Sheila got a stiff response from me because she, like many other contributors, assume that everyone else must make the sacrifice of limiting population, not her. And it is now a matter of record that many people could even take offense at the suggestion that she should start with herself.

The attempts to dismiss issues of national obligation as some sort of "yellow peril" scare are ill-informed. Countries no longer need to invade with cannon fodder, they simply crank up their economies, manipulate their trade balances and exchange rates, and then just buy the joint. Nations are still dependent on "fodder", but these days it is "tax fodder" and fought with "economic muscle".

And for all the talk about technology and innovation compensating for a stable population, it is well to remember that the major part of every nations GDP is income from personal exertion. And as the Chinese are now demonstrating, remove the constraints on the personal exertions of ordinary people and the number of people engaging in personal exertions becomes, and remains, the primary driver of economic mass.

Sheila,

I got the strong impression from the language used in your article, and some of the general themes that came across, that you apply a double meaning to the word "energy."

Your choice of words, for example:

- "Life (your capitals,) is the only force that can reorder spent energy."

- "our fellow travelers on this planet"

General themes:

* a focus on humans and human society, particularly modern society and modern inventions, as being unnatural and inherently harmful;

- "the more of them and the fewer of us, the better for the planet."

* and a romanticisation of pre-human and pre-industrial life;

- "In their place man-made things simplify what existed before,"

- “mysterious forests”

- "replacing the awe-inspiring herds and flocks of yore,"

etc.

What comes across is a strong New Age/pagan/spiritual ethos. Adherents to such ideas often co-opt scientific terms to explain their own beliefs, mistakenly seeing "parallels" and "connections" as one and the same. Most commonly, physical “energy” is equated with spiritual “energy.” (I am quite surprised that no-one else has bothered to raise this subject.) I do not wish to pry into your personal beliefs, (I may be completely mistaken,) and I do not dispute your understanding of the Laws of Thermodynamics. However, I think you should clarify whether, when you say "that Life is the only force that can reorder spent energy," that (a) you mean "Life," “force,” and "energy" in the purely physical sense, or (b) whether you attach a spiritual, supernatural or otherwise "cosmic," (in the New Age sense,) meaning to such terms. ((c)You may also try to argue that they are one and the same, with which I would also disagree.)

If (a), I stand corrected. If (b) or (c), I stand by my "faff" comment.

Either way, the suggestion that I am confronted by a woman who discusses thermodynamics is silly. Are you upset that I disagreed with you and refused to kiss your ass? If you engage my arguments, rather than pick out one word I used at the end of my post, I might show more respect.

CJ,

Perseus, although slightly rude, simply suggested that one person should practice what they preach. Catastrophist clearly articulated his desire to see billions of humans die. What is worse? Frankness to the point of rudeness, or misanthropy? You suggest that Catastrophist was being silly. Can you not also see the humour in Perseus’ comments? I stand corrected. You don’t hate yourself. You just have misplaced priorities.

Divergence, CJ, and others

If it would take three Earths to give everyone a Western European standard of living, then why not reduce our consumption by two thirds? Efficiency IS the key. How is capitalism compatible with dumping grain into the sea, or groceries out the back of the supermarket, or buying crap from China that we don’t need and will break after the second use? How does this add to our standard of living? To me, advertising, which generally tries to convince people of things which are patently untrue in order to get them to buy things they don’t need, seems to have more in common with Communism than capitalism. I think it is quite possible to reduce our consumption by 2 thirds and maintain our standard of living. And capitalism and industrial society, especially as cleaner forms of energy become more common, will get on just fine.

If you don’t agree, which one of you is going to go and tell black people to stop having babies?

Dagget,

I am with you on the colonization of space. However, I often find it amusing that a return to a hunter-gatherer society is most commonly advocated by those least likely to survive in such an environment.

"If one regional power looked like it was going to invade and grab Australia's resources for itself, what would the other(s) be likely to do?" How about you ask the Iraqi's how they feel about this question. In all seriousness though, if we become an outpost rich in resources someone is likely to want to control us to their own benefit. We do not have the military reach that we used to and are thus reliant on beign superpowers to act as umbrella (although the beign part I think will depend on your point of view).

Evolution, the world hasnt been in balance for 4.6b years. It has a habit of swinging from one extreme to the other. Balance suggests things are pretty stable, and I guess from the point of view of a human life span, then that's true. I think the idea here is that humans are potentially clever enough to expand our means of living at a rate that allows us to increase population - ie we can become more efficient. The tricky bit is working out what rate this is. We just dont know what technological advances are around the corner.

"If you don’t agree, which one of you is going to go and tell black people to stop having babies?"

Dozer, if you check it out, you'll find that its sex that people
want to have, not all those babies. Fact is that many women in
the third world can't afford contraception, family planning etc
and the dear old Western Catholic Church is doing its utmost
to stop them them being available in Africa and elsewhere. If I had my
way, the pope would be charged with environmental degradation,
but thats another story.

Kanga,
Interesting article.

Since you are responding to comments. There are a couple of areas I’d like you to expand on:
1) There seems to be an assumption in your treatise that
-egalitarianism facilitates optimum environmental management -
Am I misreading you?

2) Re “We humans have to share the land we already have more equally with each-other”
What measure determines what is ‘more equally‘
Is land to be (re)apportioned according to population ?

3) Re “The Anglo-Celtic system …is worse than most”
What are your grounds for this conclusion -and what EXISTING systems do you judge to be better?