Ahoy me hearties. Now don’t ye be tinkin’ dat da scurvy dog is after da gold booty.

Arrrrr……tis da pillaging and plunderin’ of U238 from da Davy Jones’ locker dat Master ‘Arlot’s after. Aye.... 4.5 billion tons of da green stuff in dat der seawater!

Avast me scallywags – away wit ‘is peg leg and crocheted eyepatch! It’ll be a good floggin’ for dis lilly-livered mutineer!

Clownfish, firstly, it's Wikipaedia. There are very good reasons that it's not academically accepted as a source.

Take a look at the references. The numerical data comes from the UN and governmental departments, but the analysis is overwhelmingly taken from conservative journals and think-tanks. Do you believe, even for a second, that teams of industry media managers aren't hovering over that page to ensure it gets history "right"?

The events you describe as "a perfect storm" were both predicted and unsurprising. And keep in mind that many of the "analysts" were the same people who failed spectacularly in warning us of the impending credit implosion. In particular, the World Bank (which receives 3 citations in the article) is anything but reliable or disinterested.

And - good lord! - did you read the section titled "Crop shortfalls from natural disasters"? Drought, cyclones, floods, heat waves, aridity-related crop blights, "consistent with the predicted effects of climate change." The "unseasonable droughts in grain-producing nations" are becoming the regular seasons. I know you think climate change is a furphy, but here you are, staring it in the face and claiming it's a one-off event!

I don't imagine I'm going to convince you (and I agree that biofuels are a crock), but the food crisis was the shape of things to come, not an aberration. You'll see when we get there.

On another note, why are you and other growthists unable to argue the point without descending into accusations of sadism and genocide (mil-observer is excused because he's a cultist and knows no better)? That sort of integrated ad hominem suggests a lack of belief in your own argument. I know you think it sounds triumphal and confident, but it actually comes across as the sort of defensive, clench-jawed assurance people affect when they're deliberately ignoring evidence that makes them uncomfortable.

"Ad-hominem", along with "Straw-man", the favourite adjectives of precious princesses who fondly imagine that they assume some sort of moral high ground by wearing the persona of a prissily wounded maiden aunt whenever someone rhetorically kicks their head. My favourite example was Bronwyn Bishop's faux-outrage when Gareth Evans (rather sensibly, if you ask me) threatened to cross the chamber and garotte her.

"Predicted and unsurprising" - did you read the Peter Cook quote? If tw@ts like Lester Brown dribble on long enough, every now and then a short-term fluctuation will happen along, and they can pretend that they were right all along. It's the same tactic used by sham psychics: Make a big enough screech about the one time you accidentally guess the right answer, and your adoring acolytes will conveniently ignore the 99 times you were wrong.

And, of course, it was almost tiresomely predictable that some alarmist idiot would blame it all on climate change.

"Well, whenever you notice something like that, a wizard did it. Wizard!" - Lucy Lawless, the Simpsons.

Climate Change has become the Wizard of alarmists. Temperatures rise? Climate Change! Temperatures fall? Climate Change! Ice sheets melt, ice sheets grow, droughts, floods, rainbows, rain on your wedding day, that slight cough you had last week, the time you missed the bus and were late for work? Climate change! It's all Climate Change's fault!

Simple, obvious and wrong.

"They knew that when the rains came, it was a sign.
When the rains departed, it was a sign.
When the winds rose, it was a sign.
When the winds fell, it was a sign.
When in the land there was born at midnight of a full moon a goat with three heads, that was a sign.
When in the land there was born at some time in the afternoon a perfectly normal cat or pig with no birth complications at all, or even just a child with a retrousse nose, that too would often be taken as a sign." - Douglas Adams, Life, the Universe and Everything

Clownfish, your first post had the semblance of an argument, but now all you have is abuse. I didn't think the well would run dry so quickly.

You seemed rational and sensibly critical when you first began posting here and to The Australian's letters blog, but it seems you're now happy just to fade into the reactionary white noise that can be heard in the background of a real debate.

Calling me names won't improve the quality of your argument, and neither will being an unthinking mouthpiece for industry and fundamentalist religion. Good luck nonetheless.

Peace, brother.

Considering all the doomists who contribute to these sites, there seems to be a coming together of views of anti-immigration racists, old-fashioned eugenicists, anti-(other people's)-population, infanticide of other people's children, cave-and-kelp environmentalists, and I suspect, euthanasia advocates. Amazingly, some of them think they are on the Left. Mind-boggling.

For what it's worth, I'm happy with:
* reduction of greenhouse gas emissions to ecologically sustainable levels;
* with sustainable living, along with sustainable development and use of resources;
* with increased immigration, particularly from the 'Third World', we need this for increased inter-marriage which is so obviously necessary to invigorate our Anglo population;
* with the decriminalisation of suicide and the current penalties for murder (i.e. euthanasia and infanticide);
* and for far greater funding of women's education around the world, since lower fertility eventually correlates with women's educational levels.

There was a time when Africa made up a third of the world's population, and I hope that, with present levels of fertility, they will soon re-acquire that population share. So I am also quite comfortable with:

* the current rate of growth in the African population, provided it is paired with massive infrastructural, educational and economic development, (particularly to take the burdens off women) and
* increased migration from Asia and Africa to Europe, the US and Australia,

in order to rejuvenate our populations, and move us away from tired old racist and anti-modernist policies which seek either to take us back to Menzies' fifties, or further back to a Medieval Golden Age - or even further back to a tribal Golden Age of hunting and gathering.

Hopefully, this will set a few cats of reality amongst the Utopian pigeons.

Ah ! I get it ! The anti-immigration and anti-population stance is a cover for your dread that your great-grandchildren will be coffee-coloured ! Is that it ?

Joe

Loudmouth comments "Hopefully, this will set a few cats of reality amongst the Utopian pigeons.

Ah ! I get it ! The anti-immigration and anti-population stance is a cover for your dread that your great-grandchildren will be coffee-coloured ! Is that it ?"

In the first place, what's wrong with wanting Utopia? Do you have some problem with us wanting to leave the world a better place for our children?

And, in the second place, accusations of racism don't change the facts ( http://sustainablesalmonarm.ning.com/profiles/blogs/accusations-of-racism-dont ) It's too bad that you have no better argument to support your opinions. You seem to harbour bigotry toward those who have reasonable arguments to support their own opinions. Sad.