Population Control, anyone?

[AlexBP]

What I don't understand is why you presented point 2 as though it represented all that I said about the China one-child policy. I have said much more about that. You have simply chopped that part out, and pretended what you wrote represented the extent of my response.

I have done no such thing. You've said that your policy would only be implemented "if the world's people agree". I think the world's people agreeing on such a thing is impossible and sterilization advocates have never bothered about whether anyone agrees with them after they get power. They only pretend to care about agreement before they get power. I've made this clear many times. Secondly you say "we should arrest the murderers", to which I replied in #253:

Murder is already illegal in China ... Nonetheless the murder of young girls resulting from the one-child policy continues, sometimes by abortion and sometimes by more old-fashioned methods. Hence we know that your plan to make the murder of infant girls illegal would not work, because it is already not working. It is therefore safe to assume that worldwide sterilization at gunpoint or any other plan to forcibly restrict childbirths would lead to the murder of millions of girls, and yet you remain apparently okay with that.
​

You haven't responded to that. There is no reasonable way that you can pretend I haven't responded to all of what you said on the issue of infanticide in China; I have.

And also, I don't understand how you know your point number 1 is true. How do you know that millions have been murdered? It has been deducted that many must have been murdered or aborted, since there are less girl babies. How many of these acts were acts that would be considered murder in the USA? How many were early term abortions?

On several previous occasions I've referred to Mara Hvistendahl's book Unnatural Selection: Choosing Boys Over Girls, and the Consequences of a World Full of Men. That books documents the facts about China's one-child policy and its effects with great care. As for abortion, you've previously said that you didn't want to discuss that in this thread, and I've tried to respect that, so I'm puzzled why you are now trying to start a debate about that. Obviously whether these "acts" would be considered murder in the USA depends on which person in the USA was doing the considering. But even if we agreed that abortion for sex selection was a-okay, the lopsided gender ratio in China is causing many serious social problems, as I mentioned in post #267. Unless we want to bring these problems to other nations, we don't want to implement a one-child policy worldwide.

And if abortions are happening because ultrasounds say to expect a girl, do you then want to eliminate ultrasounds? If you are going to be consistent in your objection to a particular policy because it might lead to an increased number of abortions designed to determine the sex of one's children, are you consistent in decrying the evils of ultrasounds also?

I'd decry the evil of abortion, of social biases that treat infant girls as less than human, and most of all of the one-child policy. I obviously wouldn't decry ultrasounds because those are not a policy; they're a technology. One doesn't respond to drunk driving deaths by decrying cars, but rather by decrying bad things people do which lead to deaths.

 

[AlexBP]

I have made it clear that the one-child policy should be implemented only if it saves billions. If the side-effects are worse than the cure, then we should not adopt the cure.

And how will we know beforehand what how many lives the "cure" will save and how many it will kill via "side-effects"? Obviously the answer isn't "study", since you've made it clear that you won't accept the results of study on the effects of China's one-child policy or many other topics.

One case does not prove something always happens.

No it doesn't. Technically speaking there's never scientific "proof" of anything. There's only observation of what happens, and when we see something that appears to happen in every single cases we eventually assume it's the rule. In every case where someone's head gets chopped off, that person has died, so we assume it's a rule head-chopping always leads to death. This may be wrong. Perhaps tomorrow someone will get his head chopped off and still survive. But only a fool would plan to chop his head off and simply assume that he's going to survive. Would you not agree?

Likewise in every case I know of where a government has implemented forced sterilizations, the result has been a campaign of oppression directed at minorities and the least powerful members of society. (I've previously listed the five examples that I know of: the American and British eugenics programs, the Nazis, China's one-child policy, and India's short-lived sterilization program.) So it's wise to assume it's the rule that forced sterilization always becomes a campaign of oppression. One who proposes a forced sterilization program and simply assumes that it won't work out like the previous forced sterilization programs would be like the aforementioned fool who plans to chop his head off and assumes the result will be different this time.

 

[AlexBP]

AlexBP, if you had to choose between mandatory sterilization after childbirth or letting billions starve, which would you choose? You must have been asked that question 200 times in this thread, and you have refused to answer. And so we are going to have to guess your answer based on what you have said.

Obviously asking the question one more time is not going to help. You have refused to answer in the past, and we all know you will continue to refuse. So when we make our best guess as to what your answer is, we are not trying to put words into your mouth. We have given you many, many chances to answer if you really wanted. Since you refuse to answer, we are going to need to look at your words and guess what your answer is.

Who you mean we, Kemosabe?

Previously I asked whether anybody besides yourself was having trouble understanding my answer to the question that you've asked me ad nauseum. Nobody said that they were having such trouble. Thus it seems that everyone other than yourself thinks I have given a satisfactory answer. If you think I haven't answered, then you should use the singular pronoun "I" rather then the plural pronoun "we" when discussing the problem. You should also consider, since you're all alone in this issue, that the problem may lie in your reading comprehension skills rather than in my response to you.

You never get tired of bringing up this subject. Over and over you have told us how much you hate mandatory sterilization. But as you are well aware, the only time mandatory sterilization is proposed in this thread is if it saves billions. So the only way you can possibly be against the mandatory sterilization proposed on this thread is if you would prefer the starvation of billions.

I don't recall you ever saying how bad it would be to let billions starve. So since you repeatedly condemn mandatory sterilization, and since the mandatory sterilization proposed here is to take effect only if it would save billions from starvation, you seem to be saying you would prefer to see billions die of starvation rather than initiate a mandatory sterilization policy. So we are going to need to guess that you prefer mass starvation over mandatory sterilization.

What you mean we, Kemosabe?

Does anyone other than yourself make this assumption about where I stand on the issue of mandatory sterilization to prevent the starvation of billions? If not, then you should again swap out the plural pronoun "we" and replace it with the singular pronoun "I".

If you've looked at your position in life and decided that the best thing you can do with your time on earth is to anonymously log onto an internet message board and post a series of lies about me over and over (and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over) then you're free to spend your life doing that. Everyone who has read this thread knows what I've actually said. Over a dozen posters have taken my side on the issue of sterilization at gunpoint; nobody has taken your side.

 

[doubtingmerle]

I don't believe that billions will starve if we don't implement a one-child policy. If someone wanted me to believe that, he or she should provide some evidence.

Sir, I have provided the evidence that the planet could face severe overpoulation in the future which could lead to mass starvation many times in this thread.

I post 258 I quoted this book:

Without hydrocarbons, much of the world's farmlands would quickly become unproductive. But hydrocarbons are a nonrenewable resource, and growing evidence indicates that world hydrocarbon production will peak around 2010, followed by an irreversible decline. The impact on our agricultural system could be catastrophic. As the cost of hydrocarbon production increases, food could be priced out of the reach of the majority of our population. Hunger could become commonplace in every corner of the world, including your own neighborhood. [Eating Fossil Fuels, p 2.]​

In post 260 I quoted this book:

The twin forces of rising petroleum costs and inaccessible freshwater are likely to cause grain prices to increase dramatically, beyond the doubling and tripling of prices seen in recent years. The consequence will likely be starvation among the world's poorest people, who will be unable to afford to buy food in the marketplace. In mid-2009, the World Economic Forum issued a report stating that in fewer than twenty years the world may face freshwater shortages so severe that “global food production could crater” because the world could “lose the equivalent of the entire grain production of the US and India combined.” The report warned that half of the global population will be affected by water shortages, millions will die, and water wars will increase over diminishing supplies. (William Ryerson in The Post Carbon Reader)
​

In the same post I also quoted this book:

for sustainability, global population will have to be reduced from the current 6.32 billion people to 2 billion--a reduction of 68% or over two-thirds. The end of this decade could see spiraling food prices without relief. And the coming decade could see massive starvation on a global level such as never experienced before by the human race. (Michael Rupert in Confronting Collapse: The Crisis of Energy and Money in a Post Peak Oil World)
​

Each of these books provides a detailed analysis of the problem, with numberous endnotes. The information was certainly made available to you if you had been interested.

I also wrote:

Our problem is that we not only need to advance in technology to keep up with world population growth, but also to account for the losses in resources that have occured in the last 50 years. How will we water our fields when the undergound aquifiers and glaciers are gone? How will we get phosphorous for fertilizer, when easily accessible supplies are gone? (And no, the answer is not that we will just put molybdenum into fertilizer instead.) How will we get nitrogen into fertilizer when supplies of natural gas used to retrieve nitrogen are depleted? How will we power combines without diesel fuel? With batteries the size of small asteroids? Where will we grow oranges, if much of the tropics dry up? Where will we get fish, after the oceans have been overfished? Those are some of the problems we will face.
These are the problems we face. If you will look at some of the sources I mentioned, you will see how these are huge problems for an expanding population.
​

Those are the issues we face, and I have been explaining to you why they are a problem. You can read more about them in the books I mentioned or at the oil drum website.

In post 151 I quoted another good source:

The more we degrade the planet, and the more we build up the average consumption per person, the greater the danger that we will overwhelm the planet and risk collapse. See Amazon.com: Collapse: How Societies Choose to Fail or Succeed: Revised Edition (9780143117001): Jared Diamond:
​

That books details how past societies have collapsed, and how the same could happen to us.
.
In post 75 I reference the following books on my Kindle which are also good sources for peak oil:

Fleeing Vesuvius by Richard Douthwaite and Gillian Fallon
The Crash Course by Chris Martenson
The End of Growth by Richard Heinberg
The Econtechnic Future John Michael Greer
​

I also recommend The Party's Over by Richard Heinberg and The Last Oil Shock by David Strahan.

In post 77 I explained why we probably do not have as much oil available as many people think.

Sure, there is this little place in the Middle East called Saudi Arabia--I'm sure you heard of it--that appears to have far less oil then expected. Matthew Simmons studied their engineering journals in detail, and documented how they are currently using secondary recovery methods to get out the remaining oil. If they really have as much oil as originally expected, then it should be freely flowing without resorting to the secondary recovery methods normally used at the end of an oil well's lifecycle. Simmons tells about it in his book, Twilight in the Dessert. Amazon.com: Twilight in the Desert: The Coming Saudi Oil Shock and the World Economy (9780471790181): Matthew R. Simmons: Books . Of course we don't yet know what the final oil total will be, but it looks like it will be far less than expected.

A recent leak from Saudi Arabia confirms his conclusions, stating that we may only get 60% of the expected oil out of Saudi Arabia: WikiLeaks: Saudi Arabia Overstated Its Oil Reserves : The Two-Way : NPR.
​

In post 185 I detail a statement signed by 1500 scientists warning about the dangers to our environment. They warned:

We the undersigned, senior members of the world's scientific community, hereby warn all humanity of what lies ahead. A great change in our stewardship of the earth and the life on it, is required, if vast human misery is to be avoided and our global home on this planet is not to be irretrievably mutilated.
​

In post 194 I mentioned some webpages:

The Oil Drum | Population: Thinking about our Future

The Oil Drum | Peak Oil, Carrying Capacity and Overshoot: Population, the Elephant in the Room - Revisited

The Oil Drum: Campfire | Population Growth Must Stop
​

And as always, I have been asking for the scientific community to take on these issues in more detail. All of this needs to be studied more, and put together to clearly tell us where we stand in the future.

In post 234 I discussed phosphorus limitaions:

As with all mineral reserves, we never know exactly how much is out there, or what new techniques may increase our efficiency. Finding the last bits of reserves and refining low-grade sources are extremely energy intensive, and energy is something we will be running short in. Will we be able to maintain phosphorous levels for crops, when we are use energy intensive methods on low grade sources, in the middle of energy shortages?
For more on phosphorous, see
The Oil Drum: Campfire | How do we maintain adequate phosphorus and potassium levels for crops?
The Oil Drum | Peak Phosphorus
The Oil Drum | Peak phosphorus: Quoted reserves vs. production history
​

And on and on. I have explained these things repeatedly to you. (the original posts had hyperlinks that did not come through when I copied to this post).

We are living in a world that is rapidly consuming our supplies of oil and other substances, and is rapidly polluting the environment in unsustainable means. When the cheap supplies are gone, and the planet has been polluted, the earth probably will not be hold nearly as many people as it can hold today. If you wanted to learn more about it, you could go to any of those sources.

And my emphasis has always been that I want to see further study on this, not that I am absolutely sure I am right.

So yes, I have explained why I think this is a problem.

 

[doubtingmerle]

I see we've found something else we can agree on. The federal government, which you've so often defended, has indeed set up Medicare and Social Security in a way that guarantees a future disaster. Moreover, the governments in every wealthy nation, and some not-so-wealthy nations, have done basically the same thing; only the details vary. So--leaving aside the question of why we'd trust such stupid governments to implement population control--we agree that we're facing a financial disaster because of this.

Are you opposed to Medicare and Social Security? And you are aware that before we had Social Security starvation and hypothermia were leading causes of death among the elderly?

I absolutely did not say we are facing a financial disaster because we had Social Security and Medicare. We are facing financial troubles because we are quickly using up the cheapest supplies of oil and other resources. In the years ahead we will have only expensive raw materials that will require a lot of energy to retrieve. In the meantime we have borrowed billions, hoping that good times will continue and we can pay it off. We were wrong to borrow all that money. The good economic times are coming to the end. But we still have those huge debts.

In Greece and Italy this financial disaster is hitting right now. In the USA it will it will hit over the next generation. (Some state governments, such as California, have already gotten a taste of it in their pension funds.) So a sensible approach would be to try minimizing the damage from this disaster. And to minimize the damage, we need some people who are able to do some work. Any policy that drastically cuts the number of young people, whether it be sterilization at gunpoint or something else, would take us in exactly the wrong direction, would it not?

Can you list for me the names of all countries that are experiencing a shortage of workers? Everywhere I look I see unemployment, not overempoyment.

Greece has an unemployment rate of 18%. Greek unemployment rises to 18.2 pct in October | Reuters . Italy has an unemployment rate around 9%. Unemployment in Europe (monthly) - Google Public Data Explorer So neither of these countries seem to be suffering from a lack of workers. Adding more available workers into a country that cannot employ the people they already have is not going to fix their problems.

 

[doubtingmerle]

I want to know whether there's any instance in which a national government has implemented sterilization at gunpoint or any intrusion on privacy comparable to it which the government has gotten the results it wanted. It seems a simple enough question, so I don't see why you're having so much trouble answering it.

Large government programs have indeed worked, yes. The world wide effort to fight murder, for instance, has worked to a large extent, and has limited murder.

And government programs to get rid of Small Pox have worked.

Preventing overpopulation may be the biggest task governments has ever undertaken. So I don't know if there is anything comparable in scale.

What is your point? That it might not work out so well? We have all agreed that if the consequences are worse than the cure, then don't do it. But you just ignore that I say that, don't you?

Has it really now? Did stimulus passed in February of 2009. Now look at this graph:

So much for the claim that the economy has been gaining jobs since the stimulus passed. On Jan. 9, 2009, Obama's top economic advisor released a report stating that without a stimulus, unemployment would peak at 9% in 2010. His allies in Congress projected an even lower figure, 8.3%. We passed a stimulus and unemployment rose above ten percent.

You forgot to mention that employment was in freefall in 2008. The rate of job loss hit a bottom shortly after the stimulus, and started a climb back up. Here are the changes in employment from month to month.

http://data.bls.gov/timeseries/ces0000000001?output_view=net_1mth

 

[doubtingmerle]

And how will we know beforehand what how many lives the "cure" will save and how many it will kill via "side-effects"? Obviously the answer isn't "study", since you've made it clear that you won't accept the results of study on the effects of China's one-child policy or many other topics.

Huh? Where did I ever say I will not accept the results of study on the situation in China?

How many murders occurred as the result of the one child policy? By "murder" I mean murder as defined in most modern democracies. As most modern democracies do not classify early term abortion as murder, please do not include that in your figures.

And how do you know that the abortions that occurred in China have been because of the one child policy? Since the Chinese have a strong preference for boys, would they have aborted girls anyway to get the children they wanted? How many more abortions occurred as a result of the one child policy, and how do you know that?

And how do you know that effects in China would apply in other countries who do not have as strong a preference to have baby boys?

You have not answered any of this. You have not shown convincing evidence of how many would be murdered if a one child policy was implemented.

I am asking for any decision on population control to be based on scientific study. See post 486.

Technically speaking there's never scientific "proof" of anything. There's only observation of what happens, and when we see something that appears to happen in every single cases we eventually assume it's the rule.

If you flip a coin 5 times and come up with 5 heads, then science does not say that all coin tosses will always be heads. If there is reason to believe a future case is different, there may be different results.

In every case where someone's head gets chopped off, that person has died, so we assume it's a rule head-chopping always leads to death. This may be wrong. Perhaps tomorrow someone will get his head chopped off and still survive. But only a fool would plan to chop his head off and simply assume that he's going to survive. Would you not agree?

Yes. It is a bad idea to let somebody chop one's head off.

Likewise in every case I know of where a government has implemented forced sterilizations, the result has been a campaign of oppression directed at minorities and the least powerful members of society. (I've previously listed the five examples that I know of: the American and British eugenics programs, the Nazis, China's one-child policy, and India's short-lived sterilization program.) So it's wise to assume it's the rule that forced sterilization always becomes a campaign of oppression.

No, it does not follow that because previous uses of this technique have been evil, that all future uses will be evil.

Remember that the only mandatory sterilization mentioned in this thread is to take place if otherwise billions would die. If we were in that situation, and we either had to come up with a one child policy or see billions die of starvation (and there were no other available options) which would you choose in that situation? Would you tell the future starving billions that you had to let them die because this argument made it impossible for anybody ever to do a one child policy right?

One who proposes a forced sterilization program and simply assumes that it won't work out like the previous forced sterilization programs would be like the aforementioned fool who plans to chop his head off and assumes the result will be different this time.

There are laws of nature that say if you have no head, you will die.

There is no law of nature that says if you need to have a one child policy to prevent the deaths of billions, that the one-child policy would not work.

 

[AlexBP]

And my emphasis has always been that I want to see further study on this, not that I am absolutely sure I am right.

No, actually your emphasis has often been on the fact that you're absolutely sure that you're right. For example, in post $439, you said this:

If it is found that we need to reduce to a one child policy--and I am quite certain we will find that--then the people should be informed about that and the people should decide to do something about it. [Emphasis mine.]
​

You've said similar things many times during the thread. So why on earth do you keep pretending that you've said you might be wrong, when a quick trip back through the thread shows that you've often said that you're certain you're right?

So yes, I have explained why I think this is a problem.

Yes, you have explained why you think this is a problem. You haven't explained why I should think this is problem or why anyone else should think this is a problem. There are many things that some people think are problems: Bilderberg Group taking over the world, Mayan Calendar doomsday later this year, Federal Reserve secretly destroying the country, space aliens abducting people, and the list goes on. For all of these threats and many others, there are numerous books and websites asserting that the threat is real. I do not have the time and energy to worry about everything that "could" cause billions of deaths. I instead limit myself to those things for which there's a convincing reason to believe that it will cause a major problem.

Now you're warned me repeatedly to not trust extrapolations. (See post #258, #223, and others.) According to a link that you yourself posted, extrapolation "attempts to predict future data by relying on historical data" and "is fraught with risk because some unforseeable factor almost always intervenes". By that definition, clearly anyone who comes along and gives predictions about the number of people who will be starving to death or the price of food or whatnot at some distant future point is engaging in extrapolation, and according to your own words should not be trusted. According to the link that you yourself posted, "some unforseeable factor almost always intervenes" and renders the prediction inaccurate. Hence repeating the same predictions over and over doesn't guarantee that they will be accurate.

Many people have pointed out that this isn't a new debate. Since the 18th century some people have been predicting global famine and disaster due to shortfalls of food, fuel, fertilizer and so forth. Many such false prophets have been listed in this thread and many more could be. It's safe to say that at any date in the last couple centuries at least, there's been someone saying that global supplies of food, fuel and fertilizer will soon run out, and he's turned out to be wrong. In response to that, all you do is keep insisting that your personal prediction that global supplies of food, fuel, and fertilizer will be correct, even though it's identical to countless failed prophecies of years past. A solid reason why your personal doomsday prophecy should be treated differently from the past two centuries of doomsday prophecies about global shortfalls of food, fuel, and fertilizer seems to be elusive.

Before I've asked you two questions: how many people have ever died from a global food shortage, and how many have ever died from famine in a free country? I believe the answers to be zero and zero. The second question is particularly instructive because it shows that in free countries, people have always successfully innovated to maintain the needed supply of food and other things. As mentioned before, in the USA yields have increased steadily at 1 to 2 percent per years for generations, and this process hasn't been stopped by big changes in fuel or fertilizer prices or anything else. New technologies that will be able to deal with any future shortfall in fuel are also in existence or moving through the development pipeline. Whenever I first mentioned the topic of new technologies, you responded by saying that "In terms of patents, things seem to be declining. Other than computers and electronics, there have been few changes in the last 30 years." I easily showed that to be the exact opposite of the truth. Since then, whenever the topic of new technologies has been mentioned, you've responded with juvenile put-downs, changing the subject, or trying to put the burden of proof on me. But if you want us to become "quite certain" that replicating China's murderous one-child policy is a good idea, obviously the burden of proof is on you.

 

[doubtingmerle]

Previously I asked whether anybody besides yourself was having trouble understanding my answer to the question that you've asked me ad nauseum. Nobody said that they were having such trouble. Thus it seems that everyone other than yourself thinks I have given a satisfactory answer. If you think I haven't answered, then you should use the singular pronoun "I" rather then the plural pronoun "we" when discussing the problem. You should also consider, since you're all alone in this issue, that the problem may lie in your reading comprehension skills rather than in my response to you.

And we all have noticed that not a single person knew whether you thought mandatory sterilization or mass starvation of billions is worse. The reason nobody knows that answer is because you refuse to answer.

But you do post words that seem to indicate you think mandatory sterilization is worse than mass starvation of billions. When I say it appears you think mandatory sterilization is worse, you refuse to say that you instead think mass starvation of billions is worse.

Sir, the only mandatory sterilization plan on this thread is if needed to save billions. It is being proposed only if there are two choices, either mandatory sterilization or mass starvation of billions. You have been told that many times.

Since you have repeatedly opposed the mandatory sterilization proposed on this thread, and since that proposal is suggested to take place only if there is no choice other than to let billions die of starvation, then your words seem say that you would choose the starvation of billions over mandatory sterilization if you had to choose between those two options.

But if you want to correct that inference, please do. If you had to choose between those two, which is worse, mandatory sterilization or mass starvation of billions?

If you've looked at your position in life and decided that the best thing you can do with your time on earth is to anonymously log onto an internet message board and post a series of lies about me over and over (and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over) then you're free to spend your life doing that.

I am not posting lies. You clearly have opposed the mandatory sterilzation mentioned on this thread. The mandatory sterilization mentioned on this thread is proposed only if necessary to save billions form starvation. So your words infer that you think mandatory sterilization is worse than mass starvation.

If you think mandatory sterilization is not worse than mass starvation of billions, please feel free to tell us which you think is worse.

Over a dozen posters have taken my side on the issue of sterilization at gunpoint

I proposed mandatory sterilization if there was no other choice but to let billions die of starvation.

And no, there have not been a dozen people who said that if given that choice, they would choose mass starvation of billions instead of mandatory sterilization.

If any have taken the side that mass starvation of billions is probably worse than mandatory sterilization as suggested here, then they have taken my side.

 

[AlexBP]

I want to know whether there's any instance in which a national government has implemented sterilization at gunpoint or any intrusion on privacy comparable to it which the government has gotten the results it wanted. It seems a simple enough question, so I don't see why you're having so much trouble answering it.

Large government programs have indeed worked, yes. The world wide effort to fight murder, for instance, has worked to a large extent, and has limited murder.

That fails on two hugely obvious counts. First of all, outlawing murder is not an intrusion on privacy comparable to sterilization at gunpoint. Outlawing murder is within the proper role of government because it defends the basic rights of individuals, while sterilization at gunpoint. I and others have explained this to you ad nauseum. What do you hope to accomplish by repeating rhetorical tricks that have already been debunked many times in this thread?

Secondly, there has never been a "world wide effort to fight murder". Efforts to stop murder are generally done by local police forces.

And government programs to get rid of Small Pox have worked.

That fails for the same two reasons. First of all, voluntary small pox vaccinations are not an intrusion on privacy comparable to sterilization at gunpoint. Secondly, while governments provided some funding for that effort, the main support came from health organizations, non-profits, and companies. If you read the story of Bill Foege, the scientist who came up with the "ring vaccination" technique that made smallpox eradication possible, you'll learn that governments often got in the way of his efforts and he had to work around them.

What is your point? That it might not work out so well?

No, my point is that "it"--i.e. sterilization at gunpoint--is guaranteed to be a major disaster. I don't see why that's so hard for you to understand.

We have all agreed that if the consequences are worse than the cure, then don't do it. But you just ignore that I say that, don't you?

Previously you posted that and I did not ignore it, but rather posted this:

And how will we know beforehand what how many lives the "cure" will save and how many it will kill via "side-effects"?
​

 

[doubtingmerle]

No, actually your emphasis has often been on the fact that you're absolutely sure that you're right. For example, in post $439, you said this:

If it is found that we need to reduce to a one child policy--and I am quite certain we will find that--then the people should be informed about that and the people should decide to do something about it. [Emphasis mine.]
​

I have done extensive study on this. Based on that study, I am quite certain that the world is in trouble.

But I do not ask the world to go by my views. Rather, there should be a concentrated scientific effort to study this in detail as I have suggested. That study should all be put together, with recommendations on what we need to do. Then the people should act on that.

 

[doubtingmerle]

Yes, you have explained why you think this is a problem. You haven't explained why I should think this is problem or why anyone else should think this is a problem.

I think we should leave it at that. I have presented my case. You have presented your case. The interested reader can read this thread for himself, and use it as a starting point in his own study. There is simply no point in rehashing these points over again.

If anybody is interested in what I have said, then please go back and read my actual words. That is the only way you will know what I have actually said. Second hand accounts of what I said on this thread have often been less than accurate.

Goodbye to all. I hope some people found this discussion helpful.

Cheers!

 

[doubtingmerle]

Has anybody ever seen more deplorable behavior on this forum than AlexBP has displayed in this thread? Again and again he has demanded that this thread be hijacked to talk about mandatory sterilization. Nobody, nobody--nobody!--has wanted to talk about it but him. And why does he bring it up? He brings it up to make it look like that is my intent in this thread, and that I favor it in many circumstances, even with horrible consequences. He is lying. He knows that he is lying. I have told him again and again that this is not what I am saying. He just ignored what I say, and repeats the same lies over and over.

The mandatory sterilization mentioned on this thread was only one idea for the people of the world to consider if population was extending way beyond the capacity of the planet, and if otherwise billions would die. If otherwise billions would die. If otherwise billions would die. The only way AlexBP can be opposed to the mandatory sterilization posed in this thread if it he prefers the starvation of billions of people instead of the people of the world agreeing on a mandatory sterilization policy. If AlexBP prefers mass starvation over mandatory sterilization, then let him say so. He refuses to say that. If AlexBP prefers mandatory sterilization over the starvation of billions then let him say so. He refuses to say that (because if he admitted that mass starvation is worse, then his entire time was wasted here attacking a policy that he himself agrees with!)

So which way is it, AlexBP? Do you prefer the people of the world accepting a mandatory sterilization policy over mass starvation if those were the only two choices? Then say so! But if you prefer mass starvation over agreeing on a mandatory sterilization policy, then say so. But don't come here lying about people, and pretending that the mandatory sterilization policy mentioned here is anything other than what was actually said.

Or perhaps AlexBP did not like to discuss that hot potato issue. Fine. Then why did he, only he--only he--keep bringing it up? And why did he do it only to misrepresent others, with no attempt to actually tell us if he would prefer mandatory sterilization or mass starvation if faced with that issue?

AlexBP says he has answered that question, but we all know he is lying when he says that. Not one person has been able to find one place where he clearly says he prefers mass starvation over mandatory sterilization (although some of his writings hint this is his view), or one place where he clearly says he prefers mandatory sterilization over mass starvation. He has many loyal admirers, but not one has been able to find his answer to that question. Not one! Not one! And yet he insists he has answered!

I have made my position clear. For instance, in post 175 I wrote:

AlexBP, I have emphasized to you that I support the "mandatory sterilzation after childbirth if necessary as a last resort effort to prevent the mass starvation of billions of children if no better plan can be found.I have emphasized to you that this in no way indicates a desire for mandatory sterilization other than a last resort effort to save the lives of others. Nothing that is written on this thread should in anyway be interpreted as saying that I am for mandatory sterilization in any other condition. Any attempt to suggest that I support mandatory sterilization under any other condition is a complete and absolute misrepresentation of my position. And I have made it clear that this would be implemented only if the people of the world decided that this was the best.
​

I repeated that in post 425.
I repeated that in post 437.
I repeated that in post 454.
I repeated that in post 456.
I repeated that in post 457 .
I repeated that in post 459 .
I repeated that in post 481 .
I repeated that in post 505.
I repeated that in post 515.
I repeated that twice in post 523.
I repeated that twice in post 525.

How much stronger can I make it. Only if otherwise billions would die. Only if otherwise billions would die. Only if otherwise billions would die. I told him that repeatedly. He knew that. He knew he was lying about me. But he continued to misrepresent me, when I have emphasized over and over that I am not saying what he claims. That behavior is deplorable.

 

[dogs4thewin]

The thing is too that by in enlarge the nation where people are living longer are the nations where MOST families control their population themselves. The reason that the populations of North America and Europe (particularly western Europe) are getting older is that people are having fewer children and yet living longer. Those countries do not really need to have population controls, because as more people are making the choice to either A have FEWER children or in some cases NO children and yet live longer themselves, well the population on average WILL get older will it not?

 

[keith99]

I've answered this question again and again throughout the thread, but since you apparently think you can prove something by making me repeat myself, I will do so. In considering the question of whether to strip away people's individual freedom and give the government massive new powers over the lives of individuals in order to save billions of people, we need to consider what's to be gained and what's to be lost. On the one hand, we can be sure that no one will die if we preserve individual freedom. After all, how many famines have there ever been in free countries? On the other hand, we can be close to sure that if we strip away people's individual freedom and give the government massive new powers over the lives of individuals, this will cause an enormous number of people to die by starvation, just as happened in countries such as the Soviet Union, communist China, and Nazi Germany when they took away individual freedom. In those nations, tens of millions of people starved to death. If we were to implement policies similar to theirs on a worldwide scale, it would be reasonable to assume that the death toll would be vastly larger.

So to summarize: preserve freedom and no one dies of famine, even if certain doomsayers insist that a lot of people will die of famine. Take away freedom and a great many people will die of famine. All of human history backs me up on this analysis. Of the two options, I prefer freedom.

Is Ireland a free country?

 

[Billnew]

Well of course, nobody want to have to do that. But if the alternative is that billions die of starvation then wouldn't forced reduction of average family size be better?

If you had to choose one or the other which would you choose? Billions dying of starvation, or governments uniting in a plan to control population size?

There's always Soylent green or Logan's run.
Or take reality tv one giant step forward, offer big money for a death match, or the hunger games.

When countries industrialize, they tend to reduce the number of children. No longer does the family depend on having enough children to keep the family fed and they can afford birth control.