Are we haggling over the wrong things?

[BigHornRam]

I skimmed some of the writers other articles. He sounds like a young George Wuerthner to me.

 

[Hunting Wife]

I tried reading the article & made it as far as "under Obama" & that was enough for me fricken idiot

This is just one example of the reason for my pessimism. We are too mentally fragile to even read words.

 

[brocksw]

I tried reading the article & made it as far as "under Obama" & that was enough for me fricken idiot

 

[Irrelevant]

If I've said it once I've said it... twice?

Covid was supposed to fix this problem.

No one needs old people anyway. Think of all the roundabouts we could build...

 

[brocksw]

Think of all the roundabouts we could build...

I spit out my coffee reading this.

We just had a roundabout put in next to our development, watching North Dakotan's navigate that for the first time is beyond comical. Just the other day I watched an old lady drive around the whole thing twice....I guess she didn't know how to get off

 

[44hunter45]

Not trying to trivialize this. Maybe I am better versed in pop culture than science.

 

[COEngineer]

Bottom line, covid-19 did not have much of an effect on global population growth.

From here: https://www.prb.org/news/prbs-releases-2022-world-population-data-sheet-providing-comprehensive-look-at-covid-19-pandemics-demographic-impacts-in-more-than-200-countries/

• The pandemic’s impact on fertility rates was less significant than expected and largely temporary. High-income countries such as Italy, Germany and the United States experienced small declines in births in 2020, rebounding in 2021. Low- and middle-income countries saw little to no fertility impacts.
• The global total fertility rate (TFR)—lifetime number of births per woman—is 2.3, still above the replacement-level TFR of approximately 2.1 births per woman.

 

[Deleted member 18333]

If I've said it once I've said it... twice?

Covid was supposed to fix this problem.

No one needs old people anyway. Think of all the roundabouts we could build...

Give it time. Gates and Soros are playing a bit of a long game on this one.

 

[COEngineer]

The idea that several people have expressed about how China's 1-child policy is what caused China to fail (relative to other modernizing countries) I want to say, "You're kidding, right?" It's the Chinese form of government that failed, not a singular policy. Communism (now apparently evolving to Dictatorship under Xi) is the problem, not limiting child births. IMO

 

[sclancy27]

 

[Dave N]

I spit out my coffee reading this.

We just had a roundabout put in next to our development, watching North Dakotan's navigate that for the first time is beyond comical. Just the other day I watched an old lady drive around the whole thing twice....I guess she didn't know how to get off

You should try some of them over in England. They're YUGE! Doesn't help much when the routes aren't posted and the towns are not familiar for the signage. Plus the ones with trees in the center blocking your view.

 

[gouch]

I was watching a news article on TV concerning the terrible number of deaths from fentanyl overdoses in America. It occurred to me that given the amount of users that die from it, the solution to the fentanyl problem is probably fentanyl. Perhaps in the same way, the solution to overpopulation is overpopulation. We as people are not going to tackle the problems caused by overpopulation, let alone the problem of overpopulation itself. To do so would require putting up with some inconvenience to our daily lives and we all feel that we are way too inconvenienced already. That guy in the Subaru cut me off this morning for Christ's sake and my phone battery died. How am I going to get through the day? We are too busy with living our present day lives to take seriously all the terrible things that "might" happen in a future that we may not even be alive in anyway. At some point there will be a correction and the human population will implode. The majority of or maybe even the entirety of the human population will cease to exist. Problem solved. We may destroy much of the diversity of life on the planet before that happens, (we already have done a pretty good job of that) but nature will continue on as though we never happened. It's gunna suck to be part of that correction but hopefully that won't affect me.

 

[OntarioHunter]

I read that article on Saturday while in the middle of a "metropolis in denial;" that being Vegas and its rapid race to deplete all useable water before the next person might grab some of it. After reading that article, I told my wife, "It's nice to know I'm not the only person resolved to the idea that homo sapiens will breed themselves out of a habitable landscape and someday those landscapes will again be reclaimed by the more resilient and less arrogant species of the planet."

She looked at me as if I have too much time to think about things. Then realizing I have hardly any spare time and concerned of my mental well being, she Googled "Psychologists Near Me."

All the climate issues, all the habitat issues, all the (insert here) are heavily (mostly) impacted by the denial of humans that we are subject to the same habitat constraints of every other species on this planet. We cannot continue to breed and populate to the Nth degree and think the planet can sustain. We can't and the planet can't.

And as such, we will have more wars, religious arguments, more diseases, and other ancillary activities trying to justify/claim the share of resources and habitat we feel we are owed/deserve. It is the greatest example of "Tragedy of the Commons" that our planet ever has experienced

It's not just humans and governments that are in denial. It is also our lazy media. Everyone wants to make it about the changing climate without any connection to the fact that too many people with too many demands is what changes the climate; cause v. effect. It's far easier, lazier, and safer to talk about abstract ideas of climate change. Heaven forbid we talk about issues causing climates to change, such as having ten kids, coming to the rescue of every country that has overpopulated the carrying capacity of their land, trying to grow cities in deserts, fishing the oceans to the last minnow, and on and on and on.

I know, I've lost my marbles. Excuse me while I go look for those marbles.

Coming soon to the Fresh Tracks merch store - Men's T-shirts, "Save the planet; keep your dick in your pants."

I've been screaming the same song for fifty years. It just doesn't make sense that we humans can be so scientifically advanced yet cling to crude animal instincts that can only lead to our extinction ... and the extinction of every other living thing on the planet. And the one animal instinct above all others that will undoubtedly doom the world is our fixation with reproduction. Forget about recycling, clean energy, etc. Reduce the consumers! It will happen one way or the other. Pandemics are no longer the saviors they historically have been. Now it's up to wars to save the planet. Unfortunately, the weapons we now use won't just kill us. They can make the planet inhabitable for tens of thousands of years. Or we could just choose to make less babies. Fat chance of that happening when everyone clings to religious cultural values built before there were printing presses.

 

[BigHornRam]

You should try some of them over in England. They're YUGE! Doesn't help much when the routes aren't posted and the towns are not familiar for the signage. Plus the ones with trees in the center blocking your view.

Roundabouts are like a mini Bristol for me. I like them.

 

[Nutrioso]

I've been screaming the same song for fifty years. It just doesn't make sense that we humans can be so scientifically advanced yet cling to crude animal instincts that can only lead to our extinction ... and the extinction of every other living thing on the planet. And the one animal instinct above all others that will undoubtedly doom the world is our fixation with reproduction. Forget about recycling, clean energy, etc. Reduce the consumers! It will happen one way or the other. Pandemics are no longer the saviors they historically have been. Now it's up to wars to save the planet. Unfortunately, the weapons we now use won't just kill us. They can make the planet inhabitable for tens of thousands of years. Or we could just choose to make less babies. Fat chance of that happening when everyone clings to religious cultural values built before there were printing presses.

As someone more cleaver than me once said, bottom line is we are just monkeys wearing clothes.

 

[noharleyyet]

I read that article on Saturday while in the middle of a "metropolis in denial;" that being Vegas and its rapid race to deplete all useable water before the next person might grab some of it. After reading that article, I told my wife, "It's nice to know I'm not the only person resolved to the idea that homo sapiens will breed themselves out of a habitable landscape and someday those landscapes will again be reclaimed by the more resilient and less arrogant species of the planet."

She looked at me as if I have too much time to think about things. Then realizing I have hardly any spare time and concerned of my mental well being, she Googled "Psychologists Near Me."

All the climate issues, all the habitat issues, all the (insert here) are heavily (mostly) impacted by the denial of humans that we are subject to the same habitat constraints of every other species on this planet. We cannot continue to breed and populate to the Nth degree and think the planet can sustain. We can't and the planet can't.

And as such, we will have more wars, religious arguments, more diseases, and other ancillary activities trying to justify/claim the share of resources and habitat we feel we are owed/deserve. It is the greatest example of "Tragedy of the Commons" that our planet ever has experienced

It's not just humans and governments that are in denial. It is also our lazy media. Everyone wants to make it about the changing climate without any connection to the fact that too many people with too many demands is what changes the climate; cause v. effect. It's far easier, lazier, and safer to talk about abstract ideas of climate change. Heaven forbid we talk about issues causing climates to change, such as having ten kids, coming to the rescue of every country that has overpopulated the carrying capacity of their land, trying to grow cities in deserts, fishing the oceans to the last minnow, and on and on and on.

I know, I've lost my marbles. Excuse me while I go look for those marbles.

Coming soon to the Fresh Tracks merch store - Men's T-shirts, "Save the planet; keep your dick in your pants."

 

[sapperJ24]

Speaking with some more experienced folks at work, it seems like they have optimism that humanity will turn this around. I don't know if is due in any part to the reforms they lived through in the 1960/70's with the passing of legislation including the EPA, ESA, NEPA, Clean Air Act. Unfortunately, I don't share this view. We seem too divided too accomplish anything meaningful in time.


Stolen from the internet, but this seems to sums up many millennials' feelings.

 

[LousyResident]

As D_Walt pointed out, there is strong evidence that, for lack of a better term, the more well-to-do a country is, the more likely they are to have a significant drop in their fertility rate to that which is below replacement rate (2.1). Here in the US, our population's total fertility rate is now 1.7, and yet, as a function of immigration, our population continues to grow.

If I oversimplify my hope, it is that we can rise the tide to "lift all ships" across the globe to something approaching what is more or less an equilibrium, before it all falls apart.


Apologies for the Mercator Projection.

View attachment 254098


I still think we should haggle over mule deer, and elk, and corner crossing, and the fact that my wife's engine just blew up. I think it is unhealthy mentally to focus on a sort of maximal issue so much that one dismisses all others. For one, you're no fun at parties, and for two, you could be wrong. To some it is Climate Change, to others it is Artificial General Intelligence, overpopulation, planet-killing asteroids, and on and on - all seemingly legitimate and existential. Something I think about tangential to this when people dabble in antinatalism, is there is significant evidence out there that we could reduce a hell of a lot of human suffering with varying expense, and it sure wouldn't help with human overpopulation, and yet we should. We are certainly on a ride, and I do have hope in the fact that the future is dang near impossible to predict whether it is events that will happen, or technologies that will arise.

After reading the article, I thought back on the map above. The saddest part of this is probably the fact that some of the most food insecure parts of the world are the ones pumping out more and more babies. They will likely be the ones to suffer significant starvation events if they occur. And they will likely the be the first to see true war over resources. Unfortunately that means those pretty, wealthy, blue and green countries will be able to ignore it for that much longer.

 

[Benfromalbuquerque]

Responsibility or lack thereof is a learned behavior. When I was in high school I found this old t-shirt in my folks things. It was a “Hands Across America” shirt. Wore the hell out of that because it was cool to wear 80s tees then. I didn’t understand the concept until years later.

 

[schmalts]

Roundabouts are like a mini Bristol for me. I like them.

It was an ice covered road day this AM. I use them as a drifting course on days like this