The cause of most problems is the "Mania of Growth" !

Hello Patrick, since it is TRUE that "corporation already own most of the USA"., are you saying
that NOTHING can be done about this ??? How is this possible in the "Land of the FREE and brave Americans" ?
By what method did these crooks running corporations enslave these brave americans, including you, so that
you have to be " Slaving away to survive....." ??? C'mon Patrick, be brave and WAKE up most of your slaving
American friends, and start working towards a trully American , JUST , FAIR and WISE society , which could
last for many generations to come. Dan K.

You are mistaken when you connect the word 'American' with Justice, Fairness and Wisdom.

Those qualities belong to PEOPLE, and not to States, Organised Religions or Ideologies.

Only when we re-orgainise our lives around people, will we ever hope to resolve the issues created by the existence of States, Corporations and Religions.

I think you're absolutely correct. Uncontrolled population growth is insane and is only possible because we control our own food supply. So unless we are willing to limit our food production, reproductive restrictions are an inescapable reality.
On a related issue, I think its a mistake to send food to the starving. Heartless as it sounds. It is a law of nature that populations expand to meet their food supplies. So when a species' population exceeds it's available food it declines to maintain balance in the ecosystem. Therefore artificially introducing food to a declining population causes it to expand further, which exacerbates the poverty for the next generation as the ecosystem's food supply remains the same. So sending nonrenewable food to impoverished regions serves to expand the starving populations and ultimately make far worse the problem the food was meant to alleviate.
Our current attitude towards population growth is so shortsighted. If we fail to address these issues nature will balance our population for us. I wish she would be indiscriminate in her wrath, but I have a feeling it will be those who had the least chance, did the least damage, and are already hurting the most who will be hit the hardest. I think we have a moral responsibility to take a very serious look at this problem.

Hello ninjaplease,
It is encouraging that you have contributed to this very urgent topic. However, I would like to continue
our exchange of views - first by quoting a part of your statement. Here it is:
"So sending nonrenewable food to impoverished regions serves to expand the starving populations and ultimately make far worse the problem the food was meant to alleviate."
Again, I am in complete agreement that sending "our" food to others is actually very stupid and
harmful. But, we need to address WHY people in various regions of "undeveloped" world are not able
to produce their own food, and why are they having five or more children per woman - when they are
already starving !!! In my view, this is because the LAND of these countries has been "confiscated" by
various local crooks, supported by outside money "investors", who are only interested in so called
"export crops", like coffee, cotton, tropical fruit and other comodities on which the "investors" ( and
local crooks !) can make huge profits !! In the meantime, the uneducated, starving masses are used
either as extrmely cheep labourers or as fighters beween various tribal or ethnig groups. Again, they
are fighting NOT for their own emancipation, but for some idiotic religious, racial or other "differences",
which have been implanted into their minds by these above mentioned MONEY crooks.
So, let us come to the main topic - ALL GROWTH is BAD at this time, and especially the growth of
those WELL TO DO groups at the top of 'THE FOOD CHAIN", ie. the vultures of the MONETARY proffit.
Instead of GROWING EXPONENTIALLY even in terms of the monetary "wealth", we must reorient to
THE STEADY STATE ECONOMY, based on LOCAL sustainable and environmentally friendly production of
goods at the level of CARRYING CAPACITY of each region where people live.
This much for now, and let's hear more from the thinking and good people. Dankusti

Hey Dan and Ninja,
I think it's dangerous to invoke Malthusian population dynamics as a justification for policy. The problem isn't population growth, it's the centralization of agricultural, political and economic power that is propelled by profit incentives over rational management of resources and humanitarian concerns. The world we live in is not an inevitable consequence of Adam Smith-like impersonal market dynamics, it is (like you imply in your post Dan) the direct result of policies designed to redirect wealth and resources into the hands of a corporate minority. The U.S. empire isn't a free-market any more than it's a democracy.
I'm not sure what you mean by a steady state economy, but I think I agree with what you are saying about local sustainability.
One way to look at it would be to say that we need to decentralize power so we can have a political ecology of experimentation and evolution of various state/city political systems to develop viable policies for sustaining growth. Blind hegemony, a global adherence to a US dictated policy, no matter how well thought out or intentioned, is doomed to fail. Look at natural ecosystems (while we still can)...in order to have evolution and stability you have to have a diverse ecology.
If we can maintain a system where different policies and political systems can thrive or die out, then people won't have to. Ideas can compete and die out in our stead. We can apply Darwinian laws to conceptual systems, so biological systems (us) can benefit from the results without having to starve or fight wars as part of a Malthusian struggle for survival.
There is enough scientific knowledge on this planet right now that, if applied rationally, we could all live peaceful, prosperous lives with a much larger population. The problem, in my opinion, is greed and ignorance that inflicts suffering and creates resource shortages, not overpopulation or growth in general.
Hope this made sense.
peace,
-s

Hello Del Arte ,
Your contribution to this discussion is interesting, but I would like to point out to some "flaws" in
your perception of the present World crysis. First, it stands for the "confrontational" concept of the
struggle between the "corporate minority" and "the exploited poor" . You are also dismissing the
validity of Malthusian concepts simply by blaming all World problems to this struggle. However,
when you suggest that we "....Look at natural ecosystems ( while we still can )...", and also say that
we "....have to have a diverse ecology.", you are overlooking the fact that for a given finite biosphere,
i.e. the Earth, a healthy ecology requires also a FINITE number of ANY component of that biospheric
environment , INCLUDING the human population !
Then you are calling for "....enough scientific knowledge..." to enable us to live a "...peaceful,
prosperous lives with a much larger population". ( !!!??? - my reaction to this ! ). Aren't you aware
of what is happening to overcrowded regions , like Rwanda and Bangladesh and many other regions
across the Globe - where the excessive human densities have completely destroyed the diversity of
their natural ecosystems, and caused suffering of the overcrowded human beings !
So, instead of concentrating our efforts to correct the present LUNATIC situation across our
small and extremely overused planet Earth - by pointing to the UNJUST distribution of wealth -
we need to be educated to realize that "biological systems" do NOT consist only of human beings,
but of the wonderfull WEB of life of many diverse species, from minute microbes to polar bears,
whales, giant pandas, tigers and the whole spectrum of our Earth's biosphere. Only then we might
start replacing our human greed ( reflected not only through "love of money" - but also through
mindless propagation beyong the REPLACEMENT level of birth rate ! ) with understanding of the
concept and goal of the Steady State Economy. ( all who would like to find out more about this
reasonably new concept - write these three words into your search engine and "click" on search ).
The SSE is stating that in order for humans to live within a HEALTHY biosphere - they have
to understand that humans are ONLY one member of the wonderful environment, and as such, are
NOT to expand IN ANY WAY, but to live withing it in harmony with all other components of it.
The formula IMPACT (negative) = PxAxT is a mathematical expression of this, meaning that
the negative impact of humans on environment consist of THREE factors, i.e. Population ( beyond
the carrying capacity of the region ), Affluence - reflected in GREEDY pursuit of wealth - and
Technology - or misuse of it to satisfy our STUPID pursuit of only human needs !
This much for now, and please try to understand that we are ALL together the passengers
on this wonderful but FINITE planet Earth, and that we all must work together to REPLACE our
warped sence of self importance with the wisdom of sharing our existence not only with other HUMAN
beings , but with other members of this amazingly complex BIOSPHERE. Dan Kustudich

Thanks for the reply--I think I agree with you more than you suspect. I'm out of my field, here, and am obviously going to say some things that are ill-informed or incorrect, but for the sake of debate I'd like to offer a few responses.
As for population, the real explosions and resource shortages occur more in developing than developed countries, where large families are, at the individual level, economically beneficial. Essentially this is the same ethical problem I see with the U.S. or Europe dictating global environmental policy, where post-industrial nations that have already benefited from irresponsible exploitation of their resources dictate that others shouldn't be allowed to do the same now that we realize the impact. Also, what about the large numbers of those who don't practice birth control for religious reasons? Since populations tend to stabalize with healthy economies, it seems like the end goal of a sustainable population would best be achieved by eliminating the conditions of poverty that make population growth so rampant. This is opposed to Malthusian theory, which as I understand it states that populations regulate themselves by inevitable cycles of over-reproduction and famine.
Maybe my statement about science as a possible panacea was overstated, but let me make an alternative statement--if the U.S. spent half of its nearly half a trillion dollar defense budget on developing alternative energies, low-impact housing, green-house gas reducing technologies, etc., this would provide more viable solutions to the global ecological crisis than trying to dictate foreign policy about population control while bombarding developing nations with uranium-soaked weapons.
As much as I hate to say it, it was science that got us into the current and impending state of environmental disaster, but things have progressed to the point where more technological development, not less, is the only thing that can save us.
My last point: if we make a distinction between an industrial economy and an information economy, is there anything intrinsically wrong with unlimited expansion of the latter? I'm having utopian visions of everyone giving up their urban-sprawl commute-to work and shop at Wall-mart lifestyle to live in dense low-impact highrises surrounded by communal parks (solar powered hovercars, perhaps?) generating endless steady-state wealth by buying and selling fiction, artwork, and computer games on their wind-mill powered laptops, living off organic farms. If only people could be taught that the best consumption is invisible, where it isn't a zero-sum game and the only way to become rich is by keeping someone else in poverty.
Last, last point. I lived for two years in Romania, one of the poorest countries in Eastern Europe. Their problems weren't because of over-population, but rather the mismanagement of a power-hungry dictator followed by mismanagement by exploitative capitalism.
Conclusion: the earth needs to be saved, along with as much of the biosphere as possible, but not by denying developing nations their chance at wealth and expanding economies, but by providing alternative means of achieving them. Technologize the world to keep it natural.
Peace, -d

Yeah, I think we're all on the same page more or less. Diversity is key. I think we all would agree that, ethically permissible or not, our planet will not survive the population explosion associated with the developing nations realizing their post-industrial goal. At least not if they do what we did.
I think the accuracy of Malthusian population predictions is kind of irrelevant. As far as I'm concerned the trend is clear. Also I think continued increase in human population mandates decline in other species because we all basically compete for the same resources. While this is definitely oversimplified, I would argue that further increase in human population is counter to diversity.
The tech fix sounds good, but there are such huge market barriers in place that prevent a transition to renewable energy and sustainable living. I worry that if we wait for those with a vested interest in maintaining the status quo, those with the money and control, to come around it will be too late.
Thus I subscribe heavily to the idea of sustainable local economies. We need a consciousness shift and a powerful grassroots movement. I think we need to fix ourselves, force our big businesses into a more altruistic stance and provide a model for developing nations. Don't forget that we vote everyday with our dollars.
Once we have all our ducks in order I would like to see our government offer technology and incentives for developing countries to grow up with a sustainable economy/society. These problems wouldn't seem so insurmountable if we weren't on this 30 year time frame before global warming becomes a self sustaining phenomenon.
Also Dan, it makes me sick when I think about the nations with the most natural resources being calculatedly kept in poverty and civil war by our international corporations. My answer to this is to be informed and vote with my money. A slow way to make change I know, but I can only do what I can do.

Right on.
Malthus was one of the main influences on Darwin, and I think Darwinian laws would also imply that unchecked reproduction of one species means extinction of others. Biological evolution is definitely too slow to solve our problems, and its also predicated on massive death to eliminate the unfit and select beneficial mutations from random genetic drift--not a good model. Cultural evolution and technological evolution are the only viable means to cope with economic, imperial, and military-industrial expansion before it turns the planet into a gigantic shopping mall/battlefield/desert wasteland. We need a heterogeneous intellectual climate to foster innovation, with strong governmental incentives.
In my view we also need new legislation so products on the market reflect more their REAL cost, in terms of depletion of shared resources and damage to the environment and health of future generations. We should decrease consumption while decentralizing wealth and political power--restricting the scope of national governments to protecting our resources, not subsidizing multinational companies that squander them, and starting wars that distract people from whats really going on and terrify them into submission.

I'm really intrigued by the idea of the real costs of capitalism, or truly of any economic system. If it were possible to force the costs of depletion and environmental damage onto the offending companies now, rather than a decade from now, I think we would see a very different average business model. Many of the most polluting industries would suddenly not be so profitable.
Really an amazing idea, I'm just not sure how to implement it. I am wary of awarding the government more control, either over the economy or over my life. The last thing we need is a Green Patriot Act.
I think it would be ideal if a powerful company, such as Google, decided to champion the pressing global humanitarian issues. Google, with its dominance of information distribution, could effectively shame other corporations into compliance. I want to see this movement come from the people and the private sector, not through inefficient generalized mandates and new wasteful bureaucracy's.

Hello ninja,
First, I have received your e-mail to me giving me your info. As a part of this forum, I'll use your The R.N. name. In your last reply you stated:
"I am wary of awarding the government more control, either over the economy or over my life. The last thing we need is a Green Patriot Act."
Well, this is the feeling of most people who grew up within the so
called "Free enterprize" system. The less "control" the govrmnt has, the
"more freedom" skilled and shrewed "enterpreneurs" have to accomplish
their own "personal" goals. This is a classical dilema of the importance of
individual versus society. However, as we have witnessed during the past
half a century, and especially during the past decade, these shrewed masters of investments have taken a COMPLETE control of our lives, MORE
than what I have experienced during my education period in early 1950-ties, under the government of Tito's Yugoslavia ! They completely control
the MEDIA, monetary system, ( banks ) and even our "protection" , i.e. the
military establishement. How much more CONTROL are you affraid to have imposed on you from ANY other social arrangement ???
So, "Democracy" is a nice concept, AS LONG AS these srewed crooks
at the top of finances of the nation do not lead us by the nose - and skillfully transfer your sweat and labout into their monetary profit. So, dear ninjaplease, and other inteligent, brave and freethinking Americans , do not
be BLINDED by years of mind-numbing propaganda inposed on the whole
World by these monetary crooks, and start figuring our how to wressle control from their hand into the hands of those who DESERVE it the most,
hard working citizens of USA, and many other countries
Best regard to all , Dan K.

Going off your idea about the political power of consumer behavior (think of civil rights advances made by boycotting) here's a kind of techno-utopian idea about how we could start to hold corporations responsible for ethical violations of human rights and sane environmental policy:
Set up some kind of open source, completely transparent program for establishing a database to record and evaluate companies, along with their often invisible umbrella corporations and money trails. Groups similar to amnesty international could give them ratings based on established criteria for sustainability, ecological footprint, use of sweatshops, etc.
Say you had something like a bar-code scanner with an internet connection hooked up to the database. You could have instantaneous point-of-sale info on any vendor or product, delivered to your cellphone. The software could be personalized to give you information on whatever issues/violations you felt were the most important in your decisions.
I've daydreamed frequently about ways to design a "transparent epistemology" database, kind of like a propaganda-filter, where media sources, journals, etc. could be evaluated by "knowledge communities" made up of users themselves, with complete oversight, completely non-profit. Say you hear an item on the news, you could run it through the program and see what media outlets covered it, cross-reference this with reliability indicators (again, this could be customized for the users), and a percent probability that it was skewed or biased could be generated.
I think google, or any non open-source vendor would be a mistake if we are going to entrust them with the way we think or know about the world. I know this system may seem sterile or techno-philic, but think about it, multi-nationals have or soon will have the ability to track, collect and collate data about every aspect of our lives, especially with Cell phone records fair game for the Patriot act, and potential requirements like RFIDs in drivers licenses. We need to turn this technology back against its makers, hold them accountable with the same methods they use to control us. After all, the internet was developed initially for the military, and its turned out to be a pretty powerful tool for democracy.
The advantage of open-source, and the one real cause for hope we have, in my opinion, is that systems that use deception are ultimately inefficient in information processing. Slaves have to be kept stupid enough to not realize their condition. People who believe truth is possible will work harder, and speak more clearly, in the fight to obtain it. We just have to want intellectual freedom more than they want to profit from our ignorance.
Kind of out there, but whatever, that's what the internet is for, right?

That's a very important step, to make clear the real costs, across the spectrum, of current processes as use by our culture, to generate 'profit'.

By polarising profit as monetary wealth, all other areas of benefit/cost have been occlouded.

I like to redefine profit as that product, which is crafted through human activities, which available to be shared by any given community, and that definition of community includes the environment people live in.

With regards to profit, I take it a little further, and assume that if for example you and I worked together we would split the value of what we craft, equally or by consensus..... the idea that I might work for someone, and be paid a small amount of the actual product, whilst those that 'employ' me pay themselves upto 500 times what i am paid is repugnant to me - we are equals.

One of the things I note about nature (and we are part of nature) is that each life form receives enough to thrive on as they are (without having to change what they are), and any excess is returned to the system, thus allowing diversity in terms of making resources above and beyond the real needs of any given organism available to all other organisisms.


Another question that I have asked myself is why should farmers have to work so hard because they get a mere 10% of store cost (about average), and for the most part be unable to devote enough time and labor to grow their own food? That seems strange to me. I grew up on a farm in ireland and we had a garden, and that and the farm (dairy,meat, chickens etc) produced about 80% of our food, instead of having to get money to go to a shop and buy the food, as is co common these days.

It is true that people who grow their own food, using organic methods, are healthier and safer than those who do not - healthier because their food supply is pretty stable (though they might not be able to have orange juice or bannas -exotics not grown in their area), and safer because they are not so dependent upon others for their food.

Cuba is one country that has made huge changes in this area over the past 20 years, and now most Cuban people grow some food. Havana produces about 60 - 80% of it's food requirements within the city limits. It has also led to a resurgence of community spirit, as people have been echanging food ( real value) and gardening information (again real value) with each other. If an exchange has real value (as opposed to monetary value) that exchange can be said to be humanised rather than sytemised.

Of course, to do the same in our cities would be a huge problem, though less of a problem of feeding a city of people who had no food growing. And if we're not careful, large sections of our population will find it ever more difficult to access food, as food prices are rising world wide, in line with oil prices. Cuba shows that it can be done, and are now well into a generation of people who have never had pesticides in their foods......well cool!

This is a very interesting discussion running here, but I'd like to bring a few other ideas to the table. There is some discussion about the role of corporate entities/capitalism in the creation of the current population problem. What I find interesting is that the highest birth rates are in the countries where the public as a whole lives in pre-industrial conditions but has some limited access to modern medicine and modern technology. If you look at the evolution of the developed countries, they too had large population booms, in a period of time between the start of the agricultural and then industrial revolutions (17th, 18th centuries) through to the maturation of the capitalist systems in the late 19th century. Why is this? I think it is because in pre-industrial societies, children are an economic advantage--they can work the field, they can take care of aging parents. But once you have an industrial society, and welfare state mechanisms like old-age pensions, the need for a large number of children goes away. The population booms in Western societies happened as a result of the lag between the arrival of the new reality and the realization among people that they don't need a dozen kids anymore. So I would say that the solution to the overpopulation problem is to get the Third World countries out of their limbo between pre-industrial and industrial societies, so that the people in these countries make the voluntary decision to stop having so many children. I think this would be a more humane way of solving the problem than simply leaving it to the brutal logic of Malthusian population theory (i.e., leaving it to the wars and famines that will inevitably come with overpopulation). We should, of course, always strive to make economic growth sustainable, and in the long run we should be looking at ways to get out of the trap of growth-motivated economics, but I think in the short term the best way to stop overpopulation is to bring the existing population to a standard of living where they don't want to have so many kids.

Hello DelArte, Cornellius and DanielT,
All your contribution to various ways of stopping and reversing the present mindless exploitation of people and environment by the "profiteering gangs" are very interesting and encouraging ! DelArte has
suggested the following method to "wrestle the means of information" from the hands of the LIQUIDATING
class into the hands of "enlightened" class - so that a long term Steady State Economy could be reached.
This is what DelArte suggested:
"We need to turn this technology back against its makers, hold them accountable with the same methods they use to control us. After all, the internet was developed initially for the military, and its turned out to be a pretty powerful tool for democracy.
The advantage of open-source, and the one real cause for hope we have, in my opinion, is that systems that use deception are ultimately inefficient in information processing. Slaves have to be kept stupid enough to not realize their condition. "
And Corneillius has asked: "Another question that I have asked myself is why should farmers have to work so hard because they get a mere 10% of store cost (about average), and for the most part be unable to devote enough time and labor to grow their own food? "
Well, finding the best way out of the present World unjust, cruel and UNsustainable MISmanagement by
greedy corporate gangs is NOT going to be an easy task. However, just the fact that so many of brave and
intelligent citizens of US and other countries across the Globe are realizing the need for this change - is of
extreme importance and very encouraging. Some of you mentioned the "paradigm shift" in the way people
perceive the World troubles - towards realizing that we are ALL responcible - not only for our own small
"clubs" but for the task of SAVING the remaining components of the Earth's Biosphere from further
destruction and degradation. Keep up the good work - on becoming the true warriors for the future
World of JUSTICE, WISDOM, FRIENDSHIP and SHARING the Earth's environment. Dan K.

Hi Daniel, your suggestion to the solution of excessive birth rate in "pre-industrial" regions is interesting.
However, there might be a "slight" problem in accomplishing this. You say:
"So I would say that the solution to the overpopulation problem is to get the Third World countries out of their limbo between pre-industrial and industrial societies, so that the people in these countries make the voluntary decision to stop having so many children. " The problem with this solution is that the "corporate world", i.e.
those who thrive by exploiting these starving, high birth rate, people - are doing absolutely everything to PREVENT this kind of transformation of "undeveloped" into an industrial society. So, your method would work ONLY if through an international agreement ( by a much more empowered UN ) - the corporate crooks would
be prevented from their evil , behind the scene , profiteering machinations. Freedan28

See satire on FCC and corporate media handover from my page.

Hi all,

This is my first post on TRNJ! I haven't read all of the above thread, but I thought I'd share a very relevant, and well-done, educational 'video'. It explains how the current, hyperconsumerism-promoting infrastructure, will never be green or ethical.

Here's the link: http://www.storyofstuff.com/

You don't need to accept cookies or anything sketchy.

In solidarity,

Ryan

That is a great video that everyone should watch.

>> "So I would say that the solution to the overpopulation problem is to get the Third World countries out of their limbo between pre-industrial and industrial societies, so that the people in these countries make the voluntary decision to stop having so many children."

>The problem with this solution is that the "corporate world", i.e.those who thrive by exploiting these starving, high birth rate, people - are doing absolutely everything to PREVENT this kind of transformation of "undeveloped" into an industrial society.

Dan, before I entertain to dissuade you from your theses, I must ask you how you come to the above notion. I have seen no evidence that the corporate elite is actually 'trying' to keep the underdeveloped world in it's condition. Indeed, I could not fathom how they could do so even if they would want to. As for wanting to, poor consumers cannot buy anywhere near as much of their products as can rich consumers. Henry Ford for instance often credited his own success on paying his own workers a wage sufficient for them to buy one of his cars.