Are there too many of us here (on Earth)?
-
I agree with you, Alan. The method of charity by rich nations to poor ones is controversial and it does not solve the problem. In fact, it possibly perpetuates or makes it worse. Food alleviates the needs of the "now", death and illness by starvation or malnutrition - but much less is done about the needs later - education, infrastructure, health, jobs, domicile. All of the things we take for granted in the Western world. Food alone only allows the poor child we save to become a poor adult with no better prospects than before, and will have more children to perpetuate the problem. It's difficult to change the way a nation works when the may suffer from decades of war, corruption, lack of resources or any combination thereof.
I disagree with the "plenty of space and resources" argument. One can compress humanity into whatever limited space desired, but that only allows for disease and strife to spread more quickly. We have some ability to live more efficiently, but that costs money. The amount of arable land can be increased but it will be at considerable expense, both financially and environmentally. It will cost water which IS in shorter supply (that also can be changed, again at great expense of money and energy), land/forest (innumerable reasons why it is a terrible idea to cut them down) and the use of fertilizers which poison our waterways and oceans. There is also the Vertical Farm Project, but again, big expense of energy and money for the return a civilization gets and simply not available to poorer countries that need it most.
Energy and money are necessities poor nations do not have access to; and when the do have access to it they want to be just like us, massive consumers of oil, resources and energy. Who can blame them?
If there was a better way to do things, we'd be doing it. The energy and money aren't there to compensate for the projected exponential increases in population. We won't give up our luxuries without a fight. Change will come any number of less desirable unfortunate ways.
-
I'm quite disheartened that you both are labeled as "Top SketchUcators". You are supposed to be architects! Architects are people who hope to design a better place for people to live, work and play. Think "The Living City" by Frank Lloyd-Wright, yet here you are being nothing more than "miserabilists".
"All of the things we take for granted in the Western world.". Well yes, but why can't the same be applied to those in the '3rd world'? It is a nonsense about "not enough money". There's plenty of money. What's wrong is our current capitalist system, where shareholders simply cream profits from companies they've invested in, and lock the rest away in banks or property. The government does nothing, because we, the voter are too miserable and too passive to realise that we have the power to do anything about it.
"disease and strife to spread more quickly"? Is this statement really true? What curable disease do you know which cannot be treated by pharmaceutical treatment?
"If there was a better way to do things, we'd be doing it." So we give up now do we? There are already plenty of "better ways" of doing things, but they are frowned upon so much comments such as this. Take Fairtrade for example. The affluent west demands 'organic' coffee, and you know how difficult coffee is to produce? If South American coffee farms could automate their businesses, they would create a far bigger yield, and have enough profit left to run hospitals, schools, libraries, all the things in the west we take for granted. But no. Too modern. We want organic! And of course, automation will just lead to more carbon going into the atmosphere.
I wrote "Let's SketchUp" because I wanted children (and adults) to help themselves visualise the wonderful future on this wonderful planet that lay ahead. Not a doom laden hell-hole where nothing changes. Perhaps I should be the "Top Sketchucator" instead??
-
"Kill yourself to save the Earth" is a message for depopulation advocates...If you think there is too much of US on this planet,
and want to contribute to solving this problem, than start from yourself...
Poor colonies were good for West countries and they kept them so... They had cheap resources, human is one..It was not good for west to let them progress...
Now, thet people are colonizing the West ....) At the end, nobody can escape from the BALANCE. And the global balance is the only solution for this problem. -
Tom, frankly I couldn't care less whether you're disheartened with Jeff and myself or not....and we are not supposed to be architects; you're assumptions in that are as faulty as in anything else.
So you're dismayed that there are no 'Whiteys' in cartoons like the ones Eric posted? Maybe if you bothered to check out the facts instead of spewing pseudo politically correct nonsense, you'd realise why.
Europe doesn't have a population explosion...nor does the rest of the developed world. Some W. European nations have a very slight population increase, almost entirely due to economic migration within the EU; an increase which is balanced in E. Europe where almost every nation is winessing a slight population DECLINE. But hey! don't let facts get in the way of a self-righteous political rant.
Liberia, on the other hand, has a population increase 10x that of the UK and 20x that of the Netherlands or Belgium. It's closely followed by other nations equally able to cope...NOT...like Eritrea and Somalia.
Fantasies about how we can make the planet more productive base that claim on the supposition that we can introduce western high-intensity farming methods everywhere. Or failing that, invest heavily in every village and hamlet in the 3rd World.
We cant. We can't even maintain those practices ourselves for much longer. They consume a disproportionate amount of petroleum, not only to fuel and power the agri-industry, but also for the production of nitrates and pesticides...and then to transport all that produce to market, rather than growing it locally.Yes, we could do all kinds of things...chop down more of Amazonia and what's left of the jungles in S.E Asia....cover the Sahara in solar cells to power desalination plants on the coast, then grow vegies in the shade of the panels; cover our coasts and the flanks of all our mountain ranges in wind turbines.
But the loss of habitat would be catastrophic and would lead to mass extinctions on a scale not seen for millions of years. For every one of your hypothetical new Einsteins we'd lose dozens of plants and animals that may hold untold riches in terms of what they may may provide us with in pharmaceuticals or other technological advances. All this quite apart from the morality of driving many of our fellow creatures to extinction simply to make breeding room for even more of us.The world population has doubled in little more than a generation and is set to double again in another generation. We just don't have the time or resources for your fantasies of a Brave New World. This is the real world, not Extreme Makeover Home Edition.
I'm heavily involved in the Rotary organisation. My own club is funding projects in Goa, Sierra Leone and several other parts of the developing world. What are you doing O saviour of Mankind? Because there's all the difference in the world between giving practical help...yet realising what is practically possible; and just spouting stuff you think sounds good but which is firmly planted in cloud-cuckoo land.Get of your high horse.
-
There's no need to swing to extremes in an attempt to dispute opinions presented. If the discussion can be kept on a logical, lucid it would be nice.
Kill yourself and save the Earth...
Why? Nobody suggested this. Why can't pragmatism and forethought create a plan that avoids draconian measures and misery and stabilizes world population? Why the prejudice against balance and the drive toward consumption acceptable? Why the resistance to seeing the results of past civilization's collapse applied to modern times and seeking to avoid the same fate?
We, the voter...
...and? One can observe that the voters have the power, but why has the desired change not been effected already? There's absolutely nothing wrong with capitalism, I'm all for it - in a well regulated fashion. I am against capitalism that makes it's profits on the backs of the common man, i.e.: The company does poorly but bonuses are given. Payroll cuts boost profitability, bonuses taken. Benefits slashed to boost profitability, bonuses taken. Company folds, golden parachute taken and the workers get nothing. Layoffs to boost profitability, bonuses again. Outsourcing (insert anything here) and laying off local employees, again - more bonuses. All of these fat bonuses are taken because the company has pushed more of the expenses of the employees off onto you and me, the taxpayer, because we pay for their unemployment, ER or medical visits they can't pay for, their defaults on loans. It's a Scam, and I'm tired of paying for their profitability.
Disease and Strife...
Where should I start? MRSA. AIDS. Malaria. Tuberculosis. Go here and get educated: http://www.cdc.gov/drugresistance/DiseasesConnectedAR.html
Organic Coffee keeps the farmers poor...
Really? You mean that $20/lb Coffee we buy keeps them poor? You mean the exorbitant markups and cuts taken by the middle men have nothing to do with it? Corrupt governments don't either I suppose. Show me the logic. I'm interested.
Doom laden...
Let's not get petty. Extremes get you nowhere. I don't base my idea of the future on "Star Trek", all rosy and technologically perfect. History has taught us that civilizations fall. Ours will too. How rapidly and in what manner it happens in is based on our decisions and actions today; doom is not certain, but if we continue down this path the fall will certainly hurt.
-
Alas yes for the moment!
By Michael Wolf (no photo montage)
Absolutly freaking! Is this the way you want to live?
Architecture of density
-
Nuff said:
-
.....and a graph showing the population rise over the last 12 000 years. Yeah it's not scary at all.
-
Yep Marian, graphs show things very clearly indeed. Is it just a co-incidence that this graph is identical to the oil production graph? I think not.
I have just read Paul Chefurka's article, Population The Elephant in the Room He makes a case for an sustainable World population after 'The Age of Oil' for no more than 1 Billion humans! He also makes an analogy using Wile E. Coyote, which I am sure will appeal to Alan F
This is the first article I've read where someone is actually willing to put a figure on a World Population for humans, all be it, without oil and no 'magic' alternative!
The article was written in 2007, some 4 years ago, and he was projecting current World population at approx. 8.2 or 8.3 Billion! As we know its now at 7 Billion. So maybe slowing!
I've also learned a new term in relation to this topic,'overshoot'! And it looks like we might well be in this phase.
If anyone is interested, its a good read, 20 minutes or so, with some quality graphs and stats to view. Check it out here, http://www.paulchefurka.ca/Population.html
EDIT: In my post above I got my figures wrong with regard to current World population. I have now corrected it.
-
Exactly my point, Mike....the idea that we can support even higher populations if everyone in the world was as efficient agriculturally as we are...when we are only as productive as we are BECAUSE of oil.
I've seen a number of such graphs; and they are all very similar. A couple of interesting facts emerge if you also study either the details of such graphs or the best mathematical modelling:-
The number of people currently alive on the planet is equal to the total number of people who EVER lived from the first appearance of Homo sapiens approx. 200,000 years ago until about 20,000 years ago...a period of 180,000 years.
The number of people currently alive also represents about 12% of all the people who have ever lived. That is one serious geometrical increase.
-
..... so the only way population can continue to grow is with some new mystical sources of energies that will replace oil energy and goods? Can't see that happening within the projected time-span for oil depletion. So, it looks like it will be down to Nature to sort it all out until such a source is found
Alan, we will be long gone when this comes about
-
@alan fraser said:
Yes, we could do all kinds of things...chop down more of Amazonia and what's left of the jungles in S.E Asia....cover the Sahara in solar cells to power desalination plants on the coast, then grow vegies in the shade of the panels; cover our coasts and the flanks of all our mountain ranges in wind turbines.
Wind turbines? Solar panels?? Why on earth would we want to do that? Solar panels and wind turbines are a massive waste of resources (and I mean massive!). Safer thorium powered nuclear power stations would be far more efficient and longer lasting than the former.
@alan fraser said:
But the loss of habitat would be catastrophic and would lead to mass extinctions on a scale not seen for millions of years. For every one of your hypothetical new Einsteins we'd lose dozens of plants and animals that may hold untold riches in terms of what they may may provide us with in pharmaceuticals or other technological advances. All this quite apart from the morality of driving many of our fellow creatures to extinction simply to make breeding room for even more of us.
You must have heard of scientific cataloging? Anyway what's the use of a lot of plants if we don't have the scientists who can make new biological, and quote "pharmaceutical or other technological advances"??
As for "Millions of years worth of destruction"? Again, I'm not too sure. It seems that the Amazon rainforest believe it or not is manmade anyway! It probably would have never existed if man hadn't farmed the land in the first place
@unknownuser said:
the Americas were a far more urban, more populated, and more technologically advanced region than generally assumed; and the Indians, rather than living in static harmony with nature, radically engineered the landscape across the continents, to the point that even "timeless" natural features like the Amazon rainforest can be seen as products of human intervention.
There have already been a couple of BBC documentaries about this already.
@unknownuser said:
The Amazon rainforest is the epitome of a last great wilderness under threat from modern man. It has become an international cause celebre for environmentalists as powerful agricultural and industrial interests bent on felling trees encroach ever deeper into virgin forest. But the latest evidence suggests that the Amazon is not what it seems.
As more trees are felled, the story of a far less natural Amazon is revealed - enormous manmade structures, even cities, hidden for centuries under what was believed to be untouched forest. All the time archaeologists are discovering ancient, highly fertile soils that can only have been produced by sophisticated agriculture far and wide across the Amazon basin. This startling evidence sheds new light on long-dismissed accounts from the very first conquistadors of an Amazon teeming with people and threatens to turn our whole notion of wilderness on its head. And if even the Amazon turns out to be unnatural, what then for the future of wilderness?
http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b0122njpSo there you go. Everything you are so worried of loosing isn't about to disappear as quickly as you initially thought. The graph everyone keeps flaunting may show population increasing exponentially, but actually humans have always foiled this by being resourceful. I have no doubt that we may run out of oil one day, but like usual, humans will find new and innovative ways of extracting what is needed from the earth;
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hydraulic_fracturing -
@mike lucey said:
..... so the only way population can continue to grow is with some new mystical sources of energies that will replace oil energy and goods? Can't see that happening within the projected time-span for oil depletion. So, it looks like it will be down to Nature to sort it all out until such a source is found
Alan, we will be long gone when this comes about
Mike Like I just said, "What about thorium?"
...and then there is Shale gas too.
Here's a funny article about "Peak Wood", a crisis that happened in the Elizabethan period.
@unknownuser said:
The energy crisis which struck the British Isles was βpeak woodβ. The idea of peak wood may seem absurd from our vantage point in human history, but be assured it was taken seriously by the Elizabethans.
http://www.spiked-online.com/index.php/debates/copenhagen_article/9202/ -
-
.... a totally 'natural' process!
-
Wow! What a revelation. There are the remains of ancient civilizations that have been since reclaimed by nature. Presumably the existence of Leptis Magna or many Egyptian sites now partly covered by desert sand means that the Sahara must be largely man-made too?
The plain fact is that tree cover is the natural clothing of the planet in all areas of the globe that have enough precipitation and sunlight to support it....and however much you care to extrapolate a few findings to complete absurdity.
Scientists may argue about the precise ratio, but it's generally agreed that as much O2 is produced onland as is produced by phytoplankton in the oceans...and it's the trees that are producing it.
It doesn't take a rocket scientist to work out what happens if you get rid of most if not all of the current tree cover and replace it by yet more people and livestock all breathing out CO2....especially when current levels of human activity are also seriously degrading plankton levels as well. LinkIt doesn't matter what new technologies are brought online...be it Thorium MSR, nuclear fusion or even Prof. Rossi's E-Cat cold fusion device, the result is exactly the same...just deferred.
The population is increasing. Other than a few setbacks like pandemics, it has been for the last 200,000 years. So even if such 'Star Trek' futures are attainable; and the population increases to 2 or 3 times its current level? What then?...it'll still continue to increase...or do you two imagine that it will simply and magically stop increasing for some mysterious reason?All you are arguing for is procrastination...dumping difficult decisions into the lap of some future generation. What decisions regarding population stabilization will they NOT have to face at some point in the future, that we are faced with at present? The only difference will be that we'll have raped the planet in the meantime.
-
@alan fraser said:
I'm heavily involved in the Rotary organisation. My own club is funding projects in Goa, Sierra Leone and several other parts of the developing world. What are you doing O saviour of Mankind? Because there's all the difference in the world between giving practical help...yet realising what is practically possible; and just spouting stuff you think sounds good but which is firmly planted in cloud-cuckoo land.
Well since you asked (and initially I didn't really want to rise to the bait, but what the heck?) For the last couple of years I have been raising awareness and money for the Alzheimer's Association, as well as the Stroke Association. I've also worked with children with severe disabilities such as cerebral palsy and autism, raising public awareness through music related workshops (CBSO, LPO and Glyndebourne Opera). A while ago I worked closely with a UNICEF based charity, raising money from the west German government to help a small village better their water system and get the youngsters to train learning how to fix basic electrical items. Really they should have learn't how to design and program computers, but that's what I was hoping to do with my books- starting with the SketchUp one. I'm also a member the PTA at my kids school. We've already raised money through a series of summer events to provide a school projector for the hall. I teach kids about architectural as well as engineering principles- with an emphasis on those in state education, as depressingly our governments seem to neglect that not everyone can afford to go to public schools (both Cameron and Clegg are Etonians).
It's very nice to hear that you are doing work with the Rotary Club. I bet you like showing off to the people of Sierra Leone your modelling skills? I'd like to see your results too.
BTW, my website is here if you want to have a look at some of my work;
Do have a look. One or two of the pictures I took for some of the projects are in there. But much of my work is not up there, because of copyright reasons- as well as privacy.
-
@alan fraser said:
All you are arguing for is procrastination...dumping difficult decisions into the lap of some future generation. What decisions regarding population stabilization will they NOT have to face at some point in the future, that we are faced with at present? The only difference will be that we'll have raped the planet in the meantime.
"Raped"? That's a harsh word!
What do you think the sun will do to the planet when in several billion years it dies, becomes a supernova and engulfs the earth? As for procrastination, you are putting words into my mouth. You are obviously upset because I dare disagree with you. On the contrary I am not(note I'm not shouting using upper case lettering), "dumping difficult decisions on future generations", quite the opposite. But I oppose your notion of regressing. We should be drilling for Shale gas. We should also be pouring millions into nuclear, learning how to dissipate the waste produced through technology and looking for far more efficient alternatives to solar and wind options. We went to Iraq and killed thousands of innocent men women and children on the back of Tony Blair. We spent millions of dollars doing that in partnership with GWB. If we can spend millions on a pointless war effort, we can spend money on welcoming in the 7th Billionth baby (as well as the 14th and the 28th etc etc!) -
@unknownuser said:
I'd like to share a revelation I've had during my time here. It came to me when I tried to classify your species. I realized that you're not actually mammals. Every mammal on this planet instinctively develops a natural equilibrium with their surrounding environment, but you humans do not. You move to an area, and you multiply, and you multiply, until every natural resource is consumed. 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. You are a plague, and we β¦ are the cure.
Agent Smith, The Matrix.
-
Well, bully for you, Tom. This is just descending into pettiness. I only raised the subject of Rotary because of your initial post in which you seemed to think that you were the only one here that cared for his fellow man (bleating on about potential lost Einsteins...as if that doesn't happen every day amongst all the millions of sperm that DON'T win the race to the ovum) and that the rest of us were heartless bastards who wanted to solve the problem by Gestapo-like tacics such as a bullet in the brain.
If you are going to constantly nosedive into silliness, hyperbole and now dick-measuring, then this becomes a pointless discussion.No, rape isn't too harsh a word. Don't you think that there's a slight difference between what is going to happen later on this century to your immediate descendants and what is going to happen in 5 billion years? We've evolved from amoebae in less time than that. God knows what kind of creatures will be inhabiting the planet at that point.
This is just more desperate stuff...you even accuse me of shouting because I take one particular option off adding stress to a single word. I used caps instead of italics...big deal.
Sorry, but I'm not wasting any more of my time on this level of debate...especially when you are not prepared to address any of the real points.
Advertisement