Allan Savory: How to green the world's deserts and reverse climate change (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vpTHi7O66pI#ws)
I'm not a scientist, but I play one on TV... So let's open up a debate on what else you think can save the world from all its perils (both man-made and natural)...
Always wanted to try to flex my admin powers on these forums, so let's keep this topic intelligent, shall we?
That man has just become my hero.
It does bring back much hope.
Blew my mind. Will post more later.
Gonna be researching tonight!
That is phenominal :O
Such a straightforward solution, but we have to be wary of complications always.
I'm impressed at how many people took the time to watch it.
Good job guys.
And thanks Stormrage for showing it to us.
One thing about that vid is unclear though...
He says to mimic nature by bunching and moving livestock around, in a planned fashion...
But he says that wasn't enough...
Did he really increase the livestock to 4 times its size to get the desired effect? Or did I miss something...
Quote from: Ts Stormrage on April 14, 2013, 08:45:11 PM
One thing about that vid is unclear though...
He says to mimic nature by bunching and moving livestock around, in a planned fashion...
But he says that wasn't enough...
Did he really increase the livestock to 4 times its size to get the desired effect? Or did I miss something...
He's saying that it needs to be done on a larger scale because small flocks don't have the desired effect. So they formed a herd 400% larger than normal and had it travel through targeted lands and used it to simulate nature but in a faster pace. The planning and increased livestock part is to increase the speed of simulation, to really get the areas back on track. Or so it seems to me.
But this is an excellent listen, finally someone who's not blaming oil companies for everything.
Although that canadian tar sand thing, and that fracking isn't exactly helping...
Those methods not only pollute the ground water with chemicals we're not allowed to know about, something that will devastate a lot of things further down the line, but they are also producing 20% more greenhouse gasses than conventional fossil fuels...
The reason that they never employed these methods before is because prices of a barrel of oil are, on average, high, and rising further as time progresses...
The Keystone XP pipeline, when realised, means game over for the environment... And that isn't something I just made up, that is a direct quote from the two foremost climate scientists...
The good news in this is that, due to ever lowering cost of "alternative" energy sources (solar, wind, hydro, geothermal) and rising costs of fossil fuels, the point where the green energies become cheaper than the dirty ones is rapidly approaching... When this happens, noone is going to invest in oil, coal, gas, etc anymore...
If you want to help bring this point closer much faster, do all you can do to stop new pipelines, new drilling projects, and new areas being given the green light to "develop", by voting and signing petitions, and all that... This will drive costs of fossil fuels up even faster...
A good site to visit that has an aim to bundle all the green movement's momentum is www.350.org (http://www.350.org) and is backed by the worlds leading climate scientists, including Bill McKibben, Peter Byck (maker of the movie Carbon Nation (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1482991/)) and James Hansen...
350 is based on the parts per million CO2 in the atmosphere that the best calculations show is manageable for the earth to handle without any major impact on the climate...
Just to give you an indication; pre-industial revolution, the concentration hovered around 280ppm, and the current trends suggest we are already past the 400ppm mark...
And we are still without any significant reduction in global emissions in the foreseeable future...
Quote from: Ts Stormrage on April 14, 2013, 10:11:35 PM
Although that canadian tar sand thing, and that fracking isn't exactly helping...
Those methods not only pollute the ground water with chemicals we're not allowed to know about, something that will devastate a lot of things further down the line, but they are also producing 20% more greenhouse gasses than conventional fossil fuels...
The reason that they never employed these methods before is because prices of a barrel of oil are, on average, high, and rising further as time progresses...
The Keystone XP pipeline, when realised, means game over for the environment... And that isn't something I just made up, that is a direct quote from the two foremost climate scientists...
The good news in this is that, due to ever lowering cost of "alternative" energy sources (solar, wind, hydro, geothermal) and rising costs of fossil fuels, the point where the green energies become cheaper than the dirty ones is rapidly approaching... When this happens, noone is going to invest in oil, coal, gas, etc anymore...
If you want to help bring this point closer much faster, do all you can do to stop new pipelines, new drilling projects, and new areas being given the green light to "develop", by voting and signing petitions, and all that... This will drive costs of fossil fuels up even faster...
A good site to visit that has an aim to bundle all the green movement's momentum is www.350.org (http://www.350.org) and is backed by the worlds leading climate scientists, including Bill McKibben, Peter Byck (maker of the movie Carbon Nation (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1482991/)) and James Hansen...
350 is based on the parts per million CO2 in the atmosphere that the best calculations show is manageable for the earth to handle without any major impact on the climate...
Just to give you an indication; pre-industial revolution, the concentration hovered around 280ppm, and the current trends suggest we are already past the 400ppm mark...
And we are still without any significant reduction in global emissions in the foreseeable future...
As long as oil companies exist, people are going to invest in oil. Despite a revolution in greener technology in some first world countries, it's hard to foresee a worldwide change. As well as that methods for obtaining and using oil are becoming more efficient and the demand is still growing up until green energies are on a remote scale compared to the size of the oil industry, and that an oil company can lower prices extensively if the competition DOES become so dire. I can't see oil companies going anywhere withing the next 50 years. Especially since it's becoming more and more cost efficient to drill essentially anywhere. I'm not against fracking either, I just believe it should be done in a more controlled manner.
Spoken from someone who is probably going to work for an oil company within the next 5 years.
Keith you're a geologist! SAVE OUR WORLD!@$%
Quote from: Wayshow on April 14, 2013, 10:26:53 PM
Keith you're a geologist! SAVE OUR WORLD!@$%
Maybe after i'm done milking oil companies for all their worth! After that I can work on reversing what I did lolol
Right now oil companies are pretty heavily subsidized in the US...
If fuel prices were anywhere near what they are overhere in Europe, the demand for fuel efficient cars would go up... Just to name one example... But there is a reason why noone outside of the US is buying any american cars other than the Ford Focus...
But if I was a betting man (and fortunately, due to having a critical brain that embraces the scientific method, I'm not) I would put all my money in green technologies... Scientists and economists line up overwhelmingly on the green side to be the place to put your money...
And there is one more thing... Graphene is going to do for the world what plastics have done before it, and steel before that... Only the benefit of it is that it's far less polluting...
I'll try and dig up a video of the properties of this new stuff (which is basically a 1-atom thick sheet of carbon in a honeycone lattice), and let you guys decide...
Found it:
How To Make Graphene (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PifL8bAybyc#ws)
I was amazed by the burning of grasslands in Africa.
I'm really concerned for the African people.
This is crazy to be doing this much damage.
I will be watching 2nd video and commenting shortly.
My concern is the mobility of livestock. For example, who in the U.S. is going to take it upon themselves to move livestock through Yellowstone park? I'm not sure privatized businesses would do so.
Offers salvation for Africa, however in nations where it is not yet a necessity this will not happen. As a race we only acknowledge a problem when it is glaring right back at us.
I am a bit skeptical though; it restores grasslands but applying the concept to produce mass crops introduces additional factors. Sure he speaks about an increased crop yield, but what kind of % increase would be necessary for the natives to live sustainably and support themselves?
Having said that, any sort of increase fertility in the soil has got to be considered a revelation.
Having read some of the more intelligent omments on that vid, sme ranchers already do this in the states...
You may remember that last year saw a massive draught throughout most of the country, but the crops and livestock of the ones using these techniques suffered much much less or not at all... This is what his argument is for private business...
For public land and nature reserves, all you need to do is reintroduce the wildlife that was supposed to live there in the first place, along with its natural predators...
So, sorry Sarah, no more shooting wolves from a helicopter...
Also Rick; for a population to be at sustainable numbers and not wildly spawning offspring you got to give women a measure of control of their fertility cycle...
Most of the western world still spawned 5 or more children, even after the 2nd world war, but this has levelled off to about 2.1 children per two parents...
But when women in particular get an education, or even better, a job with income, their decision-making powers within the family advance greatly... These two factors are just about the only thing that you need to explain the birthrates on this map:
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/c/c5/Birth_rate_figures_for_countries.PNG (http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/c/c5/Birth_rate_figures_for_countries.PNG)
The odd factors out are ofc China with their 1-child policy that has caused many women fetusus to be aborted in favor of having one son over one daughter, and the methodology of estimating these numbers factor in the average age people die per country, making peace-prone europe and other healthy nations drop dramatically on this chart, and war-torn Afghanistan rise just as dramatically...
The additional factor to explain birthrates is religion. Parents who practise their religion will adhere to the ban on contraception, and are more likely to spawn not just more offspring, but offspring that is religious themselves as well... Once again; education can reduce much of this damage...
Quote from: Ts Stormrage on April 14, 2013, 10:11:35 PM
The good news in this is that, due to ever lowering cost of "alternative" energy sources (solar, wind, hydro, geothermal) and rising costs of fossil fuels, the point where the green energies become cheaper than the dirty ones is rapidly approaching... When this happens, noone is going to invest in oil, coal, gas, etc anymore...
If you want to help bring this point closer much faster, do all you can do to stop new pipelines, new drilling projects, and new areas being given the green light to "develop", by voting and signing petitions, and all that... This will drive costs of fossil fuels up even faster...
I work in this industry so I think I have a bit of technical knowledge when I say the following:
A lot of people who analyze the industry from the outside use the terms you have used above - Phrases such as "due to ever lowering cost of alternative energy sources" and "rising costs of fossil fuels"; these are a very big generalization. The energy industry is primarily driven by "lowest cost" methodology. This takes into account generation, transmission, distribution, imports, exports & cost of fuel production. The energy market in any country is regulated with an overall body projecting future energy utilization by source. Green energy never shows 100% utilization in these projections in the next 50 years.
Some simple reasons off the top of my head why green energy cannot produce enough power are listed:
a) Wind power - Needs vast space between wind turbines and can only be placed along coastlines or naturally occurring wind tunnels created by landscape. Even when this occurs, it is not effective at converting mechanical power to electricity.
b) Hydroelectric - Can only be placed where you have a dam, or a naturally occurring waterfall. This is a very cheap source to run, but is limited by where it can be placed.
c) Photovoltaic (solar) - Very expensive. Yes, the power is basically free (after installation costs). However those installation costs are extremely high, and it takes an extremely long time for the capital paid in installation to be gained through electricity production.
d) Biomass - Cannot be done in large scale production.
The issue is that "green" energy can never fully compensate for fossil fuels. You will never get a worldwide 100% green energy production in the next 50-100 years, until the technology is developed further. In conjunction, fossil fuels are not rising in costs, much. Oil, maybe? Gas, no. Coal, no. For a fact I am 100% sure the coal price is stable each year within the normal 2-3% limits (I have seen the projections and history of the pricing).
The thing is, countries like Australia are not "switching" to green. Coal seam gas is relatively new (past 10-20 years), and the "switch" occurring is from coal to gas fired power stations. America might have nuclear power, but the change of this occurring in a lot of other countries is out of the question in the near future due to the extreme health risks.
I will post my thoughts after I watch the video.
very interesting
Maths, you're missing out on a couple of key new energy sources...
The hydro electric part you completely miss out on energy taken out of waves, from either on coastal installations or those snakes you see on out to sea or underwater turbines that take advantage of tidal power.
The photovoltaic (or other solar energy utilisers, such as boiling towers) methods are still expensive, yes, but the cost of it has halved roughly every 8 years since 1980. On top of that, the materials used require so little maintainence that a guy with a bucket of water and a squeegy can do it.
There's an organisation/consortium going on right now known as Desertec, which aims to turn parts of the Sahara desert into a giant solar powerplant, meeting the energy needs of all North-African countries and plenty to spare to power large portions of Europe.
See this map:
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/7/71/DESERTEC-Map_large.jpg/1280px-DESERTEC-Map_large.jpg (http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/7/71/DESERTEC-Map_large.jpg/1280px-DESERTEC-Map_large.jpg)
You also completely miss geothermal and nuclear alternatives for uranium.
Like this one:
LFTRs in 5 minutes - Thorium Reactors (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uK367T7h6ZY#ws)
China is very big on using these types of reactors to power their cities. Just as they are the the leading nation on windpower. In 6 years time they managed to increase their MWh output from windpower alone by 30 times to 70% that of ALL of the EU generates (and this includes nations big on windpower such as Germany, Denmark, Spain, and the U.K.)
EVEN the U.S. is showing a healthy growth in that industry, scaling up their MWh production by a factor of 5, to produce now more than twice what Germany does.
And yes, there are limits to where you can place these turbines, but then again, oil isn't in the ground everywhere either.
And on biomass you have to define what you are refering to:
Wood and plants? Biogas from landfill and municipal waste? Or, what I'm suspecting, biofuels from stuff like sugar cane and corn.
Biofuels come in 3 generations, each of which have their origins in South America.
The first uses the sugars in crops and converts them into bioalcohol (really this is just making liquer), and is controversial due to the food vs fuel dilemma.
The second generation is currently the most viable one and IS used on a large scale. Cellulisic material from non-food crops and waste materials such as sawdust, yard trimmings, dried dung, and agricultural waste. The difficulty is breaking the cellulose down. Grazing livestock (and we've just come full circle) does this in a very slow working enzyme process to turn it into glucose.
Generation 2.5 biofuels and biodiesels come from fungi who turn cellulose into medium and long chained hydrocarbons.
Third generation biofuels utilise algae to turn CO2 directly into biodiesel.
I'm not all that big on biomass, personally. It's a nice stop-gap, but it is, as we dutch call it, mopping up with the tap still running... It only takes CO2 out of the air to pt it back in within the year.
In the end; ALL power is solar power, as it drives the winds, maks the plants grow, etc etc. The only exception is geothermal, which utilises the heat in the earth's crust, something that comes from radioactive decay deep within the earth, and tectonic friction.
That said, the earth recieves enough energy from the sun every hour right now to sustain us for over a year. The math is there.
Population control in any way is just wrong.
Giving into a government that wants to legally kill, stop, or control what people do in the way of family is terrible.
You even slightly suggesting that it is a good thing makes me question if you want us to practice the ideology of antihumanism.
My post might be off-topic but just the same the belief that the human race is a horde of rats whose unconstrained aspirations and appetites endanger the natural order, and that measures are necessary to constrain population to save the Earth is morally wrong.
USA gets involved in Africa and sends them stuff to help control population by way of birth control.
Underlying though they are sending them a death sentence in that what they send is an increase chance to get aides and pass it.
Also the shots they provide for the birth control give them a much higher risk of death from breast cancer.
I financially support many missions to Africa and I hate what happens when they trust the wrong people/government.
I will watch the second video soon when I can give it my attention.
I'll give you a chance to modify your response after you read this thread again...
I never mentioned the 1-child policy being a good thing, and I never even mentioned aids (without the e) because it is not a consequence of giving females more control over their bodies and family income.
Nor did I say anything about giving the government the power to do those things you said...
This coming from an american is hypocritical at best, tbh...
If you look at that map with the photovoltaic cells, can you see how spread out they are across the map?
The problems associated with I^2*R power losses there are so significant, you'd have to step the voltage up to 500kV (more likely 765kV) to transmit it a significant distance. Stepping a voltage up to such a high level means billions of dollars of infrastructure (transformers, switchgear, transmission lines) across those barren deserts.
-----
QuoteChina is very big on using these types of reactors to power their cities. Just as they are the the leading nation on windpower. In 6 years time they managed to increase their MWh output from windpower alone by 30 times to 70% that of ALL of the EU generates (and this includes nations big on windpower such as Germany, Denmark, Spain, and the U.K.)
This is from Wikipedia:
The People's Republic of China is the largest consumer of coal in the world,[1] and is about to become the largest user of coal-derived electricity, generating 1.95 trillion kilowatt-hours per year, or 68.7% of its electricity from coal as of 2006 (compared to 1.99 trillion kilowatt-hours per year, or 49% for the US).
It might have dropped to 60% at the lowest point in 2013.
Who cares if it has the same as 70% of the production of EU? China generates so much electricity to fund their industrial sector, the majority of their power comes through coal generation. The focus on wind power is what they use to pull the wool over the eyes of the media so they don't have to take real action on their CO2 emissions.
Quote from: Rachellove9 on April 15, 2013, 12:50:29 PM
Population control in any way is just wrong.
Giving into a government that wants to legally kill, stop, or control what people do in the way of family is terrible.
You even slightly suggesting that it is a good thing makes me question if you want us to practice the ideology of antihumanism.
My post might be off-topic but just the same the belief that the human race is a horde of rats whose unconstrained aspirations and appetites endanger the natural order, and that measures are necessary to constrain population to save the Earth is morally wrong.
I have to respectfully disagree with you Rachel.
There are too many humans, more than the planet can sustain in the long-term.
I would never endorse an act of genocide, but we do need to reproduce in a sustainable way and aim for a population decrease.
Any family that wants to exceed two children is either selfish or does not know the dilemma we face.
Rachel, the first 3 minutes are adequate viewing for you to understand my concern.
But please watch as much as you can.
How Many People Can Live on Planet Earth (FULL) (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dN06tLRE4WE#ws)
The summary of it is at 11:45:
"If we don't control human population voluntarily, life could end in misery; the productive capacity of the Earth has physical limits, and those limits will ultimately determine how many human beings it can support"
It was only 1:44 to watch.
I watched and didn't see anything at all that changes my view.
Of course we can't be just like gumball machine and pop kids out like it doesn't matter.
But that choice is mine and not for someone else to make for me.
Much like abortion is between the dr and the woman, I feel that birth is a family matter and between the woman and her mate.
I've looked in to adopting children from other countries.
If I can afford to adopt or have my own 6 to 12 children, then who should come to me and say I'm wrong.
My issue with having more than 3 or 4 children is that the children wouldn't have the one on one time with me.
I am not from Africa or have any connection with Africa other than a deep compassion for them and send them money.
I don't approve of the USA's trade policies that included the limitation of a pesticide that wasn't allowed to be used.
It's ban has caused billions of Africans to die and I feel that the USA is responsible for it.
Population control is one of the things I'm passionately against.
I feel in the end the population will be controlled by natural disaster, sickness, wars and ect.
Humans cannot trust themselves to be responsible.
In theory I could have zero children (out of concern for the population) and all it takes is for one dumb teen girl to push out four children, and she has TOTALLY undone my life efforts.
QuoteIf I can afford to adopt or have my own 6 to 12 children, then who should come to me and say I'm wrong.
This comes at a cost. You're thinking from a cellular family view, which I understand.
But you're part of a global community as well and we're all in this together.
What if everyone made that decision? It's not sustainable.
Already, our current population exceeds Earth's capacity to provide, and yet you want us to GROW?
Let me clarify this: Freedom to choose means the population will grow Rachel.
Most people want at least two kids.
Say there is no regulation, and we keep growing.
There will be a mass population decrease due to lack of water and food.
If you're happy to ride it out until disaster strikes and then live with the effects of it, that's where we're different.
I want to prevent it rather than deal with it.
For my whole life I will be a supporter of population control.
I can't think of anything more selfish than people wanting big families at the cost of precious resources.
Every child you have comes at the cost of human life in the future.
You're taking out a loan you cannot repay.
Very interesting, never thought cattle could be a solution!
I'm still confused about what the cattle eat right at the start tho if they are basically in a desert O_o
One more movie for you Rachel. A short one this time.
David Suzuki speaks about overpopulation (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8x98KFcMJeo#ws)
I will just agree that you and I will never agree on this issue.
Family matters should remain with the family.
My body is mine to make decisions with.
Why is it okay for a woman to have 12 abortions and you tell me it is not okay to have children that I could afford and build futures for?
It is being hypercritical in my view.
I am seeing it from a very personal view and the world will be a better place from any children I would be raising.
Population tends to control itself, though...
It's usual that you see high birthrates at places where there is also a high infant mortality rate... If one of your kids dies, you replace him with another, so to speak...
It is shown that, when you give women some decisionmaking powers in the family and an income of their own, the infant mortality rate goes down, and so does the birthrate... This has happened across the world wherever some extent of womens rights became available... This is why religion, notoriously and often violently opposed to any kind of equality to a dominant male subject, is the bane of human existance... Fortunately organizations such as Oxfam Novib do wonderful work here...
As for population numbers:
Right now, there are 2 billion children, roughly 2 billion people between 15 and 30 years old, 1 billion between 30 and 45, 1 billion between 45 and 60, and a billion between 60 and older...
What we're experiencing now as a population boom is what's known as a fill-up...
Fastfoward 15 years, and you'll have:
Roughly 2 billion people between 15 and 30 years old, 2 billion between 30 and 45, 1 billion between 45 and 60, and a billion between 60 and older AND 2 billion children still, as the rate of replenishment of that bottom bracket isn't projected to speed up any faster than its current pace...
Fastfoward another 30 years and all but the 60+ bracket will have 2 billion... And again and all brackets have 2 billion, making the total population 10 billion...
I did watch that Attenborough documentairy a while back, but I forgot what kind of people we have to emulate in order to live sustainably with 10billion...
I know that if we all lived as americans we'd need 5.5 earths to sustain all of us, Europe not doing much better with 3 earths...
Rachel: YOU might be able to afford it... Financially...
The earth cannot support everyone having 12 children... Not if you want to have the cool stuff, like, you know... drinking water that doesn't kill you... Or food...
Mojo: They didn't have to feed them anything, unless they were at an area that was completely strip-mined bare... They just paid someone 5 dollars to find them the nearest grassy patch, and moved em towards that... He began his lecture with sayig that nature tends to fill up the gaps if you let it :)
Quote from: Ts Stormrage on April 15, 2013, 05:44:40 PM
Rachel: YOU might be able to afford it... Financially...
The earth cannot support everyone having 12 children... Not if you want to have the cool stuff, like, you know... drinking water that doesn't kill you... Or food...
And Rachel, I'm not targetting you specifically. Adopting is a very respectable thing to do and I respect that greatly.
That's not contributing to population growth.
Also, 12 abortions are not OK!
What also concerns me is how the planet is getting more stupid.
Less educated people tend to have kids at an earlier age.
These kids are raised in an environment that keeps them uneducated (bad parenting, poverty and lack of schooling).
Then they feed the cycle of stupidity and have lots of kids at a young age too.
What scares me even more is thinking of the possibility that there is a genetic component to stupidity. If there is, the cycle is much harder to break.
On the other hand, people who are better educated wait until later in life to have kids, and they tend to have less.
In essence, there are more kids growing up in circumstances that encourage low intelligence than high intelligence.
I firmly believe that in the developed world at least, humans have been getting marginally dumber over the last few hundred years.
Gene, do not underestimate the curiosity of children, and above all the amount of information available to them these days... People teaching themselves in this way become more and more common... It's up to us, as the intelligent ones, to help them filter out the facts from all the bullshit...
Even the dumbest people of all, from the Westboro Baptist Church and other creatard families, plenty of kids have "escaped" their families once they reach adulthood... Louis Thereaux did a wonderful job documenting that...
This is the internet, where bad ideas come to die as they cannot stand up to world-wide scrutiny...
If the picture you painted was true, than average IQ's should've gone down over time... It hasn't...
What HAS stopped is human evolution by natural selection... If I lived back in the days of fires and spears, I would've been mauled by a bear before I had my first pube... Then somewhere along the line spectacles got invented, allowing people with poor eye-sight to see, participate in society and reproduce... Effectively allowing a defect to exist... This is but one example of such defects...
I hope you're right, and that escaping those environments is the rule rather than the exception.
As for average IQ's, what we're seeing is a widening of the variance of IQ... meaning less people around the average and more around the extremes.
Just a thought about the stupid raising kids . . .
A lot of people send their children to be raised in daycares.
There is a huge difference in daycare environments.
I'm thinking this could be part of the dumbing down of American children.
If you raise your own children they will take on your language and behaviors.
If you allow a person with low IQ to raise your children maybe they take on their language skills and behaviors.
I'm not sure but I've seen some really smart parents with children that seem not up to standards.
Choosing good daycares could be part of the problem in America.
On the matter of population control, I think people should just have a couple kids, and then adopt a ton if they really want to have many. Obviously it's not a black and white scenario but that's my viewpoint. I wish there wasn't a stigma with adoption, where "you're adopted" is an insult to kids who were adopted and who weren't adopted. Your blood doesn't matter. It's your personality that defines you. Who cares if you're not related to your parents. Personally I'm only blood related to my mom. I won't delve into details but I have no clue what my father looks like, don't know his name, nothing. But I've grown up just fine!
I went to daycare from 2-3. The teacher was called Aunt Mimi and she was awesome :)
I was wrong about religion being a factor...
However, I now understand better why people are "planning for 10 billion"...
Hans Rosling: Religions and babies (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ezVk1ahRF78#ws)
I really didn't get how religion was ever to blame. . .
This video made a lot of sense to me.
If you are poor and need to do all the work yourself you need a small army to help out.
If some of them will be dying they have more just in case to keep up to the standard of help.
I don't need a small work force but I see how it makes so much sense to help the poor get in a better place.
I give to Africa and Mexico as a mission.
Still doesn't change the fact that I am in control of my body and don't want laws or groups of haters to tell me how many children to have.
Quote from: Rachellove9 on April 16, 2013, 08:23:47 PM
I really didn't get how religion was ever to blame. . .
This video made a lot of sense to me.
If you are poor and need to do all the work yourself you need a small army to help out.
If some of them will be dying they have more just in case to keep up to the standard of help.
I don't need a small work force but I see how it makes so much sense to help the poor get in a better place.
I give to Africa and Mexico as a mission.
Still doesn't change the fact that I am in control of my body and don't want laws or groups of haters to tell me how many children to have.
I'm a strong advocate that people should be able to do as they please
as long as it does not negatively affect the lives of others.
If people could have as many children as they wanted without the problems brought on by overpopulation that wouldn't bother me, unfortunately, with the way the world works, it's not possible.
If you could have 12 children and be ENTIRELY self sufficient, requiring NOTHING from an outside source, then go for it. But I don't think that would be doable, certainly not enjoyable or easy.
Say you did have 12 children, you need to feed them, provide power/water to wash, feed, entertain and possibly teach, it's not the existence of the children/people that's the problem with overpopulation, it's the resources they require, and the energy needed to provide those resources that puts the strain on the Earth. Every single person has a carbon footprint, and in a developed country, that footprint is all the bigger. If you have 12 children, that's a big carbon footprint for that family.
I feel this thread has gone very off topic, considering the speaker stated that if his plan was put into action, it would bring carbon levels down to pre-industrial revolution levels without the need for a change in industry. This could only be compounded and improved if industry changed AS WELL.
@Rachel [spoiler]But it's not about freedom or 'exercising' the right to have a lot of kids, it's about what the consequences are. Eg. Octomom. Raising good kids has nothing to do with it, it's about the carbon footprint humans put on our planet, and to me the ethics of it. I agree with what Gene said on how it's like trading 12 kids for 12 deaths (or however it said, sorry it's late). Humans should take accountability for the planet, or at least for the harm we have done to it.
If I took half an hour showers every day, other people in my house wouldn't get enough hot water.
Or, maybe if I drive a vehicle that has double the MPG of a typical car, I might be able to sponge the damage to the earth done by my neighbor that drives a 5 MPG luxury sports car.
Maybe I can help extend the life of this planet, habit by habit; act by act, and example after another. Isn't our planet a ticking time bomb?
I think having a ton of kids works the same way. Not all humans get a nice place to live. If I gave birth to 8 children now, EIGHT good children that I raised and that (I hope) will live in jolly good big townhouses, which unfortunately will deprive several hard-working and deserving immigrants, homeless, even my own descendants down the line won't have a place to live. Or, I could have made the easy choice to lessen my impact, and had two children, and saved space on this earth for 5 other families places to live in. I want my descendants to enjoy however much time as possible before this thing self-destructs. There is an expiration date on it right?
Like NightShade said, the way continents live right now, it'd take more than x planets to sustain, and etc. That's the point it makes...it's selfish. And it's foolish. We're running out of space. Food. Everything. Air. "The world could use one less man." What's the cost of a planet? 12 kids? But we can't trade lives for another planet, the universe doesn't care.
On a personal note...being 1st generation American-born-Chinese (ABC), most of my parents and uncles and aunts have one child because of China's one-child policy. See: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/asia/china/9933468/336-million-abortions-under-Chinas-one-child-policy.html (http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/asia/china/9933468/336-million-abortions-under-Chinas-one-child-policy.html)
As a child this logic drilled into my head when I was younger. My parents told me overpopulation was srs bsns. You can bet my native family's been affected by it. Like you, I thought it was "WRONG, it's very wrong...that's so horrible." Even though my parents weren't bound to these laws, I am an only child. But hey, it works. And the 'commie leaders might have shed tons of carbon footprint, maybe bought some more time for the planet. For me, it doesn't represent a right or wrong, whether I believe in abortion, whether I believe in god or not, but it makes the point that overpopulation is serious, and measures need to be taken. Overpopulation needs to be Lordship'd.[/spoiler]
I was going to say this in the first few posts, but didn't have the time. I can never get enough of TED, or informative videos and YT channels. We can swing the topic back to how the industry would need to change...you mean cool things like:
http://blog.ted.com/2013/02/27/an-electric-vehicle-you-can-carry-in-hand-sanjay-dastoor-at-ted2013/ (http://blog.ted.com/2013/02/27/an-electric-vehicle-you-can-carry-in-hand-sanjay-dastoor-at-ted2013/)
http://www.thetorquereport.com/tesla_model_s_rear_new.jpg (http://www.thetorquereport.com/tesla_model_s_rear_new.jpg) ?
I'm waiting to see a car that can switch between gas and electric. The Tesla is great, I got the opportunity to tour one a few weeks ago. In a nutshell it saves 7x more money compared to a gas car. It's a 4 door that can seat 5, plus 2 baby seats in the back. Goes 0-60 in 4.2 or 4.4. But it's limited to about 250 miles, so long distance traveling imo isn't very feasible. Charge-time does its job.
Personally, another one of these little projects in the back of my mind is to start a business that sells sustainable plastic products. Or maybe...I don't know...start a company that creates, manufactures, and sell every-day products that aren't based on petroleum-based based materials :$. I grew up working in my dad's (un)sustainable plastics company. (But only because there weren't any other options!)
Graphite thing made me jizz btw.
Think of all the plastic cups (beer pong anyone?), bags, garbage bags, grocery, plastic forks and knives, etc. The process to make most these things, in a nutshell, the definition of un-sustainability. Yeah, I'd have made millions farming off the green revolution, which is something business partners laugh about all the time...because the thing is there has yet to be a practical way to manufacture these "green" products. That's why sticking tape on graphite is so important, why it won a Nobel Prize. Until the engineers invent a way, until the mechanics invent the machine, until the countries allow them to sell (overseas trade laws, business laws, intellectual property and etc.), each is a battle in itself.
There's also the politics of the plastics business. If you haven't noticed recently, your local grocery store has probably banned single-use bags and/or has made you pay a few coins for a paper bag or re-useable bag. Politics won't stop people from littering the planet with these, which science says takes about 1000 years to degrade from earth. People need to be educated about sustainability, biodegradable material, and so on. Like I said, that's only the start of the battle.
Good news is, I'm starting to see some growth overall. In the natural field (cattle pooping into desert), AND technology, that'll help us reduce our carbon footprint, save the planet. Another example is harnessing the planet's natural energy resources (wind, solar), and how it can we get it to people's houses...cause they cost a lot, etc. etc.
Earth day today :)