How do we reconcile medical research with excessive population growth?

[Kilgore Trout]

Because you can't grow food organically.

You cannot grow enough food organically to support the present population of humans on the planet.

Tip: Look up how much arable land there is on the planet, where it's distributed, and how much arable land is required to feed each person a mixed, healthy diet.

 

[Iti oj]

You cannot grow enough food organically to support the present population of humans on the planet.

Tip: Look up how much arable land there is on the planet, where it's distributed, and how much arable land is required to feed each person a mixed, healthy diet.

Tip stop pigion hoeling my idea into the current systems. Every wall and roof is waiting to be a garden. And yes organic gardening does work on a large scale to.

 

[Kilgore Trout]

Tip stop pigion hoeling my idea into the current systems. Every wall and roof is waiting to be a garden. And yes organic gardening does work on a large scale to.

The amount of arable land and nutrition requirements for people have nothing to do with "current systems."

 

[Iti oj]

People starve, disease spread and the world burns all the while people like you make excuses.

 

[Iti oj]

The amount of arable land and nutrition requirements for people have nothing to do with "current systems."

Yes it does. Look up permaculture. Did you ever look at my link?

 

[Kilgore Trout]

People starve, disease spread and the world burns all the while people like you make excuses.

Pragmatically understanding the facts and realities involved, and not relying on vague, magical ideas isn't "making excuses."

 

[Kilgore Trout]

Yes it does. Look up permaculture. Did you ever look at my link?

Did you look up anything about arable land availability and requirements for food production?

 

[Iti oj]

It doesn't even matter my original point is still true. We already produce enough food people just lack the money to access it.

 

[Kilgore Trout]

It doesn't even matter my original point is still true. We already produce enough food people just lack the money to access it.

Yes, we produce enough food only because of large-scale petroleum use. Without it, we couldn't produce enough food for the current population.

 

[Iti oj]

Did you look up anything about arable land availability and requirements for food production?

Only the last year and a half.we practice unsustainable methods. That's why permaculture is so important. We have not yet even talked about hydro or aqua ponics either.

 

[9-10ths_Penguin]

The amount of arable land and nutrition requirements for people have nothing to do with "current systems."

The amount of arable land also isn't a fixed quantity. This is one area where technological improvements have had major impacts: there is land that was considered useless decades ago that is now farmland.

 

[Iti oj]

The amount of arable land also isn't a fixed quantity. This is one area where technological improvements have had major impacts: there is land that was considered useless decades ago that is now farmland.

He has no interest in facts. Didn't even open my link.

 

[Revoltingest]

The amount of arable land also isn't a fixed quantity. This is one area where technological improvements have had major impacts: there is land that was considered useless decades ago that is now farmland.

Aye, think of the great number of additional humans we could support, perhaps
20,000,000,000 if we knocked down & farmed the rain forests & boreal forest.
I'd regret the loss of wild spaces & biodiversity, but at least we'd have all these
extra humans who'd enrich our lives with.....uh.....hmmmm......would an extra
15,000,000,000 people really make us better off?

 

[Vinayaka]

..would an extra
15,000,000,000 people really make us better off?

Better chance of finding somebody who agreed with you.

 

[Revoltingest]

Better chance of finding somebody who agreed with you.

That is not a positive thing.

 

[Estro Felino]

I just want to clarify that, except as for Germany, a low fertility rate in Europe depends upon people's economic possibilities.
Just take a look at this map

You can see that the poorest European countries like the Slavic countries and Greece have very low birth rates compared to those of UK and France. because they can't afford them

 

[9-10ths_Penguin]

Aye, think of the great number of additional humans we could support, perhaps
20,000,000,000 if we knocked down & farmed the rain forests & boreal forest.
I'd regret the loss of wild spaces & biodiversity, but at least we'd have all these
extra humans who'd enrich our lives with.....uh.....hmmmm......would an extra
15,000,000,000 people really make us better off?

I was thinking more about deserts, and how desalination has allowed more of them to be irrigated.

Also, there's aquaculture, which usually needs little to no land.

 

[ScottySatan]

That's crap, and you have ignored every point I have made. I read some where the worlds population could fit in Texas, with yards and room to spare.

Yes, I did ignore every point you made, on purpose, because you never addressed my point to begin with, and I'm trying to steer you back to that.

I'm not talking about what is in the news, or about what's happening right now, or what activists are saying. I'm talking about what the world will be like as the population continues to grow, and growing, it is. We will run out of food and space if we keep going like this. Take the time line out as far as you like. 500 years? 5000 years?

I assume you're not getting it unless your argument is that we're not ever going to have a population problem.

 

[ScottySatan]

I'm not convinced that's fair actually. A lot of medical research is more about quality of life that simple longevity. We've become pretty good at having the ability to just keep people alive - in a lot of cases we could theoretically do it almost indefinitely. Keeping people active, healthy and happy is the challenge that's really being addressed now.

Of course much of that focuses on the West (where the money is). Frankly if the primary interest was in actually saving lives, there'd be a lot more investment in the developing world than there is.

I don't think new medical research is a major factor in global populations. The biggest increase is in the developing nations where, among other things, they're getting access to our medical research of decades ago. One of the major issues with addressing global population growth is that the increase is low, even stagnant in Western nations. That makes it difficult to sell the concept of the problem here.

well, most medical research shows that quality of life = longevity.

Japan and Korea are two of the most productive centers of medical biology. It's not about being western.

I' not sure what you mean by your last paragraph. Are you trying to say that recent medical research has not decreased mortality and morbidity of human disease?

 

[ScottySatan]

Here's the strange thing.

In countries with well developed medicine, the birth rate is low, while in the countries with poor medicine, the birth rate is high.

So I don't think that's the problem. Perhaps by increasing medical help, we actually decrease population growth? It seems like it. Maybe it's because people with good health and surviving children aren't as eager to make more children?

Essentially, what I'm saying is that good medicine is not in conflict with population growth, but rather possibly is the answer to reduce it.

Also, the rate of increase has gone down, i.e. it's still increasing but not as fast anymore:

Malthus wasn't quite right. We know today that industrial countries tend to have a more balanced growth than developing or under-developed countries. Malthus missed some parameters.

I think that it's possible one day for political borders to not control migration or flow of medical technology.