World population approaching 7 billion

[The_Real_Crunk]

Re: World population approaching 7 billion

The Zombie Apocolypse of 2015 will solve our overpopulation problems. Hell doesnt have enough room for a few extra billion people.

[orius]

Re: World population approaching 7 billion

One of the things that needs to be addressed, and which Terr touched on, is how foolishly wasteful people can be. Like the quote he gave about rich British bankers with heated outdoor pools. What I want is to see social conservatives start addressing issues like wasteful consumption and conservation seriously instead of wasting time on lost causes like gays and abortion. Unfortunately, many of them are too narrow-minded to do that, and often too small minded as well to concern themselves on more than ahandful of issues in the first place.

And I say social conservatives, because I don't trust liberals on these matters. I fear that liberal approaches will lead to a more rigid class structure that makes social advancement more difficult. But the conservatives, particularly the religious ones, are too sanctimonious about their views to do anything useful. Wasteful extravagance isn't a conservative virtue anyway; the problem is that the liberals have owned issues like these for at least a generation now, that conservatives instead of offering viable solutions, just write off condemnation of wasteful materialism as communist propaganda. I don't like that, because excessive materialism, wastefulness, planned obsolescence and the like aren't things I see as sustainable.

[Red Dragon]

Re: World population approaching 7 billion

1% of the population consumes 1/3 of the planet's resources. That's a problem, isn't it?

That's all well and good, but that 1% of the population also runs the entire planet.

[Wavelength]

Re: World population approaching 7 billion

For everyone who says that the problem is the mega-rich being wasteful in their consumption, imagine they stopped all of their (unnecessary) consumption entirely and just held the money, or imagine they simply gifted the money to whatever people or organization they deemed would raise the living standards of the bottom 50% the most.

What resources would no longer be consumed by the wealthy? How would these resources be delivered to poor people? Could they be used in other places as effectively as in the places they are used now? How would it help people that have spent their whole lives literally hammering dirt?

What would the poor people in sub-saharan Africa do with these resources? Would it have the potential to increase violence and greed among people who have been desperate their whole lives? Would it start a virtuous cycle? Would it be unsustainable? Would it create a chain reaction of consumerism for bigger and better (like we see in China now) that would have the potential to strain our resources even further?

I personally don't think the problem is so much in consumption of resources, but rather in the desire to possess and control the resources. And if people are actually doing enough good for the world to earn a lot of money (as opposed to making the money by betting on futures or running a racket), I say let them have their steak dinners and heated pools. The world was really never any worse off for it.

[Rodak]

Re: World population approaching 7 billion

Soylent Green could help...

[The Toecutter]

Re: World population approaching 7 billion

For everyone who says that the problem is the mega-rich being wasteful in their consumption, imagine they stopped all of their (unnecessary) consumption entirely and just held the money, or imagine they simply gifted the money to whatever people or organization they deemed would raise the living standards of the bottom 50% the most.

What resources would no longer be consumed by the wealthy?

Too many to list... we could start with the wood, metal, plastic, and other materials used to build multiple mansions, all of the steel, plastics, and other materials used for their collection of 100+ cars, all of the fuel consumed by their planes and yachts, the fabrics used in their expansive wardrobes, ect., and all of the energy and fossil fuels used to produce and maintain these things...

The typical American has an ecological footprint that is such that if everyone on Earth consumed like them, there would be just over 5 planet Earths needed to maintain it, assuming nothing is left for the rest of the biosphere outside of human activities.

There are people who have an ecological footprint of 100+ planet Earths, if everyone lived like them.

How would these resources be delivered to poor people? Could they be used in other places as effectively as in the places they are used now? How would it help people that have spent their whole lives literally hammering dirt?

Organizations could be set up using said wealth/resources to do all sorts of things:

-sanitation; 40% of people on Earth don't even have access to toilets or the necessary amount of potable water for basic hygene. Buildings dedicated to this purpose could be built; it would service far more people than adding these conveniences to individual dwellings.
-low energy electricity/lighting; using ~50W of solar panels and LEDs, lighting could be cheaply delivered to an entire family, which would make a big impact on the quality of life for the 25% of the world's population that doesn't even have access to electricity.
-a low-speed private motorcar for each village of more than 20 people; a 25 mph capable small diesel truck or compact car would allow remote villages to obtain medicine and other supplies that they normally are forced to do without, and with a proper engine selection, they'd be able to produce their own fuel for said vehicle for its once a month excursions. Such a vehicle could be put together for less than $3,000.
-schools; a basic 8th grade education could be accessable to the world's children, where currently 17% of the world's population is illiterate. A focus could be placed on reproductive health as well, to reduce population growth.
-medicine; basic antibiotics could be provided to treat conditions that normally would pose little threat in 1st world countries
-computer access; each small village or city on Earth could be provided with a small number of computers and internet access, so that they have access to information

The impact of these things would dramatically improve quality of life for those people who spend their lives hammering dirt, without increasing their resource footprint to any major extent.

Yes, those materials could be used as effectively in the places they are used now, if not moreso; quite often timber, metal ores, oil, and other raw materials are extracted in areas characterized by extreme poverty and lack of access to basic needs, only to be shipped to wealthy 1st world countries. While your average Joe Sixpack in the U.s. shares part of the guilt for this consumption, the extreme rich account for far more of that consumption on a per-capita basis, so much so that a bigger impact can be made by reducing the consumption of the rich slightly, than reducing the consumption of the middle class dramatically.

What would the poor people in sub-saharan Africa do with these resources?

That depends on how they are delivered. If as proposed above and basic necessities were met, along with access to education and information, there would be an extreme increase in liesure time, inclinations for political discussion, and even innovation. People, when presented obstacles, will try to do get the most they can out of what they have(one example is two civil engineers trapped in Gaza, that managed to build highway-capable EVs with 110 miles range from junk parts so that there could be some transportation, in spite of lack of affordable fuel: (source))

Would it have the potential to increase violence and greed among people who have been desperate their whole lives?

Yes, but it goes without saying that such people would also understand what they have, and if smart, would realize that violence as a result of tribal grudges could destroy it. If the violence ends up directed towards the rulers of their society though, it would be a good thing and could allow liberty to flourish in place of despotism.

Would it start a virtuous cycle?

Maybe, and hopefully; it would vary on a case by case basis.

Would it be unsustainable?

No, unless said people strived to eat meat every day, to live 20+ miles from where they work, to drive 20+ miles to work in gas guzzling vehicles, to spend an irrational sum of their money to support military conflicts and government surveillance that aren't even in their interest, and wanted to live in a home that was poorly insulated, or worse, live like the mega-rich.

Would it create a chain reaction of consumerism for bigger and better (like we see in China now) that would have the potential to strain our resources even further?

That depends on whether their leaders encourage such consumption in efforts to grow their economy, whether through added regulation(eg. some places in the U.S. require grid electricity connections for homes), preventing access to low-cost transportation(eg. destruction of mass transit in US, or certain provinces in China banning bicycles from roads to allow more room for cars), or through setting an example by paying themselves far more than they deserve...

[quoteI personally don't think the problem is so much in consumption of resources, but rather in the desire to possess and control the resources.[/quote]

The two issues reinforce each other and correlate with each other.

And if people are actually doing enough good for the world to earn a lot of money (as opposed to making the money by betting on futures or running a racket), I say let them have their steak dinners and heated pools. The world was really never any worse off for it.

The world is worse off for it in instances where they made their money by paying those in the third world not even enough money to afford basic necessities for a healthy life, and worse off when they consume so much that there isn't enough to go around for the people that need it.

Income disparities are too large and must be brought back to more reasonable levels, or this problem will never be able to be solved. While the middle class is part of the problem, their share of it is dwarfed by the elite of society. If people do a good job and make a big impact on where they work, yes, they do deserve the additional pay; however, there is no reason that one person should earn in one hour more than someone middle class earns in a year, or someone in poverty earns in a lifetime, as by such happening, it is assuring that the person in poverty is going to do without given that resources are limited and given that currency is used to represent access to resources.

An executive earning 10 times as much as a middle class laborer, I can understand; it's when the disparities are 500:1 that the problem becomes particularly egregious and allows such a disparity in resource consumption to occur. Someone earning $400,000 a year is not going to be able to afford multiple mansions or a collection of 100+ exotic cars or multiple private planes/helicopters, but they'd still be able to live a very pampered and luxurious life, so long as they don't waste what they consume; one mansion, 2 or 3 luxury vehicles, and access to air transport, perhaps a cheap/small private plane like a Cessna, is plenty. Someone earning $20 million a year, on the other hand, can waste without worry...

Oddly enough, these positions are almost never outsourced, despite there being plenty of qualified people who would gladly do said job for less pay.

[Hyper Dingo]

Re: World population approaching 7 billion

Didn't anyone of you watch Wall-ee =T

[Gros Minou]

Re: World population approaching 7 billion

7 billion already . When he got 6 billion I was 14 . It's so **Censored** fast .

[The Toecutter]

Re: World population approaching 7 billion

7 billion already . When he got 6 billion I was 14 . It's so **Censored** fast .

Like yeast in a petri dish...

[The_Real_Crunk]

Re: World population approaching 7 billion

If Ug99 has its way expect the population to drop by a few billion people.

http://www.wired.com/magazine/2010/02/ff_ug99_fungus/

[The Toecutter]

Re: World population approaching 7 billion

If Ug99 has its way expect the population to drop by a few billion people.

http://www.wired.com/magazine/2010/02/ff_ug99_fungus/

Another completely forseen yet completely ignored danger by an agricultural industry that wants the world dependent upon a system of industrial food production which it owns in its entirity. Monoculture production over vast swathes of land, dependent upon petroleum and natural gas for its pesticides and fertilizers, and becoming more dependent upon genetic engineering, has to be quite possibly the most ignorant long-term food policy that could ever be devised if the goal were to actually feed people. Ug99 has the potential to be devastating precisely because such a system of agriculture exists.

One of the aspects of Soylent Green's depicted future doesn't seem too far removed from our present; there existed within the story a monopoly on world food production, and a complete dependence by the population upon industrial food production for sustenance.

This will only lead to disaster in the long term, unless policy is changed.

[Cutter De Blanc]

Re: World population approaching 7 billion

No ug99 in America.

haha take that everywhere else

[IamPinhead]

Re: World population approaching 7 billion

If Ug99 has its way expect the population to drop by a few billion people.

http://www.wired.com/magazine/2010/02/ff_ug99_fungus/

I see what you mean. We will be conquered by power metal.

[Funk]

Re: World population approaching 7 billion

Sounds like we need to get our asses to Mars and terraform tha' mo' fugga before it's too late!

[The Toecutter]

Re: World population approaching 7 billion

Sounds like we need to get our asses to Mars and terraform tha' mo' fugga before it's too late!

The only problem with that is it still stretches the capbility of our technology to get a few people to the moon. Getting 1 person to Mars and back would cost trillions of dollars, let alone the cost of terraforming it and the sheer amount of time it would require.