Oct 28 2012: Dear Karl in reply.
I am sorry if I offend you with "Population controls." An awful phrase, I apologise for it's use.
The fact is the choices we make as rich individuals affect the lives and well being of other living things including humans. What we buy decides who prospers and who does not. Who eats and who does not. They're here.
2. Human activity results in the premature extinction of thousands of species every year, many of which have been living on this oasis of life millions of years before the ape family, of which we are one, appeared. Every one of us has a responsibility for that, without them we die.
3. My personal view is that we do have an obligation to help those less fortunate than ourselves, whatever their colour creed belief or status, both home and abroad. The pitiful 0.7 % of GDP that the UK currently spend on foreign aid has to be "sold" as in our interest, and defended as "necessary for our future growth".
4. I concede the current thinking, "teach the needy to fish, rather than provide a daily fish" is a better approach than past efforts, but it does not necessarily make for a solution, and may make it worse.
5. Rape murder, slavery, child abuse, cruelty, hate, prejudice and destruction abound across the world wherever mankind sets his foot, it is not the prerogative of the uneducated or poor.
6 Greed and power are the motivators for these, along with survival madness and belief. The worst atrocities in history and today continue to be justified in the name of good, god or necessity. You are as likely to find a rapist in your street, town or board room, as in squalor or poverty. It is a weapon of power.
6. Capitalism is the source of our wealth and power and the exponential growth of our numbers.
The difficulty is deciding which choices deliver the lesser ill, however well intentioned our act.
All the above lead to my interest in your debate. I have no solution but believe the human race must evolve and become a better species, or die out.
Oct 27 2012: The difficulty with population controls is that those who are in a position to see the facts and imagine the consequence are all very well fed, have access to the necessary birth control measures etc. If you live on the margin of survival, as Maslow so carefully explained, you care for little else but the next meal or the nearest shelter. To give all of those who live today the surety of a fair chance of survival, is most probably within the ability of human race, but falls rather low on the "wish list" of most of us.. Ergo. Nature will have her way. As a now less than youthful woman who chose 45 years ago for many reasons not to bring any children into this world, only one ( fairly low priority reason) of which was I could see little reason to bring yet more of us into it, I understand both the overwhelming drive to do so and the economics of necessity that drive the population growth. I had a choice, but who amongst us are arrogant enough to believe we have the right to choose for others ?
Yet if we do not do so the " others " essentially do choose for us. Nature is very clear, eventually she will do away with the excess of every species and any species that cannot or will not adapt to the changing planet will disapear. We are changing the planet and many do die, many humans and many more species. As a child a disaster ( flood volcano etc) killed or displaced 10s of thousands now it kill or displaces 100,000's. (eg. China 800,000 peasants displaced by the building of the 3 Gorges dam)
What we can do is talk and explain, educate, explain the consequence. Change the thinking, change the benefits, change the values, change how we rescue, change how we provide for those unable to provide for themselves, change the expectations. It has to be persuasion . Open up the choices to logic and teach people the consequence for " following " instinct rather than logic. Start with YOUR children, and YOUR culture. Be willing to make your child a misfit!
Oct 15 2012: I am intrigued by the progress of this debate. It occurs to me particularly with regards Charles's comments and Mats initiative, how and who is to decide what "makes peoples lives better" and which people are we talking about?. There is no doubt that capitalism has made a few peoples lives very much easier and filled with pleasant distractions ( I would question if they are happier or more fulfilled than our ancestral peasants working on the land but that is an opinion). It has also made very many people lives poorer and less free than many apparently less " progressive" economic models.
How then folks, are we to measure the well being of the whole worlds population ? I suggest to you that capitalism and the power it gives to a few is now of a global nature, and governments on the whole way behind the curve on the issue of cultural and technological development and often quite ignorant as to the behaviour of the majority. Culture I believe to be as much if not more about what people do, rather than what people think. ( the two may often be well removed, we mostly do what is acceptable to others around us. We can think what we choose (at least up until this moment we can). History is a harsh judge of those arrogant enough to believe they knew what was good for the world. Well we have the technology , perhaps we should first ask the world what would make you happy, or perhaps at least what would make people less unhappy? A big question. I am not even sure I can answer it myself!
Oct 13 2012: Some 40 years ago, when I was a teenager, the belief was that technology would allow us much more leisure and time to pursue self determined interest and and goals in this life. There was mention of 20 or less hours as the expected working week. Sociologist expressed concern that boredom would lead to atrophy of curiosity and the lack of the need to strive, perhaps a degeneration of the instinct to survive! Instead we have a faster pace of life. We cannot wait for anything but expect " instant" everything ( we are aggrieved if don't of get it, and ungratefully value it little if we do!).
There is a degeneration of familly life, " no time to stop and stare". We talk of "quality" time as a few hours spent with our loved ones in a week of rushing around like a hive of demented bees! There needs to be a balance. Technology yes, it a great boon, and produces wonderful tools but they are only a tools. No doubt the invention of the wheel produced a similar gasp of awe! We must solve our sociological and population problems if the human race is to survive the next 1000 years. How we we do that? Is it possible? Can our planet survive 9 billion people, what about after that, 20 billion, 40? Do we HAVE to try it to find out? We have challenged nature who dispenses with an excess of any species without mercy, what will we replace her cruelty with ? Money ? A legal life span limit? no children till grandma dies ? Or are we lemmings to fill the planet so full of our own kind we push each over the edge ( mentally if not physically)?
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A comment on Conversation: Debate: Should we endlessly assist population expansion?
I am sorry if I offend you with "Population controls." An awful phrase, I apologise for it's use.
The fact is the choices we make as rich individuals affect the lives and well being of other living things including humans. What we buy decides who prospers and who does not. Who eats and who does not. They're here.
2. Human activity results in the premature extinction of thousands of species every year, many of which have been living on this oasis of life millions of years before the ape family, of which we are one, appeared. Every one of us has a responsibility for that, without them we die.
3. My personal view is that we do have an obligation to help those less fortunate than ourselves, whatever their colour creed belief or status, both home and abroad. The pitiful 0.7 % of GDP that the UK currently spend on foreign aid has to be "sold" as in our interest, and defended as "necessary for our future growth".
4. I concede the current thinking, "teach the needy to fish, rather than provide a daily fish" is a better approach than past efforts, but it does not necessarily make for a solution, and may make it worse.
5. Rape murder, slavery, child abuse, cruelty, hate, prejudice and destruction abound across the world wherever mankind sets his foot, it is not the prerogative of the uneducated or poor.
6 Greed and power are the motivators for these, along with survival madness and belief. The worst atrocities in history and today continue to be justified in the name of good, god or necessity. You are as likely to find a rapist in your street, town or board room, as in squalor or poverty. It is a weapon of power.
6. Capitalism is the source of our wealth and power and the exponential growth of our numbers.
The difficulty is deciding which choices deliver the lesser ill, however well intentioned our act.
All the above lead to my interest in your debate. I have no solution but believe the human race must evolve and become a better species, or die out.
A comment on Conversation: Debate: Should we endlessly assist population expansion?
Yet if we do not do so the " others " essentially do choose for us. Nature is very clear, eventually she will do away with the excess of every species and any species that cannot or will not adapt to the changing planet will disapear. We are changing the planet and many do die, many humans and many more species. As a child a disaster ( flood volcano etc) killed or displaced 10s of thousands now it kill or displaces 100,000's. (eg. China 800,000 peasants displaced by the building of the 3 Gorges dam)
What we can do is talk and explain, educate, explain the consequence. Change the thinking, change the benefits, change the values, change how we rescue, change how we provide for those unable to provide for themselves, change the expectations. It has to be persuasion . Open up the choices to logic and teach people the consequence for " following " instinct rather than logic. Start with YOUR children, and YOUR culture. Be willing to make your child a misfit!
A comment on Conversation: Debate: Our culture isn't adapting to our rapidly progressing technology.
How then folks, are we to measure the well being of the whole worlds population ? I suggest to you that capitalism and the power it gives to a few is now of a global nature, and governments on the whole way behind the curve on the issue of cultural and technological development and often quite ignorant as to the behaviour of the majority. Culture I believe to be as much if not more about what people do, rather than what people think. ( the two may often be well removed, we mostly do what is acceptable to others around us. We can think what we choose (at least up until this moment we can). History is a harsh judge of those arrogant enough to believe they knew what was good for the world. Well we have the technology , perhaps we should first ask the world what would make you happy, or perhaps at least what would make people less unhappy? A big question. I am not even sure I can answer it myself!
A comment on Conversation: Debate: Our culture isn't adapting to our rapidly progressing technology.
There is a degeneration of familly life, " no time to stop and stare". We talk of "quality" time as a few hours spent with our loved ones in a week of rushing around like a hive of demented bees! There needs to be a balance. Technology yes, it a great boon, and produces wonderful tools but they are only a tools. No doubt the invention of the wheel produced a similar gasp of awe! We must solve our sociological and population problems if the human race is to survive the next 1000 years. How we we do that? Is it possible? Can our planet survive 9 billion people, what about after that, 20 billion, 40? Do we HAVE to try it to find out? We have challenged nature who dispenses with an excess of any species without mercy, what will we replace her cruelty with ? Money ? A legal life span limit? no children till grandma dies ? Or are we lemmings to fill the planet so full of our own kind we push each over the edge ( mentally if not physically)?