Depopulation Discussion

Jaeger 90

Its official our world cannot sustain the population it currently has, we are an evolving process that nature will correct. The only reason our farms produce enough food for the few that eat is through use of fertilizer made from limited fossilized minerals. We are living today off tomorrows supply.


So what is your ideal method of depopulation. I see three principal methods, feel free to add your own interpretations or idea's.

Famine, letting nature take its course instead of supllying food aid(ie. Africa)
Forced birth control. (never really implemented as far as I can see, maybe china with their one child per couple strategy)

Genocide (happening since the dawn of man)


People would complain about Genocide and forced birth control as acts against nature, I think it really depends on your view of how much we decide on instinct, which I think can be taken that all of our acts are acts of nature.


Jesus Freaks need not apply, I would like scientific discussions based on facts and logic, thanks

bizmark

Start off by killing yourself

thanks
The world

SLUSK

Are you willing to sterilize yourself to help "depopulate" the planet?

I know that some of the more consistent environmentalists advocate mass genocide in order to "save" the planet. Are you one of them?

Jaeger 90

SLUSK wrote: »

Are you willing to sterilize yourself to help "depopulate" the planet?

I know that some of the more consistent environmentalists advocate mass genocide in order to "save" the planet. Are you one of them?

When a prize winning race horse retires, what does he become?
a stud, ye?

so why don't they let a banjaxed horse father horses? genetics, we all now it already, why doesn't it apply to us, but to other animals.

People perish and die, but we can improve on ourselves, its taboo subject so I'm trying to get a proper discussion instead of just, Hitler! Hitler! head in the sand - things are fine, a rock concert can cure AIDS, there's enough food for everyone, because Money = Food doesn't it, so spending less on TV's and shit and no one goes hungry.

shqipshume

That's why they have introduced swine flu.Don't worry they make sure we die of some way so we don't over populate

SLUSK

Jaeger 90:
If you advocate sterilization or even genocide why are you not willing to be the victim of this?

bizmark

He's better than you and 99% of the population clearly :rolleyes:

SLUSK

Yeah he clearly is a member of the master race.

SLUSK

SLUSK wrote: »

Jaeger 90:
If you advocate sterilization or even genocide why are you not willing to be the victim of this?

He didn't say he advocated it, he wondered which of the three would be the best solution to the problem (and there is a problem).

This thread is hilarious: a number of posters get emotional when somebody poses a taboo question. He's asking a question, so stop acting like an emotional mob.

Jaeger 90

SLUSK wrote: »

Jaeger 90:
If you advocate sterilization or even genocide why are you not willing to be the victim of this?

Is that question supposed to 'catch me out'. great debate, and when did I advocate it? it is an option, but you'd obviously apply it to weaker cultures.

Irish people are hardly top of the league by any stretch I know, but its one to think about which you obviously don't, because you haven't made any actual points, you've just poorly tried to 'outwit' and discredit me.

Húrin

I acknowledge population growth as a problem second only to economic growth. However I haven't researched the options for curtailing it.

One child policies seem to be the best answer of the three, but my inner pessimist tells me that an epidemic disease will get most of us first.

Genocide is not only incredibly immoral, it also doesn't work. The century with the most lethal genocides, the 20th, was also the one with the fastest population growth.

silverharp

there has been a fairly strong correlation between population growth and energy supply in the past , in the absence of a giant leap forward to a new source as there was from coal to oil a 100 years ago, one would expect some levelling off. I think its too difficult to say how a negetive growth in population might occur. It could be slow and natural or it could be accelerated if the more negetive Peak Oil scenarios were to play out. I'm tending to opt for the muddle through for now as the global economy could be in some kind of recession for the next 15 to 20 years so that will curb consumption and may give time for new developments or adjusting to lower consumption.

ScumLord

Thats a load of cock. The only reason people are starving is because they can't afford the food they produce. There is more than enough food to go around it's just that most of it rots on our shelf's. Your greed fuels poverty.

Joey the lips

Jaeger 90 wrote: »

Jesus Freaks need not apply, I would like scientific discussions based on facts and logic, thanks

The bibal is factual and logical its just open to interpretation, Kinda the greatest logic ever i would have thought.

But you need not worry about shortages of food. The biggest threat to our existance is the shortage of fresh water! I kid you not

Courtasy of the BBC!


Last Updated: Friday, 2 June, 2000, 09:30 GMT 10:30 UK
Email this to a friend Printable version
Dawn of a thirsty century



By Alex Kirby
BBC News Online environment correspondent



The amount of water in the world is limited. The human race, and the other species which share the planet, cannot expect an infinite supply.
Water covers about two-thirds of the Earth's surface, admittedly. But most is too salty for use.
Population is rising, but water supplies are not

Only 2.5% of the world's water is not salty, and two-thirds of that is locked up in the icecaps and glaciers.
Of what is left, about 20% is in remote areas, and much of the rest arrives at the wrong time and place, as monsoons and floods.
Humans have available less than 0.08% of all the Earth's water. Yet over the next two decades our use is estimated to increase by about 40%.
Water shortages set to grow


In 1999 the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) reported that 200 scientists in 50 countries had identified water shortage as one of the two most worrying problems for the new millennium (the other was global warming).
We use about 70% of the water we have in agriculture. But the World Water Council believes that by 2020 we shall need 17% more water than is available if we are to feed the world.
GETTING WORSE
Growing populations
Inefficient irrigation
Pollution

So if we go on as we are, millions more will go to bed hungry and thirsty each night than do so already.
Today, one person in five across the world has no access to safe drinking water, and one in two lacks safe sanitation.
Today, and every day, more than 30,000 children die before reaching their fifth birthdays, killed either by hunger or by easily-preventable diseases.
And adequate safe water is key to good health and a proper diet. In China, for example, it takes 1,000 tonnes of water to produce one tonne of wheat.
Inefficiency behind water crisis
There are several reasons for the water crisis. One is the simple rise in population, and the desire for better living standards.
In China it takes 1,000 tonnes of water to produce one tonne of wheat


Another is the inefficiency of the way we use much of our water. Irrigation allows wastage on a prodigal scale, with the water trickling away or simply evaporating before it can do any good.
And pollution is making more of the water that is available to us unfit for use. The Aral Sea in central Asia is one of the starkest examples of what pollution can do, to the land as well as the water.
Increasingly, governments are seeking to solve their water problems by turning away from reliance on rainfall and surface water, and using subterranean supplies of groundwater instead.
But that is like making constant withdrawals from a bank account without ever paying anything into it.
Looking for solutions
And using up irreplaceable groundwater does not simply mean the depletion of a once-and-for-all resource.
Rivers, wetlands and lakes that depend on it can dry out. Saline seawater can flow in to replace the fresh water that has been pumped out.
Pumping groundwater is like making constant withdrawals from a bank account without ever paying anything into it


And the emptied underground aquifers can be compressed, causing surface subsidence - a problem familiar in Bangkok, Mexico City and Venice.
There are some ways to begin to tackle the problem. Irrigation systems which drip water directly onto plants are one, precision sprinklers another.
There will be scope to plant less water-intensive crops, and perhaps desalination may play a part - though it is energy-hungry and leaves quantities of brine for disposal.
Climate change will probably bring more rain to some regions and less to others, and its overall impact remains uncertain.
But if we are to get through the water crisis, we should heed the UNEP report's reminder that we have only one interdependent planet to share. It said: "The environment remains largely outside the mainstream of everyday human consciousness, and is still considered an add-on to the fabric of life."



http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/755497.stm

Jaeger 90

ScumLord wrote: »

Thats a load of cock. The only reason people are starving is because they can't afford the food they produce. There is more than enough food to go around it's just that most of it rots on our shelf's. Your greed fuels poverty.

No, most of the more poverty stricken area's in Africa consist of subsistence farmers, who rely on food aid from the west.

Rots on our shelfs, what exactly do you base that on? nothing I suspect

Zillah

ScumLord wrote: »

Thats a load of cock. The only reason people are starving is because they can't afford the food they produce. There is more than enough food to go around it's just that most of it rots on our shelf's. Your greed fuels poverty.

In terms of basic survival? Maybe. But it has been calculated that if every human on the planet were to consume resources at the rate of an average US citizen then we'd need a planet four times the size of earth to supply it.

Húrin

ScumLord wrote: »

Thats a load of cock. The only reason people are starving is because they can't afford the food they produce. There is more than enough food to go around it's just that most of it rots on our shelf's. Your greed fuels poverty.

You are correct in that we have enough food to feed the world. Just much of it is in the wrong place. Much of the third world barely survives by exporting grain to be fed to animals whose meat price is depressed by supermarket cartels.

These circumstances are a result of unfair trade policies created by western governments. So you are completely incorrect to imply that it is a matter of greedy western people buying too much food. Our consumer choices have no effect on this sorry state of affairs.

ChocolateSauce

Well I think sustainable intensive industrial farming combined with massive genetic modification of our food is the way forward, and I've heard some estimates of such methods being able to feed 30 billion people in ideal circumstances.

Dades

Húrin wrote: »

One child policies seem to be the best answer of the three, but my inner pessimist tells me that an epidemic disease will get most of us first.

I'd agree with this. In an ideal world people wouldn't have kids they can't afford to clothe and feed. However as this is unlikely to change, it's more likely some sort of Malthusian catastrophe will finish off a good chunk of humanity. Probably the poorer, weaker chunk too.

Take a look at these maps showing the expansion of the human race, and remember what 'the agent' in the Matrix has to say about humanity. :pac:

http://desip.igc.org/populationmaps.html

Scary growth. Short of alchemy, I don't see science saving us from some sort of a planetary "reboot".

Gurgle

Jaeger 90 wrote: »

Its official our world cannot sustain the population it currently has,

source?

Bottle_of_Smoke

Dades wrote: »

I'd agree with this. In an ideal world people wouldn't have kids they can't afford to clothe and feed. However as this is unlikely to change, it's more likely some sort of Malthusian catastrophe will finish off a good chunk of humanity. Probably the poorer, weaker chunk too.

Take a look at these maps showing the expansion of the human race, and remember what 'the agent' in the Matrix has to say about humanity. :pac:

http://desip.igc.org/populationmaps.html

Scary growth. Short of alchemy, I don't see science saving us from some sort of a planetary "reboot".

That's an amazing link.

Was reading "Strawdogs" a while back, the author put forth a very good argument for our population going to about half a million by 2150. To do with how every species goes through a bell curve of population size - gets to maximum and then crashed rapidly

Húrin

Dades wrote: »

I'd agree with this. In an ideal world people wouldn't have kids they can't afford to clothe and feed. However as this is unlikely to change, it's more likely some sort of Malthusian catastrophe will finish off a good chunk of humanity. Probably the poorer, weaker chunk too.

I think that the more forward looking (by that I only mean in terms of time) among western governments are planning for just such a scenario.

I think the 2020 map is a bit unrealistic though - it shows most of Siberia and the Amazon being colonised by humans. I think it more likely that the existing areas of dense population will become ever more dense.

Gurgle

Húrin wrote: »

I think that the more forward looking (by that I only mean in terms of time) among western governments are planning for just such a scenario.

I think the 2020 map is a bit unrealistic though - it shows most of Siberia and the Amazon being colonised by humans.

While Canada and Australia remain empty.

ChocolateSauce

The Victorians were the ones who first realised this, but what they never realised was the strange phenomenon in wealthy countries of the declining birth rate. Japan is projected to lose over 30 million people by 2100 due to natural decline. Germany's population is also in decline, and the rest of western Europe is growing mainly due to the immigrant population. As the developing world becomes wealthy like the west, their birth rate will also decline, and mega disaster will be avoided.

Húrin

Yes chocolate sauce, for that reason the UN expects the population to peak at 10 billion in about 2100. However I don't think they were taking account of major possible changes in economies and societies, caused by things like climate change and peak oil.

Gurgle wrote: »

While Canada and Australia remain empty.

That's realistic IMO.

Ostrom

Jaeger 90 wrote: »

Its official our world cannot sustain the population it currently has


So what is your ideal method of depopulation.

Famine, letting nature take its course instead of supllying food aid(ie. Africa)
Forced birth control. (never really implemented as far as I can see, maybe china with their one child per couple strategy)

Genocide (happening since the dawn of man)

You're a little late.

See 150+ years of critique also

ChocolateSauce

Húrin wrote: »

Yes chocolate sauce, for that reason the UN expects the population to peak at 10 billion in about 2100. However I don't think they were taking account of major possible changes in economies and societies, caused by things like climate change and peak oil.

I'll get straight to my ultimate point then- I don't think there is going to be a global food crisis which kills off millions and millions, even when one accounts for peak oil or climate change. Production will match or exceed consumption and population growth with pan out around the globe.

There will be local famines and maybe even regional shortages, but they will be acute and irregular.

Starfox

Yes theres alot of people on our planet but theres alot of ants too! Nobody needs to be wiped out, thats very narrow minded imo!

A food depletion! maybe, but we have the resources to feed every man women and child on this planet without the need to use fossil fuels, we have the resourses to create free energy on this planet! and there is one very simple reason why this isnt the way, POWER and those that seek it.

A world hungry, a world diseased and dying is a controlled world.

bill_ashmount

Nature will sort everything out in the end.