[Tommot1965]

ive only got about 30 years left...so Im doing my bit to solve the problem...

[GeneV]

Clearly it's a multistranded issue! It's a chicken or egg scenario - improved economic and social conditions give people the luxury of having fewer children and focussing their resources on them - rather than having lots and merely hoping that a few survive into adulthood. To me if you want to break that cycle, economic and social improvements are a prerequisite.

I believe that the world can support 7 billion people, perhaps 10 billion. There's plenty of 'pie' to go round - it's just the West is gulping down 7/8ths of the pie right now while it worries about the remaining slice not being enough for the rest of the world to eat. And what do we do? Worry how fast they're breeding. Nice!

Cultural norms against birth control have little to do with hoping that enough children will survive--at least not now. They are actually causing more children to die by multiplying beyond the local capacity to feed and support them. Populations are exploding in the developing world and not in the developed world. That indicates that the reproduction is beyond what is needed for stasis. Overconsumption may be the west's problem, but overpopulation is not, so, yes, it is appropriate to worry about how fast people are breeding.

I don't know where you get the opinion that the world will support 7 to 10 billion people. What else will disappear in the face of 10 billion humans? The pie the west is gulping is largely a pie the west is producing, while the growth in population is from the "south." There are some dastardly issues with seed producers, and there are some things we could do to help them with food production; however, it is hard to see how a bushel of wheat produced in Kansas keeps a bushel of wheat from being produced in some other country. And what benefit is served by keeping women as second-class childbearing machines? What benefit is served by growing a population that is already beyond the capacity of local resources to support?

[jsherman999]

Every forum I've been on that allowed open political discussion has discussed this topic. Not one of them has dealt with it effectively.

1. Fundamentalist leaders every where believe in their "right" to procreate.. profusely.
2. China's one child policy is roundly condemned everywhere.
3. Studies showing affluent societies produce less children, and the suggestion that if every one was economically secure, there would be voluntary population control is too much of a reality stretch for the capitalistas.

Quite simply there are no acceptable solutions. Except the one where we just waddle along with unchecked growth, hoping for disease, famine or war to take their toll.

The simple fact is, the human genome and inherited tendencies are still at the same place they were when humans were a species of 2 thousand, bordering on extinction in Africa, still competing with Neanderthals to be the dominant primate. We are simply not programmed to deal with over population. We are waiting for a disaster to happen so we can go back to doing what we do best (use our brains for basic survival.) As a species, we have little capacity to see the big picture, and almost no ability to manage it, on more than a year to year basis. The aboriginal notion of planning for 7 generations has become way to complex in such a technological world. You can create technology. You can't convince folks that it has to be used responsibly. People always behave as if all they need to do is survive the next year. For much of human history that was true. Right now, it's not an appropriate strategy. We know we'll survive the next year, we have to plan to survive the next hundred.

Nicely summarized.

[K7Man]

____________________

Overpopulation of the planet is a myth.

__

[jolepp]

...
What else will disappear in the face of 10 billion humans?
...

Indeed. The answer would seem to be: most of the rest of nature (which would be worth keeping for its intrinsic value IMO). Also, spreading the population in time instead of space to make things sustainable would make sense; there is plenty of time still while space is constrained.

[newarts]

That would probably solve more of the economic problems of the developing world (and the poorer segments of our country) than dealing with subsidies. The treatment of women is the result of culture, not economics, but that culture causes economic problems as well.

Economics of one sort or another is the root of all behavior.

Propagation of species is an economic game played with genetic survival as its goal; most likely some will survive but perhaps in modified form. The question is whether cultural or even genetic adjustments to changing conditions can happen fast enough.

It is painfully obvious that random change and "difference" is feared by most of us and we are fundamentally conservative creatures of habit. We are just place holders in the genetic game as much as we'd like to think otherwise.

[ihasa]

I don't know where you get the opinion that the world will support 7 to 10 billion people. What else will disappear in the face of 10 billion humans?

That depends on how these people decide to live and consume... We're already at 7bn now. There is enormous scope for increasing the efficiency we do things. I think it's right to want to see family planning made more widely available and culturally acceptable at the same time. Birthrates are declining, globally, even in Africa:

For the world as a whole, the number of children born per woman decreased from 5.02 to 2.65 between 1950 and 2005. A breakdown by continent is as follows:
Europe - 2.66 to 1.41
North America - 3.47 to 1.99
Oceania - 3.87 to 2.30
Central America - 6.38 to 2.66
South America - 5.75 to 2.49
Asia (excluding Middle East) - 5.85 to 2.43
Middle East & North Africa - 6.99 to 3.37
Sub-Saharan Africa - 6.7 to 5.53

But I think we need to start with ourselves first - Americans consume 2.4 times as much energy as Europeans, who are themselves pretty profligate, for example.

however, it is hard to see how a bushel of wheat produced in Kansas keeps a bushel of wheat from being produced in some other country.

It doesn't encourage developing countries to invest in their agriculture if they are barred from the global market place by subsidies, and it doesn't help their farmers if subsidised imported food can be bought cheaper than locally produced stuff. Lack of investment leads to poor yields, leading to poverty, leading to more lack of investment and so on.

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Last edited by ihasa; 05-06-2011 at 06:23 AM.

[GeneV]

That depends on how these people decide to live and consume... We're already at 7bn now. There is enormous scope for increasing the efficiency we do things. I think it's right to want to see family planning made more widely available and culturally acceptable at the same time. But I think we need to start with ourselves first - Americans consume 2.4 times as much energy as Europeans, who are themselves pretty profligate, for example.

It doesn't encourage developing countries to invest in their agriculture if they are barred from the global market place by subsidies, and it doesn't help their farmers if subsidised imported food can be bought cheaper than locally produced stuff.

You will get no argument from me that Americans need to consume less energy. However, I see very little connection between that and the overpopulation. It is apples and oranges. In the U.S. and Europe, the population expansion is far less than in the developing world. That we need to consume less energy does not mean that they don't need to curb population.

There are subsidies and seed policies that need to change as well. Again, those are two different issues. Overpopulation is a cause of problems, not solutions in connection with food production and consumption. Overpopulation will mean that, even with all subsidies removed from western agriculture, the developing world will not be able to sustain itself without the same unsustainable practices prevalent in the West.

[Ratmagiclady]

True enough, Wildman, though it primarily *is* about resource use, and waste, of course, of which sheer numbers is only one factor. (Secondarily, you don't want to utterly dominate too many habitats, or you start having biodiversity problems, thus trouble with keeping ecosystems from collapsing, ....one of our big vulnerabilities is that feeding all these people relies too much on *monocultures* which are very vulnerable, especially when they rely on production and transport of everything from the patented seeds to the petroleum-heavy fertilizer to pesticides that better keep working and be available in certain ways.

Like how about ninety percent of the potato crop is a single variety... (Take it from someone Irish, what are we, stupid? There's too many things like that in our food supply.... profitable and capable of producing great quantities, but stacked on too much needing to go a certain way all the time. Far too little resilience as well as not being sustainable, even with the numbers we have. )

Again, it's sure not helpful for some to be teaching people they need to produce *more* offspring, even if they don't want to, ...that's an ideological thing which tends to be pursued in support of a lot of business and political interests that profit by making things much worse than they even have to be.


Which doesn't mean any notion of *restricting* breeding is something that goes over big, (A la China's experiment there, which was full of unintended consequences. Maybe they should have tried something a little more flexible. ) ...which is the false choice they put up there. It's inherently problematic.

Though it'd be interesting if some value was placed in those of us who *don't* participate in overpopulation. (Heh, 'Cap and trade?' ) Especially in places of high per-capita consumption, where for some reason, the value of individual humans in the workforce seems to keep being depressed.

There *is* an interest on the corporations' part in labor being cheap, after all, whatever the other costs to the rest of the world. Another thing which dovetails with the Fundamentalists saying, 'You must breed more, or else,' and works against the interests of *all* our children.



On this, though, Gene:

Cultural norms against birth control have little to do with hoping that enough children will survive--at least not now. They are actually causing more children to die by multiplying beyond the local capacity to feed and support them.

This may be true, but *scarcity* leads to *insecurity which leads to *competitive* breeding: combined with calling 'against birth control' a 'cultural norm' (even if missionaries bring the idea and use deceit to claim so) ...what this leads to is families trying to have more kids *for themselves* so they can hope to secure more *of* what little there *is* for their own families. Of course, if everyone does this, you've got problems, but people don't think that way when there isn't *enough.* When there's food security, especially, they feel freer to make other choices, start thinking quality of life over quantity.

[GeneV]

On this, though, Gene:

This may be true, but *scarcity* leads to *insecurity which leads to *competitive* breeding: combined with calling 'against birth control' a 'cultural norm' (even if missionaries bring the idea and use deceit to claim so) ...what this leads to is families trying to have more kids *for themselves* so they can hope to secure more *of* what little there *is* for their own families. Of course, if everyone does this, you've got problems, but people don't think that way when there isn't *enough.* When there's food security, especially, they feel freer to make other choices, start thinking quality of life over quantity.

That competition may play some part, but most of these are norms primarily designed to keep men in a dominant position based upon ancient custom and belief. They seem to persist when there is no scarcity and then eventually cause the scarcity.

[ihasa]

It is apples and oranges.

Yes in a way, or if we're talking about living sustainably within the Earth's resources, 2 sides of the same coin. It's a lot easier for us to deal with the problems that WE cause first, though.

[GeneV]

Yes in a way, or if we're talking about living sustainably within the Earth's resources, 2 sides of the same coin. It's a lot easier for us to deal with the problems that WE cause first, though.

Or, it is a lot easier for us to give advice on problems we have actually been able to alleviate within our own society.

Perhaps other societies can be more instructive on how to live with less consumption per capita.

[ihasa]

Perhaps other societies can be more instructive on how to live with less consumption per capita.

Developing countries already do it, and it doesn't always have to be a horror-show in terms of life expectancy and well being (in the latter case most actually fare a lot better). But they deserve the chance to develop if they want to... we rich nations need to show by example a better model for development than 'mass consumerism'. And as you say we need to promote family planning, in a soft sort of way.

[magkelly]

I'm not that worried actually. We're only one good world wide epidemic away from millions dying, and that is usually what happens when human populations get too big. Mother Nature has a way of thinning out the herd when it gets too big. Natural disasters, plagues, they happen every so often.

I got a nasty respiratory infection on the plane coming back from SF that I am still fighting off a month and more later. I was fortunate in that it wasn't something worse, but I'm not kidding myself that some nasty bug couldn't go global in a heartbeat just like that nasty cold. All it would take is one really sick person and a plane full of people...

[ihasa]

Fortunately we do have the power to avert such catastrophes if we choose to pull together... and we always should.

But you're right - environmentally, if we out-consume the earth's resources to the point our immediate needs aren't met, first there'll be wars, then mass starvation. Not pretty, but the planet certainly doesn't care about that!