There is a simple equation;
poverty causes overpopulation-
whereas extreme poverty and warfare often cause starvation
the cure for a rapidly increasing population and for the sort of collapse that causes famine is simply wealth.
Wealthy countries spontaneously develop a low birthrate culture.
As I showed in the link in my last post, there is twenty five thousand times as much energy in the form of sunlight falling onto the earth each year as contained in all the oil reserves in the world.
It is time to attempt to use some of it.
Expecting poor people to adopt a low birthrate culture without improvement in their living standards is not viable.
The old people in poorer societies need children to support them as they have few or no savings.
oops=should read
there is Three hundred times-as much energy in the form of sunlight falling onto the earth each year as contained in all the oil reserves in the world.
heh heh
still a lot though
My argument for nature wiping us out is that “in the short term” a virus/bacteria will kill enough of us that we won’t get to the “long run.” (remind anyone of Keynesian economics?).
At this point, humans are not becoming more resistant to disease; it can be argued that our dependence on drugs has made us weaker. TBC, plague, syphilis, and Cholera still kill us, although we now have some drugs to combat these problems. Note that in each case of an outbreak, there is a significant death toll before public health officials can take control. Diseases are evolving along with us, and hence becoming stronger. Our case is made more dire when rouge terrorist states are working to develop strains of anthrax resistant to the current immunization strains (cough Iraq). This sort of sides steps my argument that nature will take care of us since we are kind of helping nature along.
Its not just the virulence of future diseases that we have to worry about, but how quickly it can spread. It used to be that if someone got the plague (or Ebola) it would kill them and the few people around them quickly, and thus end its own spread.
Consider this: A version of the plague broke out in a village in India [http://www.who.int/disease-outbreak-news/n2002/february/20february2002.html]. Imagine if the people there had rapid transport to an international airport. From that airport, they were able to take a concord to London. Add to this, the re-circulated air in an aeroplane means everyone is breathing what the guy next to you just coughed up. Gulp, I sure hope terrorists aren’t reading this…
Emacknight,
plague can be cured, it’s actually not even that difficult. It’s a virus. so an anti viral agent would take care of it, even good hygiene would stop the spreading of the disease.
I don’t think that plague can have the effect nowadays as it had in Europe in the 14th century, when it killed 1/3 of the population. Even so, diseases get more resistant, but so do humans, as it is only the western world, ie you and me, that have medicine readily avilable to cure us. Less industrialized countries do not.
I do not think that nature itself will wipe us out, or would control our population growth.
Yes, anthrax, smallpox and other extremely contagious diseases could, but they do no longer occur naturally, so we cannot really talk about “nature would take care of us”. Should anthrax and/or smallpox be released again, it would be by terrorist groups, meaning it would have to involve a human element.
The reason why I do not see nature culling human population, and would kind of like to stay away from virulent diseases and warfare to do so, is why i asked my original question:
how can we, humans, ourselves! take care of the growing population, what solutions would you propose, and how would you implement them?
I do agree with one of your earlier posts that human beings are inherently selfish, and do not take the bigger picture into account when they want to procreate. A person wanting a child will do anything to get a child, look at all the ways and means of trying to get pregnant if it doesn’t happen naturally.
So, what do we do? There are ofcourse lots of “rules and regulations” we could impose on the population, but how humane are they? How much can we restrict human liberty? Do we simply need to take away that liberty as it’s the future of Humankind we’re talking about, and everyone should bring sacrifices?
I find that this is an extremely sensitive subject, when I bring it up in conversations. People refuse to listen, and often get very angry…
Like I said, imposing restrictions on poor people is not the answer- the answer is to eradicate poverty, then the culture will change. I have heard it many times that we should try to control the population of the third world-
you can not and must not try to do this by imposing rules that will oppress them further.
Help them to attain the same living standards, education and liberty as in the west and they will choose to have fewer children- in fact you will soon find that the population will be decreasing.
eburacum45, you’re right about this, the richer people get, the less kids they want.
It’s even gone that far that in certain area’s of Hong Kong (or Beijing, forget which), the Chinese government is promising young people bonuses and tax relief when they should they have a child, as it’s the generation that prefers spending their time and money on themselves.
This from a nation that imposed a 1 child policy a decade ago!
tis getting curiouser and curiouser…(said Alice)