[asa] Re: caution urged on "population control"

On 3/6/07, David Opderbeck <dopderbeck@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> *When one side of this debate reminds the other of the dangers of
> population control they don't realize to be true to their convictions they
> need to switch sides. The fact that they don't shows their greater concern
> is holding on to material possessions rather than being consistently
> pro-life. *
>
> This is overstated. The science-skeptical Christians who oppose global
> warming initiatives tend to be science-skeptical in a particular way. That
> is, many of them would approve of "Baconian" science done by observation
> and induction, which would include practical engineering, but would exclude,
> in their opinion, most origins science and other historical or "speculative"
> science such as climate modeling. You might not agree with how they
> demarcate "science" or even of how they read Bacon (I don't), but it just
> isn't so simple as saying "they're greedy and we're living examples of the
> Sermon on the Mount."
>
>

No it's not overstated. They oppose ALL science. Climate science
**is**observational and inductive. What's speculative is their sources
that pull
an answer out of the sky rather than through an inductively verified model.
Thus, Bacon opposes them, too. As Lloyd Benson would say, "I know Bacon. He
was a friend of mine. You, sir, are no Bacon."

My point is not that one side is greedy and the other not but that both
sides are and we have to actively fight our fallen nature. The distinction
is one side is struggling with their sin and the other isn't. There's a
reason why Jesus said it was harder for a rich man to enter the kingdom of
heaven than camel to go through the eye of a needle. PCA pastor, Tim Keller,
noted of all the confessions of sin he has heard over his long pastorate he
has never heard anyone confess that they were greedy. Al Gore is wrong
about what the inconvenient truth is. It's not global warming. It's the lack
of warming of the human heart.

> Ted's concern is right -- different people can mean different things by
> "population control." I would turn this around, though, and suggest that
> evangelical environmentalists are most in danger of mixing up meanings
> here. We need to be clear that environmentalism has historically been tied
> to government sponsored population reduction programs that are inimical to
> any sort of Christian anthropology or Christian politics (IMHO). We
> shouldn't speak of "population" at all, and should rather speak of
> increasing the opportunities of families and women around the world to rear
> and raise their children in a context of political, economic and religious
> freedom.

The other side is complaining that we **aren't* *talking about population
control. So, don't blaim us for the language. Note the following:

> From Global Warming to Abortion
>
> **Logically, one can care for the environment without supporting
> population control.** But for many radical environmentalists, the route
> from global warming (and care for the environment generally) to population
> reduction seems irresistible: since people use up natural resources, release
> CO2 into the atmosphere and otherwise pollute the environment, the fewer
> people, the less global warming and less harm to the environment.3 To help
> the environment, therefore, we must reduce the human population. Q.E.D.
>
>
> This reasoning hovers in the background of current environmental debates.
> So how does the
> ECI statement respond to this background? **It doesn't*.* It simply says
> that "climate change is happening and is being caused mainly by human
> activities, especially the burning of fossil fuels."4 Actually, scientists
> still fiercely debate the causes, severity, and results of climate change
> while policymakers fiercely debate the relative costs and benefits of
> various proposed responses to climate change. But what is important here is
> that the ECI signers seem naively unaware that such dystopic interpretations
> of human activity are often tied to and derived from campaigns to reduce the
> human population.

So, "logically we can deal with the environment without dealing with
population control", but then when ECI does precisely that, an improper
argument from silence is drawn. We are not unaware of the dangers merely
because we propose solutions that don't involve population control. I wonder
what they also do with "dystrophic interpretations of human activity" found
in Scripture? I guess Romans 1-3 is just a plot by the Hewlett Foundation.
As I said before, they are unknowingly tied to an economic and political
ideology over and above Scriptural fidelity.

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Received on Tue Mar 6 13:03:49 2007