Re: [asa] A Sustainable Future and Exponential growth

The U.N. predicts that world population will increase from 6 to 9 billion
over the next 50 years (
http://www.un.org/News/Press/docs//2007/pop952.doc.htm). Growth is not
likely to continue at the pace we have seen over the past 50 years; in fact,
it is likely that the growth trend will slow and eventually reverse, without
governmental population control. There are more than adequate food and
water resources to sustain this growth, if properly managed.

The "if properly managed" part is of course the key. As Ken has noted,
energy is a major concern, as is global warming. War, totalitarian
governments, corruption and the like present further problems.
IMHO, policy-making and public funding efforts ought to focus on managing
these problems and not on population control. If we manage these other
problems, population growth will slow naturally because people will be
better educated and will move away from agrarian large-family lifestyles.
The alternative of governmental population control requires the sort of
surrender of fundamental freedoms that, IMHO, we should consider
intolerable.

-- 
David W. Opderbeck
Associate Professor of Law
Seton Hall University Law School
Gibbons Institute of Law, Science & Technology
On Sat, May 24, 2008 at 12:44 AM, Christine Smith <
christine_mb_smith@yahoo.com> wrote:
> 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> 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
> >
> > 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
> >
> >
> >
> > On Mon, May 19, 2008 at 1:33 PM, Dave Wallace
> > <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. 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 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
> >
>
>
> "For we walk by faith, not by sight" ~II Corinthians 5:7
>
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