Solutions for Overpopulation
I’m making this discussion because I think Overpopulation needs to be addressed, simply because I rarely hear it addressed and in the few times it is, there aren’t many proposed solutions. (I acknowledge that I am very likely just not looking hard enough for this discussion) We all know overpopulation is a problem that is only growing, by 2050 we will have to feed 10 billion people. I know that many of the answers to this are highly morally questionable, but they are still effective. What solutions to this problem do you think would be the most effective, even if they might not be morally ‘good’?
Comments (170)
I guess I am not answering your question. Well, more educational opportunities for women has been shown to lower the birth rate in poorer countries.
https://www.jacobinmag.com/2015/01/family-planning-environment-capitalism/
https://www.vox.com/the-big-idea/2017/12/12/16766872/overpopulation-exaggerated-concern-climate-change-world-population
Another option would be if countries, on a global level, found themselves in a position wherein they were no longer able to assist other countries, with security, financial support, medical or food. This would result in many civil wars as governments collapse. It would be messy, but would also lead to considerable life loss.
My money is on a decent virus, think Covid and Ebola have kids and then tell the kids "Go unto the world and make us proud."
The dinosaur comet option is good too, no real response to that one, but it is astronomically remote (ha ha ha)
Check here my country (Spain). You can clearly see how the metropolitan area is so crowded while the rural or towns look like abandoned. We have to try to find a system where the urbanism would work as equal as possible. Trying to avoid the feeling of "If I were born in the rural area I have to go to the city to become well formed and developed,etc...
So I guess the point here is building more urbanity in the abandoned areas developing the same opportunities as the metropolitan areas.
This is the example of my country where you can see the huge difference urban/rural administration.
Surely, we should be looking for ways for balancing problems arising from overpopulation and,the consequent issues of managing resources, rather than just looking or hoping for some form of mass destruction and extinction. Obviously, we don't really know what is going to happen with future catastrophes, such as pandemics. However, reading your comment, it all makes the whole attempt to stop Covid_19 seem in vain.
I agree that life is becoming harder and I, myself, find this because I am living in an overcrowded house. It does seem to me, and I think to some others that human civilisation may be coming to some atrocious brink. Personally, I struggle not to get really depressed about it. I do think it is best not to be fatalistic.
We don't know the future ultimately, but have to live our lives day by day, hoping and trying to work towards the best possible options and try to find more sustainable lifestyles, rather than thinking about population reduction. I have not brought anyone into the planet but it does seem that the earth will be inhabited by future generations. I would rather think and work towards their potential inheritance rather than non existence.
You're aware that the number of children is already stagnating, and thus the population will naturally peak around 11 Billion?
No I was not aware of this, thank you for informing me
Each couple should have only one child at most.
Un saludo Javier, de otro español.
Popularize Buddhism, so that more and more people ordain, living simple and celibate lives.
And become enlightened, at that!
And what does enlightened mean for you?
The only moral choice is to lead by example, hope for the best and prepare for the worst, unfortunately. Any “solution” as applied by some centralized authority will ultimately end in tyranny and failure.
Un gran saludo Miguel, ¡que bueno encontrar compatriotas en un mismo foro de cultura!
Today we have plants and animal species they produce enough for many people for example the holstein friesian produce circa 45 kg milk per day.
One consecuence is that the world market prices for corp, meat, milk,.. are down and the most farmers get bad money for theire work. It's difficult for all farmers to earn enough money for theire familiys. I think to help to fight the world hunger it's important that the farmers earn more money. I think it's start from the bottom. We need appreciation for us and the others. Appreciation for the good food. Be good to ourself and in consecuence we can be good to ohters.
That make sense.
Only 113 million have been infected, and a mere 2.5 million dead. The 1918 influenza epidemic infected about a third of the world population (1920 population was about 1.5b), and killed around 50,000,000. Now we're talking! 1 out of 10 infected dead.
Have patience. Infectious disease specialists expect new viral diseases to appear periodically. One of them may be a grand slam winner. In the future hothouse, there will be a lot more insect populations of the disease-vector kind--so that's something to look forward to.
Don't forget global warming. If the outside predictions play out, severe disruptions in agriculture and reduced ocean fish production, intolerable wet-bulb temperatures (combo humidity/heat that is fatal), flooding, and so on may come to the rescue for over-population. But then there's the question of how happy the not-dead-yet will be in a seriously over-heated world.
Other possibilities? Stay tuned.
You can make any number sound scary if you really want to and you have an agenda, maybe add a plosive 'b' to a word make some scary movies.
Wherever you are now, project a line 1 kilometre out in front of you and 1 kilometre to the right of, now make a square.
There are about 52 other people in this square if it has the same population density of the whole earth by land area excluding Antarctica and the oceans (but including mountains, deserts and other uninhabitable areas).
The problem isn't the number of people. It's the way we live.
If every family in the world had just 2 kids from now on, the population would steadily decline.
Anything that everyone believes is probably wrong. The truth is, the real problem is underpopulation. The fertility rate in the West is below replacement level. And as poor populations achieve modernity and wealth, their fertility goes down. As women get educated, they have fewer children.
As one striking example, look at Social Security in the US. In 1940 there were 159 workers to every retiree. In 2013, there were 2.8. You call that overpopulation? I call it the opposite. There aren't enough people to keep the system afloat. Other developed nations have the exact same problem. There aren't enough new people to support aging populations.
https://www.ssa.gov/history/ratios.html
Here are some links for your reading pleasure, to serve as an antidote to this particular example of a falsehood that everyone believes is true. Disclaimer, I didn't read each of these links nor do I necessarily endorse their authors nor points of view.
https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2019/03/underpopulation-problem/585568/
https://www.businessinsider.com/countries-becoming-demographic-time-bombs-2017-8
https://www.catholicworldreport.com/2011/11/01/underpopulation-the-real-problem/
https://medium.com/@kevin2kelly/the-underpopulation-bomb-594425a6df5f
https://prolifeaction.org/2010/overpopulation/
https://lancasteronline.com/opinion/letters_to_editor/underpopulation-is-the-real-issue/article_8915d5da-261e-11e8-889a-afd51d4a4f13.html/
https://www.internetgeography.net/igcse-geography/population-and-settlement-igcse-geography/over-population-and-under-population/
http://geography-groby.weebly.com/uploads/4/3/3/7/43370205/59_courses_and_cons_of_under_population.pdf
ps -- After I posted, this just happened to pop up on my news feed: Male sperm counts are dropping like crazy over the past 40 years. Every single one of those little swimmers is a potential taxpayer.
https://academic.oup.com/humupd/article/23/6/646/4035689
There are three population problems: Too many people, too few people, and the wrong demographic.
The Social Security problem is a policy issue, not a population problem. The US economy is large and healthy enough to pay for Social Security IF the Congress and President decide to transfer funds from the grossly undertaxed uber-wealthy minority to future Social Security beneficiaries. Eventually, (in a couple of decades, the last of the baby boom will begin to die off and the ratio of workers to retirees will improve. (The post WWII baby boom ended in 1964.) Hey, I'm one of the first baby boomers and I'm dying as fast as I can.
Why did women start entering the peace-time economy in the following the baby boom? One reason (not the only one) is that once the post-war economic boom started fizzling out towards the end of the 1960s into the '70s, it became necessary for families to add another wage earner to improve or maintain a middle-class standard of living. New house, new car, new aspirations -- it all cast more money. As the 20th century progressed, two earners became necessary to avoid sliding backward.
It wasn't policy, but it was once possible for a single wage earner to support (usually his) family. Workers could afford to have more children. We could, you know, pay people to breed. Have a baby, get a $5000 subsidy (provided you are the kind of people "we want more of"). No point encouraging the wrong kind of people to have more brats.
The world is over populated because it isn't just a matter of square yards per person, or providing enough of what might pass for food. Surviving global warming requires radical reduction in CO2 and methane emissions and that is hard to do when we are providing health care, schools, clothing, housing, transportation, clean water, etc. for 2 or 3 billion ADDITIONAL people, let alone the 2 or 3 billion people who need more of that stuff now.
The one-child policy was implemented in China.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/One-child_policy
75% of the population agreed with her. In an overcrowded country, it seemed the most ideal, although in the case of China, sometimes two million people were eliminated to balance the statistics and nobody says anything.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_massacres_in_China
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The idea belongs Thanos (Thank you, Marvel). Without every two people having only one child, the Earth would be more sustainable. What I don't believe in is "sustainable development". If it is development it is not sustainable and if it is sustainable, then it is not development.
https://futurehuman.medium.com/humans-may-not-be-able-to-reproduce-naturally-much-longer-scientist-warns-bd3b9dbbf859
Ironic that in the US, where this problem is particularly pronounced, the right will rage against transgender individuals, but then support any companies right to dump sex hormone mimicking compounds into our water.
Reverse osmosis set ups help, I have one, but won't get everything.
What happens when the only population to have kids are the ones that don't care about them?
Morally responsible people will stop having kids?
The only people around will be people with no morals?
So, we have a major issue on our hands - the earth won't be able to sustain humanity if it continues to grow in numbers at the rate it is. We need to act ASAP if we're to postpone, preferably cancel, our appointment with tragedy on such a scale that all the trials humans have endured up until now will be seem childishly trivial.
There's no reason to doubt that we've all come to the same conclusion - the alarming rate at which the size of the human population is growing begs our immediate attention and demands urgent action. At this point I feel a sense of satisfaction but then I quickly realize though I know we have to do something quickly, I know not what exactly what that something is.
Do we take the soft approach, initiate a global awareness campaign on overpopulation and hope that people will make the right choices whatever that may look like or do we take a hardline approach that may involve anything from policies styled along China's one-child rule to mass sterilization? I guess it would depend on how immediate our perception of the dangers of overpopulation is.
Perhaps, as some might believe, there's no need for any imtervention at all. Nature might offer its own solution to the specter of overpopulation by, for instance, reducing fertility rates in future generations or by inducing a natural form of infertility. Of the former I have no hard data but of the latter, I refer the reader to the thoroughly studied phenomenon of lactational amenorrhea. Google for details.
Last but not the least, technology, the crown jewel of humanity, might be able to offer a way out of this quagmire e.g. terraforming Mars can ease the burden that, as of now, is planet earth's.
I would sound like an antinatalist but I am agree with this policy. I think most of the Western governments do not put this issue in debate because it is a taboo topic. You know it comes from China, a communist country, "our enemy", etc... So our governments prefer still spreading the idea of "we are free in this part of the world. We are not restrictive as China".
Nevertheless, it is a big issue. Not because a social/economic problem but ethical one. I respect all projects the people might have in their minds but I think if you are irresponsible and cannot take care of your own life, please do not have children, it is simple. I think this is not dictator or totalitarian because we are (at least) guaranteeing two important scenarios:
1. Those kids that would born in broken families would end up being criminals or distorted (real life is not a fairy book most of these kids with bad parents tend to be a "non inclusive" citizens. This is the hard reality)
2. We literally reduce the problem of overpopulation. Because it is a damn issue. We all already accepted that everybody who borns shall have all rights possible. It is true. But I think the problem here is in the "roots". I mean, trying to prevent it previously someone is pregnant not when the kid is already conceived.
I bet a good solution could be a better sex educational system or changing the minds of those countries which necessarily need kids because their economy is so primary...
Quoting TheMadFool
This could be an excellent solution but sadly we are not ready yet due to the lack of investment :sad:
[quote=L.A. (2019), advertisement]A new life awaits you in the Off-world colonies. The chance to begin again in a golden land of opportunity and adventure.[/quote]
I wish I could have your hope in humanity as well.
It's called war, but nuclear ruined it.
change and improvement takes just as long.
There are ways to speed it up
Nature remembers it's debts.
Bungee jumping with weak bungees?
Nope. Look around us and even worse, the rulers of the world. Impossible having hope in this context.
Probably but somehow we need laws or rules in this nature because the opposite is live in chaos
You cannot have the hope of leaving your bike (for example) in the park and not being stolen. It is impossible by nature
Leave it to nature.
Whether someone steals your bike relys more on empathy
So does chaos
Laws deal with what's moral not whats empathic
[quote=K]There is an infinite amount of hope in the universe ... but not for us.[/quote]
Laws have to deal with order. Moral is so abstract and depends a lot of the countries and their laws. We have to put principles to create a society the most social welfare possible.
Sure. Primates originally evolved in the PETM. There's no reason to think we won't rock and roll through the next 10,000 years.
And we aren't in a mass extinction event. Here.
Not necessarily. Check out private law or agreement regulation. These are laws of interests not empathy
Also look at dictatorships and their laws... Have they empathy?
Just because your empathetic doesn't mean you'll show mercy.
This is why we need courts and law to at least reinforce it or preserve it
Because we need always an authority to reinforce those principles. We, the humans in a structured jungle, need organisms to embraced what we are debating about. If we remove these, we automatically enter into chaos because human is by nature so selfish and tend to hurt others
[quote=Agent Smith to Morpheus (1999)]Every mammal on this planet instinctively develops a natural equilibrium with the surrounding environment but you humans do not. You move to an area and you multiply and multiply until every natural resource is consumed and the only way you can survive is to spread to another area. There is another organism on this planet that follows the same pattern. Do you know what it is? A virus. Human beings are a disease, a cancer of this planet.[/quote]
You are speaking now about life choices. It depends a lot. I guess I will leave my life for my parents one but not for a random one. This is a complex situation because law is supposedly to defend a life at all costs not sacrificing one to get other. This is a dramatic scenario and the worst possible dilemma.
Select the text and then should appear a little box with “quote” function.
You can't save everyone.
Yes. Sadly. At least try it
What about the lovely/worthy ones?
You can love something that can kill you
do you actually control your actions or not?
Example?
True. We are limited by everything because we are by nature limited humans. Nevertheless, I think this also should be motivated us to improve our knowledge.
What's the cause of overpopulation is it really a lack of land and resources?
Or having a problem of how we solve those problems?
I do not accept there is over-population, so I cannot answer your question, but I will say this: resources are a function of the energy available to produce them. The Malthusian, pessimistic view - and all its intellectual descendants are fundamentally mistaken. There are no limits to growth.
:up: :clap: :lol:
The earth is in its death throes. How long until that sinks in?
Read this, and explain to me how he charts the course of energy development as key to the development of civilisation, but does not reach the conclusion that now, we need massively more energy to spend, as has accompanied every previous leap forward.
Ok. Thanos' solution seems to me the simplest as long as each person can only have one child. Later, sterilization.
If each couple has a child, but remarries or couples and may have another, the problem will continue.
Only because of continual destruction of wild habitat, unsustainable industrial farming and ravaging of the fisheries. Industrial farming relies on fossil fuels both for its fertilizers and for its harvesting machinery, Modern intensive fishing practices also rely on fossil fuels, And then you have the problem of how to transport all that food around the planet, without using fossil fuels.
https://climateandcapitalism.com/2010/04/28/overpopulation-and-global-warming-dissecting-the-numbers-part-one/
https://climateandcapitalism.com/2010/06/02/dissecting-those-overpopulation-numbers-part-two-the-perils-of-per-capita/
:mask: :up: The 'civilizational project' (via dominance hierarchies) of the last several millennia has never been a lifeboat, or ark, meant for the vast majority of human beings (or tribes, ethnicities, cultures, etc); "eugenic fascism" seems the very grammar (logic) itself of any global (top-down) metanarrative, and so ...
Quoting 180 Proof
This sort of elitist (Malthusian) prospect has been gamed-out by World Powers (militaries, intel services), R&D think-tanks, major corporations and "well-off" fallout shelter-bunker building survivalists/preppers since the beginning of the Cold War prospects of catastrophic nuclear war which eventually morphed into forecasting Global Warming disaster scenarios since the 1970s. Recently, tech billionaires (& the hypercapitalist PRC) ramping up capabilities for commercially exploiting LEO, Luna, Mars and the asteroid belt is just an extension of this +70 year prep-undertaking.
https://www.carefrance.org/ressources/themas/1/4422,CARE_COP20_Choice-not-control_Famil.pdf
That's a facile dismissal. I read the articles, and while I agree that "first world" people contribute many times more emissions per capita than so-called "third world" populations, that is not the only or even the most salient point. The avowed aim of corporations and governments is to bring poorer countries up to a first world level of prosperity and consumerism. And that would be only fair, right? ( And good for the capitalists as well :wink: ).
The problem is that to achieve that, or even just to keep feeding the current population adequately will involve continuing habitat destruction, species extinctions, depletion of water resources, salination of soils, destruction of soils by industrial farming, destruction of marine life, and so on. The more the humans get the less for the rest of the inhabitants of our little planet, and ultimately disaster for the humans too.
It'd be great if we could simply get rid of three quarters of the population, and that would be far more effective if it was three quarters of the first world population. But what would happen then? The world economy would collapse. There'd be no more aid, exports or travel to, or exploitation of, third world countries. They would be left to their own devices.
Any curtailment of business as usual would involve immense human suffering, so we seem to be riding a juggernaut that cannot be stopped without catastrophe for the humans. But continual growth is unsustainable and is very quickly approaching catastrophe anyway, so either way it's catastrophe. It's a hard fact to face, but seems inevitable unless someone can come up with a magic solution. Can you imagine any?
That's a dumb aim. It's ought to be change our patterns of consumption so that we don't end life on the planet as we know it.
Quoting Janus
Our measures of "the world economy" are basically rigged bullshit geared towards the growth of corporations and the valorization of capital. Being held hostage to shitty measures of economic growth is not a reason to commit mass ecocide.
Quoting Janus
This is your brain on capitalism. No, it would not. Curtialment of business practises under capitalism in which waste, excess, and low cost manfacturing is a necessity would result in immense human suffering. In fact, it already results in immense human suffering. What is needed is a change in the way we structure our economy, not systematic world ecocide.
Quoting Janus
Idk if you've been paying attention but there are these things called fossil fuels which we need to keep in the ground. There is also this thing called capitalism which we need to end for good. In fact the former is premised on the latter. It takes a tragic lack of imagination to imagine that planetary eugenics programs rather than changing the economy is the solution to climate change. Green fascism is still fascism, not the least worst part of which it is born out of sheer laziness of thought and inconsideration.
I agree, but a solution to that problem doesn't seem to be in the offing.
Quoting StreetlightX
Again I agree, but achieving de-growth, which seems to be essential at this stage, does not appear to be possible without collapsing the current system. Collapsing the current system is probably a very good idea, but it would involve untold human suffering; and it is always those at the bottom of the food chain who get thrown under the bus first, and that is inhumane, so—where does that leave us in practical terms?
Quoting StreetlightX
This is just nice words unless you can outline a comprehensive and actionable plan for such a radical change. I've never seen anything approaching that. I'm all for the destruction of the evil that is capitalism, but I can't envision any way to do it without collapsing the infrastructures which have been built on the foundations of capitalism.
And even if a practicable way were imaginable; I can't see the populace acquiescing, given that we are all wedded to our lifestyles and current levels of prosperity.
Quoting StreetlightX
I'm talking about the problems faced, not advocating anything, least of all "eugenics programs". For example to transition from the massive infrastructure based on fossil fuels to "green technologies" cannot be achieved overnight; it will take decades (even if the political will were one hundred percent there).
No.
War, famine, plague, and [s]wild beasts[/s] human bestiality. The four horsemen of the applesauce.
But in case that's not enough, we can add in the flood, and the fire of global warming. Problem solved!
I haven't said that. I'm only talking about what I can envision, but I'm not very smart, and I'm very open to other ideas and possibilities. But no one (that I know) seems to be presenting actionable possibilities.
So, it seems to me that even if we could, even if we were willing to, immediately end capitalism, that it would involve a great deal of suffering and death. That might just be the best thing for humanity long term, but if it involves a great deal of suffering and death, then it is morally unacceptable, so what to do?
At this point, humanity is not guaranteed to be able to find a way out that involves little suffering and death, as unacceptable as that may seem.
Just saying this doesn't make it true. Ending a regime of private property doesn't inherently involve "a great deal of suffering and death". In fact it ought to alleviate much of it.
Although I am not averse to eating just one single billionare just for funsies and as an example.
Yes, I could be wrong about that of course. I acknowledge I am speaking from within my own limited imagination.
Quoting StreetlightX
While I would have no moral objection; I don't think I could overcome my aversion at the thought of consuming human flesh.
I'm just saying: between planetary eugenics and the end of private property, one of these stands out as far more harmful than the other.
Quoting Janus
It'd be communal lunch I'd imagine.
Yes, I am totally opposed to eugenics. I feel some resistance towards giving up my own property, but if everyone was on board I'd go along with it, I suppose.
Quoting StreetlightX
Not sure if I can make it, :wink:
Private, not personal property! I.e. property used for making capital - not your toothbrush and couch.
And then what?
I'm not sure. It'd be something I'd like to explore more.
That means you rushed into things and didn't know yourself much, let alone not knowing the people. This happens a lot in an organization during hiring.
A socio-economic system in which one class, the working class, has been seperated from the means of production, which are controlled and owned instead by a seperate class, the capitalist class. This in turn leading to the pursuit of profit as the defining motive of all socio-political life. Capitalism is a more or less global system with the US right at its very heart. There's nothing fictional about it, and you would do well to minimally educate yourself about the world you live in.
The alternative of course is to liquidate the capitalist class and place the means of production back into the hands of the working class, who make up the vast majority of this Earth. This latter would be a true democracy, one in which the economy would be placed back into the hands of the people, unlike the pseudo-democracies we have today in which impersonal market mechanisms that systematically favour capital over workers continue to immeserate billions of people across the planet.
But listen - I'm not debating capitalism with someone whose knowledge comes from a single Google search. I don't debate with kindergarden level ignorance.
The solution: Our burning desire to be left alone!
This is actually easy, but people simply don't understand it.
Population growth will end when the fertility rate is below 2.0+.
That fertility rate lower than 2.0+ that has universally happened when people have become more prosperous. Just look at where you have high fertility rates (rapid population growth): in the most poorest countries. Seriously:
Rank /Country/Fertility rate in 2019 (births/woman)
1 Niger 6.824
2 Somalia 5.978
3 DR Congo 5.819
4 Mali 5.785
Niger, Somalia, DR Congo and Mali are one of the most poorest countries in the World.
(Fertility rates have GONE DOWN. Dramatically. All over the World. Thanks to the increasing prosperity and the social change because of it.)
Making people more prosperous, to eradicate poverty is not morally bad at all. Have social security, pensions, the ability that a single person without a family can live well when he or she isn't able to work anymore and isn't forced to be a beggar. So there is a truly moral solution to this. It's not about condoms, it's about that you don't have to make children in order for them to look after you when you are old. Then people don't have to have huge families to survive.
Just stop with narrative of the end of the World is nigh because of this and we have to repent our hedonistic materialism and everything else in our society and have something totally else!!!
(Unfortunately, that I think is what people want to hear when debating this issue.)
What has materialism got to do with it? Fertility rates in developing countries are controlled mainly by age of marriage, length of breastfeeding and mortality (or morbidity) prior to 50. None of those factors are related to materialism in any way whatsoever. They're largely cultural changes and medical/healthcare improvements. Even the cultural lag effect (having excess 'insurance' children because of a perception of infant mortality which lags behind actual infant mortality) is mostly cultural and partly medical/healthcare. The value of a child workforce is mostly related to the balance of rural/urban jobs. The opposition to contraception is religious. The unawareness of, or lack of access to, contraception is mostly cultural, partly political...
I'm not seeing materialism even in the top twenty...How does owning a second car have the slightest effect?
All you've shown is a weak correlation* with an extremely vague measure.
(* are you seriously suggesting Poland is wealthier than the United States?)
The link between wealth and fertility is quite well understood.
It's one of those things demographics has know for years:
Now the demographic transition theory and it's four steps explain well what has happened. Especially it's third stage is what crucial here to understand:
But what is needed is prosperity, for there to be universal education, for the situation of women to improve (and be taken into the workforce) and for all these issues like changing social attitudes to happen. If that economic take off doesn't happen (like in Mali, Somalia or the DR Congo), people truly seek shelter from economic distress by having children. In the wealthier economies hardly anybody thinks like this.
Family planning has always been something of an economic issue, you know.
This really isn't at all vague.
I think the counter to this is small businesses. Small businesses use capital to make and sell goods and services and perhaps make a profit. It sounds like you are simply against large businesses that have acquired massive wealth. Are you against small businesses because they can turn into large ones? Much of economics is simply about incentives.. People are more incentivized when they gamble their time and resources and make money on it (the heart of capitalism really). Can you separate small business capitalism with monopolistic capitalism?
Address something I've written, or just repeat your existing claim as if this were you own personal blog. Either way I don't really mind, but I'm not going to respond to the latter...definition of madness and all that...
Small businesses are in most cases even more exploitative of labour than big business. They are more likely to engage in off-the-books employment, while ignoring safety or health considerations. They are in general less subject to scrutiny and accountability, and are all the worse for it.
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Also it's always fun to post right under someone advocating planetary genocide. Not surprising given that's the logical outcome of green fascism.
I actually would have to agree with you based on what I've seen. But what is your solution to the seeming need to gamble your resources and time and work to create a new venture that makes money? That seems to drive a lot of innovation and such.
Let's put it this way.. There are probably way more Fords and Edisons who don't just invest and tinker for the hell of it, but to make a lot of money, than there are Teslas who are doing it out of pure interest for public good or curiosity.
This is one of those memes that gets rolled out every now and then in defense of capitalism, but it could not be more wrong. In fact that this is so completely wrong is probably, for me, the major reason we need to get rid of capitalism. Can you even imagine the number of people around the world who have had to give up on their dreams, or who have abandoned projects because they were not considered profitable? The fact that capitalism selects for profit means that massive swathes of planetary potential is simply wasted, swept into the garbage bin of society, because it doesn't meet the artificial and extrinsic standard of profitability - no matter how useful, interesting, or even life improving those things might be.
I was reading the other day about a 'brilliant' team of scientists who have been trying to reverse engineer insulin production, and they have spent years on it, along with incredible amounts of funding. This was pitched as a 'feel good' story, like, 'look at this ambitious people-savers who want to fight the predatory pricing of pharmaceutical companies'. But can you imagine what's really happening? These people have had to waste their talents trying to come up with something we already have, in large quantities, able to be cheaply produced. But because of market imperatives, these people are literally wasting their lives trying to replicate what is already out there. What a waste. All the while people are dying for these stupid profit games. It's insane. And that not even to mention the structure of the market which is driven by utterly unproductive speculation in finance and housing, along with weapons and stupid shit like NFTs.
And then there's the obvious fact that everywhere you look, capitalism breeds sameness. You can see this most obviously in architecture, with more or less pre-fab buildings and suburbs that have become blights on our living spaces. Houses and buildings looks the same and look rubbish because what matters is cost, not actual people. Or else look at the state of cinema, churning out squeals and franchise productions one after the other, with original scripts being nothing but 'risks', no matter how good they may be. The same can be said for our music, our cuisine, our dress, our sports. Capitalism is anti-innovation. In fact this last example points up to how it gets even worse - because of these feedback mechanisms, not only does capitalism's selection for profit kill innovation, it creates environments in which the fostering of innovation is actively discouraged. It kills our dreams, and even our courage to dream. It's hell.
Check out Graeber's essay for more on these themes: https://thebaffler.com/salvos/of-flying-cars-and-the-declining-rate-of-profit
OK,
Quoting Isaac
With modern medicine and health care morbidity has fallen throughout the World, even if there are difference between the poorest countries and the rest. Yet things like child morbidity has steadily declined all over the world since the last century. And these other issues you mention are simply minor compared to the society becoming more prosperous. In fact, changes in things like age of marriage seem to happen when societies develop and come more prosperous. Families don't get their daughters married at young age, but put them to school. Things like that.
Quoting Isaac
Well, put there the term "capitalism" or anything, but NOTICE this is just what I said to be narrative going off to something else that basically is a distraction. So as I said this is the wrong way to go, this isn't an objection to my response as my basic line is that more prosperous society makes people to have less children and hence we should try to make all people in a society, not just a tiny section, be more prosperous.
Most people live "unremarkable" lives.. By this I don't mean that they aren't doing things they enjoy or striving for some goal but rather that they aren't going to be talked about in the documentaries and books of "men that shaped the modern world". Most people don't have access to the forces of production, but that's because most people don't know how. For example, does the average person know how to get ahold of materials like iron, gold, diamonds, copper, and such, combine them together, and manufacture them into a part (probably used for some bigger item)? No they don't. Rather, manufacturing engineers do. These guys are probably contracted out by other technicians who have an end goal for the product.. Many times, the entrepreneur doesn't even own the factory.. Anyways, there are just webs and webs and networks of interactions that happen that make things come about.
I see much of the problem is that people are so specialized that they have no idea of the forces of production that create their own survival situation.. aka the modern industrialized economy. We are as isolated as can be from our own subsistence.. and like the blind man with the elephant, are perplexed by such a behemoth. So we try to grab at something that we can ground us in. For conservatives, that might just be doing your job and starting a family without much question.. BBQs, video games, sports, drinking/drugs, and screen time.. For liberals it is much the same, but add in concerns of identity politics, concern over ecological issues, and a few other social concerns. For both groups, perhaps investing in something, usually the global stock market is done to increase assets and wealth. None of them (us) have the big picture. We don't know how it is that we exist the way we do. Books by scholars are published... essays written that try to corral all the phenomena into one large manifesto or authoritative synthesis.. And readers think they gain more insight into the perplexing behemoth by simply reading this text.. But they go back to their actual lives consuming and going to work and the daily things mentioned earlier. Meanwhile the Global South knows even less but are affected materially more. I don't know how to solve the problem of being born in an impersonal system that we have little direct contribution in. We just live in it.
But this is simply not true. Literally anyone who works for a wage employs those means every time they go to work. The 'seperation' is a legal and conventional one. It has nothing to do with "remarkableness".
If you read the whole thing, I'm getting at the fact that we are so specialized as to not know how it is that we subsist on a whole. Obviously how we survive is the complex billions of interactions that have nothing to do with us directly.
The impersonal means in which we survive gives us practically no efficacy for change. "It" is so big, we just go back to staying in our lanes as described above (especially about "conservative" and "liberal").
Eh, this doesn't address anything I said at all. And in any case sounds like what one says when one is comfortable, which billions of people are not.
Oh right. I thought this was a philosophy forum. Apparently your posts are helping the starving Africans.
From 'Determinants and Consequences of High Fertility' - Robert T. Lazarus, Professor in Population Studies, Department of Sociology, Ohio State University
Just gainsaying what I said isn't 'addressing' it. There are proximate determinants of reduced birth rates, these are those I listed. They may or may not be correlated with prosperity, but even if they are, it's an historical association, there's absolutely no justification for assuming it's how it must, or ought to, be done, simply because it's how it has been done. We could just as easily say that being a white man is strongly correlated with scientific breakthroughs, I could show you a graph that would correlate even more strongly than your GDP vs Birth Rate one between Race/Gender and scientific advancements. So to get all the best new developments we should make sure our universities are stocked with white men, yes? Or would that be to confuse the way things happened to have been with the way things ought to be?
There are facts of biology. Those criteria need to be met to reduce the birth rate. The fact that those criteria are often (but not always) met where there's an increase in GDP does not in any way mean that an increase in GDP is either the only, nor the best, way to achieve those criteria.
As for...
Quoting ssu
Well no. Materialism, capitalism and prosperity are three completely different things. One is about ownership of goods, one bout the distribution of the means of production and the other about the affordance of needs. They are not simply interchangeable. Prosperity is possibe without either capitalism or materialism.
Overpopulation has a bad rep; I thought I might take the opportunity to inform you that there's a silver lining.
Quoting Isaac
So give an example as we are talking about poor societies and rich societies.
Perhaps I too quickly judged this as an ad hom on me. If you were commenting on the descriptions of the conservative/liberal ways of thinking in the previous post, my point was to demonstrate that there is an inherit inertia in the current system. We cannot know how the system is run because we don't even know the ultimate structures on which we rely upon. You are forced into a consumer and a worker, but not a systems changer.. That last one isn't even an option.
Also, it is in general, a really silly point. Do you think the revolutionaries who did away with feudalism sat on their hands because they were stupefied by the scale of the issue? No. The objection is ahistorical and frankly isn't one. It can be said of anything and anyone at any scale. That one lacks an imagination is not an objection.
Get off your high pony dude. I've known you since the last forum, and I'm sure you hate my posts just as much as I hate your style. It does speak to your point because here you are saying you are against the current system (big and small businesses owning stuff.. pretty damn ingrained practice as of now in Western culture) and I am trying to tell you that your "anti" against businesses has an inherent inertia which will make any action against it quite insurmountable. What you want is Russian/French Revolution style change? Probably not, and there's not many options.. The ones that are there are mentioned in the "liberal" version of what I discussed.. Talking points at the peripheries of things.. Nothing with changing systems...especially the very core of what produces what we consume and actively use daily.
Quoting StreetlightX
It is NOT ahistorical.. Feudalism in what country? In England it was gradually replaced by burghers/small business/land owners/farmers wanting more of a say in Parliament. France and Russia are really the examples you are looking for, but even with that.. You think that sort of violent revolution is good or inevitable?
Also, for what it's worth, I don't hate your posts. I just think they focus on all the wrong things; or at least, things I find philosophically uninteresting. There are posts I hate. Yours are generally not among them.
True it is glib, and it basically does amount to that, but it's more about exploring this idea. More specifically, I am interested in all the intricacies of how technology is brought together and how the immensity of this alone crushes any attempts to undo it without devastating consequences to comfort and well-being. Let's take your computer. It has tremendous amounts of networks.. probably in the millions for what actors, resources, and actions had to take place for you to have that in front of you. How would a "new" system even fathom to unravel these heavily threaded factors of research, services, transportation, and production to a non-business system? How would that even happen?
Let's follow the specifics here.. How did the factory get started? Where did the patents come from? Then ask this for about a million other activities related to the businesses that went into making just one product. How can you change that? Let's say it is changed somehow. What would it change to? A worker's council? What's that look like? So what does insubordination look like? That was gulags and workcamps in many communist societies.
My answer is obviously that there is a no-win. Clearly from past responses, you would know I would say that the only way out is to not force people to play the game in the first place. The game will always be rigged against the individual. And no, I don't think everyone working for a Star Trek like existence is good either. It is still using people for some "cause" well-intentioned or not. The only way you can get that to be ethically "good" in my view, would be if you somehow drugged people into being borg-like and all think the same exact thing.. If that somehow happens.. then I guess that might be ethical since no one literally can think differently. As it is now, any system will be the way it is, and YOU must comply. There is no getting around that.
Quoting StreetlightX
Well, thank you. For you that is very charitable, so I will take it.
Why would anyone want to 'unravel' these things? What is being called for is a change in the regime of property. It's an issue of control, not technical ... whatever it is you are imagining.
As for this 'no-win' business - I have no tuck with it. I have nothing to say about that because it's useless and dumb and not philosophy and the kind of thing reserved for comfortable people who like to think they are radical contrarians while changing absolutely nothing. For what it's worth I am absolutely pro anti-natalist. I hope they all die of their own accord and we never have to hear from them again. Their consistency of theory and action is the best possible favour they could lend to the rest of the world. I support antinatalists wholeheartedly. May they all drop dead and never leave a trace.
You contradicted yourself.. "A change of regime of property" would unravel these things.
Quoting StreetlightX
Not philosophical? Hardly. It is simply observation of what was and what is. There is a reason the French and the Russian systems had violent revolutions and the British one did not. It is the British system that we are all in today, really.. even China. The march of impenetrable levels of business/bureaucratic interactions that cannot be unknotted.
Also, you did not answer what would happen in your worker's councils (I'm assuming that's your goal?).. How would they handle insubordination by "other" workers? How would it not devolve into (another) dictator of a vanguard?
Overpopulation (the poor have more children): More food
Starvation (frequency & severity is greatest among the poor): Less food
Why do you think so? The removal of a capitalist class who owns the means of production does not entail any technical change in how those means function - apart of course, from what we now decide to do with them.
And I'm not answering questions about what ought to happen. That's already far afield. Again, if you think this is the best of possible worlds, then so be it. You've reached your conclusion. I don't care enough about what you say to change your mind.
The CEO of a small tech company gets paid $2 million. The head developer gets paid $300,000. A mid-level developer and R&D personnel $150,000. The tech support gets paid $60-75,000. The sales people range from $70-$200,000. The people in the manufacturing get a range from $45-$85,000 depending on their position. Customer service and related personnel get $50,000. They all get increases every year 5% for inflation. Everyone likes their little hierarchy. In larger companies, the numbers may be more and more room for ladder-climbing. Third world nations that are chiefly exporting and living subsistence want this little hierarchy too. You are trying to take that away with themes of "no property". Rather, the CEO gambled, and put in that effort 30 years ago and deserves the reward of profit-maker and figure head. The developers and mid level people are getting paid enough to live comfortably and do those things mentioned earlier (BBQs, TVs, etc.).. The third world see this and want it exported to their country. So these people would ask you what is your problem? Is it the big guys? The international corporations? The ones that pay the "real bucks" and you can climb much further up the hierarchy? Why would they hate "that"? Hey, you might even get healthcare too! (Bestowed from government or business/fiefdom).
The workers think, "Why should we own the capital.. The owner put that initial gamble and work into the company. It is his profits. He is gracious enough to pay me enough to live. I get to go on vacation soon!".
The only response you will give is some cliched notion of starving Africans who are not a part of this system right? But that is itself a different problem than taking away property. You are confusing development issues and issues surrounding fundamentals of property... But I'll be charitable and assume you are NOT going down that cliched road of third world vs. first world in this justification for no property (in the first world). So if that's the case, what is the need for taking away the capital from those who gambled to create the growth of business (and bestowment of jobs) created from that initial capital? So we will go back to global, mega corporations right? Because they are employing low wage workers in third world companies? So we go back to that... So really it is back to large corporations.. and so you fall into simply "liberal" who wants get rid of multnational corporations that exploit third world countries. That is right in line with "liberal" versions of standard capitalism. Get in line.
Ok, so what is your position? All I know is that you believe in taking away capital as it currently is, and that you don't want to discuss what your vision is for what to do after this.
Oh c'mon StreetlightX, you can do better than a red herring. Yes, I have strong antinatalist ideas.. If you look between the lines, that whole scenario I gave you wasn't something that I'm saying is thus "good", and should be perpetuated unto a new generation. That indeed is an issue unto itself (as to what we are doing when we procreate). However, I am trying to meet you with the issues you are presenting in terms of a solution through dissolving our current economic system. So are you going to answer directly or obfuscate with red herring retorts that are not answering the questions at hand regarding your economic solutions/beliefs?
https://theanarchistlibrary.org/library/errico-malatesta-anarchy
Whatever happens will have to be the result of experimentation - a thousand flowers blooming, hundreds of them failing, worked out amongst people with stakes in the society they build together. But it will have to be better than this failing, decomposing system - it's either socialism or barbarism. That's the choice.
Can you elaborate on those principles? From that quote I can see basically that no hierarchies are crucial to your beliefs. What would you say to the people in that small business scenario who are content (enough) with their pay, vacations, and healthcare? To them, the hierarchy sustains. The capitalist class CEO has provided for them.
Sure, and this is what kings and lords said to their serfs too - and they were largely right. Which is exactly the problem. It is all the more reason that it was a good thing that we got rid of them. Being a hostage is more, not less a reason to demand emancipation. But I think that's enough for this thread.
I don't think there is one. Not a clear one anyway. That's the whole point. You're simply assuming the way things are is they way they ought to be, that, in order to have a viable solution, I must present it from history, like all the ideas ever have been tried and we only get to pick from among them. I don't hold to that belief, I think it's incoherent. Why now? Why at this point in time have all the ideas been tried?
Furthermore, observe the increase in morally gestured ways of life and dogmatic viewpoints. They come with a tendency to view the gain of others as of high importance and self-interest as comparatively meager. This too meets with a distinction with what we would call the 'perfect mate' in the natural world. Disease, however brutal and horrible, is a means by which population control in the world can be exerted. That we now deal with increasingly self-engineered strains of this new coronavirus that has grown strong through activities we call our own vices – mass carbon-guzzling travel, fertility-driven activities such as clubs, bars, and events – shows us to such an extent that this performs a function in reducing populations when they are overly extended.
It wouldn't be surprising if in the near future there were a return to the melancholy ways of art and thought, seeing as these too create a sense of nobility and suffering that would reduce our will to expand and indulge in a vice-focused life. I think we are at a turning point where the larger sphere of humanity is uncertain of its chosen path: do we embrace artificiality or aim to strike a more moderate lifestyle? This will be a gesture of a greater natural process where humanity is prompted if it really wishes to survive. Ironically, that too is the focus of much of our recent discourse in philosophy.
No, but you do have to have something based on realism for the argumentation.
Quoting Isaac
All ideas haven't been tried as usually new ideas come from adapting to a new unique reality. Yet there always is some precedent, some roots in history. Someone likely has had already some similar ideas, which forms then the "new" thinking that isn't familiar to us now.
Now, minimum generational overlap: Grandparent, Parent, Children.
There's just one/two extra generation(s) [the (great) grandparent] in present times and look how big a difference it makes.
Solution (math to the rescue, again): Packing Problems.
[quote=Wikipedia]Packing problems are a class of optimization problems in mathematics that involve attempting to pack objects together into containers. The goal is to either pack a single container as densely as possible or pack all objects using as few containers as possible.[/quote]
I'm not so sure if this is the case. Ideally reproduction is something we partake in with no other interest than the well-being of the child.
In reality however, there can be many selfish motivations that lead to the choice to have children.
Some are economical, others seek to satisfy some deeply engrained biological desire, and yet others simply conform to ideas of what is normal.
I have serious doubts how many couples have entirely altruisitic motives when it comes to having children. If that were to be the case, isn't the first question one ought to ask oneself: how can I seek to do what is in the interest of my child's well-being, when I have never met them?
Furthermore, if one is solely preoccupied with the well-being of their child, another question should be: what gives me the right to decide my child should live. Is that truly in their best interest? And how do I know? And what makes me believe I would be the correct person to raise them?
Yet, parents don't seem to ask themselves these questions, or at the very least do not seem to try to answer them rigorously (I doubt anyone could). As such, these questions are often discarded - after all, they may think to themselves, these questions did not seem to dissuade our predecessors and I want to have children.
Does that attest to the characteristics of altruism and maturity of thought that you describe child-rearing as having?
Because to me, it very much seems like people are either ignorant to or dismiss and refuse to answer the difficult questions that one would expect to be answered prior to making such fundamental decisions on behalf of another. Why? Likely because they are not driven by altruism, but by their desires, and it makes them willfully blind.
That to me is no sign of maturity.
I can only say that the film-head is most susceptible to envy and a certain confusion of ego that stands in the way of them reaching a state of mind that would be deemed 'mature' by traditional society. That's just one example, but we could generate others about the medium of the video game, and the internet and reach similar conclusions. Doing it is so easy because these are not only technological extensions of the arm or leg in the McLuhan sense, but of the mind and even – if you would go so far – the desires and the soul. Reliance on this form of experiencing reality naturally conflicts with the development of rational and mature choice and self-discipline in whatever that used to mean to adults of past generations. The world of choice is continually presented as a being outside the capability of the viewer, who is allowed to indulge in ephemerally watching chaos happen, in contrast to our accepted idea of adulthood as a clear-headed, in-control, and stable lifestyle.
1. The population growth is because of increased birth rates.
2. The population growth is because of decreased mortality rates.
3. A combination of 1 & 2.
4. Which demographic/subgroup matters? For instance, if we're worried about food shortages, should we take into account the variation in appetite with sex, age, etc.? If it's pollution we're worried about, do all strata have the same carbon footprint? So on and so forth.
5. Left to the reader as an exercise.
I do not know that. I don't believe overpopulation is the fundamental nature of the problem; but that it's a very wrongful and dangerous mode of thought. I believe the fundamental nature of the problem is the mis-application of technology, and that, applying the right technologies we could sustain a large human population indefinitely.
The key technology is magma energy, shown by nasa in 1988 to have truly vast potential; over a thousand times global energy demand just from the US alone. Lavishing this energy to meet all our energy demands carbon free, plus, capture carbon, desalinate sea water to irrigate land for agriculture and habitation, and to recycle all waste, over-population would not be a problem. We'd also have to farm fish, and protect the forests while developing wastelands for agriculture and housing - but, the real problem is not too many people. Rather it's that we have not applied the right technologies to sustain human population.
Status of the Magma Energy Project
Dunn, J. C.
Abstract
The current magma energy project is assessing the engineering feasibility of extracting thermal energy directly from crustal magma bodies. The estimated size of the U.S. resource (50,000 to 500,000 quads) suggests a considerable potential impact on future power generation. In a previous seven-year study, we concluded that there are no insurmountable barriers that would invalidate the magma energy concept. Several concepts for drilling, energy extraction, and materials survivability were successfully demonstrated in Kilauea Iki lava lake, Hawaii. The present program is addressing the engineering design problems associated with accessing magma bodies and extracting thermal energy for power generation. The normal stages for development of a geothermal resource are being investigated: exploration, drilling and completions, production, and surface power plant design. Current status of the engineering program and future plans are described.
Publication:
Presented at the Symposium on Geothermal Energy, New Orleans, La., 10 Jan. 1988
Pub Date: 1987 Bibcode: 1987STIN...8820719D Keywords:
Geothermal Energy Conversion; Geothermal Energy Extraction; Magma; Wells; Energy Technology; Geochemistry; Heat Exchangers; Site Selection; Technology Assessment; Two Phase Flow; Energy Production and Conversion
p.s. quad: quadrillion btu. Global energy demand is approx. 650 quad.
https://ui.adsabs.harvard.edu/abs/1987STIN...8820719D/abstract
While what you say may be true, is all we concern ourselves with in life mere sustenance? What about the quality of life and stability of the solution?
On one hand we have a technological solution that is:
1) Quicker to implement at first, but may be so complex that no unlearned individual could well understand its methodology.
2) Will require constant oversight, innovation, and adjustment by specialist and engineers.
3) May fulfill immediate needs but possibly not subtextual needs such as love, belonging, sense of purpose.
4) May compile itself with further issues, such as issues relating to finitude of energy resources and the environment.
5) In a massive population individuals will feel more insignificant and isolated. Crime and exploitation of governing systems is more likely.
Then you have another solution – reduction of the human population – that:
1) Takes longer to implement but is exceedingly simple in concept so that almost anyone could understand it.
2) Requires individual intervention.
3) Could possibly be more difficult to implement, but this is not really measurable until after the fact.
Then the pros of the tech solution:
1) Allows us to go on with our casual lives without much more individual intervention.
2) Larger population probably equals more technological innovation.
3) Do not need to get involved in extensive government reach over individual activities.
3) May be able to colonize other planets, though this is kind of a pipe dream at this point.
Then the pros of the reducing the population solution:
1) No longer any concerns about environment. Will probably repair environmental/geological damage.
2) Less competition for the pleasures of life; a generally easier and simpler life.
3) Less 'group-thinking,' as in the reduction of personal responsibility. Individuals will feel a greater sense of citizenship and belonging.
4) Smaller population probably equals more cultural innovation (art, philosophy, etc).
5) Less need for oversight, except in the sense of keeping the population in a globally decreasing state.
It seems exceedingly easier to imagine more pros and less cons for the depopulation solution, and the pros seem better and cons less aversive, but maybe that's because I already have that solution in mind. Perhaps you could elaborate on how you might lay it out differently.
:rofl: Yep and there we were, so worried!
We can't execute old people, but we can downsize families, the Chinese way (one child policy). The problem (if) being increased lifespans & high birth rates.
Looks like antinatalism's time has come.
Perhaps skyscrapers are it! Extending ourselves into the up-down dimension should free up surface area on the beloved sphere we call earth.
What about floating cities (on water and/or air)? We would need some kind of reliable flotation device on a large scale. Antigravity? Advantage: the earthquake problem solved. Disadvantage: failure of flotation devices would be catastrophic.
Question: Why do we want children?
The planet can sustain that many people. If not something called 'death' soon deals with the problem. There is absolutely no reason to believe that overpopulation is an issue other than we're likely to have to address what people are going to do with themselves ... that is a slight worry but people awaken eventually
In terms of food and farming there isn't an issue. The same kind of doom and gloom happened in the 70's I believe then suddenly there was enough grain to feed everyone and still is. Although there are still people starving on Earth today the percentage of the population suffering in this manner has dramatically decreased and there is nothing I can see that is going to reverse this trend any time soon.
I believe such talk stems from some psychological condition we go through at a certain age/maturity in our lives. Perhaps all this talk has more to do with personally coming to terms with our own mortality and projecting out into the world at large?
The year is 2022. Just 3 more years, and we'll, or our children will, see an actual infinity.
Hyperbolic growth has something to do with positive feedback loops:
1. Population goes up.
2. More intelligent people.
3. The carrying capacity of the land increases.
4. Go to 1.
Isn't this really weird? There's a bloody algorithm? Who the hell is running this simulation we call our world?
Why could mean 'for what...' and it can mean 'what is the reason for...' It's like the movements of a mechanism; the parts don't solely have to have a final cause and there is no necessity for reason. Another question you could ask, 'Does it seem rational to realize having children?'
Then there is a natural power that exerts itself on the human body to procreate. From this point of view the question presents itself, 'Is nature good in its own right?' Then there are a whole bunch of other questions about what it means to be an individual with freedoms and liberties. So all in all it has basically every difficult question in one, but possibly every answer in one.
A few things seem clear to me about this:
- There are no organisms on Earth that could sustain unlimited population growth.
- Given human ingenuity, there are lessening limits on human population growth.
- There is currently no gauge between economic growth and population growth. We don't know for sure that capitalism doesn't rely on either population or technological growth for economic survival.
- It is not possible to state population as an unequivocal cause of the enviroinmental problems, global pandemics, and abstract bipolarization of socio-economic life that most individuals call current issues of the day.
- It is pretty easy to see how a coordinated reduction in reliance on population growth and technology in developed nations, in its ideality, would solve the three aforementioned problems.
Is it possible to have a thriving capitalist economy without population and technological growth? Is it possible for human beings to be held in equilibrium in their number and technological capability by nothing but their own collective volition? There is one main difficulty with the 'let it sort itself out' approach: if our socio-economic system is contingent on growth in population and technology then when natural limiting factors arise there will be individuals who are interested in acting against movement in the direction of harmony. If those individuals also had most of the power, then it would mean disproportionately large scale suffering compared to the relative ease of few.
The purpose of children:
1. You needed a free dishwasher
2. You needed a retirement plan
The list goes on...and on...much to my dismay I must confess.