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Please watch this video: http://www.ted.com/talks/hans_rosling_and_the_magic_washing_machine.html http://www.ted.com/talks/hans_rosling_and_the_magic_washing_.

Please watch this video: http://www.ted.com/talks/hans_rosling_and_the_magic_washing_machine.html http://www.ted.com/talks/hans_rosling_and_the_magic_washing_... In it Hans Rosling explains how something simple as making people able to use a washing machine to clean their clothes, will ultimately reduce population growth. This is because the knock-on effects of that are that women are more able to educate themselves, more able to keep their kids alive as a result of education and thus the family has no need to reproduce massively. The key is not to educate people about overpopulation, but to educate them effectively in how to remove the need for high reproduction while increasing their life quality.

lutusp 13y ago
> The key is not to educate people about overpopulation, but to educate them effectively in how to remove the need for high reproduction while increasing their life quality. This doesn't take the Population Paradox into account. I'm not saying such measures shouldn't be pursued. To do otherwise would be to abandon democratic principles and the uncontroversial advantages of education. But it won't make any difference. When medical researchers discovered antibiotics, they believed that marked the end of bacterial infectious diseases. But that was not to be -- natural selection reacted to these new measures by choosing the tiny minority of bacteria that proved resistant to antibiotics, and we now face bacterial strains that are completely resistant to any available remedies (MRSA, tuberculosis and others). In the same way, natural selection will react by these new measures by choosing the tiny minority of people that prove resistant to education and gender equality, and we will face human strains that are completely resistant to any available remedies. In case anyone thinks this is some kind of veiled racist rant, I personally think the resistant strain will turn out to be white people of European descent. The reason? We can and do rationalize anything to ourselves -- for example, that environmental projects will save either us or the planet, in the face of uncontrolled population growth. See, in the Population Paradox, it's not the people who get it that are the problem -- it's the people who don't, who can't, get it. And history proves that there's no political solution that doesn't turn out to be much worse than the problem itself. "We have met the enemy, and he is us." -- Pogo More here: http://arachnoid.com/evolution http://arachnoid.com/evolution
- waps 13y ago
  Also know that interfering with natural selection in humans is likely to have more consequences than simply fewer humans. There have been many studies about what happens when you make even seemingly insignificant artificial changes to population numbers and the results aren't pretty. Generally because of constant attempts to flip population numbers (oh no ! too many ! oh no ! too few ! oh no ! too many ! ...) the population numbers start to fluctuate wildly. Then at some point, they hit 0. Whoops. Keep in mind that if you do seek to reduce birthrate, to have more than extremely small changes in the rates is likely to result in outcomes vastly different from what you envisioned. So far, the most famous of those rate-adjustment fuckups have been with rabbits, cats and kangaroos. If the same happened to people, we'd be in shit so deep you wouldn't believe it.
- Mithaldu 13y ago
  > This doesn't take the Population Paradox into account. Because it's bullshit. The core of it is this statement: > Insensitive, unintelligent, uncompassionate listeners don't -- they will have the usual number of children. It entirely ignores the fact that having children and rearing them is WORK, EFFORT. People in poor countries do the work for a single reason: They NEED their kids to care for them in old age. As you remove this need, even dumb people will want to avoid having kids, because it's less work. There's a reason the US fertility rate has stabilized to 2 childs per woman, and an overpopulated country like china is even below it, and it is that the complex real world pressures cause an equilibrium on their own. In short: Don't just write massive posts, also ask "why?" a LOT more.
  - lutusp 13y ago
    > As you remove this need, even dumb people will want to avoid having kids, because it's less work. Yes, that explains why people who lived in the early agricultural societies, who had easy lives, also had a lot of children. It explains why, today, those with the highest birthrate end up becoming the majority, consistent with the principles of natural selection. You need to realize something about natural selection -- the future population belongs to those with the highest birth rate, whoever and wherever they are. You should know this, but you clearly do not. In Israel, arabs are outbreeding Jews and will eventually become an absolute majority: Title: "High Arab birth rate in Israel raises concerns about country’s Jewish identity": http://www.ibtimes.com/high-arab-birth-rate-israel-raises-concerns-about-countrys-jewish-identity-263449 http://www.ibtimes.com/high-arab-birth-rate-israel-raises-co... In the U.S., groups other than White descendants of Europeans are outbreeding them and will soon become an absolute majority, as they already are in California: Title: "California: Whites are no longer the majority" http://tv.msnbc.com/2013/07/01/california-whites-are-no-longer-the-majority/ http://tv.msnbc.com/2013/07/01/california-whites-are-no-long... I'm not complaining about the ethnic makeup of the future, I'm only making the point that natural selection blindly chooses those with the highest birthrate, and it is that group that becomes the future population of the world. > Don't just write massive posts, also ask "why?" a LOT more. It is you who needs to educate yourself on this issue. You posted opinions, I posted facts. You haven't the slightest idea what you're talking about. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_overpopulation http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_overpopulation Quote: "As of September 10, 2013 the world's human population is estimated to be 7.11 billion by the United States Census Bureau, and over 7 billion by the United Nations. Most contemporary estimates for the carrying capacity of the Earth under existing conditions are between 4 billion and 16 billion. Depending on which estimate is used, human overpopulation may or may not have already occurred. Nevertheless, the rapid recent increase in human population is causing some concern. The population is expected to reach between 8 and 10.5 billion between the year 2040 and 2050. In May 2011, the United Nations increased the medium variant projections to 9.3 billion for 2050 and 10.1 billion for 2100."

lutusp 13y ago

> The key is not to educate people about overpopulation, but to educate them effectively in how to remove the need for high reproduction while increasing their life quality. This doesn't take the Population Paradox into account. I'm not saying such measures shouldn't be pursued. To do otherwise would be to abandon democratic principles and the uncontroversial advantages of education. But it won't make any difference. When medical researchers discovered antibiotics, they believed that marked the end of bacterial infectious diseases. But that was not to be -- natural selection reacted to these new measures by choosing the tiny minority of bacteria that proved resistant to antibiotics, and we now face bacterial strains that are completely resistant to any available remedies (MRSA, tuberculosis and others). In the same way, natural selection will react by these new measures by choosing the tiny minority of people that prove resistant to education and gender equality, and we will face human strains that are completely resistant to any available remedies. In case anyone thinks this is some kind of veiled racist rant, I personally think the resistant strain will turn out to be white people of European descent. The reason? We can and do rationalize anything to ourselves -- for example, that environmental projects will save either us or the planet, in the face of uncontrolled population growth. See, in the Population Paradox, it's not the people who get it that are the problem -- it's the people who don't, who can't, get it. And history proves that there's no political solution that doesn't turn out to be much worse than the problem itself. "We have met the enemy, and he is us." -- Pogo More here: http://arachnoid.com/evolution http://arachnoid.com/evolution

waps 13y ago
Also know that interfering with natural selection in humans is likely to have more consequences than simply fewer humans. There have been many studies about what happens when you make even seemingly insignificant artificial changes to population numbers and the results aren't pretty. Generally because of constant attempts to flip population numbers (oh no ! too many ! oh no ! too few ! oh no ! too many ! ...) the population numbers start to fluctuate wildly. Then at some point, they hit 0. Whoops. Keep in mind that if you do seek to reduce birthrate, to have more than extremely small changes in the rates is likely to result in outcomes vastly different from what you envisioned. So far, the most famous of those rate-adjustment fuckups have been with rabbits, cats and kangaroos. If the same happened to people, we'd be in shit so deep you wouldn't believe it.
Mithaldu 13y ago
> This doesn't take the Population Paradox into account. Because it's bullshit. The core of it is this statement: > Insensitive, unintelligent, uncompassionate listeners don't -- they will have the usual number of children. It entirely ignores the fact that having children and rearing them is WORK, EFFORT. People in poor countries do the work for a single reason: They NEED their kids to care for them in old age. As you remove this need, even dumb people will want to avoid having kids, because it's less work. There's a reason the US fertility rate has stabilized to 2 childs per woman, and an overpopulated country like china is even below it, and it is that the complex real world pressures cause an equilibrium on their own. In short: Don't just write massive posts, also ask "why?" a LOT more.
- lutusp 13y ago
  > As you remove this need, even dumb people will want to avoid having kids, because it's less work. Yes, that explains why people who lived in the early agricultural societies, who had easy lives, also had a lot of children. It explains why, today, those with the highest birthrate end up becoming the majority, consistent with the principles of natural selection. You need to realize something about natural selection -- the future population belongs to those with the highest birth rate, whoever and wherever they are. You should know this, but you clearly do not. In Israel, arabs are outbreeding Jews and will eventually become an absolute majority: Title: "High Arab birth rate in Israel raises concerns about country’s Jewish identity": http://www.ibtimes.com/high-arab-birth-rate-israel-raises-concerns-about-countrys-jewish-identity-263449 http://www.ibtimes.com/high-arab-birth-rate-israel-raises-co... In the U.S., groups other than White descendants of Europeans are outbreeding them and will soon become an absolute majority, as they already are in California: Title: "California: Whites are no longer the majority" http://tv.msnbc.com/2013/07/01/california-whites-are-no-longer-the-majority/ http://tv.msnbc.com/2013/07/01/california-whites-are-no-long... I'm not complaining about the ethnic makeup of the future, I'm only making the point that natural selection blindly chooses those with the highest birthrate, and it is that group that becomes the future population of the world. > Don't just write massive posts, also ask "why?" a LOT more. It is you who needs to educate yourself on this issue. You posted opinions, I posted facts. You haven't the slightest idea what you're talking about. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_overpopulation http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_overpopulation Quote: "As of September 10, 2013 the world's human population is estimated to be 7.11 billion by the United States Census Bureau, and over 7 billion by the United Nations. Most contemporary estimates for the carrying capacity of the Earth under existing conditions are between 4 billion and 16 billion. Depending on which estimate is used, human overpopulation may or may not have already occurred. Nevertheless, the rapid recent increase in human population is causing some concern. The population is expected to reach between 8 and 10.5 billion between the year 2040 and 2050. In May 2011, the United Nations increased the medium variant projections to 9.3 billion for 2050 and 10.1 billion for 2100."