Breathing space?

[Gray-Wolf]

From looking through some of the other threads it would appear that their is plenty more things than H5N1 and climate change to challenge mankind.

When we look at some of the 'introductions' of alien species we allowed we can see time and time again a similar pattern emerging. Population boom and then population collapse. We are no different to any other species and when we use our abilities to 'outperform' other species and dominate an environment then we must be aware of the 'natural limitations' of resources.

In 1900 their were 1.2 billion of us, now there are 6.5billion of us. how long can this type of 'growth' continue without nature (or the nature of nature) forcing redress.

Unlike other species we are masters of manipulation. We manipulate materials into tools and with those tools we manipulate the environment to suit our needs. Food production is at the centre of this 'manipulation' and many common ailments come from being in close quarters with our domestic beasties (and the conditions we impose upon them) H5N1 being one such 'result' of our relationship with foul. We also need shelter and energy. Where, in 1900 we needed to house 1.2 billion folk we now manage to house 6.5 million folk. Is there an upper limit in housing (and siting for housing?) that we need be aware of and what may become should we not 'plan' our continued expansion?

Fuel. We all need fuel if only for warmth and cooking. In 1900 we needed to 'fuel' those 1.2 billion folk and their 'needs'. 100years later and 5.3 billion more folk with ever more complex energy needs we are struggling to supply all with the types of fuel they require without seriously impacting the environment (even if you will only concede the impacts of 'wooding' in developing nations as we amply saw in the Rwandan genocide episode and the resulting defoliation of the mountain gorilla's habitat to 'fuel' the refugees). If we are struggling to 'fuel' ourselves today then what of next year or the year after?

Somewhere we will experience collapse. At current global population growth rates (1.3% per annum) their will be 1 person for every habitable square metre of land on the face of the world in 150yrs time and obviously that level of population is unsustainable.

Sometime soon we will undergo population collapse. If enough of us and our technology survive this 'catastrophe' then we will indeed have 'breathing space' to ensure that we do not tread that pathway again.

Edited November 28, 2007 by Gray-Wolf

[Bobby]

Sometime soon we will undergo population collapse. If enough of us and our technology survive this 'catastrophe' then we will indeed have 'breathing space' to ensure that we do not tread that pathway again.

Oh yes, we're definitely going to experience a population collapse/die-off, just like any organism who enters overshoot. We are in massive overshoot... the sustainabiliy carrying capacity of the planet is only around 1 - 2 billion and falling as more and more environmental damage goes on. This means 4.5 to 5.5 billion people are living in ecological debt. The population is being artificially maintained by huge amounts of fossil fuels - the population exploded at right about the time oil became widely used and was rising rapidly when coal started being used. It is machines that keep us alive - machines powered by fossil fuels, largely oil.

Look at this interesting fact:

In the United States, 400 gallons of oil equivalents are expended annually to feed each American (as of data provided in 1994).7 Agricultural energy consumption is broken down as follows:

· 31% for the manufacture of inorganic fertilizer

· 19% for the operation of field machinery

· 16% for transportation

· 13% for irrigation

· 08% for raising livestock (not including livestock feed)

· 05% for crop drying

· 05% for pesticide production

· 08% miscellaneous

That's over one gallon of oil eaten every day. Not many use a gallon in their car every day. What's going to happen when oil production begins its terminal decline of a net amount of 6-7% a year? Ok, I know Americans are fat and a lot of that is excess but it highlights how dependent we are on oil for our food production. Is it a coincidence that food prices have been soaring lately, that world grain production has decline for 2 years and world grain stores are at 37 year lows at a time of record oil prices? Me thinks not.

This is worth a read too.

1. A finite earth can support only a limited number of humans. There is therefore a global “carrying capacity” for humans. A basic definition of carrying capacity is “The maximum number of people, or individuals of a particular species, that a given part of the environment can maintain indefinitely.”

2. It is an axiom of ecological science that a population which has grown larger than the carrying capacity of its environment (e.g., the global ecosystem) degrades its environment. It uses resources faster than they are regenerated by that environment, and produces waste faster than the environment can absorb it without being degraded. Some definitions of carrying capacity include this element of environmental degradation. Such a population is said to be in “overshoot.”

3. Al Bartlett sometimes writes, “A SELF-EVIDENT TRUTH: If any fraction of the observed global warming can be attributed to the activities of humans, then this constitutes positive proof that the human population, living as we do, has exceeded the carrying capacity of the Earth.” The same can be said of much of the rest of the extensive and growing human-caused ecological degradation we see today, including the breakdown of the web of life indicated by the ongoing Sixth Extinction. It is symptomatic of having exceeded the earth’s capacity to sustain our current numbers for the long term. It is, in fact, proof that under current conditions we have done so. [1] [2]

4. It’s axiomatic, as well, that a population can only temporarily overshoot carrying capacity. It will subsequently decline in number, to return to a level at or below carrying capacity. That is, though a population may grow in size until it is too large for existing resources to sustain it, it must subsequently decline.

5. Because it degrades it’s environment, a population in overshoot erodes existing carrying capacity so that fewer members of that species will be supported by that habitat in the future.

6. Our extraction of nonrenewable resources such as oil and coal has allowed us temporarily to exceed the earth’s carrying capacity for our species. As these supplies are drawn down, our numbers continue to increase, and ecological degradation progresses, the number of humans will, of necessity, come down. Whether we have a hand in voluntarily and humanely bringing them down, or simply let nature manage the whole thing for us, is up to us.

This is what's coming to us, according to the law of overshoot.

Edited November 29, 2007 by Magpie

[pottyprof]

Interesting read there Magpie..

So because of the overshoot we actually end up with a lower sustainable population? I can see the logic behind that but is there any evidence to support it? Has it been observed in any species?

[jethro]

I think perhaps a little too much emphasis is being placed upon our development/population boom due to consumption of fossil fuels here. One of the fundamentals of the ever increasing population growth is our collective ability to maintain and sustain life, due to modern medicine. We can now successfully treat many, many illnesses with antibiotics, chemotherapy, transplants etc; we can delay or mitigate the onset of many others with treatments for high blood pressure, colesterol etc, hence an aging population. I don't neccessarily feel we are heading for disaster in the developed world as the birth rate is falling, we will have a period of imbalance where there are more elderly than younger generations but time will rectify this. Our parents, grand parents came from a time when large families were the norm, today's modern society are having fewer and fewer children, many choosing not to have any at all.

[Bobby]

I think perhaps a little too much emphasis is being placed upon our development/population boom due to consumption of fossil fuels here. One of the fundamentals of the ever increasing population growth is our collective ability to maintain and sustain life, due to modern medicine. We can now successfully treat many, many illnesses with antibiotics, chemotherapy, transplants etc; we can delay or mitigate the onset of many others with treatments for high blood pressure, colesterol etc, hence an aging population. I don't neccessarily feel we are heading for disaster in the developed world as the birth rate is falling, we will have a period of imbalance where there are more elderly than younger generations but time will rectify this. Our parents, grand parents came from a time when large families were the norm, today's modern society are having fewer and fewer children, many choosing not to have any at all.

It is food that determines how high a population can get, not medicine. Access to food is the driving factor of population growth in all species on Earth. After all, you can have the best health care system in the world but what good is it if the people don't have enough food? Medicine doesn't reduce our need for food. No food, no people, no matter how good your healthcare is.

http://www.recordonline.com/apps/pbcs.dll/.../NEWS/711040325

The unpalatable truth about our oil-based food system is that " it takes 10 calories of fossil fuels to make one calorie of food energy," according to a study by David Pimentel and Mario Giampietro, published by the Carrying Capacity Institute. This scary statistic takes into account only the production of the food itself. If you factor in the processing, packaging, transportation, refrigeration and all of the other petroleum-intensive processes, that statistic can inflate to 87 calories of fuel per calorie of food.

The human population has increased because fossil fuel powered (mainly oil) machines can do the labour of producing food for us, instead of using labour from humans or animals . Fossil fuels give us pesticides, fertilisers, fungicides, herbicides, they pump the irrigration water and they power the tractors ploughing the fields, the power the combine harvesters. They power the packaging, processing, transporation - this is the reason for 6.5 billion living today.

Edited November 29, 2007 by Magpie

[jethro]

No, I don't think so. The reason for the population explosion since the industrial revolution is almost completely due to fossil fuels. It started with coal and moved to oil. Fossil fuels give us pesticides, herbicides, fertilisers. They power the pumps that pump irrigation water, they power the tractors that plough the fields and sow the crops, they power the combine harvesters that harvest the crops. Then they power the processing of the food, the packaging and the transporation of it around the world. That there are 6.5 billion people on Earth is almost nothing to do with modern medicine (which in itself is highly fossil fuel dependent. Many pharmaceuticals are directly derived from oil and natural gas and the processes to make them requires huge fossil fuel inputs) - it is due to the agricultural revoltuion that replaced human labour to produce food with that labour from fossil fuel machines. Families in the past were limited by the amount of food a family could have access to - fossil fuels greatly increased the amount of food we can produce.

It is food that determines how high a population can get, not medicine. Medicine mainly increases the quality of life and longevity of people that already exist - it doesn't create more to people allow a population to increase, certainly not to the extrent of fossil fuels at least. Access to food is the driving factor of population growth in all species on Earth

I don't see how anybody can deny this - it is recognised as a pretty basic understanding by all anthropologists, biologists and historians.

Well, I guess we'll have to agree to disagree then.

Families in the past were limited by how many infants survived beyond childhood and lack of contraception; yes poor nutrition played a part in this but sanitation, vaccinations and antibiotics played a larger one. Few people in the developed world have died of starvation since the potato famine. You only have to look at some of the poorest nations on earth to see women quite literally starving to death, still managing to carry and give birth to a child. The women and indeed the children do starve to death but more often than not, it is disease which kills them. In the west we have the food to prevent people starving but we still have disease and luckily medicine to cure. If we have medicine and vaccinations to prevent childhood deaths, medicine to treat and prolong life then you don't need a baby boom to create more people; we simply have more people because fewer are dying or living much longer. As little as 20 years ago cancer was the big nail in the coffin, look how many people now survive for years after diagnosis. Heart disease; blood pressure monitoring, cholesterol management, by-passes, angio-plasti etc means this is no longer the killer it once was. Childhood diseases; measles, scarlet fever, polio, whooping cough, all killers we no longer have to experience or lose our children to. Measles and polio vaccinations have prevented more deaths in the third world than any food aid. A population can remain static but if we save more people or enable them to live longer, then population will increase; the old saying of one in, one out, no longer holds true when for every baby born we have five people living longer.

[Bobby]

Well, I guess we'll have to agree to disagree then.

Families in the past were limited by how many infants survived beyond childhood and lack of contraception; yes poor nutrition played a part in this but sanitation, vaccinations and antibiotics played a larger one. Few people in the developed world have died of starvation since the potato famine. You only have to look at some of the poorest nations on earth to see women quite literally starving to death, still managing to carry and give birth to a child. The women and indeed the children do starve to death but more often than not, it is disease which kills them. In the west we have the food to prevent people starving but we still have disease and luckily medicine to cure. If we have medicine and vaccinations to prevent childhood deaths, medicine to treat and prolong life then you don't need a baby boom to create more people; we simply have more people because fewer are dying or living much longer. As little as 20 years ago cancer was the big nail in the coffin, look how many people now survive for years after diagnosis. Heart disease; blood pressure monitoring, cholesterol management, by-passes, angio-plasti etc means this is no longer the killer it once was. Childhood diseases; measles, scarlet fever, polio, whooping cough, all killers we no longer have to experience or lose our children to. Measles and polio vaccinations have prevented more deaths in the third world than any food aid. A population can remain static but if we save more people or enable them to live longer, then population will increase; the old saying of one in, one out, no longer holds true when for every baby born we have five people living longer.

Well, I edited the post to make it a bit clear before you read it. The best care, healthcare and medicine in the world is absolutely useless if there isn't enough food to feed people isn't it? Modern medicine doesn't decrease our need for food. Food is the driving factor.

For example, yes, modern medicine does save lives. But these people have to be fed. What's the good in curing cancer if there's no food for the cancer survivor? We might cure every single disease and ailment on Earth and make people live forever with no aging, illness etc. But they will all still die if there's no food about. The more people modern medicine saves, the more food that is needed for the survivors. Food is the one and only driving factor.

Interesting read there Magpie..

So because of the overshoot we actually end up with a lower sustainable population? I can see the logic behind that but is there any evidence to support it? Has it been observed in any species?

Well, one example I can think of is the Reindeer on St Matthew's island in North America. It was a island rich with grass and plants when the reindeer were introduced. Their population exploded, they went into overshoot and ate almost all the food on the island. Their population crashed. The carrying capacity was permanently lowered (well, in useful timescales) because with all the plants and grass eaten, the bare soil was exposed and the wind and rain washed it into the sea. It would take hundreds or thousands of years, if ever, for all the soil to recover and vegetation to grow back to levels previously. The environment was permanently damaged due to the overshoot and capacity permanently lowered (at least for hundreds/thousands of years).

Edited November 29, 2007 by Magpie

[jethro]

Well, I edited the post to make it a bit clear before you read it. The best care, healthcare and medicine in the world is absolutely useless if there isn't enough food to feed people isn't it? Modern medicine doesn't decrease our need for food. Food is the driving factor.

For example, yes, modern medicine does save lives. But these people have to be fed. What's the good in curing cancer if there's no food for the cancer survivor? We might cure every single disease and ailment on Earth and make people live forever with no aging, illness etc. But they will all still die if there's no food about. The more people modern medicine saves, the more food that is needed for the survivors. Food is the one and only driving factor.

I agree the more people there are, the more food we need but the argument that more food production has enabled more people to survive, thus increased use of fossil fuels has driven the population increase, is in my humble opinion, incorrect. More fossil fuel is needed to feed the increased population but I think this is a short term problem as the ageing population dies out to be replaced by fewer people. Contraception has given people choices previous generations didn't have, far fewer people have large families, two children is the usual, yes some have more, I myself have three and would've had a fourth if it were possible; but across the board two or less is more normal these days. As this pattern progresses and there are no signs that it will not, then the population of this and most developed countries will fall.

Personally, I think if folk really do want to make a difference to the level of fossil fuels used to feed the world then the easiest, most direct route is to grow your own. If this is not possible, then eat locally grown, organic produce which is in season. If anyone has a desperate desire to eat Broad Beans in January, then buy extra in June and freeze them. Almost everyone can grow something to eat, even those who live in cities with pots, grow-bags and there's always the allotment option although waiting lists are long. It doesn't take that much land to feed a family, all those council houses built between and after the wars don't have big back gardens to accomodate sand pits and trampolines, they were allocated a chain of land as this was enough to grow enough year round produce to feed a family and house a pig and a few chickens. It's just easier to nip into Sainsburys and buy apples from New Zealand which are then placed in plastic bags???? What happened to common sense eh?

[Hiya]

I agree the more people there are, the more food we need but the argument that more food production has enabled more people to survive, thus increased use of fossil fuels has driven the population increase, is in my humble opinion, incorrect. More fossil fuel is needed to feed the increased population but I think this is a short term problem as the ageing population dies out to be replaced by fewer people. Contraception has given people choices previous generations didn't have, far fewer people have large families, two children is the usual, yes some have more, I myself have three and would've had a fourth if it were possible; but across the board two or less is more normal these days. As this pattern progresses and there are no signs that it will not, then the population of this and most developed countries will fall.

Personally, I think if folk really do want to make a difference to the level of fossil fuels used to feed the world then the easiest, most direct route is to grow your own. If this is not possible, then eat locally grown, organic produce which is in season. If anyone has a desperate desire to eat Broad Beans in January, then buy extra in June and freeze them. Almost everyone can grow something to eat, even those who live in cities with pots, grow-bags and there's always the allotment option although waiting lists are long. It doesn't take that much land to feed a family, all those council houses built between and after the wars don't have big back gardens to accomodate sand pits and trampolines, they were allocated a chain of land as this was enough to grow enough year round produce to feed a family and house a pig and a few chickens. It's just easier to nip into Sainsburys and buy apples from New Zealand which are then placed in plastic bags???? What happened to common sense eh?

Good stuff. As someone who is more of the hunter-gatherer than farmer, I often wonder why some people buy the things they do in the shops, that are far travelled and poor quality. In the future when I have suitable space the first thing I shall be doing is getting some poultry.

I wonder what 'GW' will make of 'chickens' in the back garden, since I remember he was rather rude about people in the far east who live in close contact with their livestock.

[Gray-Wolf]

Before the 'Barret Box' age most semis were built on 1/4 acre plots. As for terraces, well a backyard. It is commonly accepted that your 'Average' family (2 adult ,2 children) would need at least an acre of land to grow the food they consume over a year, and this is before we bring protein into the equation.

However we may 'suppliment' our staples with the odd novel crop most folk do not stand a cat in hel's chance of growing anything like what they would need to survive. If we move into perma culture then obviously the land needs become even greater (however desirable the practice is).

Living with our livestick has introduced many ailments to mankind not least influenza from our fowl (ever wonder why the 'new world' didn't have flu until the Spanish took some over to them?).

Because of mans impact on the environment our 'overshoot' is even more emphasised and once the U.S/Canadian Prairies 'salt pan' (only 30cm below ground in some areas now due to 'artificial watering' introducing extra salts to the land and evaporation drawing up ,via cappillary action, ground minerals) we'll see what 'overshoot' means (when the 'grain basket of the world' is no more).

[jethro]

Before the 'Barret Box' age most semis were built on 1/4 acre plots. As for terraces, well a backyard. It is commonly accepted that your 'Average' family (2 adult ,2 children) would need at least an acre of land to grow the food they consume over a year, and this is before we bring protein into the equation.

However we may 'suppliment' our staples with the odd novel crop most folk do not stand a cat in hel's chance of growing anything like what they would need to survive. If we move into perma culture then obviously the land needs become even greater (however desirable the practice is).

Living with our livestick has introduced many ailments to mankind not least influenza from our fowl (ever wonder why the 'new world' didn't have flu until the Spanish took some over to them?).

Because of mans impact on the environment our 'overshoot' is even more emphasised and once the U.S/Canadian Prairies 'salt pan' (only 30cm below ground in some areas now due to 'artificial watering' introducing extra salts to the land and evaporation drawing up ,via cappillary action, ground minerals) we'll see what 'overshoot' means (when the 'grain basket of the world' is no more).

With the greatest of respect GW, I'm a professional gardener, have been for years. One of my many jobs over the years was to renovate and run a victorian kitchen garden for an hotel, your estimation of land required to feed a family is grossly exaggerated. Even if self-sufficiency is beyond many or undesirable, a large impact on food miles can be made without going the whole hog.

http://www.off-grid.net/2007/11/16/self-su...ats-achievable/

Edited November 29, 2007 by jethro

[Stratos Ferric]

I agree the more people there are, the more food we need but the argument that more food production has enabled more people to survive, thus increased use of fossil fuels has driven the population increase, is in my humble opinion, incorrect. More fossil fuel is needed to feed the increased population but I think this is a short term problem as the ageing population dies out to be replaced by fewer people. Contraception has given people choices previous generations didn't have, far fewer people have large families, two children is the usual, yes some have more, I myself have three and would've had a fourth if it were possible; but across the board two or less is more normal these days. As this pattern progresses and there are no signs that it will not, then the population of this and most developed countries will fall.

Personally, I think if folk really do want to make a difference to the level of fossil fuels used to feed the world then the easiest, most direct route is to grow your own. If this is not possible, then eat locally grown, organic produce which is in season. If anyone has a desperate desire to eat Broad Beans in January, then buy extra in June and freeze them. Almost everyone can grow something to eat, even those who live in cities with pots, grow-bags and there's always the allotment option although waiting lists are long. It doesn't take that much land to feed a family, all those council houses built between and after the wars don't have big back gardens to accomodate sand pits and trampolines, they were allocated a chain of land as this was enough to grow enough year round produce to feed a family and house a pig and a few chickens. It's just easier to nip into Sainsburys and buy apples from New Zealand which are then placed in plastic bags???? What happened to common sense eh?

Jethro, there's a number of flawed assumptions in your assessment, which strikes me as being a rather middle England view of the world. Firstly current population growth is disproportionately a second and third world phenomenon. The develop world has pretty much been stable population wise for a while, and in much of N Europe birth rates are falling below the levels required to sustain population. UK population IS increasing, but this is because of translocation, not underlying growth. Global population levels will not start to level off in any of our lifetimes without some form of catastrophic forcing. An additional factor is that the old are not dying: modern medicine and improved diet keep more people alive for longer - where this is not the case there tends to be a strong economic force in encouraging larger family units, and one or two rather sinoister side-effects oin countries where daughters are seen to be a burden.

The fact that we can continue to feed the world is in no small measure thanks to UNESCO and global organisations that have developed and spread improved seed (e.g. high cropping and faster growing - allowing twice yearly harvet in the inter-tropical zone) and techniques. An undesirable side-effect of this is that there is nowadays far less diversity in the bulk of global grain (wheat, maize, oats, barley etc.) with over 90% of production typically being based on just two or three varietal strains - we are more exposed to disease than ever before, even with all the chemicals at our disposal.

I do agree with you re seasonal veg and grow your won though. I grew some old variety peas for the first time this year. My youngest daughter loved watching them grow, and helping me pick them, and as with all home grown produce the taste is quite incomparable with that from supermarket purchased stuff.

The debate re tha amount of land required to feed a house rather depends on diet. If you want to be totally self sufficient then you need rather more than your average garden. Keeping livestock for dairy and meat would, I rather think, be something of an ask in a sub-urban plot.

Oh yes, we're definitely going to experience a population collapse/die-off, just like any organism who enters overshoot. We are in massive overshoot... the sustainabiliy carrying capacity of the planet is only around 1 - 2 billion and falling as more and more environmental damage goes on. This means 4.5 to 5.5 billion people are living in ecological debt. The population is being artificially maintained by huge amounts of fossil fuels - the population exploded at right about the time oil became widely used and was rising rapidly when coal started being used. It is machines that keep us alive - machines powered by fossil fuels, largely oil.

Look at this interesting fact:

That's over one gallon of oil eaten every day. Not many use a gallon in their car every day. What's going to happen when oil production begins its terminal decline of a net amount of 6-7% a year? Ok, I know Americans are fat and a lot of that is excess but it highlights how dependent we are on oil for our food production. Is it a coincidence that food prices have been soaring lately, that world grain production has decline for 2 years and world grain stores are at 37 year lows at a time of record oil prices? Me thinks not.

This is worth a read too.

This is what's coming to us, according to the law of overshoot.

Aaah, one of my very first essays at uni. Malthusian theory.

http://www.ac.wwu.edu/~stephan/malthus/malthus.1.html

Malthus is predicated on the assumption that technology cannot keep up, and that man does not eventually self-regulate. Instinctively I tend to your view Magpie, but the limits to growth are not, strictly speaking, the straight line drawn across your blackboard. Across the history of mankind the carrying capacity of earth has been rising.

[Gray-Wolf]

1

With the greatest of respect GW, I'm a professional gardener, have been for years. One of my many jobs over the years was to renovate and run a victorian kitchen garden for an hotel, your estimation of land required to feed a family is grossly exaggerated. Even if self-sufficiency is beyond many or undesirable, a large impact on food miles can be made without going the whole hog.

http://www.off-grid.net/2007/11/16/self-su...ats-achievable/

I'm certainly in your debt for the link Jethro and I'm in no way wishing to question your expertise!

That said I think you and I both know full well the probable 'uptake' of such practises and that this is not an 'instant' answer but a seasonal one involving planning and effort and what percentage of the population do you think would partake?

[jethro]

Stratos; think you may have missed/mis-read my posts, your " An additional factor is that the old are not dying: modern medicine and improved diet keep more people alive for longer -" is one of the points I've been making. Magpies' assertion that fossil fuels had enabled population growth is to my mind far too narrow a call, better medical care has had a far greater impact. I think to lay the blame of population growth at the feet of fuel consumption, although alluring, is far too one dimensional. It's not as simple as 1+1=2, like most things in life, it's far more complicated, that's why we have algebra, it wasn't just invented to torment kids at school.

GW&Stratos: If you want to go down the road of complete self-sufficiency, to include a diet of meat, cheese, butter etc, of course you need acres but to keep your family in fruit and veg, no, you really don't. A huge difference could be made to the carbon budget of this country if people would at least try to grow something themselves or at the very least, buy locally grown, organic stuff. There really is no reason for us to eat apples from New Zealand, or Tomatoes from Spain or Strawberries in January and yet people buy them without thinking and then they'll place their energy saving light bulb in the same basket and drop a donation in the Greenpeace bucket on the way out. It's all well and good being eco friendly, green thinking but when folk by-pass one of the easiest, most obvious ways they could make a difference, it makes me wonder how genuine their concern is.

[Stratos Ferric]

Stratos; think you may have missed/mis-read my posts, your " An additional factor is that the old are not dying: modern medicine and improved diet keep more people alive for longer -" is one of the points I've been making. Magpies' assertion that fossil fuels had enabled population growth is to my mind far too narrow a call, better medical care has had a far greater impact. I think to lay the blame of population growth at the feet of fuel consumption, although alluring, is far too one dimensional. It's not as simple as 1+1=2, like most things in life, it's far more complicated, that's why we have algebra, it wasn't just invented to torment kids at school.

GW&Stratos: If you want to go down the road of complete self-sufficiency, to include a diet of meat, cheese, butter etc, of course you need acres but to keep your family in fruit and veg, no, you really don't. A huge difference could be made to the carbon budget of this country if people would at least try to grow something themselves or at the very least, buy locally grown, organic stuff. There really is no reason for us to eat apples from New Zealand, or Tomatoes from Spain or Strawberries in January and yet people buy them without thinking and then they'll place their energy saving light bulb in the same basket and drop a donation in the Greenpeace bucket on the way out. It's all well and good being eco friendly, green thinking but when folk by-pass one of the easiest, most obvious ways they could make a difference, it makes me wonder how genuine their concern is.

Quite agree. However, nothing in life is free. Growing your own means not spending time doing other things. Like it or not, at present the perception is that this is tomorrow's problem. People do not habitually change behaviour altrusitically, that's why pay is taxed at source, and utility services are paid for via local tithe. And that, simply, is why, in the fullness of time, proactive action will have to be via enforced taxation. Blunt but effective.

Well, I guess we'll have to agree to disagree then.

... A population can remain static but if we save more people or enable them to live longer, then population will increase; the old saying of one in, one out, no longer holds true when for every baby born we have five people living longer.

Some populations are declining now. The 'problem' in the developed world is that women have increasingly found economic independence and are tending, on average, to have children later.

The birthrate required for a stable population, all other things being equal, is around 2.2. I was reading an article in The Economist a few months ago covering the problem of declining birthrates: in Germany, if I remember rightly, it's down below 1.5.

[Bobby]

Magpies' assertion that fossil fuels had enabled population growth is to my mind far too narrow a call, better medical care has had a far greater impact.

But you can't have increasing population without increasing food to feed them. It doesn't matter how good the medical care is as it doesn't reduce need for food. More people requires more food and we cannot produce the amount of food we do today without modern pesticides, fertilizers, herbicides, fungicides and mechanised farming - all which come mostly from oil and other fossil fuels. Just impossible. Fossil fuels allowed a complete revolution in agriculture.

Edited November 30, 2007 by Magpie

[jethro]

But you can't have increasing population without increasing food to feed them. It doesn't matter how good the medical care is as it doesn't reduce need for food. More people requires more food and we cannot produce the amount of food we do today without modern pesticides, fertilizers, herbicides, fungicides and mechanised farming - all which come mostly from oil and other fossil fuels. Just impossible. Fossil fuels allowed a complete revolution in agriculture.

But it didn't CAUSE the population increases. Yes, more people need more food, I'm not disagreeing with you on that; however it it not our ability to produce more, which made more people appear, that is down to sanitation and increased medical care. Now we have more people on the planet, of course we have to feed them but the supply outstripping demand in the developed world, is a short term blip, populations will, or in some countries (as SF said) is already declining. Birth rates are dropping, have been for quite some time, the days of couples getting married and the wife staying home to look after the three or four children are over. If you look at the reality in this country, most couples have little choice in this because housing costs are so high; if you want to own your own home and have a family then you have to offset a womans salary against the cost of childcare. One child and it's still profitable to go back to work and pay for childcare, two children and it becomes less so, three children and it would probably cost more to look after the children than you earn. This situation isn't going to change, childcare isn't going to become cheaper, housing costs won't fall; leaving all other factors aside, economically it isn't viable for the average couple on an average salary, to have the once common large family. Currently we have my generations baby boomer parents bumping up the population but my generation have had far fewer children than their generation, I expect my childrens generation to have fewer still, population in the developed world will decline. All the agri technology isn't going to change that or influence it.

Stratos: agreed, agreed, agreed; we'll have to be careful, folk will start talking!

[Bobby]

That doesn't change the fact that we can't feed 6.5 billion people without fossil fuels. Without the extra food they provide, we'd still be at pre-industrial levels of 1 billion or so people. Maybe 2 billion at best. Nowhere near 6.5 billion.

[Stratos Ferric]

But you can't have increasing population without increasing food to feed them. It doesn't matter how good the medical care is as it doesn't reduce need for food. More people requires more food and we cannot produce the amount of food we do today without modern pesticides, fertilizers, herbicides, fungicides and mechanised farming - all which come mostly from oil and other fossil fuels. Just impossible. Fossil fuels allowed a complete revolution in agriculture.

Correct. First world methods have been exported to the third world, often to the detriment of soil structure (large parts of Bangladesh were turned to salt pan by inappropriate irrigation) and also displacing many rural economies. Peasants typically farmed small plots for self sufficiency but increasingly large agri-businesses have purchased land and consolidated. Yields may increase but it severly disrupts local society and is a factor in the formatioj of many peasant shanty towns in urban peripheries of the humid developing world.

[Stratos Ferric]

But it didn't CAUSE the population increases. Yes, more people need more food, I'm not disagreeing with you on that; however it it not our ability to produce more, which made more people appear, that is down to sanitation and increased medical care. ...

I always agree with you Jethro, even when we disagree!

Strictly speaking a number of factors converged to allow population to boom in the developed world (where growth started), and the correlation to the industrial revolution is marked. Improved sanitation and water supply dramatically reduced typhus, and other diseases that could ravage populations, and medical advances also reduced death rates. Back in the 17th century birth rates far exceeded today's, yet population was fairly static, simply because of high mortality. Expectancy for people living past childhood wasn't actually much different today, but very high levels of infant mortality dragged the average right down - a situation that actually continued until surprisingly recently andf the general availability of non specific antiobiotics like Penicillin. The other factor was the availability of employment. Traditionally people subsisted because they had to: the movement from land to town was only made possible by industrialisation and it has to be remembered that towns and cities cannot, essentially, maintain themselves. They MUST import goods to support inhabitants - hence most early towns and cities were ports, or on navigable rivers. The availability of transport (trains) was also important to population growth.

What stopped runaway growth in the developed world's population was the introduction of compulsory schooling. Suddenly children stopped being a source of income and became a financial burden.

Growth in the developing world continues apace because, unfortunately, they have imported the means to protect and prolong life, but not always the economic infrastructure necessary to 'allow' smaller families to become the norm. There is also, particularly in many second world countries, a huge discrepancy between urban and rural environments.

[Admiral_Bobski]

The bottom line in all this, as far as I am able to make out, is that Science is responsible for all of today's woes. It was around the end of the 18th Century and the beginning of the 19th that Science suddenly launched us out of what was, to all intents and purposes, the Dark Ages. Our understanding of biology, medicine, chemistry, physics, mechanics and engineering skyrocketed and we were able to drag ourselves through the Industrial Revolution and onwards to today's society.

Has anyone ever wondered what it was that sparked this dramatic explosion? I have...

CB

[jethro]

I always agree with you Jethro, even when we disagree!

Strictly speaking a number of factors converged to allow population to boom in the developed world (where growth started), and the correlation to the industrial revolution is marked. Improved sanitation and water supply dramatically reduced typhus, and other diseases that could ravage populations, and medical advances also reduced death rates. Back in the 17th century birth rates far exceeded today's, yet population was fairly static, simply because of high mortality. Expectancy for people living past childhood wasn't actually much different today, but very high levels of infant mortality dragged the average right down - a situation that actually continued until surprisingly recently andf the general availability of non specific antiobiotics like Penicillin. The other factor was the availability of employment. Traditionally people subsisted because they had to: the movement from land to town was only made possible by industrialisation and it has to be remembered that towns and cities cannot, essentially, maintain themselves. They MUST import goods to support inhabitants - hence most early towns and cities were ports, or on navigable rivers. The availability of transport (trains) was also important to population growth.

What stopped runaway growth in the developed world's population was the introduction of compulsory schooling. Suddenly children stopped being a source of income and became a financial burden.

Growth in the developing world continues apace because, unfortunately, they have imported the means to protect and prolong life, but not always the economic infrastructure necessary to 'allow' smaller families to become the norm. There is also, particularly in many second world countries, a huge discrepancy between urban and rural environments.

Ok, now I'm scared, we're agreeing again. I didn't move onto the employment or schooling yesterday but the infant mortality, medical advances etc is exactly the same as the point I was trying to make to Magpie.

Just one thing though, the discrepancy between urban and rural isn't limited to second world countries; many, many areas of rural USA are incredibly poverty stricken and years behind the urban areas.

Captain B: Thanks for that, yet one more thing for me to puzzle over....

[Gray-Wolf]

Ok, now I'm scared, we're agreeing again. I didn't move onto the employment or schooling yesterday but the infant mortality, medical advances etc is exactly the same as the point I was trying to make to Magpie.

Just one thing though, the discrepancy between urban and rural isn't limited to second world countries; many, many areas of rural USA are incredibly poverty stricken and years behind the urban areas.

Captain B: Thanks for that, yet one more thing for me to puzzle over....

Now without wishing to drive to to another 'Eugenics' rant if we had allowed, through scientific intervention, and other species to flourish as we have (through scientific advances) then there would have been many scientists warning about the 'weakening of the G-Nome' of the species.

It is a sad fact that a burst appendix would have ended many folks lives 100yrs ago. How many folk do you know with appendectomy scars? Our Luke should not have even made full term and if it had not been that he decided to go 'breach' a week out from his due date he'd have starved in the womb (his placenta was already fully spent). Had he not received the treatments he received that keep him alive he would not be here. When he was born the oldest surviving Trisomi-10-P+ was 7 years, he is to be 12 in Jan. To me this indicates that medical science has improved in that 12 yrs to the point that he is still here and doing just fine! Born in a developing nation he'd have been dead by 3 months (the time frame his geneticist gave us).

So, have we allowed genetic traits into our gene pool that nature would have vetoed? Is this a good thing for our species? What does this hold in store for our future? Are we to become as dependant on science for our survival (if genetic traits that should kill are treated?) and does this just mean more 'overspecialisation' and a greater chance of collapse when one link or other in the 'chain' collapses?

Africa. No matter how we modify grain (drought/pest resistance, increased yield) if the land desertifies then it won't grow. America. The reliance of irrigation leading to the rising of natural salts and their concentration below the soil horizon throughout the Midwest (and its extension into Canada) does not bode well especially as droughts increase and more salts rise through capillary action as the top soil dries. Sounds a bit like Lot's lot awaitss us.

G.Dubya is wrong. Science does not hold all the answers. Nature on the other hand, does do a great balencing act and the scales need redressing!

Edited December 1, 2007 by Gray-Wolf