and, oh! Malcolm, by the way...

Australia does not have a "small" population. Only the ignorant use land mass as the sole criterion for carrying capacity. The Sahara Desert is comparable in size to Australia but has a mere two million people. Why? Because it's a desert. Antarctica has no permanent human population. Why? Because it's too cold and you can't grow food there. Australia is largely arid with thin poor soils and a variable climate that will be hard hit by climate change.

Infrastructure spending? Some once thought Dr Jane O'Sullivan might have got it wrong when she said each extra person costs $200,000 in infrastructure costs, but at the Fenner Conference last week the figure of $340,000 per person was used, based on the original CSIRO report by Barney Foran and Franzi Poldy. Governments may not have to cough up the lot, but some state governments (Qld, NSW) have recently fallen because they could not keep up with supplying infrastructure to a rapidly growing population.

And don't dismiss Paul Ehrlich. He didn't anticipate the Green Revolution so billions didn't die last century, but they may still might. Ian Dunlop at the Fenner Conference said a four degree warmer world (which is where we're headed) is a world on one billion people, not seven billion, let alone the projected nine or ten billion this century. I doubt it will be pretty going from seven to one billion

...and finally Malcolm...

Population is certainly one of the triumvirate of the three P's, the others being productivity and participation. But having more people doesn't help people if the spoils have to divided into ever-smaller portions. More people does not lead to higher GDP per capita. Right now we have unemployment heading for 6 per cent and underemployment of 700,000 plus about 150,000 who have simply given up trying to find work. Importing well over 300,000 people annually is only exacerbating this sad situation.

Ageing? Studies now suggest that extending the retirement age to 68 will solve any negative side of ageing. Expanding the population through increased birth rates or immigration only delays the inevitable.

Sandra Kanck, like Paul Ehrlich, may in the end be proved to be right when she says a one-child policy may be necessary. If indeed, the world can only sustain a billion people then we either wait for the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse or we do it humanely, by delaying child-bearing and by having much smaller families. The voluntarily childless will be the new heroes.

I've run out of room, but yes, a "no growth" economy - or a dynamic steady state economy - is exactly the way we have to go. We live in a finite world after all.

Our author either hasn't read or chooses to ignore The Future Eaters, by Australian of the Year Tim Flannery. Flannery is not and I'm not "anti-people" or a host of other evil things used as smears in this article. I'm just concerned about species loss, global warming and other grave environmental problems, and I can do basic arithmetic.

The Horror...the horror!

Orwell? The Spanish Inquisition? No...the Guillotine!

Behold the cutting of balls as a spectator sport.

And here is the Media Release:

http://riaus.org.au/wp-content/uploads/2013/10/131009-RiAus-World-Vasectomy-Day-Media-Release.pdf :

"On World Vasectomy Day, 17 men will PUT THEIR BALLS ON THE LINE to save the planet and they’ll do it in front of a live studio audience in association with national science communication organisation: RiAus."

"A diverse gathering of thought leaders will participate..."

Will Pilger's Truth Tellers triumph over the Thought Leaders - only Aldous Huxley knows. See his Brave New World of population control:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z776bAqWxyQ

Taking this seriously.

It takes two to make a baby. And babies can't look after themselves!
It's entirely irresponsible to have more than you can afford to feed, house, clothe and educate.
My partner and I stopped at two, with the assistance of surgery. To be sure to be sure, the only way to be sure?
That said, the natural birth rate in Australia, is below replacement. Conventional economic wisdom, would have us increase the migration numbers, so we have enough taxpayers to keep supporting us in our old age
The only effective way of limiting population growth in the third world, is to educate the masses, particularly, womenfolk!
Statistical evidence shows, as the educated female becomes a larger part of the demographic, birth rates invariably decline.
We, knowing this, have decided to assist this very outcome, by quite massively slashing our foreign aid budget.
I mean there were other choices, like getting on top of now massive tax avoidance. Avoidance that may be ripping as much as 100 billion or more PA, from the budget bottom line!?
Simple enough to fix!
All that's required is to jettison the system every boy and his dog can avoid in favour of one they can't! It's not rocket science and you don't have to be Einstein!
However, too timid by half pollies, may just have to lift their game or put the nation ahead of the usual cronies, to get it done? And if the cap fits?
Rhrosty.

Wow, Malcolm, I have rarely read so many empty words on a blank sheet of paper. A long time ago, when I matriculated, there was a topic called 'clear thinking'. You would have achieved a perfect F.

You are also a highly anthropocentric person obviously believing that humans are somehow superior to other forms of live. Well, they are not. Ultimately, we are all descended from the one bacterium, that first formed on the planet, or hitchhiked a ride onto the planet from elsewhere in the universe.

We are all dependent on each other for survival on this planet - the web of life. I vividly recall one of the David Attenborough series about 'Life in the Underground', where he concludes with with the words (an approx. quote): "...if humans disappear from the planet right now, not much will change, but it these little critters disappear the planet will become unrecognizable..." I would add, if humans disappear the planet may change for the better.

There are way too many people on the planet in proportion to anything else, everywhere: here in Australia, on every little island, in every little niche and corner, on the plains, the mountains, the cities - wherever there is land.

In my lifetime so far humans more than tripled. It would be wonderful if in the lifetime of my two very young grandchildren the human population would reduce to one third or one fourth of what it is now, namely around the one - two billion mark.

To achieve that we need population control, family planning, vasectomies and sterilizations via laparoscopy, after one or two children, and a myriad of other contraceptives. But more than that we need a cultural change, a change of mentality, a move away from humans' extraordinary arrogance that somehow they are superior.