« First « Previous Comments 29 - 68 of 102 Next » Last » Search these comments
Totally false. Trees don't grow to the sky, and forests don't cover the whole planet, yet both have survived for billions of years.
Fetishizing GDP growth
If you believe that, you don’t even understand your original post. With the above statement, you’re conflating economic growth requirements with natural resource/waste disposal requirements for a population. They aren’t the same at all. Clearly! Because most of the world is not living in luxury like we are in the USA! Horrible economies also support large populations!
Yes, Malthus was wrong. Technology has far outstripped population growth. The real key is to stop subsidizing Third Worlders
I can guarantee you that first world technology and innovation will solve any over population or climate problems WAY before eco-story teller SJWs like Al Gore and his cult.
It would give me a boner to mow down illegals with a M134 as they stepped foot across the border.
We are an outbreak species, just like protozoa on a petri dish. Please listen to the talk I linked at the top.
Once the rest of world starts looking like Haiti, you will be invaded.
There is simply no historical example of such stagnating society that survived for very long.
For many reasons, we are not "just like protozoa." We have self-awareness and other interests besides survival and reproduction; in fact, advanced civilizations are not even maintaining replacement rate.
These are policy choices. You make assumptions about political will, but those assumptions can be disproved.
Neanderthals survived for longer than all of human history, with little or no growth in GDP during most of that time.
We see current westerners living comfortably while reproducing at less than replacement level, due to advances in technology.
Technology is what enabled the outbreak, so, so far at least, it is the problem, not the solution.
The entire point of this thread was to discuss the talk I posted. So if you are not listening it, that kind of defeats the point, isn't it?
Japan is at the top of the game so that it can keep growing economically by exporting to a growing world. But I don't think it is obvious they could do it in isolation.
Financial recalculation, even bankruptcy or monetizing debt, can be extremely painful but does not necessarily end a civilization
Most of the world is now at or below replacement rate. In map below, green, yellow, and red are above. Dark blue is below, lighter blue at about replacement.
Advancing technology and productivity is a better way to achieve growth without relying on immigration, especially immigrants who hate us. We don't need population growth, and we don't even really need economic growth.
Malthus was totally right. Population growth is obviously very limited and the case can already be made that we are overshooting the environment. Just count dead zones in the ocean.
Once the rest of world starts looking like Haiti, you will be invaded.
The third world would not have the problem you're describing without 1st world welfare.
I love debates especially when I can delete comments that don't completely agree with me.
3? 6? 8? 12? 21? 22? 23?
No, bad policies enabled the outbreak.
That's like saying you want to discuss a bad investment, but only with people who intend to buy it. Perhaps you should post a transcript of the "talk", including any subliminal components and audio cues.
the idea of carrying capacity for a rapidly technologically advancing human society is silly.
And btw, counting on exponential technological progress to forever support your exponential growth is also silly.
This assumes that the rate of technological innovation will get continually faster and faster, forever. That's an idea as silly as claiming that the idea of "carrying capacity" is silly.
Reality saysthe idea of carrying capacity for a rapidly technologically advancing human society is silly.
Divide the land area of this planet by 10 square feet lots, I can assure you you'll get a finite number.
I can also assure you the planet has a "carrying capacity" that is less than that number.
Who is silly, really?
If you don't understand the thesis made in the original post, then why would you feel you can comment on it?
Are you afraid to be "hypnotized" by a 10min talk?
A finite number can be so large that, in practical terms it's unlimited.
1. The drastic reduction of existing banking centers (e.g. the population of Florence was reduced by 60-70%) and administrative centers and their dependent population (i.e. the urban poor and the wasteful rich that had become a tax/interest burden on the rest of the society especially farmers outside the cities). Because the economy was heavily agricultural at that time, the reduction of urban population as ratio to rural population served as a tax-reduction on the rural farmer population.
Those cities were not big banking centers before the plague. Florence had a population of 110,000-120,000 before the Great Plague; that was reduced to 50,000 after the plague.
Thanks for interjecting, Rin. The numbers from Plissken and from me are actually not in disagreement. Florence apparently had an early boom from the 1200's to 1338 (increasing population from about 30k to about 120k) before the crash during the Great Plague / Black Death, dropping back down to 50k pop, before booming again after 1351. The city managers may have figured out in the 2nd go-around not to run huge welfare programs and attract welfare seekers (the same mistake the Rome had made), thereby putting the city on a more sustainable growth path.
Thanks for interjecting, Rin. The numbers from Plissken and from me are actually not in disagreement. Florence apparently had an early boom from the 1200's to 1338 (increasing population from about 30k to about 120k) before the crash during the Great Plague / Black Death, dropping back down to 50k pop, before booming again after 1351. The city managers may have figured out in the 2nd go-around not to run huge welfare programs that attract welfare seekers (the same mistake that ancient Rome had made 1500 years earlier), thereby putting the city on a more sustainable growth path.
the centralized management in the middleastern Islamic empires.
The rate of technological innovation has geometrically increased every century since the beginning of the industrial revolution. That’s over 250 years.
What data do you have that it will actually slow?
Reality saysthe centralized management in the middleastern Islamic empires.
The question here is .. what management? A bunch of Imams and their so-called Caliphates are a bunch of douchebag religious bumpkins who don't know their head from their ass, can't manage any society, nevermind an empire.
BTW, religion was/is a very efficient way of reducing administrative cost. Put it this way: in Detroit and parts of Chicago, only 15% of murder cases get resolved. How can a society function without a religious faith that criminals will be caught and punished somehow?
BTW, religion was/is a very efficient way of reducing administrative cost. Put it this way: in Detroit and parts of Chicago, only 15% of murder cases get resolved. How can a society function without a religious faith that criminals will be caught and punished somehow? In the absence of a faith in a "god" or "gods," most people would default to a blind faith in an omnipotent government run by very much fallible men in costumes.
England seemed to do well when it confiscated the Monasteries, so here we disagree. Not to mention the huge bump in performance over Southern Europe by Germany, Scandinavia and Britain starting in the 1500s.
« First « Previous Comments 29 - 68 of 102 Next » Last » Search these comments
Plus 1 billion per decade.
When a culture of protozoa hits the size of the Petri dish, they drown in their own waste or run out of nutrient, or both.
Do you think we are different from protozoa?
Do you think we're special?
I'm not sure why so little attention seems to be paid to these questions, but here's 1 talk about it:
https://www.ted.com/talks/charles_c_mann_how_will_we_survive_when_the_population_hits_10_billion#t-697701