The people would keep arriving and arriving without end.

Across the north Africa and the Muslim World, there are many countries with populations already ten-times Australia's population, and there are many which are having 5 of 6 children per woman... trippling their populations every twenty years or so.

They would just keep coming and coming. If children are the future The people of the 'non-feminist world' are producing the future, as we are dying.

Meanwhile, Australians today are having only 1.8 children for every two adults - slowly suiciding out of existance. Why are we aging? Because we are failing to produce enough children to replace ourselves.

We work out why middle-class societies across the world are dying, and anti-feminist poor societies are thriving.

Middle class couples can't afford the children they want, as children are expensive. The baby-bonus and means-tested Family Tax benefits provides a perverse incentive for the welfare dependant to produce hmany children... bribing single women into servitude of many children, ensuring these children are brought up in relatively wealthy but struggling households where nobody works.

Instead we shoud make children reduce your tax... so professional parents can afford the families they want at last.

Australian men don't want to become fathes anymore - they are commitment-phobic because they don't want see their children and everything else they ever worked for stolen by the divorce lawyers

Peter Hume, best not to call others 'fools', especially when you are so oblivious to the historical reality that the state, under conditions of private ownership, invests in welfare and infrastructure primarily to maintain the social relations of capitalism. Government spending designed to perpetuate capitalism is socialist?

You may like to check out David MacMullen's website (The Economics of Social Ownership): http://economsoc.wordpress.com/ It defines the distinction between socialism and capitalism very well.

You always leave little breadcrumbs around, Boaz, for a little fact-ferret like me to follow up. For which, my thanks.

>> It will begin with a trip to my forebears tomb "Fortrose Cathedral" where you can ponder why it lies in ruins. (reading about Cromwell would help)<<

Ok. But first things first.

There are only three tombs in Fortrose Cathedral, as you know. They are those of Euphemia, Countess of Ross; Bishop Robert Cairncross; and Bishop John Fraser.

Do tell us - which one of these is your "forbear"?

The reason it lies in ruins, of course, was the Scottish Reformation. It lost its roof, first of all, to one of John Knox's purges. By the time Cromwell came along a century later to borrow some brickwork for his fortress in Inverness, it was already derelict.

The sixteenth century was not exactly a happy and peaceful time for the Scots, was it. Of course, it was that famous proddy-dog, Martin Luther who started it, back in 1520.

"If you think properly of the Gospel, please don't imagine that its cause can be advanced without tumult, offence and sedition... The word of God is a sword, it's war, ruin, offence, perdition and poison. If I am immoderate, at least I am simple and open."

http://www.bbc.co.uk/scotland/history/articles/scottish_reformation/

(Sounds eerily familiar...)

At the time, Scotland was extremely Catholic.

"By the time of the Reformation, the Catholic Church in Scotland was in a position of great power. It owned land, which it rented out, and it collected taxes. This had led to its infiltration by nobles who were far more interested in the material rewards that church positions offered than the spiritual ones. Those who opposed what they perceived to be the church’s corruption and excessive wealth became known as Protestants."

http://www.ltscotland.org.uk/higherscottishhistory/ageofreformation/background/index.asp

And there we have it. Religion vs. religion. The battle that rages through the ages (can I trademark that, I wonder?)

Now, what was that about your ancestors, Boaz?

Euphemia, we know, had two children. But as for the two Catholic Bishops... nothing.

On the right side of the blanket, that is...

Byork

The absent authority does *not* define capitalism or socialism as you claim, so it does not get you out of the confusion or dishonesty I have rightly accused you of.

“the state, under conditions of private ownership, invests in welfare and infrastructure primarily to maintain the social relations of capitalism. Government spending designed to perpetuate capitalism is socialist?”

You have not established that such spending is either “primarily to maintain the social relations of capitalism” or “to perpetuate capitalism”.
Fighting for peace is like f**cking for virginity. The assertion that by actively violating private ownership we preserve or advance it, is prima facie absurd.

To rescue your assertion, you would need to prove your unspoken assumption that, in the absence of such interventions, capitalism is not sustainable. You can see these issues thrashed out at length recently at: http://forum.onlineopinion.com.au/thread.asp?article=11446&page=0
You will see that no-one on your side was able to defend it without circular argument. They impermissibly assume in their premises what is to be proved in their conclusion. And when asked in what circumstances their belief could be proved false, they only reply with more circularity, which is irrational.

So if you’ve got something better to prove it with, you are welcome to try, but you haven’t begun yet.

No-one, including your or the author you link to, has ever refuted the economic calculation argument, which proves that socialism is impossible in theory, let alone in practice.

McMullen says
1. “Establishments bid for inputs on the basis of the expected value of their output and the cost of alternative available, and they offer output at prices that reflect their costs and any possible excess demand.”

But earlier he says
2. “This would mean that they [capital goods] are no longer owned by individuals or groups nor bought and sold.”

So there will be no prices for capital goods because there will be no sales of them, thus disproving the possibility of his first paragraph, and of economic calculation under socialism.

So which is it? Confusion? Or dishonesty?

Peter Hume, I'm neither confused on this nor dishonest. I think you're wrong if you believe that the USA, Britain, Canada, the European countries, are not capitalist because they have welfare states and their governments invest in infrastructure. Both are essential components of capitalism as practiced historically and currently. I see no point in debating with you about some idealised capitalism that is free of the above and that exists only in your mind.

Good on you for pushing the boundaries of thinking laterally David but governments won't keep up with the needs of infrastructure required to treat, house, employ and transport a growing population.

Reducing the minimum wage to create employment will only create a sub-class of low paid immigrants and refugees who usually have little understanding or knowledge of their legal rights in the workplace. Cutting red tape for small business is great but small business won't be able to provide employment for such a huge influx of people. A business employs only as many people as it needs even at the lower rate and even taking into account expansion opportunities.

How will these new immigrants be able to afford a house. You suggest that creating 'overcrowding' in the cities will provide but fail to mention any negative impacts of overcrowding. Some level of urban infill is inevitable with current immigration and birth rates but to extend that idea? Dangerous I reckon.

Where will the water come from - we are largely an arid nation. What will the impact be in relation to forestry, pollution, food supplies that don't involve huge imports of toxic vegetables and fruit from nations that have little in the way of regulation, nor does our biosecurity agencies who only test a minor percentage (3%) of imports for contamination.

This solution is fraught with problems and even the best of human innovation cannot continually resource ever-growing populations.