Population Control

[gkbass13]

Your last post made me laugh, Jonathan. Well done, sir!

I am well well aware of information regarding genetics and potential disabilities, but environmental conditions cause all sorts of problems as well, and in all seriousness, we are all at least a little crazy in our own ways.

 

[nic salsus]

When the supply of oil drops off, we will see mass deaths. Any interruption of oil supply for greater than one year has been estimated to lead to the death of over half of America. (DOD statistic) The Department of Energy also believes that worldwide demand for oil will be vastly greater than supply in 2012. With the loss of oil, we'll see the loss of our food surpluses. The amount of food grown in the world is not naturally possible. It requires massive amounts of energy in various forms.

Yep.

 

[MakiSupaStar]

Additionally you don't have to be disabled to be an idiot. Jonathan is living proof.

 

[Bassist Jay]

I do not agree with population control at all. I know someone suggested that in order to bread you should have an I.Q. test or other things. Here is the problem with that. I believe all people are created equal. If you start selecting who can and cannot breed, then you are basically saying that all people are not equal or at least do not have equal rights. How about the people who are also very smart but get test anxiety? Can you imagine the anxiety they would have if it was determined that they had to pass an intelligence test in order to have a child. Also, what about accidents? My wife and I found out the hard way that birth control did not work on her. Yes, our kids were no planned but we very much oppose abortion because of our beliefs. So if others who have those same beliefs, accidentally got pregnant, does that mean they should be forced to abort a child they want?

As far as the world running out of food, that is actually not true. The earths entire population could live comfortably in the size of Texas and there is more than enough food to feed the entire world but the problem is waste and selfishness. A pastor friend of mine was telling me a story of a missionary from China who visited him. The missionary could not believe what we as American throw away. He said that what we consider junk would make others in China rich.

In addition to being a pastor, I work for the State of Colorado as a Corrections Officer and the food that we have to throw out at every meal is stunning. I wish laws could be passed for us to freeze any food that was not used and shipped to either homeless shelters or 3rd world countries to feed the needy. Sure, the food may not be the greatest, especially re-heated, but at least they would have food. You also have to look at countries that actually do have a good source of food in cows but due to their religious beliefs, they think the cow is sacred so they do not eat it yet their people starve. Now I don't say that to try and bash anyone or their beliefs but I am just trying to illustrate that food is available but people on television or in the media would like you to think differently.

I do believe that we are heading towards population control very soon though. My beliefs of that are based on my studies of the Bible as a pastor but if someone would like to discuss that in more detail they can pm me.

 

[knumbskull]

IIRC some countries are currently having a population slump - Italy, i think, for a start, and a few others.

also, what does overpopulation have to do with genetically cleansing the population of 'retards and crazy people', as you so charmingly put it?

i'm sure you are just naive rather than actually malicious, but i would like to add my voice to those who have already suggested that you go take a running jump into the nearest lake or large body of water.

 

[ehque]

i'm sure you are just naive rather than actually malicious, but i would like to add my voice to those who have already suggested that you go take a running jump into the nearest lake or large body of water.

Agreed.

If you're willing to deny the right to procreate to certain sections of the population, perhaps you don't see how slippery that slope is. If they don't deserve to breed, they potentially don't deserve to get state-sponsored education. Or maybe they shouldn't get to vote either. Or maybe you should just get it over and done with and deny them the right to life.

As it is baby-making is already on a downward spiral. We're not having enough babies worldwide to replenish our population, and the rise in population is more to do with extended life expectancies of existing people than new children.

 

[BassyBill]

It doesn't much matter whether you agree with population control or not, really. All species are subject to population control, one way or another. Not much point telling somebody they have the right to have children without any restrictions if they happen to be unfortunate enough to live in a country like, say, Angola, where infant mortality rates are 30 times higher than the US and 40 times higher than here in the UK.

(As far as eating cows goes - yum. But this isn't a realistic answer to food shortages in India, and I'm not referring to religious beliefs when I say this.)

I really don't know what the aswer to this might be. There may not be one. People just keep right on having kids, however much they're exhorted to plan their family size (or not, in many countries) and all that economic measures aimed at the issue seem to do is increase child poverty.

 

[MIJ-VI]

i've just been compared to the NAZI party

to clarify i don't care about race or religion in my eugenics just psychological stability and intelligence.

and really i just don't want retards or crazy people.

although a society filled with intellectuals would probably get annoying too. perhaps i will be more pleased with the populous if i move out of this backward redneck state.

like i said average intelligence and not crazy is all i ask.

No jonathan, you have not been compared to the NAZI party. Honest.

If you'd have read through some of the info in that link you would have found tidbits like this:

"...One of the earliest modern advocates of eugenics (before it was labeled as such) was Alexander Graham Bell. In 1881 Bell investigated the rate of deafness on Martha's Vineyard, Massachusetts. From this he concluded that deafness was hereditary in nature and, through noting that congenitally deaf parents were more likely to produce deaf children, tentatively suggested that couples where both were deaf should not marry, in his lecture Memoir upon the formation of a deaf variety of the human race presented to the National Academy of Sciences on 13 November 1883.[55] However, it was his hobby of livestock breeding which led to his appointment to biologist David Starr Jordan's Committee on Eugenics, under the auspices of the American Breeders Association. The committee unequivocally extended the principle to man..."

In contrast to the above noble goal of sparing future generations the burden of a congenital defect, the NAZI's twisted the selective breeding of human beings into a political tool--an approach which you weren't advocating.

 

[standupright]

We're controlled by being kept fat and complacent.

mmmmmmm....donut

 

[MIJ-VI]

The ages old huge war option went away as a tool of the ruling class with the reality of total nuclear annihilation. Notice since WWII wars have had no real attainable military objective? The Cold War, Korea, Viet Nam, Afghanistan, Iraq......

..or rational?

(Cue to-day's highly motivated funny-mentalists...)

 

[Schlyder]

* Georgia Guidestones * google it.

 

[Simo98]

We will do the same thing as animals do when their population exceeds the carrying capacity of the environment they inhabit.

The options are die out as many of us fight for food and living space (ensuring the strength of the species), or mass migration.

I suppose mass migration would have to take place via space colonisation... (Sci-fi fan alert?)

We can only hope

 

[Phalex]

For the past two hundred years or so, the human population has been growing at an exponential rate. Once the number of people exceeds the carrying capacity of the earth, the population will crash. (That would be an exponential decrease in population.) At that point I expect things will stabilize and start all over again.

 

[i_got_a_mohawk]

What we need is a good old fashioned war. None of this wishy-washy stuff that we have now. That'll thin down the numbers

 

[Phalex]

What we need is a good old fashioned war. None of this wishy-washy stuff that we have now. That'll thin down the numbers

I'd settle for a plague. We haven't done much by way of pestilence for a while.

 

[RWP]

What ever happens, it aint going to be pretty. Thermonuclear war would go a long way towards trimming the global population.

 

[i_got_a_mohawk]

I'd settle for a plague. We haven't done much by way of pestilence for a while.

I finally got around to reading The Stand a few months back.

I could go with that.

Some Captain Trips would sort things out!

 

[hover]

Lord,

Please make all the ugly dum-dum people go away so I can live in my utopian society of only well-to-do pretty people.

love, J Matos

did I get that right?

 

[jonathan_matos5]

Lord,

Please make all the ugly dum-dum people go away so I can live in my utopian society of only well-to-do pretty people.

love, J Matos

did I get that right?

no. i feel the ugly dumb people are in too great of numbers to be made to go anywhere. therefore i must go away to my Utopian society and wait for their numbers to dwindle instead.

 

[Against Will]

It is a mistake to say that there are or will be too many people on Earth.
Populations tend to self regulate. Growing rates keep decreasing, everything points toward 9-10 billion people. We already produce enough food to feed that much people.
Starvation comes from bad or greedy management of ressources. It's a political, not demographic issue.

Bingo,

Richer countries have smaller families than poorer ones, for a variety of reasons. Population spurts occur when a nation grows wealthier and healthier, cutting the mortality rates of infants and children (in poor countries, those mortality rates tend to keep the # of surviving children around 2-4). So where before you had 8 or 9 kids because only 2-4 would survive, now 8-9 survive. As time goes on, those kids and their grandkids will average 2-4 kids in their own families (or maybe none) causing population growth to plateau. This of course doesn't take into account immigration, but families of immigrants also tend to follow this rule.

Any shortages are the result of distribution problems, which a market can correct for, but there's still the problem of rampant corruption that prevent markets from working and can rob countries of their resources.

I also take issue with comparing a market economy with natural selection. In the latter, a trait or idiosyncratic characteristic of an animal gives it an advantage in the wild and allows it to survive to pass on its genes. In today's economy, most of the wealth is inherited from a person's parents or grandparents, regardless of an individuals own intelligence or resourcefulness. In fact, I would argue that there are more resourceful and intelligent people in the bottom billion than there are in the top 1%. In this scenario, however, the bottom billion are the first to lose out.