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Say goodbye to those tuna rolls
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Steelrails



Joined: 12 Mar 2009
Location: Earth, Solar System

PostPosted: Sat Mar 06, 2010 4:41 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

1) Isn't most of the sushi fishing industry controlled by the Rev. Sun Myung Moon? I'm sure there is something shady going on.

2)One of the best and worst experiences of Korea was getting to eat whale. Great because I didn't have to put up with the usual PC hypocritical whining that would accompany such a move. Bad because that was probably the worst meal I've had in Korea.
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nautilus



Joined: 26 Nov 2005
Location: Je jump, Tu jump, oui jump!

PostPosted: Sat Mar 06, 2010 8:36 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

visitorq wrote:
nautilus wrote:
What is your problem with protecting threatened and declining species visitorQ?

I have no problem with it. I just value human rights more than those of fish.


False dichotomy. It is not humans vs fish, we are not waging a war against other lifeforms in order to survive. In fact we depend on them for our own survival. Its not about our rights, its about our duty to conserve and manage our resources so that they are still available to future generations. It is not our right to wipe out other species and render the world lifeless, neither is it even a desirable goal.

This is not the 1800's. The days of unsustainable exploitation and "taming the wilderness" are over.Instead we are struggling to preserve what fragmented remnants of our butchered ecosystems still survive.

You made a point earlier about these hidden conspirators viewing humans as a sort of vermin on the earth whose populations need to be reduced (something for which you yet again have no evidence). Yet isn't it true that humans as a species have been the most harmful to the planet? What is your goal- to have unlimted human expansion? We clearly don't need even more people when it is obvious that our present number is failing to live on the earth in a sustainable or wise fashion.

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This may be true, it may not be. According to the IPCC, the ice caps are going to melt in a decade or so,


Why bring in the IPCC?Thats an entirely different matter. I was talking about ICCAT.

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You also didn't attempt to answer my question: if tuna stocks are down 97% (a number so ridiculously high you could practically round it off to 100%) then how are they still catching so much tuna each year??? If the amount they catch increases each year, then surely they'd have been catching a lot less in recent years than, say, 30-40 years ago?


But they are. Where do you get the idea that the catch has increased exactly?

Southern Bluefin has been fished from Japan, Australia etc since the 1950's. Catches peaked in the 1960's, then crashed in the 80's, and have not significantly recovered since.
http://www.springerlink.com/content/2ckwjyyxh9f262m4/

here is the 97% reduction figure given by reconfiguring calculations for spawning biomass figures.
http://www.bigmarinefish.com/bluefin.html

catch of Atlantic bluefin has decreased within the bay of Biscay. If fishermen are catching only a small % of what they did in former years, doesn't that suggest to you that the population has crashed?
Not to mention that in this area they are catching immature fish before they have had the chance to breed.
http://www.iccat.int/Documents/CVSP/CV049_1999/no_2/CV049020242.pdf

ICCAT downloadable papers here:
http://www.iccat.int/Documents/CVSP/CV049_1999/no_2/colvol049_2.htm
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visitorq



Joined: 11 Jan 2008

PostPosted: Sat Mar 06, 2010 9:09 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

nautilus wrote:
visitorq wrote:
nautilus wrote:
What is your problem with protecting threatened and declining species visitorQ?

I have no problem with it. I just value human rights more than those of fish.


False dichotomy. It is not humans vs fish, we are not waging a war against other lifeforms in order to survive.

I never said we are "waging a war against other lifeforms". Stop putting words in other peoples' mouths; look up the term "strawman" and realize that it discredits you.

Anyway, it's obviously not a false dichotomy. It's about the rights of humans to have jobs and feed their families vs the rights of fish to be left alone. I couldn't care less about the "rights" of fish. That doesn't mean I want to rape and plunder the earth, however. The false dichotomy is entirely yours in this case.

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In fact we depend on them for our own survival. Its not about our rights, its about our duty to conserve and manage our resources so that they are still available to future generations. It is not our right to wipe out other species and render the world lifeless, neither is it even a desirable goal.

Yeah well, the whole crux of the debate is whether or not we are actually wiping out the species in question. The Japanese do not consider the tuna to be sufficiently endangered for a total ban to be placed. Then you (representing the environmentalist agenda) come on here and bad mouth Japan (despite the fact that they have a right to their way of life, and incidentally lead the world in the development of many eco-friendly technologies), without even being able to refute their side of the argument.

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This is not the 1800's. The days of unsustainable exploitation and "taming the wilderness" are over.Instead we are struggling to preserve what fragmented remnants of our butchered ecosystems still survive.

Yeah, it's really not even close to as bad as you portray. "Fragmented remnants of our butchered ecosystems"??? Talk about alarmism. I happen to know a reasonable amount about ecology (despite what you say), and it's really not in any danger of collapsing. You think you know better, but actually all you seem to know is what the environmentalist movement has told you. You are unable to admit that they are not neutral, and have an often very extreme agenda. They also lie a lot.

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You made a point earlier about these hidden conspirators viewing humans as a sort of vermin on the earth whose populations need to be reduced (something for which you yet again have no evidence). Yet isn't it true that humans as a species have been the most harmful to the planet? What is your goal- to have unlimted human expansion? We clearly don't need even more people when it is obvious that our present number is failing to live on the earth in a sustainable or wise fashion.

False premise. You think you're on the cutting edge of progressive human knowledge (ie. environmentalism), but you're just spouting off neo-Malthusian platitudes that have been debunked ad nauseum. Anti-humanism is far more disgusting than being unconcerned with the so-called "sacred" rights of Mother Nature.

Yes, there are environmental issues that need addressing and humans do affect the ecosystem (sometimes negatively), but no we are not "destroying" the planet - that's just the environmentalist propaganda and total nonsense. People who watch WWF videos filled with ambiant music and clips of cute animals with sad-looking eyes are being indoctrinated as if it were a religious cult. Yet practically none of them have been around the world to see things objectively for themselves.

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This may be true, it may not be. According to the IPCC, the ice caps are going to melt in a decade or so,


Why bring in the IPCC?Thats an entirely different matter. I was talking about ICCAT.

Because it's a totally analogous example, obviously. It's a question of credibility. The government has none, whatsoever.

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You also didn't attempt to answer my question: if tuna stocks are down 97% (a number so ridiculously high you could practically round it off to 100%) then how are they still catching so much tuna each year??? If the amount they catch increases each year, then surely they'd have been catching a lot less in recent years than, say, 30-40 years ago?


But they are. Where do you get the idea that the catch has increased exactly?

Southern Bluefin has been fished from Japan, Australia etc since the 1950's. Catches peaked in the 1960's, then crashed in the 80's, and have not significantly recovered since.
http://www.springerlink.com/content/2ckwjyyxh9f262m4/

here is the 97% reduction figure given by reconfiguring calculations for spawning biomass figures.
http://www.bigmarinefish.com/bluefin.html

catch of Atlantic bluefin has decreased within the bay of Biscay. If fishermen are catching only a small % of what they did in former years, doesn't that suggest to you that the population has crashed?
Not to mention that in this area they are catching immature fish before they have had the chance to breed.
http://www.iccat.int/Documents/CVSP/CV049_1999/no_2/CV049020242.pdf

ICCAT downloadable papers here:
http://www.iccat.int/Documents/CVSP/CV049_1999/no_2/colvol049_2.htm

The overall catch has remained steady or increases slightly over the past decade. This despite the stocks being depleted by "97%" (which makes no sense whatsoever). A decrease "within the bay of Biscay" is basically irrelevant, as this is only one small local area. To say tuna has been "fished from" Japan and Australia is meaningless, as it a large fish that migrates thousands of miles, and is found all over the world in the deep ocean.
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nautilus



Joined: 26 Nov 2005
Location: Je jump, Tu jump, oui jump!

PostPosted: Sat Mar 06, 2010 10:14 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

visitorq wrote:
It's about the rights of humans to have jobs and feed their families vs the rights of fish to be left alone. I couldn't care less about the "rights" of fish.

Nobody ever mentioned "the rights of fish". You're imagining things once again.
I too agree that people have a right to catch fish or to harvest whatever other natural food the earth provides. Difference is you think its OK to over-exploit such resources when all the evidence screams its time to allow them a recovery period.

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The Japanese do not consider the tuna to be sufficiently endangered for a total ban to be placed.

Well they wouldn't, would they? As the world's no.1 consumer of bluefin, it goes against their interestes and economy. They say the same thing about whales, predictably. I suppose you also fully believe Iran's claims to be developing nuclear technology for entirely peaceful purposes? Do you also believe in the tooth fairy?

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Japan (despite the fact that they have a right to their way of life,

Nobody has a right to any particular way of life if it is hurting the rights of others, irreversibly destroying the planets ecosystems or resource bas that is shared by other countries. Tuna is a shared resource, it migrates through the waters of many nations.

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Yeah, it's really not even close to as bad as you portray. "Fragmented remnants of our butchered ecosystems"??? Talk about alarmism.


Not alarmism but realism.
We are indeed living with fragmentary remains of formerly larger healthy ecosystems, that humans have cleared, burned, converted to agricultural land, polluted, concreted over, drained, dammed, logged, removed, urbanised, converted to other use, adapted, tampered with, exploited, and so on in increasing measure ever since industrialization. Hence the abundance of human-caused extinctions over the past 200 years. Open your eyes

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it's really not in any danger of collapsing.

Certain species and ecosystems have already collapsed, others are much reduced, very few are thriving.
You are the sort of peson who ignores all the evidence until its too late, out a mixture of ignorance, greed and short-term thinking.

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Anti-humanism is far more disgusting than being unconcerned with the so-called "sacred" rights of Mother Nature.


Do you agree or not that humans as a species have caused unsustainable, untenable and incomparable damage to this earth?
I'm not anti-human-I don't think any conservationists are- I just think we need to re-examine and adjust the way we are living on this planet in relation to the other life we share it with.
You're exaggerating and misportraying people who care about the natural environment as some sort of monstrous conspiracy, in order to escape your obligations. A mixture of laziness and paranoia. hence your stated goal of wanting to increase your carbons emissions. More childishnes and stupidity. A bit like Steelrails above, bragging about eating whale.

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Yes, there are environmental issues that need addressing and humans do affect the ecosystem (sometimes negatively),

Overwhelmingly negatively. Lets not try to downplay reality.

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but no we are not "destroying" the planet

Not sure what you mean exactly. yes, there will still be a spinning orb in space even after we have triggered the extinction of most other life and thereby caused our own demise. Is that what you mean by "the earth will continue"?

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Yet practically none of them have been around the world to see things objectively for themselves.

well you certainly haven't...that much is obvious from your lack of understanding.

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It's a question of credibility. The government has none, whatsoever.

Thats a huge blanket statement. Which government? All of them, in every nation? Which government department? all of them? which scientific research bodies? which of the thousands of scientists conducting fieldwork and cataloguing data? all of them?
And please don't forget to give irrefutable evdience for all the examples you give. Until then you're just frothing at the mouth.

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The overall catch has remained steady or increases slightly over the past decade.

Source?
in any case you ignoring the data from the previous 3 or 4 decades which shows we are catching a tiny % of what we did 20 years ago

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This despite the stocks being depleted by "97%" (which makes no sense whatsoever).

Its based on studies of spawning biomass, of fish at the correct age to breed, and so on. Obviously you didn't bother to read.

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A decrease "within the bay of Biscay" is basically irrelevant, as this is only one small local area.

hardly, because this fish requires a chain of geographical locations for different stages in its life-cycle. The fish in the bay of biscay are not sedentary, it is just one locality they pass through. If you kill every bluefin in the bay of biscay, you are also taking out every fish that in another month will appear of the american coast. It is a shared resource. If one country removes a link in the chain, then it damages the resource available to other countries.
Ecology 101: species do not recognise international borders.
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visitorq



Joined: 11 Jan 2008

PostPosted: Sun Mar 07, 2010 4:47 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

nautilus wrote:
visitorq wrote:
It's about the rights of humans to have jobs and feed their families vs the rights of fish to be left alone. I couldn't care less about the "rights" of fish.

Nobody ever mentioned "the rights of fish". You're imagining things once again.
I too agree that people have a right to catch fish or to harvest whatever other natural food the earth provides. Difference is you think its OK to over-exploit such resources when all the evidence screams its time to allow them a recovery period.

Quote:
The Japanese do not consider the tuna to be sufficiently endangered for a total ban to be placed.

Well they wouldn't, would they? As the world's no.1 consumer of bluefin, it goes against their interestes and economy. They say the same thing about whales, predictably. I suppose you also fully believe Iran's claims to be developing nuclear technology for entirely peaceful purposes? Do you also believe in the tooth fairy?

Your logic is backwards here. The reason Japan is the world's top consumer of bluefin is NOT because they "need" it, it's because they like it. Tuna is not a necessity of life; it's not the same as oil or lumber etc. The Japanese public doesn't depend on tuna, they just enjoy eating it. But if you are talking about the tuna industry, then it would be entirely in their "interest" to have quotas brought way down, as this would induce scarcity in the market, causing prices to rocket up. Big business loves this sort of artificial scarcity (caused by regulation), which is precisely why big oil loves the idea of anthropogenic global warming: demand for the commodity stays the same (in the case of tuna it will just become a luxury product), but they get to cut production and operating costs while prices rise. In other words, less work and more money for the monopoly men riding on the back of gov't regulation. Bad for the small-scale operators and the consumer.

At the same time, if tuna ever goes extinct, it's the Japanese who will lose out the most, since they value it so much. It is entirely in their interest to not over fish it, which is why they are leading the field in developing tuna farming. When the Japanese say that tuna is not as endangered as environmentalist organizations say, then I tend to believe them.

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Japan (despite the fact that they have a right to their way of life,

Nobody has a right to any particular way of life if it is hurting the rights of others, irreversibly destroying the planets ecosystems or resource bas that is shared by other countries. Tuna is a shared resource, it migrates through the waters of many nations.

This is more faulty logic. If the Japanese are poaching on other nations' territory, then obviously that's wrong. But other nations are also catching tuna (by far more collectively than Japanese fleets alone) and then willingly sending it over to Japan, because the Japanese are willing to pay more for it. They have every right to do so, just as they have every right to fish on international waters. Environmentalists do not have the right to demand countries change their way of life just so nature can be left untouched.

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Yeah, it's really not even close to as bad as you portray. "Fragmented remnants of our butchered ecosystems"??? Talk about alarmism.


Not alarmism but realism.
We are indeed living with fragmentary remains of formerly larger healthy ecosystems, that humans have cleared, burned, converted to agricultural land, polluted, concreted over, drained, dammed, logged, removed, urbanised, converted to other use, adapted, tampered with, exploited, and so on in increasing measure ever since industrialization. Hence the abundance of human-caused extinctions over the past 200 years. Open your eyes

My eyes are wide open. I've traveled around the world, and I do not agree with your assessment. Fact is, most of the world is not inhabited by humans, and species go extinct all the time - it doesn't mean man is the root cause. There's simply no way for you to possibly prove that the ecosystem is on the verge of "collapse", any more than I can "prove" the contrary. But to try and state the environmentalist line as a 'matter of fact' really is just alarmism by definition.

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it's really not in any danger of collapsing.

Certain species and ecosystems have already collapsed, others are much reduced, very few are thriving.
You are the sort of peson who ignores all the evidence until its too late, out a mixture of ignorance, greed and short-term thinking.

Species go extinct ALL THE TIME. This is really nothing to cry in your beer over... Mass extinction events have happened several times that we know of, killing off the vast majority of life on the planet. Guess what, life always goes on. No matter what. Humans are doing just fine, doing what we're doing, and as long as it benefits us there's no problem. It's a truism to simply state that we "need" nature. Obviously we do, but that doesn't mean we have to place it on a pedestal and worship the goddess Gaia. Saying I'm ignoring all the evidence "until it's too late" is seriously akin to some fundamentalist telling me to repent because the apocalypse is nigh.

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Anti-humanism is far more disgusting than being unconcerned with the so-called "sacred" rights of Mother Nature.


Do you agree or not that humans as a species have caused unsustainable, untenable and incomparable damage to this earth?

Honestly no. You may think I'm saying so to rub it in, but I really just don't think the earth is any serious danger whatsoever. This is not wishful thinking on my part, I have done a lot of my own research (I used to take environmentalism quite seriously, until I realized what a death cult it is, stemming directly from the eugenics movement).

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I'm not anti-human-I don't think any conservationists are- I just think we need to re-examine and adjust the way we are living on this planet in relation to the other life we share it with.
You're exaggerating and misportraying people who care about the natural environment as some sort of monstrous conspiracy, in order to escape your obligations. A mixture of laziness and paranoia. hence your stated goal of wanting to increase your carbons emissions. More childishnes and stupidity. A bit like Steelrails above, bragging about eating whale.

Nah, I don't think you're part of any monstrous conspiracy, I just know for a fact that the people feeding you their propaganda are. Organizations like the WWF, UNESCO, Greenpeace, and Planned Parenthood are run by people who literally want to de-industrialize the West, and depopulate the world. They are eugenics organizations. This is not my opinion, this is a verifiable, historical fact.
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Yes, there are environmental issues that need addressing and humans do affect the ecosystem (sometimes negatively),

Overwhelmingly negatively. Lets not try to downplay reality.

So your interpretation = "reality"? Ok then...

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but no we are not "destroying" the planet

Not sure what you mean exactly. yes, there will still be a spinning orb in space even after we have triggered the extinction of most other life and thereby caused our own demise. Is that what you mean by "the earth will continue"?

Life goes on... The notion that we are going to "trigger" the extinction of life itself (or even have the capability) is beyond absurd. If the ecosystem was that fragile, we'd all be dead by now.

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Yet practically none of them have been around the world to see things objectively for themselves.

well you certainly haven't...that much is obvious from your lack of understanding.

Right back at you.

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It's a question of credibility. The government has none, whatsoever.

Thats a huge blanket statement. Which government? All of them, in every nation? Which government department? all of them? which scientific research bodies? which of the thousands of scientists conducting fieldwork and cataloguing data? all of them?

Yes, all of them. Welcome to globalization.

As for scientists, it's case by case. But as we know, when they work for government agencies (like the CRU, for example), they're liable to produce outright fraudulent science. Science is not apolitical, nor is peer-review an impartial process. There is always money involved, and therefore almost always an agenda.

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And please don't forget to give irrefutable evdience for all the examples you give. Until then you're just frothing at the mouth.

Be specific. I don't have time to cite every single claim.

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The overall catch has remained steady or increases slightly over the past decade.

Source?
in any case you ignoring the data from the previous 3 or 4 decades which shows we are catching a tiny % of what we did 20 years ago

Huh? We are catching more tuna now than ever, more than in the 60s, and far more than the 70's when quotas were first introduced:
http://firms.fao.org/firms/resource/10014/en

Predictions of collapse during the time when quotas were first imposed in the 70's never came about, even though the quotas were increased yearly up until the present day, and they are larger than ever (hence what all the environmentalists are complaining about). The blame for quotas being increased during this time is now being placed on the ICCAT by environmentalists. Seems kind of counter-intuitive when these same people claim the fish stocks are down by 97%.
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This despite the stocks being depleted by "97%" (which makes no sense whatsoever).

Its based on studies of spawning biomass, of fish at the correct age to breed, and so on. Obviously you didn't bother to read.

Bluefin tuna spawns yearly and reaches reproductive maturity after just 3-4 years. So unless you're suggesting that the MSY suddenly plummeted to 3% in the last few years alone, then I don't see your point.

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A decrease "within the bay of Biscay" is basically irrelevant, as this is only one small local area.

hardly, because this fish requires a chain of geographical locations for different stages in its life-cycle. The fish in the bay of biscay are not sedentary, it is just one locality they pass through. If you kill every bluefin in the bay of biscay, you are also taking out every fish that in another month will appear of the american coast. It is a shared resource. If one country removes a link in the chain, then it damages the resource available to other countries.
Ecology 101: species do not recognise international borders.

Geography 101: most tuna is caught in international waters.
Economics 101: in a free market, the product goes to the highest bidder. Japan is willing to pay more for tuna, so other countries send their tuna willingly to Japan. The Japanese are not "robbing" the international community of anything.
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nautilus



Joined: 26 Nov 2005
Location: Je jump, Tu jump, oui jump!

PostPosted: Sun Mar 07, 2010 6:32 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

visitorq wrote:
The Japanese public doesn't depend on tuna, they just enjoy eating it.

Well obviously thousands of fishermen around the world do depend on tuna. For their livelihoods.

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as this would induce scarcity in the market, causing prices to rocket up. Big business loves this sort of artificial scarcity (caused by regulation), which is precisely why big oil loves the idea of anthropogenic global warming:

Ah I see this the whole of your suspicion.So then you'd better prove that Tuna are actually abundant and that its all a lie to induce artificial scarcity of a product. Where is your evidence?

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When the Japanese say that tuna is not as endangered as environmentalist organizations say, then I tend to believe them.

I don't. Because they have no history of conservation or awareness to speak of. From their annual mass slaughter of dolphins to stubborn continued killing of threatened whales, their culture views the natural world as something to be plundered rather than as a resource to be managed and protected.

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If the Japanese are poaching on other nations' territory, then obviously that's wrong. But other nations are also catching tuna (by far more collectively than Japanese fleets alone) and then willingly sending it over to Japan, because the Japanese are willing to pay more for it.

The point is that if Japan reduced its demand for this endangered species (that they do not even need, as you have stated), then it would not be so threatened as it now is.
Next you're going to defend the Chinese for consuming Tiger bone medicine I presume?

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Fact is, most of the world is not inhabited by humans,

That does not mean those areas are not impacted by humans. Very few people live in the arctic, but humans do go there to exploit the fishing grounds and their floating garbage chokes its marine life.

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and species go extinct all the time - it doesn't mean man is the root cause.

Murder and rape happens all the time too. Does that make it OK?
Of course extinctions of other species are accelerating now. Overwhelmingly because of the pressure 6.8 billion people are bringing to bear on the natural environment.
A third of the world�s amphibians, a fifth of all mammals are under threat, while 1227 (or 12.4%) of all bird species are also now considered threatened with extinction. Due to the activities of Humans.

http://www.iucnredlist.org/

Are you saying that some conspirators have lied about data for thousands of species? (most of which have no commercial value like a bluefin tuna?

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There's simply no way for you to possibly prove that the ecosystem is on the verge of "collapse"

Yes there is. There are abundant environmental indicators to show ecosystems under strain. There are numerous ecosystems that have already been devastated. just off the top of my head...the Niger river delta.

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"Findings of the team included an estimated 9 million-13 million (1.5 million tons) of oil spillage into the Niger Delta over the past 50 years. This figure according to the team represents about 50 times the estimated volume spilled in the Exxon Valdez Oil Spill in Alaska the United States in 1989. This amount is also equivalent to one Exxon Valdez spill in the Niger Delta each year."

http://www.ncfnigeria.org/inthenews/news_feeds.php?article=21

This might not impact you directly but it certainly impacts all the millions of people living in the area who depend on this ecosystem for their livelihoods. By not caring, you are the one who is "anti-human".

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Humans are doing just fine, doing what we're doing, and as long as it benefits us there's no problem.

What drugs have you been taking...

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It's a truism to simply state that we "need" nature. Obviously we do, but that doesn't mean we have to place it on a pedestal and worship the goddess Gaia.

Belittling or trying to charicature environmentalists just reveals your ignorance. Nobody is 'worshipping gaia", but everyone wants to live in a healthy environment with natural resources intact that provide for their needs. You are recommending we continue unsustainable over-exploitation until there is nothing left for us to live on and the planet becomes ever more inhospitabe and infertile. That would be...foolish.

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Do you agree or not that humans as a species have caused unsustainable, untenable and incomparable damage to this earth?

Honestly no.

Which species has done more damage pray tell? slugs? clothes moths?
I don't see mice slashing and burning the worlds rainforests or releasing toxic chemical pollutants into the air and seas.

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(I used to take environmentalism quite seriously, until I realized what a death cult it is, stemming directly from the eugenics movement).

Lol. The only death cult is you and your gang of greedy capitalists who are trashing the planet for short-term profits and to enrich themselves at the expense of the poor.

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people who literally want to... depopulate the world.


What would your preffered option be? keep increasing the global population until we have used up all the available oxygen?

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The notion that we are going to "trigger" the extinction of life itself (or even have the capability) is beyond absurd. If the ecosystem was that fragile, we'd all be dead by now.

I'm afraid most people don't want to live in a world where all that is left is cockroaches and flies.

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There is always money involved, and therefore almost always an agenda.

I agree that corruption tends to be an inescapable fact of human nature. However many conservationists are entirely motivated by the higher aims of protecting the world's biodiversity. You don't appear to have met any.
If anyone is crooked it is the money haording capitalists whom you are defending.

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And please don't forget to give irrefutable evdience for all the examples you give. Until then you're just frothing at the mouth.

Be specific. I don't have time to cite every single claim.

You claim that conservationists are crooks involved in a mass eugenics conspiracy and that no scientific data which shows many species need conservation efforts can be trusted.
Evidence?

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We are catching more tuna now than ever, more than in the 60s, and far more than the 70's when quotas were first introduced:
http://firms.fao.org/firms/resource/10014/en


Your link states:
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Declared catches in the east Atlantic and Mediterranean reached a peak of over 50,000 t in 1996 and, then decreased substantially

Fyi 1996 was 14 years ago.

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Economics 101: in a free market, the product goes to the highest bidder. Japan is willing to pay more for tuna, so other countries send their tuna willingly to Japan. The Japanese are not "robbing" the international community of anything.

However they will have done so if and when Tuna becomes extinct.
The same goes for if and when they cause the great whales to become extinct.
Animals do not simply belong to whichever country's territory they happen to enter, they are a world heritage. From blue whales to tigers,if such species go extinct the world is a poorer place. And the ecosystems they helped to regulate become less healthy and more unbalanced. ecosystems that humans too are a part of. This goes for all living things, and in ways that we may not even fully understand yet.
In your consumer-driven ignorance you don't care. But there are many who do, and that number is growing. Even dinosaurs who think like yourself.. with their outadated and selfish attitudes.. may one day be thankfully extinct.
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visitorq



Joined: 11 Jan 2008

PostPosted: Sun Mar 07, 2010 6:35 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

nautilus wrote:
visitorq wrote:
The Japanese public doesn't depend on tuna, they just enjoy eating it.

Well obviously thousands of fishermen around the world do depend on tuna. For their livelihoods.

All the more reason for them not to want tuna to go extinct. My point was that the Japanese public is not going to riot in the streets over tuna shortages, nor will the economy collapse. If that were the case, then they might indeed be willing to kill the last tuna to stave off a socio-economic crisis. However, that notion is absurd.

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as this would induce scarcity in the market, causing prices to rocket up. Big business loves this sort of artificial scarcity (caused by regulation), which is precisely why big oil loves the idea of anthropogenic global warming:

Ah I see this the whole of your suspicion.So then you'd better prove that Tuna are actually abundant and that its all a lie to induce artificial scarcity of a product. Where is your evidence?

Wrong - the onus is on you. You're the one making the claims here that would force people to given up their livelihoods and change their way of life.

I never claimed that it is all a lie to induce artificial scarcity, I'm merely suggesting that the industry (ie. the big operators who lobby the government) would most likely go along with the environmentalist agenda if it would cause regulation to tighten. The same way big oil does. More regulation is great for cartel formation, and the first people that would be out a job would be the small operators.

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When the Japanese say that tuna is not as endangered as environmentalist organizations say, then I tend to believe them.

I don't. Because they have no history of conservation or awareness to speak of. From their annual mass slaughter of dolphins to stubborn continued killing of threatened whales, their culture views the natural world as something to be plundered rather than as a resource to be managed and protected.

Wow, so much ignorance, so little time for me to reply... I'll just point out the obvious: dolphins are cute, but not endangered. Same goes for the whales they kill (they kill a small number). You're arguing from an emotional point of view, not a logical one.

(yes, I've seen the nasty video of them slicing open live dolphins, it makes great propaganda footage for environmentalists, but even though I don't consider what they do very admirable, I still know that logically it's not much different from the rest of the world torturing and slaughtering the cows and pigs they eat every day).

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If the Japanese are poaching on other nations' territory, then obviously that's wrong. But other nations are also catching tuna (by far more collectively than Japanese fleets alone) and then willingly sending it over to Japan, because the Japanese are willing to pay more for it.

The point is that if Japan reduced its demand for this endangered species (that they do not even need, as you have stated), then it would not be so threatened as it now is.
Next you're going to defend the Chinese for consuming Tiger bone medicine I presume?

Honestly, I don't care much. If I have to choose between tigers and every other exotic species on earth going extinct, and the environmentalists having their way (which taken to its logical conclusion ultimately amount to every society on earth being turned into a police state to prevent anyone from ever infringing upon nature - or better yet just exterminating the vast majority of people to make absolutely sure), then to hell with them.

Put another way, I'm not happy about endangered species being poached, but I'm even less happy with governments imposing rules on people that restrict them from doing what they want (so long as they don't infringe on the liberties of other people).
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Fact is, most of the world is not inhabited by humans,

That does not mean those areas are not impacted by humans. Of course people don't live in the arctic, but they do go there to exploit the fishing grounds and their floating garbage chokes its marine life.

You're exaggerating.

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and species go extinct all the time - it doesn't mean man is the root cause.

Murder and rape happens all the time too. Does that make it OK?
Of course extinctions of other species are accelerating now. Overwhelmingly because of the pressure 6 billion people are bringing to bear on the natural environment.

Murder and rape don't happen on their own. Species die out on their own all the time. Anyway, humans may be thriving at the direct expense of some other species, but that's still about as natural as it gets. I'm just glad I get to be a human.

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A third of the world�s amphibians, a fifth of all mammals and 70% of all plants are under threat, while 1227 (or 12.4%) of all bird species are also now considered threatened with extinction. Due to the activities of Humans.

http://www.iucnredlist.org/
Are you saying that some conspirators have lied about data for thousands of species? (most of which have no commercial value like a bluefin tuna?

Oh man... that's seriously about as absurd as white supremacist making claims about race and citing a neo-Nazi webpage. The IUCN is a full-on eugenics organization par excellence. The man behind its creation, Julian Huxley, was even the president of the British Eugenics Society. After eugenics became discredited following WWII (after the Nazis murdered millions of people in the name eugenics), he and others morphed the movement into the modern environmentalist movement. These people are all staunch internationalists, funded primarily by the globalist banking establishment (especially the Rockefeller and Ford Foundations), and most of them have the stated goal of drastically reducing world population. These people are extremely anti-human (while at the same time being elitists).

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There's simply no way for you to possibly prove that the ecosystem is on the verge of "collapse"

Yes there is. There are abundant environmental indicators to show ecosystems under strain. There are numerous ecosystems that have already been devastated. just off the top of my head...the Niger river delta.

Saying the "ecosystems are under strain" is a meaningless statement. That's like saying my body is under strain from daily living. It's just part of life. What environmentalists really mean by "strain" is that nature is only natural when humans are absent. The logical conclusion being that if you get rid of humanity, there will be no more strain on nature (complete nonsense).

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"Findings of the team included an estimated 9 million-13 million (1.5 million tons) of oil spillage into the Niger Delta over the past 50 years. This figure according to the team represents about 50 times the estimated volume spilled in the Exxon Valdez Oil Spill in Alaska the United States in 1989. This amount is also equivalent to one Exxon Valdez spill in the Niger Delta each year."

http://www.ncfnigeria.org/inthenews/news_feeds.php?article=21

This might not impact you directly but it certainly impacts all the millions of people living in the area who depend on this ecosystem for their livelihoods. By not caring, you are the one who is "anti-human".

Some local ecosystems have been devastated, yes, and this is nearly always due to government corruption and/or wars (which I am staunchly against). The average person does not share the blame in this. In the case of the Niger delta, the people are being affected by injustice brought on by corruption and theft. But the environmentalists care nothing about that - they only care about mangroves.

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It's a truism to simply state that we "need" nature. Obviously we do, but that doesn't mean we have to place it on a pedestal and worship the goddess Gaia.

Belittling or trying to charicature environmentalists just reveals your ignorance. Nobody is 'worshipping gaia", but everyone wants to live in a healthy environment with natural resources intact that provide for their needs. You are recommending we continue unsustainable over-exploitation until there is nothing left for us to live on and the planet becomes ever more inhospitabe and infertile. That would be...foolish.

Yes it would be, if it were true. But you have no proof of this - only your "faith" that the environmentalist propaganda is true. It really is like a religion. Every time you watch a WWF advertisement with baby seals and pandas in it, you have an emotional response. This is the part of your brain they are targeting (not the part that deals in logic), and it works very well. Trying to use logic and common sense on an emotionally committed person is about as futile as it gets.

It's also quite telling that you just 'assume' I don't also want to live in a healthy environment. I do. I think the environment is important. I just happen to know that the people in charge of the environmentalist movement are a bunch of eugenicists whose real agenda is depopulating the world, severely lowering our standard of living, and taking away our liberties along the way.

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Which species has done worse pray tell? cockroaches? clothes moths?
I don't see mice slashing and burning the worlds rainforests or releasing toxic pollutants into the air and seas.

You're exaggerating again. Our overall impact on the earth is nowhere near enough to threaten our existence.

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(I used to take environmentalism quite seriously, until I realized what a death cult it is, stemming directly from the eugenics movement).

Lol. The only death cult is you and your gang of greedy capitalists who are trashing the planet for short-term profits and to enrich themselves at the expense of the poor.

Wow. You have no idea what capitalism is (big surprise there). The real "death cult" is the elite group of people who control the world banking system, dominate the political, business, and academic worlds, and fund eugenics organizations like the IUCN and WWF. These people control the monetary system, which has enslaved the third world in debt. They control most of the global corporations that they send in to rape and plunder. They also control the governments of the world to a large extent, since they control the issuance of money (which governments borrow and depend on). This is corporatism, which has nothing to do with free-market capitalism. People like the Rockefellers who control the Federal Reserve and big oil are the exact same people who fund the environmentalist movement that you have been brainwashed by. How ironic.
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people who literally want to... depopulate the world.


What would your preffered option be? keep increasing the global population until we have used up all the available oxygen?

Liberty is the preferred option. Free society is prosperous, and prosperity leads to reduced birth rates, cleaner and better technology and an increased standard of living that is sustainable.

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There is always money involved, and therefore almost always an agenda.

I agree that corruption tends to be an inescapable fact of human nature. However many conservationists are entirely motivated by the higher aims of protecting the world's biodiversity. You don't appear to have met any.
If anyone is crooked it is the money haording capitalists whom you are defending.

You're not qualified to talk about capitalism, since you don't even know what it is. A free market (true capitalism) is practically the opposite of corporatism, which is funded by central banking systems run by a small group of elite families. These are the people that run the environmentalist movement, and they care nothing about nature - they just use it as a tool against humanity. At the end of the day we're talking about a group of monopoly men who are obsessed with crushing all competition and would rather just turn the world into a police state and starve the public than ever have to risk losing their privileged position by having to play fair. Environmentalism is a brilliant excuse for them to do so (we've already seen how diabolical the AGW scam was, the only purpose being to set up a carbon taxation grid).

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And please don't forget to give irrefutable evdience for all the examples you give. Until then you're just frothing at the mouth.

Be specific. I don't have time to cite every single claim.

You claim that conservationists are crooks involved in a mass eugenics conspiracy and that no scientific data which shows many species need conservation efforts can be trusted.
Evidence?

Already provided some. Research the links between environmentalism and eugenics yourself for more details. You'll find the Rockefellers (who started out as oil barons and still control the banking system in the US to this day) are involved in nearly every environmentalist organization of note.

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Your link states:
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Declared catches in the east Atlantic and Mediterranean reached a peak of over 50,000 t in 1996 and, then decreased substantially

Fyi 1996 was 14 years ago.

Read more carefully and you'll see that it didn't decrease at all (the amount reported just declined).

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Economics 101: in a free market, the product goes to the highest bidder. Japan is willing to pay more for tuna, so other countries send their tuna willingly to Japan. The Japanese are not "robbing" the international community of anything.

However they will have done so if and when Tuna becomes extinct.
The same goes for if and when they cause the great whales to become extinct.

Yeah, it's not going to happen.

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Animals do not simply belong to whichever country's territory they happen to enter, they are a world heritage. From blue whales to tigers,if such species go extinct the world is a poorer place. And the ecosystems they helped to regulate become less healthy and more unbalanced. ecosystems that humans too are a part of. This goes for all living things, and in ways that we may not even fully understand yet.

That's a nice emotional appeal (even a touch of mysticism at the end). However, I reserve my emotional attachment for humanity first and foremost, seeing as I am a human.

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In your consumer-driven ignorance you don't care. But there are many who do, and that number is growing.
Consumer-driven ignorance? When did I advocate consumerism? That's about your 10th strawman (I've lost count). I advocate (human) liberty, that's all.

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Even dinosaurs like yourself with their selfish attitudes may one day be thankfully extinct.

Don't hold back, tell me how you really feel! Laughing
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nautilus



Joined: 26 Nov 2005
Location: Je jump, Tu jump, oui jump!

PostPosted: Sun Mar 07, 2010 10:27 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

These replies are getting way too convoluted so I think its better to keep it brief and to the point.

a) You claim that a Rockefeller conspiracy, a secret society is spearheading a secret plan to create artificial scarcity of Bluefin Tuna so as to increase their own profits by way of a select cartel, and that conservation groups are in on the plot.

But none of this stands up to any scrutiny. The conservationist groups are campaigning for a total ban, not a limited trade in the hands of a few. Surely this would defeat the objective which you claim.

b) Secondly you claimed ICCAT was a corrupt branch of govt falsifying data and they could not be trusted and you compared them to the IPCC. But they are the ones who want to keep fishing at same levels as before. In other words they take your own viewpoint, they're on your side in this debate.

...and.. as always, you can never provide any actual evidence to back up your outlandish statements.

So who are the conspirators exactly? Or do they only exist in your poor feverish mind.
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visitorq



Joined: 11 Jan 2008

PostPosted: Sun Mar 07, 2010 10:56 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

nautilus wrote:
These replies are getting way too convoluted so I think its better to keep it brief and to the point.

a) You claim that a Rockefeller conspiracy, a secret society is spearheading a secret plan to create artificial scarcity of Bluefin Tuna so as to increase their own profits by way of a select cartel, and that conservation groups are in on the plot.

But none of this stands up to any scrutiny. The conservationist groups are campaigning for a total ban, not a limited trade in the hands of a few. Surely this would defeat the objective which you claim.

b) Secondly you claimed ICCAT was a corrupt branch of govt falsifying data and they could not be trusted and you compared them to the IPCC. But they are the ones who want to keep fishing at same levels as before. In other words they take your own viewpoint, they're on your side in this debate.

So who are the conspirators exactly? Or do they only exist in your poor feverish mind.

I wonder why I even waste my time replying to someone who keeps posting such ridiculous strawmen. I'm not sure if you're doing it deliberately to try to get under my skin, or if you're actually just not smart enough to understand what I wrote. Either way it's getting old, so this may be my last reply:

a) Truly laughable excuse for strawman. I certainly never mentioned the Rockefellers and tuna together (the connection could probably be made indirectly, but so far removed it's not worth discussing). Nor did I ever even suggest that tuna industry was secretly working with the environmentalists. You, being stuck on first level thinking, left out the government side of the equation, which is what actually creates any regulation. Hence: the environmentalist nutjobs demand a total ban, while the (multi-billion dollar) tuna industry pressures and/or bribes the government into a "compromise" - and presto, you end up with a highly regulated industry with only a few players given permits to fish for tuna, and prices shoot through the roof. For big business there is no safer game to play than to get the government to intervene and stamp out competition on your behalf.

b) The ICCAT is not on "my side". I am against basically any kind of internationalist authority. The ICCAT may be hypocritical and have basically no credibility, but their function is still ostensibly to conserve tuna fisheries by imposing quotas. The fact that they do not impose the very low quotas recommended by environmentalists is more evidence that the tuna stocks are not actually as low as the environmentalists claim. Yet the ICCAT won't come out and say this directly.
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thoreau



Joined: 21 Jun 2009

PostPosted: Sun Mar 07, 2010 11:12 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

There is a pretty well made documentary on this topic:

http://endoftheline.com/

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Based on a book by journalist Charles Clover, the film has spurred some retailers to remove bluefin from their menus and stores and even moved some celebrities to pose naked with the fish to advocate conserving them.

A growing demand for bluefin tuna, commonly found in sushi and now as endangered as the giant panda, has not only decreased the fish�s population, but also increased the number of undersized fish that are harvested, preventing the fish from reaching maturity. �Bluefin tuna has become the poster boy for the overfishing campaign. It�s on the buffers � it�s really on the slide down now,� Clover says. �There are no large tuna anymore. There were bluefins of 250lb in Japanese fish markets when I went there four years ago � there are none now. A third of the catch is undersize.�


http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/80beats/2009/06/09/documentary-on-endangered-bluefin-tuna-reels-in-sushi-joints-celebrities/

I downloaded it via a torrent sight and gave it a watch. Informative and entertaining.
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nautilus



Joined: 26 Nov 2005
Location: Je jump, Tu jump, oui jump!

PostPosted: Sun Mar 07, 2010 11:22 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

thoreau wrote:
�There are no large tuna anymore. There were bluefins of 250lb in Japanese fish markets when I went there four years ago � there are none now. A third of the catch is undersize.�


Try telling that to our resident nutjob. Laughing
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geldedgoat



Joined: 05 Mar 2009

PostPosted: Sun Mar 07, 2010 11:41 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

visitorq wrote:
Hence: the environmentalist nutjobs demand a total ban, while the (multi-billion dollar) tuna industry pressures and/or bribes the government into a "compromise" - and presto, you end up with a highly regulated industry with only a few players given permits to fish for tuna, and prices shoot through the roof. For big business there is no safer game to play than to get the government to intervene and stamp out competition on your behalf.


So you're okay with the nutjobs then? A total ban would not help big business or government. Very little money is made on the initial ban, fish are allowed to repopulate, the fish stocks shoot through the roof, the ban gets lifted, the supply is so great that prices are probably much lower than before, and big business ends up making alot less money. You should be all over this idea, right?

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The ICCAT may be hypocritical and have basically no credibility, but their function is still ostensibly to conserve tuna fisheries by imposing quotas. The fact that they do not impose the very low quotas recommended by environmentalists is more evidence that the tuna stocks are not actually as low as the environmentalists claim.


You say government conspires with big business, and the interests of the environmentalist nutjobs are actively opposed to those of big business... and then claim that a government entity ignoring the recommendations of environmentalists is evidence that the environmental claims are false?
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visitorq



Joined: 11 Jan 2008

PostPosted: Mon Mar 08, 2010 12:20 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

nautilus wrote:
Try telling that to our resident nutjob. Laughing

You can tack LOL emoticons on every post if you want - it doesn't change the fact that I schooled you hard in this debate and none of your claims have panned out.
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visitorq



Joined: 11 Jan 2008

PostPosted: Mon Mar 08, 2010 12:32 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

thoreau wrote:
�There are no large tuna anymore. There were bluefins of 250lb in Japanese fish markets when I went there four years ago � there are none now. A third of the catch is undersize.�


Except it appears not to be true:

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Tuna sells for record 55,700 dollars in Japan

(AFP) � Jan 4, 2008

TOKYO (AFP) � A Hong Kong sushi restaurant owner Saturday paid a record 55,700 dollars for a massive bluefin tuna in the first auction of the year at the world's largest fish market in Tokyo, an official and media reports said.

The 276-kilogram (607-pound) bluefin tuna -- caught off Japan's northern region of Aomori -- sold for 6.07 million yen (55,706 dollars) or 22,000 yen (about 202 dollars) per kilo, an official at the Tsukiji fish market said.

http://afp.google.com/article/ALeqM5isF4HrCnoSFK2GNic6_ReR5GwkPQ
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visitorq



Joined: 11 Jan 2008

PostPosted: Mon Mar 08, 2010 12:45 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

geldedgoat wrote:
visitorq wrote:
Hence: the environmentalist nutjobs demand a total ban, while the (multi-billion dollar) tuna industry pressures and/or bribes the government into a "compromise" - and presto, you end up with a highly regulated industry with only a few players given permits to fish for tuna, and prices shoot through the roof. For big business there is no safer game to play than to get the government to intervene and stamp out competition on your behalf.


So you're okay with the nutjobs then? A total ban would not help big business or government. Very little money is made on the initial ban, fish are allowed to repopulate, the fish stocks shoot through the roof, the ban gets lifted, the supply is so great that prices are probably much lower than before, and big business ends up making alot less money. You should be all over this idea, right?

Not at all. I'm for free markets and governments staying out of it. The same goes for environmentalists, or anybody else who wants to control people or tell them how to live their lives. I have nothing against big business, so long as they play fair and don't try to lobby the government to impose regulations and stamp out competition. I am against cartels.

As for imposing a temporary ban, the problem is that it rarely ever ends up being temporary, especially if it is caused by governments succumbing to pressure from environmentalists. If the tuna stocks are really threatened (which hasn't been proven yet) then the fisherman themselves need to get together and form an agreement to solve the problem. I am totally against government intervention, as no good ever comes from it.

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The ICCAT may be hypocritical and have basically no credibility, but their function is still ostensibly to conserve tuna fisheries by imposing quotas. The fact that they do not impose the very low quotas recommended by environmentalists is more evidence that the tuna stocks are not actually as low as the environmentalists claim.


You say government conspires with big business, and the interests of the environmentalist nutjobs are actively opposed to those of big business... and then claim that a government entity ignoring the recommendations of environmentalists is evidence that the environmental claims are false?

You're oversimplifying (or perhaps, given your wording, I should say over complicating) matters. It's not all a "big conspiracy" - that only applies to elite at the very top, such as the people who pull the strings in the environmentalist movement. They have a hidden agenda, but it has to do with a lot more than just tuna.

In the case of government and big business, it's mostly just good old fashioned corruption. It only enters conspiracy territory when you start talking about the highest levels of government and the banking system. The elite have more important and diabolical things to deal with than fish.
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