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Seriously now, what's it going to take before yous top eating steer and pig, taking 3 hour showers, and leaving your computer on all night long while you proudly sleep with the lights on to your favorite radio station?
I'm not quite sure I could handle it. But if I had to, I might sleep in the dark.
I turn my computer off at night, take 5-10 minute showers, eat things associated with pig only once in a great while, and my room is completely dark when I sleep.
About the only thing I leave on is my iPod.
I completely agree. At this point, people should have the common decency to stop bearing children.
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Originally Posted by FF VII
I'm a strong advocate for adoption. There's too much in the world that needs to be taken care of.
Having said that it's usually the intelligent people who should procreate that are choosing not too.
People in general should be more practical in their lifestyle habits. Things like turning off lights when you leave a room and taking reasonable showers are things that shouldn't inconvenience anyone. On the other hand, no one should be expected to comply with some of the insane rhetoric being perpetuated by some conservation groups. Like I said in the other thread, many of the problems we face today concerning the natural world are not happening because of what we're doing to the environment, but instead of what we're doing to each other.
EDIT: Wait. What are we talking about?
From a human rights standpoint, anyone woman should be allowed to have children. From a sociological and economic standpoint, I would recommend other means be explored. Is there any proof that intelligent people, genetically give birth to children that are considerably more adept to learning than children of so-called "normal" parents? Or can the discrepancy be explained through the nurturing process? Either way, I guess I agree with you.
The very same thought crossed my mind.
You edited your post and now mine looks out of place and stupid. ;_;
Nature (genetics) does play a minor-MINOR role but I'm banking on the nurturing process.Quote:
Originally Posted by Yamaneko
Higher IQ ususally means that an individual has better problem solving skills so that when a child does something wrong a parent can rely on these skills as opposed to resorting immediately to physical punishment (which tends to happen out of fustration for lack of anything better to do). Also, people who generally have a higher academic based IQ (logical mathamatical, linguistic, spatial) tend to go to college more frequently and consequently get better jobs and thus better pay. Pay is important to support a child. More money usually means that food is a better quality and food is essential in a child's mental and physical growth. More money also means that a parent can offer their child extra-curricular activities to stimulate social skills ... but yeah there's a whole bunch of subsequent factors.
Dude. The title of this thread and the first post barely relate to each other. Seriously, what's the topic, overpopulation, or energy and food conservation?
In any case I think people who can't afford children should not pop out babies. It's curious to me that so many people with poverty or near-poverty income have so many children. I may be discriminating against poor people, but tough. If you can't afford to financially support children, don't have them.
The thread ain't dead yet. It's actually kind of interesting, so I'm not editing anything.Quote:
Dude. The title of this thread and the first post barely relate to each other. Seriously, what's the topic, overpopulation, or energy and food conservation?
A world were only intelligent people were bred would be a very horrible world in the long run. Imagine a world where everyone was inclined to go to college to learn higher end jobs, and had the potential for better social understanding. With everyone wanting the better jobs, who would be the farmers, the mechanics, or the department store cashiers? Intelligent people wouldn't want these jobs, yet they still need done. Now imagine if the government came up with a system to fill these jobs, whether it be by lottery, chosen by birth, or any other means. The person chosen would not be happy with their life.
Gods and clods, hero.
You can't breed intelligent people and we're never going to have intellectual households as nurturing environments across the board. You have nothing to worry about.
>>> Just, hurry up and colonize Mars...
Terraform the galaxy!
I think that would only be true if the dominant paradigm in the society were that of capitalism. There are other paradigms that have hardly ever been explored.Quote:
A world were only intelligent people were bred would be a very horrible world in the long run. Imagine a world where everyone was inclined to go to college to learn higher end jobs, and had the potential for better social understanding. With everyone wanting the better jobs, who would be the farmers, the mechanics, or the department store cashiers? Intelligent people wouldn't want these jobs, yet they still need done. Now imagine if the government came up with a system to fill these jobs, whether it be by lottery, chosen by birth, or any other means. The person chosen would not be happy with their life.
As to why people in poverty pop out babies - as I said in the other thread, it's because the social cost of having children for people living in poverty is negligible, and in fact it's actually advantageous for people living in Third World conditions to have children. In an agricultural or sweatshop society, children manage to sustain themselves around the age of eight. In a post-industrial society, where you have to send kids to college and they generally don't even work for a living until they're out of graduate school, having children becomes a much larger social cost, and so people abstain from doing it nearly as much. So, in short, one solution to overpopulation would be to stop hoarding so much for ourselves.
That said, I think the dangers of overpopulation in the Third World to the planet as a whole are frequently overstated. Certainly, if we continue to be as generous towards the Third World as we currently are, the number of people starving (it's currently 30,000 per day, and growing) will only continue to increase. However, the people living in the Third World are not the ones using all the resources. The USA contains 4% of the world's population, and consumes 35% of the world's resources, while the rest of the world, containing 96% of the world's population, consumes 65% of the world's resources. That means that, per capita, Americans use over twelve times as much resources as the rest of the world, averaged out. When you compare Americans to the poorest thirty percent of the world, it's even larger - I think it's a hundred times per capita or something.
There is the problem of foreign aid. If America did dole out money for the poor lot of us, I've never seen a single cent. Yes, it never reaches the people who need it the most.Quote:
Originally Posted by The Man
Actually poverty because of all these hoarding of resources isn't the solely the fault of the people of America. They have money, they spend it, eat a lot and avail of different luxuries.Quote:
Originally Posted by The Man
They're first-world, they earned their state after years of history anyway. We just have to catch up.
Can you imagine how unfunny and boring the world would be without dumb people? I would not like that much.
Isn't it clear what the solution is? Neuter everyone! Seriously, anybody born as of the end of this sentence should be culled.
So what you wanna do!?
Unless we start cutting penis and stuff like that things will never change!
I give blood is that a starter?
Maybe starting the Battle Royale Act would help
Yes, God forbid there wouldn't be another wasted TV slot of idiots running their motorbikes over homemade ramps or doing body slams off the roofs of their houses.Quote:
Originally Posted by Millia Billia
Childbirth shouldn't have to be controlled by a government, that's what nature was for. We've come to a point, however, where natural selection no longer has the power to keep our numbers in check. Rather, medical and technological advancements have allowed for our species to master nature so that the death rate in infants due to natural (and unfortunate) circumstances has been significantly reduced.
It's now a personal and moral obligation to logically evaluate the circumstance of our environment and ask ... "Does the world need another child?"
God knows we all want to have our own bundle of joy. I can't deny my own maternal instincts... but that's exactly what it is: instinct, primal urges and primitive desire to procreate to keep the species and genes alive. Our natural make-up did not predict technology though... so although it's difficult; its truely up to us to overcome these instincts so that maybe we can start preserving the world instead of our species.
We respect the lives of our species so much, and for good reason... but we respect ourselves so much that we forget to respect the land and the creatures we share it with.
Does this mean I'm not allowed to have babies? :whimper:
What's it going to take? A cosmic anomaly, my friend. Not that I do any of that on regular basis.
Extremely poor people shouldn't have children. They should all be sterilised. Anyone who would want to have a child when they know the child is going to suffer, is not fit to be a parent anyway. An then there are the people who are a waste of space. It would be better if the government would put them to good use by experimenting on them, but if their not going to do that, they may as well kill them. Rather than just throwing them in prison an making us pay to keep them. Or worse,leaving them free to harass the decent folk. An as for resources, that's down to the government again. How the worlds resources are supplied, is not under my control.
Ain't that the truth. Sums up my thoughts well enough. Of course, everyone should be able to afford to have ONE baby sometime in their life. But ten? C'mon now.Quote:
Originally Posted by Miriel
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Originally Posted by Squall
GCSE Geography teaches us that third world people have more children because they need them to take care of the rest of the family, and help on the farm/sweatshop/whatever.
I wasn't referring to 3rd world countries in my post. And if having more children makes things more financially viable for a family, then that doesn't fall into my category of people who are unable to support their children.
I was however talking about poverty-stricken families right here in Los Angeles who have like 5 kids. My Dad is a Minister and he does what he can to help families like this in the slums of LA. So I've seen these people with my own eyes. And I just can't understand why people would bring children into this world who are gonna go hungry. It may have something to do with religion and the refusal to use birth control. But god dammit, poor people are just gonna have to give up on sex if they can't afford children and they refuse to use birth control.
We should eradicate the entirity of the worlds Poverty and send all of teh Convicts in the US to China and hype them up on steroids and Crack causing a war in the streets that will eventually spread throughout China and their population. With the Drugs now available to the the common man of China to a degree never thought possible we should send spies in to incite revolts among the drug users and cause wide spread destruction across China so they inevetably destroy themselves. Not only will this remove convicts from america, but eliminate a large portion of the world population.
With the completion of this step we should launch an asault against india and use the land for cattle farming to feed our ever growing hunger.
Doing things morally and naturlaly are for the week.
Cuba did something like that already, and, in the end, all we got out of it was Scarface and a transformed South Florida. Oh, and the Cuban Missile Crisis.Quote:
Originally Posted by corncracker
We don't need to make enemies with China. We need Genocide. (I mean, if your plan is going to work. I'm not suggesting anything...)
And we're capitalists, so we don't much care for the government forcing anyone to have any particular job. Being, you know, freedom-loving and that.Quote:
Originally Posted by The Man
The answer is technology and space. Nanotech + genetics + terraforming Mars = massive boosts already. The further afield we go the more resources we have to exploit.
Some people believe we already have secret underground tunnels on Mars, you know?
Some people believe in God.Quote:
Originally Posted by theundeadhero
Some people believe that we never landed on the moon.Quote:
Originally Posted by I'm my own MILFSome people believe in God.Quote:
Originally Posted by theundeadhero
Experimenting on people?!
Death sentence for being poor...?
That's just twisted logic. Do you know what we call those people? Nazis. We call them Nazis.
What we need to do is take personal responsibility.
Self-sustainibility is the way of the future!
Down with the global culture!
Up with small sustainable communities!
I don't know what it's like in America, but I know here a lot of council house people just have a [img]/xxx.gif[/img][img]/xxx.gif[/img][img]/xxx.gif[/img][img]/xxx.gif[/img]load of babies and then sponge child benefits off the government, and they make a lot of money doing it, too. It's completely retarded, but there's not a fat lot you can do about it.Quote:
Originally Posted by Miriel
>>> The poor people has the same rights as everyone else. Is that so hard to understand?..
Experimenting on animals is fine. Experimenting on rapists makes you a nazi..... An I've got twisted logic!Quote:
Originally Posted by Chemical
if we were concerned with overpopulation, there would be provisions made to help the world. the problem is most people don't care...i sure don't. if i get enough food and a warm place to sleep...why do i care if some kid in africa goes hungry?
look up norman borlaug...hope i spelled that right...he wasn't content to be fed and warm...and he saved so many lives...he's just one man with some help...think of what the entire population of north america could accomplish! overpopulated areas are like that because people stay in one place....do you have any idea how much space is in canada? the amount of people we could fit onto this giant landmass amuses me to no end
what are we at...7 billion?? thats nothin...mcdonalds has served more than that
Actually, I'd be all too happy if that stuff disappeared (I hate reality tv, and television period, mostly because of reality tv). I was talking more along the lines of politicians and people undergoing legal battles. :)Quote:
Originally Posted by ChemicalYes, God forbid there wouldn't be another wasted TV slot of idiots running their motorbikes over homemade ramps or doing body slams off the roofs of their houses.Quote:
Originally Posted by Millia Billia
Yeah they're all equally crazy. What's your point?Quote:
Originally Posted by MartyrSome people believe that we never landed on the moon.Quote:
Originally Posted by I'm my own MILFSome people believe in God.Quote:
Originally Posted by theundeadhero
That... that... this is very, very special :bigsmile: Whilst I'm of the opinion that the planet can sustain far more people than it currently does, I'm not sure that argumentum ad McDonalds is the best way to propound as much.Quote:
Originally Posted by Araciel
just trying to add some mirth to what i said...if someone reading that finds it invalidates what i said before it then i won't bother trying to defend myself
That's because the West's idea of "aid" to the Third World traditionally consists of sending money to their governments. Frankly, the governments are usually part of the problem; they're often directly responsible for kicking people off the land they used to use to grow all their food (at the behest of bribery from corporations, of course). Even sending food to the Third World doesn't help much; it perpetuates a state of dependence on aid. What should really be done with money sent to the Third World is to buy land for the people who are starving, then teach them agriculture so they'll be able to sustain themselves.Quote:
Originally Posted by 41-Inches-Wide
Part of the reason you still need to catch up is because of deliberate actions by the west, so I'd say it's not all earned (especially considering the atrocities committed to the natives here in the first place).Quote:
Originally Posted by 41-Inches-Wide
I love it when capitalists imply that all other economic systems imply the absence of freedom. They always focus on the freedom to do things. That's all very well and good, but sometimes the freedom from things, like starvation and disease and ignorance, is just as important if not more so. If I'm a starving child in Zaire, I'm really not going to give a [img]/xxx.gif[/img][img]/xxx.gif[/img][img]/xxx.gif[/img][img]/xxx.gif[/img] that technically I have the freedom to make as much money as I want, because I'm never actually going to see any of it if I don't get enough food to survive until tomorrow, and even if I manage that, the economic system is stacked such that the chances of a starving child in Zaire becoming a multibillionaire are effectively nil.Quote:
Originally Posted by I'm my own MILF
When capitalists talk about freedom, they're nearly always talking about the freedom for themselves to hoard as many possessions to themselves as possible. Such a parochial and egocentric view of the world.
That's if we don't burn out all the resources we have on Earth first, which, increasingly, looks quite likely. That said, space exploration does seem rather promising, but it's probably never going to happen.Quote:
Originally Posted by I'm my own MILF
No one ever said that experimenting on animals was right. (MOOT!)Quote:
Originally Posted by AnaisaExperimenting on animals is fine. Experimenting on rapists makes you a nazi..... An I've got twisted logic!Quote:
Originally Posted by Chemical
Experimenting on people is wrong, them being a rapist doesn't make it any more right.
And yes, yes it is. Twisted like a twisted thing.
We're supposed to be civilized human beings, the solutions we offer should be ethical and moral. It's easy to be angry at the world for being so frigged up. It's even easier to be angry at all the 'bad' people in the world who do terrible and bad things... but we shouldn't let our anger justify our own immoral actions.
Listen ... there's just a lot of wrong things in the world so it just seems that we each need to be responsible for making sure that someone is doing something right.
Yeah, I'm sure those hundreds of millions of people will be able to sustain themselves on that fraction of an acre of land. We've moved beyond the agrarian model. With the amount of people on earth it's not possible for everyone to be a farmer.Quote:
Originally Posted by The Man
I agree, globalization isn't the greatest thing, but it's debatable if things would be that much better if that exploitation didn't exist. If foreign government isn't willing to protect its citizens from unfair wages and work environments, who's to say they would do anything to benefit the country if U.S. economic influence didn't exist?Quote:
Part of the reason you still need to catch up is because of deliberate actions by the west, so I'd say it's not all earned (especially considering the atrocities committed to the natives here in the first place).
So the state should have the right to tell you when you've made enough money and when you've acquired enough possessions?Quote:
When capitalists talk about freedom, they're nearly always talking about the freedom for themselves to hoard as many possessions to themselves as possible. Such a parochial and egocentric view of the world.
Of course not, but the people who are farmers will be able to produce enough food for the people who aren't. In the model we have now, what usually ends up happening is simply that no one produces food at all. Land that was previously used to produce food for natives is converted to produce, say, flowers for the American market. What's more, where there were hundreds of people working on that land originally, it's all machinized, so nearly all those people end up out of a job.Quote:
Yeah, I'm sure those hundreds of millions of people will be able to sustain themselves on that fraction of an acre of land. We've moved beyond the agrarian model. With the amount of people on earth it's not possible for everyone to be a farmer.
Simply converting the land back to its original use would solve quite a lot of the problem.
My point is that on occasion, they have actually done things to hurt the vast majority of their citizens thanks to the influence of multinational corporations. For instance, raising property taxes to an insane level in order to force natives off their land; there are documented cases of this happening in southeastern Mexico.Quote:
I agree, globalization isn't the greatest thing, but it's debatable if things would be that much better if that exploitation didn't exist. If foreign government isn't willing to protect its citizens from unfair wages and work environments, who's to say they would do anything to benefit the country if U.S. economic influence didn't exist?
Pretty much. That money and those possessions always come at the expense of someone else. Look at it this way: America is a nation of people who consume and don't produce (by and large), so the Third World is an antimatter universe of people who produce and don't consume.Quote:
So the state should have the right to tell you when you've made enough money and when you've acquired enough possessions?
The capitalist model is founded on the assumption, based on Adam Smith's conception of the "Invisible Hand," that everyone, in maximizing their own self-interest, is maximizing the self-interest of the public as a whole as well. Unfortunately, this assumption is demonstrably untrue. Let us take the example of the tragedy of the commons. For those who are unfamiliar with it, there is a commonly owned land where everyone is allowed to graze cattle. In this scenario, it is in every farmer's self-interest to have as many cattle as they can, so they can raise as much milk as possible and make as much money as possible. Unfortunately, after a certain number of cattle graze on the land, they eat the grass down to its roots, and after a point, milk production actually goes down. It's still in everyone's self-interest to graze as many cattle as possible, though, so no cattle get removed, some probably get added, and the commons end up completely unusable for any grazing purposes whatsoever.
This can be extended to so many scenarios - overfishing of the ocean, the case of driving cars versus using public transportation, and I could go on. The only solution to these problems is when a coercive outside entity, necessarily the government, steps in and says, "Enough is enough." Naturally, there are plenty of cases where the government itself can be corrupt, and that is why I favour as much transparency as possible in government and as much civic awareness as possible in the population (which naturally requires a solid education, and thus implying a number of other things as well, but that's irrelevant really).
The majority of people think it's right. You've yet to comment on whether you think it's right or not. If you don't think humans should be used, an you don't think animals should be used, since there is currently nothing else to experiment on to get the results we need, that would mean that we wouldn't be experimenting on anything. Few people agree that's a good idea, so it's most likely you agree with animals being tested on. If you thought otherwise, you'd have said so.Quote:
Originally Posted by Chemical
Yes it does. If you had to choose whether a decent person or a rapist was experimented on, surely you'd choose the rapist. Their a despicable human being an deserve to suffer. Sending them to prison isn't a good enough punishment, an it's a waste of money an resources keeping them there.Quote:
Experimenting on people is wrong, them being a rapist doesn't make it any more right.
No, it's not twisted. It's perfectly logical. Criminals serve no purpose in prison an aren't being appropriately punished. Their a waste of space. Experimenting on them would help other people, an animals, whilst giving them the punishment they deserve.Quote:
And yes, yes it is. Twisted like a twisted thing.
Humans aren't civilized, they never have been. They like to think they are. The solution I've provided is ethical, an moral.Quote:
We're supposed to be civilized human beings, the solutions we offer should be ethical and moral.
My actions aren't immoral. The reason why so many people do bad things is because their not adequately punished for it. If criminals knew they'd end up in a lab getting experimented on for life, they would be a whole lot less likely to commit the crime in the first place.Quote:
It's easy to be angry at the world for being so frigged up. It's even easier to be angry at all the 'bad' people in the world who do terrible and bad things... but we shouldn't let our anger justify our own immoral actions.
Maybe we could move to Uranus *snigger snigger*
More people farming does not equate higher supply. Why do you think we've moved onto a mechanized form or agriculture in the last one-hundred and fifty years? There just isn't enough man-power alone to feed the entire world. Machines have made that possible.Quote:
Originally Posted by The Man
There's also a large machine industry that employs people too. Those people and their skills will be put out of a job as well. What's more, we need those machines to keep production at a high rate. Manual labor alone cannot keep up production at the same pace as mechanized labor.Quote:
What's more, where there were hundreds of people working on that land originally, it's all machinized, so nearly all those people end up out of a job.
This has really been a domestic problem in Mexico. The domination of the PRI up until 2000 signaled close relations with the U.S. as a means to industrialize the country. Fox and the PAN have done very little to curb this.Quote:
My point is that on occasion, they have actually done things to hurt the vast majority of their citizens thanks to the influence of multinational corporations. For instance, raising property taxes to an insane level in order to force natives off their land; there are documented cases of this happening in southeastern Mexico.
I still don't agree with it. The state should have no right on the amount of money I can make within legislative conditions and how many things I can own.Quote:
Pretty much. That money and those possessions always come at the expense of someone else. Look at it this way: America is a nation of people who consume and don't produce (by and large), so the Third World is an antimatter universe of people who produce and don't consume.
In the two cases you described above the government steps in and compensates the farmer in exchange for the destruction of their product. This seems fair.
The topic is overpopulation
Unrelated.Quote:
Originally Posted by Anaisa
And don't ever make assumptions about someone's oppinion it's quite rude and antithematic to the process of an intellectual discourse.
Unrelated.Quote:
Yes it does. If you had to choose whether a decent person or a rapist was experimented on, surely you'd choose the rapist. Their a despicable human being an deserve to suffer. Sending them to prison isn't a good enough punishment, an it's a waste of money an resources keeping them there.
If I had to choose? No no no.. see I wouldn't have to choose because experimenting on people, any people, is wrong.
Unrelated.Quote:
No, it's not twisted. It's perfectly logical. Criminals serve no purpose in prison an aren't being appropriately punished. Their a waste of space. Experimenting on them would help other people, an animals, whilst giving them the punishment they deserve.
People are a waste of space in general; which is the topic of this thread.
http://moral.wjh.harvard.edu/index2.htmlQuote:
Humans aren't civilized, they never have been. They like to think they are. The solution I've provided is ethical, an moral.
Morals are a set social standard of right and wrong conduct - I'm afraid experimenting on people doesn't make the bar.
Even more unrelated.Quote:
My actions aren't immoral. The reason why so many people do bad things is because their not adequately punished for it. If criminals knew they'd end up in a lab getting experimented on for life, they would be a whole lot less likely to commit the crime in the first place.
You're suggesting we put all our resources, time and effort in correcting a whole different problem. This doesn't assist with the overpopulation crisis.
I'll reiterate that overpopulation is a problem and the state has no ethical or moral manner in dealing with this issue on a mass level; right now. I feel the best that the government can do right now is educate, people need to know that making the choice of having children is contributing to a problem.
We each need to have the moral obligation of taking responsibility for our own actions. People who want to be parents should be considering the alternative of adoption. There's way to much in the world that needs to be taken care of and every day more and more mothers and fathers are dieing and more and more women are having children they don't plan on keeping, consequently leaving the children in a state of limbo.
I'm also advocating Yeuthanasia - the act of mercy killing, although not moral by our social standards, is practiced in some European countires. I believe Holland. I feel that allowing this system to function in certain and specific cases could relieve some pressure on the medical system and our own society.
I'm not against placing a limitation on the amount of children a person has; though I don't think this system would work in our culture as there are too many differing variables that would not allow for a communal justification... but I think that having children in our culture is rediculously unnecessary especially in the case of urban and suburban dwellers. The point of children was once to have farm aid, now there's no other reason except "I want." So I'd say maybe a max of 2... but again it would be too difficult to create a moral backing to justify this course... But 2 would be a good number because that would mean that 2 people are either sustaining the population or they're reducing it.
Education. Education. Education. People should be aware of the different types of birth controls, they should be aware of the different types of sterility treatments. These things should be pushed on a mass level. Let there be public service commercials and educational programs. Unfortunately the state isn't too concerned with the population level - Capitalists pigs. They won't worry either until resources have run out and every square inch of lang is consumed by suburban sprawl. Enough needs to be enough.
Stupid people should be banned from breeding. Along with pikies and the like.
I don't shower, or eat, or sleep, and I have no lights. Therefore I am the perfect human. :bigsmile:
But overpopulation. I suggest we screw morals and ethics, and just live like animals. In fact, that's probably what's going to happen eventually anyway. Let's start now!
That, or stop pissing around with our pointless wars, unite as a planet and figure out a way to sort ourselves out. 1 of those 2 options is possible. It's not the latter.