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Growth Patterns Must Shift or Poor Will Be Worse Off: UN
SEOUL (AlertNet) – Will the next Earth Summit in 2012 kick start a fundamental change by pushing countries to embark on a path of development that is sustainable? Or will it be just another date in a long list of international calendar events?
As the world’s population grows, competition for scarce resources increases and climate change brings more extreme weather and threatens food production, but can calls for a 'green economy', sustainable development, and poverty eradication also find ways to protect biodiversity and halt climate change. This was the question posed by Rae Kwon Chung, director of the environment and development division of the United Nations’ Asia Pacific commission, on Monday to a group of activists and civil society groups who have gathered in Seoul for a two-day preparatory meeting for the Summit.
"While global GDP more than doubled between 1981 and 2005, 60 percent of the world's ecosystems have degraded,” he said at the opening session of the meeting, organised by the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) and the Asian Development Bank (ADB).
“What is clear is that the current patterns of growth will eventually undermine the sources of livelihood and the poor and the vulnerable will be worse off,” he said.
"Rio+20 is an opportunity to re-think, re-order and restructure governance” of environmental systems as part of a broader push toward sustainable development, he said.
Better known as Rio+20, the United Nations Conference on Sustainable Development (UNCSD) will take place next June in Rio de Janeiro, 20 years after the first Earth Summit there was hailed as a landmark meeting.
The 1992 gathering, attended by more than 100 heads of state or governments, created a wide-ranging blueprint for action to achieve sustainable development worldwide, as well as the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change.
Rio+20 is aiming to secure renewed political commitment to sustainable development. The plan is to focus on two specific themes: how to make the world’s economy greener while improving sustainable development and poverty eradication, and how to create a better institutional framework for sustainable development.
As the world’s population grows, competition for scarce resources increases and climate change brings more extreme weather and threatens food production, “we are on the threshold of an unprecedented turning point," Chung told the audience.
"We know what we're doing to the world and we know what needs to be done to fix it. Rio+20 is an opportunity to put that knowledge into action,” Chung said.
GREEN OR GREED ECONOMY?
Asia Pacific accounts for 60 percent of the world’s population and 37 percent of the world’s gross domestic product, yet millions continue to live in squalor with little access to water and essential public services.
Environmental activists and groups point to this as an example of how the current economic model is flawed and lacks equity, a buzzword during the day’s proceedings.
They say the region is facing severe environmental problems that climate change could worsen, including desertification and land degradation in north Asia, drought and sea level rise in the Pacific, rising competition for water and energy in south and central Asia and increasing dependence on fossil fuels in Southeast Asia.
There is an urgent need for better public policies to reverse this trend, Chung said.
“The big question is then how to make the shift to a green economy,” he said.
There is contention, however, from non-government organisations over the term ‘green economy’. Many say the term focuses too much attention on economic and science issues and ignores two other important aspects of sustainable development - social and environmental needs.
Young-Woo Park, UNEP’s regional director for Asia Pacific, said the growing focus on building a green economy does not replace sustainable development efforts, but could be an effective instrument to reduce poverty.
Uchita de Zoysa, executive director of the Sri Lanka-based Centre for Environment and Development, was not convinced.
Repackaging and reselling sustainable development as green economic growth is creating confusion, he told AlertNet.
“New green technology would mean there are going to be intellectual property rights, controlled by a small group of people on Earth,” he said.
He called Rio+20 “a sad, fragmented, isolated and confused process.”
“1992 was a great unifier. 2012 is the great divider, where the focus is on the green economy,” he said. “Is this another way of justifying greed growth in a green manner?”
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Show All"Growth Patterns Must Shift or Poor Will Be Worse Off: UN"
Agreed, and the necessary first step to be taken must be population/birth control so additional growth isn't required to accomodate an ongoing, rising unsustainable human population, particularly in rich countries using the most resources and thus generating the most waste and pollution deragding the planetary ecosystem everyone relies upon. Related to that step is the equity problem--a million Western banksters and corporadoes easily use/waste resources that would probably support close to a billion subsistent farmers.
"Development" is a tricky concept, and its perception/what it means often differs greatly when viewed from the bottom->up subsistence farmer or top->down by the "development" banker. Development's clear failure to-date is because it's the top->down perspective that's been dominante and persistes despite its being proven destructive and ultimately anti-development from the bottom->up perspective--scores of case-studies from Asia and Africa back that reality. And thus the article's closing quote's validity.
How do you reconcile "the necessary first step to be taken must be population/birth control... particularly in rich countries" with the idea of reversing the "top->down perspective that's been dominante [sic] and persistes [sic] despite its being proven destructive."?
Enforcing population control sounds a lot like a top down measure. So far, individual initiative in this matter hasn't led to the desired results. And if the measures aren't voluntary then it is forced or coerced as with the one-child policy in China. Curious as to how you see these being compatible.
Forced birth control from the left. . Who are these people? We are attempting to fight the culture of death with a culture of life. The birth control issue needs to also be decentralized. Lets not divide people while a movement of unity is progressing and consciousness is rising. I know your arguments, but, mother nature has useful answers if you would get off your death march and look for them. A culture of death leads only to death.
Sorry for the typos. The best documented way to control population growth is by educating women and providing them with basic birth control knowledge and technology of the sort that the Republicans have always sought to withold or make conditional and thus greatly destabilize efforts by the UN and NGOs to provide the needed info and supplies in a bottom->up fashion. In other words, bottom->up programs work best when they're allowed to operate freely, freed from top->down interference usually tied to funding such operations, the so-called "global gag-rule" being but one of several examples. And bottom->up programs are very popular when they've had an oppotunity to work, especially in Africa where many cultures are matrilineal yet destabilized since men were put into unnatural positions of power by the Colonial Powers. In China's case, controling population growth is a national security issue, thus the draconian nature of its one-child policy.
Resonsibility when it comes to family planning is paramount as a case can be made that having more than 2 children--being irresponsible--threatens the human rights of those behaving responsibly, particularly in G20/OECD countries that consume far more than there fair share of resources: The Equity Issue. Of course, one cannot be expected to be responsible unless one is educated as to WHY it's important to be responsible--the sort of education that's long been attacked and is thus lacking in the USA and elsewhere, the history of which goes back to the end of 19th century. Thus the question begged but seldom asked is Why the longstanding effort to thwart efforts at instituting/providing the means to responsibly control population growth.
"Resonsibility when it comes to family planning is paramount as a case can be made that having more than 2 children--being irresponsible--threatens the human rights of those behaving responsibly, particularly in G20/OECD countries that consume far more than there fair share of resources: The Equity Issue."
I find mixing up the family size issue and the "equity issue" revolting, especially when having more than two children is directly equated with "irresponsibility". Sorry.
"Thus the question begged but seldom asked is Why the longstanding effort to thwart efforts at instituting/providing the means to responsibly control population growth."
Please explain what exactly you mean by "responsibly controlling population growth". There is a huge difference between giving people the education and tools necessary for a responsible plan of life (access to healthcare in general including abortion, general family planning help, a reliable and foreseeable form of material sustenance (access to food, water and shelter) and access to a good education) and imposing rules and regulations from above. Even though you're talking about "top-down" and "bottom-up" approaches, your point is not exactly clear: what do you think about technology based population control tools (which are being worked on and will unavoidably be implemented in third world countries) in particular? Are they acceptable?
'I find mixing up the family size issue and the "equity issue" revolting, especially when having more than two children is directly equated with "irresponsibility". Sorry.'
Yes, it's "revolting," but that's reality. The equity issue is way out of control and will probably take centuries to correct--centuries free from the Capitalism paradigm, and that's if humanity is decidely lucky and able to mitigate Global Warming. Indeed, there is a matrix of issues that must be solved/at least worked on simultaneously if humanity is to have a chance at becoming Civilized. Your responsibly controlling population growth question I answered in the sentence you quoted as the percieved replacement rate of 2 children/couple will actually reduce population in the longterm: One is free to engage in as much sexual activity as one wants but only two children or less can be the responsible outcome during one's lifetime--and women must be empowered to enforce that responsibility instead of continuing as "Slaves to the species." The two best technologial tools available to empower women's enforcement of responsibility are the before and after birth control pills--along with education informing them WHY it's important for them to be responsible and the benefits they will gain from such behavior. As stated, there are many documented studies confirming the efficacy of such birth control programs in Africa and Asia and they are accepted by the target populations, and that was before the AIDS epidemic.
As long as it's not centrally driven but is based on education, I wouldn't call it "control" (to me this word implies a much more strict regulation).
"Yes, it's "revolting," but that's reality."
I think it would be a reasonable first approach to reality if all people were equal in terms of material waste and consumption. Right now, global unequality in this respect is pretty extremely high, and sometimes, in poorer parts of the world, if even a family of 10 doesn't waste and pollute as much as an average American, we really don't have much moral basis to say anything. Irresponsibility? No one will accept this from us, as long as just buying a single SUV wastes more than a lifetime of a third world person.
But of course I understand what you are saying and it will (hopefully) be an extremely important point (although not in such a simplistic form) for any future developed sustainable society, and it is also very much worth fighting for the things you mentioned (access to birth control and education for women), but people have to realise that these things will have basically no effect on the biggest crises we are facing right now. It will make the work of forming some kind of just society easier *in the future*, so I am pretty much supportive of the things you are saying, but overpopulation is not what's driving GHG emissions, pollution, waste - our current global economic system is. In addition to this, populations appear to be stabilising in ever more parts of the world, and some sustainable economic development (in healthcare, education, food production (meaning agroecology, not GMOs etc) in the poorest parts of the world could help pretty quickly - the burdens of which should be born imo overwhelmingly by the West, as much as possible that is. That is imo the only acceptable Western response to overpopulation.
That is clearly not the first necessary step, not even in the USA (let alone Europe, where populations are mostly declining). Universal access to food and water, education, healthcare, including family planning and abortion, so overall a reliable and relatively comfortable future are what stabilise populations. This would work even in the US (especially if the worst effects of overzealous religious bigotry could be eliminated.) I don't really think the US or even Europe should be subjected to fascist crap like that, but Westerners should not even begin to think of doing this to third world countries. Anyway, Europe is a good proof that declining populations will not necessarily lead to declining waste and pollution.
More importantly, even if you get populations under control, you must realise that capitalism itself is based on growth in general and it is absolutely and completely impossible to solve the problem through population control while the world is ruled by capitalism. There is no "steady state capitalism". No matter how many people live in the world, waste and destruction will grow unless an economic system that is not based on constant expansion will take place of capitalism.
Second, any actual use of population control will not occur in the service of creating a sustainable material economy. There is no possibility for that to happen whatsoever, definitely none under capitalism. It will only serve long term top-down control of populations. Seeing how BMGF and other groups of madmen are working on this crap, it is also pretty much unavoidable that some measures (mostly technological) are going to be implemented in third world countries, so we really shouldn't be supporting these assholes.
Yes, the distribution/equity problem is directly related to capitalism's failings, and you touched on the Jevons Paradox that enetrs the process. I'm focused on trying to find mechanisms that will create a steady-state global economy, which by definition isn't Capitalism. Also by definition, steady-state means no growth, particularly population growth which provides the primary pressure for economic growth, and thus its First Step position.
Environmental imperitives are oddly missing from the Occupy movement. Except for a small Marcellus Shale contingent, there is not a pip about it here in Pittsburgh. One sign in the park even called for cheaper gasoline.
That is an interesting observation. I'm hearing concerns about economic inequality, and not much about "environmental imperatives," as you say. A key issue with AGW is intergenerational injustice - it's young people who will to have to live on a more ruined planet. But older folks have a keener sense of how dramatically the weather has changed over the past few decades. There needs to be outrage among the young over the future we're stealing from them with out carbon conveniences.
Some of the "niceties" of an intact ecosystem, like fresh wild seafood, the young will never miss--they will only exist in the memories of the elders and after that, only in literature. More importantly, being "well nourished" will become increasingly impossible for the overwhelming majority of humanity as more and more is demanded of an increasingly incapable ecosystem--in stead, we will see obesity and famine emerge as the sick twins of globalized industrial agriculture........ By the way, where do you get your omega-3s these days. I am ashamed to admit that I get mine in a nice clean white bottle from costco--doing more than my share to help take out the bottom of the ocean food chain.
I love avocados. And my grocery sells these green shakes, made from algae. Fish get their omega-3s from algae, ultimately.
Major vegetarian sources of O3FA include algae, hempseeds and hempseed oil, walnuts, flaxseeds and flaxseed oil, olive oil, canola (rapeseed) oil, avocado and chia seeds.
Vegetarian Nutrition
Some people think aquaculture is the answer to dwindling fisheries. But most fish are carnivorous - aquaculture depends on wild feedstock fisheries, which are also collapsing.
Ocean ecology perfectly exemplifies the mess we've made. The problem isn't warming or acidification or pollution or overfishing or habitat destruction, it's all of the above.
Thank you for that Aleph Null.
Some further discussion of intergenerational justice:
The traditional model obscures the temporal aspect of the perfect moral storm. Once emitted, a substantial proportion of climate emissions typically remain in the atmosphere for hundreds of years, and some persist for tens — even hundreds — of thousands. This means that the current generation takes benefits now, but spreads the costs of its behavior far into the future.
Climate Ethicist: Why Should People in the Future Pay to Clean Up Our Mess?
Capitalists , and those who continue to support that all devouring monster, advance to us the mantra that "wealth" can be created out of nothing.
Such is not the case. For that illusion of wealth some thing or some person must bear the cost.
A local union leader once said in opposition to the green movement here in British Columbia. "A tree is not WORTH anything until it is chopped down".
This is the heart of Capitalism.
For capitalists, all of the Earth is but a mine as they go about their legal obligation to increase share holder value.
“New green technology would mean there are going to be intellectual property rights, controlled by a small group of people on Earth,” he said.
I'd like good corporate citizen companies to control the intellectual property rights. Companies like that have existed for a few years, but many have been sold out. Their founders grew old and couldn't manage the companies anymore.
It's possible to write more permanence into the company articles of incorporation.
Every time I hear "Intellectual Property Rights" I reach for my pistol. The very words are horrible.
Patents are supposed to be a government granted right to the inventor for a limited amount of time. They are no more "property" than the right of free speech is. The idea of patents being speculatively traded and bought by hostile buyers to stifle competetion** would have shocked Jefferson and med him question the patent system altogether.
---------------------
**such as Chevron-Texaco holding the patent on MiMH batteries and refusing all licenses for anything larger than a "D" cells except for the prohibitively large production runs. This has killed EV development. Thank goodness the patent expires in 2014.
And most all new inventions or developments rest on a communal body of knowledge, for which individual patent holders cannot take credit for or claim sole rights to. Patent rights are too generally, well, generous. Someone will also have to prove to me that without an unbridled profit motive that inventiveness will be starved.
You got a permit for that thing? Hope you weren't packin' this weekend at the rally.
"It's possible to write more permanence into the company articles of incorporation. "
Just the opposite, it is both impossible and unethical. Society is not a static structure, it lives by constantly reproducing itself, constantly changing every single component, it is extremely difficult to keep any kind of constancy, and there aren't many structures whose rules have remained reasonably constant. But it is also unethical to demand that people in a hundred years or so should act based on the rules we're devising. It is mostly impossible to devise a subsystem of society that can not be subverted and changed and perverted to serve purposes completely opposite to the intention of their creators. Good rules are necessary of course, but only a constantly vigilant democratic control by an informed citizenry can keep things working justly. Nothing but constant, active, participatory mass democracy can do that. No system of rules, however well defined. There is no such genius among humans who can create such a thing.
I'm not sure about this good corporate citizen thing though, are you just joking? Good corporate citizen? What?
Respect Nature and when we take something from her, give back to her. This is the valuable concept of reciprocity.
Population growth is killing the planet. We can lower it with humane birth control or Mother Nature will lower population inhumanely.
Completely wrong. Growth of waste and pollution is not directly related to population. It might be killing the planet in a hundred years in some communist utopia, but right now the culprit is capitalism and the people most responsible number about a billion.
OVERPOPULATION: A KEY FACTOR IN SPECIES EXTINCTION
The world’s human population doubled from 1 to 2 billion between 1800 and 1930, and then doubled again by 1975. At the end of October 2011, it’s expected to reach 7 billion. This staggering increase and the massive consumption it drives are overwhelming the planet’s finite resources. We’ve already witnessed the devastating effects of overpopulation on biodiversity: Species abundant in North America two centuries ago — from the woodland bison of West Virginia and Arizona’s Merriam’s elk to the Rocky Mountain grasshopper and Puerto Rico’s Culebra parrot — have been wiped out by growing human numbers.
As the world’s population grows unsustainably, so do its unyielding demands for water, land, trees and fossil fuels — all of which come at a steep price for already endangered plants and animals. Most biologists agree we’re in the midst of the Earth’s sixth mass extinction event; species are disappearing about 1,000 times faster than is typical of the planet’s history. This time, though, it isn’t because of geologic or cosmic forces but unsustainable human population growth.
Today’s global human population stands at 6.9 billion. Every day, the planet sees a net gain of roughly 250,000 people. If the pace continues, we’ll be on course to reach 8 billion by 2020 and 9 billion by 2050.
By any ecological measure, Homo sapiens sapiens has exceeded its sustainable population size. Just a single human waste product — greenhouse gas — has drastically altered the chemistry of the planet’s atmosphere and oceans, causing global warming and ocean acidification.
In the United States, which has the world’s third largest population after China and India, the fertility rate peaked in 2007 at its highest level since 1971 before dropping off slightly due to the recent economic recession. At 2.1 children per woman, the U.S. fertility rate remains the highest among developed nations, which average around 1.6. The current U.S. population exceeds 300 million and is projected to grow 50 percent by 2050.
The mission of the Center for Biological Diversity is to stop the planetary extinction crisis wiping out rare plants and animals around the world. Explosive, unsustainable human population growth is an essential root cause of this crisis.
We can reduce our own population to an ecologically sustainable level in a number of ways, including the empowerment of women, education of all people, universal access to birth control and a societal commitment to ensuring that all species are given a chance to live and thrive. All of these steps will decrease human poverty and overcrowding, raise our standard of living and sustain the lives of plants, animals and ecosystems everywhere.
http://www.biologicaldiversity.org/campaigns/overpopulation/index.html
You are exactly correct ~ezeflyer~.
And some of your key words are __ greenhouse gas __ global warming and __ ocean acidification __.
HIghly qualified oceanic bio-chemists have determined that most of the ocean's coral reefs will very likely not survive past 2030 or less... Life on this planet cannot survive without the coral reefs and the vital for all life microscopic (green plant life) __ phytoplankton __, which supply the planet with most of it's oxygen.
Global warming has caused the dramatic reduction of the Arctic's perennial sea ice and most scientists now believe the Atrctic will be ice free within the next three to four years... When that happens, a trillion tons or more of methane will most likely have entered our already heavily polluted atmosphere,,, the result will be a totally out of control global warming with no means of correcting it, ever! __ Life for humans and most other life forms will not be possible and that could occur any time within the next five to ten years.
So none of us should be overly concerned or worry about overpopulation, because as you have well stated Eze, Mother Nature will take care of that problem and do it very quickly.
I really don't like saying such things but reality is reality and we cannot alter reality any more than we can alter physics... We have gone too far with our use of fossil fuels and noone is going to reduce their use in any meaningful manner within the next three to five years or the next 10+ years.
Methane has already been escaping from the Arctic region by near a billions tons a month for the past three years and very recent scientific research has proven methane in the atmosphere has alone caused (one third) of the rise in Earth's temperature, not just (a sixth) as scientist's computer models have shown.
So we can talk about "birth control" till doomsday, but we have already gone to far with global warming and the few professional global warming deniers have done their jobs well for big oil and coal, as no world leaders are listening to the scientists and they aren't going to listen.
Depressing huh? __ Yes, reality is sometimes very depressing and none of us wish to hear about it, or believe it... "It's not going to happen to me or my family".... We'll soon see.
Can anything at all be done to reverse a runaway global warming,,, with no turning back, no "do-overs"? __ Nothng I am aware of,,, that will strictly be up to the world's top scientists and if they can find a safe method to do something productive, they'd better start now.
Of course ocean acidification and global warming (CO2 emissions) can be overwhelmingly attributed to the developed world: USA, Europe, the developed Far East (Japan and SK), and exported emissions to China etc.
http://photos.mongabay.com/09/forecast_co2.jpg
so overpopulation is quite obviously not the underlying issue. Additionally, it is also true that the West is responsible for the large majority of excess CO2 already in the atmosphere, while increasing populations (except in the US) are not a Western problem.
"We have gone too far with our use of fossil fuels and noone is going to reduce their use in any meaningful manner within the next three to five years or the next 10+ years."
If America started than Europe would go along and then the rest of the world also. I don't think there's any other chance but for the US to take the lead. In addition to this, population control will clearly not solve or even meaningfully reduce current short or mid term problems, which stem from incredible levels of waste and overproduction/overconsumption (probably an order of magnitude more than necessary).
Simply put: there is no evidence that a decrease of population will lead to a decrease of material consumption/waste, in fact it will continue unless the global economic system changes. I don't know what the problem is, but no one so far bothered to answer this claim. No matter whether you handle overpopulation or not, no matter how many people will live on Earth in a hundred years, if capitalism remains, the ecosystem will go. Even (or especially) in the US, the most important task is to curb waste and overconsumption/production, not to bring population down. Focus on overpopulation will not save the world.
You wrote and correctly,,, ("If America started").... Sadly and incredibly, our 536 DC elected are for the majority either corrupt or stupid...They ignore and or beat down our top scientists... So America isn't going to do anything about it.
Forgive the repeated post here, but:
Atomsk, OK -- we're counting on you to explain to all those exponentially-expanding populations in Brazil, India, Indonesia, Thailand, Central America, Iran, Turkey, Ecuador, Venezuela, Mexico, Nigeria and dozens of other countries (including the United States) why they are NOT allowed to drive automobiles, run air conditioners, own refrigerators, eat meat, eat sushi, or fly on airplanes like most of us in the "developed" world routinely do. Once you're successful with that campaign, maybe I'll be ready to buy your argument that environmental destruction has little to do with population. In the meantime, though, there are every day more and more of us are consuming more and more (about 200,000+ humans added EVERY DAY), and Mother Earth is at the breaking point.
Errr, I am talking about, you know, what actually happened and who did it. I am not talking about some ideal future in which all people in the world can drive cars or whatever. What I'm saying is that current levels of environmental destruction doesn't have much to do with Brazil, India, Indonesia, Thailand, Central America, Iran, Turkey, Ecuador, Venezuela, Mexico, Nigeria and the other countries with increasing populations, much more with Europe (whose population is stagnating/decreasing), the US and developed East Asia. I don't really have to explain why people won't be able to access the same luxuries we did, it's pretty fucking obvious: we have wasted all the good stuff.
Just the opposite: I think the burden is on you to explain what exactly these countries have to do, with their large and growing populations, with global warming, ocean acidification, overfishing, abuse and waste of agricultural land and so on. Not in some unknown ideal future where every Indian family will have three cars, but in the past and the present. How would, say, decreasing the population in Venezuela or India or wherever decrease current emissions in America, still one of the biggest polluters, and by far the largest historically? How would decreasing population in Africa solve Europe's overfishing problems? Even killing off the entire third world would do exactly nothing, UNLESS the US and Europe change first.
Seriously, I'm not saying the Earth can support a hundred billion people. I am saying that it's us, the rich parts of the world, who have to change first. Simply put: Mother Earth is not at the breaking point because of India and China and other overpopulated countries. It is at the breaking point because of a fucked up and wasteful economic system that is most active in just a few relatively small parts of the world: most importantly Europe and North America. If we don't change that, we alone will fuck the world up.
"Forgive the repeated post here, but: Atomsk, OK -- we're counting on you to explain to all those exponentially-expanding populations in Brazil, India, Indonesia, Thailand, Central America, Iran, Turkey, Ecuador, Venezuela, Mexico, Nigeria and dozens of other countries (including the United States) why they are NOT allowed to drive automobiles, run air conditioners, own refrigerators, eat meat, eat sushi, or fly on airplanes like most of us in the "developed" world routinely do. "
I don't really like this question, because it's quite loaded, but the answer is not exactly complicated: because we, the "developed" world have already wasted all of this stuff. It's not because there are too many people in the world. It's because we fucked up and wasted everything, mostly on meaningless crap. And accidentally this means that whether it's "better" to have fewer people with higher standards of living or the other way around is certainly not something we have any moral right to decide. We should first get rid of our own fucked up legacy before we force this shit down the throat of the world.
I mean, America and Europe are both pretty fucking rich continents, even now easily able to support themselves. Why not demonstrate to all the overpopulating countries how to do it right? How to have a relatively high standard of living, without waste, without imports and exports (except the really, really necessary stuff), in a completely sustainable fashion? If practice shows that we can do it only by somehow decreasing our populations, well, so be it. But as long as it's our countries wasting and polluting and exporting pollution and so on, I don't think we look trustworthy. In general, our preachy words and evil actions do not match at all.
In addition to this, what the fuck are we afraid of exactly? I mean, *our* pollutions and CO2 emissions were what have already pushed us at least a bit beyond the safe zone, and *our* emissions will keep increasing those, whatever the rest of the world does. What can the rest of the overpopulated world do to us?
I mean, I know what people are afraid of: a billion Chinese living American suburban lives, with three SUVs, fully air conditioned mansions, eating beef every day and so on. If you think this is possible or probable, well, you can believe whatever idiocy you want, but even in this scenario the danger is in the lifestyle and the economic system behind it, not the number of people. It is also just a possible (but very improbable) future, not the present, which is the result of the past - in particular OUR Western past.
"Brazil, India, Indonesia, Thailand, Central America, Iran, Turkey, Ecuador, Venezuela, Mexico, Nigeria and dozens of other countries (including the United States)" - you know, there's just a tiny little bit of difference between Iran or Venezuela and the US. You know what? It's the past. The West has used Venezuelan and Iranian resources to enrich itself and partly to provide its people with a significantly higher standard of living than in the countries you mentioned, not the other way around, and it is through this historical use of resources, which has already happened, and has already effected significant change, that we are in this shit. I think that talking about what might happen in these countries in the future because of overpopulation a bit fucked up. I completely fail to see how decreasing populations in the poor parts of the world would have any fucking effect on waste and pollution. As for the U.S., even a 50% increase in population wouldn't need to result in a 50% increase of consumption and waste; first, because resources could be distributed a lot better - it's not like the U.S. don't have enough stuff, it's just wasted on shit; and second, because a lot of waste is not consumption related (but military and other structural waste and vanity crap).
Overpopulation has NOT caused the current environmental crises. "Solving" it would NOT solve the current environmental crises. In addition to this, it is NOT something that happened by itself, it is in fact a result of economic and scientific development ("progress") and a natural reaction to a basically exploitative economic system (capitalism). It is of course important in any form of developed global society - because any material economics behind such a society has to be sustainable and continuous increase can not be sustainable by definition, but that is a long term question and at this moment NONE of our immediate problems have much to do with it.
"The current U.S. population exceeds 300 million and is projected to grow 50 percent by 2050."
Thanks for posting that info, ezeflyer. I exerpted the above for what ought to be an obvious reason--150 million more people consuming resources at already outrageous levels pose a very serious threat to the planet's ecosystem and the remainder of humanity. Here're three links, one to a chart http://i1095.photobucket.com/albums/i475/westexas/ASPO_Charts.jpg another to one with this snippet: "Saudi energy demand to double by 2028" http://gulfnews.com/business/oil-gas/saudi-oil-saudi-energy-demand-to-double-by-2028-1.891497 and the third to an series of slides detailing how/why net exports is the metric needed to understand the energy dilemma, with slide 18 dealing with Saudi that accentuates the second item's importance, http://www.aspousa.org/2010presentationfiles/10-7-2010_aspousa_TrackBNetExports_Brown_J.pdf
Population growth is the driving force behind the many resource wars fought by the USA since the end of WW2 as admitted by the US government itself in its own planning discussions from 1947-49 and as pollicy has yet to change other than the cover lie used to keep the wars going. As you click through the slides, it ought to become clear that the Business as Usual scenario is doomed as its primary resouce will become quite rare and costly within 2 decades. The easiest way to minimize deaths due to the coming shortages of key resources and implosion of the current economic paradigm is to minimize population growth. We should not fool ourselves into thinking we'll have 150 million new jobs for the anticipated 150 milllion additional US citizens when we cannot even generate the 25 million jobs needed now to provide full employment. I'm glad CD reposted this article to its overt newswire after burying it yesterday. The issue of population growth has always been contensious as it touches on fundamental freedoms and most people want the government to stay out of their bedrooms for a host of reasons. But there is no more space or resources available for humans to "go forth and multiply." Indeed, if humanity is to survive the next 200 years, its numbers must decline by 50%, perhaps more, by 2222--Ten generations with a fertility rate of 1.75 will accomplish the task easily. And that's not nearly as draconian as an alternative future without some sort of planned population reduction.
Nothing wrong with what you wrote karlof1, evcept for talking about they future years of 2028 or more.
Unless scientists can find a safe method to prevent it, the Arctic will be (ice free) by 2014 - 2015... Massive amounts of methane gas, a trillion plus tons, which has been safely locked in permafrost ice will have released into our atmosphere and within one to five more years we most likely won't be here worrying about _overpopulation_... There won't be any human population.
Of course we don't wish to believe or accept those facts, so we'll talk about the years 2028 and or up to 2100 until the years 2015 to perhaps 2020.. .
One thing I learned from observing and becoming involved with Peak Oil is not to adopt the near-term Doomer position. Yes, I'm well informed about methane and permafrost and the realted Arctic ice situation, particularly the recent assessment "that the Arctic Sea could be free of ice in the summer in ten years time," http://www.norwaypost.no/news/the-arctic-sea-may-be-free-of-ice-in-ten-years-25841.html As a result, I'm much closer to Lovelock's opinion that a vestige of humanity will survive, but that isn't denying the urgency of our dilemma.
I've read nearly every book Lovelock wrote, and I tremendously admire his accomplishments, but I'm having trouble understanding where he's coming from lately:
He endorses the denialist meme that the hacked "climategate" emails were evidence of data fudging.
He champions nuclear power.
He sees "modern democracy" as an impediment to progress on climate change. "It may be necessary to put democracy on hold for a while."
He advocates adaptation before mitigation - massive investment in seawalls around population centers (as if the sea might stop rising without reducing atmospheric CO2).
James Lovelock: Humans are too stupid to prevent climate change
The "vestige of humanity" Lovelock envisions hanging on in a ruined world is an elite vestige. Add in Lovelock's ideas about adaptation and democracy, and you have a fairly complete spokesman for the powerful - who not only think they can survive the catastrophe they're unleashing, they think they can profit from it.
Hello Mr Null. Yes, Lovelock has become somewhat of an enigma [there's that concept again] in his old age. Certainly his personal store of cynicism has given rise to his increased use of sarcasm as witnessed in recent interviews. I think that like many of us he cannot fathom why people in general cannot see the changes happening all around them and link that to the data being supplied by science. Then there's a longstanding animosity that's existed between him and "mainstream" science regarding his Gaia Hypothesis, now redubbed Earth SystemsTheory. And of course there's the grave socioeconomic fallout from any attempt at real mitigation that would involve the almost complete cesation of fossil fuel use. So, it seems possible to understand why he's become enigmatic. It seems he's reached the point where he realizes he can do nothing but observe the catastrophe, sort of like when the two climatologists at the weather station in the film "The Day After Tomorrow" realize they're goners, and that's resulted in a certain resignation not present before.
Hi karlof1, thank you for the reply, I will reply below where there is more url space.
Don't forget about the egregious Gini index of inequality here in the states. Some are not using resources at nearly the same rates as others. Many are out in the cold, literally, when it comes to the simple need to heat one's home in winter, while others run the AC on high 24/7.
But yes, I agree that voluntary birth control, free of cost, is a desireable goal.
Atomsk,
OK -- we're counting on you to explain to all those exponentially-expanding populations in Brazil, India, Indonesia, Thailand, Central America, Iran, Turkey, Ecuador, Venezuela, Mexico, Nigeria and dozens of other countries (including the United States) why they are not allowed to drive automobiles, run air conditioners, own refrigerators, eat meat, eat sushi, or fly on airplanes like most of us in the "developed" world routinely do. Once you're successful with that campaign, maybe I'll be ready to buy your argument that environmental destruction has little to do with population. In the meantime, though, there are every day more and more of us are consuming more and more (about 200,000+ humans added EVERY DAY), and Mother Earth is at the breaking point.
Repply to karlof1
Hi karlof1... In 2007 the top scientists at the National Snow and Ice Data Center, (NSIDC), in Bolder, Colorado, stated the Arctic would probably be ice free in the summer months of the year 2030.... By the year 2009 they said things are happening so fast with global warming that the summer Arcitc would be ice free in 10 more years.... This year, the NSIDC scientists have determined the Arctic will be ice free in the summer months by 2015,,, or three to four more years. Most other climate scientists agree.
Things are happening much, much faster than most climate scientists had predicted...The major problems of loss of sea ice is the returning winter ice is only one year ice, which is thin and melts off the next summer very quilckly, along with much more thick perennial ice, especially so as the Arctic Ocena waters' are now warmer than they have been for more than a million years.
Then the second major problem is,, as the sea ice melts off the sub-sea permafrost melts and as we all know huge amounts of methae then escape into the atmosphere, causeing much faster warming of the planet than has been predicted.
Many of our top world's scientists warn if only 2% of the methane located beneath the Arctc Ocean's floor escapes quickly, within a three to five year period, it will cause a catastrophic, uncontrollable, no return, world wide global warming disaster... Two % would be an estimated 24 billion tons... Since it is now estimated near a billion tons a month of Arctic methane is escaping into the atmosphere, that gives us about two, maybe three more years for 2% of the Arctic's methane to escape... Will that cause a world wide catastrophic disaster? __ We'll have to wait and see.
Personally I believe planet Earth could sustain more than 9 or 10 billion humans IF, if we humans had lived like humans should have lived,,, without putting our money into unjust, illegal, insanse wars and used a small portion of that wasted money to develop geothermal, solar, wind and tidal energy.
If we had not caused global warming, not ruined the oceans and and not destroyed our rain forests, polluted our streams, rivers, lakes and aquafers and used (hemp) for it's more than 5,000 commercial uses, such as bio-degradable non poisonous plastics, cloth, paper products, medicines, etc, etc, 5,000 times and all safe bio-degradable, non polluting products... Hemp by the way is illegal to grow in the US,,, even though it is not marijuana... Hemp requires no poluting chemical fertalizers or irrigation. It's a weed, it will grow well on a gravel lot.
Anyway; we humans, the most intelligent life form, reap what we sow... Whatever happens we can only blame ourselves... Our elected? Well who elected them?__ Most don't even bother to vote... I'm done ranting here,, except to say,,,"Beware the Arctic's methane",, really, it is not one bit funny, it is (deadly), nonforgiving serious.
NSIDC--24 AUG 2011--"The new study suggests that inherent variability in sea ice extent will make it impossible for scientists to predict exactly when the Arctic will lose its ice. “What happens on short timescales depends a lot on inherent variability that may be impossible to predict,” said Kay. But in the long term, the influence of climate change means that sea ice will continue to decline. Kay said, “There is no escaping that we will see an Arctic with no summer sea ice this century if we continue to rapidly increase greenhouse gases in the atmosphere.” http://nsidc.org/icelights/2011/08/24/climate-change-or-variability-what-rules-arctic-sea-ice/#more-523
As I said, I'm well informed, but I've seen no article published by the NSIDC stating your claims, although this one contains some of the language you present. Here are the last two paragraphs from that short article:
"Studies by James Overland at NOAA and Muyin Wang at the University of Washington predict that the Arctic will be nearly ice free in three or four decades. Overland and Wang combined observational data with climate models to reach their conclusions. However, other research suggests that the Arctic could lose its ice even sooner. For example, a study by Wieslaw Maslowski, of the Naval Postgraduate School in Monterey, California, suggests that the Arctic could lose its summer ice cover by the end of this decade. Maslowski’s work is different from Overland/Wang’s in that it analyzed changes in recent observations and estimates of sea ice volume to project—rather than predict—future sea ice loss. That is, Maslowski’s study estimated how fast sea ice volume might decline if the current loss rate continues on a linear path.
"What is the right number?
"Nobody knows exactly when the Arctic will lose its summer ice cover, because changes in the ice are introducing even more changes to the sea ice and Arctic climate. However, most researchers agree that it is a question of when, rather than if we will see ice-free summers. Maslowski said, “If ice is melting, the ocean can absorb more and more solar energy.” And that extra heat will have to go somewhere – limiting winter ice growth and accelerating summer melt, affecting weather patterns, melting glaciers in Greenland, or disrupting ocean circulation patterns. Overland said, “When sea ice goes from a present loss of 30 percent to an 80 percent loss in the future, the added heat storage could have larger effects on climate.”
http://nsidc.org/icelights/2011/05/03/when-will-the-arctic-lose-its-sea-ice/#more-381
I would also argue your contention that humans are "the most intelligent life form," for it's clear we aren't much smarter than yeast.
Some models have projected a mid-century date (or even later!) for a sea-ice-free Arctic. These projections are already embarrassingly missing the trend apparent in current observations.
I find Maslowski more credible, because his projections from years ago are now borne out by observations. Joe Romm provides a useful gloss to the 2016 (+/- 3 years) date attributed to Maslowski:
By “ice-free,” Maslowski tells me he means more than an 80% drop from the 1979-2000 summer volume baseline of ~200,00 km^3. Some sea ice above Greenland and Eastern Canada may survive into the 2020s... but the Arctic as it has been for apparently a million years will be gone.
Arctic death spiral: Naval Postgrad School’s Maslowski “projects ice-free* fall by 2016 (+/- 3 yrs)”
Neven's Arctic Sea-Ice Blog has done excellent work on this subject. In this projection of a simple exponential trend from current data, September sea-ice volume hits zero in 2015. But Neven actually anticipates a Gompertz curve, decelerating as volume approaches zero. The Gompertz curve substantially agrees with Maslowski:
September 2011 sea ice volume, looking back and ahead
Some observers are convinced by the predictions of a loss of Arctic summer sea ice sooner than later, but not convinced that this will mean the immediate onset of an irreversible methane feedback. That would depend on how quickly terrestrial permafrost can melt (it is quite thick) and how quickly warmer temperatures reach sub-sea permafrost (which serves as a lid over huge clathrate deposits).
There's already enough thermal momentum to carry the Earth over the sea-ice-free Arctic threshold fairly soon, but possibly not enough yet to inevitably engage an Arctic methane feedback, imho. At the rate we keep pouring on more heat with our carbon emissions, this distinction may be purely academic anyways.
"There's already enough thermal momentum to carry the Earth over the sea-ice-free Arctic threshold fairly soon, but possibly not enough yet to inevitably engage an Arctic methane feedback, imho."
I agree with your assessment. There's also the unknown amount of methane the ocean will absorb and the rate of absorbtion. Unfortunately, the future of mitigation looks bleak when so-called leaders come to conclusions like this:
"Speaking at the conclusion of a two-day meeting with international energy ministers and business leaders in Paris, senior officials from the agency painted a gloomy picture of the world's current trajectory. It said growth in energy demand will be powered largely by coal and the only hope of restraining the rise in global temperatures to safe levels is to create cheaper technologies to capture the carbon dioxide it produces." http://www.foxbusiness.com/markets/2011/10/19/iea-sees-dire-future-for-climate-energy-without-new-technology/print
Perhaps it's now clearer why Lovelock favors nukes as he likely sees them as the lesser evil when it comes to burning more coal to power lights, computers, air conditioning, etc. and the chimera/fraud of carbon capture. The news item also makes clear the unwillingness of so-called leaders to destabilize the current political-economic paradigm and thus risk their status just to mitigate Global Warming. I'm 55, so I rather doubt I'll be alive to witness the wrath of a quite destabilized climate system that will certainly become the norm within 50 years. And I've argued back-and-forth between trying to foment change peacefully within the political system or via revolution, which implies violently, that overthrows that system, and opted for continuing within the political system. At some point, however, my patience will be overcome.
http://www.treehugger.com/files/2009/09/arctic-ocean-ice-free-summer-by-2015.php
From the article:… (“Anyone keeping up on the pace of Arctic summer sea ice melting, take note: Mongabay is reporting on new research presented by the National Space Institute at Technical University of Denmark (and others) which says that if current melting trends continue, the Arctic Ocean will be ice-free in the summer by 2015:
These latest estimates are based on new data on the rate of rapid thinning of Arctic sea ice -- 2004-2008 saw a total decline of 67cm. (More on this from NASA.).
Another article of over 25 where scinetists predict an ice free arctic by 2015.
http://www.adn.com/2011/09/15/2070156/arctic-sea-ice-shrinks-to-second.html
From the article…("This is not a random event," said oceanographer James Overland of the U.S. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. (NOAA). "It's a long-term change in Arctic climate."
The new measurements were taken by the National Snow and Ice Data Center in Boulder, Colo... (NSIDC),,,It reported that the amount of ice covering the Arctic hit its lowest point late last week, covering just 1.67 million square miles. Only in 2007 was there less summer sea ice, which has been dramatically declining since scientists began using satellites to monitor melt in 1979. Other records go back to 1953.”).
Sucking carbon dioxide from air too costly, say physicists
This article is about an American Physical Society report on how much open-air carbon-capture would cost: $600 per tonne. If motorists were assessed an effluent-processing fee at the going rate, it would come to $5.28 per gallon. That's certainly steep, but not enough to cause the collapse of civilization. There are challenging problems with open-air capture (such as sequestration of captured carbon), but cost isn't one of them - when realistically compared to the cost of continuing to use the atmosphere as a sewer.
Capture at a concentrated source, such as the smokestack of a coal plant, is eight times cheaper. The sequestration side of the problem is a possible show-stopper, but that's not what has stopped carbon capture in its tracks, afaik. So long as it remains cheaper to just release the CO2 into the air, people will keep doing it. It's the old tragedy of the commons, writ large.
Via taxation, most EU motorists pay more than double the US petrol cost, and the revenues generated produced an outstanding public transit system--local, intra and international--providing people with an alternative aside from walking or biking. Such a system in the USA was destroyed by corporations wanting even more money. But lets back-up for a moment.
The report I linked to referenced an International Energy Agency (IEA) conference, an agency that accepts the fact that Peak Oil production has already occured, which is why it's concluded that coal use for energy will increase regardless of concerns. So, if coal generated CO2 is to be sequestered at the emission source, then it is electricity that will cost more, which is to say the cost of sequesteration will ultimately be paid by the user. So when measuring the cost of electrical production for solar, wind, wave, tide, etc., versus fossil fuels, sequestration cost must be added to get the real comparable equation. And somewhere in that equation the eventual exaustion of fossil fuels must be considered in determining capital costs since the fossil fuel using plant will eventually close due to lack of fuel supply. Thus the need to build geosolar electric generating plants addresses the requirement to mitigate CO2 emissions while also anticipating the at first rising cost then demise of fossil fuel supplies.
Many nations and peoples already understand the above and are tying to implement such devices. But the continent-sized countries--USA, Canada, Russia, China, India--have yet to do so; and in the case of the USA have tried to sabotage attempts by the others to address the problem. And until the oil and coal corporate control of the US federal government ceases, the USA will continue to hinder efforts at CO2 mitigation, including sequestration. I have called the US actions acts of Terrorism and a form of warfare since its Barbarous behavior threatens the lives of billions and the ONLY planetary ecosystem. Only geosolar energy production systems can deliver electricity too cheap to meter, but will they be built on a scale large enough and quickly enough to make a difference in the shortrun?
The cost of producing a KwH of electricity by geo-thermal is on average $0.015 cents, up to two cents,,, far, far less than Nuke or fossil fuels power generation.
What you wrote is correct ~karlof1~, unfortunantly it was not done 40 or more years ago... Now it is too late. and we all know coal will continue to be burned in power plants world wide, like Hell would not allow it.
Mountaintop removal will continue, horrible pollution of rivers and aquifers will continue, deforestation will continue, as will acidification of our precious ocean waters'....Global warmng will continue and intensify every year and nothing is going to change in time to prevent the end of life as we understand life on our planet... And I do wish that were not so.
Humans the most intelligent life form was intended to be sarcasm.
Pigs actually do not shit in thrir beds or their water and food.