He really says: the world WOULD clearly be much better off without so many of us [1] There are varying degrees of mendacity involved in making the above state

He really says: the world WOULD clearly be much better off without so many of us [1] There are varying degrees of mendacity involved in making the above statement. The most honest thing to say would have been, "I want my share of natural resources to be higher than it is, therefore I want fewer people." It becomes more and more dishonest to say, "I fear for the planet/environment, etc". But what is this "the world"? Is it the trees? That would be an interesting thing, to be an herbal supremacist. It goes FAR beyond the typical yuppy habit of paying 80 dollars for a pound of Darjeeling. But, really, by "the world" he means "the people", thus the people WOULD clearly be much better off without so many of us And who is "us". Who else could "us" be besides "the people". Therefore, the people WOULD clearly be much better off without so many people Clearly, we are dealing with an idiot. Even if the roundaboutedness of the above statement were accepted, his prophecies of apocolypse should be self-correcting by killing off most of us anyway. His is a college-level equivalent of the grade school bestseller "Ishmael". But...he's not really an idiot, as I've deliberately misinterpreted him in the very manner that he wants to be misinterpreted. The correct translation is this: my group WOULD clearly be much better off without so many of your group I agree that this is a rational thing to say. It indisputably results in a value true for all inputs "my" and "your". This attitude is very common as a result, and even if he never honestly advocated the genocide of x billion people, clearly it "WOULD" be a nice thing. [1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mims-Pianka_controversy#Response_to_criticism http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mims-Pianka_controversy#Respons...