It looks more like 1 billion people who think & 5 billion who don't.

In answer to Pericles and hangers on.
None of us are in a position to act individually. To begin with 'twould be futile, but beyond that, we're social beings and despite the bravado we crave the camaraderie and approval of our peers. Acting individually and in opposition to our fellows is nothing more than eccentricity. I'm nowhere near as vociferous with my opinions outside OLO because I don't want to be a pariah. For me to act alone in the real world is to estrange myself and invite neuroses to take up residence, because I can't support my opinions without corroboration. I don't think many of us appreciate how deep that banal sounding phrase goes, we're "social animals".

Ammonite very reasonably says "Asking humans to stop breeding is like persuading cockatoos to quite demolishing my verandah. Just ain't natural behaviour". Yet the difference is "reason"; we have that gift, and the power to foresee--forewarned is forearmed...
Well, you would think so. Even Yabby lately tends to take the fatalistic tack: "The planet will keep spinning, with or without humans on board". The fact is that Yabby will still avoid obvious dangers and act reasonably, prudently despite his mock-cynicism, so far as he can. That's what humans do as individuals, families and even small communities. I think the trouble is it's all so big and impersonal, and in the overwhelming context of global markets and geo-political forces we're all rendered impotent.
It's not that we're no better than those incorrigible Cockatoos, we are, it's that faced with the scale of the problems we retreat to the safety of parochialism and individualism (that is we try to distinguish ourselves within the group). Even in our own country, it's impossible to be represented by the populist "trends" (political parties) that have evolved to patronise us, yet represent no one.
Let's face it, if we were members of a small community subsisting on little arable land and few resources, we'd be having town meetings on how best to husband it, and we'd be cautioning ourselves as families to live within our means etc.

No cherry picking, Clownfish. I was comparing countries with
a similar standard of living, where the difference is religion
and peoples ability to afford family planning. It shows that
Govt programmes work, if religion does not interfere.

In places like Italy and Spain, people can afford to buy their
own and even Catholics mostly take no notice of the churches family
planning policies. Poor Phillipinos have no such choice.

Well if your in business, a primary producer, In the religious fields of work, or anything that counts of people for profit....don't want population reduction. Lets face it! Their lives depends on it....right! I understand that, we all understand that:) so it wont happen ever.

Yes kid yourselves all you like with your good intentions, cause I know where there coming from:)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HMLoQ-cdGXA

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Jn_yeVeEI70&feature=related

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UmmGZGYeGdw&feature=related

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cz-Lf4YkzOk

Enjoy or not:)

LEA

"Every nation on earth must legislate to create severe penalties for any couple who have more than one child"

If China could not pull that little stunt off what hope does anybody else have?

@nicco: Cheryl, aka Malcolm [King]

Of course! Now it is pointed out, that shared intransigence seems so obvious.

@Divergence: http://www.ecologyandsociety.org/vol14/iss2/art32/

Thanks for the link. I didn't realise our current species extinction rate was comparatively so high.

As for the rest of you pinning your hopes on declining population growth rates, they are speculative. A few experts were discussing it here: http://www.abc.net.au/rn/nationalinterest/stories/2011/3209647.htm#transcript

From that I learned that now the world's population has grown from 6 to 7 billion, the peak estimate has grown from 9 to 10 billion.

Sadly that wasn't the worst news. The expert in food production could not see how we will meet the world's food requirements in 20 years - long before the peak.

Rstuart; They imply,If China could not pull it off with a one child policy,what chance has the rest of the world got with no policy? Not all Chinese fell in line with the one child edict.There were just too many unknown peasants.

Most of the poverty on the planet is created via our Western Central Banking system.They create money from nothing to equal the increases in our productivity and loan it back to us a debt? The poor countries have no chance under this debt based system.They cannot buy new technology or education without going into debt by a Western banking system.Their money and thus productivity is not recognised by this system.The harder they work ,the more debt they incur.In addition to this,we have Western Oligarchs encouraging corrupt regiemes to screw their own people.

The more stressed populations become due to war and poverty,the more children they have to compensate for losses.Thus the cycle of poverty continues due to Western greed and power lust.

Now the Bankster Oligarchs want rapid de-population via carbon taxes and the ETS.These very same scumbags are the source over population due their greed and now set themslves up as the paragons of our salvation.

The way forward to keep the planet in balance,is freedom/democracy and not their totalitariarn New World Order.