6 ms·

There is another solution: less people.

by snarfy 10y ago

throwanem 10y ago
Oh, by all means, don't stop there! Elucidate the enormities you're willing to encompass.
- RankingMember 10y ago
  C'mon man don't throw a thesaurus at us like that.
  - throwanem 10y ago
    Language can be a form of play! I picked up my vocabulary from books, back when books were what you had to use. You have the Internet. Go thou forth and roll around in it!
    - RankingMember 10y ago
      I also speak Spanish, but not in comments since my goal is to have the people understand me. ;) IMO it's important to keep the person who's going to read your words in mind if you want them to understand you rather than using your favorite high-dollar words to try to sound smart. Making word soup like that obfuscates your message, as evidenced by the off-message conversation we're having right now.
      - throwanem 10y ago
        Not that you're wrong, but I've been having conversations like the one that is on message here for a very long time now. I'm accustomed to there being a few people who will say "well, the real problem is that there's just too many people", and I'm familiar with the typical unwillingness of such people to be drawn on questions like exactly whom they find surplus to requirements, exactly how they see that changing, and exactly why they imagine it reasonable to say such things in front of God and everybody, just as though it were nothing to be ashamed of. I've more or less given up trying to draw such people into useful conversation, because there isn't enough common ground for direct discourse between me and someone who finds it other than abhorrent to seriously contemplate mass human slaughter as a geoengineering technique. Happily for my state of mind if nothing else, that perspective seems rare enough overall to make largely unnecessary an engagement for the benefit of the audience - put simply, this isn't really a subject on which most people need a worked example. So, in such a case, I sometimes feel at some liberty to indulge myself, especially here on Hacker News, where the typical user's personal lexicon is considerably broader than you tend to find a lot of other places. Of course I understand that it's not a game to everyone the way it is to me. But I also understand that I'm not the only one who feels that way about it. And I don't really know that there's a lot of grounds to assume, for example, that I'm just "using high-dollar words to try to sound smart". I mean, I already know I'm not all that smart, and I hope I'm not terribly insecure about it; I make myself useful in other ways, and in general I'm just glad to be able to keep up on HN to the relatively limited extent I succeed in so doing. Some folks just like playing with words, that's all. I've always been one of them. Sometimes, when there's no real need to hammer home a point most people already grasp implicitly and the rest aren't at home to, I screw around a little. You're the first person who has evinced any upset at all about that since before I was in high school. Maybe you're right, and I shouldn't indulge myself this way at all, rather than just doing so very rarely. But I don't really know that I care to stop. I guess I'll just have to hope that people getting bent out of shape over it remains as rare as it has been throughout my life heretofore.
lallysingh 10y ago
Populations past a certain level of prosperity for a generation or two do seem to drop reproductive rates. Perhaps the answer here is higher educational costs to discourage people from having many kids, and lots of alternative activities instead (Pokemon)?
- guptaneil 10y ago
  Higher education costs would lead to the opposite of what you're hoping for. Generally poor and uneducated families have more kids than educated ones, for a variety of reasons. You'd be better off lowering education costs.
- throwanem 10y ago
  Are you really suggesting people will play Pokemon instead of screwing? I mean, yeah, if they weren't going to screw anyway, maybe, but the idea of advancing the one as a serious alternative to the other...well, I mean, I know people get really into those games for whatever reason, but that much?
- adrenalinelol 10y ago
  Increase college tuition (even more?) with the hopes of stemming population growth? You know the majority of the planet doesn't actually attend college as is already?
  - deleted 10y ago
    [deleted]
konschubert 10y ago
What are you trying to say?
- snarfy 10y ago
  That the problem is there are too many people in a world of finite resources. A solution is less people. I'm not suggesting how this is done, but we probably shouldn't e.g. subsidize growth anymore. You shouldn't get a tax break for having kids. It should go the other way.
  - runeb 10y ago
    It gets problematic, because then you'd basically have a system where the government decides who gets to have kids. A better solution is probably a raised standard of living and more education. edit: By raised standard of living I'm not talking about AC and other energy-intensive luxuries. I mean not having to have 7 kids because many of them will probably die.
    - dredmorbius 10y ago
      You've got two variables you can control. Birthrate and deathrate. Someone, or something, will ultimately be making decisions. Why not a government, or government analog? What about that bothers you? What alternatives do you suggest? Different mechanisms? Different institutions? Raising standards of livings has always required raising material resource consumption.
      - runeb 10y ago
        Its an interesting question to ponder if the reduced birth rate by increasing quality of life, education levels and general health will offset the raised material resource consumption by that move. In the end I think the individuals themselves will be the ones making the decision to have fewer kids. I don't have a source for this, but I seem to remember that immigrants to more developed nations have fewer children after assimilating than people in their native, less developed countries.
WDCDev 10y ago
The good news is that global populations will begin to decline over the next 100 years!
- chr1 10y ago
  That is assuming humans will live 80 years like they do now. Hopefully in next 100 years we'll figure out a way to increase human lifespan enough to keep exponential growth of total population. (Some people believe that it is possible http://www.sens.org/ http://www.sens.org/)
nl 10y ago
I don't understand why people say this like it is some kind of self evident comment. High levels of industrial production without counting the cost of carbon emissions is the problem. Counties with high birth rates (mostly in Africa) aren't the ones causing that. It's really the 2 person family in the West, with 3 cars, a MacManshion and 4 overseas holidays a year.
- legulere 10y ago
  > Counties with high birth rates (mostly in Africa) aren't the ones causing that. They are simply on their way to become like us: high population density, high individual environmental damage.
- stillsut 10y ago
  In the same way that PG showed us how startup = growth, AGW = continued exponentially growing emissions.Since the effect of CO2 on temperature is logarithmic, there can only be marked warming in the continued exponential growth scenarios. Europe and even US have negative emission growth recently, even though our populations are slowly growing, our emissions efficiency is outclassing our increased consumption for a net small retreats in emissions. 1st world alone, and at their current and projected rate we'll continue to increase CO2 concentration and warm but second derivative of temperature will go strongly negative, and we will never hit a crisis. There are no scary AGW that show this 1st world emissions plateau, instead they show continued exponential growth coming from increased wealth and high population growth (e.g. projected 6 billion people in Africa by the end of the century) in the developing world. This doesn't me to "blame" anyone, simply to point out that if we "froze" the consumption levels and population at today's levels there is no scary AGW. Only with inexorable population and economic growth do we get +2C scenarios.
  - nl 10y ago
    As far as I can tell, I think most of your assumptions here aren't born out by the evidence. Firstly, 6B in Africa is the most pessimistic assumption possible[1]. Secondly, this is completely wrong: 1st world alone, and at their current and projected rate we'll continue to increase CO2 concentration and warm but second derivative of temperature will go strongly negative, and we will never hit a crisis. To quote Wikipedia: In a scenario where global emissions start to decrease by 2010 and then declined at a sustained rate of 3% per year, the likely global average temperature increase was predicted to be 1.7 °C above pre-industrial levels by 2050, rising to around 2 °C by 2100.[2] To make it clear: with a global reduction in emissions (not just first world) we are still in the "crisis" area of a 2 °C increase in temperatures by 2100. Those estimates were made in 2008, and I believe we are already past the possibility of dropping emissions enough to meet those targets. [1] https://esa.un.org/unpd/wpp/Graphs/Probabilistic/POP/TOT/ https://esa.un.org/unpd/wpp/Graphs/Probabilistic/POP/TOT/ (Need to choose Africa) [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/General_circulation_model https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/General_circulation_model
RubyMyDear 10y ago
I really don't want to be "that guy" but.... I have a big problem with what you said. It should be "fewer people."
dirtyhenry 10y ago
"Less people" is not a solution. "Very slowly reducing the world population" could be one. But it could never be implemented. Reading Thomas Piketty's book is really good to apprehend this population growth vs economic sustainability subject.

There is another solution: less people.

by snarfy 10y ago

There is another solution: less people.

throwanem 10y ago

Oh, by all means, don't stop there! Elucidate the enormities you're willing to encompass.

RankingMember 10y ago
C'mon man don't throw a thesaurus at us like that.
- throwanem 10y ago
  Language can be a form of play! I picked up my vocabulary from books, back when books were what you had to use. You have the Internet. Go thou forth and roll around in it!
  - RankingMember 10y ago
    I also speak Spanish, but not in comments since my goal is to have the people understand me. ;) IMO it's important to keep the person who's going to read your words in mind if you want them to understand you rather than using your favorite high-dollar words to try to sound smart. Making word soup like that obfuscates your message, as evidenced by the off-message conversation we're having right now.
    - throwanem 10y ago
      Not that you're wrong, but I've been having conversations like the one that is on message here for a very long time now. I'm accustomed to there being a few people who will say "well, the real problem is that there's just too many people", and I'm familiar with the typical unwillingness of such people to be drawn on questions like exactly whom they find surplus to requirements, exactly how they see that changing, and exactly why they imagine it reasonable to say such things in front of God and everybody, just as though it were nothing to be ashamed of. I've more or less given up trying to draw such people into useful conversation, because there isn't enough common ground for direct discourse between me and someone who finds it other than abhorrent to seriously contemplate mass human slaughter as a geoengineering technique. Happily for my state of mind if nothing else, that perspective seems rare enough overall to make largely unnecessary an engagement for the benefit of the audience - put simply, this isn't really a subject on which most people need a worked example. So, in such a case, I sometimes feel at some liberty to indulge myself, especially here on Hacker News, where the typical user's personal lexicon is considerably broader than you tend to find a lot of other places. Of course I understand that it's not a game to everyone the way it is to me. But I also understand that I'm not the only one who feels that way about it. And I don't really know that there's a lot of grounds to assume, for example, that I'm just "using high-dollar words to try to sound smart". I mean, I already know I'm not all that smart, and I hope I'm not terribly insecure about it; I make myself useful in other ways, and in general I'm just glad to be able to keep up on HN to the relatively limited extent I succeed in so doing. Some folks just like playing with words, that's all. I've always been one of them. Sometimes, when there's no real need to hammer home a point most people already grasp implicitly and the rest aren't at home to, I screw around a little. You're the first person who has evinced any upset at all about that since before I was in high school. Maybe you're right, and I shouldn't indulge myself this way at all, rather than just doing so very rarely. But I don't really know that I care to stop. I guess I'll just have to hope that people getting bent out of shape over it remains as rare as it has been throughout my life heretofore.

lallysingh 10y ago

Populations past a certain level of prosperity for a generation or two do seem to drop reproductive rates. Perhaps the answer here is higher educational costs to discourage people from having many kids, and lots of alternative activities instead (Pokemon)?

guptaneil 10y ago
Higher education costs would lead to the opposite of what you're hoping for. Generally poor and uneducated families have more kids than educated ones, for a variety of reasons. You'd be better off lowering education costs.
throwanem 10y ago
Are you really suggesting people will play Pokemon instead of screwing? I mean, yeah, if they weren't going to screw anyway, maybe, but the idea of advancing the one as a serious alternative to the other...well, I mean, I know people get really into those games for whatever reason, but that much?
adrenalinelol 10y ago
Increase college tuition (even more?) with the hopes of stemming population growth? You know the majority of the planet doesn't actually attend college as is already?
- deleted 10y ago
  [deleted]

konschubert 10y ago

What are you trying to say?

snarfy 10y ago
That the problem is there are too many people in a world of finite resources. A solution is less people. I'm not suggesting how this is done, but we probably shouldn't e.g. subsidize growth anymore. You shouldn't get a tax break for having kids. It should go the other way.
- runeb 10y ago
  It gets problematic, because then you'd basically have a system where the government decides who gets to have kids. A better solution is probably a raised standard of living and more education. edit: By raised standard of living I'm not talking about AC and other energy-intensive luxuries. I mean not having to have 7 kids because many of them will probably die.
  - dredmorbius 10y ago
    You've got two variables you can control. Birthrate and deathrate. Someone, or something, will ultimately be making decisions. Why not a government, or government analog? What about that bothers you? What alternatives do you suggest? Different mechanisms? Different institutions? Raising standards of livings has always required raising material resource consumption.
    - runeb 10y ago
      Its an interesting question to ponder if the reduced birth rate by increasing quality of life, education levels and general health will offset the raised material resource consumption by that move. In the end I think the individuals themselves will be the ones making the decision to have fewer kids. I don't have a source for this, but I seem to remember that immigrants to more developed nations have fewer children after assimilating than people in their native, less developed countries.

WDCDev 10y ago

The good news is that global populations will begin to decline over the next 100 years!

chr1 10y ago
That is assuming humans will live 80 years like they do now. Hopefully in next 100 years we'll figure out a way to increase human lifespan enough to keep exponential growth of total population. (Some people believe that it is possible http://www.sens.org/ http://www.sens.org/)

nl 10y ago

I don't understand why people say this like it is some kind of self evident comment. High levels of industrial production without counting the cost of carbon emissions is the problem. Counties with high birth rates (mostly in Africa) aren't the ones causing that. It's really the 2 person family in the West, with 3 cars, a MacManshion and 4 overseas holidays a year.

legulere 10y ago
> Counties with high birth rates (mostly in Africa) aren't the ones causing that. They are simply on their way to become like us: high population density, high individual environmental damage.
stillsut 10y ago
In the same way that PG showed us how startup = growth, AGW = continued exponentially growing emissions.Since the effect of CO2 on temperature is logarithmic, there can only be marked warming in the continued exponential growth scenarios. Europe and even US have negative emission growth recently, even though our populations are slowly growing, our emissions efficiency is outclassing our increased consumption for a net small retreats in emissions. 1st world alone, and at their current and projected rate we'll continue to increase CO2 concentration and warm but second derivative of temperature will go strongly negative, and we will never hit a crisis. There are no scary AGW that show this 1st world emissions plateau, instead they show continued exponential growth coming from increased wealth and high population growth (e.g. projected 6 billion people in Africa by the end of the century) in the developing world. This doesn't me to "blame" anyone, simply to point out that if we "froze" the consumption levels and population at today's levels there is no scary AGW. Only with inexorable population and economic growth do we get +2C scenarios.
- nl 10y ago
  As far as I can tell, I think most of your assumptions here aren't born out by the evidence. Firstly, 6B in Africa is the most pessimistic assumption possible[1]. Secondly, this is completely wrong: 1st world alone, and at their current and projected rate we'll continue to increase CO2 concentration and warm but second derivative of temperature will go strongly negative, and we will never hit a crisis. To quote Wikipedia: In a scenario where global emissions start to decrease by 2010 and then declined at a sustained rate of 3% per year, the likely global average temperature increase was predicted to be 1.7 °C above pre-industrial levels by 2050, rising to around 2 °C by 2100.[2] To make it clear: with a global reduction in emissions (not just first world) we are still in the "crisis" area of a 2 °C increase in temperatures by 2100. Those estimates were made in 2008, and I believe we are already past the possibility of dropping emissions enough to meet those targets. [1] https://esa.un.org/unpd/wpp/Graphs/Probabilistic/POP/TOT/ https://esa.un.org/unpd/wpp/Graphs/Probabilistic/POP/TOT/ (Need to choose Africa) [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/General_circulation_model https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/General_circulation_model

RubyMyDear 10y ago

I really don't want to be "that guy" but.... I have a big problem with what you said. It should be "fewer people."

dirtyhenry 10y ago

"Less people" is not a solution. "Very slowly reducing the world population" could be one. But it could never be implemented. Reading Thomas Piketty's book is really good to apprehend this population growth vs economic sustainability subject.