Worldwide Immigration Emergency (it's about overshoot)

[icehorse]

I am not entirely on board with you re forced migration in coming decades though we could agree that climate change is inevitable, relentless, and will happen regardless of what we humans do. And that climate change will certainly have an effect on humankind.

I hope you can agree that Greenland's and Antarctica's glaciers are melting? If we take ONLY Greenland's glaciers, the math is that when all of Greenland's glaciers melt, the sea level around the world will rise about 20 feet. Simple math. Now all we have to do is look at a map of the world and figure out how many people live near an ocean AND who live only a few feet above sea level. That number is around a BILLION. Again, simple math.

For the most part, those billion people will have to move.

I appreciated an essay by Bjorn Lomborg who spelled out the tremendous cost of futilely trying to change the climate or stop climate change vs the cost to humankind if the climate models turn out as predicted from how to the end of this century and we do nothing.

Yeah, Bjorn is well known, and he talks a good game. Now I don't know what his motivations really are, but his actions and talks are completely in line with someone who is a shill for the energy industry. He is correct that efforts ot minimize climate change would be extremely expensive. For the sake of discussion I'd be willing to accept his financial estimates. But he's simply wrong about the implications of staying the current course. That path will be costlier still

That said, there is no doubt that science will make some discoveries that will help. But nowhere nearly enough.

Certainly the seven billion humans added to the world population since the beginning of the Industrial Revolution has had an effect on various environments. But short of massive genocide which no moral people would suggest, much less condone, we humans are given huge capacity to figure out how to establish and maintain quality of life within the environment we live.

If we can learn to do that, massive migrations would likely not be necessary.

How about an idea something like this:

- Every woman who reaches menopause having had 0 babies gets a $500,000 retirement payment.
- Every woman who reaches menopause having had only 1 baby gets $250,000.

No penalties for anyone, no genocide, only bonuses.

 

[Valjean]

Okay so we are in agreement as to the situation that exists now and thank you.

I am not entirely on board with you re forced migration in coming decades though we could agree that climate change is inevitable, relentless, and will happen regardless of what we humans do. And that climate change will certainly have an effect on humankind.

I appreciated an essay by Bjorn Lomborg who spelled out the tremendous cost of futilely trying to change the climate or stop climate change vs the cost to humankind if the climate models turn out as predicted from how to the end of this century and we do nothing.

https://www.wsj.com/articles/follow-the-science-leads-to-ruin-climate-environment-policy-3f427c05?mod=opinion_lead_pos5

Think how much we Earthlings have advanced technology in just the last 50 years and we will almost certainly continue to accelerate that progress in the next 50 years. What if we poured all the massive funding now said to be going into preventing climate change into ways that humankind can adapt to/adjust to/profit from climate change? Adjust food crops according to changing weather patterns. Find ways to mitigate problems that changing weather patterns cause. Develop on a large scale efficient ways to make ocean water potable for plant, animal/human consumption.

Certainly the seven billion humans added to the world population since the beginning of the Industrial Revolution has had an effect on various environments. But short of massive genocide which no moral people would suggest, much less condone, we humans are given huge capacity to figure out how to establish and maintain quality of life within the environment we live.

If we can learn to do that, massive migrations would likely not be necessary.

How could we maximize utilization of the planet's resources and still retain the biodiversity that maintains the planet's ecosystem?

 

[Heyo]

How could we maximize utilization of the planet's resources and still retain the biodiversity that maintains the planet's ecosystem?

We already have over-maxed the utilization of resources, and we already are loosing biodiversity.
To optimize resource utilization, one goal is to reduce human population on Earth to about 2 billion.

 

[Foxfyre]

How could we maximize utilization of the planet's resources and still retain the biodiversity that maintains the planet's ecosystem?

We cannot control changing biodiversity that will occur due to climate change if we cannot control the climate. Once dinosaurs and other massive creatures roamed the Earth but became instinct without any participation from humankind. The Earth ecology continued quite nicely without them. There were once billions of passenger pigeons and humankind is mostly culpable in its extinction. I do not at all advocate hunting anything into extinction but the truth is, all species on Earth are surviving quite efficiently without passenger pigeons. But biodiversity was definitely changed with their demise along with all the other thousands and thousands of species that once populated the Earth and no longer do. And what remains is still here and surviving nicely.

The best we can do is enforce laws that prevent us from hunting other creatures into extinction or needlessly destroying plant life into extinction. In my home state effort is made to protect the habitat of a rare silvery minnow but that protection comes at a cost of denying irrigation water to many farmers/ranchers who depend on the river the minnows live in. Would the world really be devastated by the loss of a few thousand minnows if people were the first consideration? I don't know the answer to that. But I tend to think if we do what we can to be responsible and honorable in our stewardship of the Earth God gave us, He'll take care of the rest.

But I don't believe in order to be responsible and honorable that we have to allow our country to be overrun by migrants who come here for no other reason than they want to be here for whatever advantage they can get. Far better to develop resources that we can effectively utilize and teach others to do the same so that they can stay home and improve their own situation where they are.

 

[Valjean]

We cannot control changing biodiversity that will occur due to climate change if we cannot control the climate. Once dinosaurs and other massive creatures roamed the Earth but became instinct without any participation from humankind. The Earth ecology continued quite nicely without them. There were once billions of passenger pigeons and humankind is mostly culpable in its extinction. I do not at all advocate hunting anything into extinction but the truth is, all species on Earth are surviving quite efficiently without passenger pigeons. But biodiversity was definitely changed with their demise along with all the other thousands and thousands of species that once populated the Earth and no longer do. And what remains is still here and surviving nicely.

The best we can do is enforce laws that prevent us from hunting other creatures into extinction or needlessly destroying plant life into extinction. In my home state effort is made to protect the habitat of a rare silvery minnow but that protection comes at a cost of denying irrigation water to many farmers/ranchers who depend on the river the minnows live in. Would the world really be devastated by the loss of a few thousand minnows if people were the first consideration? I don't know the answer to that. But I tend to think if we do what we can to be responsible and honorable in our stewardship of the Earth God gave us, He'll take care of the rest.

But I don't believe in order to be responsible and honorable that we have to allow our country to be overrun by migrants who come here for no other reason than they want to be here for whatever advantage they can get. Far better to develop resources that we can effectively utilize and teach others to do the same so that they can stay home and improve their own situation where they are.

We do control biodiversity. We destroy habitat, migration corridors, water and food sources. Extinction rates are soaring, and we're the cause. Organisms are not surviving quite nicely. Species Extinction Rate Hundreds of Times Higher Than in Past 10 Million Years, Warns Secretary-General Observance Message, Urging Action to End Biodiversity Loss by 2030 | Meetings Coverage and Press Releases

It takes millions of years for the ecosphere to stabilize after a mass extinction, such as the asteroid caused extinction event of 66M years ago you mentioned. We're now at the beginning of a sixth mass extinction.

Organisms exist in a web of interdependance. Alter one species and others are altered, as well. Degrees of interdependence vary.
Climate is created and maintained largely by the biosphere, ie: by the planet's life forms. O2, CO2 and CH4 levels are regulated by living things.
Maintaining the ecological balance is important. Life on Earth can thrive without humans. Human's can't thrive without an intact biosphere.

The silvery minnow may not be a keystone species, but it's part of a web of interdependence. We've had a drought for the past 20 or 30 years. Rainfall has diminished, human water usage has increased. You've seen the river in midsummer.
The farmers can change; nature -- not so much. Maintaining the status quo at the expense of biodiversity is hazardous.

The migrants aren't overrunning us, and they're economically beneficial. They flee the conditions we created in their countries.

"Develop resources?" What does that entail?

 

[Foxfyre]

We do control biodiversity. We destroy habitat, migration corridors, water and food sources. Extinction rates are soaring, and we're the cause. Organisms are not surviving quite nicely. Species Extinction Rate Hundreds of Times Higher Than in Past 10 Million Years, Warns Secretary-General Observance Message, Urging Action to End Biodiversity Loss by 2030 | Meetings Coverage and Press Releases

It takes millions of years for the ecosphere to stabilize after a mass extinction, such as the asteroid caused extinction event of 66M years ago you mentioned. We're now at the beginning of a sixth mass extinction.

Organisms exist in a web of interdependance. Alter one species and others are altered, as well. Degrees of interdependence vary.
Climate is created and maintained largely by the biosphere, ie: by the planet's life forms. O2, CO2 and CH4 levels are regulated by living things.
Maintaining the ecological balance is important. Life on Earth can thrive without humans. Human's can't thrive without an intact biosphere.

The silvery minnow may not be a keystone species, but it's part of a web of interdependence. We've had a drought for the past 20 or 30 years. Rainfall has diminished, human water usage has increased. You've seen the river in midsummer.
The farmers can change; nature -- not so much. Maintaining the status quo at the expense of biodiversity is hazardous.

The migrants aren't overrunning us, and they're economically beneficial. They flee the conditions we created in their countries.

"Develop resources?" What does that entail?

In my opinion we affect biodiversity in what we humans do, but we do not control it except on a very limited scale. Fish farms replace wild caught fish which some thinks save the natural biodiversity while others claim that farm raised fish are less healthy or perhaps less humane than wild caught. (That is not intended to be anything other than an illustration of the whole thing and not an invitation to discuss fish farming vs wild caught.)

Certainly we change our environment when we raise large groups of cattle or sheep where once mostly deer and elk grazed. And also when we plow up thousands of acres of land to grow various crops to feed humans and their animals and for other purposes. But humans are also an Earth species and will do what humans do as all other species do. Because of our higher intellect we are less predictable and less bound to instinctual behaviors than other creatures on earth and therefore have a larger impact per capita than most.

But it took homo sapiens roughly 200,000 years to number one billion on Earth. And it has taken only roughly 300 years to go from one billion to more than eight billion people. That of course has had a huge impact on the ecology that all those people occupy. But short of massive genocide we all have to live here. I trust human ingenuity to allow us to do so.

Yes, we should be responsible stewards of the Earth and all the creatures on it since we are the only species with ability to care about such things. But I'm pretty sure the universe, our galaxy, our solar system, our planet will continue to do what it wants pretty much without any help or interference from us.

 

[Valjean]

The ecosystem is not so robust as you seem to think. Species are like Jenga blocks. Removal destabilizes. Removal of a key block can collapse the whole structure.
Fish farms feed their fish with wild caught fish. Efficiency is not 100%. It takes multiple wild caught fish to produce a farm fish.

When we use resources faster than they can be replaced we invite disaster. When we profligately destroy habitat we invite disaster. What humans do is not "as all other species do." We've removed ourselves from the system and are now breeding, using resources and destroying habitat unsustainably. We're functioning like a global infection.

We can both reduce our numbers and our impact without resorting to overt genocide, but our tribalism seems to preclude this. We continue to fight each other and work for short-term benefit rather than see the big picture and take responsible actions. If this continues it's tantamount to an unintended genocide.