We are overloading the planet: Now What?

[Elixir]

Your 8 million do not have the skills to obtain food without technology and they do not have the means to maintain that technology.

That's nonsense. Please 'splain to me - how did the 10k-60k survivors of the Toba catastrophe make it, and by your figuring 1000-8000 times that many survivors wouldn't be enough to maintain the species? Do you think the people of 75k years ago had big tech capabilities? (Cue that weirdo from Ancient Aliens).

 

[DBT]

What you fail to see is that attempting to hinder growth will have an even bigger hindrance on the only hope of avoiding a crash--technology. You're in an unpleasantly fast turn--do you hit the brakes? Only if you want to die!

I made no mention of "hitting the breaks," but just what Adam Smith, et al, envisioned - transitioning into a steady state economy and population equilibrium, where birth rate equals death rate and we maintain a stable population and economy. We should have worked to achieve this decades ago.

A steady state economy is no more possible than a steady state universe.

You are probably right, just not for the reasons you think. It's not that a balance in population numbers and their needs and wants cannot be achieved in principle, but that our mental makeup doesn't permit it. We, ourselves are the obstacle in developing a rational system of management.

 

[DBT]

If we can provide for our needs and wants without perpetual growth, aka Adam Smith, et al, how much more and more and more do we want need? Five houses each? Ten cars? Not enough, we need to keep adding more and perpetual growth is the key?

How about more efficient houses and smarter transit systems inatead of just more of the same old crap?

A steady state economy doesn't exclude living well, innovation, efficiency or progress in science. It just excludes the notion of perpetual growth in population and exploitation of natural resources, which, given a finite world that we have alreading overburdened, is a Ponzi scheme heading for disaster.

1) If you have progress in science you do not have a steady state economy.

2) Even if it is stable you're still mining resources. That's not infinite. We aren't going to suddenly run out of something but the effort required to obtain things will increase--and such effort is no longer available for maintaining our standard of living. Eventually a point will be reached where there is negative output.

The Greens have this utterly unrealistic view of small technology that by some magical means has no resource inputs.

Progress in understanding the natural world is achieved through research, observation and testing. A steady state economy doesn't exclude allocating funds for scientific research. It just excludes perpetual growth in population, economic growth and consumption, which is impossible in any case: Adam Smith, et al.

 

[Swammerdami]

Fundamentally, time causes inequality because some fare better at growing capital and the advantage is progressive. Change upsets this and favors equality. Periods of change are periods of relative equality. And since the Industrial Revolution got into high gear we have been in a period of change.

As Piketty(!) points out, much wealth is INHERITED. The Walton children are not super-rich because they are "better at growing capital." They are rich because they've held on to the WMT stock Daddy gave them.

The changes in wealth and income inequality over the centuries are interesting to review. Of course the worst inequality tended to be brutal totalitarian regimes where a majority earned just enough to avoid starvation. And there is some of that in today's world: Some farmers in West Africa harvest large quantities of cocoa beans but have never tasted chocolate -- they can't afford it.

Anyway, wealth and inequality -- which is much worse in the U.S.A. than in other developed economies -- is growing and now exceeding the high levels during the "Gay Nineties" and the "Roaring Twenties."

Maybe it will be Zuckerberg's grandchildren who buy and sell the politicians of the future instead of Sam Walton's grandchildren -- if that's your point about "turnover" -- but high inequality is bad for society. Frankly, I'm tired of the apologists for dog-eat-dog capitalism and the present-day oligopoly system who fall for plutocrats' memes like "trickle-down."

 

[Merle]

You refuse to tell us which you would prefer if you were faced with the two options.

But, if you say that, when faced with the two options, that the choice to reduce population is the wrong answer, then that is the same thing as stating that you prefer reducing affluence if faced with that choice.

It's a loaded question.

We are not face with that choice, and are never likely to be. I refuse to state a preference, because to do so would imply accepting the hidden premise that such a choice is possible, or even plausible. It's not.

LOL! I shared a peer-reviewed paper with you that argued that we needed to limit consumption. That paper referenced multiple peer-reviewed papers that said the same thing. Yes, peer-reviewed papers are sometimes wrong, and you have the right to dispute them. But how can you tell us that you not only refuse to accept the conclusion of this article, but you refuse to accept it is even possible, and refuse to accept it is even plausible?

I reference other peer-reviewed articles that say the same thing.

What do you offer as a counter? What do you have to prove that Wiedmaan et. al. are wrong? We have nothing but your quips and cartoons declaring that you are right, and the opposing evidence cannot possibly be right.

If Wiedmann, et. al., are right then we need to limit consumption. If we need to limit consumption, and consumption is equal to the population times the average consumption-per-capita, then we would need to decide if we would address this by limiting population, limiting consumption-per-capita or both. But you refuse to answer that question, because you refuse to admit that there is any possibility that Wiedmann, et. al. might be right.

Once again, this reminds me of my satire of the blind faith of Habakkuk.

17 Although the fig tree shall not blossom, neither shall fruit be in the vines; the labour of the olive shall fail, and the fields shall yield no meat; the flock shall be cut off from the fold, and there shall be no herd in the stalls:
18 Yet I will rejoice in Nuclear Power, I will joy in the God of my salvation.
19 Nuclear Power is my strength, and he will make my feet like hinds' feet, and he will make me to walk upon mine high places.

-- Habakkuk 3:17-19, Saint Bilby Version

 

[bigfield]

If you choose option c, can you explain how your plan would eliminate those who may be reading this that are in the top 20%? Some of us don't want to be "eliminated".

If you don't want to be eliminated then you'll need to reduce your environmental impact.

You're a far bigger problem than the average African, but somehow it's their existence that's the problem, not yours.

 

[steve_bank]

Yo don't need a PHD to see we are have a problem wit run away consumption.

If at all possible tell us something we do not know.

Or modern economy is called a consumer economy. In the 19th century the bulk of the economy was essential goods and services. Tools, nails, ,lumber, nails, cattle, horses and so on.

Agriculture was a major employer.

With modern manufacturing and agricultural technology essential needs are met with a small portion of the punctuation. Employment for the rest depends on the buying of things people do not need.

In a good economic period if for any reason consumer confidence drops and people spend less the economy drop, employment drops, and investors hold back.

Trying to seriously limit consumption could have catastrophe effects globally.

As to peer reviews papers, it all depends on who the reviewers are and in the end the topic is more philosophical than quantifiable science that can be demonstrated.

The idea of a steady tette population and economy is speculat8ve, not science.

 

[DBT]

The human population has never been 8 billion and growing. It has been roughly steady state throughout our existence....

 

[bilby]

You refuse to tell us which you would prefer if you were faced with the two options.

But, if you say that, when faced with the two options, that the choice to reduce population is the wrong answer, then that is the same thing as stating that you prefer reducing affluence if faced with that choice.

It's a loaded question.

We are not face with that choice, and are never likely to be. I refuse to state a preference, because to do so would imply accepting the hidden premise that such a choice is possible, or even plausible. It's not.

LOL! I shared a peer-reviewed paper with you that argued that we needed to limit consumption.

Yes. And you continue to act as though consumption were synonymous with affluence, despite the fact that it's not.

So LOL yourself. Your question is a loaded question, and no answer to it is therefore possible without accepting a hidden premise with which I do not concur.

That paper referenced multiple peer-reviewed papers that said the same thing. Yes, peer-reviewed papers are sometimes wrong, and you have the right to dispute them. But how can you tell us that you not only refuse to accept the conclusion of this article, but you refuse to accept it is even possible, and refuse to accept it is even plausible?

No, I just don't treat "consumption" and "affluence" as interchangeable words.

I reference other peer-reviewed articles that say the same thing.

What do you offer as a counter? What do you have to prove that Wiedmaan et. al. are wrong? We have nothing but your quips and cartoons declaring that you are right, and the opposing evidence cannot possibly be right.

If Wiedmann, et. al., are right then we need to limit consumption. If we need to limit consumption, and consumption is equal to the population times the average consumption-per-capita, then we would need to decide if we would address this by limiting population, limiting consumption-per-capita or both.

Both. We already did the first; And we can do the second without limiting affluence.

But you refuse to answer that question, because you refuse to admit that there is any possibility that Wiedmann, et. al. might be right.

No, again, I refuse to answer your question because it is a loaded question.

Once again, this reminds me of my satire of the blind faith of Habakkuk.

17 Although the fig tree shall not blossom, neither shall fruit be in the vines; the labour of the olive shall fail, and the fields shall yield no meat; the flock shall be cut off from the fold, and there shall be no herd in the stalls:
18 Yet I will rejoice in Nuclear Power, I will joy in the God of my salvation.
19 Nuclear Power is my strength, and he will make my feet like hinds' feet, and he will make me to walk upon mine high places.

-- Habakkuk 3:17-19, Saint Bilby Version

To be effective, satire should be firmly based in reality. It typically also avoids direct references to its targets (which are, in decent satire, obvious without being explicitly named).

If it directly names those it is aimed at, it risks crossing the line between satire and defamation.

 

[DBT]

The human population has never been 8 billion and growing. It has been roughly steady state throughout our existence....

 

[bigfield]

The human population has never been 8 billion and growing. It has been roughly steady state throughout our existence....

"Roughly steady state" meaning "always growing". That's very "roughly".

 

[bilby]

The human population has never been 8 billion and growing. It has been roughly steady state throughout our existence....

"Roughly steady state" meaning "always growing". That very "roughly".

Population growth has been significant for a LONG time; So regardless of what endpoint you select, you see a rapid increase at the end of your dataset, with a relatively "fairly flat" period at the beginning.

https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/population lets you generate graphs with endpoints before today.

This is the population data up to 1200CE:


Looks like King John should have been seriously alarmed; Population was in a "roughly steady state", until shortly before his time.

Perhaps Jesus would have had a different perspective.


...or perhaps not.

Maybe things looked less alarming around the time that the Egyptians piled all those rocks up in nice neat pyramids:


...or maybe not.

 

[DBT]

The human population has never been 8 billion and growing. It has been roughly steady state throughout our existence....

"Roughly steady state" meaning "always growing". That's very "roughly".

The point was a low human population that did not exceed the earths carrying capacity, overshoot.....where we now at because of the huge spike you see on the right of the graph. But you know that was the point, and why I said 'roughly.'

 

[DBT]

The human population has never been 8 billion and growing. It has been roughly steady state throughout our existence....

"Roughly steady state" meaning "always growing". That very "roughly".

Population growth has been significant for a LONG time; So regardless of what endpoint you select, you see a rapid increase at the end of your dataset, with a relatively "fairly flat" period at the beginning.

https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/population lets you generate graphs with endpoints before today.

This is the population data up to 1200CE:

View attachment 45319
Looks like King John should have been seriously alarmed; Population was in a "roughly steady state", until shortly before his time.

Perhaps Jesus would have had a different perspective.

View attachment 45320
...or perhaps not.

Maybe things looked less alarming around the time that the Egyptians piled all those rocks up in nice neat pyramids:

View attachment 45321
...or maybe not.

It's the spike at the end that's the issue, which includes consumption rate in developed nations, ecosystem and habitat loss, pollution and clearing in developing nations, etc, as shown in numerous studies, papers, as quoted , cited and linked by several posters on this thread and others.

400 million, two billion or 4 billion was never going to be the issue that eight billion and still growing is now and in the coming decades. We should have stabilized at two, or at least no more than 4 billion.

 

[DBT]

''Until the Industrial Revolution began, birth rates and death rates were both very high, which kept the global human population relatively stable. In fact, it took all of human history, until around 1804, to reach 1 billion people.''

 

[bigfield]

The human population has never been 8 billion and growing. It has been roughly steady state throughout our existence....

"Roughly steady state" meaning "always growing". That's very "roughly".

The point was a low human population that did not exceed the earths carrying capacity, overshoot.....where we now at because of the huge spike you see on the right of the graph. But you know that was the point, and why I said 'roughly.'

The concept of a "steady state" is incoherent unless there is something steady about the system it's describing. That is, if you let the society carry on for a really long time then it won't keep changing in one direction (such as population growth).

"Roughly steady state" would mean that the population goes up, down, up, down, but the ups and downs don't completely balance each other out. What we actually have here is a a population that has been going up, and up, and up, with no downs outside of the Black Death.

 

[bigfield]

''Until the Industrial Revolution began, birth rates and death rates were both very high, which kept the global human population relatively stable. In fact, it took all of human history, until around 1804, to reach 1 billion people.''

Population growth was accelerating before the industrial revolution. It has been accelerating for all of human history:

This is the population data up to 1200CE:

Doesn't look like a steady state to me, even "roughly".

 

[DBT]

The human population has never been 8 billion and growing. It has been roughly steady state throughout our existence....

"Roughly steady state" meaning "always growing". That's very "roughly".

The point was a low human population that did not exceed the earths carrying capacity, overshoot.....where we now at because of the huge spike you see on the right of the graph. But you know that was the point, and why I said 'roughly.'

The concept of a "steady state" is incoherent unless there is something steady about the system it's describing. That is, if you let the society carry on for a really long time then it won't keep changing in one direction (such as population growth).

"Roughly steady state" would mean that the population goes up, down, up, down, but the ups and downs don't completely balance each other out. What we actually have here is a a population that has been going up, and up, and up, with no downs outside of the Black Death.

"A steady-state economy seeks stability over the long-term and may be judged on a local, regional, or national scale. Steady-state economies would still grow and contract, but the idea is to minimize the severity of these fluctuations. Ecological and environmental economists–major supporters of the idea of a steady-state economy–have long held that the environment cannot support an unlimited growth of production and wealth."

https://www.investopedia.com/terms/s/steady-state-economy.asp[/img]

 

[bigfield]

The human population has never been 8 billion and growing. It has been roughly steady state throughout our existence....

"Roughly steady state" meaning "always growing". That's very "roughly".

The point was a low human population that did not exceed the earths carrying capacity, overshoot.....where we now at because of the huge spike you see on the right of the graph. But you know that was the point, and why I said 'roughly.'

The concept of a "steady state" is incoherent unless there is something steady about the system it's describing. That is, if you let the society carry on for a really long time then it won't keep changing in one direction (such as population growth).

"Roughly steady state" would mean that the population goes up, down, up, down, but the ups and downs don't completely balance each other out. What we actually have here is a a population that has been going up, and up, and up, with no downs outside of the Black Death.

"A steady-state economy seeks stability over the long-term and may be judged on a local, regional, or national scale. Steady-state economies would still grow and contract, but the idea is to minimize the severity of these fluctuations. Ecological and environmental economists–major supporters of the idea of a steady-state economy–have long held that the environment cannot support an unlimited growth of production and wealth."

https://www.investopedia.com/terms/s/steady-state-economy.asp[/img]

Continuous and accelerating growth for millennia is not

• "stability over the long-term"
• fluctuating between growth and contraction

 

[Merle]

If you choose option c, can you explain how your plan would eliminate those who may be reading this that are in the top 20%? Some of us don't want to be "eliminated".

If you don't want to be eliminated then you'll need to reduce your environmental impact.

Sounds like something the mafia would say.

You're a far bigger problem than the average African, but somehow it's their existence that's the problem, not yours.

I agree that the average American has a far greater impact than the average African. I write:

The case can be made that births to American women, whose children are likely to have a large Ecological Footprint, can be causing more impact on the planet than the many births of a woman in a poor country. Americans average 1.66 births per woman, each having an average ecological footprint of 7.5 gha, for a total of 12.5 per woman from her direct offspring. The average woman in Somalia has 6.3 births per woman, each having an Ecological Footprint of 0.9 global hectares, for a total of 5.7 (FODAF, 2022). So, arguably it is much more important for American women to further decrease their birth rates.

But this assumes that the poor will be kept in poverty, and Americans, by virtue of birth, will be kept rich. Poor countries are going to at least be striving to increase their affluence, and many in poor countries will be migrating to more affluent countries. So, one cannot say that, just because a country is poor, it does not matter that their birth rate is high. Births in rich countries make a greater impact on the environment, but it all makes a difference.

Source: https://mindsetfree.blog/we-are-overloading-the-planet-now-what/