Parasitic capitalists - a point to ponder.

[JimC]

The potential limits are imposed by the large amounts of energy required to convert atmospheric nitrogen into nitrate fertiliser, to mine the phosphates etc. and distribute them to farmland...

Energy is even less limited than those other resources. Thorium based nuclear energy, for example, currently under development, has the potential to supply ten times the power output of current nuclear reactors for the next thousand years. Long before then, we should have deuterium based nuclear fusion, which means enough deuterium for at least 100 million years energy.

Technically feasible, I agree. The question is whether we can make the switch to such long-term energy sources before our current civilisation curls up its toes...

I'm not Crumple, so I don't think such a scenario is inevitable, but neither do I have your apparent certainty that it won't...

[Audley Strange]

I'm not Crumple either, but I can't see us getting out of this without some form of socio=political or environmental catastrophe that bumps most of us off.

[JimC]

I'm not Crumple either, but I can't see us getting out of this without some form of socio=political or environmental catastrophe that bumps most of us off.

A little crumple-esque, it seems...

[Audley Strange]

A crump-ette?

[Blind groper]

The thing as I see it is that humanity has already solved a heap of problems that were supposed to cause widespread devastation.

Rachel Carson wrote "Silent Spring" (published 1963) describing how ecologically disastrous pesticides were going to cause widespread devastation. It did not happen because people learned to make less toxic and biodegradable alternatives.

Paul Ehrlich wrote "The Population Bomb" (published in 1968) describing how the growing population would exceed ability to produce food, causing massive death by starvation, during the 1970's. It did not happen because people learned to grow more food.

The Club of Rome wrote "The Limits to Growth (published in 1973) describing how we would run out of resources, including oil by the year 2000. It did not happen because people learned to find and extract more oil.

Other predictions included Y2K, nuclear war, nuclear winter, ozone depletion, various ecological catastrophes etc. What they all have in common is that none of them happened because people learned to do what was needed to avoid the disaster.

So now we have Audley predicting disaster.......

[Hermit]

The thing as I see it is that humanity has already solved a heap of problems that were supposed to cause widespread devastation.

Rachel Carson wrote "Silent Spring" (published 1963) describing how ecologically disastrous pesticides were going to cause widespread devastation. It did not happen because people learned to make less toxic and biodegradable alternatives.

Paul Ehrlich wrote "The Population Bomb" (published in 1968) describing how the growing population would exceed ability to produce food, causing massive death by starvation, during the 1970's. It did not happen because people learned to grow more food.

The Club of Rome wrote "The Limits to Growth (published in 1973) describing how we would run out of resources, including oil by the year 2000. It did not happen because people learned to find and extract more oil.

Other predictions included Y2K, nuclear war, nuclear winter, ozone depletion, various ecological catastrophes etc. What they all have in common is that none of them happened because people learned to do what was needed to avoid the disaster.

So now we have Audley predicting disaster.......

So, what happened in the past is bound to keep happening in the future? On the small scale that is good news for the Mayans, the Pueblo Indians and the Easter Islanders among others. On the large scale it's good news for humanity.

[Clinton Huxley]

The thing as I see it is that humanity has already solved a heap of problems that were supposed to cause widespread devastation.

Rachel Carson wrote "Silent Spring" (published 1963) describing how ecologically disastrous pesticides were going to cause widespread devastation. It did not happen because people learned to make less toxic and biodegradable alternatives.

Paul Ehrlich wrote "The Population Bomb" (published in 1968) describing how the growing population would exceed ability to produce food, causing massive death by starvation, during the 1970's. It did not happen because people learned to grow more food.

The Club of Rome wrote "The Limits to Growth (published in 1973) describing how we would run out of resources, including oil by the year 2000. It did not happen because people learned to find and extract more oil.

Other predictions included Y2K, nuclear war, nuclear winter, ozone depletion, various ecological catastrophes etc. What they all have in common is that none of them happened because people learned to do what was needed to avoid the disaster.

So now we have Audley predicting disaster.......

This is kind of the argument David Deutsch makes in his latest book. He is an optimist - humans are good at causing problems but they are also good at solving them. He's kind of the Anti-Crumple.

[Horwood Beer-Master]

The thing as I see it is that humanity has already solved a heap of problems that were supposed to cause widespread devastation.

Rachel Carson wrote "Silent Spring" (published 1963) describing how ecologically disastrous pesticides were going to cause widespread devastation. It did not happen because people learned to make less toxic and biodegradable alternatives.

Paul Ehrlich wrote "The Population Bomb" (published in 1968) describing how the growing population would exceed ability to produce food, causing massive death by starvation, during the 1970's. It did not happen because people learned to grow more food.

The Club of Rome wrote "The Limits to Growth (published in 1973) describing how we would run out of resources, including oil by the year 2000. It did not happen because people learned to find and extract more oil.

Other predictions included Y2K, nuclear war, nuclear winter, ozone depletion, various ecological catastrophes etc. What they all have in common is that none of them happened because people learned to do what was needed to avoid the disaster.

So now we have Audley predicting disaster.......

This is kind of the argument David Deutsch makes in his latest book. He is an optimist - humans are good at causing problems but they are also good at solving them. He's kind of the Anti-Crumple.

The solving of most of these problems so far has involved more efficiently using/exploiting the resources available, but efficiency has a limit (in principle 100%, in practice always less than that) and the fact remains that we are an island in space, and our total resources have an absolute limit, and that without bringing population under control we will one day hit this limit.

Sure there are more resources in space, and sure they are potentially exploitable. But even so without putting the brakes on our population growth in a massive way, it is inconceivable that we could possible bring resources to earth (or send people into space) at anything like the kind of rate needed to keep pace with our needs. To quote Dawkins in The Selfish Gene,

...It is a simple logical truth that, short of mass emigration into space, with rockets taking off at the rate of several million per second, uncontrolled birth-rates are bound to lead to horribly increased death-rates...

I'm sorry but anyone who disputes the logic of this argument has to my mind moved beyond "optimism".




P.S. In case anyone get's the wrong idea, I am very much in favour of the human colonisation of space, I just don't see it as the solution to our ecological problems on earth. It should be done anyway for it's own reasons.

[Clinton Huxley]

I agree, HBM, and Deutsch doesn't advocate space colonisation as a panacea for our ills either. His schtick is that "solving problems" is what humans do. We may leave it to the last minute but we do solve them.

[Atheist-Lite]

Crumple is a realist. Even now he's doing the hard slog of trying to figure out where/when the coming die-off will bottom out. Assuming the underlying 'driving agency' is interested in remaining intact and requires somekind of industrial civilization with a certain level of social stability a good place to be for your survival is near a large city but not in one. The city is a spent force with modern communications, the vast proportion of the die-off will occur within large city areas caused by fuel/food disruption stemming from the dollar crash. I figure the largest city will be no bigger than 200,000 to 250,000* in future...from this much socio-dynamic upheaval can be predicted including rising, declining and stable powers and a limit to the die-off.

*This is consistant with a level twice above the pre-industrial average for a large city.

[Blind groper]

On the population explosion bullshit.

I will probably have to point this out at least a thousand times and then repeat myself.

The population explosion is over. Average global fertility is now 2.55, down from 5.5 about 50 years ago. The population continues to grow due to the increase in life span rather than any great birth rate. Most western nations have fertility less than 2.2, which is replacement rate. The United nations monitors these changes, and know that fertility continues to drop. Their projections run to global average fertility of 2.0 by 2050, which is well below replacement rate. Increasing life span will allow population growth a little beyond that, but it will peak out at about 10 billion (plus or minus the error factor) by 2100, after which the population will be in decline.

So each and every one of you posters who predict disaster based on increasing population are talking bullshit.

[Horwood Beer-Master]

I agree, HBM, and Deutsch doesn't advocate space colonisation as a panacea for our ills either. His schtick is that "solving problems" is what humans do. We may leave it to the last minute but we do solve them.

If he thinks this is something we will solve 'at the last minute', then he clearly must believe (wrongly) there is some kind panacea waiting to be found.

But this is not something we can solve at the last minute, because this is one of those problems where the "last" minute is in fact too late (far vast swaths of the current generation* at any rate).


* - By 'current generation' I of course mean the current generation of whatever time we're talking about, not (necessary) anyone alive today.

[Clinton Huxley]

On the population explosion bullshit.

I will probably have to point this out at least a thousand times and then repeat myself.

The population explosion is over. Average global fertility is now 2.55, down from 5.5 about 50 years ago. The population continues to grow due to the increase in life span rather than any great birth rate. Most western nations have fertility less than 2.2, which is replacement rate. The United nations monitors these changes, and know that fertility continues to drop. Their projections run to global average fertility of 2.0 by 2050, which is well below replacement rate. Increasing life span will allow population growth a little beyond that, but it will peak out at about 10 billion (plus or minus the error factor) by 2100, after which the population will be in decline.

So each and every one of you posters who predict disaster based on increasing population are talking bullshit.

Many a slip twixt cup and lip, old chap. I'd be cautious about any prediction that projects out to 2100 or beyond. Of course, make the error factor large enough, and you will always be correct. Not saying these projections aren't based on the best current data but the proof of the pudding and all that.

[Clinton Huxley]

I agree, HBM, and Deutsch doesn't advocate space colonisation as a panacea for our ills either. His schtick is that "solving problems" is what humans do. We may leave it to the last minute but we do solve them.

If he thinks this is something we will solve 'at the last minute', then he clearly must believe (wrongly) there is some kind panacea waiting to be found.

But this is not something we can solve at the last minute, because this is one of those problems where the "last" minute is in fact too late (far vast swaths of the current generation* at any rate).


* - By 'current generation' I of course mean the current generation of whatever time we're talking about, not (necessary) anyone alive today.

His belief is in the ability of the scientific method to solve any material problem. Whether he is right, we'll see.

[Atheist-Lite]

I agree, HBM, and Deutsch doesn't advocate space colonisation as a panacea for our ills either. His schtick is that "solving problems" is what humans do. We may leave it to the last minute but we do solve them.

If he thinks this is something we will solve 'at the last minute', then he clearly must believe (wrongly) there is some kind panacea waiting to be found.

But this is not something we can solve at the last minute, because this is one of those problems where the "last" minute is in fact too late (far vast swaths of the current generation* at any rate).


* - By 'current generation' I of course mean the current generation of whatever time we're talking about, not (necessary) anyone alive today.

His belief is in the ability of the scientific method to solve any material problem. Whether he is right, we'll see.

Any method that can split the atom has potential.