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World Population Grows Beyond 7 Billion
First time accepted submitter assertation writes in with a LA Times feature about the booming world population and the strain it puts on the environment and governments. "After remaining stable for most of human history, the world's population has exploded over the last two centuries. The boom is not over: The biggest generation in history is just entering its childbearing years. The coming wave will reshape the planet, and the impact will be greatest in the poorest, most unstable countries."
This means more than 70 million are in the top 1%!
Taco's wife needs to stop having kids.
It's time to start colonizing Mars, the Moon and other celestial objects. The http://mars-one.com/en/ project looks interesting.
"Earth is too small a basket for mankind to keep all its eggs in." Robert A. Heinlein
It all starts at 0
war is good for business
It also means that you've only got a 0.0000000143% chance of getting that coveted first post.
Sheesh, evil *and* a jerk. -- Jade
"After remaining stable for most of human history, the world's population..."
Well, that already proves they have no idea what they're talking about. Do these morons really think there were no more people in 1800 CE than in 800 CE? The world's population has always grown exponentially.
And fertility rates are dropping everywhere, and more people than ever are choosing to simply not have children. Of course by mentioning that, this article wouldn't be nearly as alarmist, so it was conveniently omitted.
Liberty in your lifetime
How many of those people starve to death everyday? People who cannot provide for their kids need to make a conscious effort to stop having them.
The only problem with exploding population is that it's not profitable to move all the food around so some people throw 50% away and some people starve.
Oh and as for governments, they don't scale. We need to start chopping everything up into smaller bits.
Abortion, sterilization, genetic cleansing of sexual desires, genetic manufacture of population. All part of the big plan to make us dependent on the IFSP.
Discuss.
Generations don't come in waves. Children are not born only every 30 years. The human population has never been stable either. The absolute growth changes, but the factor by which an exponentially increasing population changes is always the same. It's half full one doubling time before it's full. That doesn't mean it's not on an "explosive" (exponential) growth curve before.
....that if i had a button which if pressed, would kill every man, woman and child; I would push it without hesitation.
By bringing middle classes to developing nations. People who don't have to have litters to ensure that one child survives have one or two children, below the replacement rate. People who have careers and money to spend and cultural activities to take part in don't spend so much time screwing. And when they do, they realize that having extra children will prevent them from enjoying those luxuries.
In short, the fight against overpopulation is the same as the fight against global inequality.
Give me Classic Slashdot or give me death!
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and still none for the average /.er. ;-(
Nature has a way of equalizing the population to it's confined space. We may not like it, but it will happen one way or the other. I like how the video tries to tell you that the problem is solvable by government action. It isn't by any realistic measure. The more you provide resources to people, the more they will consume, and the worse the problem becomes. Wars, while not ideal, do a fairly good job of removing large numbers of the population quickly, as does desease. However, we like to think that to be civilized we should do all we can to stop both. So instead we allow people to starve to death... Yea, humanity.
Some days I get the sinking feeling Orwell was an optimist.
per Hans Rosling in http://www.ted.com/talks/lang/en/hans_rosling_religions_and_babies.html we have already peaked the world population.. worth a watch.
I come to Slashdot only to read sigs. One you are reading is mine.
If the present day is the right hand side, things always look more stable in the past. It's always been a J-curve, though.
UN's "medium" estimate is that population will reach about 10 billion and then plateau. Of course, projecting population 90 years in the future is an inexact science at best. On thought on resource consumption: an individual human being's resource consumption is, to a large degree, a factor of his or her standard of living. Consider the per capita resource consumption of developed, western countries vs. sub-Saharan Africa. One could reasonably argue that it will prove impossible to maintain the current global mean standard of living as population increases, ergo environmental stress may not end up increasing linearly with population.
Didn't he say something about a virus?????
Huh?
Obligatory TED links, that might actually be a bit more insightful than TFA.
http://www.ted.com/talks/lang/en/hans_rosling_religions_and_babies.html
http://www.ted.com/talks/hans_rosling_on_global_population_growth.html
While I am skeptical that we'll have enough resources either way, I think that humans are going to have to adapt hard or the entire race will just fade away. This won't necessarily be a problem for a few generations, but there is very little left in this world that is untouched, or that we can leave untouched. Solutions to the energy crisis aside, food and water are still major concerns, and we can't infinitely increase the amount of farming, because we'll also need to increase our living spaces; however, this is unless we go full Tokyo and build above and below ourselves and learn to live in cramped situations. Even still, it will be an incredibly difficult feat to convince most Westerners that they aren't allowed cars anymore and that they need to walk or use trains to go to work. I don't mind myself, since I'm a student who uses trains and busing all the time, but few people want to give up the luxury of driving to work in favour of using a subway system (similar to how most east asian countries operate).
In the meantime, I'm going to be developing my zombie formula so that I can do my part to end overpopulation. Call me if you can help, I'm trying to put a patent together so I can sue others who want to destroy the Earth while the zombies and lawyers (?difference) take over.
It is a very significant possibility that at this growth we will be starving ourselves to death. There is only so much to go around. The question is, how many and who?
It's not "the Coming Wave," we're right in the midst of it, and have been for some time. It's not in front of us, we're well into it. That's not to say it won't get much, much worse, but it's very important to realize that we have entered the effects of overpopulation.
Just ask the Atlantic Cod fisheries, the Pacific garbage patch, that dry lake somewhere in the former USSR - heck, there are too many to list.
The living have better things to do than to continue hating the dead.
Over at TED, Hans Rosling has a fantastic presentation of why he thinks the world's pop will plateau at 10 billion. That's still a LOT of people, but there appears to be hope...
...off...my....lawn!
Windows 2000 - from the guys who brought us edlin
"We need regulations that strictly govern who is allowed to reproduce and how many babies can be born. That is unpleasant and almost unthinkable but it must be done." *** And may I suggest we begin the sterilization with YOU!
Religion is what got us to this place to begin with! Anyone with a rational brain can see the consequences of having too many kids. Religion teaches irrational behavior.
-- By all means let's be open-minded, but not so open-minded that our brains drop out.
Where are they hiding?
-- Boycott Shell
"There is very little left in this world that is untouched, or that we can leave untouched"
I'm not sure how true this is. In terms of natural resources (mines, forestry, oil) things will get tougher. However, there are lots of places with places for people.
However, most people tend to
a) Prefer to live in the big, already-crowded cities
b) Not want to start new towns
Technology allows us to cultivate land that was previously quite un-usable. The big problem is that we're dirty pests that tend to f*** up said land. If we could clean up our act ecologically, perhaps we could integrate better into the large amount of landmass that's still available.
It will consume the world till it consumes itself.
-- By all means let's be open-minded, but not so open-minded that our brains drop out.
"This natural inequality of the two powers, of population, and of production of the earth, and that great law of our nature which must constantly keep their effects equal, form the great difficulty that appears to me insurmountable in the way to the perfectibility of society."
Thomas Malthus, 18th century.
People have been saying that the "end is near" since human beings developed speech. None have been right. Ockam's razor and the law of induction tells me they won't be in the future.
If he explores all forms and substances Straight homeward to their symbol-essences; He shall not die.
The birthrate will in the long term tend toward one birth per person (or two children per woman given a 50:50 sex ratio). The only question is whether this happens because most children that are born die of famine or violence before they get the opportunity to reproduce or whether it happens by a more benign mechanism.
The implied warning: the Moties were a stand-in for humanity. We're well on our way to the end of our first cycle.
Anybody who does not believe the earth is too populated has not viewed the earth from 20 to 30 miles up. Given where I live in the southeastern U.S. I can see the massive devastation of forest and biomass that once existed here. In my lifetime, I have seen massive amounts of land just decimated by "developers". I can foresee that this will continue because of course, the land has no value until it is developed.
The average man produces almost one whole pound of poop a day. Times 7 billion. No wonder life stinks.
If you kill yourself then the effect is the same, from your point of view.
“Common sense is not so common.” — Voltaire
Biology got us into this situation.
“Common sense is not so common.” — Voltaire
This is not the first time population growth drove change.
not to many posts but by reading them you might comprehend what is happening, why and where we are heading
https://www.facebook.com/pages/Abstraction-Physics-101/170311386325230
Yes, population is discrete. Yes it can be approximated as continuous. We are talking about 7 billion points. Nothing to see here.
Like all pain, suffering is a signal that something isn't right
The most effective, and least oppressive way to reduce birth rates is to give women an education. I would rather make college mandatory than get into the business of regulating people's sexual behavior.
“Common sense is not so common.” — Voltaire
Firstly, TFA is dead wrong in stating that human population has been relatively stable throughout most human history. This is blatantly false, for anyone who has bothered to look at the historical record. In pre-history, human populations have varied wildly, from up to several dozen million to possibly as low as several tens of thousands. Likewise, once "civilization" has started, human populations have obeyed a rather steadily increasing geometric curve. We notice now because we're finally at the heel portion of the hockeystick curve where the numbers start increasing quickly.
Secondly, the decline in number of children per woman is primarily tied to increasing Woman's Rights in a society. The closer women are treated like property (both culturally and legally), the higher the number of children borne, and the inverse when women and men are treated equally. Women's Rights is also closely correlated (and, likely a causative factor) in development of a significant middle class. Religion only has an impact in so far as it affects Women's Rights (which, it certainly can have a very negative impact).
Also, there are two major factors that aren't really addressed in TFA: lack of energy, and water. Advanced civilizations require ludicrously larger amounts of power than low-tech societies, and, even with conservation, this isn't going to change. We need power to run our 1st world countries, and the more everyone else tries to emulate us, power requirements will be exponential (probably high exponential) in growth. Until we have real clean energy, this energy demand and the side effects of providing energy is going to be the number one environmental pressure. On the other hand, (decreasing) access to clean water for both drinking and agriculture is something that is radically reshaping societies, as we can't really de-salinize enough to make a difference at this point, and we're well on our way to draining many historical water sources out of existence. Water will be the new oil which people fight over, likely very, very soon. It's already a major friction point in the Middle East and Indian subcontinental areas.
To quote the old Chinese curse: "May you live in interesting times."
There are always four sides to every story: your side, their side, the truth, and what really happened.
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Mission accomplished breeders. Enough already.
That's our life, the big wheel of shit. - The Fat Man, Blue Tango Salvage
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to spend his money providing free birth control rather than trying to wipe out disease in the Third World. That would be the most effective use of his money.
Preventing childhood disease is a laudable goal, but that just brings more misery in the long run from overpopulation -- unless you also bring them up to First World standards in education, economy and infrastructure. And I don't think Bill has enough money to do that. There's probably not enough money on the planet to do that actually.
But I can understand why he does what he does. Who wants their legacy to be "The Great Population Reducer"? Everybody will hate him, from the religious who oppose abortion and birth control, to the liberals who will accuse him of genocide for preventing the blacks and browns from having babies. On the other hand, save children from dying by malaria and everyone will applaud him. Safe choice.
I call India. They just breed like rabbits man. It is practically their religion to bang each other raw.
A few months back some distraught fellow ran into a building shooting everyone that he could and apparently had left behind messages about over population and what is about to occur. I suspect that he was driven off his rocker because nobody wanted to hear him.
Let me see if I'm following the logic of this correctly: Nobody wanted to listen to a criminally insane person rant, so he murdered a bunch of people, therefore he was correct and we should start implementing reproductive laws to keep the population down so we can support a huge military to keep out the countries that can't even feed their own citizens?
<xml><I><am><so><damn>Web 2.0</damn></so></am></I></xml>
Nothing a little bit of war, disease, and famine can't take care of.
People have been saying that the "end is near" since human beings developed speech. None have been right. Ockam's razor and the law of induction tells me they won't be in the future.
Many folks kept calling for a massive crash in the stock markets and in the real estate markets for years.
Then one day they were right with catastrophic consequences because hardly anyone believed them.
The few that did made billions of dollars.
Many times the doomsday "alarmists" are right but their timing is off.
Oh!
People have been saying that the "end is near" since human beings developed speech.
No they haven't..
Ockam's razor and the law of induction tells me they won't be in the future.
I think they will be. And it has happened in the past - Easter Island. Fortunately, I don't either one of us will be alive to see it happen World wide.
and it is a Myth.
There are two ways of looking at the human condition of over population: If you are in the 1%, it is an extreme dire emergency because everyone one alive is plotting ways to steal your luxery living, entire economic sectors your family controls, or the future payoff budgets in making government do exactly as you tell them.
If you are the 99% it is obvious the planet is under developed technologically, due to the wars...the constant trillion dollar wars, bankers literally stealing everything from left to right, and governments who have created conditions with rules for themselves, and then rules for everyone else. It is _not_ over populated.
In those sorts of conditions chaos stunts technological development. (Unless you want to waste resources and energy making cute technological gadgets like iSh*t this and iSh*t that.)
You know, when you build a computer network, one of the obvious things you want to eliminate are bottlenecks in all of your edge networks. One way to do that is to add more infrastructure to accommodate those bottlenecks as well as adding redundancy.
However, you don't ask your users to stop using the network in a sort of austerity measure because you want them under your thumb and just don't feel like working that hard to build a larger network.
One example I use is power distribution. Half of the energy in power production is lost before it even arrives at its destination. Everyone should generate their own power, and it should be forbidden to centralize its production. There are lots of ways to do this, but they won't be permitted because a few people own all of the power and it would be threat a ruling dynasty.
Secondly what they don't tell you is as long as infrastructure is in place and kept up, most communities stop having more than maybe 1 or 2 kids. This is a well known side effect of developed countries who have good education systems, and economies that aren't in the clutches of a bunch of crooked bankers.
Iceland would be a good example there.
But the 1% don't want that. They want destruction, war and huge crisis that _THEY_ caused so that they can appear to be in control and save us all by essentially making things worse and worse.
Yeah there is a over population, an over population of 1% having way to much and strangling technological development for the rest of humanity so that little old ladies can't cool their apartments and babies have to die of stupid diseases.
Specifically I am talking about Democrats, Republicans, the Rothschild banking Syndicate, and United Nations that need to just GO AWAY.
If they don't, the human species might not be around for very much longer.
-Hack
Got Geometrodynamics? Awe, too hard to figure out? Too bad.
Anything that teaches people to believe in things without question, simply because of some myth, is irrational.
-- By all means let's be open-minded, but not so open-minded that our brains drop out.
More and more people being born into countries that do not have the resources to support them. Sure fire way to increase poverty: help those currently in poverty reproduce by giving them handouts while not giving them the means to support themselves.
There may be a lot more people in Africa now than there was 5000 years ago, but they're not living longer, they're running out of food, being crippled by disease and generally not well off. There is less wild life now from excessive hunting and poaching so less food to feed more people. Dense populations increase the spread of disease. So does malnutrition.
Unfortunately the bible didn't stop at the commandments... there's a few other things in there that make it more than slightly detestable.
Help I am stuck in a signature factory!
It looks like we won't hit peak population for another 100 years at least. Quite honestly I liked the earth much better when it had 3 billion people on it.
FYI - mathematically speaking, you could shove the entire world population in Texas and you'd have ~230sq ft. to dedicate to each person (been a few months since i calculated last, number might be slightly off). Granted, no roads, buildings, or anything other than tape separating each persons plot, but it conveniently illustrates we still have plenty of places to fit shit in.
While the idiocy and volume of our next generation can be concerning, I think it pales in comparison to how powerful big corporations and "super-conglomerates" and lobbying groups are becoming (think "Brawndo" in idiocracy, where they just simply BUY the FDA after they talk bad about one of their products lol). One day, our grand-kids will look back on this time and say "Hey remember when companies could just buy anything? Like people, politicians, laws, and whatever cuz they had SO MUCH money?"
"Yeah...people were pretty fucking stupid back then too..."
The first four are "irrational" according to the left. Of course in Christianity, only three of those are valid ;)
Christians do not believe in Ten Commandments. They believe in Nine Suggestions and One Legalism, which if you keep, you cannot be saved.
Agent K: A *person* is smart. People are dumb, stupid, panicky animals, and you know it.
Or the government could simply stop giving tax breaks for having kids and take away welfare if one has a kids while on welfare.
I didn't read TFA but I vaguely remember there was a TED video explaining that statistically the earth's population will stabilize around 10 Billion.
That number is the equilibrium between countries reaching a higher standard of living and industrialized countries going with lower levels of births and a bigger senior population.
The question is if the earth can support us growing to 10 billion.
A couple of problems with the statement "used up virtually all of the dense sources of energy that can be recovered without technology.. like coal, oil, and natural gas."
First, the reserves for coal and natural gas are still much greater than a measurement of being virtually all gone (oil is probably the same). Second, it required a great deal of technology to go from a coal-driven pump that produced a quarter of a horse-power at a terribly low efficiency (something like 1% efficiency) to a modern coal generator that gets something like an 85% efficiency.
Your statements about all the easy stuff is gone are terribly misleading.
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The video is quite good, but what it shows is that which religion you are doesn't affect birth rates. It doesn't show any data about secular people, so it can't disprove a link between religion and birth rates.
Give me Classic Slashdot or give me death!
Check out some of his earlier videos (including other TED talks that he's done) at Gapminder.
Imagine waking up tomorrow and not being able to buy gas, not being able to repair your car, not being able to use electricty; all becuase one country or another has MORE resources than we do. Guess what will happen?
Population inflation has a solution, and its coming whether we like it or not. When critical resources dwindle to zero (no matter what resource it is) it WILL precipitate war.
I'm not sure if they thought about this or not... but World War III hasnt happened... Yet.
The more advance the science we got, the more people we gonna have, and the more pressure the human population gonna put on the ecology of Planet Earth
Link below illustrates the link between population explosion since the dawn of modern industrial revolution
http://www.ecology.com/2011/09/18/ecological-impact-industrial-revolution/
""Modern humans have been around for about 2.2 million years. By the dawn of the first millennium AD, estimates place the total world human population at between 150 Ã" 200 million, and 300 million in the year 1,000"
"At the dawn of the Industrial Revolution in the mid 1700s, the worldÃ(TM)s human population grew by about 57 percent to 700 million."
"It reached one billion in 1800."
"The birth of the Industrial Revolution altered medicine and living standards, resulting in the population explosion that would commence at that point and steamroll into the 20th and 21st centuries.
"In only 100 years after the onset of the Industrial Revolution, the world population would grow 100 percent to two billion people in 1927 (about 1.6 billion by 1900). "
Muchas Gracias, Señor Edward Snowden !
"World to End Tomorrow, Women and Minorities Hardest Hit". Worst paper ever....
The last six are prefaced by the first four. They are a combined total of 10. But for the sake of argument.
5) My parents were total dirtbag drug addicted sexual perverts (not really, but I know people whose parents were), why should I "honor" them for such a despicable childhood?
Agent K: A *person* is smart. People are dumb, stupid, panicky animals, and you know it.
There is no global overpopulation. Some places (such as Japan) are already experiencing population aging and decline, which is bad in many ways. Other places (such as the USA and specially Europe) already have sub-replacement fertility rates; their population only grows because of demographic lag and immigration. It is predicted the European Union population (now at 503M) will reach zero natural population increase by 2015 and zero total population increase in 2035 (at 520M), then start declining.
The USA will grow from 310M in 2010 to 403M in 2050. [1]
Asia will grow from 4.2B in 2010 to 5.1B in 2050, then start declining. [2]
The only region that is really growing is Africa. It will increase from 1B in 2010 to 2.2B in 2050. [2] Then its population density will be 73/km2. [3] Compare that to the current population density in Portugal (115/km2), in South Korea (487/km2) and in Taiwan (641/km2). [4]
Global population is predicted to grow from 7B in 2011 to 9B in 2050 and 10B in 2100 [5] and start falling soon after [6].
And according to [7], 40-50% of America-produced food is thrown away. According to [8], 1/3 of the world food is thrown away.
And this does not take into account that people eat, just for pleasure, excessive quantities of resource-intensive food (such as meat). If Americans/Europeans want to help the poor, an easy way would be to decrease (say, by 30%) their diet of meat. This will immediately reduce food demand and, for double bonus, the saved money can be donated to charity. And much arable land is wasted on subsidized inefficient corn-based ethanol. You can lobby your government to stop that.
Plus, there does not seem to be a negative correlation between population density and GDP per capita. [9]
African hunger is not caused by overpopulation. It is caused by corrupt and authoritarian governments, and by guerrillas/terrorists motivated by Marxism, theocratic Islamism, ethnic hate or simply greed.
Overpopulation fear-mongering is very old - at least as old as Malthus. One of its more recent incarnations was the 1968 book "The Population Bomb", which predicted mass starvation to occur in the 1970s.
Anyway, for better or for worse, there is already strong action taken by billionaire individuals, foundations, and Western governments, to restrict fertility in Africa.
1 : http://esa.un.org/unpd/wpp/Analytical-Figures/htm/fig_11.htm
2 : http://esa.un.org/unpd/wpp/Analytical-Figures/htm/fig_2.htm
3 : According to [2], Africa will have 2.2B people in 2050, and according to Google[10] and Wikipedia [11], the area of Africa is 30,221,532 km2
4 : http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_sovereign_states_and_dependent_territories_by_population_density
5 : http://esa.un.org/unpd/wpp/Analytical-Figures/htm/fig_1.htm
6 : http://esa.un.org/unpd/wpp/Analytical-Figures/htm/fig_6.htm
7 : http://www.foodnavigator-usa.com/news/ng.asp?id=56376-us-wastes-half
8 : http://www.fao.org/news/story/en/item/74192/icode/
9 : http://sanamagan.wordpress.com/2011/03/10/population-population-density-gdp-per-capita-ppp/
10 : https://www.google.com.br/search?q=africa+area
11 : http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Africa
That TED talk only shows that religious birth rates were dropping similarly fast in the past. But there is a small religious minority who's birth rate still hasn't dropped, and barring legal reforms or some other limiting effect, simple evolutionary theory suggests they will dominate before long and bring the rate back up. And no, there is no significant limit to food production. It can be synthesized cheaply, in quantities only limited by the carbon content of earth's and other planet's crusts, from rocks, air, and nuclear or space solar power.
Because God said so, duh.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Space_habitat
http://pcast.ideascale.com/a/dtd/A-global-effort-to-develop-self-replicating-space-habitats/76206-8319
From JD Bernal writing in the 1920s:
http://cscs.umich.edu/~crshalizi/Bernal/world/
"Imagine a spherical shell ten miles or so in diameter, made of the lightest materials and mostly hollow; for this purpose the new molecular materials would be admirably suited. Owing to the absence of gravitation its construction would not be an engineering feat of any magnitude. The source of the material out of which this would be made would only be in small part drawn from the earth; for the great bulk of the structure would be made out of the substance of one or more smaller asteroids, rings of Saturn or other planetary detritus. The initial stages of construction are the most difficult to imagine. They will probably consist of attaching an asteroid of some hundred yards or so diameter to a space vessel, hollowing it out and using the removed material to build the first protective shell. Afterwards the shell could be re-worked, bit by bit, using elaborated and more suitable substances and at the same time increasing its size by diminishing its thickness. The globe would fulfil all the functions by which our earth manages to support life. In default of a gravitational field it has, perforce, to keep its atmosphere and the greater portion of its life inside; but as all its nourishment comes in the form of energy through its outer surface it would be forced to resemble on the whole an enormously complicated single-celled plant. "
Quadrillions of humans could live in style in space habitats in the solar system. It would take another 1000 years of exponential growth to approach that. And then it is somebody else's problem -- perhaps to create virtual universes, travel faster-than-light, or create matter and energy and space from the quantum vacuum, or just migrate into a computational matrix?
As Julian Simon said, the human imagination is the ultimate resource (whether expressed through science or otherwise):
http://www.juliansimon.com/writings/Ultimate_Resource/
The more people, the more imagination. People may consume resources and take up space, but they also produce resources and make spaces worth being in.
A 21st century issue: the irony of technologies of abundance in the hands of those still thinking in terms of scarcity.
about birth rates. Even in the US the birth rate is barely keeping up with death rates. Funny how educated people that are completely broke and working 12 hours/day 6 days a week don't want more kids. Just wait and see what happens in the developed world when the male birth control pill hits...
Hi! I make Firefox Plug-ins. Check 'em out @ https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/youtube-mp3-podcaster/
"The main problem...most people would prefer a global war that wipes out 2/3 of the population rather than living in a world where they can't eat meat"
From: http://www.drfuhrman.com/library/article16.aspx
==== By Doug Lisle and Alan Goldhamer
An abundance of food, by itself, is not a cause of health problems. But modern technology has done more than to simply make food perpetually abundant. Food also has been made artificially tastier. Food is often more stimulating than ever before -- as the particular chemicals in foods that cause pleasure reactions have been isolated-and artificially concentrated. These chemicals include fats (including oils), refined carbohydrates (such as refined sugar and flour), and salt. Meats were once consumed mostly in the form of wild game -- typically about 15% fat. Today's meat is a much different product. Chemically and hormonally engineered, it can be as high as 50% fat or more. Ice cream is an extraordinary invention for intensifying taste pleasure -- an artificial concoction of pure fat and refined sugar. Once an expensive delicacy, it is now a daily ritual for many people. French fries and potato chips, laden with artificially-concentrated fats, are currently the most commonly consumed "vegetable" in our society. As Dr. Fuhrman reports in his excellent volume Eat to Live, these artificial products, and others like them, comprise a whopping 93% American diet. Our teenage population, for example, consumes up to 25% of their calories in the form of soda pop!
Most of our citizenry can't imagine how it could be any other way. To remove (or dramatically reduce) such products from America's daily diet seems intolerable -- even absurd. Most people believe that if they were to do so, they would enjoy their food -- and their lives -- much less. Indeed, most people believe that they would literally suffer if they consumed a health-promoting diet devoid of such indulgences. But, it is here that their perception is greatly in error. The reality is that humans are well designed to fully enjoy the subtler tastes of whole natural foods, but are poorly equipped to realize this fact. And like a frog sitting in dangerously hot water, most people are being slowly destroyed by the limitations of their awareness.
The pleasure trap
Figure 1 (above) depicts a devastating trap. People consuming a whole natural foods diet will experience a normal range of pleasure from eating low-fat, high-fiber, unprocessed foodsâ"shown as Phase I. However, if concentrated, adulterated, processed foods are consistently allowed in the diet, they quickly will become preferred.
In Phase II, we see that these products are typically experienced as better -- that is, more pleasurable -- than natural foods. This is the result of the heightened pleasure-inducing characteristics of artificially-produced foods. However, within a short period of time (a few weeks), the taste nerves adapt to this higher level of stimulation, and reduce their firing rate. This reduces the pleasure experience of artificially-stimulating foods back down to normal levels (Phase III).
Phase III is the culmination of a process of extraordinary importance. It is within Phase III that most people live out their lives. And it is from within Phase III that most people will engineer their own health crises. Phase III occurs when we have become "used to it" - used to the extreme levels of stimulation present in artificial foods. Yet ultimately, we experience no more pleasure than had we remained on a simpler, more healthful diet! However, this process is rarely noticed - just as we rarely notice the process of getting used to a brightly-lit room.
A challenging escape
Once in awhile, a person may actually become aware of important dietary knowledge. Despite the ingenious misinformation campaigns waged by the dairy, cattle, and processed food industries, sometimes a person actually comes to understand the truth about diet. At such times, determin
A 21st century issue: the irony of technologies of abundance in the hands of those still thinking in terms of scarcity.
Because honoring them is a limited scope engagement, and most, if not all, religious leaders would say the same.
Also, Honoring is not the same as Obeying. If you are an honorable person, then an honorable parent would be proud. It's a chicken\egg argument.
It's all about your own character, even if those you are supposed to honor are despicable people, and don't deserve it.
Thou shalt not kill.
Good one. Can't argue there.
Thou shalt not commit adultery.
Depends on the context. This is Old Testament, of course, which means that you can be nailing multiple wives, slave girls and/or concubines without technically committing adultery. Pretty much any woman who is your property. Or, you can take the Christian extreme, and make even private fantasy a sin to be burned forever for. Sounds shitty either way. How's about you allow the participants in a relationship dictate the terms of that relationship freely amongst themselves.
Thou shalt not steal.
Not bad. Can't argue with it.
Thou shalt not bear false witness against thy neighbour.
Again, not bad.
Thou shalt not covet thy neighbour's house,
What a stupid rule. If you are abiding by #7, this is superfluous. And, like adultery, it's another attempt to legislate thought crime.
thou shalt not covet thy neighbour's wife, nor his manservant, nor his maidservant, nor his ox, nor his ass, nor any thing that is thy neighbour's.
Stupid for the same reason as #9, but more insidious than that. Do you notice something about that list? It explicitly says that a wife is OWNED by her husband, along with the slaves that he owns(quick quiz: How many times is slavery condemned in the bible? Zero!). Moreover, they are listed in the same block of property as animals.
I want you to mull over that for a while. I want you to chew on the level of barbarism that that mindset entails. The best summation of morality you can put forward for your religion is a couple of obvious ethical standpoints, some nasty thought crimes and some atrocious violations of human rights. Congratulations on that.
All that is necessary for the triumph of good is that evil men do nothing.
hi friends..how ho are you today?
srsly
"The biggest shortcoming of the human race is our inability to understand the Exponential Function"
http://www.youtube.com/view_play_list?p=6A1FD147A45EF50D
We will be witnessing severe problems during our lifetime if things continue like this (and they will)...
The solution is easy. If you haven't started a family yet, talk about not having more than 2 children of your own. Teach your kids to do the same.
What people don't understand, is that the Bible was meant for an earlier time, not today! It's like reading the hieroglyphics in the Egyptian Pyramid and thinking its today's news. Humans evolve, ancient text doesn't.
-- By all means let's be open-minded, but not so open-minded that our brains drop out.
What people don't understand, is that the Bible was meant for an earlier time, not today! It's like reading the hieroglyphics in the Egyptian Pyramid and thinking its today's news. Humans evolve, ancient text doesn't.
I have no problem with viewing the bible as a historical document. But we aren't talking about that. The person I replied asked why the last 6 commandments were bad as public policy(teaching "good stewardship"). The answer is that they are a mixed bag, a couple of laudable bits with a bunch of horrible bits mixed in. As a general guideline for a modern pluralistic society, they don't cut it.
All that is necessary for the triumph of good is that evil men do nothing.
Let's get the factories built. It will also create jobs.
"No matter where you go, there you are." -- Buckaroo Banzai
Wait - are you trying to prove that 60% of christianity teaches good stewardship? That's not even a passing grade...
lolfailboat.
The commandments don't teach. They rule. They tell people to do as they're told, "or else". It's the grown-up equivalent of "because I said so".
The "or else" refers to a supernatural entity that will punish them if they do not abide. That threat which has not been materially documented because well, it happens after you die. That's the irrational part. Even less logical is the fact that even if you break those commandments, you can still have your slate erased if you believe that a man from 2000 years ago was in fact the supernatural entity that will punish you.
Good enough for you?
Did we not just hit 6 billion the year before? how could 1 billion creep up so quickly without warning? or is it the governments do not want to scare us so they keep us uninformed???
"Make mine Mad Max!"
"After remaining stable for most of human history" seems like yet another example of how starting a sentence with a subordinate clause is pretty weak. Especially when you are wrong.
"They all still afford college and everything else because they only buy what they need. They don't buy two cars per person, they make large meals and reuse leftovers, the first two kids get new clothing and everyone else has hand-me-downs, they go to cheaper schools, etc... Their cable and internet bills are the same as yours, they go to more community activities and have enough people to play board and card games with themselves so less expensive electronic gaming, they've got multiple people to split up the chores so everything gets done faster despite there being a little more work. It really isn't that harder to wash 6 dishes than wash and dry 2 dishes (another kid will do the drying of the 6 dishes). It's just as easy to read to four kids the same story as it is to read to two kids. Eventually the older kids will start helping out the younger kids, providing you with more time and the older kid better experience compared to an only child. Assuming all the kids don't hate each other, they've got their brothers and sisters who will back them up when needed thus less prone to depression and feeling like an outcast. There are many, many more examples. I'm not sure which large families you've seen, but the one's I've seen get by by having a more sustainable life style. Tax breaks don't out weight the cost of a kid. If they did, kids wouldn't be expensive and everyone would have many. Each kid after 2 or 3 becomes cheaper than the last."
Mod parent up. With a solar system that is almost entirely empty, I'm just shocked to see all the people on Slashdot celebrating low fertility. Sure, a small cafe (the Earth) in a big city (the Solar system) may have an occupancy limit, but we don't go around telling people not to have kids because some cafe is too crowded. People generally just open another cafe...
Here is a step towards how:
http://www.kurtz-fernhout.com/oscomak/SSI_Fernhout2001_web.html
http://pcast.ideascale.com/a/dtd/A-global-effort-to-develop-self-replicating-space-habitats/76206-8319
And here is why:
http://scienceworld.wolfram.com/biography/Tsiolkovsky.html
"Russian physicist and theoretical father of rocketry. Tsiolkovsky was the son of a Polish deportee to Siberia. Tsiolkovsky was an inventor and aviation engineer who was also an insightful visionary. As early as 1894, he designed a monoplane which subsequently flew in 1915. He also built the first Russian wind tunnel in 1897. In 1903, as part of a series of articles in a Russian aviation magazine, Tsiolkovsky published the rocket equation, Eric Weisstein's World of Physics and in 1929, a theory of multistage rockets. Tsiolkovsky was also the author of Investigations of Outer Space by Rocket Devices (1911) and Aims of Astronauts (1914). One of Tsiolkovsky's many memorable and inspiring quotes is "Mankind will not forever remain on Earth, but in the pursuit of light and space will first timidly emerge from the bounds of the atmosphere, and then advance until he has conquered the whole of circumsolar space" (1911). Tsiolkovsky's most famous quote is, "Earth is the cradle of humanity, but one cannot remain in the cradle forever." "
The more people, the more vision and imagination...
http://www.juliansimon.com/writings/Ultimate_Resource/
This "overpopulation" meme is so short sighted and despairing. Someday maybe we will see potential parents getting obsessed with "pleasure traps" of modern technology as perhaps a bad thing, rather than something that is now celebrated. Industrialized populations (especially places like Japan and Italy, and even the USA just about without immigration) are no longer even replacing themselves and their populations demographically will fall. Where does tha
A 21st century issue: the irony of technologies of abundance in the hands of those still thinking in terms of scarcity.
http://overpopulationisamyth.com/content/episode-5-7-billion-people-will-everyone-please-relax
A 21st century issue: the irony of technologies of abundance in the hands of those still thinking in terms of scarcity.
http://overpopulationisamyth.com/
A 21st century issue: the irony of technologies of abundance in the hands of those still thinking in terms of scarcity.
"it is natal control not sex control so don't be paranoid because no more children will come in decades. To start with, the real culprits are those who sell useless gadgets for a profit not for supply something useful and durable to consumers. Stop making money for the sake of it, make money with a worthy purpose like to provide a useful and durable thing or service and above all sell foods that really are food not just a way to make money that more often that not ruin the health of those who buy and/or eat it, provide medicine that really works not just an excuse to go deep into patient pocket and that more often that not make patient worse and so on. If the real gosh you worship is easy money play Russian Roulette till there is no bullets because you are an unworthy Humanimal."