Korean Job Discussion Forums

[Senior]

This video is titled The Most IMPORTANT Video You'll Ever See.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0GySmzLw3zs&feature=related

I see it as what not to think about population growth.

To me, pop. growth means humans are an industrious, intelligent, loving and successful species. We want more polar bears and elephants, why isn't more humans a good thing? Why do we discriminate against our own species?

The guy in this video can only see a problem. When I see pop. growth, I see an opportunity. People have found a solution to every problem that has ever befell them. The obvious solution to the pop. problem is space travel. Obviously living on other planets is impossible right now, but many things we take for advantage today, would've seemed like magic to our grandparents.

My thesis is, that the solution to the "problem" of pop. growth is not killing people or allowing them to die, but to create more life and to create better life.

[detourne_me]

Population growth is a double edged sword. It's both a problem and an opportunity.
It's a problem becomes it makes sustainable human development REALLY hard to accomplish, but it's also an opportunity because it provides a massive workforce.

I just watched a new TED talks video last night about modern slavery.
Apparently there are around 27 million slaves currently in the world today. This is the most there have ever been, and the cheapest too. because of the 300% population growth worldwide in the last 60 years the price of owning a human has become comparable to owning a used car.

The only good news about this is... because of the immense population growth, slavery accounts for the smallest percentage of the total population and the smallest percentage of the total economy worldwide than it ever has in the past.

Personally I feel that the worth of human life is devalued as there are more of us now.

[Globutron]

That last sentence 'humans are devalued' is so true.

I mean, you, OP, have basically said 'I don't care that millions upon millions of people die every year as a result of overpopulation, because us westerners have it pretty sweet'.

You also say 'it's ok because the solution is to simply go into space and live elsewhere' - But if you read the physics of this thought, it CANNOT happen with what we have for hundreds, perhaps thousands of years. And the idea of going to another planet outside of the solar system? tens of thousands. The energy needed surpasses all that the entire earth combined can offer us.

We would need to learn to manipulate energy from our sun and other stars by a factor of 100%. In this time, billions of humans will have died horrible deaths due to population overgrowth.

Not to mention the wildlife that suffers as a result. Wildlife that has no less right to this planet than ourselves.

Now lets look at the opportunities. a huge workforce. Yes, to fit the desire of the huge population. Less population means we need less workforce.

Expanding our race - as the dawn of basic instinct. Sure, but the only way we can do this without killing ourselves off is by moving planet, which cannot be done for a long time, so really if we were decent, we'd wait it out until we could actually control it.

Bare in mind that MOST of the population growth, by the way, is in third world countries.


Edit - oh and a solution to everything that's every befell us? Think *that* one over again. The more we research, the more we are simply aware of what we *don't* know, or *can't* know, such as Heisenberg's 'Uncertainty principle'. One cannot solve what they can never know.

Ugh, I still have more to say. Going philosophical, we are successful only by how *we* define successful. No different than saying Kim Jong Il is successful because he can feed himself and breed.

Not telling you off or anything, but it's a pretty naive way - either that or selfish - to look at things. It's not being deliberately negative to see that the issues *worldwide* outweigh the opportunities, It's a realistic view, I think.

[Senior]

[Fox]

I agree that the best way to limit population growth -- assuming we want to limit it -- is by increasing the standard of living in the third world. Not just the best way, the only way (barring totally unethical ideas). Poor people breed like rabbits. People with a higher standard of living have a hard time breeding sufficiently to keep their populations stable, much less expanding their populations. In actuality, if third world standard of living were to rise substantially, we might actually end up facing a world-wide population decline problem.

As an aside:

[nautilus]

[Senior]

[wesharris]

No NO.
His attitude we DO need.
To forget what your detractors say, is to invite death.

[wesharris]

No NO.
His attitude we DO need.
To forget what your detractors say, is to invite death.

[nautilus]

[blackjack]

[Globutron]

[quote="Senior"]

[AmericanExile]

[machinoman]

[tacoman]