← Autodidact Archive · Original Dissent · neoclassical
Thread ID: 18730 | Posts: 7 | Started: 2005-06-20
2005-06-20 08:15 | User Profile
Ask an environmentalist in private what the world's biggest problems are and they will probably talk of climate change and human population growth, before moving on to disappearing species and habitats, deforestation, chemical pollution, resource wars, energy shortages and globalisation, to name just a few. Ask that same question in public and the odds are you will get one omission from that list - population growth.
Why aren't we talking about population? One reason is its almost unique capacity to offend just about every shade of opinion, from the neo-cons and evangelicals, who see it as an attack on liberty or a promotion of contraception/abortion, to the left, for whom multiculturalism has achieved iconic status - and who therefore view any questioning of immigration, currently responsible for some 84 per cent of projected UK population growth, as tantamount to racism.
What's even more disturbing, however, is the pattern of denial. By accident or design, we seem to have expressly evolved structures that prevent us confronting the fundamentals of planetary survival. We could deal with the population issue if we began talking about it. At the moment, we're looking the other way.
[url]http://comment.independent.co.uk/commentators/story.jsp?story=648262[/url]
2005-06-20 16:02 | User Profile
In California alone they have to build one new school per day in order to accommodate the influx of illegals.
At this time 52% of all new borns are from illegals and 94% of them don't have any kind of medical insurance thefore you and I are paying for them.
Illegals in American jails cost us one billion per year.
Gangs of illegals are taking over many cities.
Those who are bad are bad because they are bad but the one to blame is the government for not doing anything about it.
The same status of [B]"can't talk about them"[/B] which is now reserve for Jews is now also the same status being reserve for illegals....can't you guys se the elephant in my living room?????? :angry: :angry: :angry:
2005-06-21 03:03 | User Profile
The problem with Malthusian discussions is that the earlier versions of them were discredited, thanks to advances in agricultural productivity, so now no one listens to them.
Trouble is, some of the advances in agricultural output have the long term effect of salting the soil (This goes back to an article I read in Scientific American about 5 years ago) with the indisious "desertification" of many previously fecund lands.
Depending on which economist, agronomist, and ecologist you talk to, you get different perspectives on how close to the "can't heal the damage" line farmlands are approaching. There is a limit.
One of the counter Malthusian "salves" was fish in the sea. Big deal in the 50's and 60's. Once Man decided to go after fish with a vengeance, the renewability of fish populations was tested. And the fish failed. The Grand Banks are virtually out of Cod, and catches in the Pacific Northwest are declining.
I think it is time to revisit Malthus and his theories. There is a time for healing needed -- hey, Ecclesiasties anyone? :smile: -- or we can start planning on a global version of the Irish Potato Famine.
Joy.
[QUOTE=neoclassical]Ask an environmentalist in private what the world's biggest problems are and they will probably talk of climate change and human population growth, before moving on to disappearing species and habitats, deforestation, chemical pollution, resource wars, energy shortages and globalisation, to name just a few. Ask that same question in public and the odds are you will get one omission from that list - population growth.
Why aren't we talking about population? One reason is its almost unique capacity to offend just about every shade of opinion, from the neo-cons and evangelicals, who see it as an attack on liberty or a promotion of contraception/abortion, to the left, for whom multiculturalism has achieved iconic status - and who therefore view any questioning of immigration, currently responsible for some 84 per cent of projected UK population growth, as tantamount to racism.
What's even more disturbing, however, is the pattern of denial. By accident or design, we seem to have expressly evolved structures that prevent us confronting the fundamentals of planetary survival. We could deal with the population issue if we began talking about it. At the moment, we're looking the other way.
[url="http://comment.independent.co.uk/commentators/story.jsp?story=648262"]http://comment.independent.co.uk/commentators/story.jsp?story=648262[/url][/QUOTE]
2005-06-21 05:53 | User Profile
[QUOTE=Angeleyes]The problem with Malthusian discussions is that the earlier versions of them were discredited, thanks to advances in agricultural productivity, so now no one listens to them.[/QUOTE] The estimate may have been wrong, but the principle was not. So "discredited" - maybe only to drones of the TV.
2005-06-21 06:28 | User Profile
Other than neocons (which includes many Evangelicals), I don't really know what other group is ga ga for population growth. Catholics don't believe in birth control, but I don't know if that makes them ga ga for population growth (even if this is population growth).
Until the last 20-or-so years, population growth was a popular and open concern. But, that was when the population growth was of whites. Now, that it's hispanics and the third-world, it has become "racist" to be concerned with population growth. Add these leftists to the neocons and the topic of population growth becomes taboo.
2005-06-21 12:47 | User Profile
The heirarchy of the RC Church is quite enthusiastic about an exploading population so long as it is RC. This fact was brought home to me while watching a documentary about Mexico City and its many denizens living in what we would call trash dumps. My arch RC relative, and a ph.d to boot, said that it was not the numbers of people that were the problem, but allocation of resources, urban planning, etc. etc. In brief, human failing not the devine intent of God that is at fault. His view is an accurate one of RC belief, and one has to think that church very off the track.
2005-06-21 13:08 | User Profile
Sadly, I think you're right. The funny thing is, for all the liberal RC talk about the dignity of the individual, encouraging out-of-control population growth has a dehumanizing effect and reduces third world masses to the level of cattle or pawns in an ongoing demographic war. Not to mention, the pressures from overpopulation lead to migration which siphons off workers who could be more useful in their home countries. More importantly, it produces a divisive and destabilizing impact on host populations. There's nothing Roman Catholic, much less Christian, about endorsing population growth in the third world.
[QUOTE=solutrian]The heirarchy of the RC Church is quite enthusiastic about an exploding population so long as it is RC.[/QUOTE]