Overpopulation in 2023

[mistermack]

The thing is, companies are there to make money. Pharma is there to make money from Pharmaceuticals. For all commerce, their first responsibility is to the shareholders or owners. There's nothing wrong with that, it works. 

Improving the world is the job of voters. The politicians will only do what gets them votes, in general. Or what they calculate will win votes. It's up to the public to shape the world, by using the media, and influencing the politicians. The shape of the world is the work of the man in the street, at the end of the day. Both through what they do, and what they don't do. 

[CharonY]

It is a tragedy of the commons issue, though. Few folks will vote for measures that could limit their own unfettered use of resources. We do see it in how climate change is playing out. The rhetoric minimizes their impact and if that stops working focus shifts to blaming folks, so that ultimately nothing gets done. 

[Phi for All]

36 minutes ago, mistermack said:

The thing is, companies are there to make money. Pharma is there to make money from Pharmaceuticals. For all commerce, their first responsibility is to the shareholders or owners. There's nothing wrong with that, it works. 

There's a HUGE amount wrong with that in modern execution. Many companies made great profits in the past without beggaring the rest of the population, including their own workers. If you haven't seen how much more money goes to the shareholders and owners these days, you aren't paying attention. I've spent my life in business to make money, but I never excused industries like Pharma for the corrupt business practices they've lobbied into law. 

Oh, and I don't think it's working for anyone but the ethically corrupt, but I'm sure your support is appreciated.

[mistermack]

Companies are there to earn a living. When you risk your money, you do your best to make a profit and not go bust. (except people like Donald Trump) Bleeding heart liberals aren't going to bail them out, if they go bust looking after other concerns. It's not easy running a business. If it was, we'd all be billionaires. 

It's politicians who have the means and the duty to improve the world, not businesses. And it's the man in the street that has the power to influence the politicians with their voting intentions. 

[TheVat]

Say that we do get to a more stable, egalitarian, nonsexist, eco-aware and carbon-neutral planetary civilization.  Call it the Thunbergian Era.* In terms of quality of life and elbow room, what would people here see as a good population size?  Maybe most would say it's impossible to determine.   Sierra Club style nature nuts might offer a lower figure where lots of Earth is a wild preserve and Yosemite is never crowded.  People with rare niche hobbies might want more, to increase odds of finding fellowship.  Some people would just shrug and say things like I want the beach less crowded on Sundays so it's easier to fly kites.  My guess is a lot of preferences relate to how popularion is distributed rather than numerical totals.   We could have three billion people, a figure that seems to me a nice middle path, but that could be very differently distributed.   A decentralized population with autonomous houses  could sprawl across the countryside, or a very urbanized population could concentrate in dense clusters of soaring towers surrounded by immense green spaces.  Or other options between those polarities.  That distribution is somewhat tied to wealth of nations and complicated social trends.  

 

 

* you can call it something else, Mack.  🙂

[iNow]

6 hours ago, TheVat said:

Saying it's relevant is not to say reducing population is THE solution, only that it may be part of a suite of solutions

Who gets to decide which people die and by what method their life terminates?

3 hours ago, Phi for All said:

There's a HUGE amount wrong with that in modern execution.

His position also ignores the cost of externalities and how often new costs get imposed on society by businesses who won’t ever pay them. 
 

[StringJunky]

7 minutes ago, iNow said:

Who gets to decide which people die and by what method their life terminates?

You might be looking at the wrong end of the life scale. Preventing lives from starting in the first place would be ethically easier to reduce the population. I think if we collectively wring our hands and reach a tipping point where Darwin rules increasingly, then this kind of discussion will be moot. The biggest, richest and meanest will prevail. 

[iNow]

19 minutes ago, StringJunky said:

Preventing lives from starting in the first place would be ethically easier to reduce the population.

Who gets to decide which potential parents get sterilized and by what method their genetic line terminates with them?

Edited August 29, 2023 by iNow

[StringJunky]

6 minutes ago, iNow said:

Who gets to decide which potential parents get sterilized and by what method their genetic line terminates with them?

No idea, but somebody will make the decision when current democratic norms become part of the past, as resources and space become scarcer. As things get worse, people will become more selfish. It will become more about 'me' and less about 'us'

Edited August 29, 2023 by StringJunky

[iNow]

10 minutes ago, StringJunky said:

No idea

Me either, but we need to stop saying it’ll be part of the solution until we figure it out. 

Until then, it’s similar to saying we need to migrate to other star systems… ok, sure, but how?

[Ken Fabian]

What should we be doing that we are not already? I am all for education, healthcare and availability of contraception. And economic security and prosperity for all. All of which tend to lead, through providing enough freedom to do so, to choosing reduced family size.

Population reduction other than by reduced birthrate and attrition over multiple generations across multiple nations seems especially problematic. Regulating which people can and can't have children and under what circumstances - rather than who lives and who gets murdered - has serious ethical as well as practical issues too.

Education and encouragement is fine - let's do more where we can - but I am not convinced we should be trying regulation and enforcement. I think some of our more serious population related problems won't give the time for population reduction to help even if we could force it and I feel a sense of foreboding about that. An aside is I don't think global warming is primarily a population problem - I think it is a dirty energy problem and per capita emissions problem.

Good governance is essential, yet the worse the external conditions the more likely it seems that we will get all that bad governance can give - blameshifting and divisiveness and conflict. Things going badly seems to enable and encourage exploitation and corruption; desperation leads to looking out for no.1 and  life becoming a zero sum game and that is not conducive to good governance.

Edited August 29, 2023 by Ken Fabian

[zapatos]

2 hours ago, iNow said:

Who gets to decide which potential parents get sterilized and by what method their genetic line terminates with them?

I don't think anyone needs to be sterilized. Many countries have already shown that simply by being prosperous (and the things that go along with that) is often enough to lead to population decline. Stopping lives from beginning can be achieved through global development. Not many people are opposed to their lives getting better.

[mistermack]

Stop subsidising peoples children would be a start. If you have kids, you should be able to support them. And totally free education, especially sex education, and free contraceptive products, all of the kinds. You're not talking about a lot of money there, just enabling things to happen.

Then cut the power of the religions. Put religions into the same tax brackets as any other enterprise, and you could pay for it all and still be in huge profit. 

The thing is though, that governments LIKE a bigger population. They view any shrinkage as a problem. It reduces their power, and their income to have a drop in population. It makes growth look worse, and gives ammunition to the opposition. So governments of countries with negative population growth start campaigns for people to have more babies, and subsidise them in taxes, and make immigration easier. (while saying that they are doing the opposite)

So it's all pretty inevitable that population WILL continue to explode. Unless they put me in power. That's where the world is going wrong. 

And of course, a world with 11 billion population WILL produce more CO2. You can't daydream that away. You're adding two Chinas to the world population. Energy price will win out. Look at what China is using, and add that twice over. 

[dimreepr]

24 minutes ago, mistermack said:

Stop subsidising peoples children would be a start. If you have kids, you should be able to support them. And totally free education, especially sex education, and free contraceptive products, all of the kinds. You're not talking about a lot of money there, just enabling things to happen.

Then cut the power of the religions. Put religions into the same tax brackets as any other enterprise, and you could pay for it all and still be in huge profit. 

The thing is though, that governments LIKE a bigger population. They view any shrinkage as a problem. It reduces their power, and their income to have a drop in population. It makes growth look worse, and gives ammunition to the opposition. So governments of countries with negative population growth start campaigns for people to have more babies, and subsidise them in taxes, and make immigration easier. (while saying that they are doing the opposite)

So it's all pretty inevitable that population WILL continue to explode. Unless they put me in power. That's where the world is going wrong. 

And of course, a world with 11 billion population WILL produce more CO2. You can't daydream that away. You're adding two Chinas to the world population. Energy price will win out. Look at what China is using, and add that twice over. 

You're right, we can't control population without predator's; but if they threaten me, I'm building a wall and die under siege.

Our best chance is to figure out a way to feed and sustain each other and therefore maximise the number clever buggers, to work on the problem; rather than rely on idiots to thin the herd...

[Sensei]

18 hours ago, CharonY said:

I think a big driver is also that the industries are building for obsolescence and low cost (e.g. clothing) in order to maximize profit.

This is the result of a choice made by the customer..

18 hours ago, CharonY said:

It is often cheaper to buy rather than to repair (not to mention more convenient).

This is a result of too high salaries in Western countries..

In Africa and Asia, they repair "everything"..

18 hours ago, CharonY said:

And considering that it is also often cheaper to ship things to different countries to assemble and/or process things, the cost savings add up to a lot of environmental cost that we offload to future generations.

This is a result of too high salaries in Western countries..

18 hours ago, CharonY said:

And I know that a lot of hypocrisy is involved here as I am sitting in a AC-cooled environment in front of a computer and surrounded by affordable electronics (not to mention coffee).

..and African or Asian workers dream to be you especially when they have 40-50 C..

ps. iPhone is not so affordable.. 😛

 

 

[Endy0816]

Population growth is expected to slow after it hits 10 billion.

I think we'll be able to manage in terms of resources, but we'll need to rethink things. A focus on arcologies and multi-use midrises would be ideal. Widespread urban farming(in all it's forms) and reducing food waste would likewise help with improving efficiency

[zapatos]

28 minutes ago, Sensei said:

This is the result of a choice made by the customer.

It is also a result of choices made by industries and governments. Everyone who has a voice in the decision on what/where/how to manufacture has an impact.

Edited August 29, 2023 by zapatos

[TheVat]

14 hours ago, iNow said:

Who gets to decide which people die and by what method their life terminates?

Holy feck, did you just troll me?  Dude, no one who advocates a set population for the planet is advocating people dying.  This is about family planning and a demographic shift to smaller families being a viable choice and one that is rewarded.  i.e. fewer new people being born.   I'll thank you also to skip the forced sterilization strawman, too.  

Edited August 29, 2023 by TheVat

[Sensei]

14 hours ago, iNow said:

Who gets to decide which people die and by what method their life terminates?

..you know the name..

 

Anyway, any interference is not even necessary, on a truly overpopulated planet, people in capitalist countries will simply die because they will not be able to pay for water and food. Supply and demand and greed.
 

Edited August 29, 2023 by Sensei

[iNow]

13 hours ago, zapatos said:

I don't think anyone needs to be sterilized.

1 hour ago, TheVat said:

Holy feck, did you just troll me?  Dude, no one who advocates a set population for the planet is advocating people dying.

No trolling, just trying to point out the obvious. Whenever the subject of overpopulation comes up, there is a chorus of people suggesting the need for population control. 

Control is a very specific word. It implies removing life or preventing it from starting. 

We all support education, eradication of poverty, destruction of patriarchal rules forcing women into motherhood, etc., but those are different things. They are NOT population control. They are progress accelerators with a side benefit of reduced birth rates.

So, just say that. "I support progress accelerators that bring the side benefit of reduced births," not "part of the solution here must include population CONTROL."

/pedant

[TheVat]

1 minute ago, iNow said:

We all support education, eradication of poverty, destruction of patriarchal rules forcing women into motherhood, etc., but those are different things. They are NOT population control. They are progress accelerators with a side benefit of reduced birth rates.

Well, ok then.  If you were making a point about semantics I wish you had just said so, goddamit.  😀

I just figure a good faith discussion of how to reduce population is predicated on the assumption it is via lower birth rates achieved through various carrots and sticks.  One stick that wouldn't be as coercive would be just to eliminate tax credits if you have more than, say, three children.  That just says, we're not stopping you but bear in mind you are putting a disproportionate burden on various social infrastructures and resources.   So you need to help pay for that.

As others point out, doing this globally is not possible at the moment, as various ideologies and creeds of growth prevail, especially the mostly unexamined phobia that economic shrinkage is a fate worse than death.  

[zapatos]

41 minutes ago, iNow said:

They are NOT population control. They are progress accelerators with a side benefit of reduced birth rates.

They ARE population control. With a side benefit of progress.

/tomato tomahtoe 

[iNow]

37 minutes ago, TheVat said:

doing this globally is not possible at the moment

It's also not fast enough to address the problems we're facing (as Ken pointed out above)

11 minutes ago, zapatos said:

/tomato tomahtoe 

[mistermack]

1 hour ago, iNow said:

Control is a very specific word. It implies removing life or preventing it from starting.

By the same logic, disease prevention and modern medicine and reduction of infant mortality are also population control, only upwards instead of downwards. 

In reality, you can influence the birthrate without also killing people. It IS possible to do one and not the other, even if that comes as a surprise to you. And it's likewise possible to have a falling population, and still prevent disease and provide medicine. I know it's complicated, but take my word for it, if it's confusing. 

[Phi for All]

4 hours ago, Sensei said:

This is the result of a choice made by the customer.

Not entirely. Retailers make a LOT of choices about what to sell based on space available, profit margins, and many other factors, none of which were driven by the customer. I want a specific part to fix my X, but to save space and make more profit, the retailer carries a kit that fits 90% of all Xs so he only has to stock the kit, which costs 50% more and makes the retailer more profit than the specific part I wanted.

Not sure if it's happening where you are, but in the US the grocery stores are revamping their floorplans and procedures, paying their employees more and giving them better working conditions (which is long overdue), but they've done so at the expense of the customer. We used to load up our carts and bring them to the checkout, where the checker took each item out of the basket to scan it. Now the checkouts start with a conveyor belt, the customer loads AND unloads the cart, and the checker just scans. They have fewer checkers, so the lines are longer. The stores are making record amounts of profit, but they aren't hiring more workers, they're just getting the customers to do more for free. 

The US is far from a free market, and blaming the customer is blaming the victim, imo. I've still got my eye on the ultra-rich as the culprits.