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permaculture - Re: [permaculture] Viridian Principles Response Part Two

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  • From: dwayne <dwayne@pobox.com>
  • To: permaculture <permaculture@lists.ibiblio.org>
  • Subject: Re: [permaculture] Viridian Principles Response Part Two
  • Date: Sun, 06 Jul 2003 05:33:51 +1000

"Gaden@ziplip.com" wrote:
>
> A different example of this is a statement that appeared
> in a post a little while back. Something along the lines
> of "The earth cannot sustain its current population. We
> have to significantly reduce the world population."
> Wonderful piece of pseudo-science reductionist
> Cartesian logic (dumb doggeral). (I'm critiquing
> the statement, not whoever wrote it:)
>
> It's arguable correct. It's a nice 'power' statement as
> it gives the speaker the solid (stolid) backing of scientific
> research. It's a 'feel good' statement as it makes the
> speaker sound strong, decisive, knowledgable. It's a piece
> of crap.

Totally, the issue is not at all our population but our technology.
I read recently that 94% of everything extracted from the environment
becomes waste. As in wasted during the refining/manufacturing process,
it never gets to the end consumer. The same article said that we need
another 2 earths to support our current consumption level.

Now, if we have 6% resource utilisation, it stands to reason that if we
can triple this to 20%, voila! we have enough stuff to go around.

Similarly the catholics have calculated we could sustain a population
of, um, something enormous, 30 billion or something equally crazy, if we
got our technology sustained-up enough.


So, yes, there's too many people *in our current technological society*
for the earth to handle, but it's a tech issue, not a population issue.

Hell, one word: arcologies.

> Picture this. You are walking around your
> allotment with a piece of paper. On the paper,
> you have this statement written on it ("We have to
> significantly reduce the world's population.") Just
> how to you plan on implementing that at a personal
> level? Join a death cult and encourage broadscale
> euthanasia?
>
> Toss out a few neutron bombs (destroys people but
> not infrastructure) into population hotspots (Third
> world centres, obviously)? Withhold vaccines and
> medications which may treat/prevent epidemics such as
> HIV AIDs, malaria, or amoebic dysentery? Perhaps
> re-popularise the charming concept of Eugenics to
> make sure only the 'right' people breed and
> survive?


Oh that's super-easy:


nuke mecca


The resultant war would wipe out most people, I'd suggest.


Aaaaaand don't get me started on the widespread rumour in conspiracy
circles about the whole http://www.dieoff.org/ scenario leading to The
Powers That Be In The US firing up a long-term plan to grab all of the
world's resources and wipe out about 90% of humanity so they don't have
to share. Is it true? Who knows, not me, but if it is, boy I'm glad the
yanks love Australia.

But, it seems to me to be a MUCH NICER plan to improve the way we
utilise the resources we have, as a species.

Dwayne
--
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