Let's talk about Overpopulation

[Orion]

Land increases arent that simple. For the world to keep up, it'd have to spew all of the innards out. Besides, natural land erosian cancels out land from volanic eruptions in the oceans. It takes awhile for islands to form enough to hold life. That's an overal process that's being occur for eons. You have to remember, if there was a nuclear winter, the earth would have no life for thousands of years. But then the rivers would run clean again and critters would run about, this planet as millions of years left in it. It can afford to waste several thousand to get rid of an infection. Humanity's actual civilizations are only something like seven thousand years old. Our recorded history is just a speck on Earth's timeline, How we use it depends on how big of a speck we are.

[Starwitch]

Rythe, your post made my mind go gobbly-goo. Too much science for a simple girl like me.

[JBRaven]

Like Orion said that takes time. Telomere erosion is a problem we can't do much about, but over population is thus it is more of a problem.

[Enki]

Actually, it depends what part of the world your talking about. There is underpopulation in many parts of Europe and in Japan. The US population growth (not counting immigration) is slowing rapidly. Its really only in developing countries that there is the population problem, such as India.

But as these societies advance technologically and the standard of living rises through increased trade and by immigrants sending money home to their families, they will follow the same trend as the first world nations and their birth rates will drop.

So I don't really think it is a problem long term and will take care of itself without anyone imposing controls on having children.

[WolfWitch]

First off, Lulu, That is a very mature attitude that you have taken in regards to adoption and children. I wish more people today would be willing to make such a personal sacrafice as to only adopt. Kudos and applause.

On to the topic at hand.

I don't think that the Natural disasters are Natures way of dealing with us. I think that's just her doing what she's always done to make and mold the earth. It's just there's enough of us now that we're in her way.

We've upset the balance. "Natural selection" and "Survival of the fittest" don't apply to us anymore. We live longer and even view our children, in some cases, as an unwanted surpluss. To put it in a Nature terms, "Our herd isn't being thinned anymore."

This scares me.

Nature always corrects imbalances, ALWAYS! We're getting caught in natural disasters because we're getting in her way. What happens when she decides to "right the scales"?

A lot of people don't think it's going to happen. This, I think is arrogant pride. How's the old saying go about pride before the fall? We aren't so evolved that this planet and the universe in general can't humble us. I pray we as a species survive it when it happens.

Blessed Be.

WW.

[Sercee]

You have to remember, if there was a nuclear winter, the earth would have no life for thousands of years

Actually, according to David Suzuki, we're already in a nuclear winter. I'll have to find that article again, it was really interesting.

I think you're all pretty much right. Yes, the world constantly creates and destroys land. The problem, I think, lies in the fact that we as a species expect permanancy. We have built cities in beautiful places... directly in say, the hurricane belt. Or on the deltas of a major river. Look at New Orleans. The whole area used to change as sediments were washed in and out by the mississippi. Then we built walls around it to hold back the water. Now the region constantly loses STAGGERING amounts of land every year because there is no way to replenish it. Then Hurricane Katrina comes along. New Orleans was meant to be a pirate cove, not a major metropolis but we stubbornly hang on.

I think my point is that we fight nature directly head on most of the time. The things that Mother Earth does to actually fix the population tend to be more subtle, I think. Superbugs? Drug resistant strains? The diseases we've been fighting since day one are strong enough to overcome some of our best work. That, I think, is population control.

Oh, and I plan to have one baby myslef and adopt another.

[[Kate]]

I have to agree with Wolfwitch on this one. I don't think mother nature decided that over population had to be dealt with, I think that nature is always going to create and destroy, calm and stormy, light and dark. I think that disaster hit and people suffered. Sercee you should try to find that article, it seems really interesting.

[Sobek]

i would love a child, but generally adoption is out of the question for me, in Australia you pretty much to have to be married and rich before they let you adopt.

[[Epothes]]

It's a bit funny to think about how the things that we, as humans, do to help ourselves only to hurt us in the long run then never get around to fixing these problems. We create cars that burn fossil fuels into the air then discover it's harmful to the environment, we design nuclear power plants and bury the waste under ground only to find that the drums break and pollute underground water, etc. I might be a bit off on some of these theories but my conclusion is that we will end our own existences.

Getting back on topic (or at least a little closer), it's nice to know that the things we change are eventually counter-balanced by nature and other forces to keep things balanced. I still think we'll end our own existence though. Let me know if I'm wrong.

[Sercee]

Epothes, you'll know wether you're right or wrong if or when we do exterminate ourselves. We will never know for sure until it happens. All we can do in the meantime is do our best to not contribute to the problems we've created and instead look for a solution.

[Sobek]

i agree epothes, whether directly, or indirectly i think we will have the honour of our own demise(i dont know about everyone else, but i'd rather go out on my own terms). But who knows, humanity may come around and surprise us, doubtful as that is, most of us have gotten used to a certain quality of living which hits the fine line of "luxury || necessity".