Will human population and economic activity exceed the Planets carrying capacity?

[Jokodo]

My unfortunate memory glitch in relation to percentage of growth at the end of the century makes not the slightest difference to the issue I am talking about.

Of course it does. Eighty years at a growth rate of 0.9% annually represents a doubling of the population, while 80 years at 0.09% means an increase of merely 7.5% total.

But that's not really the issue. The issue here is how readily you accept a number that can't possibly be right, as you could easily determine by thinking about it for less than a minute. The fact that you misread, or misremembered, the figure quoted is neither here nor there, but that you believed it is telling. It wouldn't make a iota of difference if you'd actually read it somewhere - any source stating something as obviously wrong needs to be treated with a lot of scepticism, not quoted as gospel (your words were "is expected", not something like "may be as high as ... by some estimates", not even "some expect").

It can be zero growth by 2100 and it won't alter environmental degradation now, species driven to the edge of extinction now, ever more congested cites now, business as usual still the rule, all in relation to growing rates of consumption driven by increases in living standard.

It can be 0 population growth now without altering any of that. It can be 0 births now without making much of a dent in what's happening now or in the near future.

The OECD projection for global economic growth is roughly a tripling by 2060 (https://data.oecd.org/gdp/real-gdp-long-term-forecast.htm#indicator-chart), presumably assuming a median population growth variant. For whatever that projection is worth, if instead of the UN medium projection, the low variant comes to pass (i.e, 8 instead of 10.2 billion people by 2060), that's still more than 2.5 times today's trade volume (assuming equal per capita GDP), and still a huge problem if (if!) the current correlation between economic activity and emissions etc. stay roughly what they are. If we enact an absolute, exceptionless memorandum on births until 2060, we'd still have almost 2 times today's emission under that economic scenario. And that's likely a significant over-estimation of the effect a slower or even reversed population growth would have: Children and young people tend to consume much less than older adults (this article, based on this paper concludes among other things that in the US, 60 year-olds have more than double the carbon footprint of 20-year-olds), so all else equal, a population of 6 billion most of whom are between 40 and 80 is going to produce significantly more waste, emit significantly more CO2, than 60% of a population with the age structure given by a medium growth scenario, and likely closer to 80%.

You could have simply phrased your objection as "[population] makes not the slightest difference to the issue"*. In which case, I will wholeheartedly agree.



* Not at the scale of decades, anyway, at the scale of centuries, it does - but then at the scale of centuries, the difference between a 0.9% growth rate in 2100 (more or less today's growth rate, suggesting a fixation of the growth rate at near today's level and thus continued exponential growth) vs. a growth rate of 0.09% and dropping (suggesting a peak in the early 22nd century and a slow decline thereafter), is very relevant.

 

[ruby sparks]

I totally agree. Why would anyone say that population makes even the slightest difference to the issues? It'd be ridiculous.

 

[Jokodo]

I totally agree. Why would anyone say that population makes even the slightest difference to the issues, unless they were a loony?

I'll be happy to continue the discussion when you show some Basic willingness to read and at least attempt to understand my posts. Until then, you're wasting my time and yours

 

[4321lynx]

And look at this.

View attachment 18680

38 million square kilometres of wide open, prime development land.

Yep, when all the deserts of the world are made fertile and filled with people, we can start populating the mountains and the seas, plenty of room, we can fit hundred of billions before turning to the Moon. No problem at all, after all, we are the clever Species.

Think also underground. More room. Think also genetically engineering people, or perhaps just 99% of them, to make them smaller or less needy.
EB

And less nerdy and more obedient?
Who was that foreign chap, one of the "Wogs that begin at Calais" as any true Englishman would call them, if those natives of perfidious Albion could speak the truth when and if they saw the truth, (and that's a big if), the foreign chappie with his satire on "the best of possible times to live in the best of possible worlds" ? Voltaire, wasn't it? Out of fashion lately, rarely mentioned. Pity. He'd enjoy this and other threads here.

 

[Speakpigeon]

I totally agree. Why would anyone say that population makes even the slightest difference to the issues? It'd be ridiculous.

It's become clear in the last period you've grown increasingly negative in your comments. It seems you're now unwilling to argue your position, using sarcasms instead. I can only suggest you try to step back and maybe take the time to assess the situation.

And sorry if you feel I'm intruding into your privacy but your posts are obviously definitely public.
EB

 

[Speakpigeon]

Think also underground. More room. Think also genetically engineering people, or perhaps just 99% of them, to make them smaller or less needy.
EB

And less nerdy and more obedient?
Who was that foreign chap, one of the "Wogs that begin at Calais" as any true Englishman would call them, if those natives of perfidious Albion could speak the truth when and if they saw the truth, (and that's a big if), the foreign chappie with his satire on "the best of possible times to live in the best of possible worlds" ? Voltaire, wasn't it? Out of fashion lately, rarely mentioned. Pity. He'd enjoy this and other threads here.

Seems people nowadays have no longer the time to read books, let alone Voltaire's. I'm pretty sure even mention of his name here has grown much less frequent. Our attention seems now entirely taken by the immediacy of the news cycle. We're now ignoring Voltaire and Montaigne to make sure we have the time to listen to news reports on the long litany of outrages that occur with deadly regularity some place in the world. We've stopped listening to past voices to look instead at the world as it is this very minute. I can't tell whether it's a tragedy or a good thing but we can expect this will have consequences. Given that the past has produced both the First World War and the Holocaust, and then some, maybe we've lost the moral ground to protest this profound change in who we are.

I didn't know this expression, the "Wogs that begin at Calais". Thanks. I guess this is telling as to how noxious the debate over the Brexit has become. Things are going pear shape fast over there.
EB

 

[4321lynx]

Think also underground. More room. Think also genetically engineering people, or perhaps just 99% of them, to make them smaller or less needy.
EB

And less nerdy and more obedient?
Who was that foreign chap, one of the "Wogs that begin at Calais" as any true Englishman would call them, if those natives of perfidious Albion could speak the truth when and if they saw the truth, (and that's a big if), the foreign chappie with his satire on "the best of possible times to live in the best of possible worlds" ? Voltaire, wasn't it? Out of fashion lately, rarely mentioned. Pity. He'd enjoy this and other threads here.

Seems people nowadays have no longer the time to read books, let alone Voltaire's. I'm pretty sure even mention of his name here has grown much less frequent. Our attention seems now entirely taken by the immediacy of the news cycle. We're now ignoring Voltaire and Montaigne to make sure we have the time to listen to news reports on the long litany of outrages that occur with deadly regularity some place in the world. We've stopped listening to past voices to look instead at the world as it is this very minute. I can't tell whether it's a tragedy or a good thing but we can expect this will have consequences. Given that the past has produced both the First World War and the Holocaust, and then some, maybe we've lost the moral ground to protest this profound change in who we are.

I didn't know this expression, the "Wogs that begin at Calais". Thanks. I guess this is telling as to how noxious the debate over the Brexit has become. Things are going pear shape fast over there.
EB

It's a very old expression, to my knowledge from the late1940s/early1950s. Expresses the islanders' contempt for the "lesser races, children of a lesser God". The sentiment underlies the wish for Brexit, is not a result of the noxious debate. Comes from the days when the English knew that God was an Englishman, and "the Passage to India must be kept open, don't you know, Sir?"
An equivalent, less offensive, expression is the northern Italians' "the Third World begins at Florence."

 

[bilby]

Seems people nowadays have no longer the time to read books, let alone Voltaire's. I'm pretty sure even mention of his name here has grown much less frequent. Our attention seems now entirely taken by the immediacy of the news cycle. We're now ignoring Voltaire and Montaigne to make sure we have the time to listen to news reports on the long litany of outrages that occur with deadly regularity some place in the world. We've stopped listening to past voices to look instead at the world as it is this very minute. I can't tell whether it's a tragedy or a good thing but we can expect this will have consequences. Given that the past has produced both the First World War and the Holocaust, and then some, maybe we've lost the moral ground to protest this profound change in who we are.

I didn't know this expression, the "Wogs that begin at Calais". Thanks. I guess this is telling as to how noxious the debate over the Brexit has become. Things are going pear shape fast over there.
EB

It's a very old expression, to my knowledge from the late1940s/early1950s. Expresses the islanders' contempt for the "lesser races, children of a lesser God". The sentiment underlies the wish for Brexit, is not a result of the noxious debate. Comes from the days when the English knew that God was an Englishman, and "the Passage to India must be kept open, don't you know, Sir?"
An equivalent, less offensive, expression is the northern Italians' "the Third World begins at Florence."

The saying, "The wogs begin at Calais" (implying that everyone who is not British is a wog), appears to date from the First World War but was popularised by George Wigg, Labour MP for Dudley, in 1949 when in a parliamentary debate concerning the Burmese, Wigg shouted at the Conservative benches, "The Honourable Gentleman and his friends think they are all 'wogs'. Indeed, the Right Honourable Member for Woodford [i.e., Winston Churchill] thinks that the 'wogs' begin at Calais."

- Wikipedia

 

[DBT]

We have started to wake up to the problem some time ago and we have still a long way to go but we're moving. In France, the wake-up call came in 1974 with a guy called René Dumont:

He ran for President in 1974 as the first ecologist candidate, and won 1.32% of the votes. That election opened the way to political ecology (EB: at least in France)

.

Obviously, we don't know what the solution is before we find it. I'm quite optimistic about the capabilities of the human mind. Progress is made possible by individuals, people like Newton, Einstein and Darwin. The rest are basically idiots, bureaucrats, egoists, reactionaries, populists, but if some bright mind find a way out all the idiots will line up behind. That's what they do and that's what makes humanity so successful. In science as well as in all areas of life. That seems to explain at least some of why Hitler could do what he did. Most people feel content just moaning about problems and we can't at any rate all spend our lives all looking at the same one issue so it's how it should be. But this is still just moaning. In a way it's even helpful since it goes in the direction of supporting change, in particular and crucially at the political level. Trump is just one moment. Americans are already moving to make sure Trump will be history in a short while and never to eternally return. And even Trump-like politicians can wake up, although Trump himself may look like the definitive counterexample. Again, let's see how people react when the catastrophes start to pile up on their doorstep. And at any rate, we'll get what we deserve.
EB

Well, at least moaning about the problem is a step up from ignoring the issue altogether, pretending that there is no problem, putting on the rose coloured glasses and saying how fine and rosy the world appears (this comment is not directed at you).

 

[DBT]

You could have simply phrased your objection as "[population] makes not the slightest difference to the issue"*. In which case, I will wholeheartedly agree.

I have clearly stated, including the OP title, that it isn't population alone that shall tip our economic activity from sustainable to unsustainable, if we have not already gone past that point, as some reports are saying.

The problem is still the issue of rising living standards in developing nations (as is their undeniable right), which means an ever increasing demand on goods and services, more mining, construction, use of non nonrenewables, degradation of ecosystems, etc.

And obviously, the more people there are, the greater the scale of the problem. This is not my personal view, it is a proposition that is supported by numerous studies;

Abstract
''Within the context of Earth’s limited natural resources and assimilation capacity, the current environmental footprint of humankind is not sustainable. Assessing land, water, energy, material, and other footprints along supply chains is paramount in understanding the sustainability, efficiency, and equity of resource use from the perspective of producers, consumers, and government. We review current footprints and relate those to maximum sustainable levels, highlighting the need for future work on combining footprints, assessing trade-offs between them, improving computational techniques, estimating maximum sustainable footprint levels, and benchmarking efficiency of resource use. Ultimately, major transformative changes in the global economy are necessary to reduce humanity’s environmental footprint to sustainable levels.''

 

[Speakpigeon]

The saying, "The wogs begin at Calais" (implying that everyone who is not British is a wog), appears to date from the First World War but was popularised by George Wigg, Labour MP for Dudley, in 1949 when in a parliamentary debate concerning the Burmese, Wigg shouted at the Conservative benches, "The Honourable Gentleman and his friends think they are all 'wogs'. Indeed, the Right Honourable Member for Woodford [i.e., Winston Churchill] thinks that the 'wogs' begin at Calais."

- Wikipedia

You're breaking my heart here. We tend here to grumpily respect Churchill for his decisive contribution to the WWII victory and now this suggests he was in fact a horrible man motivated by a species of racial prejudice. I wonder what tall Charles thought about that.

I initially contemplated doing a wog/Whigs pun but I see now that it would have been a bad move given the obviously very respectable role played by this George Wigg in originating the phrase. Well, at least this shows if it was needed that some Brits are very decent people. It Brexits my heart.
EB

 

[bilby]

The saying, "The wogs begin at Calais" (implying that everyone who is not British is a wog), appears to date from the First World War but was popularised by George Wigg, Labour MP for Dudley, in 1949 when in a parliamentary debate concerning the Burmese, Wigg shouted at the Conservative benches, "The Honourable Gentleman and his friends think they are all 'wogs'. Indeed, the Right Honourable Member for Woodford [i.e., Winston Churchill] thinks that the 'wogs' begin at Calais."

- Wikipedia

You're breaking my heart here. We tend here to grumpily respect Churchill for his decisive contribution to the WWII victory and now this suggests he was in fact a horrible man motivated by a species of racial prejudice. I wonder what tall Charles thought about that.

I initially contemplated doing a wog/Whigs pun but I see now that it would have been a bad move given the obviously very respectable role played by this George Wigg in originating the phrase. Well, at least this shows if it was needed that some Brits are very decent people. It Brexits my heart.
EB

If you thought Churchill wasn't a horrible racist, then you clearly don't know much about his life.

He was the right man to lead Britain in an existential conflict. He was a dreadful person to have in charge under any other circumstances.

 

[ruby sparks]

You could have simply phrased your objection as "[population] makes not the slightest difference to the issue"*. In which case, I will wholeheartedly agree.

I have clearly stated, including the OP title, that it isn't population alone that shall tip our economic activity from sustainable to unsustainable, if we have not already gone past that point, as some reports are saying.

The problem is still the issue of rising living standards in developing nations (as is their undeniable right), which means an ever increasing demand on goods and services, more mining, construction, use of non nonrenewables, degradation of ecosystems, etc.

And obviously, the more people there are, the greater the scale of the problem. This is not my personal view, it is a proposition that is supported by numerous studies;

Abstract
''Within the context of Earth’s limited natural resources and assimilation capacity, the current environmental footprint of humankind is not sustainable. Assessing land, water, energy, material, and other footprints along supply chains is paramount in understanding the sustainability, efficiency, and equity of resource use from the perspective of producers, consumers, and government. We review current footprints and relate those to maximum sustainable levels, highlighting the need for future work on combining footprints, assessing trade-offs between them, improving computational techniques, estimating maximum sustainable footprint levels, and benchmarking efficiency of resource use. Ultimately, major transformative changes in the global economy are necessary to reduce humanity’s environmental footprint to sustainable levels.''

Wake up and smell the coffee, DBT. Those guys are only in it for the money. And the world is full of them, though obviously not overfull.

 

[Speakpigeon]

You're breaking my heart here. We tend here to grumpily respect Churchill for his decisive contribution to the WWII victory and now this suggests he was in fact a horrible man motivated by a species of racial prejudice. I wonder what tall Charles thought about that.

I initially contemplated doing a wog/Whigs pun but I see now that it would have been a bad move given the obviously very respectable role played by this George Wigg in originating the phrase. Well, at least this shows if it was needed that some Brits are very decent people. It Brexits my heart.
EB

If you thought Churchill wasn't a horrible racist, then you clearly don't know much about his life.

He was the right man to lead Britain in an existential conflict. He was a dreadful person to have in charge under any other circumstances.

Yes, I have to admit to know very little about him! But it seems the Brits knew enough to defeat the Conservatives, of which he was the leader, immediately after the war. Perfidious Brits.

Yet, he did have a second premiership:

Second term as prime minister: 1951–1955
After the general election of October 1951, Churchill again became prime minister, and his second government lasted until his resignation in April 1955. He also held the office of Minister of Defence from October 1951 until 1 March 1952, when he handed the portfolio to Field Marshal Alexander.
In domestic affairs, various reforms were introduced such as the Mines and Quarries Act 1954 and the Housing Repairs and Rents Act 1954. The former measure consolidated legislation dealing with the employment of young persons and women in mines and quarries, together with safety, health, and welfare. The latter measure extended previous housing Acts, and set out details in defining housing units as "unfit for human habitation." Tax allowances were raised, as well, construction of council housing accelerated, and pensions and national assistance benefits were increased. Controversially, however, charges for prescription medicines were introduced.
Housing was an issue the Conservatives were widely recognised to have made their own, after the Churchill government of the early 1950s, with Harold Macmillan as Minister for Housing, giving housing construction far higher political priority than it had received under the Attlee administration (where housing had been attached to the portfolio of Health Minister Aneurin Bevan, whose attention was concentrated on his responsibilities for the National Health Service). Macmillan had accepted Churchill's challenge to meet the latter's ambitious public commitment to build 300,000 new homes a year, and achieved the target a year ahead of schedule.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Winston_Churchill

Not quite so "dreadful", it seems.
Maybe the bombing of Dresden says it all.
Well, then again on peut pas faire une omelette sans casser des œufs.
And, yes, probably something about his role in the British colony of India, I seem to remember.
But we ourselves had Maréchal Pétain and we're just in the middle of celebrating our WWI "maréchaux" and also in the middle of a controversy about Pétain. Celebrate or not? Life is so hard when you try to do the right thing.
EB

 

[ruby sparks]

I totally agree. Why would anyone say that population makes even the slightest difference to the issues, unless they were a loony?

I'll be happy to continue the discussion when you show some Basic willingness to read and at least attempt to understand my posts. Until then, you're wasting my time and yours

To say that population makes not the slightest difference is on a par with saying that population is not a problem. Both are inaccurate, and the scenario in your previous post does not support it. It really should not even need to be explained to an intelligent, reasonable person, though it has been, repeatedly. I'd be happy to continue the discussion with you if you stop trying to argue for something inaccurate and untenable, but since you show no signs of being willing to do that, I may occasionally lampoon, because you repeatedly appear to be unable to accept simple facts, which at the end of the day is not really my problem, and that there are those on the intertubes peddling nonsense that does not deserve to be taken seriously is not really worthy of a newsflash.

 

[Jokodo]

I totally agree. Why would anyone say that population makes even the slightest difference to the issues, unless they were a loony?

I'll be happy to continue the discussion when you show some Basic willingness to read and at least attempt to understand my posts. Until then, you're wasting my time and yours

To say that population makes not the slightest difference is on a par with saying that population is not a problem. Both are inaccurate, and the scenario in your previous post does not support it. It really should not even need to be explained to an intelligent, reasonable person, though it has been, and it has fallen of deaf ears. I'd be happy to continue the discussion with you if you stop trying to argue for something inaccurate and untenable, but since you show no signs of being willing to do that, I may occasionally lampoon, because you repeatedly appear to be unable to accept simple facts, which at the end of the day is not really my problem, and that there are those on the intertubes peddling nonsense is not really a newsflash.

... in which you demonstrate, once again, that you didn't read my post.

True to your reputation.

 

[Speakpigeon]

To say that population makes not the slightest difference is on a par with saying that population is not a problem. Both are inaccurate, and the scenario in your previous post does not support it. It really should not even need to be explained to an intelligent, reasonable person, though it has been, and it has fallen of deaf ears. I'd be happy to continue the discussion with you if you stop trying to argue for something inaccurate and untenable, but since you show no signs of being willing to do that, I may occasionally lampoon, because you repeatedly appear to be unable to accept simple facts, which at the end of the day is not really my problem, and that there are those on the intertubes peddling nonsense is not really a newsflash.

... in which you demonstrate, once again, that you didn't read my post.

True to your reputation.

Let me try on his behalf. You seem to say that the level of population is not the problem by itself, as we could be twice as many as we are today without the slightest worry about global warming and no worry at all about living a good life with decent accommodation and what not. The problem, as I understand you believe, is we're not even really trying to mitigate the effect of our present economic activity in terms of greenhouse gases and such. Were we to try it earnestly, the problem would be solved even if the population stayed at the level it is today or increased at whatever level expert opinion says it probably will. So, population is not the problem. However, I can infer from what you say that what this population does, overall, including crucially its leaders, certainly makes a difference. Would that be a fair summary?
EB

 

[ruby sparks]

... in which you demonstrate, once again, that you didn't read my post..

No. I read it. It's just that it in no way warrants saying that population makes not the slightest difference to the issue.

 

[4321lynx]

Not quite so "dreadful", it seems.
Maybe the bombing of Dresden says it all.
Well, then again on peut pas faire une omelette sans casser des œufs.
And, yes, probably something about his role in the British colony of India, I seem to remember.
EB

The Indian famines were not of Churchill's time except for Bengal in 1943, wartime, and their causes were complicated. He did call Ghandi "the naked Fakir" in the 1930s... But the colonialist attitude can be seen here. And this was the Pearl in the Crown of the Empire.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Famine_in_India

Churchill was a man of his time, his judgment coloured, clouded, distorted, by his upbringing in the English uppermost caste. And don't forget, God was an Englishman.

 

[Speakpigeon]

Churchill was a man of his time, his judgment coloured, clouded, distorted, by his upbringing in the English uppermost caste.

Yes, it's easy for today's braggers cosy in our comfortable societies to smart about how dreadful this or that ancient person had been, without ever acknowledging that everything at the time was dreadful. People at the time never had a chance to learn about our cosy system of values. Churchill was indeed a man of his time but he did do a very good job in the circumstances, one that very few people could have done at all. Just try to imagine yourself in his shoes, facing the Third Reich.

Still, he was also the embodiment of the English upper-class culture and criticising these people is just right because we're not talking at them, that would be unfair but also impossible, we're talking to each other, and criticising the British Public School culture is just an effective way of saying to each other "never again", which is a really minimal expenditure of our personal resources but can't do much harm. Keeping to a rational standard of discourse is necessary but most of what we say isn't motivated by rationality. Our motivation is very nearly always elsewhere, essentially in private emotions we usually don't want to admit to. Really understanding other people would require an ability to interpret their words we usually don't have. So a rational message is what we communicate but only in spite of ourselves. So, critics of Churchill, most of them, are really talking about something else, us.

And people like Voltaire were just very fortunate to live ahead of their time, although it can be a dangerous way of living your life.

And don't forget, God was an Englishman.

Yes, exactly. Gott mit uns. God is capable of being with all sides at the same time precisely because He is all-powerful. This should be proof enough.
EB