Bazz And DP I disagree, first we are what we are, and we have not begun to truly consider population control.
The developed world is, but poorer nations increase population, just so kids can feed mum and dad.
While I live I grow, and learn, I have recently had to confront my views.
I do not think the planet, under our current systems, is ready for lowering population.
We will need to.
But to try right now? is to say this country is willing to stall its growth.
It takes people to consume and to produce.
We are growing, yes we have troubles, but are currently considering our population one of the most successful economy's.
WE do not have the workers to do all the jobs.
It is complex in this matter as in every thing every action has a reaction, some we can not yet see.
Bazz it has been what?120 years ? from the time oil drove the industrial revolution?
We are not at peak oil.
Not near it.
Both candidates for the Presidency in this USA race say north America will soon not need to import fuel.
Australia could tomorrow join that race, if we used the natural gas we near give away by exporting.
While developing new fuels, the power and influence of oil, is all that stalls that now.

Belly, you are an incurable optimist.
You said;
We are not at peak oil.

Sorry, but we are ! The IEA in their 2010 report said that the peak
occurred in 2006.
All those oil shale and shale gas wells are a new form of Ponzi scheme.
They require constant drilling and a constant flow of money.
They are simply not making money, hence Chesapeake's financial problems.
The wells have a lifetime of about 2 years and cost millions to drill.
>
Both candidates for the Presidency in this USA race say north America will soon not need to import fuel.
----
They are dreaming, it just won't happen, the shale oil production is
falling and the number of working oil rigs has more than halved.
It just isn't economic as they cannot produce oil at a price people
will pay.
The US is still importing 40% of their usage.

Gas, will be used to generate electricity and that will help but they
do not have the credit to convert their truck fleet and car fleet
and install the distribution system. They simply cannot afford it !

No, it is a dream that has a catch 22 built in.

With the worlds resources there is a finite supply for our use.
The more of us there are, the less there is for each of us.
We will like most developed countries attempt to keep our standard
of living, but it will be only possible by keeping the standard of others lower.

Pete you know, I don't think the planet really cares if it's iron oxide is still in a mountain in it's natural state, or is in a junk yard, rusting back into the ground, it is going to keep on circling the sun, regardless.

I don't even think it cares if people profit from digging up its resources, or leave them where they are.

In fact I don't believe it spends much time worrying about us, or even if we exist.

Why, if you dislike humanity so much, do you worry about it so much. The planet is not going to loose any sleep over us, perhaps you should not either.

Belly,

Take a trip to Europe and spend a few days in Prague. You might then begin to realise how vacuous the growth argument is. But at least consider the question of the infrastructure costs of population growth. Pop growth vampires would sooner scoff down knobs of garlic than confront this reality.

It is far from easy, trying to put threads of worth and ones that take us away from politics up.
I had hoped Ludwig would be the first to post, but maybe the very thought this is a many sided issue has turned him away.
Bazz, you are aware I respect you, but as Ludwig has been charged, by others, as being a one issue poster, I charge you.
Not with being one issue Ludwig is not either but you both want to have ONLY YOUR THOUGHTS on your pet issues spoken.
And Bazz YOU ARE WRONG.
Now my poster fester, gee bloke or bloket, you give me no reason to think you understand this complex issue.
I here have DEMANDED WE control the planets population.
Here in this thread said a day will/must come that it is done.
BUT consider what drives an economy.
Is it stagnation, or growth?
We can, by doing things better using better tools, increase productivity without extra workers.
Less jobs less consumers who do we sell to.
Australia can set out to be the world factory or food bowl.
IF we , and we will not, made it work, are we to increase the population to fill our roll?
Dreaming lefts minority see Morris Dancing happy folk in a dream land that is more likely a hell for most of us.
A stagnating population, in just a few country's not all, sidelines those country,s.
We can plant two even three trees for every one we harvest.
Clean river banks and build dams, we can send all storm water inland, and continue to grow our population-for a time.

Yes, I agree Belly, I am a one issue poster and there is a good reason for that.

Energy is the very basis of everything !
Without it nothing happens. As supply gets tight, before even a
shortage develops, the price rises and becomes a pressure on the
economy as its price pulls the surplus out the GDP.

Over the last 50 years every recession except one (the dot com) was
preceded by a spike in oil price. What has happened this time is
different because two years later in 2008 the GFC hit & US oil price
reached US$147 for Cushing Oklahoma.
The crude oil peak in 2006 has set a new parameter and its current
price Tapis $113, Brent $110 last I looked, is what is stopping Europe
from paying off its debts and the rest is history.

The cost of new oil is US$80 to $100 and that oil will become a higher
proportion of the mix as the old oil continues its decline.
That is why they say that we will never have cheap oil again.
At some point in the next few years the decline rate of the old oil
will overpower the rate of new oil and shortages will develope.

Alan Kohler wrote recently that the two methods economists use to get
economies going again is to stop spending and screw down government
OR to spend spend print print the way out of the problem, but
neither is working and no one knows why.

Well that is not true, as there are a few that understand why.
It is just that politicians find it unacceptable and economists are
dumbstruck at the thought.

To get back closer to the point, we have no option but to live within
our means and that means sustainability and the steady state economy.
ie, no growth and hopefully no contraction.