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How big an environmental issue is population?
I've read a few articles recently about population growth and its impact on the environment(such as Earth is too crowded for Utopia ) but I sometimes feel uneasy about this link and the whole area of 'population control' which can be used as an excuse for forced sterilisation and worse.
I think there has been scaremongering about population in the past which turned out to be inaccurate - I think we were all supposed to be doomed by now.
Do you think it is a real environmental threat and f so what should we do about it?
I think there has been scaremongering about population in the past which turned out to be inaccurate - I think we were all supposed to be doomed by now.
Do you think it is a real environmental threat and f so what should we do about it?
Replies to This Discussion
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Permalink Reply by Graeme Mills on -
I'm with you on this Grace. I think population is a symptom of other ills (poverty, lack of health or social care, lack of education) rather than the cause.
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Permalink Reply by Doug Harris on -
The biggest problem about population growth is that very few are brave enough to openly discuss the matter for fear of being branded racist or anti-life etc. The Population Trust are at least one organisation that will discuss the matter and they do this in neutral, matter-of-fact terms revolving around finite resources etc. Take a look at what they say. Years ago in environmental circles we used to talk about 'the precautionary principle' but political correctness has vetoed even that. Now we just crash on ahead with not upsetting minorities as the number one political aim.
Matters of 'the wider environment' include not only the planet's pollutants, its energy resources and its ability to feed us all etc, but also the quality of life we are able to enjoy. And what's the point of life if it is no longer enjoyable? Better to have x billion happy souls than x+y miserable ones. If it gets any more crowded, particularly in this small island, our enjoyment will be severely reduced and furthermore, if the procreational tendencies of non-whites, particularly nations of a particular religion, becomes any more entrenched in the UK through immigration, then the whole nature of the British way of life will be lost forever. I don't want this, certainly not in any unnaturally accelerated way, do you? I count my way of life as part and parcel of my environment. We have to decide as a race whether achieving the maximum possible population on this hot rotating rock is a sensible aim (because that's where the viewfinder is pointing right now) and whether the existence of the as-yet unborn is more important than the freedom, happiness and potential to thrive of those already here.
So my answer is most definitely a strong YES - population increase at current rates is a serious threat. We have seen that the world struggle for fossil fuels tends to lead to conflict. Why would the ultimate struggle for land, food and clean water be any different?
Graeme asks what should we do about it? - I know we can't demand that third world countries limit the number of children families have (although China managed it) and Grace heralds offspring as a 'right' (it's certainly one of life's most wonderful gifts but MUST also bring responsibilities), but perhaps in the first instance we can stop warping Darwin's laws of natural selection and survival of the fittest by enabling the weakest to thrive .... because that effectively is what our overseas aid programmes (much of it misappropriated anyway) and our home-based unemployment benefits etc etc do. I will help anyone who knocks at my door with food and shelter and indeed my son has just returned from 3 weeks in Zambia working with kids out there through sport. So, yes to education I say, yes to assisting nations develop their own natural resources, but no to handouts and mass emigration that can only eventually lead to more mouths that struggle to feed themselves.
As an aside, I went to London and the south generally this weekend. The lack of personal space down there is suffocating in comparison to the north east, traffic is a nightmare, air quality is noticably poorer and people are generally less patient and more highly stressed. That is what a small part of population increrase looks like to me ...
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Permalink Reply by Graeme Mills on
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Hi Doug
Isn't it a paradox that greater poverty means greater birth rate? Therefore more economic investment in 3rd world will reduce birth rates?
As for the UK I think the British way of life is not a static thing - not sure the British way of life in the 1950's was the same as the Victorian era. Cultural influence that alter us are not just from immigration - economic membership of the EU, American television/films, Internet technology I think are greater influences on our culture (for good and ill- depending on your perspective).
The country who consumes the greatest amount of resources per head of population is America closely followed by Europe - so in terms of population limits from an environmental perspective we woudl achieve more in reducing birth rates in that country. I know there was an American environmental group who (for a short period) advocated this by saying 'the last thing that the environment needs is more Americans'.
Appreciate your posting as I hope we can start having some real debates on the network around controversial issues.
Graeme
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Permalink Reply by Gareth Kane on -
I agree with Graham - 'British' is not static and never has been. I'm sure the Celts said "Bloody Romans, come over here, take our land, build their roads and never try to fit in..." Most human migration is economic. If you were in the half of the population that lives on less than $2 a day and you see people living at the standard we do, why shouldn't you try to get a slice of that pie? I believe if we abolished all migration controls we'd solve world poverty extremely quickly.
Going back to the more substantial issue of global population, we do need to start curtailing it or nature will do it for us. We've got to face down the religious fanatics of all ilks and promote family planning, the emancipation and education of women, and a general improvement in healthcare. Somewhere along the line we've got to fix the pension system too so we're not dependent on an expanding population to support us in old age.
My second sprog is arriving in November. It'll be my last too, I'm stopping there.
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Permalink Reply by Doug Harris on
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Hi Gareth and Graeme,
I certainly didn't claim that the formerly great Britain has always been like this, or any other snapshot in time. NO country is unchanging and they all get the same forces for change through the internet or TV or commercialism etc. It's the accelerated rate of change that is unsettling, as much to the third world countries (especially when powerful religions are factored in) as it is to us on this small island. All of the curves on the environmental graphs are getting ever steeper and that's what causes tension.
Furthermore, who gave us the idea that we should run around the globe fixing other people's problems just because we can? As Gareth says, nature will self-limit many of mankind's excesses, so there is an argument for allowing that to happen within continental or other physical and political boundaries. To open the borders of the world to everyone will simply delay mother nature's demonstration of the folly of our ways. And to imagine for a moment that world poverty would be solved in this manner is naive in the extreme. History tells us that standards are dragged down far more than they are pulled up. Don't make the mistake of assuming that the bulk of the other billions of people out there are necessarily intelligent, friendly, pleasant, helpful and productive. Many are simply out to grab what they can in the short term for themselves ...
Please visit www.optimumpopulation.org before shooting from the hip any further!
Gareth Kane said:I agree with Graham - 'British' is not static and never has been. I'm sure the Celts said "Bloody Romans, come over here, take our land, build their roads and never try to fit in..." Most human migration is economic. If you were in the half of the population that lives on less than $2 a day and you see people living at the standard we do, why shouldn't you try to get a slice of that pie? I believe if we abolished all migration controls we'd solve world poverty extremely quickly.
Going back to the more substantial issue of global population, we do need to start curtailing it or nature will do it for us. We've got to face down the religious fanatics of all ilks and promote family planning, the emancipation and education of women, and a general improvement in healthcare. Somewhere along the line we've got to fix the pension system too so we're not dependent on an expanding population to support us in old age.
My second sprog is arriving in November. It'll be my last too, I'm stopping there.
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Permalink Reply by Gareth Kane on
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It's about human rights - money is allowed to pass freely from country to country, but people aren't. Is the economy more important than people?
The EU gives farmers $2 a day per cow. 50% of the world's population live on a similar wage or less. We are better off than those people by chance. Is that right? Is it wrong that the poor want a slice of the pie?
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Permalink Reply by Doug Harris on
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The point is that if you are not born, you won't be poor and you won't feel that your slice of the pie is too small.
And it's as much about human responsibilities as it is about 'rights'. The two should never be separated.
Gareth Kane said:It's about human rights - money is allowed to pass freely from country to country, but people aren't. Is the economy more important than people?
The EU gives farmers $2 a day per cow. 50% of the world's population live on a similar wage or less. We are better off than those people by chance. Is that right? Is it wrong that the poor want a slice of the pie?
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Permalink Reply by Gareth Kane on
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Just as a post script to this discussion, I've posted a profile of Garrett Hardin on Green Gurus. Hardin was a controversial proponent of population and migration control.
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Permalink Reply by Graeme Mills on
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Interesting stuff. I vaguely remember Garrett Hardin or at least his prophecies of being overcrowded. When I was at school we had a lesson on this and stll remmeber the image showed to us of an squashed up face looking out from inside a transparent globe - weird and scary.
There is some logic to the arguments about population but I just can't get over feally uneasy about it and that it could lead to something darker.
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