Hall of Fame Member
Posts: 10,496 
Location: The Evil Empire
Location: The Evil Empire
February 14th, 2006, 09:42 AM
The global population is higher than the Earth can sustain, argues the Director of the British Antarctic Survey in the first of a series of environmental opinion pieces on the BBC News website entitled The Green Room. Solving environmental problems such as climate change is going to be impossible without tackling the issue, he says.
Ten thousand delegates attended the recent Montreal Summit on the control of carbon emissions "beyond Kyoto".
That's a lot of people! The conference organisation must have been daunting; and just imagine arranging the hotel accommodation and restaurant facilities and dealing with the additional human-generated waste.
Imagine the carbon and nitrogen emissions from the associated air travel!
The 40 or more decisions made were announced as an historic success.
Supposing this proves to be so, will it be sufficient to secure an acceptable quality of life for the generations to come?
What about the myriad other planetary-scale human impacts - for example on land cover, the water cycle, the health of ecosystems, and biodiversity?
What about our release of other chemicals into the environment?
What about our massive transport and mixing of biological material worldwide, and our unsustainable consumption of resources?
Big foot
All of these effects interconnect and add up to the collective "footprint" of humankind on our planet's life support systems.
The consequences extend to the ends of the Earth (recall the hole in the ozone layer over the Antarctic) and each is as difficult to predict and as challenging to deal with as the link between carbon emissions and climate.
It would surely be impractical and almost certainly ineffective to assemble 10,000 delegates to address each one of these issues, and especially to do so in the necessary "joined up" way?
And in particular, what about the net 76 million annual rise in the world's population, which currently stands at about 6.5 billion - more than twice what it was in 1960 - and which is heading towards eight billion or so by mid-century)?
That's an annual increase 7,500 times the number of delegates in Montreal.
Imagine organising the accommodation, feeding arrangements, schooling, employment, medical care, cultural activities and general infrastructure - transport, power, water, communications, waste disposal - for a number of people slightly larger than the population of the UK, and doing it each year, year on year for the foreseeable future.
Combined with ongoing economic growth, what will be the effect on our collective human "footprint"? Will the planet cope?
Steps to Utopia
Although reducing human emissions to the atmosphere is undoubtedly of critical importance, as are any and all measures to reduce the human environmental "footprint", the truth is that the contribution of each individual cannot be reduced to zero.
Only the lack of the individual can bring it down to nothing.
So if we believe that the size of the human "footprint" is a serious problem (and there is much evidence for this) then a rational view would be that along with a raft of measures to reduce the footprint per person, the issue of population management must be addressed.
Let us assume (reasonably) that an optimum human population level exists, which would provide the physical and intellectual capacity to ensure a rich and fulfilling life for all, but would represent a call upon the services of the planet which would be benign and hence sustainable over the long term.
A scientific analysis can tell us what that optimum number is (perhaps 2-3 billion?).
With that number and a timescale as targets, a path to reach "Utopia" from where we are now is, in principle, a straightforward matter of identifying options, choosing the approach and then planning and navigating the route from source to destination.
Cinderella subject
In practice, of course, it is a bombshell of a topic, with profound and emotive issues of ethics, morality, equity and practicability.
As found in China, practicability and acceptability can be particularly elusive.
So controversial is the subject that it has become the "Cinderella" of the great sustainability debate - rarely visible in public, or even in private.
In interdisciplinary meetings addressing how the planet functions as an integrated whole, demographers and population specialists are usually notable by their absence.
Rare indeed are the opportunities for religious leaders, philosophers, moralists, policymakers, politicians and indeed the "global public" to debate the trajectory of the world's human population in the context of its stress on the Earth system, and to decide what might be done.
Unless and until this changes, summits such as that in Montreal which address only part of the problem will be limited to at best very modest success, with the welfare and quality of life of future generations the ineluctable casualty.
Professor Chris Rapley is Director of the British Antarctic Survey, based in Cambridge, UK
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/4584572.stm
The global population is higher than the Earth can sustain, argues the Director of the British Antarctic Survey in the first of a series of environmental opinion pieces on the BBC News website entitled The Green Room. Solving environmental problems such as climate change is going to be impossible without tackling the issue, he says.
Ten thousand delegates attended the recent Montreal Summit on the control of carbon emissions "beyond Kyoto".
That's a lot of people! The conference organisation must have been daunting; and just imagine arranging the hotel accommodation and restaurant facilities and dealing with the additional human-generated waste.
Imagine the carbon and nitrogen emissions from the associated air travel!
The 40 or more decisions made were announced as an historic success.
Supposing this proves to be so, will it be sufficient to secure an acceptable quality of life for the generations to come?
What about the myriad other planetary-scale human impacts - for example on land cover, the water cycle, the health of ecosystems, and biodiversity?
What about our release of other chemicals into the environment?
What about our massive transport and mixing of biological material worldwide, and our unsustainable consumption of resources?
Big foot
All of these effects interconnect and add up to the collective "footprint" of humankind on our planet's life support systems.
The consequences extend to the ends of the Earth (recall the hole in the ozone layer over the Antarctic) and each is as difficult to predict and as challenging to deal with as the link between carbon emissions and climate.
It would surely be impractical and almost certainly ineffective to assemble 10,000 delegates to address each one of these issues, and especially to do so in the necessary "joined up" way?
And in particular, what about the net 76 million annual rise in the world's population, which currently stands at about 6.5 billion - more than twice what it was in 1960 - and which is heading towards eight billion or so by mid-century)?
That's an annual increase 7,500 times the number of delegates in Montreal.
Imagine organising the accommodation, feeding arrangements, schooling, employment, medical care, cultural activities and general infrastructure - transport, power, water, communications, waste disposal - for a number of people slightly larger than the population of the UK, and doing it each year, year on year for the foreseeable future.
Combined with ongoing economic growth, what will be the effect on our collective human "footprint"? Will the planet cope?
Steps to Utopia
Although reducing human emissions to the atmosphere is undoubtedly of critical importance, as are any and all measures to reduce the human environmental "footprint", the truth is that the contribution of each individual cannot be reduced to zero.
Only the lack of the individual can bring it down to nothing.
So if we believe that the size of the human "footprint" is a serious problem (and there is much evidence for this) then a rational view would be that along with a raft of measures to reduce the footprint per person, the issue of population management must be addressed.
Let us assume (reasonably) that an optimum human population level exists, which would provide the physical and intellectual capacity to ensure a rich and fulfilling life for all, but would represent a call upon the services of the planet which would be benign and hence sustainable over the long term.
A scientific analysis can tell us what that optimum number is (perhaps 2-3 billion?).
With that number and a timescale as targets, a path to reach "Utopia" from where we are now is, in principle, a straightforward matter of identifying options, choosing the approach and then planning and navigating the route from source to destination.
Cinderella subject
In practice, of course, it is a bombshell of a topic, with profound and emotive issues of ethics, morality, equity and practicability.
As found in China, practicability and acceptability can be particularly elusive.
So controversial is the subject that it has become the "Cinderella" of the great sustainability debate - rarely visible in public, or even in private.
In interdisciplinary meetings addressing how the planet functions as an integrated whole, demographers and population specialists are usually notable by their absence.
Rare indeed are the opportunities for religious leaders, philosophers, moralists, policymakers, politicians and indeed the "global public" to debate the trajectory of the world's human population in the context of its stress on the Earth system, and to decide what might be done.
Unless and until this changes, summits such as that in Montreal which address only part of the problem will be limited to at best very modest success, with the welfare and quality of life of future generations the ineluctable casualty.
Professor Chris Rapley is Director of the British Antarctic Survey, based in Cambridge, UK
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/4584572.stm
Genius
Posts: 859
Location: Whitby, Ontario
Location: Whitby, Ontario
February 14th, 2006, 09:54 AM
Well of course the Earth is over populated. Not sure what to do; nature used to keep us in check with natural selection and the odd epedemic here and there. Wars and violet conflict haven't been doing as good a job as before in controling our population.
We have a few options:
We can expand our horizons and invest in space exploration and find another planet or two to in habit.
We can regress morally and cull our population
We could genetically engineer a super natural predator that would make sure we stay in check.
We could invest in genetic research and find out what makes you homosexual and propogate it throughout the world.
Any other ideas?
Well of course the Earth is over populated. Not sure what to do; nature used to keep us in check with natural selection and the odd epedemic here and there. Wars and violet conflict haven't been doing as good a job as before in controling our population.
We have a few options:
We can expand our horizons and invest in space exploration and find another planet or two to in habit.
We can regress morally and cull our population
We could genetically engineer a super natural predator that would make sure we stay in check.
We could invest in genetic research and find out what makes you homosexual and propogate it throughout the world.
Any other ideas?
House Member
Posts: 2,761
Location: California
Location: California
February 14th, 2006, 10:06 AM
You may be surprised to hear this, but I've actually found it's easy to get men to have sex when they know I don't want to do it so I can produce a baby. 
Quoting
Enjoying my child free existence Quoting
So, what are you doing later?
We could try to get my mother to stop harassing me into procreating...
You may be surprised to hear this, but I've actually found it's easy to get men to have sex when they know I don't want to do it so I can produce a baby. Super Genius
Posts: 1,274
February 19th, 2006, 05:19 PM
I think we have been on the verge of having Utopia for the past few hundred years, its completely possible.
Over-population is one thing that ensures we won't get there.
There is no doubt we are over-populated, many of our problems would be gone if we were 1/10th or even less populated.
Big "footprint" problems like global warming and pollution, which are both a survival threat and causing illness right now, would not be issues if we were less populated. Many diseases and mental health issues would be reduced with reduced population.
Some religious followers might not see our present numbers as a problem, that it is just part of a process. We may have been guided by those people...
I think that various areas of the world used various techniques to convince the human race to become over-populated. Religion was the most common on.
The great boom in the human population came in the 21st C. Mass communication could have swayed people one way or another, and we sure never heard anything about slowing down.
Catholics were openly encouraged to have lost of kids, many Catholic families I knew had 12 or more kids.
That was in the "greatest population explosion of all time" years of the mid- 20th Century.
Keeping up with the third world was a challenge. In north american schools, in the 60's, we heard about the huge numbers of foreign people, brown people. We would be swallowed by their sheer numbers, numbers we could not imagine.
Population, like many of the issues in those days, were handled so apcalyptic, even just smoking a joint. Our leaders were stretching out for the most radical scary scenerios for some of these issues.
Something was really wrong with so many of the individuals in leadership roles, as if they were all insane, talking abour Reefer Madness and The Cold War Threat and Commies Everywhere ahhhhhh!!!!! Looking back, they really look nuts if they took themselves seriously.
They, the leaders/authority of the 40's 50's 60's and 70's, were brainwashed to spread the Elites agenda. They tried to spread it to all of us, with some success - we over-populated ourselves, and very few even saw it coming. We adapted lots of other brainless habits too, like being good consumers way beyond what we need.
Once we come out from over-population and poor health and ruined environement, someone will be there trying to make sure we never find our Utopia. Its just fear.
I think we have been on the verge of having Utopia for the past few hundred years, its completely possible.
Over-population is one thing that ensures we won't get there.
There is no doubt we are over-populated, many of our problems would be gone if we were 1/10th or even less populated.
Big "footprint" problems like global warming and pollution, which are both a survival threat and causing illness right now, would not be issues if we were less populated. Many diseases and mental health issues would be reduced with reduced population.
Some religious followers might not see our present numbers as a problem, that it is just part of a process. We may have been guided by those people...
I think that various areas of the world used various techniques to convince the human race to become over-populated. Religion was the most common on.
The great boom in the human population came in the 21st C. Mass communication could have swayed people one way or another, and we sure never heard anything about slowing down.
Catholics were openly encouraged to have lost of kids, many Catholic families I knew had 12 or more kids.
That was in the "greatest population explosion of all time" years of the mid- 20th Century.
Keeping up with the third world was a challenge. In north american schools, in the 60's, we heard about the huge numbers of foreign people, brown people. We would be swallowed by their sheer numbers, numbers we could not imagine.
Population, like many of the issues in those days, were handled so apcalyptic, even just smoking a joint. Our leaders were stretching out for the most radical scary scenerios for some of these issues.
Something was really wrong with so many of the individuals in leadership roles, as if they were all insane, talking abour Reefer Madness and The Cold War Threat and Commies Everywhere ahhhhhh!!!!! Looking back, they really look nuts if they took themselves seriously.
They, the leaders/authority of the 40's 50's 60's and 70's, were brainwashed to spread the Elites agenda. They tried to spread it to all of us, with some success - we over-populated ourselves, and very few even saw it coming. We adapted lots of other brainless habits too, like being good consumers way beyond what we need.
Once we come out from over-population and poor health and ruined environement, someone will be there trying to make sure we never find our Utopia. Its just fear.
