Narz
keeping it real
After you my dear.
Is overpopulation cause for concern?
- Thread starter LucyDuke
- Start date
After you my dear.
LucyDuke
staring at the clock
The cars are absolutely insane. It completely baffles me that as Americans we won't admit we have a problem.
The book I'm reading on climate change mentions the same concern for biodiversity, though it is only after we and along with a bunch of other species have been wiped out.
amadeus
Bishop of Bio-Dome
I'm not the one making outrageous claims about human civilization coming to an end when everybody in the world could fit inside the state of Texas and have an acre of land for every man, woman, and child.
I'm guessing after about >100 years time and we, if not, future generations will be royally screwed.
Narz
keeping it real
I'm not even going to respond to this garbage, I knew someone would say the "every human could fit into Texas" line sooner or later.
The Texas Argument
Narz
keeping it real
For a more academic take click the link within the link above, here it is, this should quell Formaldihyde's cries of "evidence, evidence, evidence!!" also.
Mowque
Hypermodernist
Hey I'm no crazy like Narz (
) But the Texas argument? Really?.
Edit- I was merely expressing my shock that a (usually) smart and clever poster such as Amadeus would post that...dreck..as a argument.
) But the Texas argument? Really?.Edit- I was merely expressing my shock that a (usually) smart and clever poster such as Amadeus would post that...dreck..as a argument.
Narz
keeping it real
Crazy like a fox.
And I'm not sure what you're asking Mo.
And I'm not sure what you're asking Mo.
Who hasn't admitted we have a problem?
Every car company on the planet is scrambling to offer a 100% electric motor vehicle within the next 2 years.
Renewable energy is growing exponentially (solar doubling every 2 years, wind doubling every 3 years) to provide the electricity to run the vehicles.
Winner
Diverse in Unity
Europe exterminated most of its fragile species centuries ago. All you have left are roachesI'm honestly of the opinion that Australia should be paid an "inefficiency dividend" for our utter inability to exterminate our wildlife before people started caring. It now costs us a fortune because we have to put up with ignorant Europeans and Americans crying over our culls of the overpopulated Grey and Red Kangaroos. If you look and care you should have to pay for the privilege of enjoying our biodiversity, you exterminated yours
Sorry, but if anybody screwed your environment, it's you. And you're still doing that - as Diamond wrote: you're mining it.
As for European biodiversity - some species are now at or near the bottleneck, so it is to be expected that some of them don't make it. There is not much we can do about it. The important point is that the overall quality of environment in Europe is improving - less pollution, more forests, more natural reserves, more government money spend on environmental protection.
We're on a right track, which is why Europe will survive while Australia will collapse. How many people can that continent sustain? 7 million at most? You're well past that point.
Please note that your ridiculous idea that Earth could sustain 50 billion people has been noted and thoroughly laughed at
It's actually funny how hard are you trying NOT to understand what we're saying.
Imagine you get stuck on a deserted island with very limited resources. There is a limited number of coconut palms, limited number of animals you can hunt, limited ways how to obtain fresh water. You can either realize the limitation and take only as much as you need to survive in order to allow the resources to regenerate (in other words, consume the resources at a rate lower than the natural replacement rate), or you can eat/drink everything now to fill your stomach in order to feel good for a while, and then die because you exhausted all the sources of food and water (in other words, you can consume the resources at a rate higher than the natural replacement rate - and die).
Which makes more sense from a human/economist's point of view?
If we as a civilization want to survive on this planet, we need to learn how to live sustainably. That's a fact, pure and simple.
Narz
keeping it real
But dude, I was on this desert island once & we were all drinking pina-coladas comfortably! No one was starving. There was a little hotel that fit 300 of us, probably if the hotel were tall enough we could fit the whole state of Texas there. Pwned!Please note that your ridiculous idea that Earth could sustain 50 billion people has been noted and thoroughly laughed at
It's actually funny how hard are you trying NOT to understand what we're saying.
Imagine you get stuck on a deserted island with a very limited resources. There is a limited number of coconut palms, limited number of animals you can hunt, limited ways how to obtain fresh water. You can either realize the limitation and take only as much as you need to survive in order to allow the resources to regenerate (in other words, consume the resources at a rate lower than the natural replacement rate), or you can eat/drink everything now to fill your stomach in order to feel good for a while, and then die because you exhausted all the sources of food and water (in other words, you can consume the resources at a rate higher than the natural replacement rate - and die).
Winner
Diverse in Unity
But dude, I was on this desert island once & we were all drinking pina-coladas comfortably! No one was starving. There was a little hotel that fit 300 of us, probably if the hotel were tall enough we could fit the whole state of Texas there. Pwned!
Touché
PiMan
Deity
According to the Optimum Population Trust, Australia's population based on current lifestyles is sustainable at just 10 million people. Well below the current population of 21 million, but certainly above your estimate of 7 million.
If we were to change our lifestyle to be similar to Europe's but with two-fifths the energy usage, then we could support that full 21 million.
Your country, the Czech Republic, can sustain a population of just 4 million based on current lifestyles, and 8 million according to the European average lifestyle and two-fifths the energy usage. Compare this with your current population of 10.5 million.
Winner
Diverse in Unity
It's not my estimate, but Diamond's (it's possible the figure is different, I read it long time ago). It's not about energy usage or whatever crazy methodology does the "trust" use, it's about what Australia's dry climate, poor soils and fragile ecosystem can handle.
So far, Australians are doing a great job destroying the environment on their continent at an alarming rate.
Czech Rep. has many environmental advantages compared to Australia - we have plenty of fresh water, fertile soils that are not being eroded and depleted so fast, temperate climate, plenty of forests and relatively low population density (by European standards). Even with eco-friendly policies in place, our country could support twice as much people (not that I want it) as it does now.
The biggest difference is that the environmental situation here is improving, while the situation in Australia is getting worse.
PiMan
Deity
This Optimum Population Trust takes into account water resources, soil quality and many other figures. Just look at the first Excel spreadsheet in the linked page to see the numbers that have gone into it.
I see no more reason to trust Diamond than what I linked (or vice versa).
I see no more reason to trust Diamond than what I linked (or vice versa).
Well, Nature is nasty in tooth & claw. There are millions of species breeding and eating each other. This has created a huge web of life, where each species' lifestyle contributes to keeping things rich and healthy. Now, humans are king of the planet. We benefit from the toilings and the natural selection. Sure, there are a few pests. But we benefit from the cleaned air, the enriched soil, the pollinated plants, the cleaned water.
Ecosystems are like a cloth. You can snip a few strings in a cloth, and it's still a perfectly good cloth. You can snip a few more, and it becomes tattered looking, but you can still use it. But eventually there's a point where the cloth is just crap, right? Amazingly, it's still 30 or 50% 'whole', but it's still crap for us. This is because the weave is a self-supporting system, it has a threshold which we don't want to go past. And like strings in a cloth, an extinct species doesn't come back. And it doesn't get replaced in an ecosystem (via natural selection) in timeframes that we appreciate.
OR.
Think of it like an economy, and businesses being lost (since businesses live nasty tooth & claw with each other). You city could handle it if a few coffee shops went out of business. They could handle it if a few lawyers went out of business. But if you ruin enough businesses, you'll finally get a runaway effect which would greatly ruin the town.
And where amadeus makes a mistake about Texas. The entire planet does NOT live in Texas, and yet their main aquifer is dropping. Now aquifer water is cleaned via natural processes, processes which we don't pay for, and deem to be 'free'. Texans are pretty wealthy, but how wealthy are they going to be when they have to pay for technology to clean their water?
Oh yeah, we'll adapt. But we'll 'adapt' by eating the seed corn. As well, because aquifers run dry rather suddenly, we're not really going to see a slow escalation of the cost of water, but it will happen rather quickly. We'll go from using well water that's nearly free to only being able to use precipitation water. And we'll be used to having nearly free water.
Ayatollah So
the spoof'll set you free
Evil capitalists to the rescue?
If everything (or at least food and water, for starters) is about to become in terribly short supply ...
Why hasn't the price gone up already?
After all, before the world economy tanked, oil speculators had already bid up the price to levels we can expect to see when oil has peaked and production has begun to decline. And why? Out of the goodness of their hearts, to give us the wake-up call that our favorite form of energy is running low? No, to make money on the inevitable future price rise (they jumped the gun, as it turned out, but never mind about that, their predictions will come true within the decade, I don't doubt). But, it DID have the salutary side effect of sounding that wake-up call.
So then, why isn't there a booming futures market in water?
Wall Street isn't omniscient, of course, but you'd figure there'd be at least a few geniuses out there positioning themselves. Unless - smart money is betting that conservation measures will quickly be worked out, allowing more people to flourish with less water. That "we can do it - we have the technology" to quote a famous TV series.
If everything (or at least food and water, for starters) is about to become in terribly short supply ...
Why hasn't the price gone up already?
After all, before the world economy tanked, oil speculators had already bid up the price to levels we can expect to see when oil has peaked and production has begun to decline. And why? Out of the goodness of their hearts, to give us the wake-up call that our favorite form of energy is running low? No, to make money on the inevitable future price rise (they jumped the gun, as it turned out, but never mind about that, their predictions will come true within the decade, I don't doubt). But, it DID have the salutary side effect of sounding that wake-up call.
So then, why isn't there a booming futures market in water?
Wall Street isn't omniscient, of course, but you'd figure there'd be at least a few geniuses out there positioning themselves. Unless - smart money is betting that conservation measures will quickly be worked out, allowing more people to flourish with less water. That "we can do it - we have the technology" to quote a famous TV series.