Saltpetre says:

"There is not the means available to lift all the world's population to prosperity, high education and true freedom of choice - not now, and probably not in the foreseeable future - not at current population levels"

This is the nub of the sustainbility concept and the larger theme of AGW. It is a nonsense; no doubt its advocates can dredge up the usual examples of the dire consequences of man interfering with nature or 'exceeding' nature's limitations.

Well, I don't want to read about Easter Island or the Mayans or any of the usual suspects because none of them deal with man exceeding nature; they all deal with man NOT exceeding nature and herefore being constrained by Malthusian principles.

They were dead technologically.

Humanity today, globally, is not dead technologically; the only constraints are those which are being generated by AGW and its ridiculous, amorphous offspring, sustainability.

For all those who are preaching sustainability and living within nature's means go and google Kardashev scale; and try not to be so miserable.

Banjo says:

"I think you are very wrong if you think that technological advances in food production and distribution can keep pace with the rising world population."

Let's be positive shall we Banjo and hope that the greens don't lock up any more productive farmland

Hi Banjo,

Lo and behold ! On the news today, they mentioned developing a new strain of safflower oilseed crop with a far higher mono-unsaturated oil content, and suitable, not just for human consumption, but for processing into plastics.

I recall an episode of The New Inventors in which a couple of blokes were demonstrating a filtering system which would enable irrigation using much more brackish water and potentially doubling the area Australia's arable lands.

Yes, I agree that there is little point in population growth for its own sake, but from Cohenite's Fertility Map, it is clear (well, at least to my mind) that countries which:

* enforce compulsory education for all children between the ages of 5-6 and 14-15, forcing children out of the free labour market and making them a cost instead of an asset for those years,

* institute an old-age pension scheme;

* enable equal educational opportunities for women,

have fertility rates below replacement level.

If anything, fertility rates in some countries may be too low to satisfactorily maintain a population balance in which the numbers of old people on pensions can be paid for by the number of younger people working.

For those who are thinking in terms of a 1 % p.a. reduction in population, or something even more drastic, consider these factors:

* since the 'population reduction' that we are talking about focusses on the birth-rate (one would hope!), a 1 % reduction means a massive reduction in the annual number of births, maybe 10 % p.a., i.e. halving the birth-rate in barely seven years - reducing the birth-rate by three-quarters in fourteen years, and by seven-eights in twenty eight years, i.e., in a single generation;

* that rate of reduction would mean that each generation was 28 times as numerous as the next, and so on: how many working people might there be then, for each new generation of people on pensions ?

[TBC]

[contd.]

Okay, what people may mean is a 1 % p.a. reduction in the birth-rate, not in the overall population. Let's run with that:

* even so, it would mean that each new generation is only three-quarters as numerous as the previous one, or barely half as numerous as the one before that. i.e.

* only fifty babies are born to every seventy five young people who were born to the one hundred people who are now mature-aged.

And the total population might have declined by 10 % in those fifty or sixty years, at an average of 0.1 - 0.2 % p.a.

Even with ZPG, there are roughly sufficient people working to finance the costs of pensions and health care, etc. Even with a 0.5 % p.a. reduction in the birth-rate, population would be significantly reduced, putting a heavier financial burden on those who are working, and for all of their working lives.

But why should I worry ? I'm in the age-group which is living in clover, at least until the Deep Greens take over and feed me into the grinders.

Cheers,

Joe

The thing is, Cohenite, that you can offer absolutaly no solutions,
apart from man plundering ever more of planet earth, wiping out
any other species in the way, to make way for ever more human babies,
which all your claimed human ingenuity seemingly is unable to
deal with, apart from more plundering.

Sustainability does not matter? What will you do when you run of
more land to plunder?

If its not sustainable, Cohenite, then all your hoping and dreaming
might just turn out to be a failure. Given that you only have one
planet to destroy, why would you want to risk it?

The world is full of flawed human judgement. One disaster after the
next, but your solution is to ignore all that and create another
disaster, somewhere else.

People like you give me all the confidence about my own prediction.
Humanity is intelligent enough to invent interesting new things,
but simply too stupid to use them wisely. In the end the planet
will spin with cockroaches and ants on board, those walking, talking
apes will simply be a memory of evolution having played out as
predicted.

So be it, its just a shame, it could have been a rather nice place,
for quite some time.

Joe,
Thanks for your thoughts. Sometime the figures regarding birthrate are confusing because they are expressed differrently. Some call it 'fertility rate' whish I hate because it does not measure fertility, then sometime the percentage is expressed over the whole population. I prefer the birthrate to be expressed in the number of births per woman and I can easily see where it is going.

Yabby posted a link on page 7 of this thread which give a comparison between Thailand and the Phillipines and the difference in the two countries is amazing. The Thai government actively sponsored family planning while the Phillipines does not. It seems to me that the economy of Thailand is much better off and can now find more funds to spend on social policies, like education and health. Iran also is worth googling for family planning as it to has made dramatic reductions in birthrates. I have not read of any envisaged problems in those countries, only in Aus have I seen comments regarding low birthrates that could cause future tax problems.

I am thinking more in relation to famine suseptable countries where masses of people die from lack of food. There are a number of websites that put out birthrate or fertility figures per country.

If a government thought its sponsored family planning was working too good and may cause some future problems, it would be easy to reduce government involvement and the birthrate would increase.

Loudmouth,

Joe & behold, when you get old the government will give you to the private sector for age care(disposal). You will be treated like sh$t on a shoestring budget while the books are cooked to make it look like you are healthy at great cost to taxpayers and are in need of more immigrants to care for you. This is just a ruse to boost imported votes for politicians and boost consumer numbers to profit Australia's monopolistic corporate sector. the Australian Labor & Liberal governments are alternately running this Ponzi scheme to the detriment of all citizens including you.

As you age, the last thing you'll know is being placed in aged care and as your brain deteriorates you will just remember all the garbage you have written here and it will haunt you into oblivion.

So maybe you should just show a bit more respect for the truth that is dawning on just about everyone except you, as australia is being overpopulated & overcharged to death.

Meanwhile immigration is being spruiked as the panacea to all Australia's problems when it the beginning of UNSUSTAINABILITY & low quality life for the bulk of the masses.