take population alarmists seriously will be when they start killing themselves to save the planet.
 
ksen said:
When the "Earth is Overpopulated!1!!1!" crowd starts killing themselves in order to help alleviate the perceived problem I'll start taking them seriously.
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No, suicide would be a poor strategy for helping to alleviate the perceived a problem, as it only removes one person for each member of the aforementioned crowd. This would not only make an insignificant dent in the population, but it would also limit the propagation of the overpopulation meme by killing off its proponents. If overpopulation proponents were to kill themselves, it would be easy to dismiss them as mentally ill cultists. I doubt you would take mentally ill cultists seriously.

Contrast with a scenario wherein they start killing non-proponents (especially those who attempt to refute the notion of overpopulation). Like suicide, homicide is a "hard-to-fake sign of commitment" to the cause, but homicide, in addition to commitment, would indicate a greater degree of long-term thinking(not as great as other strategies, of course), and if each proponent committed multiple homicides, it would make a bigger dent in the population.
 
Unbeatable said:
ksen said:
When the "Earth is Overpopulated!1!!1!" crowd starts killing themselves in order to help alleviate the perceived problem I'll start taking them seriously.
Click to expand...

No, suicide would be a poor strategy for helping to alleviate the perceived a problem, as it only removes one person for each member of the aforementioned crowd. This would not only make an insignificant dent in the population, but it would also limit the propagation of the overpopulation meme by killing off its proponents. If overpopulation proponents were to kill themselves, it would be easy to dismiss them as mentally ill cultists. I doubt you would take mentally ill cultists seriously.

Contrast with a scenario wherein they start killing non-proponents (especially those who attempt to refute the notion of overpopulation). Like suicide, homicide is a "hard-to-fake sign of commitment" to the cause, but homicide, in addition to commitment, would indicate a greater degree of long-term thinking(not as great as other strategies, of course), and if each proponent committed multiple homicides, it would make a bigger dent in the population.
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Agreed. Nothing says "I am not a mentally ill cultist" like going on a homicidal rampage in support of your fantasies.

Oh, wait.

Shit.
 
I think that what I'm referring to would say something more along the lines of "I'm a terrorist, not a mentally ill cultist". Now I don't know, maybe you're under the impression that those are the same thing, but the bottom line is I'm sure you'll be more likely to take them more seriously if they're killing other people and not just themselves.
 
Unbeatable said:
I think that what I'm referring to would say something more along the lines of "I'm a terrorist, not a mentally ill cultist". Now I don't know, maybe you're under the impression that those are the same thing, but the bottom line is I'm sure you'll be more likely to take them more seriously if they're killing other people and not just themselves.
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I don't think they are exactly the same thing, but there is certainly an enormous amount of overlap.

I take threats to my life, and to the lives of my family and friends, very seriously; I do not, however, consider such threats to be cause to comply with the demands of those doing the threatening. Quite the reverse.
 
Need more people to populate the universe. Just have to get them off the earth.
 
rousseau said:
seyorni said:
How so?

And is the welfare of society your 1ry consideration? What about the welfare of the ecosystem? Doesn't our society depend on a healthy biosphere, regardless of all other factors?
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People that are old tend not to be productive workers, and usually need to lean on society. People that are younger are productive and can support themselves. If you have less young people and more old people there are more people to support with less doing the supporting, where if you have more young people and less old people the opposite is true.
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Good thinking 99. Lets euthanase every soul the moment they reach what, 40-50?
 
All those who think the planet is far from reaching a maximum population sustainability. What according to you would be a sustainable population, 15 billion, 20 billion, what about the extraordinary figure of say...40 billion??
If the population doubles in say, 100 years and with the present agriculture methods, an area the size of Canada would be needed to feed them all.
 
I don't see the point in an ever increasing population...is it an experiment to see how many people we can cram onto, into and around a planet? If our population stabilizes at 10 billion or 20 billion, whatever is deemed to be sustainable, is that it? Nobody is going to cry 'stagnation!' 'stagnation!' and demand a return to growth? Given human nature, I doubt it.
 
angelo atheist said:
All those who think the planet is far from reaching a maximum population sustainability. What according to you would be a sustainable population, 15 billion, 20 billion, what about the extraordinary figure of say...40 billion??
If the population doubles in say, 100 years and with the present agriculture methods, an area the size of Canada would be needed to feed them all.
Click to expand...

DBT said:
I don't see the point in an ever increasing population...is it an experiment to see how many people we can cram onto, into and around a planet? If our population stabilizes at 10 billion or 20 billion, whatever is deemed to be sustainable, is that it? Nobody is going to cry 'stagnation!' 'stagnation!' and demand a return to growth? Given human nature, I doubt it.
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The population isn't going to double again; nor is it "ever increasing". It will stabilise in the next 30 to 50 years at about 10 billion.

There is no point in wild speculation about eternal increase, nor about tens of billions. It has basically stopped growing now, except for demographic lag. By about 2050 population growth will be history, unless something dramatic happens to change things - like a massive increase in human lifespan.

Unless you are about to announce a "live to 200" pill, your objections are not grounded in reality.
 
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