Just to follow up on the overpopulation thread. I can cut and paste like alpiner. Here a carbon tax is effective, sustainable, and will not impoverish the citizens. Google DOER_Carbon_Fee_Study_12-19-14.pdf as the link will not display.

Overpopulation is real. It is a problem. It will become more so all the time.

Still, we have government programs that reward people for having children and other government programs to help "cure" infertility.

Financial "success" is in creating new jobs sufficient to keep up with the population growth.

We are supposed to cheer when "housing starts" increase from year to year.

I remember the LDS teaching that God will never allow Earth to be overpopulated. There is plenty for all if only man could figure out how to get it to those in need. Oh wait, that is contrary to human nature. Mankind wants power and control. Having dominion over the supply lines for distribution of resources has to be the ultimate power trip.

It is the one subject that seems to be taboo when the eco-weenies start assigning blame for climate change. The world's population has more than tripled in the last 115 years and fossil fuelis consumed to clothe and feed these billions of mouths. And before anyone takes me to task for not mentioning solar and wind power, let me state that there is no other fuel source with the energy density of oil with which to power the trucks, trains and ships that bring our food and hard goods to us.
As a lifelong farmer, I am proud of the job North American farmers have done to conserve their soil and reduce their fuel consumption, all the while growing more food than ever before.

RB

Lethbridge Reprobate Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> let me state that
> there is no other fuel source with the energy
> density of oil with which to power the trucks,
> trains and ships that bring our food and hard
> goods to us.

Ron, I'm mostly with ya.
Just wanted to point out, though, that there are quite a few energy sources with higher "energy density" than petroleum. They're just generally more expensive (or more problematic/dangerous, like hydrogen!).

Oil "won" because it was cheap and easy to use. But it has its problems...

:)

Point taken. Hydrogen presents it's own problems because of the pressures it needs to be stored at, supply infrastructure, etc. And when I was farming it would have been wonderful to have plugged into the grid every night and then farmed all the next day on battery power. Such was not the case. I ran my irrigation pumping engine on natural gas due to the high cost of running power lines and then buying electricity here in Alberta.

RB

What's interesting is that the current statistical models are showing that the dramatic population increase of the 20th century is changing.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Total_fertility_rate

This graph is especially interesting as it shows the trends going toward replacement.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Total_fertility_rate#/media/File:Trends_in_TFR_1950-2050.png

What does this all mean? The population will continue to grow but it will not reach the predictions of the 60's and 70's.

The other major concern I see floating around is "How are we going to feed all these people". This is normally quoted with some pretty frightening graphs on how outrageously high the yields of crops have to increase to meet forecasted needs.

Well let's look at our current production amount and usage. Here's a good one on corn acreage.

http://www.iowacorn.org/documents/filelibrary/education/U_2E7B4C24D3A43.png

Here is one for the E.U. use of wheat.

http://appliedmythology.blogspot.com/2013_05_01_archive.html

As you can see a large percentage of the usage of these two crops are in the production of meat. Corn are soy are also used for non-food related items.

Why do all of these doom and gloom predictions always leave out one important concept? Our diets adjust depending upon the availability and cost of foods. If meat becomes more expensive because of increase cost of grains (due to shortage), people will eat more legumes. The doom and gloomers always create projections based upon little to no change of current consumption rates.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but what spells doom for exponentially growing populations in closed systems (like earth) is WASTE.

We will likely destroy ourselves by drowning in our waste.

Waste is a huge issue. Finding sites for new landfills is a major problem as in many cases it involves taking farmland out of production or city sprawl increasing and taking good farmland out of production. Calgary is one example of that. When I attended college there in 1968 Calgary was 300K. Now it's approaching 1.2M and most of the expansion has taken over farmland. Interesting that cities like Budapest, Hungary and Belgrade, Serbia (both of which I've visited) have 2 Million+ population each and occupy a fraction of the land that some smaller N. American cities do.

RB

The demographic transition model shows the typical change in birthrates as countries develop. In general, as populations become more educated and have access to medical care and economic opportunities, birth rates go down. This is particularly true as women gain access to education and have opportunities beyond bearing children. Many developed countries (e.g., Germany, Italy, Japan, which have about 1.4 births per woman) actually have problems because their populations are declining and the number of young people is inadequate to support their increasingly geriatric societies. In the U.S. (1.88 births per woman), the population growth is attributable primarily to immigration rather than births.

Assuming other countries follow the demographic transition model, countries such as Niger (with an astounding 7.6 births per woman) will ultimately have much lower birth rates as those countries develop. The global population will certainly continue to grow for some time, but will eventually stabilize and potentially decline.

So the good news is the global population will eventually stabilize. However, as other countries develop, they desire a living standard that more closely approximates the standard of the U.S., Canada, Australia, and other developed countries. The bad news is that for everyone to enjoy the living standard of the U.S., we need another 3 Earths. Consequently, there will be some big decisions (and associated conflicts) to determine how resources will be allocated globally over the coming years.

World economies are based on perpetual growth.

If world population stabilizes or declines, capitalism implodes.

It's DEEEEE-licious.

And don't mock the premise--we're only a few years away from 2022:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soylent_Green#Plot


; )

...a new food product made from soybeans and lentils:

https://www.soylent.com/

brb ~ killing offspring

brb ~ killing self

TFW ~ helping to curb overpopulation

Feminism will save us. More and more women are learning to avoid men, so reproduction will decline.

Not to mention the millions of acres wasted on lawns, golf courses and parks that can be put in production.

Was just watching a 1978 Johnny Carson re-run with Carl Sagan as guest talking about us running out of oil. Now the problem is a glut of oil everywhere.

We practice tremendous waste. Drive an hour to work, drive to party and blow money on furniture and big houses, and booze, and vacations and on and on. And we let government waste much of our money on stupid wars and welfare programs.

So, yes, we might someday have to be less wasteful, but we are nowhere near starvation.

Our production is up to the task, and so is distribution. But chaos can really have its way with us if the distribution system gets too seriously messed with. Both incoming and outgoing.

Thought about those 72 hours after a a local catastrophe, when power and water are cut off in your city? Besides the food and water problems you might have, where you gonna poop?

I don't know what percentage of farm land is in government reserve programs but of my families 3 'small farms' 2 are in government 'grass programs' ----- totally out of production. I know my cousin has a number of his acreage in 'grass programs' also.

These were all productive wheat farms but with few of us willing to work the farms the government programs are very worthwhile. We still have contractors/cousins farm the 'wheat' farm but do as well from the government programs normally.

We never had Conservation Reserve Programs (CRP) in Alberta. I always thought it was a scam anyway. That and the ubiquitous US Farm Bill.

RB

The oceans are awash with plastic waste.

ITT ~ the sky is falling



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