The absolute limit is about 100 cubic meters per person. It's like like
living in prison, but it far far far away -- as it takes about 2 trillion
people to use up 70% of land area (rest ommited as hardly habilatbe, like
Himalaya, lakes and stuff).
100m3 per person, that's a space of around 4.6m around... Slightly
better than prison but still not a place I think most of us would want
to be in. Does this 100m3 includes the space needed for food and other
goods production? If so, the actual amount of usable personal space
would be significantly less. Do we really want to live in sardine
cans?
In theory my country can support a lot more people than it holds now.
But already I can barely stand the crush and crowd of people, yet like
you, my government will have us increase the population by another 50%
for the sake of the economy.
Yes, we could all live functionally in minimalistic conditions, but I
happen to prefer a quality life with space to roam than one as a drone
contributing merely to the pleasures of the elite.
You're ignoring economic pressure. And this one works best. If resources are
scarce they are expensive. And in hard situation people do not like to
reproduce if that reproduction is not going to be beneficial.
By the time that kicks in, it may be too late, if it isn't already.
It's like global warming, by the time the signs are staring at us in
the face, it may be too late to do anything useful to reverse the
effects before it rolls us over by sheer momentum.
You're right. In countries where manual labor is not so important to sustain
the family the families are smaller. And in more troubled times people
reproduce much less. Look at Russia (and Ukraine) as prime exaple. Those are
industrially developed countries, and manual labour is not needed to keep
families up. As situation is not perceived as good enough though, their
population is (rapidly) decreasing. Natural laws and laws of economy do work.
The problem is in many cases, the government attempts to counter the
natural laws. Just like in mine.
And rightly so. This is simply better for economy.
Sacrificing the world tomorrow for better economics today is right?
Well, probably doesn't matter to us since we would still benefit and
enjoy a booming economy. Too bad for the (more) people coming after us
who have to deal with the aftermath.
Simply. The laws of nature do not exclude humans. All species reduce
reproduction if conditions are not good enough.
Except the very perverse human race which unfortunately has the
conscious will to choose otherwise.
Harmful to society and to economy.
Harmful to the economy perhaps as there are less people for the
government to tax, less people to consume etc. But that's never been
my concern in this particular discussion. It's the long term
viability/survivability of the world in a NOT minimalist kind of way.
And stop kid "mass production".
At which point, they would have already contribute irrevocably to at
least a 100 years of ecological burden. It's better than they don't
add these burden today.
We're way too supid to know anything exact about the future. Wasting energy
on blind moves is a stupid idea. First we have to understand how things
work, the we can make an educated decission. Now we can't.
Having less children saves energy.
We don't know how exactly having a lot more people will do in terms of
the planet's ability to support it, in that we are blind perhaps.
Perhaps it can, perhaps it cannot. Assuming that it can, is not
exactly prudent is it? However, we do know the planet CAN support a
lesser population, in that we are not blind. Is a 100% guarantee of a
better quality of life for a smaller population better than an unknown
gamble of the entire planet's fate?
Noone has proven tha ecology is non-sustainable. It rather looks like it's
much more sustainable that we think. Fossil fuels are only like using value
As long as technological advancement manages to keep up with our
needs. But these advancement usually come with a price, and that price
is usually variety and choice. Sure we could all survive healthily
enough on 3 meals every day comprising of the same manufactured
carbohydrates, fibre, protein slabs and vitamin pills. But is that
desirable? Maybe to some it is, to some of us, that's not a life worth
living.
viable to produce fuel from crops containig a lot of oligosaccharides and
starch (apolysaccharide), at about 90-100$ per barrel it becomes viable to
produce fuel from cellulose which is abundant in plants, and in parts of
plants now thrown away. And even better there are fuel usable platns which
are not crops but which grow much faster and in areas not suitable for crops
(like willows). There are in fact countries (for example Brasil) where
significant part of transport is based on such fuels).
And we have reports of concerns that farmers are diverting so much
land to biofuel production for profits that there might not be enough
to feed people.
We're now neither shortsighted nor longsighetd -- we're allmost blind.
Blind to the future, blindly gambling that technology will get us out
of the death trap. Thus, is it not better than we do not gamble the
world on it? Should technology prevail, the lives of a lesser
population will be vastly improved, but the lives of a greater
population not that better off.
It's a significant percentage (AFAIR it's in the teens percents).
According to the Internet, 98.4% of all statistics are made up
They're unable to create psychic links with them? Things don't go like those
parent thought they would (they are often waiting long for their own, then
they look for a child to adopt, and they have idealised image of how it is
to have a child. Such image is rarely even close to being adequate)? And
last but not least, genes (and our animal instincts associated with them) do
work.
Then, the problem is with the parents, all the more they shouldn't
have children. Even for biological families, there are many I see that
are barely, if at all, qualified to be parents. My neighbour has 4
adopted children, it's been years, I don't see them having any
abnormal problems that a biological family does not.
I don't se here any ecological benefits. But I see children whoich got their
family and then lost is again. Imagine their suffering.
Every adopted child that takes the place of another newborn, say via
test tubes, is one less lifetime of pollution and ecological stress.
Therefore a benefit.
Perhaps it's a suffering, but perhaps they at least had some joy
during that period they might never have known otherwise. Ultimately,
being an abandoned child means suffering one way or another. At least
if somebody chooses to adopt rather than have a new toy, the world
benefits where it really matters.
All of us, no matter great or small, our sufferings will pass soon
enough. But the damage we do to the world, that we pass on to the next
generation, will not so easily go away. The choice is between being
selfish for our petty selves or to sacrifice (if it is even one) for
the long term greater good.
