Google Earth

[Estro Felino]

Deserts are spreading, the climate's changing, the sea's rising, aquifers are being depleted, methane's bubbling out of the tundra, lakes and seas, topsoil is thinning, arable land is diminishing, the oceans are polluted and acidifying, fish stocks are reduced by >90%. Do we seriously think we can stop any of this without decreasing demand (population}?

well-....you mean that it's too late?

 

[Valjean]

It may well be...

 

[Shuttlecraft]

Incidentally, many monks and nuns don't want to get married and have kids (I'm not a monk but I never wanted to be a family man either), so maybe WE are mother earth's answer to overpopulation?
Problem is, we're hugely outnumbered by people who DO want to have kids..

 

[dgirl1986]

Incidentally, many monks and nuns don't want to get married and have kids (I'm not a monk but I never wanted to be a family man either), so maybe WE are mother earth's answer to overpopulation?
Problem is, we're hugely outnumbered by people who DO want to have kids..

Gay people are said to be the downfall of human civilization because we will not have kids and it turned out to be your fault

 

[Valjean]

Perhaps we should launch a PR and advertizing blitz to get more people to choose this lifestyle.

 

[Estro Felino]

Incidentally, many monks and nuns don't want to get married and have kids (I'm not a monk but I never wanted to be a family man either), so maybe WE are mother earth's answer to overpopulation?
Problem is, we're hugely outnumbered by people who DO want to have kids..

well...I didn't mean a radical choice like chastity. Lots of women take the pill, and they have a lots of sex.

 

[BSM1]

Someone posted a link to an article yesterday that had something to do with scientists training fish to walk. At the bottom of that article there was a video link to technology of the future in regards to food. Based on the video, food = no issue for 1st world countries come 2100. I also heard it rumored.. that if the worlds population was split into families of 4, that every family could own and live on an acre of land in texas and one other state, but I forgot which.

Edit* Didn't someone make a similar post earlier this week.

I think it was Nebraska, but I'm not sure either. This "overpopulation" bogeyman has been around since I was a kid. Relax, there's still enough to go around.

 

[Valjean]

Do you believe the present population is sustainable, BSM?

 

[Shuttlecraft]

Incidentally, scientists have been scratching their heads for years about fertility issues, and if the sperm count keeps dropping it'll be 'adios human race'-

News article extract- "Why are men's sperm rates falling?
Men's sperm production is decreasing rapidly and the scientific community is struggling to find an explanation"..

FULL ARTICLE- Why are men's sperm rates falling? - Telegraph

 

[BSM1]

[

quote=Seyorni;3949399]Do you believe the present population is sustainable, BSM?

[/QUOTE]

Absolutely.

 

[Triumphant_Loser]

when I debate with people who claim that the world is not overpopulated, I always tell them to take a look at Google Earth, to figure out how many areas are livable and rich in resources.
the first thing one realizes is that there are immense geographical areas, which are completely yellow. That means, desert areas.

so...do you really think that the population can keep growing?
where will we get drinkable water and cultivable fields?

My college Biology teacher taught us that overpopulation is a myth. He said that if we were to keep the entire population of Earth as closely concentrated as it is in New York City, then we could fit everyone in the world in the state of Texas.

 

[Estro Felino]

My college Biology teacher taught us that overpopulation is a myth. He said that if we were to keep the entire population of Earth as closely concentrated as it is in New York City, then we could fit everyone in the world in the state of Texas.

It's not a matter of room. the problem is insufficient and exhaustible resources

 

[Valjean]

[

Absolutely.[/quote]
You're really not familiar with this issue, are you?

 

[BSM1]

Absolutely.

You're really not familiar with this issue, are you?

[/QUOTE]

Obviously I don't have your credentials. Have you lassoed that Ph.D yet? Again this is one of those psuedo catastrophes that people with agendas seem to thrive on. We are supporting the population now, aren't we?

 

[Shuttlecraft]

Dinosaurs lasted for millions of years despite their giant stomachs being like incinerators needing tons of green stuff every day, and when they eventually ate all the woods and forests through overpopulation they died of starvation.
There's a lesson there for the human race, and maybe the "meteor strike wiped out the dinos" theory is just a cover story put out by those who want to play down the dangers of overpopulation..

 

[BSM1]

[

quote=Shuttlecraft;3950239]Dinosaurs lasted for millions of years despite their giant stomachs being like incinerators needing tons of green stuff every day, and when they eventually ate all the woods and forests through overpopulation they died of starvation.
There's a lesson there for the human race, and maybe the "meteor strike wiped out the dinos" theory is just a cover story put out by those who want to play down the dangers of overpopulation..

[/QUOTE]

This is interesting. Can you cite the studies that show this? Seems like everyone else is scratching their collective heads when it comes to explaining the demise of dinosaurs.

 

[Shuttlecraft]

Shuttlecraft quote: Dinosaurs lasted for millions of years despite their giant stomachs being like incinerators needing tons of green stuff every day, and when they eventually ate all the woods and forests through overpopulation they died of starvation.
There's a lesson there for the human race, and maybe the "meteor strike wiped out the dinos" theory is just a cover story put out by those who want to play down the dangers of overpopulation..

This is interesting. Can you cite the studies that show this? Seems like everyone else is scratching their collective heads when it comes to explaining the demise of dinosaurs.

No "studies" are necessary mate, we can simply use our commonsense..
For example Cambodia's huge city of Angkor went the same way, the people overpopulated it and when droughts dried up the rivers and irrigation channels they'd had their chips.
WIKI- "Angkor had been the largest pre-industrial city in the world...
agricultural systems in the Angkor area may have supported up to one million people...
the possibility is that Angkor's canals and reservoirs ran dry and ended expansion of available farmland"
Angkor - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Paradise lost.. Angkor Wat temple sits at the centre of what was a gigantic city complex..

 

[Knight of Albion]

I think Sir David (Attenborough) is spot on. Overpopulation is our most pressing problem.
We're heading to 10 billion by 2050 - and this will still leave us with 3 billion or so under 30 at that time - so it's not going to stop there.
And this at a time of dwindling resources and climate change.

And how the natural world can co-exist and survive with such a greedy and demanding force (as humans) remains to be seen.

 

[Valjean]

Aquifers are drying up, topsoil thinning, rainforests disappearing, forest and savannah desertifying, oceans are polluted, dying and rising; rivers and lakes are polluted; petroleum reserves are dwindling and remaining sources expensive and hazardous to access. All this is due to us.
How is any of this consistent with a sustainable population?

We are using resources faster than they can be replenished. How can that continue? You can argue that technology will come up with miraculous fixes, but the technology depends on those resources too and, with half the world's population in poverty, doesn't seem to be keeping up.
Our population is increasing as the carrying capacity of the planet is decreasing. Sustainable -- I don't think so.

The biosphere is a dynamic, interconnected system of myriad life forms and chemical reactions. It's like a huge machine or single massive organism. I don't think most people appreciate the intricacy of its various systems, if they're aware of them at all. I don't think most people have any inkling of how quickly and seriously these systems are being degraded.

A sustainable population, you'd think, would require a stable support system. Are overpopulation deniers arguing that we have a stable biosphere, that we're not impacting the biosphere, or that the biosphere's unnecessary?

 

[Shuttlecraft]

I never had the slightest desire to be a family man and have kids, so if mother nature put that idea into many more peoples heads, population levels would begin to fall.
I mean, kids are noisy and smelly and I can't understand why anybody wants them in the first place..