Re: [asa] A Sustainable Future and Exponential growth

Christine wrote: "... Use science to constrain, as
well as possible, what that carrying capacity is given
current and anticipated technology trends are, then to
use government and other institutional systems to
develop and implement a comprehensive program to help
us achieve that population target...."

The problem with this kind of thinking is that no one knows enough or is smart enough to do the job. History teaches that neither governments nor scientists could be trusted. Consider that Earth's land areas are mostly open space, meaning that vastly larger populations could be accommodated if we could figure out how to do it wisely. No one predicted the technological advances of the past that have made life better for people, no one can foresee the technological advances of the future that may make life even better.

Vastly more people today are living better lives materially speaking than at any time in the past. Why try to shut this trend down, since you're not smart enough to know how to do it? Only the commies were smart enough, until they realized they weren't.

Only when things start getting noticeably worse for the average human than they were previously will we have an indication that we may be up against some kind of limit. Even then the deterioration could be only temporary.

Don

  ----- Original Message -----
  From: Christine Smith<mailto:christine_mb_smith@yahoo.com>
  To: asa@calvin.edu<mailto:asa@calvin.edu>
  Sent: Friday, May 23, 2008 8:44 PM
  Subject: Re: [asa] A Sustainable Future and Exponential growth

  My last post of the evening :)

  David -- I concur with your first point--population
  will likely not grow at the same rate in the future,
  for a multitude of reasons. However, I disagree with
  you that distribution of resources (and in your
  previous posts, technological solutions) will
  accommodate continued population growth.
  Fundamentally, every living thing requires at least 2
  inputs -- food & water...energy & matter, if you
  will...theoretically speaking, there is only so much
  energy & matter that exists on this planet...even if
  we could find technology solutions to convert all the
  available energy and matter into food & water sources
  for us, you would still only be able to sustain on
  that energy & matter a certain population level. The
  only other way to change the equation would be to
  reduce or eliminate our need for food & water, but
  other than for us to become something other than
  human, I don't see how this would happen.

  So, from my point of view, the question isn't "is
  there a carrying capacity for the existing ecosystem",
  the question is rather, "what is the carrying
  capacity", and then, how can we use technology and an
  equitable distribution system to maximize this
  carrying capacity--not just for humans, but for all of
  God's creatures. I'm not sure that anyone has the
  answer to this--certainly, technology and resource
  distribution will change just as population will in
  the future, so it's hard to predict. Nevertheless, a
  couple of observations...first, its clear from human
  poverty, environmental pollution, species extinction,
  and climate change, that we are not at that optimal
  point now. Second, we in the developed world are far
  more wasteful and careless with our resources than we
  ought to be, thus reducing the carrying capacity of
  the ecosystem. Third, if already we are surpassing the
  ecosystems' constraints, then certainly we will
  overwhelm the system if everyone were to live as we do
  now, which at present seems to be the goal for
  transforming nations from "developing" into
  "developed" (which, I might add, is a good goal, but
  only to a certain degree).

  So: how to achieve this sustainable population without
  resorting to a China-type control strategy is a tough
  question? Certainly, as Christians, we hear the
  command to "be fruitful and multiply" and we don't
  want the government to be telling us otherwise.
  Reproduction is, if you will, the first "right" ever
  given to God's creatures. Nevertheless, as with other
  "rights", perhaps this "right" is not absolute in the
  legal sense that we are free to reproduce as long as
  it does not infringe on someone else's right to
  reproduce. Perhaps this type of ethic, in which we
  weigh, in a voluntary manner, our right to reproduce
  versus the right of other's to reproduce and to have
  for their children what we would want for our own, is
  the key here. Do we consider that perhaps, as I
  believe Rich said?, humanity has already fulfilled
  God's command, and then some? Alas, voluntary
  assessments that sometimes call for self-sacrifice for
  the sake of others rarely work though. So, do we then
  resort to government intervention?...do we let the
  inevitable happen whenever resources become
  scare--conflict and disease--to "naturally" reduce and
  control our population size? Do we hope to avoid the
  question through God's return and judgment? Do we seek
  to postpone the question by colonizing space? I don't
  think any of those represent good answers to the
  question of population and sustainability.

  Perhaps a better? approach (at least an alternative
  approach) would be to use science to constrain, as
  well as possible, what that carrying capacity is given
  current and anticipated technology trends are, then to
  use government and other institutional systems to
  develop and implement a comprehensive program to help
  us achieve that population target through plans that
  could include the following components: 1) significant
  resources and outreach devoted to promoting adoption
  as an alternative to having children 2) significantly
  expand efforts to combat unwanted pregnancies (which,
  I'd concur with others, would exclude abortion) 3)
  more research and resources aimed at correcting
  resource distribution problems, market inefficiencies,
  waste, etc. and 4) more radically, providing
  incentives (financial or otherwise) to couples who
  choose not to have children.

  Gotta' go...will be interested in hearing what you
  think :)

  In Christ,
  Christine (ASA member)

  --- David Opderbeck <dopderbeck@gmail.com<mailto:dopderbeck@gmail.com>> wrote:

> Dave W. said: Remember that in this thread I am not
> postulating that we are
> at that limit now, you get to choose how many more
> doublings can be
> sustained.
>
> I respond: First, I don't accept the assumption the
> population will
> continue to grow at the same rate. If and as
> economic and political
> conditions improve around the world, population
> growth is likely to slow and
> then to decline. We don't need governments to
> enforce this; it will happen
> as a natural consequence of prosperity. See "World
> Population in 2300,"
> Proceedings on the United Nations Expert Meeting on
> World Population in
> 2300, available at
>
  http://157.150.195.10/esa/population/publications/longrange2/2004worldpop2300reportfinalc.pdf<http://157.150.195.10/esa/population/publications/longrange2/2004worldpop2300reportfinalc.pdf>
>
> Second, given a reasonable rate of population growth
> in the foreseeable
> future, I don't think the problem is one of the
> amount of available
> resources; it's primarily a problem of distribution.
> For example, right
> now, "[w]orld agriculture produces 17 percent more
> calories per person today
> than it did 30 years ago, despite a 70 percent
> population increase. This is
> enough to provide everyone in the world with at
> least 2,720 kilocalories
> (kcal) per person per day. . . The principal problem
> is that many people in
> the world do not have sufficient land to grow, or
> income to purchase, enough
> food." World Hunger Education Service, World Hunger
> Facts 2008, available
> at
>
  http://www.worldhunger.org/articles/Learn/world%20hunger%20facts%202002.htm<http://www.worldhunger.org/articles/Learn/world%20hunger%20facts%202002.htm>
>
>
>
> On Mon, May 19, 2008 at 1:33 PM, Dave Wallace
> <wmdavid.wallace@gmail.com<mailto:wmdavid.wallace@gmail.com>>
> wrote:
>
> > Randy Isaac wrote:
> >
> >> Dave Wallace wrote:
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >>> A few years back computer speed doubled roughly
> every 18 months. I
> >>> suspect that Intel and AMD strongly wish they
> could still continue with that
> >>> pattern. Sure they still double transistor
> gates every couple of years or
> >>> so, but heat problems seem to have killed the
> raw speed doubling or at least
> >>> have halted it for now.
> >>>
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >> Interestingly, performance is increasing at 82% a
> year (faster than a
> >> doubling every 18 months) and shows no sign of
> slowing down. (Full
> >> disclosure: I am not objective but am strongly
> biased in two ways: 1. vested
> >> interest in the winner of the last 7 rankings--my
> baby called Blue Gene; 2.
> >> having published claims that Moore's Law has
> slowed down:
> >>
> >> I tried not to go too deeply into some of the
> nuances, thats why I said
> > the number of gates is still increasing. This
> increase results in things
> > like multi core processors and the ability to
> interconnect many processor
> > chips to create things like Blue Gene. However,
> the regular increase in
> > raw single core performance that used to entice
> people to upgrade their PCs
> > every few years seems at least for now to have
> stopped or severly slowed
> > down. A 2 core processor provides some apparent
> performance improvement but
> > 4 core seems pretty marginal unless one is running
> something like SETI@home<mailto:SETI@home>. Maybe some future version
> of Windows, MacOS... will figure out how to
> > effectively use the extra resources. I agree
> Blue Gene is a major
> > breakthrough. Maybe the compiler people will
> figure out how to
> > automatically create multi threading code that can
> utilize the multiple
> > cores.
> > And David O
> >
> > I'm getting old and cranky though, so I don't
> think the Lord will tarry a
> >> billion years.
> >>
> > Me neither but after all he has allowed the show
> to go on for roughly 13
> > billion years to date.
> >
> > What I can't agree with, however, is the notion
> that human over-population
> >> is the fundamental driver of these problems
> >>
> > I fail to understand how you justify this given
> limits on the amount of
> > food, water, air... that the biosphere can produce
> and the amount of waste
> > that it can absorb. Remember that in this thread
> I am not postulating that
> > we are at that limit now, you get to choose how
> many more doublings can be
> > sustained. It seems to me that we are getting
> close to fulfilling the
> > imperative to fill the earth.
> >
> > Dave W (ASA member)
> >
> >
> > To unsubscribe, send a message to
> majordomo@calvin.edu<mailto:majordomo@calvin.edu> with
> > "unsubscribe asa" (no quotes) as the body of the
> message.
> >
>
>
>
> --
> David W. Opderbeck
> Associate Professor of Law
> Seton Hall University Law School
> Gibbons Institute of Law, Science & Technology
>

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Received on Sat May 24 01:33:14 2008