RE: Overpopulation is the problem -- not oil

Ken Piers wrote:

> -----Original Message-----
> From: asa-owner@lists.calvin.edu
> [mailto:asa-owner@lists.calvin.edu] On Behalf Of Kenneth Piers
> Sent: Friday, July 09, 2004 10:15 AM
> To: asa@calvin.edu
> Subject: Re: Overpopulation is the problem -- not oil

> It seems that when it comes to energy demand, we need to ask
> this question: Can the world afford to have US around? Have a
> nice weekend. ken

I will push back a bit on this self-flagellation. Having lived 3 years
in Europe I heard lots of complaints about how profligate the US was in
terms of energy use. And many there do share your opinion that the
world would be better off without US. Sure we use lots of oil, but we
have less of an environmental impact than does Europe (who rather
hypocritically point the finger our way), Arabia, India and China. In
Nature, 2 weeks ago was an article which calculated the percentage of
net primary productivity used by humans. Most of the US is in the
20-30% range. Most of Europe 45-120% range, Arabia, India and China are
largely in the 60-200% range. That means that the locals are using far
more of the natural resources than the natural resources can sustain.
Thus, it is not just the US and it is not just our problem and doing
away with the US will not solve the over use of natural resources by
large parts of the world. We are all in this together and we have all
caused the problem together.

See Marc L. Imhoff et al, "Global Patterns in Human consumption of Net
Primary Production," Nature, June 24, 2004, p. 870-873
**
Received on Fri Jul 9 18:34:28 2004