A very dangerous man.

sheepman1 · Jan 14, 2020

[/QUOTE]

M-J-G said:
I can't stand Packham, but I see little to disagree with in the OP article.

The world has too many people and it's going to be bled dry. Uncomfortable to hear, but we are using P, K, Salt, oil, gas, (to name a few) resources and carving the planet up into a mess.

I think super bugs will do the job of controlling population, and at the rate we travel around the world these days we would be pretty effective at spreading a disease to most parts of the planet.

All cheery stuff

SALT ??

SilliamWhale · Jan 14, 2020

Exfarmer said:
He has a point, the population cannot keep expanding, for certain global warming is solely due to population growth beyond the planets ability to contain our emmissions.
I suggest he volunteers for the chop, to set an example to all mankind

Yes but population statistics seem to suggest you make people wealthier then rate of babies produced goes down. Population control of poor people doesn't work and its cruel.

I think Packham is wrong here. The world has had it best decade ever- more people were richer than ever before. Yes climate may be changing but there is no real evidence for the "runaway" climate change idea anyway - we will probably see a degree or two of warming over 100-150 years. There is room for more people in the world no bother at all - Finland is empty, Russia is empty, Wales is empty, France is pretty empty, Canada is for sure. Only 11% of England is built on

SilliamWhale · Jan 14, 2020

DrWazzock said:
Whenever there is a famine abroad the first thing you see on telly is somebody surrounded by their 10 children complaining that they can't feed them, so I'm not so sure if that argument is valid.

Famine is often not because of a lack of ability to grow food. War is the biggest thing.

PSQ · Jan 14, 2020

M-J-G said:
I think super bugs will do the job of controlling population, and at the rate we travel around the world these days we would be pretty effective at spreading a disease to most parts of the planet.

All cheery stuff

It might be superbugs, but my money is on another Mount Tambora type eruption, which preceded "the year without a summer" in 1816 with failed crops around the northern hemisphere, and snow and freezing conditions across the US in June and July of that year.
It must have been a hell of a bang to remove 4000 foot of mountain.
Repeat that with 9 billion mouths to feed.

Danllan · Jan 14, 2020

Chris Packham is a definite git in some respects, but I like him.

On the subject of the world's population being too large, no surprise there. We gave 20th Century medicine to cultures that ranged from being equivalent to the Late Middle Ages in many places to being just out of the stone age in most of Black Africa. And then we expected them to quickly 'evolve' the societal responsibility necessary to use them without problems. That was never going to happen, and it didn't...

SilliamWhale said:
Famine is often not because of a lack of ability to grow food. War is the biggest thing.

Only sometimes, mostly it's too many mouths to feed, see above.

SilliamWhale · Jan 14, 2020

PSQ said:
It might be superbugs, but my money is on another Mount Tambora type eruption, which preceded "the year without a summer" in 1816 with failed crops around the northern hemisphere, and snow and freezing conditions across the US in June and July of that year.
It must have been a hell of a bang to remove 4000 foot of mountain.

I reckon the USDA report may push wheat up to £180 then!

SilliamWhale · Jan 14, 2020

Danllan said:
Chris Packham is a definite git in some respects, but I like him.

On the subject of the world's population being too large, no surprise there. We gave 20th Century medicine to cultures that ranged from being equivalent to the Late Middle Ages in many places to being just out of the stone age in most of Black Africa. And then we expected them to quickly 'evolve' the societal responsibility necessary to use them without problems. That was never going to happen, and it didn't...

Only sometimes, mostly it's too many mouths to feed, see above.

I can't think of a modern day famine that was caused by too many mouths.

That Mount Tambora was a natural disaster so would it have really mattered what the population was? Its like saying a tsunami in Japan which wiped out crops would be a demo that the population was too large to be sustained agriculturally

PSQ · Jan 14, 2020

SilliamWhale said:
I reckon the USDA report may push wheat up to £180 then!

I reckon you'd have 7-10 days before the government requisition the contents of every grain store in the country under 'emergency powers'.

Wellytrack · Jan 14, 2020

M-J-G said:
And......

And thankfully us in the West have beaten those diseases. Don’t forget who these diseases still largely affect..

By your ‘and...’ it seems you recognise that disease causes undue and unnecessary misery but since it’s not ‘us’ all is well.

DrWazzock · Jan 14, 2020

Macsky said:
Regarding bad religions, I have been thinking quite a bit recently of how whole climate alarmism/activism falls neatly into the same model as many of them.

The planet/mother earth is god
Climate change/environmental damage is the sin
Sacrificing our modern comforts is the penance
The poor will be manipulated/controlled by rules given down from above by those to whom the rules will not apply, and who will be made even richer by the implementation of said rules.
There’s nothing new under the sun.
(ftr I’m a Christian of the reformed persuasion)

Indeed.
Though the "save the planet" religion be new, the materialism and selfishness that causes the damage has been questioned and mulled over in many religions for thousands of years. People have tried to lead non materialist lives treading lightly on the earth but have generally been swimming against the tide. Monks and nuns who lead self sufficient celebate lives in monasteries could i suppose have been forerunners of some kind of green movement, maybe unwittingly, in that what they saw as religious piety was actually doing more to promote resource saving attitudes than anything since.
Quite interesting where paths cross.

If we could turn enthusiasm for short term materialism into enthusiasm for leading a sustainable low impact life for the common good then we would be getting somewhere, but in reality I cant see this happening globally, if it even happens at all, anything like quickly enough to stave off the worst effects of climate change and resource depletion.

In other words we are heading for the edge of the Malthusian saw tooth graph and about to plummet. The earth will self repair of course and carry on for millennia after we have gone. It will manage just fine without us.

flowerpot · Jan 14, 2020

SilliamWhale said:
Famine is often not because of a lack of ability to grow food. War is the biggest thing.

It is lack of money rather than lack of food. And food is not well distributed. Do we need to be able to buy string beans from Africa? On the other hand it is giving work to the population so they can feed their families. It is a puzzle.

Macsky · Jan 14, 2020

Danllan said:
Chris Packham is a definite git in some respects, but I like him.

On the subject of the world's population being too large, no surprise there. We gave 20th Century medicine to cultures that ranged from being equivalent to the Late Middle Ages in many places to being just out of the stone age in most of Black Africa. And then we expected them to quickly 'evolve' the societal responsibility necessary to use them without problems. That was never going to happen, and it didn't...

Only sometimes, mostly it's too many mouths to feed, see above.

You like Chris Packham?

Wellytrack · Jan 14, 2020

M-J-G said:
You can't blame any social group (be it religeous or not) for people having kids, people do what they do and children are born.
If you don't want to used controlled measures and you want to make sure that another little person doesn't appear, then don't do the thing that makes it happen, or at least not during the times that it can happen.

It's not like leaving the bulls gate open, people are supposed to be intelligent.

To some of us, having children is a choice, others it is not, and absolutely Religion has played a role.

How about this, an Irish woman had a family of five children, she wanted no more as she could barely feed or cloth what she had and refused having sex with her husband.

Her husband told her to go see the priest. Off she cycles in to see him. What do you imagine he tells her?

That’s right, that she is subservient to her husband and is committing a sin and offending God by refusing him sex. Two more children appear. Husband dies. Seven children to look after on her own.

Birth control didn’t exist, but even if it did the Catholic Church would have strictly forbidden it’s use anyhow.

Religion absolutely has had an effect on population.

SilliamWhale · Jan 14, 2020

flowerpot said:
It is lack of money rather than lack of food. And food is not well distributed. Do we need to be able to buy string beans from Africa? On the other hand it is giving work to the population so they can feed their families. It is a puzzle.

If you take away the climate change argument for a minute then really there should be no puzzle at all - making people all over the world a bit richer is a brilliant thing for them, now and its a wonderful thing. Somebody on a few dollars a day isn't so worried about their children or their grandchildren, they worried about tomorrow or next year. The saving the planet stuff is for us westerners to fuss about.

And furthermore there is no real effort to deal with the low hanging fruit with regards to climate change - we should be using more fracked resources, more nuclear etc. The idea that somehow contracting our economy just to reduce climate change just isn't going to happen - people need to be realistic about this.

DrWazzock · Jan 14, 2020

SilliamWhale said:
Famine is often not because of a lack of ability to grow food. War is the biggest thing.

I am always harping on about Iran because its the only place I have ever visited. But this is what struck me there.
The population was only 40 million in 1980. Its 80 million today.
You travel over it and there appears to be nothing but sand.
Tehran is running short of water as the winter rains in the surrounding mountains are failing.
In the streets you choke on traffic fumes.
So what did the ayatollah do?
He encouraged everybody to have more kids, so they told me.
Total balmpot if you ask me, but what do I know, I'm just an engineer.
And all those might well have less kids as they get richer, but instead of living in tents herding a few goats they live in high rises each with a big air con unit bolted to the side. And they each want a car and to eat more and have more leisure and fly around the world to see stuff.
Its a catastrophe in my book, Greta is right.
Everybody is denial and thinks is not me mate. I don't need to do anything.
Doesnt help that being green is one of the biggest partypooping things there is.
But it isn't if you change your focus away from crass materialism to using your energy to build sustainable ways of living.

M-J-G · Jan 14, 2020

Wellytrack said:
And thankfully us in the West have beaten those diseases. Don’t forget who these diseases still largely affect..

By your ‘and...’ it seems you recognise that disease causes undue and unnecessary misery but since it’s not ‘us’ all is well.

The "and" was simply asking why you felt the need to point out the obvious.

I fail to see why you feel the need to get a hump on when someone has made a suggestion that population should be controlled in the way that diseases used to.

I am far from a supporter of Packham, but from what I read, nobody is suggesting introducing or using disease to control populations, more suggesting that the subject needs to be addressed.

SilliamWhale · Jan 14, 2020

Macsky said:
Regarding bad religions, I have been thinking quite a bit recently of how whole climate alarmism/activism falls neatly into the same model as many of them.

The planet/mother earth is god
Climate change/environmental damage is the sin
Sacrificing our modern comforts is the penance
The poor will be manipulated/controlled by rules given down from above by those to whom the rules will not apply, and who will be made even richer by the implementation of said rules.
There’s nothing new under the sun.
(ftr I’m a Christian of the reformed persuasion)

Oh its totally a religious thing. And more than that its actually a religion in the Christian/ monotheistic tradition mixed and matched with a bit of western style animism. A cult to a sect to an ecclesia...

kill · Jan 14, 2020

SilliamWhale said:
Yes but population statistics seem to suggest you make people wealthier then rate of babies produced goes down. Population control of poor people doesn't work and its cruel.

I think Packham is wrong here. The world has had it best decade ever- more people were richer than ever before. Yes climate may be changing but there is no real evidence for the "runaway" climate change idea anyway - we will probably see a degree or two of warming over 100-150 years. There is room for more people in the world no bother at all - Finland is empty, Russia is empty, Wales is empty, France is pretty empty, Canada is for sure. Only 11% of England is built on

There needs to be an awful lot of Empty or pretty Empty to make up in anyway for the horrendous areas of population that I believe are called towns and cities where the human population live on top of each other with barely any greenery anywhere and everything transported in and transported out and run on vast quantities of energy and water.
It's not exactly rocket science that there are just too many humans raping this planet and unfortunately we all believe strongly it's not our problem but it's other people's and virtually any realistic answer from any government would be so harsh that it would finish their chance of re'election EVER .

M-J-G · Jan 14, 2020

Wellytrack said:
To some of us, having children is a choice, others it is not, and absolutely Religion has played a role.

How about this, an Irish woman had a family of five children, she wanted no more as she could barely feed or cloth what she had and refused having sex with her husband.

Her husband told her to go see the priest. Off she cycles in to see him. What do you imagine he tells her?

That’s right, that she is subservient to her husband and is committing a sin and offending God by refusing him sex. Two more children appear. Husband dies. Seven children to look after on her own.

Birth control didn’t exist, but even if it did the Catholic Church would have strictly forbidden it’s use anyhow.

Religion absolutely has had an effect on population.

But it's the person's choice to partake in Religeon in the free world.

Can't this Irish Catholic woman count? Or at least get her dominating husband or interfering priest to count for her.

DrWazzock · Jan 14, 2020

SilliamWhale said:
Oh its totally a religious thing. And more than that its actually a religion in the Christian/ monotheistic tradition mixed and matched with a bit of western style animism. A cult to a sect to an ecclesia...

No, its an engineering systems thing and it needs better monitoring and control.

A very dangerous man.

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