From eglaze@vsta.com Sat Nov 7 11:18:58 1998 Received: from rivendell.vsta.com (rivendell.vsta.com [204.57.96.15]) by csf.Colorado.EDU (8.8.5/8.8.4/CNS-4.1p-nh) with ESMTP id LAA18268 for ; Sat, 7 Nov 1998 11:18:56 -0700 (MST) Received: from eglaze.vsta.com (eglazeADSL.vsta.com [204.57.96.81]) by rivendell.vsta.com (8.8.8/8.8.6) with SMTP id MAA26305 for ; Sat, 7 Nov 1998 12:20:57 -0600 (CST) From: "Ed Glaze III" To: "PPN Listserv" Subject: News articles and introduction Date: Sat, 7 Nov 1998 12:24:16 -0600 Message-ID: <01be0a7b$d3d29100$516039cc@eglaze.vsta.com> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit X-Priority: 3 X-MSMail-Priority: Normal X-MimeOLE: Produced By Microsoft MimeOLE V4.71.1712.3 This nation and this planet, by the numbers GOOD POP ARTICLE -- print from this URL Bookmark this URL ABC US news stories ANALYSIS: Religious right tries to bounce back Enraged greens say climate talks have sold out Environmentalists at the U.N. climate talks in Buenos Aires on Friday accused industrialized nations of putting their own economic well-being above the need to curb global warming for the good of all mankind. EcoWars: A matter of values The environment has become a battle ground in a war of values. Some recent clashes indicate the battle is escalating. CNN Quick Vote question Do you think civil disobedience is an acceptable way to protest environmental issues? As of 12:45 am EST the tally was 59 percent saying yes! New Chinese Law Loosens Rules for Domestic Adoption SHANGHAI--China, the land that has become the United States' biggest source of adopted babies, has changed its law to encourage more of its own people to adopt orphaned and abandoned children. Italy intercepts ship carrying more than 300 immigrants It was too early to say where the immigrants came from but Italy's shores are a constant magnet for desperate people from Albania, Africa Turkey, Iraq and Sri Lanka hoping for a better life in Europe. Geologist Explores Faith-Science 'Dialogue' Religion: As the battle over evolution vs. creationism continues, more scientists and theologians are looking at what both fields have to offer. ----------------- Sprawl, voting on urban growth initiatives and the Sierra Club were all discussed Friday on All Things Considered. There were several mentions of Sierra Club and the sprawl program, opinions from builders, professors, and others. Overall some very positive media support for the sprawl issue. They closed with a statement something like, "They will have to build a million houses a year for the next decade just to keep up with population growth." NPR ALL THINGS CONSIDERED Listen to the latest show -- get the Friday show on Saturday NPR Programs ------------------ Every letter to the editor in today's Sacramento Bee addresses sprawl. If ANYONE still has access and wants to post it: Searching for limits to growth -- 27 Oct See also the Kozmology cartoon "Bores Celebre" at: ------------- Introduction follows if you are interested. I am a new subscriber to this PPN listserv but some of you might be familiar with me from the other pop listservs, KZPG, Audubon, and Sierra Club. I mentioned the PPN listserv on the other lists so there may be an increase in new subscribers. I am a pop activist for Audubon, Sierra Club, and ZPG along with many memberships and subscriptions to other population groups. I am also a newsletter editor and population chair for my local SC group. My view on overpopulation is that we need is a very sizable planned reduction in population before nature does it for us. I am almost 44, a native Texan living in the small fishing village of Port Mansfield, which is 50 miles north of Brownsville, and am working as a real estate broker in the family business. I divorced in '81 when my ex decided she might want kids. I practice what I preach and we went our separate ways. One great things about Port is that we have digital subscriber lines for fast internet connection (700k), though it costs $60/mo. I do lots of web browsing and like to pass on pop-related articles and websites to the listservs, especially on the weekends when so few other people are posting. I have lived in Houston, Dallas, and several other Texas cities but for now am enjoying small-town life. I've put in about 10 years of college with degrees in business management and journalism, along with lots of computers and some graduate environmental science. I believe in a generalist education and living a simple lifestyle -- shorts, t-shirt, and bare feet -- which you can't do when you get an MBA of doctorate. ________ Ed Glaze Port Mansfield, TX "If they don't understand the severity of the problem, they won't understand the severity of the solution. Overpopulation must be dealt with." ________ Ed Glaze "If they don't understand the severity of the problem, they won't understand the severity of the solution. Overpopulation must be dealt with." From eglaze@vsta.com Sat Nov 7 12:17:51 1998 Received: from rivendell.vsta.com (rivendell.vsta.com [204.57.96.15]) by csf.Colorado.EDU (8.8.5/8.8.4/CNS-4.1p-nh) with ESMTP id MAA20980 for ; Sat, 7 Nov 1998 12:17:48 -0700 (MST) Received: from eglaze.vsta.com (eglazeADSL.vsta.com [204.57.96.81]) by rivendell.vsta.com (8.8.8/8.8.6) with SMTP id NAA27463; Sat, 7 Nov 1998 13:19:36 -0600 (CST) From: "Ed Glaze III" To: "Audubon Population" , "Population Forum, Sierra Club" , "KZPG Overpopulation News Network" , "PPN Listserv" Subject: People Count on CNN -- Sunday 1:30 EST Date: Sat, 7 Nov 1998 13:22:56 -0600 Message-ID: <01be0a84$05e977a0$516039cc@eglaze.vsta.com> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit X-Priority: 3 X-MSMail-Priority: Normal X-MimeOLE: Produced By Microsoft MimeOLE V4.71.1712.3 PEOPLE COUNT: FORGING AHEAD Jane Fonda hosts Turner Broadcasting's newest PEOPLE COUNT special, a half-hour look at the environment's past, present and future The special begins with a look at the ancient civilization of Easter Island, which offers a metaphor for what is being done to the planet today. According to one scientist who has spent 40 years studying the island and its mysterious 30-foot-tall statues, Easter Island's history offers a clear example of a culture that used up all of its natural resources, leading to an environmental meltdown. A team of scientists is now exploring a frightening theory, one that could affect all of us, about what destroyed the Easter Island civilization. In Atlanta, Ray Anderson, chairman and CEO of Interface, Inc., is taking climate changes into his own hands with a top-down vision of environmental responsibility, involving every one of his 7,500 employees. Innovative corporate policies, like dramatically reducing the greenhouse gases the Interface plants emit and attempting to achieve zero waste, are all part of his long-term strategy. We meet Prapa Kongton, whose life has been touched in a unique way by Ray's vision. The PEOPLE COUNT series of specials puts a human face on global issues debated at the United Nations. PEOPLE COUNT identifies solutions and profiles remarkable people who are having a positive impact in their own communities. Themes include stabilizing population, developing sustainable communities and cleaning up the environment. The half-hour special premieres on CNN Sunday, November 8th at 1:30 p.m. (ET). CNN International will carry the special in Asia on Sunday, November 8th at 10:30 (GMT) in Europe. To coincide with climate change negotiations on the Kyoto Climate Change Protocol, being held in Buenos Aires November 2-13, PEOPLE COUNT: FORGING AHEAD focuses on real solutions and real people getting involved with this complex issue. For more information on PEOPLE COUNT People Count is available to television stations worldwide and non-profit educational organizations, absolutely FREE. Each year, new programs become available. Specific issues include women's rights, the environment, population stabilization and reversing poverty through innovative job programs. ----------------------------- CNN Quick Vote question is: To vote go to: Results: Which best describes your environmental values? People first, Earth second 38% Earth first, people second 62% ________ Ed Glaze Port Mansfield, TX "If they don't understand the severity of the problem, they won't understand the severity of the solution. Overpopulation must be dealt with." Unofficial Easter Island Page A Brief History of Population and the Environment Facing The Future: People and the Planet Perhaps the most dramatic and best-documented example of overpopulation destroying a local environment - and ultimately the culture dependent upon it -- is Easter Island. This small island in the South Pacific -- now known primarily for its enormous carved stone figures, or moai -- was settled around 500 C.E. by Polynesian seafarers. Their culture flourished for several hundred years due to plentiful resources, including dense forests and abundant wildlife. But population growth caused the culture to exceed the island’s carrying capacity by about 1500 C.E., resulting in deforestation, exhaustion of the soil, and extinction of most species. By the time European explorers arrived in the early eighteenth century, the island was completely barren, and the culture had collapsed. The remaining people -- reduced by some two thirds from peak levels -- were engaged in constant warfare over the few remaining resources, and practiced cannibalism. As the history of Easter Island demonstrates, the decline of forests is not a modern phenomenon. What is unique today is the rate and extent of deforestation globally. Earlier in this century, forests covered around 40 percent of the earth’s total land area. Today, that forest cover is down to 27 percent - a loss of roughly one third. In developing regions, where population pressures have forced accelerated clearing of forests for agriculture and fuelwood, that loss is estimated to be nearer one-half. From rcollins@netlink.com.au Sun Nov 8 05:57:11 1998 Received: from netlink.com.au (merlin.netlink.com.au [203.16.172.196]) by csf.Colorado.EDU (8.8.5/8.8.4/CNS-4.1p-nh) with ESMTP id FAA22926 for ; Sun, 8 Nov 1998 05:57:06 -0700 (MST) Received: from netlink.com.au (j145.netlink.com.au [203.62.227.145]) by netlink.com.au (8.8.8/8.8.8) with ESMTP id AAA04332 for ; Mon, 9 Nov 1998 00:01:01 +1100 Message-ID: <364594EB.1EA87EAC@netlink.com.au> Date: Sun, 08 Nov 1998 23:56:11 +1100 From: rc&am Reply-To: rcollins@netlink.com.au MIME-Version: 1.0 To: PROGRESSIVE POPULATION NETWORK Subject: overpopulation Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit MYTHS OF OVERPOPULATION (36 pages) exposing the myth of overpopulation and the use of it as a weapon against women in poorer nations $2 (Australian currency; include additional $2.50 postage, $1 for extra copies) Available from Barricade Books Barricade Library Publishing POBox 199 East Brunswick 3057 From eglaze@vsta.com Sun Nov 8 07:41:11 1998 Received: from rivendell.vsta.com (rivendell.vsta.com [204.57.96.15]) by csf.Colorado.EDU (8.8.5/8.8.4/CNS-4.1p-nh) with ESMTP id HAA25006 for ; Sun, 8 Nov 1998 07:41:03 -0700 (MST) Received: from eglaze.vsta.com (eglazeADSL.vsta.com [204.57.96.81]) by rivendell.vsta.com (8.8.8/8.8.6) with SMTP id IAA13653; Sun, 8 Nov 1998 08:42:55 -0600 (CST) From: "Ed Glaze III" To: , "PROGRESSIVE POPULATION NETWORK" Subject: Re: overpopulation Date: Sun, 8 Nov 1998 08:46:15 -0600 Message-ID: <01be0b26$89728880$516039cc@eglaze.vsta.com> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit X-Priority: 3 X-MSMail-Priority: Normal X-MimeOLE: Produced By Microsoft MimeOLE V4.71.1712.3 Being new to this list I am unfamiliar with , however, it seems he (?) is promoting a booklet that, judging from the title "MYTHS OF OVERPOPULATION," takes the head-in-the sand approach to environmentalism. If he were not from Australia, where the book is published, I might think he was just making us aware of another book put out by the scientifically and demographically challenged. With all the environmental information available in books (visit your library) and online, there should be no reason for a person who really wants to be informed about population issues to stick to the right-wing fringe, which is where this booklet seems to belong. Why so little comment about the booklet? If any of you find an interesting, population-related publication then share a review of it with the rest of the list subscribers. Especially if you want us to spend our money on it. It would also be nice if you took the trouble to include a URL for more information. Most of us should realize that there is not going to be an easy or painless way to solve overpopulation. And the social, economic, and environmental effects of our growing numbers -- and eventual reversal of that trend -- will take a toll on all of us, not just women in poorer countries. It seems more likely to me that the biggest sacrifices will eventually be made by the rich overconsuming populace in countries like the US because they live so much further from sustainability than poor people. For those of you who are interested, here is the URL to Barricade Books and their listing of environmental books: "Myths of Overpopulation" is not listed, or any other population title and there is not really much in the way of serious environmental titles at all. This does not seem to be a good source for becoming better informed. The only population title I found was under their "Feminism" section: Title: Depopulating Bangladesh Author: Farida Akhter. Description: Essays on the politics of fertility. Under their "Anarchism and Libertarian Titles" section I found: Title: The Green City Author: Graham Purchase. Description: This booklet is about the possibilities for creating green, sustainable and self-governing cities in a future social environmental anarchy. It is one of a number of related pamphlets concerning specific areas of anarchist theory and practice. Here is a short history of Barricade Books "February 1995: Barricade Books/Infoshop opens. A loose group of anarchists had been organising for a few years to open an anarchist bookshop after there was considered a need for an outlet of anarchist and grass-roots libertarian and anti-authoritarian literature in Melbourne. We are the fourth anarchist bookshop to have opened in Melbourne in the past twenty years, the other three have been and gone! July, 1995: The shop came under attack from the police in relation to objectionable publications and the same week saw our windows smashed in by nazi-skinheads. Internal Investigations Department of Victoria Police contact the shop in relation to the investigation of police corruption in kickbacks being paid to police by window-shutting businesses. We couldn't (and didn't want to) help them. Could it be that police 'arrange" for windows to be smashed to increase their backhander payments? A long campaign was fought with the local council over erecting preventative shutters over our windows. State Government appointed Commissioners refused to grant our planning application claiming it would detract from the amenity of the area. Never mind there are at least 50 or so businesses on Sydney Road that have roller doors/grilles over their windows. Could it be that there is a hidden agenda behind the planning committee??" For those of you interested in browsing the web for some population materials, I recommend: There are many others available and a web search using MetaCrawler is an easy way to find them. Also check the links on the sites you visit. Whatever you do, become informed from a variety of sources and understand just what problems overpopulation is causing and will likely cause in the decades ahead. ________ Ed Glaze Port Mansfield, TX "If they don't understand the severity of the problem, they won't understand the severity of the solution. Overpopulation must be dealt with." -----Original Message----- From: rc&am To: PROGRESSIVE POPULATION NETWORK Date: Sunday, November 08, 1998 7:02 AM Subject: overpopulation > MYTHS OF OVERPOPULATION (36 pages) > > exposing the myth of overpopulation and the use of it as > a weapon against women in poorer nations > > $2 (Australian currency; include additional $2.50 postage, > $1 for extra copies) > > Available from Barricade Books > Barricade Library Publishing > POBox 199 East Brunswick 3057 From eglaze@vsta.com Sun Nov 8 14:01:22 1998 Received: from rivendell.vsta.com (rivendell.vsta.com [204.57.96.15]) by csf.Colorado.EDU (8.8.5/8.8.4/CNS-4.1p-nh) with ESMTP id OAA16107 for ; Sun, 8 Nov 1998 14:01:19 -0700 (MST) Received: from eglaze.vsta.com (eglazeADSL.vsta.com [204.57.96.81]) by rivendell.vsta.com (8.8.8/8.8.6) with SMTP id OAA19750; Sun, 8 Nov 1998 14:59:38 -0600 (CST) From: "Ed Glaze III" To: "Audubon Population" , "Population Forum, Sierra Club" , "KZPG Overpopulation News Network" , "PPN Listserv" Subject: Sunday news, opinions, and stuff Date: Sun, 8 Nov 1998 15:02:59 -0600 Message-ID: <01be0b5b$2a5fbf40$516039cc@eglaze.vsta.com> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit X-Priority: 3 X-MSMail-Priority: Normal X-MimeOLE: Produced By Microsoft MimeOLE V4.71.1712.3 Earth Worst THE FUTURE IN PLAIN SIGHT: Nine Clues to the Coming Instability. by Eugene Linden (Simon & Schuster: 256 pp., $25) review by MARK HERTSGAARD (excerpt below) His thesis: As climates change, population growth and economic globalization continue, the effects will overwhelm financial systems, food production, disease control and other pillars of the social order. Because these trends are all but irreversible in the short run, writes Linden, humans in the 21st century will "be in the position of watching and understanding events that we cannot control, and that will make the coming instability all the more intolerable." Humanity will eventually make the transition "to stable population growth, to an economic system that neither beggars the Earth nor marginalizes the great bulk of humanity, and to a value system that recognizes the limits of materialism, but these transitions will not come about smoothly." Billions may die along the way. Gloom and doom is a tricky message for an author, but to his credit, Linden does not pull punches for fear of frightening away readers. Nor does he employ the melodramatic tone favored by some environmental Paul Reveres. His voice is urgent but businesslike. He cares about his subject and trusts readers to care too. --------------------------- Greening of the Board Rooms A lot of Republicans in Congress have staked out a pretty clear position on global warming: It doesn't exist. Never mind the evidence. They don't want it to exist, and so it doesn't. -------------------------- Overpopulation 'Two or fewer' measure sends message to slow growth letter to the editor by Ed Patton, Yakima I would like to offer solutions to slow population growth. We should lobby the U.S. Congress to limit the child tax credit after 2000 to two children per family. People who chose to have more than two children after 2000 should be required to pay (out of pocket) for the education of the additional children unless they are adopted. The most cost-effective way to slow growth would be to quadruple the funding for Washington state's very popular, but underfunded, vasectomy program for low-income men. The allocated funds for the fiscal year are used up in the first five months. (This program returns more than $30 for every $1 of taxpayer money invested). This birth-control method is the best way to avoid abortion. Demographers are telling us that the West Coast and British Columbia will easily double their population in the next 50 years. This will bring dire consequences! Is this what we want to leave future generations? A "two or fewer" resolution, which I am trying to get passed by the Legislature, will have a very beneficial impact with respect to growth management; it will raise our consciousness and broaden the dialogue with respect to the issue of population and its connection to environmental problems. By adopting the "two or fewer" resolution, we would be sending a message to the rest of the world that it is time to start lowering our numbers. (One-quarter of the 6 billion people on Earth are between the ages of 15 and 25 -- the prime child-bearing age). I believe this is the most compassionate approach to solving the critical and most complex problem of our time. The speaker of the state House of Representatives has sole discretion as to whether a resolution can be heard. Rep. Mary Lou Dickerson, D-Seattle, has agreed to sponsor it if at least two Republicans will sign on. Please ask your representative to be a co-sponsor. -------------------------- Urban Sprawl Initiatives NPR All Things Considered for Nov 6 -- Listen to it with RealAudio John Nielsen reports that candidates for political office this week on an anti-sprawl platform generally did well. Environmental groups say the issue of overdevelopment has come of age and propelled many candidates into office over business-as-usual opponents. But at the same time, actually changing the myriad local zoning laws to get more building in urban areas and less development in outer suburbs and farmland will be very difficult. (4:00) ------------------------- Population experts gather in Cairo to report on successes What makes this meeting special, however, is that it is an opportunity for an exchange of information on population successes and failures in 13 countries from a network of Southern nations. Partners in Population and Development, a coalition of developing countries, was created after the Population Conference in 1994. This month, they plan on returning here November 7-12 for their annual board meeting. ------------------------- PEOPLE COUNT: FORGING AHEAD Just got through watching the show. CNN even ran the Easter Island segment commercial-free. Discussed was overpopulation, including overshoot and collapse. Many environmental and social problems were discussed in reference to Easter Island but the show only used it as a warning for the world of today, instead of pointing out our specific problems and what needs to be done. No recommended actions. Check for transcript in a few days. A book I highly recommend is "The Cartoon Guide to the Environment." It covers the overpopulation aspect Easter Island scenario very well. Despite its name it is an excellent introductory book which gets across some advanced ecological principles in a way that even pre-teens will understand. It would make a great Christmas gift for young and old. The Cartoon Guide to the Environment On CNN's World Today there was a report on how the demand for chopsticks is helping deplete China's forests. Transcripts of the show are posted after a couple day. How to eat with chopsticks. Chopsticks and Trade Japan consumes 130 million disposable chopsticks everyday. ----------------------------- Climate negotiators urged to integrate 1994 consensus on population policy ________ Ed Glaze Port Mansfield, TX "If they don't understand the severity of the problem, they won't understand the severity of the solution. Overpopulation must be dealt with." From plicysci@frii.com Sun Nov 8 19:07:47 1998 Received: from deimos.frii.com (deimos.frii.com [208.146.240.2]) by csf.Colorado.EDU (8.8.5/8.8.4/CNS-4.1p-nh) with ESMTP id TAA26282 for ; Sun, 8 Nov 1998 19:07:45 -0700 (MST) Received: from frii.com (ftc-0445.dialup.frii.com [216.17.134.189]) by deimos.frii.com (8.9.1a/8.9.1) with ESMTP id TAA03613 for ; Sun, 8 Nov 1998 19:07:42 -0700 (MST) Message-ID: <36464EE4.80193AF7@frii.com> Date: Sun, 08 Nov 1998 19:09:40 -0700 From: Jim Talboy X-Accept-Language: en MIME-Version: 1.0 To: PROGRESSIVE POPULATION NETWORK Subject: An ugly reply to Mr. Glaze. References: <01be0b26$89728880$516039cc@eglaze.vsta.com> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Ed Glaze III wrote: > Being new to this list I am unfamiliar with , > however, it seems he (?) is promoting a booklet that, judging from the > title "MYTHS OF OVERPOPULATION," takes the head-in-the sand > approach to environmentalism. Dear PPN, My complaint, against the tide perhaps, is the insistence that "the poor," are the problem. Given that the USA economy demands consumption beyond the needs of its inhabitants, and especially the amount of waste those citizens tolerate, these arguments are particularly galling. It might be better to use kindness, warmth and compassion as criteria, rather than full employment within such a system. Our insistence on purely rational solutions smacks too heavily of the immense failures of secularism. For those of you who might not have noticed, in the period since the "Enlightenment," these ideological proponents of rationality, have successfully killed at least 170,000,000 people to gain "heaven on earth." If you choose not to have children, bully for you perhaps, but don't try force "rationality" on those who have noticed the uneven standards you've attempted to promote. Expedient sloganeering, "head in the sand approach," is not appreciated and should not be tolerated. From ttoal@jps.net Sun Nov 8 21:44:55 1998 Received: from smtp2.jps.net (smtp2.jps.net [209.63.224.235]) by csf.Colorado.EDU (8.8.5/8.8.4/CNS-4.1p-nh) with ESMTP id VAA03749 for ; Sun, 8 Nov 1998 21:44:53 -0700 (MST) Received: from jps.net ([209.142.46.155]) by smtp2.jps.net (8.9.0/8.8.5) with ESMTP id UAA12646 for ; Sun, 8 Nov 1998 20:47:28 -0800 (PST) Message-ID: <364672B3.F01965D8@jps.net> Date: Sun, 08 Nov 1998 20:42:27 -0800 From: Ted Toal MIME-Version: 1.0 To: ppn Subject: The Poor Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Jim Talboy said: "My complaint, against the tide perhaps, is the insistence that "the poor," are the problem. Given that the USA economy demands consumption beyond the needs of its inhabitants, and especially the amount of waste those citizens tolerate, these arguments are particularly galling...." This would seem to have been in response to Ed Glaze: "It seems more likely to me that the biggest sacrifices will eventually be made by the rich overconsuming populace in countries like the US because they live so much further from sustainability than poor people." I'm afraid I don't understand Jim's point. Perhaps he is under the impression that overpopulationists blame the poor of the world for the overpopulation problem. But Ed pointed out that the "rich" of the world are the one's living farther from sustainability, thereby acknowledging that they are as much or more of a problem than the poor. I suggest that we try to get beyond the idea of "blame". What is happening today in the world is far bigger than any one person, group of people, nation, or group of nations. There is no need to place blame. There is only a need for understanding the big picture, and taking actions to change it. From eglaze@vsta.com Sun Nov 8 22:21:54 1998 Received: from rivendell.vsta.com (rivendell.vsta.com [204.57.96.15]) by csf.Colorado.EDU (8.8.5/8.8.4/CNS-4.1p-nh) with ESMTP id WAA05521 for ; Sun, 8 Nov 1998 22:21:51 -0700 (MST) Received: from eglaze.vsta.com (eglazeADSL.vsta.com [204.57.96.81]) by rivendell.vsta.com (8.8.8/8.8.6) with SMTP id XAA02900; Sun, 8 Nov 1998 23:23:53 -0600 (CST) From: "Ed Glaze III" To: , "PROGRESSIVE POPULATION NETWORK" Subject: A more rational reply from Mr. Glaze. Date: Sun, 8 Nov 1998 23:27:15 -0600 Message-ID: <01be0ba1$9c936c60$516039cc@eglaze.vsta.com> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit X-Priority: 3 X-MSMail-Priority: Normal X-MimeOLE: Produced By Microsoft MimeOLE V4.71.1712.3 I am not sure why you think your reply was ugly. It certainly didn't offend me except in its lack of substance. Maybe you were upset with my previous messages. I very clearly mentioned the overconsumption by the rich and that they were likely to suffer even more than the poor, as shown in the portion of my message below which you snipped from your reply: "Most of us should realize that there is not going to be an easy or painless way to solve overpopulation. And the social, economic, and environmental effects of our growing numbers -- and eventual reversal of that trend -- will take a toll on all of us, not just women in poorer countries. It seems more likely to me that the biggest sacrifices will eventually be made by the rich overconsuming populace in countries like the US because they live so much further from sustainability than poor people" That is the only reference I made about the poor and consumption. I doubt many others on this list find it offensive, though if they live in the US they might hope I am wrong. I certainly did not promote the uneven economic and consumption patterns that exist in the world. I did point them out and even said they were a problem. I wonder why that upset you so? Rhetorical, we need not debate it on the list. You do seem upset about "rationality" and seem to indicate that such logical thinking would not be the best way to solve overpopulation. I, however, do feel that it is the best way to understand the problem of environmental degradation, overpopulation, overshoot & collapse, and a variety of other ecological disasters we are leading ourselves into. You make a statement about the pursuit of rationality has "killed at least 170,000,000 people to gain heaven on earth." Yet you offer no further information or substantiation. I do not doubt that many people have died but I would like to know how you attribute this number to the "ideological proponents of rationality." If you want us to understand and give your statement the credibility you think it deserves you might want to at least give us a URL or book title so we can follow up if we wish. Is rationality the best way to convince people they need to change and to guide them through that change? Maybe not. But first they need to know the reason why change is necessary and logical reasoning backed up by scientific facts and demographic trends are very convincing to most. Maybe you feel some people are offended by such "rationality" and will refuse to believe or change their ways. But does that change the facts? You seem to imply that "kindness, warmth and compassion" might be better ways to live than by measuring our worth in financial terms. Yes, our society, especially in the big cities, tends to place a dollar value on everything and for those of us who do not wish to live that way of life we do not fit in. And yes, I do live that type of life to a great extent -- though I am not broke and do drive a car to shop in a grocery store for all my food. Then again, I doubt I have worn long pants more than six times a year since 1983. To me that speaks of a lifestyle that has sufficient "kindness, warmth and compassion" even if I do not presently have a life partner, or whatever, and kids to share it with. In no way was I trying to force my way of life on anyone. What you are disagreeing with was put into my introduction which I told list subscribers to read "if you are interested." I would hope that any of us would be free to put whatever we choose into a little bio of an introduction as a way to better inform others of just who we are and how we feel about the issues that overpopulation has forced upon us. The "head in the sand approach" that I mentioned dealt with the book that someone else mentioned on the list. You also snipped that from your reply. The description of that book does imply that women in poorer nations suffer because of overpopulation. Do you really doubt that? To me, overpopulation will cause everyone in poorer nations to suffer and much of that is due to the culture of that nation and cannot be blamed completely on the rich countries who might, or might not be exploiting the country economically. Personally, I feel that the booklet title itself is an example of "expedient sloganeering." From: rc&am Sunday, Nov 8, 1998 7:02 AM MYTHS OF OVERPOPULATION (36 pages) exposing the myth of overpopulation and the use of it as a weapon against women in poorer nations Maybe you think there is not an overpopulation problem, hence this idea of the MYTHS booklet appeals to you. I would hope you are in the minority on this population listserv because there is a vast amount of evidence to prove that most every country in the world is overpopulated and increasingly suffering because of it. You also seem to indicate that a failure of secularism is causing us to fail in finding viable solutions to the problem of overpopulation. Hey, if you have a better solution, even if it is religious, please share it with me and the many other population activists and world leaders who would like to know. Some of us who are well informed about environmental issues might think that what should not be tolerated are unsubstantiated statements about there being no overpopulation problem. If you have a problem with what is widely recognized as a serious threat to our global future, tell us why. If logic and secularism is unacceptable to you and you have a better way of understanding the world and solving its problems let us know. Till then I stand by every word I have said and ask you not to read into my statements things that I do not say. You would also improve your credibility if you backed up some of your statements. If you don't want to clog the listserv with a long message, by all means send it to me privately. ________ Ed Glaze Port Mansfield, TX "If they don't understand the severity of the problem, they won't understand the severity of the solution. Overpopulation must be dealt with." rationality (Dictionary) 1. the state or quality of being rational. 2. the possession of reason. 3. agreeableness to reason; reasonableness. 4. the exercise of reason. 5. a reasonable view, practice, etc. reason 1. a basis or cause, as for some belief, action, fact, event, etc. 2. a statement presented in justification or explanation of a belief or action. 3. the mental powers concerned with forming conclusions, judgments, or inferences. 4. sound judgment; good sense. 5. normal or sound powers of mind; sanity. 6. Logic. a premise of an argument. 7. Philosophical: a. the faculty or power of acquiring intellectual knowledge, either by direct understanding of first principles or by argument. b. the power of intelligent and dispassionate thought, or of conduct influenced by such thought -------------------------------------------- -----Original Message----- From: Jim Talboy To: PROGRESSIVE POPULATION NETWORK Date: Sunday, November 08, 1998 8:13 PM Subject: An ugly reply to Mr. Glaze. >Ed Glaze III wrote: > >> Being new to this list I am unfamiliar with , >> however, it seems he (?) is promoting a booklet that, judging from the >> title "MYTHS OF OVERPOPULATION," takes the head-in-the sand >> approach to environmentalism. > >Dear PPN, > >My complaint, against the tide perhaps, is the insistence that "the poor," are >the problem. Given that the USA economy demands consumption beyond the needs of >its inhabitants, and especially the amount of waste those citizens tolerate, >these arguments are particularly galling. It might be better to use kindness, >warmth and compassion as criteria, rather than full employment within such a >system. Our insistence on purely rational solutions smacks too heavily of the >immense failures of secularism. For those of you who might not have noticed, >in the period since the "Enlightenment," these ideological proponents of >rationality, have successfully killed at least 170,000,000 people to gain >"heaven on earth." If you choose not to have children, bully for you >perhaps, but don't try force "rationality" on those who have noticed the uneven >standards you've attempted to promote. Expedient sloganeering, "head in the >sand approach," is not appreciated and should not be tolerated. From plicysci@frii.com Mon Nov 9 03:25:06 1998 Received: from deimos.frii.com (deimos.frii.com [208.146.240.2]) by csf.Colorado.EDU (8.8.5/8.8.4/CNS-4.1p-nh) with ESMTP id DAA25580 for ; Mon, 9 Nov 1998 03:25:04 -0700 (MST) Received: from frii.com (ftc-0320.dialup.frii.com [216.17.134.116]) by deimos.frii.com (8.9.1a/8.9.1) with ESMTP id DAA27863 for ; Mon, 9 Nov 1998 03:25:01 -0700 (MST) Message-ID: <3646C375.40FF201E@frii.com> Date: Mon, 09 Nov 1998 03:27:01 -0700 From: Jim Talboy X-Accept-Language: en MIME-Version: 1.0 To: PROGRESSIVE POPULATION NETWORK Subject: Re: A more rational reply from Mr. Glaze. References: <01be0ba1$9c936c60$516039cc@eglaze.vsta.com> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Ed Glaze III wrote: > I am not sure why you think your reply was ugly. > It certainly didn't offend me except in its lack of substance. > Maybe you were upset with my previous messages. > > I very clearly mentioned the overconsumption by the rich and that > they were likely to suffer even more than the poor, as shown in the > portion of my message below which you snipped from your reply: I'm surprised, my understanding is that when you demand a tax on children, that only the rich can participate. Are you suggesting that this be the deciding factor in survival? As far as the "rationality" stance, from at least 1900 until roughly 1989, we have seen all sorts of "intellectual" decisions that have destroyed many innocent people for the sake of a "better world." Slavery, in the USA and elsewhere, had rational economic proponents as well. The destruction has no precedent, and frankly this list server is as well informed and studied as any you've participated in yet. Will you suggest forced sterilization next? What on earth are you asking us to implement? Yes, the world is overcrowded, but what are you suggesting be done? Are we really that capable? It seems far too complicated, given the multi cultural world that lays beyond our control. I frankly don't believe it's "our" place to make righteous demands given the extent of variation in culture that "conflicts" with our own Western thinking. Rationality, is a smugly deceptive perspective, because the Universe defies rational description and politics has nothing to do with rationality. Does your righteousness stem from a concern about immigration? Or is it from a sense of helplessness? Science, and government, has not ever had all the answers Ed. Please don't ask for a url to back up that statement, and don't assume the list isn't interested. My concern, with rationality, is that no amount of it will account for hidden factors or unanticipated results. From plicysci@frii.com Mon Nov 9 04:12:01 1998 Received: from deimos.frii.com (deimos.frii.com [208.146.240.2]) by csf.Colorado.EDU (8.8.5/8.8.4/CNS-4.1p-nh) with ESMTP id EAA27461 for ; Mon, 9 Nov 1998 04:11:59 -0700 (MST) Received: from frii.com (ftc-0320.dialup.frii.com [216.17.134.116]) by deimos.frii.com (8.9.1a/8.9.1) with ESMTP id EAA02545 for ; Mon, 9 Nov 1998 04:11:56 -0700 (MST) Message-ID: <3646CE74.67B877B1@frii.com> Date: Mon, 09 Nov 1998 04:13:56 -0700 From: Jim Talboy X-Accept-Language: en MIME-Version: 1.0 To: PROGRESSIVE POPULATION NETWORK Subject: Implementation is a key matter in an irrational world that understandably suspects "rationality." References: <364672B3.F01965D8@jps.net> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Ted Toal wrote: > Jim Talboy said: > > "My complaint, > > > This would seem to have been in response to Ed Glaze: > > "It seems more > likely to me that the biggest sacrifices will eventually be made by the rich > overconsuming populace in countries like the US because they live so much > further from sustainability than poor people." > > I'm afraid I don't understand Jim's point. I suggest that we try to get > beyond the idea > of "blame". What is happening today in the world is far bigger than any one > person, group of people, nation, or group of nations. There is no need to > place blame. There is only a need for understanding the big picture, and > taking actions to change it. No, you've got the point Ted. Thank you for intervening. However to clarify, I'm suggesting the big picture is "irrational" and yet beyond our capabilities to understand at this point. I am also suggesting that those who'd be left to implement the program cannot be given isolated, particular solutions that ignore the whole. The whole is simply not going to respond to piecemeal solutions, and irrational Ol' Mother Nature, will resist interference. Given the time frame we are working with, and the current magnitude of the world's population, what can "we" do realistically? Keep in mind, that ideas are fun to discuss, but if they cannot be implemented worldwide, for whatever reason, they are not relevant to decision makers. "Ideas," in general have caused too many problems as of late, because we are irrational, don't fit "in little boxes," and have had limited experience as political animals. "Rationality" has crushed the human spirit during the last century especially, and it is hard not to notice that it was also used expediently. What is "rational" today, slavery for example, is subject to paradigm shifts tomorrow. My own rant, regarding the admittedly diverse "rich," is that regressive taxes or penalties are selective, and are based on local economic concerns more than sustainability. From rcollins@netlink.com.au Mon Nov 9 04:48:01 1998 Received: from netlink.com.au (merlin.netlink.com.au [203.16.172.196]) by csf.Colorado.EDU (8.8.5/8.8.4/CNS-4.1p-nh) with ESMTP id EAA28247; Mon, 9 Nov 1998 04:47:55 -0700 (MST) Received: from netlink.com.au (h039.mel.netlink.com.au [203.62.225.39]) by netlink.com.au (8.8.8/8.8.8) with ESMTP id WAA18193; Mon, 9 Nov 1998 22:51:56 +1100 Message-ID: <3646D62C.44612F4C@netlink.com.au> Date: Mon, 09 Nov 1998 22:46:52 +1100 From: rc&am Reply-To: rcollins@netlink.com.au MIME-Version: 1.0 To: Ed Glaze III CC: PROGRESSIVE POPULATION NETWORK , M-Fem@csf.colorado.edu Subject: Re: overpopulation References: <01be0b26$89728880$516039cc@eglaze.vsta.com> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit The following is a rely to a post from ed glaze, which was (as you can read) a reply to a post advertising a book on population which i thought may be of interest. as ed notes, it is not available on the web, but is - for a very small price - available from Barricade Books in Australia. My original post is in italics at the end. it seems that ed has already made up his mind that overpopulation is both a fact, and that such a fact threatens the world. ed has previously described himself thus: "I am a pop activist for Audubon, Sierra Club, and ZPG along with many memberships and subscriptions to other population groups. I am also a newsletter editor and population chair for my local SC group. My view on overpopulation is that we need is a very sizable planned reduction in population before nature does it for us." He holds an MBA. Thus, he feels he has the low-down on the facts. I beg to differ. I think Mr glaze enjoys holding forth with assumptions as if they are facts in order to provide him with all the comforts of certainty, and these so-called facts with immunity from dispute or discussion. regards, angela Ed Glaze III wrote: > Being new to this list I am unfamiliar with , > however, it seems he (?) is promoting a booklet that, judging from the > title "MYTHS OF OVERPOPULATION," takes the head-in-the sand > approach to environmentalism. > If he were not from Australia, where the book is published, I might think > he was just making us aware of another book put out by the scientifically > and demographically challenged. With all the environmental information > available in books (visit your library) and online, there should be no > reason > for a person who really wants to be informed about population issues to > stick to the right-wing fringe, which is where this booklet seems to belong. > > Why so little comment about the booklet? If any of you find an interesting, > population-related publication then share a review of it with the rest of > the > list subscribers. Especially if you want us to spend our money on it. It > would > also be nice if you took the trouble to include a URL for more information. > > Most of us should realize that there is not going to be an easy or painless > way to solve overpopulation. And the social, economic, and environmental > effects of our growing numbers -- and eventual reversal of that trend -- > will > take a toll on all of us, not just women in poorer countries. It seems more > likely to me that the biggest sacrifices will eventually be made by the rich > overconsuming populace in countries like the US because they live so much > further from sustainability than poor people. > > For those of you who are interested, here is the URL to Barricade Books > and their listing of environmental books: > > "Myths of Overpopulation" is not listed, or any other population title and > there is not really much in the way of serious environmental titles at all. > This does not seem to be a good source for becoming better informed. > > The only population title I found was under their "Feminism" section: > > Title: Depopulating Bangladesh > Author: Farida Akhter. > Description: Essays on the politics of fertility. > > Under their "Anarchism and Libertarian Titles" section I found: > > Title: The Green City > Author: Graham Purchase. > Description: This booklet is about the possibilities for creating green, > sustainable and self-governing cities in a future social environmental > anarchy. It is one of a number of related pamphlets concerning specific > areas of anarchist theory and practice. > > Here is a short history of Barricade Books > > "February 1995: Barricade Books/Infoshop opens. A loose group > of anarchists had been organising for a few years to open an anarchist > bookshop after there was considered a need for an outlet of anarchist > and grass-roots libertarian and anti-authoritarian literature in Melbourne. > We are the fourth anarchist bookshop to have opened in Melbourne in > the past twenty years, the other three have been and gone! > July, 1995: The shop came under attack from the police in relation > to objectionable publications and the same week saw our windows > smashed in by nazi-skinheads. > Internal Investigations Department of Victoria Police contact the > shop in relation to the investigation of police corruption in kickbacks > being paid to police by window-shutting businesses. We couldn't (and > didn't want to) help them. Could it be that police 'arrange" for windows > to be smashed to increase their backhander payments? > A long campaign was fought with the local council over erecting > preventative shutters over our windows. State Government appointed > Commissioners refused to grant our planning application claiming it > would detract from the amenity of the area. Never mind there are at > least 50 or so businesses on Sydney Road that have roller doors/grilles > over their windows. Could it be that there is a hidden agenda behind > the planning committee??" > > For those of you interested in browsing the web for some population > materials, I recommend: > > > > > > > There are many others available and a web search using MetaCrawler > is an easy way to find them. Also > check the links on the sites you visit. Whatever you do, become informed > from a variety of sources and understand just what problems overpopulation > is causing and will likely cause in the decades ahead. > > ________ Ed Glaze > Port Mansfield, TX > "If they don't understand the severity of the problem, > they won't understand the severity of the solution. > Overpopulation must be dealt with." > > -----Original Message----- > From: rc&am > To: PROGRESSIVE POPULATION NETWORK > Date: Sunday, November 08, 1998 7:02 AM > Subject: overpopulation > > > MYTHS OF OVERPOPULATION (36 pages) > > > > exposing the myth of overpopulation and the use of it as > > a weapon against women in poorer nations > > > > $2 (Australian currency; include additional $2.50 postage, > > $1 for extra copies) > > > > Available from Barricade Books > > Barricade Library Publishing > > POBox 199 East Brunswick 3057 From eglaze@vsta.com Mon Nov 9 11:11:34 1998 Received: from rivendell.vsta.com (rivendell.vsta.com [204.57.96.15]) by csf.Colorado.EDU (8.8.5/8.8.4/CNS-4.1p-nh) with ESMTP id LAA14270 for ; Mon, 9 Nov 1998 11:11:31 -0700 (MST) Received: from eglaze.vsta.com (eglazeADSL.vsta.com [204.57.96.81]) by rivendell.vsta.com (8.8.8/8.8.6) with SMTP id MAA15955 for ; Mon, 9 Nov 1998 12:13:33 -0600 (CST) From: "Ed Glaze III" To: "PPN Listserv" Subject: Re: A more rational reply from Mr. Glaze. Date: Mon, 9 Nov 1998 12:16:56 -0600 Message-ID: <01be0c0d$22b5cac0$516039cc@eglaze.vsta.com> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit X-Priority: 3 X-MSMail-Priority: Normal X-MimeOLE: Produced By Microsoft MimeOLE V4.71.1712.3 Ed responds after the statements. If you would like continue this debate, I suggest we do it off-list as I have done with Angela . By the way Jim Talboy since you did not sign your name, are you male? -----Original Message----- From: Jim Talboy To: PROGRESSIVE POPULATION NETWORK Date: Monday, November 09, 1998 4:35 AM Subject: Re: A more rational reply from Mr. Glaze. > I'm surprised, my understanding is that when you demand a tax > on children, that only the rich can participate.Are you suggesting > that this be the deciding factor in survival? I did not demand a tax on children. What is your basis for that statement? Your statement is illogical unless the tax is extremely high, but there are costs every parent must face when they have children and they are not all economic. Possibly you are referring to economic incentives/disincentives to influence population growth, such as shown here: > As far as the "rationality" stance, from at least 1900 until roughly 1989, > we have seen all sorts of "intellectual" decisions that have destroyed > many innocent people for the sake of a "better world." Many of those deaths may be the result of technological improvements which changed society and possibly allowed even more exploitation of resources and people. There are both good and bad technological improvements which affect population. Rational things like medical advancements have had a great effect on average lifespan and quality of life. Seldom does the economic system do long-term thinking about what changes will be wrought by rational improvements. They all seem like good ideas at the time. > Slavery, in the USA and elsewhere, had rational economic proponents > as well. I never mentioned slavery. Almost every decision made by anyone, anywhere, at anytime, about anything had some basis in rational thought. You cannot legitimately discredit rationality in general because of a specific wrong you disagree with. Also the decisions of different times were made under different circumstances which may dictate solutions different from what would be expected here and now. Much like China faces a population problem much more severe than the rest of the world and yet we decry their solution because it is not a solution we would want. Maybe we will understand their reasons better when our country suffers under 350 million people or more. > The destruction has no precedent, and frankly this list server > is as well informed and studied as any you've participated in yet. I trust you are talking about environmental destruction and I agree. I lvery much ook forward to discussing and learning from informed population activists on this listserv. Maybe some of us will have some rational discussions. > Will you suggest forced sterilization next? Since you ask, yes, I think there are instances where forced sterilization is appropriate. Not everyone needs to have children, especially in a world with so many excess people already. Did you see the news article about the woman in a coma who is pregnant? What about the severely retarted that are unable to even care for themselves? It is a dichotomy that dictates one stance is always the truth. > What on earth are you asking us to implement? > Yes, the world is overcrowded, but what are you suggesting be done? > Are we really that capable? It seems far too complicated, given the > multi-cultural world that lays beyond our control. What I am asking is that we recognize that we are overpopulated and deal with it in a realistic manner. The principles of carrying capacity and sustainability dictate something must be done. To me that means reducing the excess, not waiting generations while population doubles yet again or letting our environmental and economic systems collapse because of our inaction. I do not think our political and cultural systems are capable of dealing with a populaton reduction of the size needed and we are in for much worse times ahead. > I frankly don't believe it's "our" place to make righteous demands > given the extent of variation in culture that "conflicts" with our own > Western thinking. How about we let each country deal with its own problems? Whether it is population, natural resources, food, or whatever let us all stay inside our borders and live or die on the merits of the political decisions we make and the environment we have. If we cut off all international trade, monetary assistance, military support, and immigration (especially refugees) how many countries, Western or not, would survive? All of us are doing unsustainable things, whether it is population or consumption, and we need to change. Facts are facts. Ideologies, beliefs and cultures will not save anyone unless they deal with the worsening environmental reality we face. > Rationality, is a smugly deceptive perspective, because the > Universe defies rational description. Being unable to completely describe something does not mean we do not understand it sufficiently to anticipate the probable future based on certain assumptions. The physical Universe is supremely rational and science has solved many of its mysteries that humans did and understand and even feared in times past. > Politics has nothing to do with rationality. Decision making is basically a rational thing to do. As is compromise. The problem is that politics is not only rational. Humans can be greedy and their self-interest will often skew the decisions they make. Tragedy of the Commons is a good example. > Does your righteousness stem from a concern about immigration? > Or is it from a sense of helplessness? My concern stems from overpopulation and our unwillingless to take actions that lead to viable solutions within a timely manner before the environment suffers too much of a loss. Immigration is just one small factor in the population problems we face. Am I righteous? Possibly, but I would prefer to call it a realistic outlook leading to a pessimistic attitude. I still do what I can to increase awareness of overpopulation, so I haven't given up. Maybe a few of us will make the difference. No, I am not feeliing helplessness or hopelessness. righteous 1. characterized by uprightness or morality: a righteous observance of the law. 2. morally right or justifiable: righteous indignation. 3. acting in an upright, moral way; virtuous: a righteous person. 4. Slang. absolutely genuine or wonderful realistic 1. interested in, concerned with, or based on what is real or practical: a realistic estimate of costs; a realistic planner. 2. pertaining to, characterized by, or given to the representation in literature or art of things as they really are: a realistic novel. 3. resembling or simulating real life > Science, and government, has not ever had all the answers Ed. > Please don't ask for a URL to back up that statement, and don't > assume the list isn't interested. My concern, with rationality, is that no > amount of it will account for hidden factors or unanticipated results. We do not need all the answers. We know enough to realize we have serious problems that will get much worse unless they are dealt with quickly. A scientific and rational understanding of the world is what allows us to make predictions for the future, including demographic trends. Those probabilities can take into account many factors but can never be perfect, but they need not be perfect to yield a result that we can use. The same rational understanding also gives us some idea as to the likelihood of proposed solutions to a problem actually coming about or being successful. For example, it is very unlikely that we will find a solution to overpopulation through space travel, unlimited energy, or allowing the status quo of growth to continue. We are left with having to think about what options there are, evaluating the options, and then implementing our chosen option(s). What you should be most concerned with is that too many people, including politicians, businessmen, influential persons, and world leaders do not think in a rational way. They deny the problem exists, they resist efforts by others to convince them, then they disbelieve the facts and rational arguments that prove the problem. Does any of this sound familiar? All that is left is the panic they will feel when they realize it is too late to solve the problem and the regret they should feel for not acting sooner. ________ Ed Glaze "If they don't understand the severity of the problem, they won't understand the severity of the solution. Overpopulation must be dealt with." From ttoal@jps.net Mon Nov 9 19:27:33 1998 Received: from smtp1.jps.net (smtp1.jps.net [209.63.224.236]) by csf.Colorado.EDU (8.8.5/8.8.4/CNS-4.1p-nh) with ESMTP id TAA16277 for ; Mon, 9 Nov 1998 19:27:31 -0700 (MST) Received: from jps.net (208-25-51-227.stk.jps.net [208.25.51.227]) by smtp1.jps.net (8.8.5/8.8.5) with ESMTP id SAA00388 for ; Mon, 9 Nov 1998 18:27:22 -0800 (PST) Message-ID: <3647A42A.A4B79F3C@jps.net> Date: Mon, 09 Nov 1998 18:25:46 -0800 From: Ted Toal MIME-Version: 1.0 To: ppn Subject: Re: The Poor Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Angela wrote: "....since as this child could see all around them, not everyone consumes the same amounts of resources. so: those who claim overpopulation as the problem are in fact ... arguing that those who have higher birth rates .... ARE THE PROBLEM. In today's world, such an argument is racist and it is a weapon against the poor, most of whom are not european, or australian, or north american." Simply wrong. The impact of people on the environment is equal to the PRODUCT of the average impact of one person and the total number of people. In developing countries, the former is small and the latter large, while in the developed countries the reverse is true. In both cases, the impact is highly significant. Growth of the U.S. population by 1 person per hectare is more-or-less equivalent, from an impact point of view, to growth of the population of Bangladesh by about 300 per hectare. Both rich and poor countries are contributing to the problem, and both need to reverse their population growth. Trying to trace the factors that result in the existing fertility rates of both rich and poor countries is an impossibly complex task. Certainly poverty plays a role, and certainly the "solution" must therefore address poverty. No one is trying to blame overpopulation on poor countries and further, no one expects them to deal with it by themselves. You cannot decide that overpopulation is not a problem simply because you don't like what you think might be the implications of that. It IS a problem, and we must understand and accept the implications and find the solutions. There is absolutely no need to place blame, to put forth calls of racism, to blame the poor, blame the rich, etc. That is completely counterproductive. The process that is happening now, the extreme demands being placed on the planet by a human population far beyond any reasonable bounds, is a process that began 10,000 years ago during the agricultural revolution. The implications of that revolution were completely lost on the people involved in it, and have only recently become clear. The pace of the revolution, though rapid in comparison with human cultural changes that preceded it, has been slow enough that the adaptable human has done just that, adapted to a radically changing world. And if we keep on adapting, we just might adapt to living in a nightmarish hell on a distintegrating planet. With a 10,000 year history behind it, it is absolutely ridiculous to even consider "blaming" some group for overpopulation. Let's try to be mature about this, set blame aside, and start looking for solutions. Ted Toal. From rcollins@netlink.com.au Mon Nov 9 21:40:34 1998 Received: from netlink.com.au (merlin.netlink.com.au [203.16.172.196]) by csf.Colorado.EDU (8.8.5/8.8.4/CNS-4.1p-nh) with ESMTP id VAA20537 for ; Mon, 9 Nov 1998 21:40:28 -0700 (MST) Received: from netlink.com.au (j166.netlink.com.au [203.62.227.166]) by netlink.com.au (8.8.8/8.8.8) with ESMTP id PAA10136; Tue, 10 Nov 1998 15:44:27 +1100 Message-ID: <3647C36F.B7F3B165@netlink.com.au> Date: Tue, 10 Nov 1998 15:39:14 +1100 From: rc&am Reply-To: rcollins@netlink.com.au MIME-Version: 1.0 To: PROGRESSIVE POPULATION NETWORK Subject: malthus Content-Type: text/plain; charset=iso-8859-1 Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit re/productions: Issue#1 __________ An Imagined Reality: Malthusianinsm, Neo-Malthusianism and Population Myth Mohan Rao ___________________ Malthusianism and neo-Malthusianism offer an excessively simplistic understanding of the complex relationship of resources and population, which has proven to be a theoretical red herring. This article attempts to critically examine the Malthusian writings locating the philosophy in a socio-political context and draws attention to its conceptual, methodological and empirical weaknesses. ___________________________________ India was one of the first nations in the world to initiate an official family planning programme. Commencing in the First Five-Year Plan in 1952 with a clinic approach, the programme took wing in the Third Five-Year Plan with the adoption of the Extension Education approach in 1962. In 1965, the United Nations Advisory Mission suggested the launching of what was called the 'Reinforced Programme', the major component of which was an "energetic loop (IUCD) programme". As a consequence, the programme was over hauled with an emphasis on the intrauterine device to meet the family planning programme goals. Towards the end of the 60s it was increasingly being realised that the IUCD strategy had not been successful. The programme strategy in the Fourth Plan period, in the early 1970s, relied therefore largely on vasectomy in what was called the 'camp approach'. The camp approach, however, proved difficult to sustain and in view of the abuses in the family planning programme in the period of the emergency, vasectomy was virtually abandoned. Attention now focused on female sterilisations- which formed the cornerstone of the programme during the Sixth and Seventh Plan periods. Towards the end of the Seventh Five Year Plan, it was increasingly, albeit grudgingly, being accepted that the programme had failed. The mid-term appraisal of the Seventh Plan noted that the birth rate had not fallen despite couple protection rates having gone up considerably. The Public Accounts committee in its 139th Report observed that despite massive financial inputs into the programme, the birth rate had remained stationary. Indeed the late prime minister Rajiv Gandhi in his inaugural address to the XXI International Population Congress in September 1989 observed that there was "inadequate causal connection between our family planning programme and the impact of these on our birth rates" and that "the rate of increase in financial outlays in family planning is not matched by a commensurate decline in birth rates". Briefly, what has occurred is that a programme strategy is adopted with enthusiasm; it appears to work before soon running aground. A new strategy is then adopted, frequently centering on some new technology, often inspired by international agencies. But each new twist in the programme strategy appears to lead up a blind alley. Indeed it would not be exaggeration to state that the history of family planning in India is a history of monumental failures. As PC Joshi succinctly stated, "Family planning has failed, but family planning must succeed runs the refrain of policy-makers". [Joshi 1974] This paper addresses itself to why the programme has quite simply failed to take off. Is the problem one of strategy ? Is it the question of technical choices alone ? Is it - as is so frequently adduced- due to the superstitious disregard of people who need education about the virtues of a small family ? But then even this approach failed to yield commensurate results. While these are no doubt important and relevant issues, the questions addressed here are substantially different. Could it be that there is some fundamental problem in the approach, in the manner in which the problem is posited ? Has the conceptualisation of the question ignored critical and central issues ? Is this due to the over-arching influence of the ideas of Malthus on the perception of the issue? The paper is divided into two sections; the first examining the writings of Malthus, attempts to situate them in a socio-political context and includes a critique of Malthusian methodology. The second traces the different threads that form the weft and warp of neo-Malthusianism and draws attention to its conceptual, methodological and empirical weaknesses. I So overwhelming is the influence of Reverend Thomas Malthus that no examination of the question of population can avoid commencing with his writing. 1 But before considering his writings and placing them in the social contest of his times, it might perhaps be salutary to briefly survey the views of some 18th century moral philosophers of Europe on the subject of population. Montesquieu was one of the most influential writers on the population question. His work Letters Persanes, published in 1721, made a profound impact on Enlightenment thinkers both in Scotland and on the Continent. Written in the form of an imaginary correspondence, the book examines a number of social issues of the day. In his view, the French nation was degenerate and the population, therefore, declining. In a large number of letters he examines the reasons for the decline of population. He attributed the decline to the influence of the Catholic Church on the one hand; and the oppressive economic policies- in particular agricultural taxation of the aristocracy - on the other. He called for thoroughgoing economic reforms to halt the decline of population. Comparing contemporary France to a supposedly populous Ancient Greece, he argued that a government must be concerned with increasing the population through the provision of employment. This coupled with political liberty, lead in his view to the wealth of a nation. [Tomaselli 1988]. Hume did not echo Montesquieu's views on the populousness of ancient civilisations. Nonetheless he noted that compared to the commonwealth of the ancient world "where of course a great equality of fortune prevailed", the "situation of affairs in modern times with regard to civil liberty as well as equality of fortune, is not near so favorable either to the propagation or happiness of mankind". The populousness of a nation was related to and depended upon happiness, equality, liberty and industriousness. In his words: "every wise, just and mild government by rendering the condition of its subjects easy and secure, will always abound most in people as well as in commodities and richer... If every this else be equal, it seems natural to expect, that, wherever there are most happiness and virtue, and the wisest institutions, there will also be most people [Tomaselli 1988]. The ideas of Jean-Jacques Rousseau on the question of population were also distinctly pro-nationalist, In Du Control Social, published in 1762, he wrote: What is the end of political association ? The preservation and prosperity of its members. And what is the surest mark of their preservation and prosperity ? Their number and population ... The rest being equal, the government under which, without external aids, without naturalisation or colonies, the citizens increase, and multiply most is beyond question the best [Rousseau 1762] The most influential of Enlightenment texts, the Encyclopedia of 1765 edited by Diderot, drew largely on the work of Montesquieu and Hume. Its entry on population noted that ceteris paribus the countries where felicity flourished were those which were also endowed with large populations. These were also the countries where the government was least complex and where there existed relative equality, and liberty. [Tomaselli 1988]. The importance of employment to population was further developed in Sir James Steuart's An Enquiry into the Principles of Political Economy, a rather sophisticated discourse on the population question published in 1767. Modern society, he said, was complex and it was on the basis of the complex division of labour, and the consequent exchange of goods and services, that the wealth of a nation was built. Full employment and industriousness were both essential. Steuart's observations are also precursors of ideas Malthus later developed; the Malthusian seed was, in a manner of speaking, sown in his theories. To quote one crucial passage, if at length: Every individual is equally inspired with a desire to propagate. A people can no more remain without growing propagating, than tree without growing.2 But no more can live than can be fed; and as all augmentations of food must come to a stop so soon as this happens, a people increase no more; that is to say, the proportion of those who die annually increases. This insensibly deters from propagation, because we are rational creatures. But still there are some who, though rational, are not prudent; these marry and produce. This I call vicious propagation. Hence I distinguish propagation into two branches, to wit, multiplication, which goes on among those who feed what they breed, and mere procreation, which takes place among those who cannot maintain their offspring. This last produces a political disease, which mortality cures at the expense of much misery.... How to propose a remedy for this inconveniency without laying some restraint upon marriage; how to lay a restraint upon marriage without shocking the spirit of the times, I own I cannot find out. [Tomaselli 1988]. What is striking about the commentaries of all these thinkers is their appreciation of the enormous complexities of the problem and the phenomenal number of issues which are seen in relation to population. These encompass a wide range of socio-economic issues including wages, employment, the condition of work, security in old age, parental perception of children, the status of women and so on. The second feature these thinkers share is that population is regarded as the dependent variable, responding to changes in a wide spectrum of interlinked socio-economic determinants. Population, then, is the effect of changes in a complex web of inter-acting socio-economic factors. Strikingly unanimous is also the perception of the desirability of large populations which are associated with plenitude, equality and liberty; in other words, the very structure of society. By the late 18th century, however, the perception of the population question had altered fundamentally. The reasons for this shift in perception are enormously complex and are to be sought in the socio-economic milieu of those turbulent times. We shall explore some of them shortly after examining the writings of Malthus. Predecessors of Malthus Among the numerous predecessors of Malthus, two deserve mention. Robert Wallace in Numbers of Mankind, published in 1753, calculated the number of progeny of one couple under different sets of conditions. And Benjamin Franklin in a pamphlet in 1755, entitled Observations Concerning the Increase, argued that the population of America tended to increase geometrically, doubling every 25 years [Gordon 1991]. Indeed Malthus, in the first edition of his work, acknowledged the fact that numerous other writers had already put forward the population growth argument. But it was Malthus who stole the limelight; it was his name that became common household knowledge; his ideas that were eponymously named. The historic work, An Essay on the Principle of Population was first published anonymously to resounding success in 1798. Malthus sets forward two basic propositions. "First, that food is necessary to the existence of man. Secondly, that the passion between the sexes is necessary and will remain nearly in its present state". Then after a reference to Godwin's 'unphilosophical' (i.e. unscientific) speculations on the moderation of sexual passion, he writes one of the most famous, or notorious, passages in social science : Assuming that my postulates as granted, I say, that the power of population is indefinitely greater than the power in the earth to produce subsistence for man. Population, when unchecked, increase in a geometric ratio. Subsistence increases only in an arithmetic ratio. A slight acquaintance with numbers will show the immensity of the first power in comparison of the second. [Malthus 1970]. It followed therefore that populations would increase as long as there was availability of food. When numbers grow beyond that point, the growth of population is halted by two means : one he called the positive check, i.e, hunger famine and pestilence; and the other a preventive check, i.e, "a foresight of the difficulties attending the rearing of a family acts as a preventive check"3. The former inevitably, and naturally' , fall on the lower classes of society. To attempt to raise the standard of living of the lower classes by increasing wages would, through the operation of the laws of nature, be rendered ineffectual. Their population would then only increase further, till checked by subsistence. Thus emerges an iron law of wages : the subsistence wage as the just wage, because if wages are higher, population growth occurs till checked by poverty. Poverty, then was a natural condition of human existence and was not a product of human institutions. The role of the poor was to accept misery for "the misery that checks population falls chiefly, as it always must do, upon that part whose condition is lowest in the scale of society". The rich are in no way responsible for poverty; they are enjoined not to exert themselves to do something about it for "no possible contributions or sacrifices of the rich, particularly in money, could for any time prevent the recurrence of distress among the lower members of society." Malthus was opposed to relief for the poor under what was known as the Speenhamland system. In his view, relief would only mean a deterioration of the general condition of not only everyone else but also that of the poor themselves: The poor laws of England tend to depress the general condition of the poor in these two ways. The first obvious tendency is to increase population without increasing the food for its support .. Secondly the quantity of provisions consumed in work houses upon a part of the society that cannot in general be considered as the most valuable part diminishes the shares that would otherwise belong to the more industrious and more worthy members and thus in the same manner forces more to become dependent.4 Malthus was thus a trenchant partisan to one of the most bitter debates of the day relating to the reform of the Poor Laws. Indeed his views heavily influenced the passage of the Reform Bill in 1834 [cole 1946]. What was the Poor Law reform ? How did the need for change in the Poor Laws arise : Customarily, in the days of yore in England, the maintenance of the poor and disabled was the responsibility of the local community, the parish. The paristi church obtained a tithe- one tenth of an income-from every member of the community, a par of which was made over to the needy in the parish. However, the commercialisation of agriculture and the consequent take-over by landlords of common pasturage, viz, the Enclosure Movement between the 16th and 18th centuries not only sundered feudal relations but also. through pauperisation of a section of the peasantry [Hobsbawm 1977] vastly increased the magnitude of poverty even as it enriched the landlords. The poor were earlier tied by feudal bonds to their parishes; now not only were these bonds not existent, they were backbend by the prospect of jobs, however unfamiliar, in the newly-opened industries in the towns. Painful as the prospect of leaving an ancestral hearth was, more and more poor were left with little option. In the words of Hobsbawn, But ... an industrial economy needs labour, and where else but from the former non-industrial sector was it to come from ? The rural population at home were the most obvious sources supplemented by the miscellaneous petty producers and labouring poor. Men must be attracted into the new occupations, or if- as was most probable- they were unwilling to abandon their traditional way of life- they must be forced into it. Economic and social hardship was the most effective whip; the higher money wages and greater freedom of the town the supplementary carrot. Roving bands of paupers seeking employment, migrating, were thus a common sight in the English countryside over these years. Rootless and jobless, they were ever-present sources of political trouble, of potential and threatening lawlessness. What then was to be done about them ? Malthus was very forthright in his views: "The truth is that the pressure of distress on this part of the community -viz, the lower classes is an evil so deeply seated that no human ingenuity can reach it. The palliative he suggested was the "total abolition of all the present parish laws" to facilitate free movement of labour as dictated by the commands of the market. For those beyond the pale of what demographers rather aseptically call push and pull factors, namely, those who for reasons of ill health, age and debility, could not respond to the beckoning of market forces, Malthus recommended workhouses. These workhouses were to be made as unattractive as possible in order to distinguish the deserving from the non deserving poor, the latter could not be admitted into the workhouses. He recommended "the fare should be hard, and those that were able to obliged to work". 6 In the second edition of his work, published in 1803, Malthus' tone was more assured, more 'scientific' and less polemical. But while the principle of population as natural law, provided the scientific basis for Poor Law reform, the second edition argued that the poor had no moral right to relief. A man who is born into a world already possessed, if he cannot get subsistence from his parents on whom he has a just demand, and if the society do not want his labour, has no right [emphasis added] to the smallest portion of food, and in fact, has no business to be where he is. At nature's mighty feast there is no vacant cover for him. She tells him to be gone and will execute her own orders, if he do not work upon the compassion of some of her guests. If these guests getup and make room for him, other intruders immediately appear demanding the same favour. These guests learn too late their error, in counteracting those strict orders to all intruders issued by the great mistress of the feast, who, wishing that all guests should have plenty, and knowing that she could not provide for unlimited numbers, humanely refused to admit fresh comers when her table was already full. [Malthus, cited in Meek 1977]. What is all too often forgotten in examining the work of Malthus is that it is primarily a tract against the 'Utopian Socialist' of the age, namely, Godwin and Condorcet.7. His work was, in the first instance a rejoinder to the ideas of the perfectibility of mankind advanced by them. In other words, it was a political tract against the hopes for social progress aroused by the French Revolution of 1789 and the collapse of the Ancien Regime [Harvey 1974]. Indeed the frontispiece of the first edition of the Essay on the Principle of Population as It Affects the Future Improvement of Society with Remarks on the Speculations of Mr. Godwin, M Condorce and Other Writers. Malthus wrote: Godwin's work on Political Justice is to show that the greater part of the vices and weaknesses of men proceed from the injustice of their political and social institutions and that if these were removed and the understandings of men more enlightened, there would be little or no temptation in the world to evil. However, this is entirely a false conception, and independent of any political or social institutions whatever, the grater part of mankind, from the fixed and unalter-able laws of nature (viz, the law of population) must ever be subject to the evil temptations arising from want. The French Revolution, with its rallying cry of 'libertie, egalite and fraternitie' aroused great hopes for the advancement of mankind among some sections of the population. Wordsworth, for example, wrote, "Bliss was it that dawn to believe" when he heard of the storming of the Bastille. The Revolution also aroused great fears in the minds of the propertied. "The awakening of the labouring classes after the first shocks of the French Revolution made the upper classes tremble", noted Lady Frances Shelley in her diary [quoted in Thompson 1982]. Lord Cock burn wrote, "Everything rung and was connected with the Revolution in France. Everything, not this thing or that thing, but literally everything was soaked in this one event". [Meek 1977]. Fears of the mobs taking over were rampant; indeed there was ample evidence that these fears were not entirely misplaced and were certainly not paranoid [Thompson 1982]. The poor, comprising a motley lot of occupations but held together by memories of a communitarian moral economy, and both distrustful and hostile to the emergent marker economy, were inspired by a long tradition of popular dissent - of Levellers. Deggers, Ranters and Chilianism [Hill 1984]. Groups as miners and self-employed artisans saw wages as a matter of custom. They expected prices to be regulated by custom also. The new 'god-given' laws of supply and demand8 whereby any scarcity led to soaring prices had not won popular acceptance. An elaborate code of custom regulated the price, the size and the quality of a loaf of bread. And a price rise or any move to impose standardised measures resulted in a riot. Bread riots marked the landscape of 18th century England- with a series of outbreak in 1764, 1766, 1783 and 1788. [Thompson 1982]. Profoundly influential on the rebellious poor was Paine's Rights of Man, published in 1791. As Thompson has noted, "The seed of Rights of Man was English; but only the hope brought by the American and French Revolutions enabled it to strike". In what was considered the foundation text of the English working class movement, Paine thundered. When the rich plunder the poor of his rights, it become an example to the poor to plunder the rich of his property... The aristocracy are not the farmers who work the land but are mere consumers of the rent. Paine then elaborated on a host of social security arrangements, in addition to political enfranchisement of the people and the abolition of hereditary privilege, as a solution to the problems of the day. These included general education, old age pensions, maternity benefits, funeral funds, unemployment benefits, etc - not as a matter of grace and favour but of right [Thompson 1982]. Equally influential and widely circulated was a pamphlet by Alexander Kilham entitled The Progress of Liberty. The writings of Voltaire and Rousseau also made the rounds. The popularity of such democratic ideals seriously worried the establishment. They fond their ideologue, their prophet, in Malthus. For had he not 'scientifically' proven that by the etemal law of nature poverty was inevitable ? And that the best thing to do about it is to do nothing ? Malthus' work may also be read as a tract on the inherent nature of man. The man that is celebrated, structured created, as the natural man is the quintessential bourgeois man, self-seeking, competitive, and heartless; the "rational" profit-maximising individual of neoclassical economics. Society, for him, comprised an assemblage, an agglomeration of such individuals. It was 'naturally' a "society divided into a class of proprietors and a class of labourers" with "self love the main spring of the great machine". It is not surprising therefore that Malthus' writings greatly influenced that other great figure of the 19th century, Charles Darwin [Flew 1970]. It was, in a sense, zeitgeist; but the spirit not so much of an age as of a class that finds resonance in Malthus. It must not be forgotten however that in those troubled times "a benignant spirit was abroad"9. It is in the context of the debate on the nature of man and the perfectibility of humankind in this volatile period that we must locate Malthus. He was, then, one of those who through recourse to 'scientific' laws of eternal and unchangeable nature, argued against the possibility, indeed the desirability, of changing social and political institutions which outlived their days. Scientific Claims What in fact was the 'scientific' claim of Malthus ? Does it lie in the fact that his language is cloaked in the idiom of the science of the times ? In the insistent and constant use of rates and ratios ? We read, for example : "These operations of what we call nature have been conducted almost invariably according to fixed laws. And since the world began, the causes of population and depopulation have probably been as constant as any of the laws of nature with which we are acquainted". Or again, "It has appeared, that from the inevitable laws of nature some human beings must suffer from want. These are the unhappy persons who, in the great lottery of life, have drawn a blank". "The constancy of the laws of nature and of effects and of causes" writes Malthus, "is the foundation of all human knowledge"; although he concedes that God may change the laws if he so wishes. While Malthus' admiration for Newton is acknowledged, less attention has been paid to the influence of 18th century positivist science, Newtonian science, on Malthus. Central also is the concept of equilibrium, of a stable state of population which is the equilibrium point of two forces, the capacity to procreate and the ability to produce food [Gordon 1991]. This balancing of forces he regarded as an obvious truth'. This truth is, however, not so obvious. The major propositions, or assumptions, that population when unchecked grows in a geometric ratio while food can grow only in an arithmetic ratio, the foundation of the Malthusian edifice- are in fact entirely arbitrary. It is on the basis of these arbitrary propositions that the entirely complex issue of the relationship between resources and population is examined. If an empirical observation of society provides evidence of poverty, then syllogistically it follows, that there exists population pressure. The problem, in other words, is of the method used. A famous analogy would illustrate the problem at the very heart of the Malthusian method. Socrates, unable to bear political persecution due to his supposedly heretical writings, committed suicide by drinking hemlock. A logician of Malthusian persuasion when asked to examine the cause of his death may argue as follows : All men are mortal. Socrates was a man. Therefore Socrates is mortal. This syllogism, used to account for Socrates' death makes no reference to either heresy, political persecution or hemlock. The logic of course is impeccable; and it is empirically true that all men are mortal as indeed that Socrates was a man. A syllogism like the above does not in fact focus on the cause while appearing to offer an explanation. To take the syllogistic argument a little further. Drinking hemlock causes death. Socrates drank hemlock in 399 B C. Therefore Socrates died in 399 B C. This syllogism might be acceptable to an expert in forensic medicine but not to a social scientist. The apparently logical process here again offers only a partial explanation of the cause of the phenomenon under study [Gordon 1991]. Given Malthusian assumptions, the solution to the problem follows axiomatically. In other words, out of a complexity of historically determined variables which are interactive, this method takes into account an isolated few variables, makes some assumptions regarding the behaviour of their relationship, tests empirically the validity of the outcome of the association and then arrives at a deduction of causality. This, clearly, is not methodologically valid. What Malthus arrives at is not a theory; he makes certain statements of facts but fails to arrive at any coherent explanation. The problem with Malthus' method becomes more explicit if his work is examined in the context of the debate on the Corn Laws - a debate which tore apart English society as few issues of the time did. Thompson has noted for example that during the passage of the Corn Laws in 1815. "the houses of Parliament were defended with troops from the menacing crowds". The debate on the Corn Laws was related to the debate on free trade policies, or as is better known, on laissez-faire policies; it was related also to a certain vision of society, which attempts to identify which class in the nation was the more dynamic in its contribution to the wealth of the nation. The rising class of industrialists, the nouveau bourgeois, were opposed to laws restricting import of wheat - the price of which had increased steeply during the Napoleonic wars. The landed interests were, however, benefited by the high price and were therefore opposed to free trade, to the free import of wheat which would, in their view, lower prices. The free traders argued that these laws increased the price of food and therefore of the wages that had to be paid. An increase wage bill cut into profits; and therefore, it was argued, into capital that could be productively invested to increase the wealth of the nation [Meck 1977]. The industrial class prided itself on its dynamism, vigour, parsimony and industry. The landlords were characterised as effect, parasitic rent-seekers, self-indulgent, non-productive and given to conspicuous consumption. As the battle lines were drawn on the Corn Laws, landlords -who then dominated the parliament - sought protection from imports while the manufacturing class sought free trade [Huberman 1981]. The most famous political economists of the day- Malthus and Ricardo - took sides in the battle; the former as a partisan of landlord interests and the latter of the manufacturing class. Malthus in his Principles of Political Economy recognises that there is a problem to be solved in the accumulation of capital in society. The capitalist saves, invests in production, sells the product at a profit, and reinvests a part of the profits to set off yet another cycle of production. He, however, needs buyers for the product. This demand for products, Malthus was certain, could not emanate from the lower classes; it was self evident that their purchasing power was limited. The problem of effective demand was, he argued, very crucial in an economy. He argued that effective demand could only arise from those classes- landlords and functionaries of the church and state- who were outside the production process [Harvey 1974]. Effective demand emanating from the unproductive classes of society was therefore a vital force, both in stimulating accumulation of capital and in the expansion of employment. Indeed labour may be unemployed simply due to the failure of the upper classes to consume. Now this theory of effective demand does not sit easily with the theory of population. Malthus advocates in the latter that the power to consume be withheld from the lower classes; while in the former he endorses the incontinent consumption of the upper classes. He attempts to reconcile this contradiction by arguing that the upper classes don't increase their numbers for fear of coming down in life; unlike the lower classes who breed imprudently. The law of population is consequently disaggregated into one law for the rich and another for the poor. This is, in effect, a denial of its power as a natural law. Malthus does not explain why effective demand cannot be generated by increasing the purchasing power of the labouring classes. He simply dismisses the possibility as illogical because "no one will ever employ capital merely for the sake of demand occasioned by those who work for him". This could happen in only one instance: if the labourers "produce an excess of value above what they consume". And Malthus denies that this could happen. It is, in fact, this concept - that Malthus does not consider - that forms the core of Marx's concept of surplus value [Harvey 1974]. In the Essay Malthus does not consider the possibility that more people can raise proportionately more food. But in the Principles of Political Economy he does examine this as a possibility before dismissing it by focusing upon the law of diminishing returns10. While Ricardo made short shrift of the concept of effective demand enunciated by Malthus, he accepted Malthus' views on population and the law of diminishing returns. The version of population theory that Ricardo and his school of political economy utilised was based explicitly on the proposition that the law of diminishing returns is an inescapable property of agricultural production. But the law of diminishing returns is as chimerical as the iron law of wages. In the words of Engels : Where has it been proved that the productively of land increased in arithmetical progression ? The area of land is limited- that is perfectly true. But the labour power to be employed on this area increases together with the population; and even if we assume that the increase of output associated with this increase of labour is not always proportionate to the latter, there still remains a third element- which the economists, however, never consider as important - namely, science, the progress of which is just as limitless and at least as rapid as that of population [cited in Meek 1977]. Although we cannot, in our times help being cautious about the boundless beatitudes of science described by Engels, we are equally unable to refute the inapplicability of the law of diminishing returns to conditions of changing technology and methods of production. A detailed examination of Malthus and his work is unavoidable even most contemporary discussion of the relationship between resources and population are overshadowed by his ideas and methods. We shall briefly take up what Marx and Engels had to say on the population question. But before we do so let us note en passant that the experience of England in the 19th century when an increased population was accompanied by dramatic improvements in standards of living put paid both to the iron law of wages and the law of population. The Malthusian spectre of population growth was laid law for the time being. Marxist Critique Marx and Engels, besides reserving a number of choice epithets for Malthus, argue that there is no fixed, universal, eternal law of population. Marx notes that social factors create a "law of population peculiar to the capitalist mode of production", adding that "In fact every particular historic mode of production has its own special laws of population, historically valid within that particular sphere" [Marx 1976 edition]. Central to capitalism is the surplus value that is generated in the production process and is appropriated by the capitalist as interest, profit or rent. Marx points out that the working population under capitalism produces both the surplus and a "relative surplus population". The relative' surplus population "the sized of which varies over time- comprises that section of the labour force not imployed by capital currently, depending upon both capital accumulation and the technology deployed. Underlying the law of population is therefore the compulsions of capitalist production. The relationship between the rate of capital accumulation, the size of the labour force and the technology employed determines what proportion of the population is unemployed at any point of time and forms the relative surplus population. In order to generate greater accumulation over time, there is a change in the composition of capital, a greater part now being constant capital (i.e. that which is expended on the technical aspects of production), with a shrink in the variable part of capital (i.e; the labour utilised). Thus it is Capitalist accumulation itself that constantly produces, and produces in the direct ratio of its own energy and extent, a relative redundant working population, i. e. a population which is superfluous to capitals average requirement a surplus population [Marx 1976 edition]. Marx adds, The labouring population therefore produce, along with the accumulation of capital produced by it, the means by which it itself is made relatively superfluous... If a surplus labouring population is a necessary product of accumulation or of the development of wealth on a capitalist basis, this surplus population also becomes, conversely, the lever of capitalist accumulation, indeed it becomes a condition of existence of the capitalist mode of production. It forms a disposable industrial reserve army, that belongs to capital quite as absolutely as if the latter had bred it a its own cost. Independently or the limits of the actual increase of population, it creates for the changing needs of the self-expansion of capital, a mass of human material always ready for exploitation. In other words, the production of a relative surplus population and an industrial reserve army are seen by Marx as being both historically specific and internal to the capitalist mode of production. This mass of unemployed labour then acts both as disciplining force on the labouring population, and serves to depress their wages. Marx was not arguing that population growth per se was a mechanical product of the law of capitalist accumulation, nor was he arguing that population growth per se did not affect the situation. But he was arguing very specifically, contrary to the position of Malthus and Ricardo, that the poverty of the labouring classes was the inevitable product of the capitalist process of accumulation. Poverty then was not to be explained away as a natural condition for a section of society a natural law. We have noted that the 19th century English experience of a surge in population accompanied by rising per capita income, discredited the ideas of Malthus. As England completed its industrial and health revolutions, and as birth rates subsequently commenced a secular decline, Malthusianism lost its bite, its urgency, and its pungency. It was not, however put to deserved rest. It continued to be resurrected as an explanation of poverty in other parts of the world. Malthus himself would probably have turned in his grave could he have learnt that the influence of his ideas was apparent for instance in British government's decision to withhold relief during the famine of 1870 in India. At that point India supported one fourth the population it supports today; a note on which to turn to Malthus in his resurrected form. II India was integrated into the world of capitalism with the Battle of Plassey in 1757. The colonial loot of the 'jewel' in Britain's crown was both instantaneous and staggering. It has been estimated that the treasure taken from India alone between Plassey and Waterloo was an astounding 500 million pounds to 1,000 million pounds [Patnaik 1973]. Its impact on the industrial revolution in England was equally instantaneous and has been noted in the following words : ... the Bengal plunder began to arrive in London, and the effect appears to have been instantaneous.... At once in 1759, the bank (of England) issued 10 and 15 pound notes.... and the industrial revolution began with the year 1760 [Adams, cited in Patnaik 1973]. Thus while India provided a large chunk of the capital for England's industrialisation the process of her own impoverishment and deindustrialisation began. And India was "systematically deindustrialised" [Hobsbawm 1977]. and became in turn a market for Lancashire cottons : In 1820 India took 11 million yards; by 1840 it already took 145 million yards. Spinners and weavers in India, unable to bear the competition, suffered destitution. Spinning and weaving in urban India were wiped out; the rural artisans, immiserised, were ready victims for the famines which loomed over India in the 19th century. The ideas of Malthus were resurrected as an explanation of Indian poverty. As far back as early in the 19th century European travellers, setting the tone for later colonial administrators supervising the plundering of India, invoked Malthus as an explanation for poverty in India. For example, we find the remarks of Abbe Dubois. After surveying the destruction of the Indian weaving industry and the consequent pauperisation of her artisans, and after linking this to the mills of England Abbe Dubois writes : Of these causes (of misery) the chief one is the rapid increase of population. Judging by my own personal knowledge ... of Mysore and the districts of Baramahland Coimbatore, I should say that they increased by 25 percent in the last 25 years... Some modern political economists have held that a progressive increase in the population is one of the most unequivocal signs of a country's prosperity and wealth. In Europe this argument may be logical enough, but I do not think that it can be applied to India; in fact, I am persuaded that as the population increases, so in proportion do want and misery. For this theory of the economists to hold good in all respects the resources and industries of the inhabitants ought to develop rather rapidly; but in a country where the inhabitants are notoriously apathetic and indolent, where customs and institutions are so many insurmountable barriers against a better order of things, and where it is more or less a sacred duty to let things as they are, I have every reason to believe that a considerable increase in the population should be looked upon as a calamity rather than as a blessing [Dubois 1906]. Thus is assiduously constructed the image of the Other, of Orientalism, of seething poor overpopulated tropics in a swoon of customs and habits, ineradicable and unchanging [Said 1991]. Colonial policy is exonerated the responsibility of creating a relative surplus population in India. In addition to the destruction of her cottage industry, British agricultural policy - of commercialisation and revenue extraction, through the Permanent Settlement Act- impoverished vast sections of the Indian peasantry [Ptnaik 1973]. This pauperised peasantry did not have the option that their English counterparts did, of turning into proletarians, working in the industries, for British free trade policies actively hindered indsutrialisation. India was thus integrated into the world economy as an exporter of primary commodities with a virtually stagnant, vast and immiserised agricultural sector and no industrial sector to speak of. The spectre of Malthus loomed large over India even in the 19th century when there was little population growth and the Indian population was stalked by periodic and terrible famines. Subsequently, in the late 19th century, we witness the birth of a new 'avatar' of Malthusianism, namely, neo-Malthusianism. Malthusianism and neo-Malthusianism are not conceptually or methodologically distinct. They differ insofar as the victims of their ideas or methods are concerned. While Malthusiasm was concerned with the poor of their own countries, neo-Malthusians looked across the seas at the poor in developing countries. And while Malthusians came equipped with contraceptive technology. The parents of neo-Malthusianism were the eugenists and birth controllers. Eugenic movement Charles Darwin's The Descent of Man published in 1871, provided a significant measure of inspiration to the birth of the Eugenics Movement [Greer 1984]. The ideas of competitive struggle, natural selection and the survival of the fittest, when applied to human populations had frightening consequences, not to mention deep ethical and moral implications. Racial purity and improvement of the racial stock were the prime concerns of the Eugenics Movement. The Eugenics Movement was named by one of its illustrious founders, a cousin of Darwin; Francis Galton, Galton pioneered the use of statistics on human populations. A R Wallace, who CO-discovered the process of evolution with Darwin, argued in an essay, The Action of Natural Selection on Man : At the present day it does not seem possible for natural selection to act in any way so as to secure the permanent advancement of morality and intelligence for it is indisputably the mediocre, if not the low, both as regards morality and intelligence who succeed best in life and multiply fastest. Here again we find a scientist asserting something utterly unproven and probably unprovable as something 'indisputably' true. He is obviously stating something merely as a matter of faith. He nonetheless inspired Jane Hume Clapperton who published the text of eugenics, Scientific Meliorism in 1885. "The racial blood," she wrote, shall not be poisoned by moral disease. The guardians of social life in the present day dare not be careless of the happiness of coming generations, therefore the criminal is forcibly restrained from perpetuating his vicious breed... The type will disappear whilst evenly balanced natures, the gentle, the noble, the intellectual, will become parents of future generations, and the purified blood and unmixed good in the veins of the British will enable the race to rise above its present level of natural morality. To promote the contentment of congenital criminals within their prison home, where they are detained for life, an alternative to celibacy might be offered, viz, a surgical operation rendering the male sex incapable of reproduction11 [Greer 1984]. Francis Galton inaugurated the Eugenics Education Society and brought out a journal called Eugenics Review. He was also responsible for the founding of the biometrics laboratory at University College, London and its journal Biometrica. Galton's passion was the collection of biostatistics and the collection of data on the lineage of the pedigreed. He was firmly committed to the idea that the brightest and best should be encouraged to breed. Eugenics therefore had two sets of action on its agenda: the positive eugenics of Galton and the negative eugenics of Clapperton. Those who received the attention of the latter at one time or the other were criminals, the mentally retarded, the insane, the tuberculous, lepers, alcoholics, epileptics, the feeble minded, the degenerate, immigrants and of course the poor, who apparently bred all these characteristics. For example, it is noted with alarm : In Degeneracy healthy aspirations no longer exist, the struggle for survival the higher in the organism against the lower having ceased and the cells having conformed in a mass to a lower grade of being.... There is no greater menace to a race than is furnished by such sturdy degenerates [Greer 1984]. The IQ test was designed in part to select cases eligible for eugenic sterilisation. Eugenics held great appeal for influential people on both sides of the Atlantic. A prominent eugenist in Germany wrote, Because the inferior are always numerically superior to the better, the former would multiply so much faster - if they have the same possibility to survive and reproduce - that the better necessarily would be placed in the background. Therefore a correction has to be made to the advantage of the better. The nature (sic) offers such a correction by exposing the inferior to difficult living conditions which reduce their number. Concerning the rest the nature (sic) does not allow them to reproduce indiscriminately, but makes a relentless selection according to their strength and health conditions [Hitler, cited in Bondestam 1980]. The 'correction' he offered to nature's lethal ways was called the final solution. Adolf Hitler included among others, Jews, communists, homosexuals and gypsies in his grand design. In America the eugenics movement gained momentum early in the 20th century, mainly at the instance of natural scientists convinced by Galton that 'genius' was a heritable characteristic. The rediscovery of Mendel's work in 1900 led to the formation of the American Breeders Association in 1903. In 1906, a Eugenics Section of the Association was established to "emphasise the value of superior blood and the menace to society of inferior blood" [Hodgson 1991]. The American eugenic movement involved itself with legislation to restrict immigration for "unrestricted immigration", especially of those not Anglo-Saxon or Nordic, was described as the "annihilator of our native stock". The eugenists were also instrumental in initiating legislation and carying out eugenic sterilsations on institutionalised mentally subnormal, the epileptic and the psychotic. Indeed, the eugenicist Leon F Whitney wrote, "We cannot but admire the foresight of the (German) plan (of sterilising 4,00,000 people) and realise by this action Germany is going to make herself a stronger nation". He also observed that "the negroes furnished six times as many sub-normals as did the native-born whites". Let us note that the victims of all this 'scientific' hysteria were the weak, the powerless and the helpless. That the eugenist utopia continues to exert a powerful attraction, despite being shorn of its scientific halo, is evident in even current legislation and practice; regarding, for example, the introduction of hormonal implant contraceptives in the US. Women on welfare, with either a criminal record or a record of 'child neglect', must have Norplant implanted in order to be eligible for welfare. Thus the vast majority of women subjected to Norplant are blacks or hispanics [Srinivas 1992]. Meanwhile in London in 1930. the Eugenic Society, encouraged by the Report of the Joint Committee of the Board of Education- which found that "mentally deficient parents create centres of degeneracy and disease which welfare work can never reach" - began concerted lobbying and propaganda for a Eugenic Sterilisation Bill. Associated with this effort were a press baron, the noted author HGWells, Darwin's son Major Darwin and Julian Huxley. The last, who later became a lion of the population control movement. wrote : The principle of supplementing the segregation of defectives by sterilisation in certain cases is to my mind very important, and indeed very essential, if we are to prevent the gradual deterioration of our racial stock. Eugenics was scientifically discredited by that famous biologist (and friend of India) J.B. S Haldane. But it was Herman Mueller's discovery of mutation the early 1940s that denuded it of the very last vestiges of scientific respectability. The eugenic lobby now turned to what they called crypto- eugenics or population control. In 1956 the British Eugenics Society decided in a resolution: that the Society should pursue eugenic ends by less obvious means, that is by a policy of crypto- eugenics. The Society's activities in crypto-eugenics should be pursued vigorously, and specifically that the Society should increase its monetary support of the Family Planning Association and the International Planned Parenthood Federation [Greer 1984]. Birth Control movement This brings us to that other parent of the population control movement, namely, the birth control movement. Various streams of thought, jostling uneasily with one another, congealed into the birth control movement in the late 19th century. One stream was that of the radical feminists, tracing their descent in modern times to Mary Wollstonecraft's publication in 1792 of The Vindication of the Rights of Women. These persons believed, and believed strongly, that it was women's right to control their own destinies, their own bodies. Access to birth control, then banned, was one element in their larger struggle for democratic rights. The seconds stream was the socialist. Their ideas on birth control were coloured by the feeling that the burden of repeated pregnancies was harmful to the health of working women; and by the belief that it was in the interests of capitalists and not their own to have an unlimited supply of cheap labour. It was thus in the ranks of the International Workers of the World that the first stirrings demanding free access to contraception arose[Gordon 1976]. The third and important stream, which came to dominate the birth control movement was the neo-Malthusian. Finally the last and least significant was an offshoot of the Romantic movement, the free lovers who believed in the liberating powers of the sexual act which, they believed should be untrammeled from its association with procreation. As is obvious, these contending tendencies produced a certain in-built tension in the birth control movement. The movement was ultimately taken over by the neo-Malthusians by the 1920s. This is attributed partly to the period of post first world war reaction; partly to the weaknesses of the socialist and feminist movements; and above all to the right-wing fear of communism after the establishment of the Soviet Union in 1917. This fear was strengthened in the 30s when the western world was threatened with a crisis, the Great Depression, which the Soviet Union was seen to be able to withstand [Bondestam 1980]. In the field of economics the time was ripe for the Keynesian revocation of Malthusians theories of population. Annie Basant and Charles Bradlaugh's trial in 1877 over the publication of a book on contraception entitled The Fruits of philosophy was a cause-celebre to the birth control movement. Besant herself, before she got involved in the esoteric religions of Theosophy and India, published the neo-Malthusian tract The Law of Population, carrying advice on what she called marital prudence. The notoriety of the Bradlaugh-Besant trial ended the career of the former, while Besant went, on with C. R. Drysdale, a medical witness at the trial, to found the Neo-Malthusian League in 1877 to Agitate for the abolition of all penalties on the public discussion of the population question and to spread among the people by all means a knowledge of the law of population of its consequences, and its bearing on human conduct and morals [Demerath 1976]. A journal was brought out called, appropriately, The Malthusian. Birth control propaganda was initially aimed at middle class women who sought to limit fertility. The philosophy was that it was physically possible and morally desirable for husbands and wives to control the size of their families; and that the ultimate decision to have one or more children should be made by parents and not by tradition, church or state. Soon, however, the ambit was widened to include the understanding that a small number of children in a family is good for the society as a whole which is otherwise endangered by a rapid rise of population. Margaret Sanger, an American nurse, possibly did more than anybody else to ultimately put birth control on the world agenda. Powerful and influential, she has been described as the "messiah of medicalised birth control". While still involved in the feminist and socialist movement - a heritage she deeply disowned in her later years - she brought out a pamphlet, Family Limitation, in 1914. Her primary aim was to limit what she perceived as the excessive fertility of the poor, a view that caused distress and shock to her anarchist mentor Emma Goldman from whom she was subsequently estranged. "Large families", Sanger wrote, "are associated with poverty, toil, unemployment, drunkenness, cruelty, fighting, jails; the small ones with cleanliness, leisure, freedom, light, space, sunshine" [Greer 1984]. Her most famous book was the 1920 publication Women and the New race, an orthodox tract of eugenics : "First stop the multiplication of the unfit. This appeared the most important and greatest step towards race betterment." Even as views such as this alienated her erstwhile associates, it won favour among the rich and influential. Sanger was able, in addition, to attract attention, if not notoriety, to her cause by her unorthodox tactics. She founded the American Birth Control League in 1921, a nationwide organisation for medicalised birth control- for Sanger had won over medical professionals to her cause. For what distinguished Sanger's efforts from those of the feminists and socialists was the professionalisation of birth control [Gordon 1976]. In 1925 she organised the International Neo-Malthusian and Birth Control Conference in New York bringing together leading eugenists and birth controllers; and in 1927 the First World population Conference in Geneva bringing together American and European eugenists and neo-Malthusians. In 1940 Henry Pratt Fairchild, president of The American Eugenics Society, told the annual meeting of the Birth Control Federation, the new incarnation of the American Birth Control League : One of the most outstanding features of the present conference is the practically universal acceptance of the fact that these two movements (viz, eugenics and birth control) have now come to such a thorough understanding and have drawn so close together as to be almost indistinguishable [Gordon 1976]. This momentous marriage had the financial backing of American corporate capital that had earlier supported eugenics; Gordon notes that "in no academic field was the coalition between corporate capital and scholars developed more fully than in eugenics". In England, meanwhile the ministry of health established a National Birth Control Council in 1930; the Council became, in 1931, the National Birth Control Association. On the Birth Control Association were several eugenists, prominent among them were Julian Huxley and Major Darwin. Demographic theses In the 40s and 50s, eugenic ideas were considered embarrassing, close as they were to those of the architect of the Nazi holocaust. Population control, however, came to occupy a respectable position. This was also a period for major shifts in the perspective in the discipline of demography was concerned with attempting to understand demographic phenomena. Viewing 19th century population changes, research in demography over six decades had crystallised into a Theory of Demographic Transition. This 'theory' held that wide-ranging shifts in a large number of socio-economic variables, among others urbanisation, industrialisation, rising standards of living, the health revolution, together brought under the rubric of modernization, had led to a decline of death rates followed, after a gap by a decline of birth rates. That is to say demography carried a perspective that viewed population as a dependent variable; and socio-economic factors the determining independent variables. Demographers observed that the timing and extent of western fertility decline had not been related to advances in contraceptive technology. In most countries of the west, the spread of contraceptives had occurred in a hostile environment with both governments and religion opposed to it. They had concluded therefore that fertility declined when the motivation to have children changed and was not strictly related to the ability to control fertility. Motivation changed in response to structural changes in the social system; in other words population was determined by socio-economic conditions [Hodgson 1991]. The post-second world war baby boom knocked out some of the scientific credibility of the demographic transition theory [Hodgson 1988]. Leading demographers now focused on other problems; for example, they pointed out that the theory was unable to explain the low birth rates in France and Bulgaria prior to industrialisation. What they also did in the process was to question the very perspective of the demographic transition theory. Leading American demographers were now turning their attention to the non-industrial third world. Kingsley Davis noted an alarming situation in India in his influential classic The Population of India and Pakistan [Davis 1968]. He observed that British colonial policy, replacing the savage rule of natives with their penchant for 'hereditary plunder', had brought civilisation to India. As a consequence of their benevolent health policy, death rates had declined, but had not been followed by declines in the birth rate. A population problem therefore loomed large. The decline in death rate, Davis noted, had not depended upon general economic development as in the west. It had occurred due to the: Diffusion of death control techniques which did not depend on the diffusion of other cultural elements or basic changes in the institutions and customs of the people affected [Davis 1956]. He highlighted the 'paradoxical' association of rapid population growth and continued widespread poverty, a 'grotesque' example of 'human self-frustration'. He argued that "economic development alone cannot be counted on to save a situation over which it has so little control and by which it is itself so greatly influenced". American economists during this period, the 1950s, emphasised the role of capital accumulation in the development process. Undevelopment was a condition of little capital stock in the workforce; development was a process of adding to that stock. It was self-evident to development economists that rapid population growth induced high dependency ratios in a country. This increased the need for investments in social sectors such as education and health, and thereby curtailed the capital available for more direct productive investments. A high dependency ratio also cut into the rate of saving in the economy. The country was thus caught in a vicious cycle of poverty-high population growth rates-low savings-low productivity-poverty. Some economists developed models describing a 'low-level equilibrium trap' in which population growth precluded growth of per capita income. Coale and Hoover quantified the economic costs of continued high fertility and found it considerable [Coale 1958]. Coale also pointed out that the post-war mortality decline, since it occurred most sharply in the younger age groups, was actually further increasing the dependency ratios. Large parts of the underdeveloped world were saddled with populations wherein for every one individual in the economically active years, there were one or more nonproductive dependents. This appeared to be a 'demographic stumbling block' to economic development [Coale 1956]. Demographers and economists thus fed off each other's fears. It was not long before demographers began to assert that something ought to be done about the population problem. Demography, then, became a policy science. Shedding its social science heritage; it became, in this period, more prescriptive, more activist, less academic, less thoughtful. The earlier demographic perspective implied that motivation for curtailing family size could not exist in primarily peasant communities. But demographers now overturned nearly 60 years of research on the determinants of fertility by suggesting that fertility in agrarian societies could be lowered directly through the use of contraceptive technology. This vision of the determinants of fertility was entirely novel. Was this based on adequate empirical evidence : The fatally flawed Khanna Study was one piece of evidence, demonstrably unreliable and biased [Wyon 1971]. It was more likely based on Davis' assertion that in 'rural sections' of India a women in her 40s "would show a model preference for two or three living children". There were other factors at work shaping these new trends in demography which viewed population as the independent variable, and socio-economic factors as the dependent variable [Hodgson 1983]. It was these other factors perhaps which turned the demographic world upside down. What were the factors which shaped this new demographic perspective ? The post second world war world was one of anti-colonial national liberation struggles. Colonialism collapsed in large parts of the globe; post, colonial nations rushed to their 'tryst with destiny". As these nations set out on their long delayed journey to industrialisation, they were beckoned by the Soviet model. The Soviet Union was then the prime 20th century example of planned and rapid industrialisation. Indeed in the early 40s the leading American demographer Notestein had held out the Soviet case as an exemplar of how to deal with the 'population problem' [Notestein, cited in Hodgson 1988]. The example of a backward nation achieving planned and rapid industrialisation was heartening to demographers who believed that indsutrialisation and modernisation necessarily preceded fertility decline. But when America's war ally grew to be her most feared competitor in the cold war era, and when the third world became the arena of this competition, such a line of thought- particularly in the paranoid McCarthy- years- was no longer possible. Population growth in these third world countries was now a source of horror; inseparable from the probable political consequences envisioned. The establishment of a communist state in China injected a note of urgency to these worries. The ruling classes in the first world were acutely aware that the third world was the source of raw materials that they must continue to have access to; the defection of these nations would be a blow to their economic interests. Kingsley Davis described the "uncommitted" third of the world as a "prize to be won in the struggle between the Communist and the free worlds" [Davis, cited in Hodgson 1988]. Davis also noted : What the United States would like to see them (the leaders of the underdeveloped countries) do is to foster peaceful and democratic industrialsation, a rising level of living, and, in general, adherence to our side. To this end we have given or lent money for agriculture, industry, transportation, public health and arms. We have maintained that this is a effective way to head off Communism because, as we say, chronic poverty breeds Communism. This reasoning has much to commend it, but it ignores population trends and thus runs the danger of underestimating or misinterpreting the requirements for economic development (emphasis mine). Davis, like other western demographer, was attempting to influence US policy-makers to include population control as a component of US aid by playing on their fears of communism. At this point demographers such as Davis. Hauser and Tauber drew attention to the race between India and communist China, the outcome of which was thought to be of great importance to the free world. India was perceived as the last bastion of freedom; to be guarded against the communist onslaught in the pack of falling dominoes. American Corporate Funding Once very significant if not decisive, influence on the shape of demography and the growth of the population control lobby was the quantum and nature of funding. We had earlier noted that eugenics had attracted American corporate capital. With the co-option of eugenics into the population control movement, funds began flowing, initially from the Ford Foundation and Rockefeller Foundation, into both demography as an academic discipline and its policy counterpart, the population control lobby. Between 195 and 1975, the Ford Foundation had spent more that 150 million dollars on population control. Of this, about 80 million went into research and training in reproductive biology. About 35 million was used to finance family planning programmes. India received more than 20 million dollars [Domerath 1976]. Hodgson notes that: the expenditures on demography had a profound impact. In 1950 it was taught at the graduate level in only three places. Seven additional programmes were added between 1951 and 1961; nine more between 1961 and 1967. From 1952 to 1968 a dozen population centres in the United States were the recipients of major Ford Foundation funding. In 1952 John D Rockerfeller, a major actor in the arena of population control, established the Population Council. The Population Council stepped in to aid demography's rapid growth with its fellowship programme and by institutional grants. These funds changed a small group of scholars, sharing an interest in a subject, into a substantial group of researchers attempting to resolve a crisis of their own making. Foundations also funded the establishment of population programmes as American universities with special fellowships for third world students. These students were trained here to view fertility as a variable capable of being manipulated by contraceptive technology; a variable which could be moulded into a solution to the problem of poverty in their societies. Leading third world demographers were thus trained to imbibe and share the perception of the West on the population problem and its solutions. Journals dealing with demography were also funded by monopoly capital. The Population Council published Studies in Family Planning and Population and Development Review; the Ford Foundation provided the seed capital for Demography; and that handmaiden of US foreign policy then engaged in containing communism in Vietanam, USAID, funded the International Family Planning Perspective [Hodgson 1988]. India has always been at the forefront of the attention of population controllers. We had noted earlier the comments of the French priest Abbe Dubois, perception which deeply influenced colonial administrator. The 1891 Census Report, for example, invoked Malthus to contend that overpopulation was responsible for Indian Poverty [Banerji 1985]. This was then repeated in subsequent censuses also. Patnaik points out that in the Indian subcontinent population growth is a relatively recent phenomenon; it dates back to the 20s and makes its appearance only on comparison of the censuses of 1921 and 1931. The stagnation of the economy preceded this period by decades: He points out that between approximately 1860 and 1910, the per capita income at 1948-49 prices is estimated to have increased by approximately a rupee per year [Patnaik 1973]. Focusing on population growth as an explanation for Indian poverty is therefore seriously misleading. It nonetheless held great appeal to not only colonialists but leading sections of the Indian population. For example, Wattal's influential work, entitled The Population Problem in India: A Census Study, published in 1916, commences with Malthus' law of population, concluding that the "alarming" growth of Indian population was responsible for widespread poverty and ill-health [Wattal 1934]. It has been observed that by the 30s "significant layers of the native elites adopted neo-Malthusain views" [Mass 1974], Margaret Sanger therefore had a ready and receptive audience. The first family planning clinic in India was opened in 1925 by Darve who later went on to assist in the formulation of official policy as a member of the National Sub Committee on Population. The Indian chapter of the neo-Malthusian League was inaugurated in Madras in 1928 [Base 1983]. In 1930, the world's first government- sponsored birth control clinic was inaugurated at the behest of the Maharaja of Mysore. Madras followed with the establishment of birth control clinics in state hospitals in 1933. In 195 in Bombay the Family Hygiene Society was established; the Society brought out a journal quaintly entitled The Journal of Marriage Hygiene. In the same year Sanger undertook a triumphant nationwide tour, winning friends and influencing people, although she left Mahatma Gandhi singularly unimpressed. One such apostle, Lady Dhanvantri Rama Rao, invited her to address the All-India Women's Conference [Lakshmanna 1988]. In 1938 Lady Rama Rao and Margaret Sanger organised the First Family Hygiene Conference in Bombay. In this task they were assisted by an Indian millionaire whose American wife shared Sanger's conviction that India was poised at the precipice of a population explosion and had therefore established the Watamull Foundation to control it [Greer 1984}. Also in 1938, the Indian National Congress established a National Planning Committee under the chairmanship of Jawaharlal Nehru. The deliberations of one of the subcommittees chaired by Radhakamal Mukherjee, were devoted to the question of population. Its concerns were largely eugenic in nature. It deplored the fact that "attention to eugenics or race culture are matters hardly yet in the public consciousness of this country" and went on to say : Man, who has come to the stage of development where he is anxious to breed carefully such species of the lower animals as dogs or horses to obtain very specific qualities in particular specimens of the species, has not yet, realised apparently the possibilities in herent in carefully scientific breeding of the human race [National Planning Committee 1948]. The second world war diverted the attention of planners from such concerns. But in 1949 the Family Planning Committee was formed in Bombay with Lady Rama Rao as president. In 1951 it was renamed the Family Planning Association of India The EPAI has been a major force shaping population policy in the country. Indeed it takes credit for "playing an active role in inducing the first planning Commission to incorporate family planning in health' [EPAI 1975]. Financial assistance to the FPAI is largely provided by international agencies, particularly the Rockefeller Foundation supported IPPF; in 1982 the FPAI received a project grant of US dollars 2,782,000. It was in this period - the 50s.- that the population control lobby was consolidated. Hugh M Moore, an American millionaire, established the Hugh Moore Fund which published a pamphlet called The Population Bomb in 1954. The Ford Foundation joined Moore and Rockefeller in their activities. In 1952, Margaret Sanger and Lady Rama Rao launched the International Planned Parenthood Federation (IPPF) in Bombay. One of the most influential people invited to this conference was the eugenist C P Blacker who set the agenda : Nor need we question that a husband and wife living in squalor and ignorance who already have a large number of children not being reared properly might well be considered unfit to have additional children. Yet many parents of these various unfit types keep producing unduly large numbers of children, chiefly because through ignorance or indifference- and often against their will-they let Nature take its course. To combat this situation, eugenists favour the spread to birth control [Greer 19845]. The IPPF has been a major force in the population control movement across the globe. The funding for the IPPF initially came from the Hugh Moore Fund and Rockefeller Foundation. Soon it attracted funding from DuPont Chemicals, Standard Oil and Shell. On the board of IPPF sit representative of DuPont, U S Sugar Corporation, General Motors, Chase Manhattan Bank, Newmont Mining, International Nickel. Marconi RCA, Xerox and Gulf Oil, a veritable Who's Who of America's corporate and finance capital. The Rockefeller Foundation and The Milbank Memorial Fund founded an office of Population Research in Princeton University. The office included leading demographers such as Kingsley Davis and Frank Notestein. When Rockefeller founded the Population Council both these demographers took up employment there [Gordon 1976]. Hugh Moore founded the World Population Emergency Campaign in 1960 with funds from his foundation and from DuPont. The campaign was run by the then president of the World Bank. The primary aim of the World Population Emergency Campaign was to create and reinforce First World fears of a population explosion in Third World countries [Geoge 1976]. It has been suggested that the revolution in Cuba provided additional impetus to these fears [Mass 1974]. The emergency campaign and the population council began a systematic and forceful campaign to influence US policy-makers to include population control as a component of US aid to third world countries. This campaign bore fruit in 1966, when president Johnson included a commitment of federal funding for population control. The president observed : "Let us act on the fact that less than five dollars invested in population control is worth a hundred dollars invested in economic growth: John D Rockefeller emphasised the limitations of private efforts at population control hitherto employed and called for greater governmental participation: "The problems of population are so great, so important, so ramified and so immediate that only government, supported and inspired by private initiative, can attack them on the scale required" [Doyal 1981]. In other words, two developments followed the grant of government support for population control : one, the amount of funds available increased enormously and second, the private foundation shifted some of the costs to the American tax-payer who had by now been convinced that population growth in Third World countries ate into the world's resources. The US government now began to expend massive funds on population control. Expenditure increased from 4.6 million dollars in 1965 to 14.7 million dollars in 1969; USAID funding increased from 10.5 million in 1965 to 45.5 million in 1969 and 123 million by 1972 [Caldwell 1986]. At the same time, changes in American policy began to exert an influence on the United Nations. By the late 60s a number of UN and multinational agencies, including the UNFPA and the World Bank, were involved in population control programmes in Third World countries. The president of the World Bank, Robert McNamara explained : My responsibility as president of the World Bank compels me to be candid. Are we to solve this problem by famine ? Are we to solve it by riot, by insurrection, by the violence that desperately starving men can be driven to ? [Mass 1974]. The World Bank officially stated : All such activity arises out of the concern of the Bank for the way in which the rapid growth of population has become a major obstacle to social and economic development in many of our member states. Family planning programmes are less costly than conventional development projects [Mass 1974]. Neo-Malthusianism had thus arrived on the world agenda. Inevitably, India-always at the forefront of the family planning movement's field of vision- saw neo-Malthusianism thrust forcefully on its official policy and programmes. They not only funded research but were also involved in training demographers, doctors and statisticians. It is not surprising then that large and influential sections of Indians fervently uphold these neo-Malthusian ideas. We shall now briefly examine what the conceptual, methodological and empirical problems with neo-Malthusianism are. Neo-Malthusianism We had earlier noted that in terms of methodology neo-Malthusianism and Malthusianism are not distinct. The earlier critique of Malthusian methodology, therefore, applies equally to neo-Malthusianism. The critique, in short, is that it misses the wood for the trees. It focuses on a part of the larger picture, misjudges association for cause, provides misleading and partial explanations and is based entirely on the validity of the assumptions made. Hodgson, for example, notes that when the 'catastrophe' predicted by neo-Malthusian 'orthodox demographers' never arrived, their assumptions were subject to scrutiny, with startling results [Hodgson 1988]. Coale's model had measured the costs of high dependency ratios and had found them considerable. But Paul Schultz found no clear relationship between the percentage of gross national product invested in education and the age structure of the population [Schultz, cited in Hodgson 1988]. Demographers assumed that high fertility would produce low rates of saving but Kelley (1973) found the actual relationship more complicated. Mason (1988) confirmed Kelley's findings that children were not just a short-term source of expenditure for parents: they could often be along-term form of 'risk protection' [Cain 1983] or even a king of savings. One important underpinning of the neo-Malthusian argument is that population growth eats into resources which are finite, that some resources are limited as a truism. But what the more general and abstract statement above does is gloss over the actual picture on who is actually consuming the resources. Social problems – of poverty and hunger – are then attributed to that part of the population which is said to grow the fastest. But this is precisely the population which consumes the least, totally as well as per capita. This is true from both national and international perspectives. It is argued for instance that a reduced population will ceteris paribus will lead to reduced energy consumption, less resource use and less pollution. This is strictly true in ceteris paribus arguments alone; ceriris paribus cannot be used in reality. In reality, according to UN sources, consumption of energy in coal equivalents in 1975 amounted to 10,999 kilogrammes per capita per annum in the US; and to 221 kilogrammes in India per capita per annum [Hofsen 1980]. The prevention then of one American birth is as important as the birth of 50 Indians in terms of energy use. Yet population controllers worry about the growth of the Indian population. The rich nations of the globe constituting 18 percent of the population consume 66 percent of the gross world product, whereas the poorer nations of the globe with 50 percent of the world's population consume 14 percent of the gross world product [Bondestam 1980]. Populations growth in the periphery is a drop in the ocean compared to the consumption of the populations of rich nations. Neo-Malthusian views focusing on birth rates in the periphery obscure this critical issue. They divert attention from the fact that resources are being exploited in the third world by first world nations, and that there is a net transfer of resources from the developing world to the industrialised world which is of the order of 40 to 50 billion dollars every year [UNICEF 1992]. This does not occur naturally, fortuitously or automatically; it is the product of social, economic and political institutions, both in the first world and the development world. In other words, the ruling classes in the third world are part and parcel of this arrangement of the utilisation of resources. If we consider intra-national figures in India, for instance, the figures are equally startling. The bottom 20 per cent of the population has a share of about 8 per cent in total consumption expenditure in the rural sector and about 7 per cent has a share of about 39 per cent in the rural sector and 42 percent in the urban [Bardhan 1974]. It is simply not true that the poor are consuming resources disproportionately. What the data also indicate is that by cutting down the numbers in the lower decile groups, which is the avowed objective of population control, the quantum of resources generate would be minuscule [Qadeer 1977]. The inescapable conclusion is that population control is not even an efficient or effective way of raising resources. There are more effective ways to raise these resources, even within the same sociopolitical set-up. Demographic trends in the developing countries have quite clearly revealed the conceptual and empirical weaknesses of noe-Malthusianism. Bauer (1984) observed : Both economic history and the contemporary scene make clear that the conventional reasoning fails to identify the principal factors behind economic achievement. Rapid population growth has not inhibited economic progress either in the West or in the contemporary Third World. The population of the Western world has more than quadrupled since the middle of the 18th century. Real income per head is estimated to have increased by the factor of five. Most of the increase of incomes took place when population increased as fast, or faster than in most of the contemporary less developed world. Similarly, in what is now called the third world, population growth has often gone hand- in- hand with rapid material advance. Simon (1984) called attention to the large body of scientific work showing an absence of the supposed negative relationship between population growth and economic growth in the long run. And the effect of higher population density actually seems to be positive. In the same vein, Preston (1984), observing the association of rapid population growth accompanying increasing rates of per capita income growth in large parts of the development world, concludes that "rapid population growth in most times and places is a relatives minor factor in reducing per capita income and other measures of welfare". Indeed it has been suggested on the basis of empirical evidence that population growth may in fact be desirable as it appears to accelerate technical change and innovation [Boserup 1981]. The near-zero correlation between population growth and per capita economic growth in the Third World, which became apparent in the 70s and the 80s, had in fact been noted 20 years earlier by Kuznets (1967) and Easterlin (1967). But in the full tide of neo-Malthusianism had been largely ignored. Anthropologists and sociologists, meanwhile, also pointed out the gross limitations of a neo-Malthusian understanding of the population question. Caldwell concluded that the most critical factor was the motivation to bear children. In most primarily agricultural societies, this motivation–moulded by social-structural factors–was limited [Caldwell 1986]. Mamdani carried out a brilliant critique of the neo-Malthusia Khanna Study. He not only drew attention to the conceptual and methodological weaknesses of this very influential study but hinted at, with evidence, fraudulence. He showed that despite evidence to the contrary, the study had come to pre-determined conclusions. In other words neo-Malthusianism had proven to be a theoretical red herring. His own study unearthed the contrary evidence; that people are not poor because they have large families but on the contrary they require large families because they are poor. The poor peasant's decision not to accept contraception was a rational one for that would mean "courting economic disaster" [Mamdani 1973]. Djurfeldt and Lindberg furnished data questioning the belief in the high fertility of marginalised peasants. They too highlighted the economic and social need for children in such groups in a marginalised peasant economy [Djurfeldt 1980]. George (1976). Zurbrigg (1984), Doyal (1918) and Meillasoux (1974) reached similar conclusions. In addition, for a variety of reasons, support to demography and to population control were withdrawn during this period. The stock market collapse of the early 70s had apparently 'dramatically altered' financial support. Further there was a consolidation of right-wing forces during this period as exemplified by the election of Ronald Reagan as president. There was therefore a withdrawal of both government and private foundation funding to population control. Financially lean but academically more fit, demography became, once again, a more reflective science in the US. Demographers began to disown the heritage of Davis and Notestein–who increasingly came in for attack by feminists who labelled them 'eugenic demographers'. But facts, in this case are not enough; their existence has not laid to rest the shadow of neo-Malthusianism in practice. The same familiar ideas of neo-Malthusianism enfold, like a shroud, both discourse and policy on family planning in India. Neo-Malthusianism fails to recognise that motivation to practise family planning is dependent on the socio-economic situation of parents, which in turn alters the determinants of family size. It also fails to recognise that these determinants vary among different sections of the population. In other words, birth rates do not possess geographical or national characteristics; they are determined or moulded by the behaviour of the determinants of family size which vary among different sections of the population, depending on socio-economic factors. The family planning programme in India, which fails to recognise this fact, seems doomed not to learn its lessons from history. Malthusianism and neo-Malthusianism offer an excessively simplistic understanding of the complex relationship of resources and population; an understanding which has proven to be a theoretical red herring. Despite their flimsy conceptual, methodological and empirical foundations, these theories have won widespread acceptance in both academic and public policy circles. This acceptance is explained by factors both manifold and complex, some of which have been discussed in this article. The problems faced by the Indian family planning administrative or strategical. The neo-Malthusian understanding of the population issue lies at the heart of the programmes' failure. Dr. Mohan Rao is in the department of Social and Community Health at Jwaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi. First published in the Economic and Political Weekly. Notes 1 Note for example even the monumental and scholarly work of Robert Cassen, India : Population, Economy, Society, Macmillan, London, 1980. 2. Malthus acknowledges Steuart in the second edition of his Essay. But the acknowledgment is, in a sense, superfluous. For even a casual reading of his text reveals similarities, the use of the metaphor of a tree is a striking example. 3. That this, in effect, undermines his entire argument, is not something Malthus chooses to ponder about. 4. The shadow of Malthus falls heavily on the deliberations of the Bhore Committee which shaped the development of health and family planning services in post-colonial India 5. The tale of Robin Hood and his merry men, robbing the rich and giving to the poor, is the glamourised, mythlogised, account of this phenomenon of the immiserisation of a section of the peasantry in the wake of the commercialisation of agriculture in England. 6. Hobsbawm tells us the labrourer in a workhouse "had to separate from wife and child in order to discourage the sentimental and unMalthusian habit of thoughtless procreation" and that "The Poor Law of 1834 was designed to make life so intolerable for the rural paupers as to force them to migrate to any job that offered. And indeed they began to do so." 7. condorcet was the Marquis de Condorcet. His famous work was the Esquisse d'un Tableau Historique De Progres de'Espirit Humain, roughly translatable as the 'Sketch of the Historical Tableau of the Progress of the Human Spirit', published in French in 1794 and in English translation the following year. He was an active participant in the French Revolution of 1789. In this book he outlines 10 stages of human civilisation, the last with universal brotherhood of all the people of the world, liberated from inequalities of race, gender and class. William Gowin was the influential father-in-law of the poet Shelley. His book Enquirey Concerning Political Justice was published in 1793, with second and third editions in 1796 and 1798. Daniel Malthus, the father of Thomas Malthus, was deeply enchanted with these visionary works which he urged his son to read, Malthus, politically conservative, wrote his Essay as a rejoinder. 8. Hobsbawm writes wryly of this period : 'There was an order in the universe, but it was no longr the order of the past. There was only one God, whose name was steam and spoke in the voice of Malthus. McCulloch, and anyone who employed machinery". 9. William Wordsworth in a walk with a friend encountered a hungry peasant girl. Moved, he wrote the poem 'Beaupuy': And at that sight my friend, In agitation said, Tis against that That we are fighting.' I with him believed That a benignant spirit was abroad Which might not be withstood, that poverty Abject as this would in a little time Be found no more, That we should see the earth Unthwarted in her wish to recompense The meek, the jowly, patient child of toil, All institutes for ever blotted out That legalised exclusion, empty pomp Abolished, sensual state and cruel power, Whether by edict of the one or few: And finally, as sum and crown of all, Should see the people having a strong hand In framing their own laws: whence better days To all mankind. wordsworth was of course recalling the glorious hopes aroused by the French Revolution. 10 This law asserts that if production is carried out with different 'factors of production'. and if some of these factors are constant in amount, then an increase in the other factors will increase production but not proportionately. 11. Tender-hearted social workers who may well wince at the crudity of the above may note the views of Tara Ali Gaig, head of the Indian delegation to the UN Population Conference at Bucharest and chairman of the Indian Council of Child Welfare. "Sterilisation of one partner", she said "has to be made imperative where a man or woman suffers from hereditary insanity, feeble-mindedness or congenital venereal disease; they must be barred by law from procreating children. This should have been done decades ago. If children's lives and future are to be protected, compulsory sterilisation in necessary for many reasons... After all considering the crime against children committed by irresponsible parenthood compulsory sterilisation is hardly punitive. Sterilisation of the unfit is long overdue" Greer cites this as a typical upper class Indian reaction of revulsion for the poor and disadvantaged [cited in Greer 1984] Reference Banerji, D (1985) : Health and Family Planning Services in India. Lok Paksh, New Delhi. Bardhan, Pranab K (1974) : 'Some Aspects of Inequality' in Bose et al (eds) Population in India's Development 1947-2000, Vikas, Delhi. Bauer, Lord P T (1984) in Wattenberg and Zuismeister, Karl (eds) Bondestam, Lars (1980) : 'The Political Ideology of Population Control' in Bondestam, Lars and Begstrom, Staffan (eds), Poverty and Population Control, Academic Press, London. Bose, Ashish and P B Desai (1983) : Studies in Social Dynamics of Primary Health Care, Hindustan Publishing, Delhi Boserup, Ester (1981): Population and Technological Change: A study of long-term Trends, University of Chicago Press, Chicago. Brook Adams (1973) cited in Patnaik. Cain, Mead (1983) : 'Fertility as an Adjustment to Risk', Population and Development Review, Vol 9, No 4. Caldwell, John Cand Pat Caldwell (1986) : Limiting Population Growth and the Ford Foundation Contribution, Francis Pinter, New Haven. Coale, Ansley J and Hoover, M Edgar (1958) : Population Growth and Economic Development in law Income Countries, Princeton University Press. Coale, Ansley J (1956) : 'The Effects of Changes in Mortality and Fertility on Age Composition', Milbank Memorial Fund Quarterly, Vol 34, No. 1. Cole , Margaret (146) : Beatrice Webb, Harcourt Brace and Company, New York. Davis, Kingsley (1968) : Population of India and Pakistan, Russel and Russel, New York. – (1956) : 'The Amazing Decline of Mortality in Underdeveloped Areas', American Economic Review, Vol 46, No 2. – (1988) cited in Hodgson. Demerath, J Nicholas (1976) : Birth Control and Foreign Policy : The Alternatives to Family Planning. Harper and Row, New York. Digby (1973) cited in Patnaik. Djurfeldt, Goran and Lindgerg. Staffan (1980) : Pills against Poverty : A Study of the Introduction of Western Medicine in a Tamil Village, Macmillan, New Delhi. Doyal, Lesley and Pennel, Imogen (1981) : The Political Economy of Health. Pluto Press, London. Dubois, J A Abbe (1906) : Hindu Manners, Customs and Ceremonies Translated by Beauchamp, H. K. third edition, Clarendon Press, Oxford. Easterlin, A Richard (1967) : 'Effects of Population Growth on the Economic Development of Developing Countries, Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science, 369. Engels, F(1977) cited in Meek. Flew, Anthony (1970) : 'Introduction" in An essay on the Principle of Population and a Summary View of the Principle of Population, Penguin, Harmondsworth, 1970. Family Planning Association of India (1975) : FPA all India Council 1973-1975. Bombay. George, Susan (1976) : How the Other Half Dies. Penguin, Harmondsworth. Gordon, Linda (19976) : Women's Body, Women's Right, Penguin, Harmondsworth. Gordon, Scott (1991) : The History and Philosophy of Social Science, Routledge, London. Greer, Germaine (1984) : Sex and Destiny : The Politics of Human Fertility, Secker and Warburg. London. Harvery, David (1974) : 'Ideology and Population Theory' International Journal of Health Services. Vol 4, No 3. Hill, Christopher (1974) : The World Turned Upside Down, Penguin, Harmondsworth. Hitler, Adolf (1980) : Mein Kampf, cited in Bondestam. Lars and Bergstrom. Staffan (eds), Poverty and Population Control. Academic Press. London. Hodgson, Dennis (1983) : 'Demography as Social Science and Policy Science', Population and Development Review, Vol 9, No1. (1988) : 'Orthodoxy and Revisionism in American Demography' Population and Development Review. Vol 17, No 1, March. Hofsen Erland (1980) : 'Is There a Population problem in the Indsutrialised Countries? :' in Bondestam and Bergstrom. Huberman, Leo (1981) : Man's Worldly Goods, People's Publishing House, New Delhi. Joshi, PC (1974) : 'Population and Poverty – The Moral Discord' in Ashish Bose (ed), Population in India's Development 1947-2000. Vikas, Delhi. Kelley, Allan C (1973) : 'Population Growth the Dependecy Rate, and the Pace of Economic Development' Population Studies Vol 27, No 3. Kuznets, Simon (1967) : 'Population and Economic Growth' Proceeding of the American Philosophical Society. Vol 111, No. 3 Lakshmanna, Mamata (1988) : Population Control and Family Planning in India, Discovery Publishing House, Delhi. Malthus, T R (1970) : An Essay on the Principle of Population and a Summary View of the principle of Population, Penguin, Harmondsworth. Malthus, Essay (Second edition) cited in R L Meek (ed). Marx and Engelson the Population Bomb (1977), The Ramparts Press. Bekeley. Mamadani, M (1973) : The Myth of Population Control : Family, Caste and Class in an Indian Village, Monthly Review Press. London. Marx, Karl (1976 ; Capital Volume I Penguin. Harmondsworth. Mason. Andrew (1988) : 'Saving, Economic Growth, and Demographic Change' Population and Development Review, Vol 14, No 1 Mass, Bonnie (1974) : 'An Historical Sketch of the American Population Control Movement', International Journal of Health Serves Vol 4. No. 4 Meek R L (ed) 1977) : Marx and Engels on the Population Bomb, The Ramparts Press, Berkeley. Meillasoux, Claude, 'Over-Exploitation and Over-Population : The Proletarianisation of Rural Worders' Social Scientist, 78, January. National Planning Committee (1948) : Report of the Sub-Committee on Population, Vora and Company, Bombay. Notestein (1988) cited in Hodgson. Patnaik, Prabhat (1973) : 'On the Political Economy of Underdevelopment' Economics and Political Weekly, Vol 8 Nos 4, 5 and 6 February. Preston (1984) in Wattenberg. Qadeer, I (1977) : 'Population Problem– Myth and Reality' in In Search of Diagnosis, Medico Friend Circle, Vadodara. Rousseau, Jean Jacques (1792) : Du Control Social. Said, Edward (1991) :Orientalism, Penguin. Harmondsworh. Simon (1984) in Wattenberg. Srinivas, K R and K Kanakamala (1992) : 'Introducing Norplant : Politics of Coercion', Economic and Political Weekly. Vol 7, No 29. Thompson, E P (1982) : The Makings of the English working Class, Penguin, Harmondsworth. Tomaselli, Sylvana (1988) : 'Moral Philosophy and Population questions in Eighteenth Century Europe', Population and Development Review, Supplement to Vol 14. UNICEF (1992) : The State of the World's Children, OUP, Delhi. Wattal, P K (1934) : The Population Problem in India : A census Study, Bennett Coleman. Wattenberg and Karl Zuismeister (eds) (1984) : Are World Population Trends a Problem ?, American Enterprise Institute, Sashington. Wordsworth, William (1980), Selected Poems. Collins, London. Wyon, Johnb and John E Gordon (1971) : The Kanna Study : Population Problems in Rural Punjab, Harvard University Press. Cambridge, Massachusetts. Zubrigg. Sheila (1984): Rakku's Story : Structures of- health and the Source of Change, George Joseph, Madras. copyright: re/productions From plicysci@frii.com Tue Nov 10 04:29:25 1998 Received: from deimos.frii.com (deimos.frii.com [208.146.240.2]) by csf.Colorado.EDU (8.8.5/8.8.4/CNS-4.1p-nh) with ESMTP id EAA08055 for ; Tue, 10 Nov 1998 04:29:21 -0700 (MST) Received: from frii.com (ftc-0527.dialup.frii.com [216.17.134.219]) by deimos.frii.com (8.9.1a/8.9.1) with ESMTP id EAA23036 for ; Tue, 10 Nov 1998 04:29:14 -0700 (MST) Message-ID: <364823A9.18782344@frii.com> Date: Tue, 10 Nov 1998 04:29:45 -0700 From: Jim Talboy X-Accept-Language: en MIME-Version: 1.0 To: PROGRESSIVE POPULATION NETWORK Subject: Are the MEANS, MOTIVES or GOALS the issue? References: <3647A42A.A4B79F3C@jps.net> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Ted Toal wrote: > Angela wrote: "....since as this child could see all around them, not everyone > consumes the same amounts of resources. so: those who claim overpopulation > as the problem are in fact ... arguing that those who have higher birth rates > ... > ARE THE PROBLEM. In today's world, such an argument is racist and it is > a weapon against the poor, most of whom are not european, or australian, or > north american." > Simply wrong. The impact of people on the environment is equal to the PRODUCT I think this needs to be qualified. The average number, hides a range of impact that can include 1 person per hectacre in the USA as contrasted with 300 persons per hectacre in Bangladesh. Obviously one country has much more impact, frankly, on an individual by individual basis. Both "rich and poor" are contributing to the problem, but at vastly different scales. It is easy enough to figure out how much overall space might be regained, for example, if the USA were to lessen its hectacre impact per person. It is yet not willing to do this, and perhaps the arguments are immediately suspect because of the general nature of its economical imperatives. The GOAL alone is not sufficient to accommodate any MEANS to achieve the GOAL. The world is not going to allow heartless solutions that seem to accommodate the developed world's insatiable hunger at the expense of lesser developed countries and its defenseless citizens. If you believe the problem are leaders who are not willing to listen to "facts," then you've missed the whole point of my last few submissions. The facts are not enough to justify the MEANS suggested to accomplish the GOALS, because we've seen this "rationality" cause far more problems than previously existed. FACTS are not enduring and they've been "cooked" before. FACTS, of economic viability, did not justify slavery either, but it sure achieved its GOALS. If you do not understand the implications of that analogy, then understand that slavery was the MEANS to achieve the GOAL. There are more values than economics can accommodate in this debate. There are at least forty other public values, that lay outside the realm of economics that decision makers must consider. To argue they are stonewalling is simply naive. > rich and poor countries is an impossibly complex task. Certainly poverty plays > a role, and certainly the "solution" must therefore address poverty. No one is > trying to blame overpopulation on poor countries and further, no one expects > them to deal with it by themselves. You cannot decide that overpopulation is > not a problem simply because you don't like what you think might be the > implications of that. It IS a problem, and we must understand and accept the > implications and find the solutions. There is absolutely no need to place > blame, to put forth calls of racism, to blame the poor, blame the rich, etc. > That is completely counterproductive. > I'd say that we still need to examine MOTIVES that cause folks, such as Ed, to suggest these "solutions," simply because we've seen the exploitation has not stopped, and is apparently not going to stop either. "Solutions," are usually not simply drawn to solve one single "problem." A single particular solution will not impact only population growth either because of the integrated nature of the problem. This will be especially troubling, given the extent of contributing factors in such a complicated issue. I've also tried to point out that in such complicated arenas, there are many unforeseen complications that can arise from meddling, especially with ancient, instinctual patterns. However, we know well of other MOTIVES, that have historically hidden behind "rationalism." I've tried to quietly explain this view in my last few submissions. Now what? Are we really arguing that Angela seemingly considers population is not a problem, or that the methods of solving the problem are not acceptable, because we feel there may be inappropriate MOTIVES driving the decision making? So in my view, efforts to refocus the debate on Angela's "apparent" finger pointing, could be seen as an attempt to redirect our attention from the baser motives that potentially underlie the "solution." These MOTIVES have been part of the historical record and they've not yet vanished. Angela's personality and presentation have nothing to do with the underlying concern. Thanks for your patience. > From eglaze@vsta.com Tue Nov 10 08:58:22 1998 Received: from rivendell.vsta.com (rivendell.vsta.com [204.57.96.15]) by csf.Colorado.EDU (8.8.5/8.8.4/CNS-4.1p-nh) with ESMTP id IAA26287 for ; Tue, 10 Nov 1998 08:58:18 -0700 (MST) Received: from eglaze.vsta.com (eglazeADSL.vsta.com [204.57.96.81]) by rivendell.vsta.com (8.8.8/8.8.6) with SMTP id KAA16186 for ; Tue, 10 Nov 1998 10:00:16 -0600 (CST) From: "Ed Glaze III" To: "PPN Listserv" Subject: Re: overpopulation & Malthus Date: Tue, 10 Nov 1998 10:03:41 -0600 Message-ID: <01be0cc3$af877a00$516039cc@eglaze.vsta.com> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit X-Priority: 3 X-MSMail-Priority: Normal X-MimeOLE: Produced By Microsoft MimeOLE V4.71.1712.3 I though that Angela and I could carry on out little debate off the list but I guess I was mistaken. The basis of her recent Malthus message was evidently to counter the links I gave her for publications that had special issues on Malthus. Here are a few URLs for online information. The other links are shown in my message to Angela below. MALTHUSIAN TRUTHS ABOUT TODAY'S WORLD A web site encouraging thought along Malthusian topics -- Conservation, Population, and Limits The Malthus Homepage Thomas Malthus on Population and Consequences on Economics Theory -----Original Message----- From: Ed Glaze III To: Angela Cc: M-Fem@csf.colorado.edu Date: Monday, November 09, 1998 10:24 AM Subject: Re: overpopulation Hello Angela, Didn't you notice in my message about the book that I said, "it seems he (?) is promoting a booklet?" When you did not put your name at the end of your post how was I to know you were a female. I think I did the right thing by saying I was not familiar with you and putting a question mark after he. Unfortunately it is a widely known fault of the English language that there is not a gender neutral personal pronoun. I also posted URLs and other information about Barricade Books to make it easier for others to find out more about the book you mentioned. Your initial post would have been better if you had included such information along with a review of the book. I will assume that you did read it since it was only 36 pages. You are right about my certainty that overpopulation is a fact and is threatening the world. I am not sure how it could be otherwise. We have 6 billion people growing to 9 billion within most of our lifetimes. We can witness or read about the vast environmental degradation that has already taken place and will continue. I do not doubt that some of the problems suffered by women, such as those you mention, are serious and examples of abuse. I do not deny that there are many problems with the increasing wealth and power of multinational corporations and the financial establishment such as the IMF. Pharmaceutical companies also need to test their procedures and in some cases they may be doing so in methods that take advance of the poor or others. However, I do not agree that these are reason that allow you an easy dismissal overpopulation as a factor in the problems faced around the world. Never is overpopulation cited on death certificates as the cause of death and yet it is obvious that almost all factors of a society are changed by conditions of overpopulation. Food, water, and resources become more scarce as the competition increases on the local, regional and international scales. When there is an ever increasing number of people the liberties and worth accorded to an individual decreases. Is it right, no, but it does happen. The problems of the poor are worsened by increasing growth, especially unneeded births, within their families and in their countries. Excess population places many demands on the infrastructure of a country which often cannot keep up. New schools, additional jobs, and increased food supply are just a few of examples of the difficulties that politicians everywhere must deal with when population grows. That should not be too difficult to understand but it is difficult to deal with. Many countries have cultures that are pro-natalist for religious or other reasons. Thus the people want to have multiple children and through these personal decisions contribute to overpopulation and make the conditions in their country that much tougher. Whether the people having the kids are rich or poor does not matter, except in the scale of lifetime consumption which will be much worse for the rich. I do not have an MBA and did not say that I did, though you might have thought my business management degree was an MBA. I did drop out of an MBA program when I decided that I did not want to live a life that required three-piece suits and keeping up with the Joneses. I have never sought out a high paying job and have been a very active civic volunteer for many years. The reason I feel I have "the low-down on the facts" about overpopulation is that I am very well read on the issue. For over 20 years I have been reading environmental books and specializing in population issues. My personal circumstances and lifestyle have allowed me the time to do some extensive reading and attend college to further my education. I also browse the internet for population items to share with others. Did you bother to follow up on any of the URLs I listed in my earlier posts? They are there to help people become better informed about population issues. The demographic trends we face are backed up by scientific reasoning which is rigorous enough o indicate that there really is a serious problem. Nothing I have read has been able to convince me that there is not an overpopulation problem. Just as nothing has convinced me there is a god. People, for whatever reason, may be optimistic and attribute the environmental crisis we are in the middle of to some other factors but I want more than faith. Denial of the problem does not seem realistic and that is why I seek substantiation of contrarian views, like those in the booklet you mention. There is ample credible writing available which convinces me that Malthus was not wrong. The conditions that he was concerned about still exist today and through our excess population we are likely to exhaust or diminish the non-renewable resources (oil, fresh water, arable land, rubber, biodiversity, etc) on which our economic societies depend. We have yet to fully pay the price for our foolishness for thinking we were exempt from the laws of nature. Our technology has delayed the Malthusian prediction but we have not invalidated it. For more info on Malthus and how relevant his predictions still are: Beyond Malthus: Sixteen Dimensions of the Population Problem Worldwatch Paper 143 The Social Contract Volume VIII, Number 3, Spring, 1998: Theme: Malthus Revisited ________ Ed Glaze Port Mansfield, TX "If they don't understand the severity of the problem, they won't understand the severity of the solution. Overpopulation must be dealt with." (snipped the previous messages -- we have copies of them already) ------------------------------ Below is a population article from Australia that you might have missed. Unfortunately the Canberra Times does not offer an online search for issues over a few days old. SLOWING THE POPULATION TITANIC by Tom Gosling Canberra (Australia) Times -- October 10, 1998 Copyright 1998 The Canberry Times In the movie Titanic the captain, E.J. Smith, receives radio warnings about icebergs but ignores them because he has been told by the ship's owner to increase speed. After ordering the last four boilers lit, Smith pockets the radio messages and retires to his cabin, a pathetic figure soon to go down with his ship. The theme is familiar -- supreme confidence in technology, a vainglorious conviction that size and power will conquer everything, deafness to the voices of caution and whammo! -- Mother Nature proves yet again that she has an ace up her sleeve. It was precisely to oppose this "bigger, faster and to hell with the consequences" mentality that a courageous band of souls assembled 10 years ago. The half-dozen founding members of Australians for an Ecologically Sustainable Population first met in the Canberra suburb of Bruce on October 12, 1988. They resolved to try to convince the public that Australia's population growth should be halted as soon as possible, and that the Australian Government should increase foreign aid related to restricting global population growth. The message has been dismissed as "pessimistic" by many -- even by some in the environment movement -- but has found influential supporters. Opening AESP's national conference in Sydney last year. NSW Premier Bob Carr congratulated it for raising the issue. "We've got to dispose once and for all,' he said, "of the notion that Australia is an underpopulated continent, an empty continent waiting to be filled up." It's a view that has found support also from some of the icons of Australian public life: Nugget Coombs, Manning Clark, A.D. Hope, Sir Macfarlane Burnet, Professor Frank Fenner, Sir Mark Oliphant (who opened the first national conference in Canberra in 1989) and Judith Wright (AESP's patron). Coombs, back in 1977, called for population growth to be "halted...and stabilized at an ecologically safe level" and in 1988 Wright complained that the need to control population growth had "not even been recognized by governments. "Australia is perhaps one of the last countries on Earth in a position to ensure that its population does not exceed its resources," she said. "With its enormous problems of land degradation, water and rising pollution levels, Australia is far from being limitless." Others who share this view have included Sydney University professors Charles Birch and Jonathon Stone. In 1994, the Australian Academy of Science recommended the Australian Academy of Science recommended that Australia encourage contraception and limit its net annual immigration too so that the population would stabilize at 23 million in the year 2040. More recently, author Tim Flannery, whose book and TV series The Future Eaters have been widely acclaimed, has argued that Australia's long-term sustainable population is probably well below its present size. Professor Ian Lowe, chairman of Australia's first State of the Environment report, commissioned by the Federal Government, has voiced serious concern about the environmental impact of population growth. John Coulter, former leader of the Australian Democrats, went further to become AESP's president in 1996. AESP's numbers have grown from the original six to 900, and it has added branches in Sydney, Melbourne, Adelaide, Perth, south-east Queensland, Townsville and cairns, yet it has failed (perhaps because of its insistence on a non-racist immigration policy) to burst upon the national consciousness in the way one Nation has. A major obstacle, it believes, is that powerful commercial interests particularly in real estate, construction and the media are applying strong pressure on the leadership of both major political parties to ensure that Australia's population growth continues, even accelerates, regardless of the environmental consequences and regardless of the opinions of the passengers. AESP, funded entirely by donations and modest membership fees, has held conferences, sponsored public lectures and debates lobbied politicians, issued press statements, prepared submissions for inquiries, written articles and letters to editors, distributed leaflets just about everything a group can do to get across its message, short of demonstrations and standing for Parliament. In terms of what has happened in population growth, however, it has had about as much success as the radio operators had in slowing down the Titanic. During most of the 10 years of AESP's existence, Australia has had the world's highest per-capita rate of immigration, and our population has grown by 2.3 million to 18.8 million. The rate of population growth slowed during the decade, but is showing signs of picking up again. The annual growth rate peaked at 1.7 per cent in 1989, and slowed gradually to 1.1 per cent last year. The latest Australian Bureau of Statistics figures, however, show it increasing again. Last month's Australian Demographic Statistics give our population rate as 1.2 per cent and our net overseas migration is more than having been down to less than in 1997. In combination with a relatively high fertility rate for OECD nations (1.77 children per woman) Australia's population is on track to continue rapid growth. At the current rate, our population will be about 27 million, and growing, by the middle of next century. It's a depressing prospect for the "father" of AESP., retired CSIRO soil scientist Dr. Chris Watson. Now 63, he was responsible for monitoring the soils of the Murray Irrigation Area in the 1970's: "I could see the land deteriorating before my very eyes, with increasing salinity, especially around Deniliquin and northern Victoria." A few years later he became a councilor of the Australian Conservation Foundation and, at its quarterly meetings in Melbourne, struck up a friendship with a like-minded Monash University sociology professor Bob Birrell. When Bob Birrell came to the ANU's Centre for Resource and Environment Studies for a year's sabbatical in 1987-88, they started a newsletter Population Stability for Australia, which spawned AESP. Watson says, "I found I couldn't get many people interested at CSIRO, or in science circles generally, but I did notice that there were people writing letters to the Canberra Times so I phoned them and asked them if they wanted to form a group. I didn't get a single knock-back." The first meeting of AESP. was held at the home of radar engineer Greg Dunstone and librarian wife Eileen. Those present included poet Mark O'Conner, retired Bureau of Mineral Resources geologist Hugh Oldham, Australian Democrats political adviser Jenny Goldie (formerly Jenny Macleod), a former assistant secretary in the Immigration Department, Duncan Waddell, and CSIRO staff member Peter Martin. O'Conner says, "We didn't realize the intense negativity of much of the media. At first, the letters to the editor page, especially of The Canberra Times, was one of the few places where these new ideas were permitted. "We've also held our membership against a long-entrenched ideology of growth from newspapers like The Australian, which has consistently run a propaganda campaign on the virtues of high immigration." As an example, he cited ALP leader Kim Beazley's announcement earlier this year that the ALP would introduce an environmentally responsible population policy when next in office. "It drew a fierce response from senior Murdoch journalists, with opinion headlines like ‘too many fogeys, not enough people' " he says. "Beazley subsequently changed his tune, announcing in August that he was in favor in increased immigration.." He says thee is also something "deeply wrong" in the culture of some parts of the ABC's news and current-affairs sections: "You could tune into a whole year of the ABC's TV News and 7.30 Report and discover only that our high immigration policy is good and inevitable, and that anyone who questions it is probably a secret member of the Hitler Youth League. "The vast majority of Australians who oppose high immigration are misrepresented as a small and suspect minority, while the tiny minority who endorse it are falsely misrepresented as responsible mainstream opinion." Another active early ESP. member was poet, broadcaster and 1997 Canberran of the Year Anne Edgewroth, who says it is "logical" that ESP., now a national organization, began in Canberra. "Canberra is unique. It's larger than a country town but smaller than any of the other capital cities, so it's still comparatively easy to get from one end to the other," she says. "It's always had a highly educated population because of the Public Service and the universities, and it's always had an attraction for writers; and it has a very pleasant physical environment there's this quality of the city, surrounded by the Brindabellas and the alps, which places it apart in a way." Concern about population only "crept up fairly gradually" on Duncan Waddell. He says he began to think seriously about it when he was senior immigration officer at the Australian consulate in New York from 1966 to 1969: "I became aware of America's huge conurbations and the pressures of population in those tremendous cities, and I began to wonder whether this was a direction we ought to be heading in. I gradually realized we were going to end up with wall-to-wall people, which seemed to me a pretty horrible prospect. We were destroying all the farmlands and the forests and the wild places and all the other species, and pretty soon there would be nothing but people." The greatest single step forward in ESP's development has been the establishment in 1996 of the Sustainable Population Fund under the triple trusteeship of former Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Commission chairwoman Dr. Loitja O'Donoghue, Canberra lawyer Margaret Brewster, and University House Master Rafe de Crespigny. The fund, which for the first time has allowed tax deductibility to be claimed for donations to ESP, has attracted major donations from individuals, and the money has been used to set up a national office in Canberra and pay a full-time employee, national director Edwina Barton. Barton says that although ESP. has undoubtedly raised the level of public discussion of population growth, in one way its very success has worked against it because the "pro-growth lobby" has intensified its efforts, in the last two years in particular. "What we are seeing now is a massively resourced backlash by the pro-growth lobby to regain public and political support for endless population growth," she says. "The big problem for us is that we don't have the human or financial resources to match them." Founding member Hugh Oldham says, "ESP. has at least made a big dent in the smugness of the pro-growthers and that's as much as I thought we'd ever be able to do. Most politicians don't want to listen to what we are saying because they don't think it will produce anything useful for them in three years." ----------------------------------------------------------------- NPG Population-News Listserve http://www.npg.org To subscribe: send e-mail to MAJORDOMO@NPG.ORG with the message text: subscribe population-news ----------------------------------------------------------------- From rcollins@netlink.com.au Tue Nov 10 08:58:27 1998 Received: from netlink.com.au (merlin.netlink.com.au [203.16.172.196]) by csf.Colorado.EDU (8.8.5/8.8.4/CNS-4.1p-nh) with ESMTP id IAA26305 for ; Tue, 10 Nov 1998 08:58:24 -0700 (MST) Received: from netlink.com.au (h108.mel.netlink.com.au [203.62.225.108]) by netlink.com.au (8.8.8/8.8.8) with ESMTP id DAA20677 for ; Wed, 11 Nov 1998 03:02:47 +1100 Message-ID: <36486264.D44B5A78@netlink.com.au> Date: Wed, 11 Nov 1998 02:57:24 +1100 From: rc&am Reply-To: rcollins@netlink.com.au MIME-Version: 1.0 To: PROGRESSIVE POPULATION NETWORK Subject: world population report Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Other info that you may find of interest: The UN has released the State of the World Population 1998 which you can find at http://www.unfpa.org/ (if you haven't already). Comprehensive report that gives age demographic projections and regional analyses. For a look at the absurdity of the anti-humanity lobby's use of 'wildlife endangerment and ecological risk' as reasons for curtailing agricultural production (which they apparently see as a means of justifying a need to reduce human population (read non-caucasian population)) see "The importance of high farm yields to wildlife conservation" by Denis Avery, Director of Global Food Studies, Hudson Institute, US. EVAG hosts a copy at http://www.altgreen.com.au/sr/9808-09sugarcane.html forwarded by angela From ttoal@jps.net Tue Nov 10 21:14:38 1998 Received: from smtp2.jps.net (smtp2.jps.net [209.63.224.235]) by csf.Colorado.EDU (8.9.1a/8.9.1/ITS-5.0/csf) with ESMTP id VAA01447 for ; Tue, 10 Nov 1998 21:13:03 -0700 (MST) Received: from jps.net (209-142-55-76.stk.jps.net [209.142.55.76]) by smtp2.jps.net (8.9.0/8.8.5) with ESMTP id UAA17494 for ; Tue, 10 Nov 1998 20:15:45 -0800 (PST) Message-ID: <36490E69.9E96CAE9@jps.net> Date: Tue, 10 Nov 1998 20:11:21 -0800 From: Ted Toal MIME-Version: 1.0 To: ppn Subject: What Can We Do? Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Jim Talboy asks: "Given the time frame we are working with, and the current magnitude of the world's population, what can "we" do realistically?" First, realize that we have already done a lot, and if we hadn't, the situation would be far worse. Also realize that we haven't done nearly as much as we could have, hence the situation is much worse than it could have been. I.e. the situation is a continuum, not black/white. Where we are 75 years from now, on that continuum, depends greatly on what we do now. Every little bit has an effect. So what CAN we do? Its funny that so many people ask this question about overpopulation. Of all our problems today, this is the one that has MANY ways to approach it. My web page lists a bunch of possibilities: http://www.iti.com/iti/kzpg/Current/KZPG/Opinion/Solutions/whattodo.html I'll add stuff to this, send me your ideas. (BTW, if it appears unreadable, please let me know, I'm still learning how to do this and it may have a problem). The most important thing to do is to spread awareness, to foster an enlightened consciousness about OP by talking about it. The overpopulation problem is not a technological one in any sense -- we have contraceptives. It is basically a problem in consciousness. Anything you can do to open people's eyes will help. One obvious thing that always stands out is to improve contraceptive availability. There are still well over 100 million women who want to be using them but can't afford or obtain them. From ttoal@jps.net Tue Nov 10 21:23:24 1998 Received: from smtp2.jps.net (smtp2.jps.net [209.63.224.235]) by csf.Colorado.EDU (8.9.1a/8.9.1/ITS-5.0/csf) with ESMTP id VAA01619 for ; Tue, 10 Nov 1998 21:21:29 -0700 (MST) Received: from jps.net (209-142-55-76.stk.jps.net [209.142.55.76]) by smtp2.jps.net (8.9.0/8.8.5) with ESMTP id UAA20616 for ; Tue, 10 Nov 1998 20:24:11 -0800 (PST) Message-ID: <36491059.B0D2E9DD@jps.net> Date: Tue, 10 Nov 1998 20:19:37 -0800 From: Ted Toal MIME-Version: 1.0 To: ppn Subject: Irrational? Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Jim Talboy said: << However to clarify, I'm suggesting the big picture is "irrational" and yet beyond our capabilities to understand at this point. >> Perhaps you meant to say "Rational"? I think there is no arguing that the big picture is ultimately far beyond our capability of understanding at this point. Which actually is all the more reason to be concerned. It MIGHT be that earth can hold several trillion people just fine, and with a few adjustments to attitudes here and there the wildlife will do well too under that condition. But, since we don't KNOW for certain and do not have the ability to analyze the earth as a system and understand it thoroughly, and since everything we DO KNOW points overwhelmingly in the direction that we have a major problem, the prudent position is to do whatever we can to humanely stop and reverse population growth. << I am also suggesting that those who'd be left to implement the program cannot be given isolated, particular solutions that ignore the whole.>> Who are you referring to? What solutions? I think everyone working on the OP problem is doing their best to understand the whole, to understand all the pieces and how they work together. << The whole is simply not going to respond to piecemeal solutions, and irrational Ol' Mother Nature, will resist interference.>> In a sense the entire problem is due to interference with 'Ol' Mother Nature'. I disagree that piecemeal solutions will have no effect. They will. But of course the more one can understand the whole and apply solutions that deal with the whole, the better. From rcollins@netlink.com.au Tue Nov 10 22:28:14 1998 Received: from netlink.com.au (merlin.netlink.com.au [203.16.172.196]) by csf.Colorado.EDU (8.9.1a/8.9.1/ITS-5.0/csf) with ESMTP id WAA03322 for ; Tue, 10 Nov 1998 22:26:34 -0700 (MST) Received: from netlink.com.au (h139.mel.netlink.com.au [203.62.225.139]) by netlink.com.au (8.8.8/8.8.8) with ESMTP id QAA08424 for ; Wed, 11 Nov 1998 16:30:58 +1100 Message-ID: <36491FC5.C2E17A51@netlink.com.au> Date: Wed, 11 Nov 1998 16:25:26 +1100 From: rc&am Reply-To: rcollins@netlink.com.au MIME-Version: 1.0 To: PROGRESSIVE POPULATION NETWORK Subject: quinacrine - a different view Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Population Bomb: Two Americans Export Chemical Sterilization To the Third World --- More Than 100,000 Women Undergo the Procedure; Cancer Risk Is Feared --- Secret Doings in Vietnam By Alix M. Freedman 06/18/98 The Wall Street Journal Page A1 (Copyright (c) 1998, Dow Jones & Company, Inc.) Stephen D. Mumford's house looks much like any other in the leafy suburbs of Chapel Hill, N.C. Set on a one-acre plot, his brick-and-wood home features four bedrooms, an eat-in kitchen and a cozy den. Outside, there's a vegetable garden and a garage with a station wagon parked in front. No one would ever guess what he has in his basement. Down there are more than 300,000 tiny yellow pellets in rows of white plastic jars. The pellets, made of a compound known as quinacrine, are bound for India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Morocco and more than a dozen other countries. There, in remote, often filthy clinics and doctors' offices, they will be used to sterilize some of the world's poorest women. In the past decade, quinacrine pellets supplied by Mr. Mumford have been responsible for the irreversible chemical sterilization of more than 100,000 Third World women. There are enough pellets in his basement at the moment to sterilize 20,000 more. Inserted directly into the uterus, quinacrine (pronounced KWIN-a-krin) prevents pregnancy by scarring the fallopian tubes. No anesthesia is used, and the procedure is painful; some women faint. For many, short-term side effects include abnormal menstrual bleeding, backaches, fever, lower abdominal pain and headaches. Longer-term consequences are less certain but potentially more ominous: Independent laboratory studies in the U.S. indicate that quinacrine causes cells to mutate. Some scientists say this is circumstantial evidence that it may cause cancer as well; according to the World Health Organization, between 60% and 80% of known mutagens are also carcinogens. Because questions of safety and effectiveness haven't been resolved, quinacrine sterilizations aren't permitted in the U.S. They are also opposed by nearly all major family-planning organizations and by many foreign governments. In 1993, the World Health Organization declared that, pending further lab research, quinacrine shouldn't be used to sterilize women in any country because of the potential cancer risk. World-wide, Mr. Mumford and his partner, a like-minded contraceptive researcher named Elton Kessel, are the sole distributors of the substance. In a remarkably quiet crusade, they have managed to pay for its manufacture in Switzerland, arrange for its free distribution in about 20 countries and mobilize a far-flung network of doctors, nurses and midwives to administer it. Operating mostly in impoverished nations with weak regulation of health-care practices, the two Americans have bypassed the stringent controls that typically govern the testing and use of experimental drugs. As a result, mass-sterilization programs affecting thousands of women, but involving limited health-related follow-up, have been launched in several countries. In addition, some women seeking routine gynecological care have been sterilized without their knowledge or even against their will. The two American promoters say that, judging by the information they have gathered from human testing abroad, quinacrine is both safe and effective. They acknowledge that quinacrine pellets cause mutations in certain test-tube studies but note that research on mice has been inconclusive. In any case, they say, the lab results hardly prove that the pellets cause cancer in women. Their primary goal, they emphasize, is to improve the lives and protect the health of Third World women, almost 600,000 of whom die each year from pregnancy-related complications. The World Health Organization, which advises the United Nations and its members, reports that the incidence of such deaths is 18 times as high in the developing world as it is in industrialized countries. But Mr. Mumford, 55, is also pursuing a more controversial agenda than health care. Describing quinacrine as "essential to population-growth control," he says he sees it as a means of reducing the potential number of immigrants to the U.S. from developing nations. "This explosion in human numbers, which after 2050 will come entirely from immigrants and the offspring of immigrants, will dominate our lives. There will be chaos and anarchy," says Mr. Mumford, who relies in part on anti-immigrant forces in the U.S. for financial backing. Mr. Mumford blames the Catholic Church for discouraging population control while promoting the migration of Catholics to the U.S. to bolster the strength of the church in this country. "Overpopulation is a gravely serious national-security issue, even more serious than the nuclear threat," warns Mr. Mumford, who calls his tiny, not-for-profit organization the Center for Research on Population and Security. "The security survival interest of the U.S. is in conflict with the papacy's long-term survival," he adds. A researcher with these political views and no support from drug companies, health groups or national governments might be expected to encounter trouble bringing a product to market. But quinacrine is so inexpensive -- about a penny per pellet -- that Mr. Mumford's organization has had to spend only $36,000 for the three million pellets it has had manufactured in this decade. Mr. Mumford and Dr. Kessel, who is 79, also benefit from the fact that they don't seek financial gain, are willing to operate on a shoestring -- and are passionately persistent. "If you want to make a difference in contraceptive research, you have to take a vow of poverty," Dr. Kessel says. Mr. Mumford draws a salary of $37,500 a year from his research center; Dr. Kessel lives off less than $30,000 from Social Security and income from small investments. Many people in the family-planning field think the two men's quinacrine crusade is nothing short of evil. Adrienne Germain, president of the International Women's Health Coalition in New York, says that quinacrine's inexpensiveness, portability and simplicity make it "highly open to abuse," adding that, "with this, there is no murky middle. It shouldn't be used, period." At the World Bank, which provides loans for family planning, population official Thomas Merrick says that quinacrine use abroad "gives the impression that we have different standards for poor women." He adds, "This undermines the cause of developing safe, effective and acceptable methods that respect the reproductive rights of women in the Third World." Numerous women's-rights advocates world-wide agree. But, as in many areas where the Western health establishment comes into contact with the developing world, the quinacrine issue isn't as simple as many may believe. Some health-care workers in the Third World, desperate for cheap, easy-to-administer birth control, see the two maverick Americans as saviors -- and their critics as dangerous meddlers. One outspoken quinacrine advocate is gynecologist Naseem Rahman. On a Sunday in late January, she threads her way through a Dhaka, Bangladesh, slum inhabited by stonecutters and rickshaw pullers and speaks to women about birth control. She says she will send her health workers back here soon to spread the word about the free quinacrine sterilizations that she provides at her private clinic. She believes that the developed world's cautious standards of medical ethics and safety have no place in the lives of women for whom repeated pregnancies bring nothing but deprivation and danger. Quinacrine, she points out, is dramatically less expensive than any alternative she can provide. A few feet away from Dr. Rahman, a whimpering woman clutches a dead baby to her breast. The doctor declares: "First, let these women be accepted as humans and then let's talk about human rights. As it is, they're going to die, so what do the long-term complications of quinacrine matter?" Quinacrine's vast appeal, and its considerable dangers, are also on display in Vietnam. In 1986, Dr. Kessel buttonholed Do Trong Hieu, Vietnam's family-planning director, at a seminar in New Delhi, and told him about quinacrine. On the spot, Dr. Kessel supplied Dr. Hieu with a number of quinacrine pellets. At the time, Vietnam's population growth was among the fastest in Asia, the country's economy was in a state of collapse -- and the ministry of health had a budget that provided barely 15 cents per woman for family planning. Vietnam's only widely available family-planning option was the IUD. But many women complained about the side effects and, for the government, price was a concern: about $2.50 per woman compared with $1 per woman for quinacrine, including all clinic-related costs. "Quinacrine didn't require surgery, was easy to provide to users and was cheap," Dr. Hieu recalls. "I said, `This would be good for a poor country.'" He began a quinacrine - sterilization effort that ballooned so quickly that more than 31,000 Vietnamese women had been sterilized before the government decided to follow up on the women's progress three years later. After this period, no increased incidence of cancer or other serious complications was detected. But the government's study revealed that some health workers performing the sterilizations were recording pregnancy rates of 13% -- not the desired 2%. The apparent reason: Some of the 1,300 health workers who had been hastily enlisted to do the sterilizations hadn't been properly trained. By the time Dr. Hieu sorted all this out, 20,000 more Vietnamese women had been sterilized, Mr. Mumford says. The program was dropped in 1993 under intense pressure from the World Health Organization. It also turned out that not everyone who had been sterilized had undergone the procedure voluntarily. Many of the involuntary sterilizations had occurred in a remote area five hours by car from Ho Chi Minh City, on the Hoa Binh Rubber Plantation. Hoa Binh rubber worker Nguyen Thi recalls that on March 10, 1993, she went to the plantation health clinic, where she was told that she would receive a routine gynecological examination. Instead, Duong Dang Hanh, the clinic's doctor, removed Mrs. Thi's IUD and sterilized her with quinacrine. Dr. Hanh performed the same procedure on 106 other unsuspecting rubber workers, he confirms. Only later, after some got infections and sought treatment, did any of them learn what had been done. Today, at age 41, Mrs. Thi, whose dark, wrinkled skin and wiry frame suggest years of hard labor, is still bitter: "Did they consider us lab rats so that they could do whatever they wanted with our bodies?" Most details about the sterilizations remain buried within the sprawling plantation; a reporter's efforts to interview workers there in February resulted in her expulsion from the grounds. Her notes were confiscated by security police. Interviewed on a later day at the plantation clinic, one senior employee said Dr. Hanh performed the sterilizations to enhance his career by helping enforce Vietnam's two-child policy. But the youthful doctor, who wasn't fired after the incident, insists he was simply working from a list of names of women to be sterilized that had been supplied to him by plantation officials. In Hanoi, some health workers speculate that the plantation's bosses themselves orchestrated the campaign to keep productivity high. The plantation's top officials decline to comment. Standing at her rickety roadside drink stand in the nearby town, Ngo The says that some workers, like her sister, Tran Thi Luan, now have young children because the single insertion of quinacrine they received wasn't sufficient to sterilize them. (Dr. Kessel and Mr. Mumford recommend two insertions of seven pellets each, one month apart.) Others, like Nguyen Thi Lanh, already ill from the unsanitary way the hasty sterilizations were performed, were beaten by their enraged husbands when the men learned of the procedure. After Mrs. Lanh's husband threw her and her children out of the house, she begged for food in the streets. Expressing horror at the Vietnam experience, Mr. Mumford says, "If we had had more money, we would have done more monitoring and wouldn't have let quinacrine take off this way." Both Mr. Mumford and Dr. Hieu, though, remain excited about the prospect of reintroducing quinacrine sterilization in Vietnam in the next few years. "Any method that is easy can be abused, but you have to weigh the benefits," says Dr. Hieu, who still keeps a stash of quinacrine in a desk drawer. Indeed, despite significant uncertainties regarding health and safety, demand remains high -- even among Vietnamese women -- for the yellow pellets that Mr. Mumford stores in the basement of his North Carolina home. On a visit to Vietnam in February, one of three trips he has made there since 1992, Mr. Mumford is treated like a returning hero. Dang Thi Mai, a worker in a noodle factory, waits for hours at the Nam Dinh province's family-planning headquarters to meet him. When he arrives, she tells him that she was among the first Vietnamese women to be sterilized with quinacrine. Her factory, she says, encouraged older women to use a permanent method of birth control so they could "stay healthy and keep productivity high." Mrs. Mai, who had three children, complied. Now 47 years old, she declares, "Through 10 years, I have been very happy with quinacrine." Le Thi Mau, a representative of the women's union, tells Mr. Mumford that she doesn't understand why the government discontinued the quinacrine sterilizations. Even now, she says, women keep asking for quinacrine to be brought back. Tran Thi Vinh, the province's top family-planning official, implores Mr. Mumford "to explain quinacrine's benefits to the world. We want to choose the best method for our women, and I choose quinacrine," she says. Choking up, Mr. Mumford thanks Dr. Vinh "for providing leadership in family planning for Vietnam and the world." Later, when he is back in America, Mr. Mumford will reflect in minute detail on the particulars of "this hell of a show of gratitude." "Being able to have experiences like we had that day," he says, "is what drives me." Both Mr. Mumford and Dr. Kessel became devotees of population control after having had separate, first-hand encounters with Asian poverty. Mr. Mumford, who grew up poor in Louisville, Ky., and dreamed of becoming a farmer, had his epiphany during an Army hitch in Korea in 1969 and 1970. Shocked by Seoul's squalid shantytowns, which were teeming with rural migrants, Mr. Mumford thereafter devoted himself to population studies, obtaining a doctorate from the University of Texas and embarking on a career in contraceptive research. Dr. Kessel, who trained at Harvard and the University of Chicago, traces his own commitment to the population field to a harrowing three-year stint as a public-health doctor in rural India in the 1950s. Appalled by the rampant malnutrition and disease that he encountered, he decided that reducing population growth was "an absolute prerequisite to social and economic development." Both men ended up at a contraceptive-research firm called Family Health International, or FHI, in Research Triangle Park, N.C. There, in the early 1970s, Dr. Kessel learned about quinacrine sterilization from its developer, a Chilean researcher named Jaime Zipper. Quinacrine in pill form had long been a widely accepted antimalarial drug with no known links to cancer. Though it was a potentially riskier matter to place the compound directly into the sensitive uterine environment, Dr. Kessel was impressed with Dr. Zipper's early work. Dr. Kessel brought a supply of quinacrine, then in liquid form, to Bangladesh in 1973. In Dhaka, the nation's capital, the American met an idealistic young public-health doctor, Zafr ullah Chowdhury, who expressed interest in testing the new sterilization method. The result was tragic. Minutes after Dr. Chowdhury inserted the liquid into the uterus of a 28-year-old mother, she died from its toxic effects. Shattered, Dr. Chowdhury never touched quinacrine again. Today, he calls what he did, "for all practical purposes, cold-blooded murder." But Dr. Chowdhury's experience didn't deter Dr. Kessel, who says the woman's epileptic condition may have contributed to her death. By the time Mr. Mumford got to FHI in 1977, Dr. Kessel was its president, and Dr. Kessel, Dr. Zipper and other researchers were laboring to develop pellets -- to be deposited in the uterus with an IUD inserter -- as a safer form of quinacrine. Mr. Mumford quickly came to share Dr. Kessel's enthusiasm for the chemical method; together they planned how they might make quinacrine sterilizations the dominant form of birth control in the Third World. Dr. Kessel says he was fired by FHI in 1980 following disagreements with its board; Mr. Mumford was dismissed three years later for writing a string of articles and making public statements that excoriated the Vatican. Mr. Mumford struck out on his own, setting up his Center for Research on Population and Security in his basement. Dr. Kessel established his own small research outfit. Ever since, the two men have traveled to the far corners of the earth, toting beat-up suitcases crammed with reams of research and free samples of quinacrine. Though Dr. Kessel is less concerned than Mr. Mumford about the immigration implications of Third World overpopulation, he shares his vision of a better world. "The present rate of illegal immigration isn't healthy, but it won't be a disaster," he says. "But I see slowing the rapid population growth in developing countries as an absolute prerequisite to their social and economic development." >From the start, the two men's bare-bones financial needs -- about $1 million over the past decade -- have been met by an assortment of U.S. backers, some of them linked to the anti-immigration movement. Their most devoted fund-raisers are Donald A. Collins and Sally G. Epstein, a Washington, D.C., couple. Both are on the board of the Federation for American Immigration Reform, or FAIR, a group that, like Mr. Mumford, favors sharp reductions in immigration. Ms. Epstein says her commitment to quinacrine is based not on immigration concerns but on a desire to aid Third World women: "I feel like a missionary. Quinacrine is something that can help women help themselves," she says. Mr. Collins is also on the board of the Scaife Family Foundation, whose principal trustees are the two children of Richard M. Scaife, the billionaire publisher who often contributes to conservative causes. The foundation has donated $160,000 to the quinacrine effort since 1994. Another key backer lined up by Mr. Collins is Lee Fikes, son of a Dallas oil magnate; Mr. Fikes's family foundation has provided about $320,000. Messrs. Fikes and Scaife are also big contributors to FAIR. Joanne Beyer, vice president at the Scaife Family Foundation, says the decision to fund quinacrine had "absolutely nothing to do" with the elder Mr. Scaife, who doesn't sit on the board of the foundation, or with FAIR. Mr. Fikes says he backs quinacrine because he sees population stability as crucial to improving the quality of life world-wide. Drug companies aren't among quinacrine's financial backers. Around the world, only four leading pharmaceutical companies are pursuing any contraceptive research at all. At least nine others abandoned product research and development in the wake of litigation during the mid-1980s over A.H. Robins Co.'s Dalkon Shield intrauterine device; after thousands of women alleged that the IUD caused infections and sterility, Robins filed for bankruptcy-law protection in 1985. Quinacrine would be especially problematic from a liability standpoint because of the possible cancer risk. "No company worth anything ever would have put a contraceptive mutagen like quinacrine on the market," says Jeffrey Spieler, who runs the population-research division at the U.S. Agency for International Development, the Third World's biggest contraceptive funder. The only drug company that will touch quinacrine is Sipharm Sesseln AG, a small Swiss concern that limits its role to formulating the pellets under contract to Mr. Mumford. "If there was absolute clinical evidence that the pellets were toxic and dangerous, we would refuse to make them," says company President Fritz Schneiter. "But it isn't our role to check if this is safe or not. We aren't the conscience of the world." Dr. Kessel and Mr. Mumford say there are limits to their own roles, as well. While they distribute the pellets as widely as they can, they say that the way quinacrine is administered by overseas doctors is -- and should be -- beyond their influence. "These people don't want to be the puppets of imperialist American researchers," Mr. Mumford says. "They want to be in control." As a result, Dr. Kessel and Mr. Mumford say, some overseas sterilization programs turn out to be better administered than others. And, they acknowledge, problems with such matters as informed consent, proper dosages, record-keeping and long-term follow-up sometimes develop. Many of these problems are apparent in India, where Dr. Kessel and Mr. Mumford have worked extensively for nearly two decades. Indu Das's sterilization is a case in point. Late in the spring of 1995, the 27-year-old mother of three showed up at the Palam Health Center intending to be fitted with an IUD. But on that day, Anita Sabherwal, then a graduate student at one of New Delhi's most prestigious government hospitals, also happened to be at Palam with a different agenda. "Dr. Anita recommended a new, good medicine that has come on the market that the government has approved," recalls Mrs. Das. She says she was happy to hear from Dr. Sabherwal that the drug would last for "10-15 years" but not forever. Mrs. Das hastily signed an informed-consent form, which she didn't read. Even if she had, she wouldn't have found any reference to scientific concerns that quinacrine might cause cancer. She says she left the clinic without knowing the name of the drug or its purpose. Dr. Sabherwal and her supervisor wouldn't comment on any aspect of Mrs. Das's account. Mrs. Das says she received a single seven-pellet dose of quinacrine -- not the two doses that Dr. Kessel and Mr. Mumford recommend. Did this mean the sterilization was less likely to work? Dr. Kessel and Mr. Mumford think so. But evaluating success rates and health effects is complicated by the fact that many of the women who are sterilized with quinacrine recede into the anonymity of local slums and rural villages, and many don't return for further evaluation. The leading quinacrine advocate in Calcutta, Biral Mullick, who has sterilized about 2,000 women, says he relies on women to come back to him voluntarily if they develop any health problems or if the sterilization doesn't work. Dr. Mullick says none of the women he sterilized have returned and that he has made no effort to find them. "How could I have gone door to door when resources were so limited?" he asks. Despite such problems, many doctors working with Dr. Kessel and Mr. Mumford do produce reports of their findings, and a number of these end up in peer-reviewed scientific journals. The reports are uniformly positive: Effectiveness approaches 98% after two years; side effects are minimal; there is no measurable increase in the incidence of cancer among women who have been sterilized. But how reliable are the data? Critics argue that there is too much variation in the studies' methodology -- in the number of pellets used, the screening of patients, the reliability of the follow-up -- for the reports to be conclusive. Says Patrick Rowe, medical officer in the World Health Organization's human-reproduction program, "The quinacrine clinical trials don't come up to generally accepted standards of good clinical practices. . .. . It makes an independent evaluation of safety more difficult." In Dr. Sabherwal's case, her 1996 thesis abstract cited only one pregnancy after 10 months among the 30 women she sterilized and no "serious, life-threatening complications." Her conclusion: " Quinacrine sterilization can be safely used on a mass scale in a country like ours where maternal mortality is alarming." Apparently unbenownst to Dr. Sabherwal, Mrs. Das, who had experienced severe bleeding right after the attempted sterilization in 1995, became pregnant in late 1997. She had an abortion and finally got the IUD she wanted in the first place. This result made its way into no scientific reports. Exacerbating the difficulties involved in treating and tracking thousands of women like Indu Das is the ignorance of many of the doctors and health-care aides who administer the drug. In the tiny rural outpost of Fuleshwar, India, a two-hour drive from Calcutta, C.C. Pramanik estimates that he has performed 500 quinacrine sterilizations. Seated cross-legged on a blanket in the unfinished brick building that serves as his school for doctors and midwives, Dr. Pramanik recalls learning from his mentor, Dr. Mullick, that "quinacrine was accepted in the developed countries of the world, including America." Dr. Mullick, who is one of Dr. Kessel's staunchest allies, also assured his disciple that quinacrine has "no long-term side effects," according to Dr. Pramanik. Told by a reporter that quinacrine may be a carcinogen and that it isn't used in the West, Dr. Pramanik gazes uneasily at a family-planning poster that supplies the bare wall with its only decorative touch. "Obviously, the patients should know the side effects," he says. "But I knew nothing, so how could I tell them?" Dr. Mullick acknowledges that he is aware of the cancer issue but that if he and other doctors explained it to patients, they might panic unnecessarily. "People might come and kill the doctor," he says. Further east on the subcontinent, in Dhaka, Salahuddin Yusuf, Bangladesh's health minister, gathers with about a dozen of his lieutenants in a dilapidated health-ministry conference room to tell a reporter how his country is dealing with overpopulation. Asked about quinacrine, he says, "We don't allow doctors to do this -- they can't do this. If anything goes wrong or someone dies, who will compensate these women?" Later that same day, as evening is closing in, Dr. Rahman, the Dhaka gynecologist, can be found at her clinic briskly instructing Ambia Khatoon, a 45-year-old maid at a private elementary school, to lie down on an examination table and slide her feet into the stirrups. Dr. Rahman has already swallowed a quinacrine pellet to reassure Mrs. Khatoon, who has four children, that the drug "won't kill her" and, using deliberately simple language, has told her that the "powder will close the door so the baby can't come out." While the doctor keeps a private ledger of her subjects, she doesn't provide them with informed-consent forms. Dr. Rahman says she wouldn't dream of creating a paper trail in this mainly Muslim country where a woman's failure to get pregnant can give a husband grounds for divorce. Acting without the knowledge of her husband, a rickshaw puller who is frequently ill, Mrs. Khatoon has traveled to Dr. Rahman's clinic accompanied by two other maids. One already has received a free sterilization here. Mrs. Khatoon moans softly as Dr. Rahman briskly thrusts an IUD inserter filled with 12 quinacrine pellets deep into the patient's uterus. Moments later, the doctor instructs an assistant to mop up a small pool of blood that has dripped onto the floor. Informed that the government has specifically refused to allow quinacrine even in clinical trials, Dr. Rahman replies: "No one ever told me this drug is banned in Bangladesh." Dr. Rahman says she has done more than 2,900 such sterilizations in the past three years. Half an hour later, Mrs. Khatoon hurries from the clinic, clasping a packet of antibiotics. After haggling with three rickshaw bikers -- the cost of the round-trip excursion will require her family to forgo vegetables next week -- she climbs into one of the brightly painted carriages with her companions. They are quickly lost in Dhaka's eerie nighttime maze of dimly lighted passages and human shadows. Because of the generally laissez-faire attitude of Third World governments toward enforcement of public-health laws, no one, it appears, has ever been prosecuted for performing unauthorized quinacrine sterilizations in any of the roughly 20 countries where they occur. Giuseppe Benagiano, who was in charge of the World Health Organization's human-reproduction program until last year and led its attack on quinacrine, says the organization has no power to change this. "We aren't a regulatory agency for any country, let alone a regulatory agency of the world. It is up to individual governments to decide if individual doctors have done something borderline or unethical." Similarly, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration, while decrying the overseas use of the unapproved sterilization method, says the FDA has no power to police the two Americans' activities abroad. This is so because Dr. Kessel and Mr. Mumford aren't purporting to run FDA-approved clinical trials. Under heavy pressure from women's-rights activists, India is one country that has tried to crack down -- though apparently with little success. On March 16, its supreme court declined to interfere with the government's plan to ban quinacrine sterilizations following a public-interest lawsuit lodged by women's-rights advocates. Since then, surgeon J.K. Jain, an avid quinacrine backer and former member of Parliament, says he has been vigorously lobbying the Health Ministry to derail the prohibition. He appears to have the tacit support of his political party, the Hindu-nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party, which is now in control of the government. Ignoring the proposed ban, Dr. Jain continues his program to mail free quinacrine samples and inserters to thousands of Indian gynecologists. Meanwhile, in Fuleshwar, Dr. Pramanik has just begun providing family-planning training to a new group of aspiring midwives. In his spartan classroom, about 20 young women sit in neat rows at rough-hewn wooden tables, listening raptly. During a class break, 18-year-old Sipra Langal shyly volunteers that she has already learned about options like tubectomy and vasectomy but thinks quinacrine is best. "In the village, girls don't have the luxury to rest after surgery. It takes a very short time to recover from quinacrine and out of 100 procedures, 100 will be successful," Ms. Langal says, echoing what she has been taught in class. For Dr. Kessel and Mr. Mumford, the stop in Fuleshwar is a highlight of their trek through the poorest countries of Asia. Many times, they have been discouraged -- by the mounting opposition of governments and family-planning groups, the meager resources available for the quinacrine effort, the difficulty of spreading their message as far and as fast as they would like. But in remote Fuleshwar, they see a way to move far beyond the 100,000 quinacrine sterilizations that have been performed so far. "The future of quinacrine will be with village midwives," Dr. Kessel says. "They are so scattered it will be very hard for the government to stop." --- Global Reach of Chemical Sterilization Year that quinacrine use began and status for each country; estimates are as of March 1998 Bangladesh 1989 Offered by private doctors Chile 1977 Offered in government hospitals if allowed by hospital administrator China 1993 Two provincial-government trials halted in 1997 pending evaluation by central government; decision expected in June regarding expansion of program to 10,000 women Colombia 1989 Offered by private doctors Costa Rica 1989 Status undetermined Croatia 1988 Offered in one government hospital Egypt 1988 Offered by private doctors India 1979 Government plan to ban quinacrine accepted by Supreme Court in March; private doctors continue to offer quinacrine Indonesia 1985 Government trials halted under WHO pressure in 1997; one follow-up study continues Iran 1990 In government trials and offered by private doctors Malaysia 1985 Government halted trial in 1985 after patient recruiting difficulties Morocco 1997 Offered by private doctors Pakistan 1987 Offered by private doctors Philippines 1993 Government trial halted in 1994 because of religious opposition Romania 1994 Offered by private doctors Venezuela 1993 Study at government hospital completed Vietnam 1989 Government trial suspended in 1993 under WHO pressure; follow-up study continues Note: Supplies of quinacrine shipped at request of private doctors in 1997 for Brazil, Greece, Guyana, Mali, Nigeria and United Arab Emirates; number of women sterilized and status of quinacrine use not available Source: Mr. Mumford's Center for Research on Population and Security --- One Hundred Thousand and Counting... COUNTRY A B C D Vietnam 50,000 38.4 2.69 160 India 26,000 71.1 3.20 570 Pakistan 15,000 96.8 5.25 340 Chile 5,000 13.6 2.23 65 Bangladesh 4,700 102.3 3.57 850 Indonesia 900 63.1 2.70 650 Costa Rica 700 13.5 2.90 55 China 700 39.6 1.81 95 Iran 250 52.7 4.72 120 Colombia 235 25.8 2.35 100 Venezuela 200 29.5 2.87 120 Romania 200 23.2 1.25 130 Egypt 200 72.8 3.58 170 Croatia 170 10.2 1.40 N.A. Philippines 100 35.9 3.69 280 Morocco 30 43.2 3.58 610 Malaysia 25 24.0 3.27 80 U.S. 0 6.7 2.06 12 TOTAL 104,410 -- -- -- A -- ESTIMATED NUMBER OF WOMEN STERILIZED WITH QUINACRINE B -- INFANT MORTALITY RATE (Per 1,000 live births) C -- FERTILITY RATE (Children born/woman) D -- MATERNAL MORTALITY RATE (Per 100,000 live births) Sources: The Center for Research on Population and Security, Mr. Mumford's organization; CIA World Factbook 1997-98; World Health Organization; U.N. --- The Sterilization Technique Because no surgery is involved, quinacrine sterilizations are relatively straightforward procedures, and nurses and midwives perform them routinely. The health worker simply places the quinacrine pellets in a woman's uterus with an IUD inserter. It takes about a half hour for the pellets -- usually there are seven -- to dissolve in the uterus. The quinacrine then spreads a short distance into the fallopian tubes, destroying a portion of the tubes' inner lining. If the sterilization is successful, the resulting scar tissue blocks the tubes, preventing pregnancy. To maximize quinacrine's effectiveness, a woman should be given a second seven-pellet dose one month after the first, Dr. Kessel and Mr. Mumford recommend. Though the procedure, which takes 2-3 minutes to perform, can be painful, no anesthesia is used. Most women spend less than an hour recuperating in the clinic before they are sent home. Family Planning Costs Products' annual cost per couple in the Third World, in U.S. dollars* PRODUCT COST Quinacrine** $0.0081 Intrauterine device 0.42 Birth-control pills 3.15 Depo Provera injections 3.72 Condoms 6.48 Norplant implants 6.80 *Figures based on what the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) pays for the contraceptives it distributes to the developing world, excluding all service-delivery-related costs such as patient counseling. ** Assumes two doses of seven pellets; USAID doesn't distribute quinacrine. Sources: The Futures Group consulting firm in Washington, D.C.; and Mr. Mumford's organization, the Center for Research on Population and Security From rcollins@netlink.com.au Tue Nov 10 22:29:10 1998 Received: from netlink.com.au (merlin.netlink.com.au [203.16.172.196]) by csf.Colorado.EDU (8.9.1a/8.9.1/ITS-5.0/csf) with ESMTP id WAA03332 for ; Tue, 10 Nov 1998 22:27:19 -0700 (MST) Received: from netlink.com.au (h139.mel.netlink.com.au [203.62.225.139]) by netlink.com.au (8.8.8/8.8.8) with ESMTP id QAA08495 for ; Wed, 11 Nov 1998 16:31:49 +1100 Message-ID: <36491FF8.559E2B9A@netlink.com.au> Date: Wed, 11 Nov 1998 16:26:16 +1100 From: rc&am Reply-To: rcollins@netlink.com.au MIME-Version: 1.0 To: PROGRESSIVE POPULATION NETWORK Subject: [Fwd: Fw: Quinacrine on 60 Minutes & Bill McKibben chat] Content-Type: multipart/mixed; boundary="------------2098193E25C8331FA0BE450B" This is a multi-part message in MIME format. --------------2098193E25C8331FA0BE450B Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit --------------2098193E25C8331FA0BE450B Content-Type: message/rfc822; name="nsmailDA.TMP" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Content-Disposition: inline; filename="nsmailDA.TMP" X-POP3-Rcpt: rcollins@merlin Return-Path: Received: from rivendell.vsta.com (rivendell.vsta.com [204.57.96.15]) by netlink.com.au (8.8.8/8.8.8) with ESMTP id EAA23945 for ; Wed, 11 Nov 1998 04:48:50 +1100 Received: from eglaze.vsta.com (eglazeADSL.vsta.com [204.57.96.81]) by rivendell.vsta.com (8.8.8/8.8.6) with SMTP id LAA19061 for >; Tue, 10 Nov 1998 11:46:22 -0600 (CST) From: "Ed Glaze III" To: " Subject: Fw: Quinacrine on 60 Minutes & Bill McKibben chat Date: Tue, 10 Nov 1998 11:49:46 -0600 Message-ID: <01be0cd2$81298540$516039cc@eglaze.vsta.com> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit X-Priority: 3 X-MSMail-Priority: Normal X-MimeOLE: Produced By Microsoft MimeOLE V4.71.1712.3 I doubt you agree with me on this sterilization topic but below is a copy of a message on Quinacrine that I posted recently. Yes, I am in favor of sterilization in some cases and if Quinacrine is cheaper and safer than surgery for females then that is an option that should be available. Especially if sterilization is needed on a large scale in a country that cannot afford, or does not have, the doctors necessary. The choice to use Quinacrine should be available and I am ver much in favor of continued trial use with a rapid expansion. Forced sterilization procedures may have been abused, or the policies have been faulty, but there is a need for cheap, long-lasting, and effective birth control in many countries. Plus it does not seem that there are widespread or serious problems with Quinacrine when used properly. I think we will be disagreeing on many population issues because I view the problem in much different terms -- namely that we have excess people now and a population reduction is needed. I know that discussions such policies are not going to be welcomed even on a population listserv, much less in social and political circles. However, that does not mean that population reduction is not what we really need. ________ Ed Glaze -----Original Message----- From: Ed Glaze III To: Audubon Population Date: Sunday, October 18, 1998 7:07 PM Subject: Quinacrine on 60 Minutes & Bill McKibben chat >Just watched 60 Minutes and saw the Quniacrine story. > >Overall it was pretty good and the coverage was balanced. >Mumford and Kessel came out looking reasonable while the >opponents seemed much less so with their implication of >racist motives. Overpopulation was mentioned and Morley Safer >seemed concerned and understanding. The motivation to oppose >Quinacrine use for sterilizations came across as political, not >medical or environmental. > >Other interesting points: >FDA study of Quinacrine would take 8 years and cost 8 million dollars. >India and several other countries recently quit using Quinacrine. >There are US doctors who want to provide it to their patients. >No major side effects were documented or even implied by doctors. >Fears and possibilities of side effects were mentioned by opposition. >China getting ready to do major trial on Quinacrine. > >At the end of the story they said the FDA ruled just last week that >Quinacrine is unsafe and told Kessel and Mumford to stop all >imports and exports of Quinacrine and to destroy all their stock. > >________ Ed Glaze > >"If they don't understand the severity of the problem, >they won't understand the severity of the solution. >Overpopulation must be dealt with." > >---------------------- > >Quinacrine (online preview available) >Two Americans who distribute a controversial drug to Third World >women say they are offering a cheap and safe method of sterilization. >But critics say there's no proof the drug is safe for that purpose and >accuse these men of using poor people as pigs. >Co-editor Morley Safer reports. > >(no mention of transcripts) > >Quinacrine Non-surgical Method of Voluntary Female Sterilization: Newsletter > > >Row over sterilisation divides India > > >Phantom Sterilizations -- The Quinacrine Story > > >Food and Drug Administration > >(no mention of the Quinacrine ruling) > >Stephen Mumford >Freethinkers United! Conference 1997 > > >International Federation for Family Health (IFFH) >Elton Kessel, 6100 N E Mineral Springs Road, Carlton OR 97111 > >THE LIFE AND DEATH OF NSSM 200 >How the Destruction of Political Will Doomed a U.S. Population Policy >by Stephen D. Mumford > > >______________________ > >Chat With Author Bill McKibben > Is One Child Enough? > > We often see overpopulation as a problem for someone else -- >Tanzanians, perhaps, or Bangladeshis. But writer Bill McKibben >says we can't sustain the lifestyle we take for granted unless we >curb our own population growth. The author of the new book >Maybe One: A Personal and Environmental Argument for >Single-Child Families, McKibben thinks couples should at least >consider having no more than one child. > McKibben, who wrote the The End of Nature, The Age of >Missing Information and Hope, Human and Wild, is a frequent >contributor to The New York Times, Atlantic Monthly and other >magazines. Bill McKibben joined ABCNEWS.com for a chat >on Friday, May 29. (link to above URL for the actual chat) > --------------2098193E25C8331FA0BE450B-- From rcollins@netlink.com.au Wed Nov 11 06:18:25 1998 Received: from netlink.com.au (merlin.netlink.com.au [203.16.172.196]) by csf.Colorado.EDU (8.9.1a/8.9.1/ITS-5.0/csf) with ESMTP id GAA18462 for ; Wed, 11 Nov 1998 06:17:06 -0700 (MST) Received: from netlink.com.au (h150.mel.netlink.com.au [203.62.225.150]) by netlink.com.au (8.8.8/8.8.8) with ESMTP id AAA08600 for ; Thu, 12 Nov 1998 00:21:40 +1100 Message-ID: <36498E0B.6F7B4268@netlink.com.au> Date: Thu, 12 Nov 1998 00:15:55 +1100 From: rc&am Reply-To: rcollins@netlink.com.au MIME-Version: 1.0 To: PROGRESSIVE POPULATION NETWORK Subject: [Fwd: A more rational reply from Mr. Glaze.] Content-Type: multipart/mixed; boundary="------------12CBC9ABC1BD8B20D225ADBF" This is a multi-part message in MIME format. --------------12CBC9ABC1BD8B20D225ADBF Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit --------------12CBC9ABC1BD8B20D225ADBF Content-Type: message/rfc822; name="nsmail8B.TMP" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Content-Disposition: inline; filename="nsmail8B.TMP" Message-ID: <3646D635.C9BD6F60@netlink.com.au> Date: Mon, 09 Nov 1998 22:47:01 +1100 From: rc&am Reply-To: rcollins@netlink.com.au MIME-Version: 1.0 To: eglaze@vsta.com Subject: Re: A more rational reply from Mr. Glaze. References: <01be0ba1$9c936c60$516039cc@eglaze.vsta.com> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Ed Glaze III wrote: > The "head in the sand approach" that I mentioned dealt with the book > that someone else mentioned on the list. You also snipped that from > your reply. The description of that book does imply that women in poorer > nations suffer because of overpopulation. no, they suffer from malnutrition, superexploitation, racism, and many other things besides. overpopulation is not a problem. the problem for many of these women is that they are used as guniea pigs for pharmaceutical companies trialing contraceptive and sterilisation procedures, which in amny cases, is the only well-funded health care that is made availble through health funding, or at the very least, is enforced as a condition of the terms of IMF loans and western aid. > To me, overpopulation will cause everyone in poorer nations to suffer > and much of that is due to the culture of that nation and cannot be blamed > completely on the rich countries who might, or might not be exploiting the > country economically. here mr glaze shows us his real concern re: the poor. he argues that they are responsible for their own impoverishment (this is somehow the result of their 'culture') and in turn, that their present conditions are created because of overpopulation. despite all this waving about of rationality and the facts, such thinking is actually mired in idiocy and ignorance. > I would hope you are in the > minority on this population listserv because there is a vast amount of > evidence to prove that most every country in the world is overpopulated > and increasingly suffering because of it. no one is suffering because of overpopulation. there is no scarcity. mathus was wrong when he was writing, and you are wong now. as you were wrong because of the prejudicial ease with which you infered that 'rc&am' was a he. angela --------------12CBC9ABC1BD8B20D225ADBF-- From rcollins@netlink.com.au Wed Nov 11 06:18:37 1998 Received: from netlink.com.au (merlin.netlink.com.au [203.16.172.196]) by csf.Colorado.EDU (8.9.1a/8.9.1/ITS-5.0/csf) with ESMTP id GAA18473 for ; Wed, 11 Nov 1998 06:17:17 -0700 (MST) Received: from netlink.com.au (h150.mel.netlink.com.au [203.62.225.150]) by netlink.com.au (8.8.8/8.8.8) with ESMTP id AAA08615 for ; Thu, 12 Nov 1998 00:21:49 +1100 Message-ID: <36498E15.C2DA8D1A@netlink.com.au> Date: Thu, 12 Nov 1998 00:16:05 +1100 From: rc&am Reply-To: rcollins@netlink.com.au MIME-Version: 1.0 To: PROGRESSIVE POPULATION NETWORK Subject: [Fwd: overpopulation] Content-Type: multipart/mixed; boundary="------------3C373907889009079E841B47" This is a multi-part message in MIME format. --------------3C373907889009079E841B47 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit --------------3C373907889009079E841B47 Content-Type: message/rfc822; name="nsmailMH.TMP" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Content-Disposition: inline; filename="nsmailMH.TMP" X-POP3-Rcpt: rcollins@merlin Return-Path: Received: from rivendell.vsta.com (rivendell.vsta.com [204.57.96.15]) by netlink.com.au (8.8.8/8.8.8) with ESMTP id DAA29456 for ; Tue, 10 Nov 1998 03:23:37 +1100 Received: from eglaze.vsta.com (eglazeADSL.vsta.com [204.57.96.81]) by rivendell.vsta.com (8.8.8/8.8.6) with SMTP id KAA12959; Mon, 9 Nov 1998 10:21:26 -0600 (CST) From: "Ed Glaze III" To: Cc: Subject: Re: overpopulation Date: Mon, 9 Nov 1998 10:24:48 -0600 Message-ID: <01be0bfd$788d2520$516039cc@eglaze.vsta.com> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit X-Priority: 3 X-MSMail-Priority: Normal X-MimeOLE: Produced By Microsoft MimeOLE V4.71.1712.3 Hello Angela, Didn't you notice in my message about the book that I said, "it seems he (?) is promoting a booklet?" When you did not put your name at the end of your post how was I to know you were a female. I think I did the right thing by saying I was not familiar with you and putting a question mark after he. Unfortunately it is a widely known fault of the English language that there is not a gender neutral personal pronoun. I also posted URLs and other information about Barricade Books to make it easier for others to find out more about the book you mentioned. Your initial post would have been better if you had included such information along with a review of the book. I will assume that you did read it since it was only 36 pages. You are right about my certainty that overpopulation is a fact and is threatening the world. I am not sure how it could be otherwise. We have 6 billion people growing to 9 billion within most of our lifetimes. We can witness or read about the vast environmental degradation that has already taken place and will continue. I do not doubt that some of the problems suffered by women, such as those you mention, are serious and examples of abuse. I do not deny that there are many problems with the increasing wealth and power of multinational corporations and the financial establishment such as the IMF. Pharmaceutical companies also need to test their procedures and in some cases they may be doing so in methods that take advance of the poor or others. However, I do not agree that these are reason that allow you an easy dismissal overpopulation as a factor in the problems faced around the world. Never is overpopulation cited on death certificates as the cause of death and yet it is obvious that almost all factors of a society are changed by conditions of overpopulation. Food, water, and resources become more scarce as the competition increases on the local, regional and international scales. When there is an ever increasing number of people the liberties and worth accorded to an individual decreases. Is it right, no, but it does happen. The problems of the poor are worsened by increasing growth, especially unneeded births, within their families and in their countries. Excess population places many demands on the infrastructure of a country which often cannot keep up. New schools, additional jobs, and increased food supply are just a few of examples of the difficulties that politicians everywhere must deal with when population grows. That should not be too difficult to understand but it is difficult to deal with. Many countries have cultures that are pro-natalist for religious or other reasons. Thus the people want to have multiple children and through these personal decisions contribute to overpopulation and make the conditions in their country that much tougher. Whether the people having the kids are rich or poor does not matter, except in the scale of lifetime consumption which will be much worse for the rich. I do not have an MBA and did not say that I did, though you might have thought my business management degree was an MBA. I did drop out of an MBA program when I decided that I did not want to live a life that required three-piece suits and keeping up with the Joneses. I have never sought out a high paying job and have been a very active civic volunteer for many years. The reason I feel I have "the low-down on the facts" about overpopulation is that I am very well read on the issue. For over 20 years I have been reading environmental books and specializing in population issues. My personal circumstances and lifestyle have allowed me the time to do some extensive reading and attend college to further my education. I also browse the internet for population items to share with others. Did you bother to follow up on any of the URLs I listed in my earlier posts? They are there to help people become better informed about population issues. The demographic trends we face are backed up by scientific reasoning which is rigorous enough o indicate that there really is a serious problem. Nothing I have read has been able to convince me that there is not an overpopulation problem. Just as nothing has convinced me there is a god. People, for whatever reason, may be optimistic and attribute the environmental crisis we are in the middle of to some other factors but I want more than faith. Denial of the problem does not seem realistic and that is why I seek substantiation of contrarian views, like those in the booklet you mention. There is ample credible writing available which convinces me that Malthus was not wrong. The conditions that he was concerned about still exist today and through our excess population we are likely to exhaust or diminish the non-renewable resources (oil, fresh water, arable land, rubber, biodiversity, etc) on which our economic societies depend. We have yet to fully pay the price for our foolishness for thinking we were exempt from the laws of nature. Our technology has delayed the Malthusian prediction but we have not invalidated it. For more info on Malthus and how relevant his predictions still are: Beyond Malthus: Sixteen Dimensions of the Population Problem Worldwatch Paper 143 The Social Contract Volume VIII, Number 3, Spring, 1998: Theme: Malthus Revisited ________ Ed Glaze Port Mansfield, TX "If they don't understand the severity of the problem, they won't understand the severity of the solution. Overpopulation must be dealt with." (snipped the previous messages -- we have copies of them already) ------------------------------ Below is a population article from Australia that you might have missed. Unfortunately the Canberra Times does not offer an online search. SLOWING THE POPULATION TITANIC by Tom Gosling Canberra (Australia) Times -- October 10, 1998 Copyright 1998 The Canberry Times In the movie Titanic the captain, E.J. Smith, receives radio warnings about icebergs but ignores them because he has been told by the ship's owner to increase speed. After ordering the last four boilers lit, Smith pockets the radio messages and retires to his cabin, a pathetic figure soon to go down with his ship. The theme is familiar -- supreme confidence in technology, a vainglorious conviction that size and power will conquer everything, deafness to the voices of caution and whammo! -- Mother Nature proves yet again that she has an ace up her sleeve. It was precisely to oppose this "bigger, faster and to hell with the consequences" mentality that a courageous band of souls assembled 10 years ago. The half-dozen founding members of Australians for an Ecologically Sustainable Population first met in the Canberra suburb of Bruce on October 12, 1988. They resolved to try to convince the public that Australia's population growth should be halted as soon as possible, and that the Australian Government should increase foreign aid related to restricting global population growth. The message has been dismissed as "pessimistic" by many -- even by some in the environment movement -- but has found influential supporters. Opening AESP's national conference in Sydney last year. NSW Premier Bob Carr congratulated it for raising the issue. "We've got to dispose once and for all,' he said, "of the notion that Australia is an underpopulated continent, an empty continent waiting to be filled up." It's a view that has found support also from some of the icons of Australian public life: Nugget Coombs, Manning Clark, A.D. Hope, Sir Macfarlane Burnet, Professor Frank Fenner, Sir Mark Oliphant (who opened the first national conference in Canberra in 1989) and Judith Wright (AESP's patron). Coombs, back in 1977, called for population growth to be "halted...and stabilized at an ecologically safe level" and in 1988 Wright complained that the need to control population growth had "not even been recognized by governments. "Australia is perhaps one of the last countries on Earth in a position to ensure that its population does not exceed its resources," she said. "With its enormous problems of land degradation, water and rising pollution levels, Australia is far from being limitless." Others who share this view have included Sydney University professors Charles Birch and Jonathon Stone. In 1994, the Australian Academy of Science recommended the Australian Academy of Science recommended that Australia encourage contraception and limit its net annual immigration too so that the population would stabilize at 23 million in the year 2040. More recently, author Tim Flannery, whose book and TV series The Future Eaters have been widely acclaimed, has argued that Australia's long-term sustainable population is probably well below its present size. Professor Ian Lowe, chairman of Australia's first State of the Environment report, commissioned by the Federal Government, has voiced serious concern about the environmental impact of population growth. John Coulter, former leader of the Australian Democrats, went further to become AESP's president in 1996. AESP's numbers have grown from the original six to 900, and it has added branches in Sydney, Melbourne, Adelaide, Perth, south-east Queensland, Townsville and cairns, yet it has failed (perhaps because of its insistence on a non-racist immigration policy) to burst upon the national consciousness in the way one Nation has. A major obstacle, it believes, is that powerful commercial interests particularly in real estate, construction and the media are applying strong pressure on the leadership of both major political parties to ensure that Australia's population growth continues, even accelerates, regardless of the environmental consequences and regardless of the opinions of the passengers. AESP, funded entirely by donations and modest membership fees, has held conferences, sponsored public lectures and debates, lobbied politicians, issued press statements, prepared submissions for inquiries, written articles and letters to editors, distributed leaflets just about everything a group can do to get across its message, short of demonstrations and standing for Parliament. In terms of what has happened in population growth, however, it has had about as much success as the radio operators had in slowing down the Titanic. During most of the 10 years of AESP's existence, Australia has had the world's highest per-capita rate of immigration, and our population has grown by 2.3 million to 18.8 million. The rate of population growth slowed during the decade, but is showing signs of picking up again. The annual growth rate peaked at 1.7 per cent in 1989, and slowed gradually to 1.1 per cent last year. The latest Australian Bureau of Statistics figures, however, show it increasing again. Last month's Australian Demographic Statistics give our population rate as 1.2 per cent and our net overseas migration is more than having been down to less than in 1997. In combination with a relatively high fertility rate for OECD nations (1.77 children per woman) Australia's population is on track to continue rapid growth. At the current rate, our population will be about 27 million, and growing, by the middle of next century. It's a depressing prospect for the "father" of AESP., retired CSIRO soil scientist Dr. Chris Watson. Now 63, he was responsible for monitoring the soils of the Murray Irrigation Area in the 1970's: "I could see the land deteriorating before my very eyes, with increasing salinity, especially around Deniliquin and northern Victoria." A few years later he became a councilor of the Australian Conservation Foundation and, at its quarterly meetings in Melbourne, struck up a friendship with a like-minded Monash University sociology professor Bob Birrell. When Bob Birrell came to the ANU's Centre for Resource and Environment Studies for a year's sabbatical in 1987-88, they started a newsletter Population Stability for Australia, which spawned AESP. Watson says, "I found I couldn't get many people interested at CSIRO, or in science circles generally, but I did notice that there were people writing letters to the Canberra Times so I phoned them and asked them if they wanted to form a group. I didn't get a single knock-back." The first meeting of AESP. was held at the home of radar engineer Greg Dunstone and librarian wife Eileen. Those present included poet Mark O'Conner, retired Bureau of Mineral Resources geologist Hugh Oldham, Australian Democrats political adviser Jenny Goldie (formerly Jenny Macleod), a former assistant secretary in the Immigration Department, Duncan Waddell, and CSIRO staff member Peter Martin. O'Conner says, "We didn't realize the intense negativity of much of the media. At first, the letters to the editor page, especially of The Canberra Times, was one of the few places where these new ideas were permitted. "We've also held our membership against a long-entrenched ideology of growth from newspapers like The Australian, which has consistently run a propaganda campaign on the virtues of high immigration." As an example, he cited ALP leader Kim Beazley's announcement earlier this year that the ALP would introduce an environmentally responsible population policy when next in office. "It drew a fierce response from senior Murdoch journalists, with opinion headlines like ‘too many fogeys, not enough people' " he says. "Beazley subsequently changed his tune, announcing in August that he was in favor in increased immigration.." He says thee is also something "deeply wrong" in the culture of some parts of the ABC's news and current-affairs sections: "You could tune into a whole year of the ABC's TV News and 7.30 Report and discover only that our high immigration policy is good and inevitable, and that anyone who questions it is probably a secret member of the Hitler Youth League. "The vast majority of Australians who oppose high immigration are misrepresented as a small and suspect minority, while the tiny minority who endorse it are falsely misrepresented as responsible mainstream opinion." Another active early ESP. member was poet, broadcaster and 1997 Canberran of the Year Anne Edgewroth, who says it is "logical" that ESP., now a national organization, began in Canberra. "Canberra is unique. It's larger than a country town but smaller than any of the other capital cities, so it's still comparatively easy to get from one end to the other," she says. "It's always had a highly educated population because of the Public Service and the universities, and it's always had an attraction for writers; and it has a very pleasant physical environment there's this quality of the city, surrounded by the Brindabellas and the alps, which places it apart in a way." Concern about population only "crept up fairly gradually" on Duncan Waddell. He says he began to think seriously about it when he was senior immigration officer at the Australian consulate in New York from 1966 to 1969: "I became aware of America's huge conurbations and the pressures of population in those tremendous cities, and I began to wonder whether this was a direction we ought to be heading in. I gradually realized we were going to end up with wall-to-wall people, which seemed to me a pretty horrible prospect. We were destroying all the farmlands and the forests and the wild places and all the other species, and pretty soon there would be nothing but people." The greatest single step forward in ESP's development has been the establishment in 1996 of the Sustainable Population Fund under the triple trusteeship of former Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Commission chairwoman Dr. Loitja O'Donoghue, Canberra lawyer Margaret Brewster, and University House Master Rafe de Crespigny. The fund, which for the first time has allowed tax deductibility to be claimed for donations to ESP, has attracted major donations from individuals, and the money has been used to set up a national office in Canberra and pay a full-time employee, national director Edwina Barton. Barton says that although ESP. has undoubtedly raised the level of public discussion of population growth, in one way its very success has worked against it because the "pro-growth lobby" has intensified its efforts, in the last two years in particular. "What we are seeing now is a massively resourced backlash by the pro-growth lobby to regain public and political support for endless population growth," she says. "The big problem for us is that we don't have the human or financial resources to match them." Founding member Hugh Oldham says, "ESP. has at least made a big dent in the smugness of the pro-growthers and that's as much as I thought we'd ever be able to do. Most politicians don't want to listen to what we are saying because they don't think it will produce anything useful for them in three years." ----------------------------------------------------------------- NPG Population-News Listserve http://www.npg.org To subscribe: send e-mail to MAJORDOMO@NPG.ORG with the message text: subscribe population-news ----------------------------------------------------------------- --------------3C373907889009079E841B47-- From rcollins@netlink.com.au Wed Nov 11 06:18:42 1998 Received: from netlink.com.au (merlin.netlink.com.au [203.16.172.196]) by csf.Colorado.EDU (8.9.1a/8.9.1/ITS-5.0/csf) with ESMTP id GAA18476 for ; Wed, 11 Nov 1998 06:17:23 -0700 (MST) Received: from netlink.com.au (h150.mel.netlink.com.au [203.62.225.150]) by netlink.com.au (8.8.8/8.8.8) with ESMTP id AAA08621 for ; Thu, 12 Nov 1998 00:21:59 +1100 Message-ID: <36498E1E.EA8071C2@netlink.com.au> Date: Thu, 12 Nov 1998 00:16:14 +1100 From: rc&am Reply-To: rcollins@netlink.com.au MIME-Version: 1.0 To: PROGRESSIVE POPULATION NETWORK Subject: [Fwd: sterilisation] Content-Type: multipart/mixed; boundary="------------8AABE1B03701847BFA7C6AB7" This is a multi-part message in MIME format. --------------8AABE1B03701847BFA7C6AB7 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit --------------8AABE1B03701847BFA7C6AB7 Content-Type: message/rfc822; name="nsmail6I.TMP" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Content-Disposition: inline; filename="nsmail6I.TMP" Message-ID: <3648625C.713AA714@netlink.com.au> Date: Wed, 11 Nov 1998 02:57:16 +1100 From: rc&am Reply-To: rcollins@netlink.com.au MIME-Version: 1.0 To: Ed Glaze III Subject: Re: sterilisation References: <01be0bfd$788d2520$516039cc@eglaze.vsta.com> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Mr glaze, i will not take you up on all the dubious propositions resting behind your seemingly concerned arguments. i will however ask you one specific question re your comment below: Ed Glaze III wrote: > Pharmaceutical companies also > need to test their procedures and in some cases they may be > doing so in methods that take advance of the poor or others. Namely: have you - or do you still - support the trials of quinacrine sterilisation? angela --------------8AABE1B03701847BFA7C6AB7-- From dhenwood@panix.com Wed Nov 11 08:06:24 1998 Received: from mail1.panix.com (mail1.panix.com [166.84.0.212]) by csf.Colorado.EDU (8.9.1a/8.9.1/ITS-5.0/csf) with ESMTP id IAA24203 for ; Wed, 11 Nov 1998 08:05:06 -0700 (MST) Received: from [166.84.250.86] (dhenwood.dialup.access.net [166.84.250.86]) by mail1.panix.com (8.8.8/8.8.8/PanixM1.3) with ESMTP id KAA11045 for ; Wed, 11 Nov 1998 10:05:03 -0500 (EST) X-Sender: dhenwood@popserver.panix.com Message-Id: In-Reply-To: <01be0cc3$af877a00$516039cc@eglaze.vsta.com> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Date: Wed, 11 Nov 1998 10:05:08 -0500 To: PROGRESSIVE POPULATION NETWORK From: Doug Henwood Subject: Re: overpopulation & Malthus Ed Glaze III wrote: >I though that Angela and I could carry on out little debate >off the list but I guess I was mistaken. > >The basis of her recent Malthus message was evidently >to counter the links I gave her for publications that had >special issues on Malthus. Here are a few URLs for >online information. The other links are shown in my >message to Angela below. Do any of these links contain the bit where Malthus recommended building houses for the poor near polluted bodies of water, so they die earlier? I believe this has been suppressed in subsequent editions of his masterpiece. Doug From eglaze@vsta.com Wed Nov 11 17:59:33 1998 Received: from rivendell.vsta.com (rivendell.vsta.com [204.57.96.15]) by csf.Colorado.EDU (8.8.5/8.8.4/CNS-4.1p-nh) with ESMTP id RAA00765 for ; Wed, 11 Nov 1998 17:59:28 -0700 (MST) Received: from eglaze.vsta.com (eglazeADSL.vsta.com [204.57.96.81]) by rivendell.vsta.com (8.8.8/8.8.6) with SMTP id TAA03553; Wed, 11 Nov 1998 19:01:26 -0600 (CST) From: "Ed Glaze III" To: "KZPG Overpopulation News Network" , "PPN Listserv" Subject: 2 articles on Chinese population policy Date: Wed, 11 Nov 1998 19:04:45 -0600 Message-ID: <01be0dd8$6fe30ac0$516039cc@eglaze.vsta.com> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit X-Priority: 3 X-MSMail-Priority: Normal X-MimeOLE: Produced By Microsoft MimeOLE V4.71.1712.3 Notice of this article was given to me by Keith Hurt ________ Ed Glaze IS ONE ENOUGH? Will China's generation without siblings break away from the one-child rule? by Vivienne Walt SALON Nov. 11, 1998 LANGXIA TOWNSHIP, China -- Just as the Chinese New Year celebrations exploded across the country last February, Hong Yuanqing and Xiong Jianrong threw a party to mark their wedding. They registered their marriage with the local Communist Party committee in this district north of Shanghai, and eight months later, on a brisk autumn day in October, sat on a hard bench in Langxia's "newlywed class," discussing the finer details of sex and love. Slightly built, with big glasses and a blue V-neck sweater, Hong, a 27-year-old hairdresser, doesn't look like the avant-garde of a country in the midst of major social upheaval. His soft voice barely breaks through the echoing din in the crowded classroom, and he visibly blushes each time he looks at his 25-year-old wife, whose hair, drawn back in a ponytail, frames a pale face and drops over a sedate maroon suit. But this couple is as good a mark as any of China's vast changes. Inside the classroom, there are astonishingly few inhibitions: The discussion this day ranges from why some men ejaculate too soon to how they can bring their women to orgasm before they ejaculate. The newlywed classes are only for married or engaged couples, whose bosses release them from work one afternoon a month to participate. Still, the topics would have been unthinkable nearly a decade ago, when the public newlywed classes first began in many Chinese towns. The teacher, a young woman, stands in the front of the classroom wearing a plastic apron on which is printed, to scale, the female anatomy -- a walking instructional tool. Yet for all this racy material, the talk among the couples inevitably reverts to the one crucial question intruding in all their lives: the government's policy to persuade, cajole and often compel couples to have only one child. "Here we learn about contraception," says Hong. "We're using condoms right now. But soon we'll plan to have a child." Then comes the zinger: "And if we're rich enough, we'll have two or three. We would like three." When Americans consider whether to have another child, they weigh factors like paying for education or a bigger house. But having a second child can be far costlier than that in China. In Langxia the government levies huge fines on couples who transgress family-planning rules by giving birth to more than one child. In a system that varies wildly across the country, here couples are fined about one-quarter of their annual income for each of the first five years of this surplus human being's life. And so, like much else in China's new freewheeling capitalism, you can, for a price, purchase your privileges, including those in the most intimate areas of your life. Even with parts of Asia in economic crisis, Hong and Xiong each still earn 10,000 yuan, or $1,250, a year, a handsome sum for a small-town Chinese couple. At this rate, they will be able to buy their way into a bigger family. And that's a very unsettling thought for government officials, charged with administering perhaps the most controversial and tightly controlled population program in history. Last month, for the first time ever, China's State Family Planning Commission, one of the country's most pervasive bureaucracies, invited a group of foreign journalists to tour the country and see how the government has dramatically eased the country's population problem -- or at least see its version of the success story. In a trip the Rockefeller Foundation in New York facilitated and financed, we received rare access to neighborhood clinics, factory health posts and rural families, and met with top family-planning officials in Beijing and Shanghai. It's been nearly 20 years since China imposed a policy dictating reproduction quotas. The policies are a labyrinth of regulations, varying greatly from district to district, and often resting on the quirky discretion of local officials. Still, some tough rules apply. No one in the big cities is permitted to have more than one child without facing dire fines: In Shanghai, where about 16 million people are crammed within the city limits, couples who have a second child are fined three times their total annual earnings, a kind of "social-compensation tax," as one official interviewed put it. One-child parents also get rewarded when they retire, with 2,300 yuan (about $287); childless retirees receive double that. In many places, women still need permission from their work units or local party committees to conceive a second child, and if they go ahead without that permission, local officials "encourage" -- the word I heard several officials use -- them to have an abortion. If they fail to abort, the government can deny the new baby the free schooling and health care due its fellow citizens. In rural areas, couples are permitted to have a second child only if the first is a girl -- an unabashed disappointment for many -- and then only after waiting four years from their first child's birth. And in remote areas, and among China's 55 ethnic minorities, there are no rules at all -- partly because enforcing them would likely be a bureaucratic fiasco. Ever since the party introduced its policies in 1979, Western governments have howled about human-rights abuses. Between 1986 and 1993, U.S. funds earmarked for the United Nations Population Fund were frozen, and although President Clinton lifted the freeze as one of his first acts as president, Congress continues to bar any U.S. funding from being spent on population projects in China -- the world's most populous country, with 1.24 billion people. Western attacks certainly found rich fodder in the grueling stories of forced abortions and sterilization, and of overzealous local officials, given extra funds for keeping population figures down, seizing the houses and furniture of families after the birth of a second child. Baby girls abandoned in orphanages have become poster children for the international furor over China's one-child policy, as well as a gold mine for American adoptive parents. By the late '80s, there was an alarming disparity between the number of boys and girls counted in the official Chinese census, apparently because man couples simply aborted girl fetuses, or gave birth to them secretly. But that, say Chinese officials, was then. "We were never coercive," Li Hong-Gui, vice minister of family planning, told us in Beijing. "Some parts of China did this, but central government didn't support it," he said, before adding this frosty comment: "The West has its own opinions about our policies. Maybe some Western journalists are just not friendly to China." In fact, despite their anxieties about what we journalists might unearth, the Chinese officials had impressive successes to tout. With an economic boom in recent years, they have flooded many parts of the country with free contraceptive services, rather than, as in the early one-child years, routinely fitting every woman with an often hazardous intrauterine device and then invariably sterilizing her after she gave birth. On a rainy afternoon in Shanghai, I watched a worker at a printing house upstairs from the factory discuss with a nurse how to choose from an array of contraceptives. Across the city, one local committee seemed to encourage couples to linger in the little fluorescent-lit family-planning clinic by displaying a cabinet filled with some tempting extras for sale: condom rings, vibrators and porno videos to spice up the sex lives of their quiet, one-child families. Such user-friendly services would be envied by most American women. But almost every official interviewed boasted of something far less tangible: a dramatic change in the mind-set of Chinese youth, most of whom, they say, have lost any desire they might once have had to have more than one child. Few scenes could capture so well what's happened within one generation as observing a class at a vocational college in Luwan, a Shanghai district of about 800,000 people. When asked who had a brother or sister, the 16 teenagers glanced around confusedly and shook their heads, as if they had been asked which family had a Great Dane at home. Finally, after a pause, one girl in jeans and sneakers raised her hand and said: "I do, my sister and I were born before the policy." All heads swung around in curiosity. When asked whether they wanted more than one child, no one in the class said yes, or perhaps none had the nerve to say so. In a country desperately short of housing, most of them are squeezed into decrepit apartments with extended families, and finding more space is a daunting prospect under any circumstances. And besides, an entire generation has simply lost the experience of having siblings; so effective has the party's social engineering been that few of them contemplate the possibility. "It is good for our country to have just one child," said one boy in class, echoing many other such statements. During their parents' generation, Mao Zedong was still preaching to couples to have big families as a way of beefing up the Communist ranks during the Cold War. China's population soared during Mao's rule. By the mid-'70s, shortly before these students were born, China was facing a population powder keg. Between 1970 and 1975, Chinese women had an average of 4.9 children; today it's 1.8. Demographers now think the world's population will hit its peak in 2050, at around 9.4 billion people, about 500 million fewer than earlier predictions. And in some part, we have the Chines Communist Party to thank. But can the sentiments of those Shanghai students win out? The government has good reason to worry, since in 1979, it included one crucial loophole to its one-child policies: that if two only-children marry, they would be permitted to have a second child. As the country gears up for next year's 50-year celebration of Communist rule, China's first only-child generation is beginning to think about marriage, and that loophole is coming home to roost. The one-child party line is ubiquitous. But you needn't dig very deep to find the same lingering doubts about one-child families that Americans argue over so passionately: that only children are overindulged, that they are socially backward. "Perhaps she's lonely," one Beijing journalist said to me over lunch, about her daughter. "I worry a little. I try to see she has other children to play with." In the Shanghai neighborhood of Hongchu, only six out of the 999 households have two children, and, said one official, "They are all twins." "Are the parents treated badly? Are the children scorned?" I asked. "No," she said. "We all celebrate! We think they are very lucky." Even with its one-child policies, China still adds about 20 million people a year -- about three New York Cities, or more than one Australia. And there's good reason to wonder whether second children might one day become a status symbol among the nouveau riche -- living proof of a comfortable life, but one that could severely throw off the country's population growth. China's new generation is beginning to like its experiments with individualism, and as yet, there's no knowing whether childbearing might become another way of distinguishing oneself. Back in Langxia, Hong and Xiong, at least, have already broken with the official line. How many more there are like them will emerge during the next decade or so, as Chinese couples weigh their country's health against their children's. "We each have one brother," says Hong. "We want our children to have siblings, too." ----------------------------------------- ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- ------ NPG Population-News Listserve http://www.npg.org To unsubscribe: send e-mail to MAJORDOMO@NPG.ORG with the message text: unsubscribe population-news ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- ------ Population Control Measures Upped for Anticipated Baby Boom (c) 1998 Agence France Presse) BEIJING, Nov. 04, 1998 -- (Agence France Presse) China has launched an extensive campaign to promote later marriages and childbirth well ahead of an anticipated fourth baby boom at the end of the next decade, the state-run Xinhua news agency said Wednesday. Another peak period of rapid birth increases was expected between 2009-2014 due to the population structure, Xinhua said citing Yang Kuifu, vice-minister of the State Family Planning Commission. "China will witness over 20 million births annually during the period even if fertility rate of Chinese women is strictly controlled at two children," said Yang. "Therefore, controlling population growth will be at the top of the agenda for [a] long period of time to come," he added. Yang said the goal of the campaign was to promote new concepts of marriage and fertility which were beneficial to the family planning policy and would be carried out in all provinces, municipalities and autonomous regions. "The new concepts include later marriage and later births, healthier births and nurturing, girls are just as good as boys and men also bear responsibility for family planning," he said. Chinese, particularly rural residents, still hold to traditional beliefs that more children mean more happiness and only male children will carry on the family line. Surveys have shown a slight imbalance in birth rates of male and female children in recent years indicating the continuing general tendency to favor male offspring. Yang said both intensive and extensive publicity would be required to erase old concepts from the minds of many people and help sustain a low and balanced birth rate. "The effort will represent a long-term struggle between old and new concepts," Zhang Weiqing, minister in charge of State Family Planning Commission, was quoted saying. "We will exert every possible effort to enlighten more people." Six villages in central China's Henan Province have been selected to promote the new concepts of marriage and fertility. A sample survey last year recorded a population of 1.236 billion. The population is expected to hit 1.3 billion in 2000 and continue to climb to 1.6 billion by the middle of the next century before beginning to decline. From ttoal@jps.net Wed Nov 11 19:32:21 1998 Received: from smtp2.jps.net (smtp2.jps.net [209.63.224.235]) by csf.Colorado.EDU (8.8.5/8.8.4/CNS-4.1p-nh) with ESMTP id TAA10141 for ; Wed, 11 Nov 1998 19:32:19 -0700 (MST) Received: from jps.net (209-142-59-138.stk.jps.net [209.142.59.138]) by smtp2.jps.net (8.9.0/8.8.5) with ESMTP id SAA20613 for ; Wed, 11 Nov 1998 18:34:00 -0800 (PST) Message-ID: <364A4811.F5135DB@jps.net> Date: Wed, 11 Nov 1998 18:29:38 -0800 From: Ted Toal MIME-Version: 1.0 To: ppn Subject: The Poor and The Rich Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit George Alter tried to post something but it didn't appear. I'd like to respond, so I'll quote what he said here: <<< The overpopulationist position may not intend to "blame" the poor, but it certainly puts the burden of population control on the poor countries of the world.>>> I don't think it has to be that way at all, at least if you are talking financial burden. I believe the developed countries should be shouldering a good deal, if not most, of the financial burden of fertility reduction. Now if you are saying that the poor countries are the ones that have the burden of lowering their fertility rate, yes, of course I'd have to agree with that, but surely you can't be saying that they should not have to be subject to such a burden! <<< Fertility in the rich countries is already below replacement level. Although we are still growing because of echoes of the baby boom of the 1950s, in the next century Europe, North America, and Japan will go below ZPG to negative population growth.>>> This will not happen unless we reduce immigration, which at this point seems unlikely. In the U.S., fertility is not yet below replacement level, and in California it is about 2.5 because of larger families of Hispanic immigrants. It is my hope that the strong downward trend in fertility in the developing countries will continue, and a below-replacement rate will be reached in a decade or so, leading to NPG sometime towards the middle or end of the 21st century. <<< Furthermore, any further decline in the birth rate will only exacerbate the problem of funding future old age pensions, which still depend upon transfers from the young to the old.>>> This may be true, but its just another problem that has to be solved somehow other than by continuing to overpopulate the planet. I have to admit that this is one problem I've paid little attention to. Realize that there will be both negative and positive benefits of NPG, but I believe the positive ones will far outway the negative ones. <<< So, if the world is to move closer to ZPG, the burden of change must be in the poor countries that still have relatively high birth rates.>>> So you ARE saying what I thought you couldn't possibly be saying! This makes no sense. You are saying, "The world may be overpopulated, but because it is the poor countries for the most part (excluding U.S.) that need to reduce their fertility rates, that is too big a burden for them, so we'll just have to continue growing the population." <<< There is one alternative that could smooth the transition. If the rich countries would allow more immigration from the poor countries, the taxes paid by the immigrants would help to fund old age pensions in rich countries and also ease population pressures in the poor countries. Since the fertility of immigrant populations is lower than fertility in sending regions, this would reduce birth rates globally as well. >>> I think you are dead wrong here. Let me give my reasoning. First, this would have several negative effects: (1) immigrants take on the consumption rate of the receiving region, so they are basically moving from a low-consumption region to a high-consumption one. The net effect is to increase impacts on the environment. (2) Though their fertility might be lower than the sending region, it is generally HIGHER than the receiving region, leading to an increase in fertility in the receiving region, which, having a higher consumption level, further increases environmental impacts. (3) Such immigration is usually of unskilled laborers, and so it lowers the availability of unskilled jobs in the receiving country, which are already in short supply. This further hurts the welfare of the poor in the receiving country. The second problem with your suggestion is that it simply wouldn't help the sending country. Even a large increase in immigration rates would not put more than a slight dent in the population of the sending countries. And furthermore, most of those leaving are the ones who are a bit more well-off, a bit more educated than the average. Immigration acts as a brain drain on the sending countries. Another thing to consider is that immigration is pretty disruptive to families. People don't immigrate to a totally different culture out of choice. That can't be an easy thing to do. I don't think we should be encouraging it, although agribusiness and certain other businesses that depend on low wage labor would certainly like it. The solution is to improve conditions in the sending country, not try to use immigration as a relief valve for them. <<< Anti-immigrant rhetoric is fueling the rise of neo-fascist parties in Europe, and most political parties (e.g. the U.S.) are afraid of the issue.>>> Immigration is certainly a tough issue to deal with. The accusations of racism fly like crazy, often totally unjustified, yet at the same time fully understandable given humanity's past history of racism. The neo-fascists just add fuel to the fire. We need to keep talking about it and try to understand one another. Ted Toal From ttoal@jps.net Wed Nov 11 19:40:57 1998 Received: from smtp2.jps.net (smtp2.jps.net [209.63.224.235]) by csf.Colorado.EDU (8.8.5/8.8.4/CNS-4.1p-nh) with ESMTP id TAA11036 for ; Wed, 11 Nov 1998 19:40:54 -0700 (MST) Received: from jps.net (209-142-59-138.stk.jps.net [209.142.59.138]) by smtp2.jps.net (8.9.0/8.8.5) with ESMTP id SAA24207 for ; Wed, 11 Nov 1998 18:43:37 -0800 (PST) Message-ID: <364A4A52.AFFA6D9B@jps.net> Date: Wed, 11 Nov 1998 18:39:14 -0800 From: Ted Toal MIME-Version: 1.0 To: ppn Subject: Rational Replies to Mr. Glaze Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Angela said: "despite all this waving about of rationality and the facts, such thinking is actually mired in idiocy and ignorance." and: "no one is suffering because of overpopulation. there is no scarcity. mathus was wrong when he was writing, and you are wong now." Such absolute statements that you are right and the other is wrong, not even giving any support for your position, serve no purpose other than to cause people to ignore you. About the only message coming thru from you that I'm getting is that you're angry. Ted Toal. From rcollins@netlink.com.au Wed Nov 11 22:51:26 1998 Received: from netlink.com.au (merlin.netlink.com.au [203.16.172.196]) by csf.Colorado.EDU (8.8.5/8.8.4/CNS-4.1p-nh) with ESMTP id WAA19381 for ; Wed, 11 Nov 1998 22:51:21 -0700 (MST) Received: from netlink.com.au (h115.mel.netlink.com.au [203.62.225.115]) by netlink.com.au (8.8.8/8.8.8) with ESMTP id QAA03289 for ; Thu, 12 Nov 1998 16:55:56 +1100 Message-ID: <364A770A.34A52C33@netlink.com.au> Date: Thu, 12 Nov 1998 16:50:02 +1100 From: rc&am Reply-To: rcollins@netlink.com.au MIME-Version: 1.0 To: PROGRESSIVE POPULATION NETWORK Subject: [Fwd: overpopulation] Content-Type: multipart/mixed; boundary="------------53A6D2AF18D74BD1AE5DDC84" This is a multi-part message in MIME format. --------------53A6D2AF18D74BD1AE5DDC84 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit --------------53A6D2AF18D74BD1AE5DDC84 Content-Type: message/rfc822; name="nsmail7Q.TMP" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Content-Disposition: inline; filename="nsmail7Q.TMP" X-POP3-Rcpt: rcollins@merlin Return-Path: Received: from kryten.ipax.com.au (kryten.ipax.com.au [203.29.72.3]) by netlink.com.au (8.8.8/8.8.8) with SMTP id HAA23340 for ; Thu, 12 Nov 1998 07:45:38 +1100 Received: from server01.rie.net.au (server01.rie.net.au [203.30.170.10]) by kryten.ipax.com.au (8.6.11/8.6.9) with ESMTP id GAA22683; Thu, 12 Nov 1998 06:52:28 +1100 Received: from vucqprlj ([203.30.170.50]) by server01.rie.net.au (8.8.7/8.8.7) with SMTP id HAA07545; Thu, 12 Nov 1998 07:39:06 +1100 From: "margaret" To: "Ed Glaze III" , Cc: Subject: Re: overpopulation Date: Thu, 12 Nov 1998 06:19:34 -0800 Message-ID: <01be0e47$793c1480$LocalHost@vucqprlj> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit X-Priority: 3 X-MSMail-Priority: Normal X-MimeOLE: Produced By Microsoft MimeOLE V4.71.1712.3 >Hello there, > Thought you might like some more information on the pamphlet mentioned. I am one of the distributors and have contacted the editor who got the publication together so she may respond herself. " A New Face of Eugenics: The Myth of Overpopulation - A Collection of Articles About Attempts to Control the Bodies and Fertility of Third World Women; is a selection of articles which challenge, in various ways, mainstream Western notions of overpopulation. The views presented are varied and sometimes contradictory, which unlike explanations presented in the mainstream media may require some though on the part of the reader. Since the dominant Western discourse son population levels, poverty in the Third World and the state of the environment tends to be the voices of rich white men, using so-called scientific evidence and objectivity; the following articles are (mostly) deliberately the voices of those most affected - poor women and women of colour. These voices are rarely heard in the West, even in so-called "activist" circles, and it is perhaps for this reason that many Western activists, be they feminists or environmentalists have not challenged traditional racist and sexist notions of overpopulation. Conservatism on this issue amongst many feminists and environmentalists has allowed the engineers of eugenci depopulating policies to co-opt the language and ideas of these movements, and sometimes even their direct support." From the Introduction. Contents: 1. New Shift in Depopulating Strategy - Introduction: in the context of Bangladesh Cyclone by Farida Akhter, reprinted from Depopulating Bangladesh - Essays on the Politics of Fertility and Reproductive Rights.1996. Narigrantha Prabartana, 2/8 Sir Syed Road, Mohammadpur, Dhaka 1207, Bangladesh Tel 318428 Fax 880-2-813065. 2. Family Planning: Population Control in Drag by David Morrison http://www.pop.org/students/contrary.html 3. UBINIG: Declaration of the People's Perspectives on "Population" Symposium; reprinted from Radically Speaking: Feminism Reclaimed, edited by Diane Bell and Renate Klein, Spinifex Press, Victoria 1996. 4. People or Population: Towards a new Ecology of reproduction by Maria Miles and Vandana Shiva, reprinted from Ecofeminism. 5. Racism, Birth Control and Reproduction (excerpt) by Angela Davis, reprinted from Women, Race and Class, The Women's Press, London 1981. 6. Politic of "Population" as a number and "Ecology" as the crisis of the natural system (excerpt) by Farida Akhter reprinted from Depopulating Bangladesh (details given above). Given the present 1998 floods in Bangladesh; the Farida Akhter article seems reinforced, today we hear the same "too many poor people cause environmental destruction" media-massaged ideology which is the agenda of eugenic, racist and anti-poor exploiters. The other articles are also still pertinent. You wrote: >Didn't you notice in my message about the book that I said, >"it seems he (?) is promoting a booklet?" When you did not put >your name at the end of your post how was I to know you were >a female. I think I did the right thing by saying I was not familiar >with you and putting a question mark after he. Unfortunately it >is a widely known fault of the English language that there is not >a gender neutral personal pronoun. > To prejudge someone to be male or female says most about the prejudice of the person who assumes to know which, is then defensive to be corrected, competitive in contrast of ideas adn authoritarian in concluding to exclude the subjects of "over population" over half the world are women! English language, the language of imperialism was enforced on the Scottish, Welsh, Cornish, Irish through land enclosures, military and industrial conscription. Bloody trade war expansion in Europe and then to Americas, Africa and Asia made it the language of white men. Continuing with the growth of US based Corporate capitalism ensured all trade related movement ie air-traffic, shipping, telephone exchanges, now computer and satellite developments are primarily the same continuous racket. Derided as "political correctness" attempts by women, indigenous peoples, people of colour, gays & lesbians, to modify language for their own culture is denounced as divisive eg something as simple as Canadians speaking two languages ie French and English or officially recognising Spanish as second language in US (why do "Latin Americans" speak Spanish & Portuguese, same bloody history of European trade war expansion... >I also posted URLs and other information about Barricade Books >to make it easier for others to find out more about the book you >mentioned. Your initial post would have been better if you had >included such information along with a review of the book. I will >assume that you did read it since it was only 36 pages. > Thanks for passing on the information. >You are right about my certainty that overpopulation is a fact and >is threatening the world. I am not sure how it could be otherwise. >We have 6 billion people growing to 9 billion within most of our >lifetimes. We can witness or read about the vast environmental >degradation that has already taken place and will continue. > If Industrial Society collapsed due to a Y2 computer crash the "over population" would be seen as not a problem for a Military Tyranny ie "soylent green" we eat the numbers into "military intelligence" (oxymoron!) official balance! Or a better scenario, we only eat, or at least compost, the "overpopulated" rich, abolish all Borders and allow people to move freely so they can live in sustainable bioregional areas instead.The rich have always tried to lock the poor out of land they originally owned as indigenous people and were evicted from. >I do not doubt that some of the problems suffered by women, >such as those you mention, are serious and examples of abuse. >I do not deny that there are many problems with the increasing >wealth and power of multinational corporations and the financial >establishment such as the IMF. Pharmaceutical companies also >need to test their procedures and in some cases they may be >doing so in methods that take advance of the poor or others. Good at least your ears and eyes are open to the world. >However, I do not agree that these are reason that allow you an >easy dismissal overpopulation as a factor in the problems faced >around the world. > Well that is where you seem to "lose the plot" for me! >Never is overpopulation cited on death certificates as the >cause of death and yet it is obvious that almost all factors >of a society are changed by conditions of overpopulation. Well, "poverty" is never cited either more to the point...in Indonesia to North of Australia at present most people are only eating one poor meal a day while the military eat very well, the rich eat unbelievably well. Is this due to "overpopulation" or the corrupt system of capitalism there? Really!! >Food, water, and resources become more scarce as the >competition increases on the local, regional and international >scales. When there is an ever increasing number of people >the liberties and worth accorded to an individual decreases. >Is it right, no, but it does happen. > Let us turn the golf courses of the world into gardens, grow food trees in every street instead of queueing up to eat expensive, unsustainable, genetically modified crap from supermarkets! >The problems of the poor are worsened by increasing growth, >especially unneeded births, within their families and in their >countries. With no "welfare" State the majority of the people in the world want big families as traditionally families are needed to support each other. If you want to be looked after in your old age you have kids as a basis for community or do you prefer the misery of "nursing homes" run for profit. What about free choice of euthenasia, what about freedom for abortion, contraception decided by women not the Church or State or in your case what about vasectomy? Funny how "sterilisation" of the poor is encouraged but not vasectomy for the ruling male elite now why is that? Duh! Excess population places many demands on the >infrastructure of a country which often cannot keep up. New >schools, additional jobs, and increased food supply are just a >few of examples of the difficulties that politicians everywhere >must deal with when population grows. Population, and immigration, increase jobs, share resources. Here in Australia we have had bigots from the Campaign Against Further Immigration also use such "ecological" arguments. Big lies in their case for a racist agenda, many joined the One Nation Party and opposed "multiculturalism", "single mothers", "special treatment for Aboriginals" "Asianisation" of Australia etc bigoted crap. So when I hear such arguments I see where they have lead here - what are your political interests? >That should not be too difficult to understand but it is difficult to deal with. Perhaps we need a "Green Hitler"? (NOT!) You do know the Nazis saved the Black Forest, encouraged organic food farming, stopped vivisection etc but alas replaced animals with people for experiments, murdered or sterilised "over populating" under classes of their fucked racial hierarchy? >Many countries have cultures that are pro-natalist for religious or other reasons. >Thus the people want to have multiple children and through these >personal decisions contribute to overpopulation and make the >conditions in their country that much tougher. Whether the people >having the kids are rich or poor does not matter, except in the >scale of lifetime consumption which will be much worse for the rich. > Gee can I be rich kid instead of poor, ironically Tuberculosis used to be called "consumption" a reduced lifetime was ensured if you were poor. Do you recommend the rich get TB instead of the poor or are you referring to ostentatious wealth of yuppy types. Really large scale waste is done by military-industrial complex after all. >I do not have an MBA and did not say that I did, though you might >have thought my business management degree was an MBA. >I did drop out of an MBA program when I decided that I did not >want to live a life that required three-piece suits and keeping up >with the Joneses. I have never sought out a high paying job and >have been a very active civic volunteer for many years. > Gee nice to know you have the time, free from poverty (which means you spend most of your life selling your labour), to be a volunteer how about the rest of the world get the same choice..Can I choose to travel freely without a passport as we used to be able to before the First World War (no Gypsy types allowed here!) but too many "agitators", and "ghastly poor people" were getting about, so it had to be run by the State and made profitable for the Corporations. Only "political refugees" (not "economic refugees") are sometimes tolerated. Women escaping arranged marriage or other sexist practices are not allowed official status of course. >The reason I feel I have "the low-down on the facts" about >overpopulation is that I am very well read on the issue. For over >20 years I have been reading environmental books and specializing >in population issues. My personal circumstances and lifestyle have >allowed me the time to do some extensive reading and attend college >to further my education. > How nice for you. The Catholic Church (which is racist, sexist, homophobic etc but is "pro-population") is overpopulated with men whose personal circumstances and lifestyle allow them too "time to do extensive reading and extend their education" despite some differences, you share more in common perhaps than you admit too wanting to control women? >I also browse the internet for population items to share with others. >Did you bother to follow up on any of the URLs I listed in my >earlier posts? They are there to help people become better >informed about population issues. > Disinformation can also be found on the internet. >The demographic trends we face are backed up by scientific >reasoning which is rigorous enough o indicate that there really is >a serious problem. Nothing I have read has been able to convince >me that there is not an overpopulation problem. Just as nothing has >convinced me there is a god. People, for whatever reason, may be >optimistic and attribute the environmental crisis we are in the middle >of to some other factors but I want more than faith. Denial of the >problem does not seem realistic and that is why I seek substantiation >of contrarian views, like those in the booklet you mention. > You seem to have replaced one God (religion) for another (science) yet there is a "third alternative" to question both (no God, No Master!) If a small number of people can get State Power, declare war on their enemies, is that a way to reduce "overpopulation"? or really just a way to keep power!? >There is ample credible writing available which convinces me that >Malthus was not wrong. Whoah - misanthropy! >The conditions that he was concerned about >still exist today and through our excess population we are likely to >exhaust or diminish the non-renewable resources (oil, fresh water, >arable land, rubber, biodiversity, etc) on which our economic societies >depend. Are we exploited and our exploiters equally to blame, should all be "punished"? We have yet to fully pay the price for our foolishness for thinking >we were exempt from the laws of nature. Which laws are they, the law of gravity (repealed by technology) "survival of the fittest" bullshit or really widespread in nature and indigenous society: mutual aid instead? >Our technology has delayed the Malthusian prediction but we have not invalidated it. Hello! Weapons of mass destuction, have delayed misanthropy? For more info on Malthus and how relevant his predictions still are: > Get a life! >Beyond Malthus: > Sixteen Dimensions of the Population Problem > Worldwatch Paper 143 > > >The Social Contract >Volume VIII, Number 3, Spring, 1998: >Theme: Malthus Revisited > > > >________ Ed Glaze > Port Mansfield, TX >"If they don't understand the severity of the problem, >they won't understand the severity of the solution. >Overpopulation must be dealt with." > >(snipped the previous messages -- we have copies of them already) > >------------------------------ > >Below is a population article from Australia that you might have missed. >Unfortunately the Canberra Times does not offer an online search. > > Canberra Crimes is owned by? Pushes the ideology of which class of people in our society? Encourages journalists of which grovelling, non-investigative" (aka "gutless") ilk etc? > >SLOWING THE POPULATION TITANIC >by Tom Gosling >Canberra (Australia) Times -- October 10, 1998 >Copyright 1998 The Canberry Times > > In the movie Titanic the captain, E.J. Smith, receives radio >warnings about icebergs but ignores them because he has been told by the >ship's owner to increase speed. > After ordering the last four boilers lit, Smith pockets the radio >messages and retires to his cabin, a pathetic figure soon to go down with >his ship. > The theme is familiar -- supreme confidence in technology, a >vainglorious conviction that size and power will conquer everything, >deafness to the voices of caution and whammo! -- Mother Nature proves yet >again that she has an ace up her sleeve. > It was precisely to oppose this "bigger, faster and to hell with >the consequences" mentality that a courageous band of souls assembled 10 >years ago. > The half-dozen founding members of Australians for an >Ecologically Sustainable Population first met in the Canberra suburb of >Bruce on October 12, 1988. They resolved to try to convince the public that >Australia's population growth should be halted as soon as possible, and that >the Australian Government should increase foreign aid related to restricting >global population growth. The message has been dismissed as "pessimistic" by >many -- even by some in the environment movement -- but has found >influential supporters. > Opening AESP's national conference in Sydney last year. NSW >Premier Bob Carr congratulated it for raising the issue. "We've got to >dispose once and for all,' he said, "of the notion that Australia is an >underpopulated continent, an empty continent waiting to be filled up." > It's a view that has found support also from some of the icons of >Australian public life: Nugget Coombs, Manning Clark, A.D. Hope, Sir >Macfarlane Burnet, Professor Frank Fenner, Sir Mark Oliphant (who opened the >first national conference in Canberra in 1989) and Judith Wright (AESP's >patron). > Coombs, back in 1977, called for population growth to be >"halted...and stabilized at an ecologically safe level" and in 1988 Wright >complained that the need to control population growth had "not even been >recognized by governments. > "Australia is perhaps one of the last countries on Earth in a >position to ensure that its population does not exceed its resources," she >said. "With its enormous problems of land degradation, water and rising >pollution levels, Australia is far from being limitless." > Others who share this view have included Sydney University >professors Charles Birch and Jonathon Stone. In 1994, the Australian >Academy of Science recommended the Australian Academy of Science recommended >that Australia encourage contraception and limit its net annual immigration >too so that the population would stabilize at 23 million in the year 2040. > More recently, author Tim Flannery, whose book and TV series The >Future Eaters have been widely acclaimed, has argued that Australia's >long-term sustainable population is probably well below its present size. >Professor Ian Lowe, chairman of Australia's first State of the Environment >report, commissioned by the Federal Government, has voiced serious concern >about the environmental impact of population growth. John Coulter, former >leader of the Australian Democrats, went further to become AESP's president >in 1996. > AESP's numbers have grown from the original six to 900, and it >has added branches in Sydney, Melbourne, Adelaide, Perth, south-east >Queensland, Townsville and cairns, yet it has failed (perhaps because of its >insistence on a non-racist immigration policy) to burst upon the national >consciousness in the way one Nation has. May I draw your attention back to my comment about One Nation and its "overpopulation" anti-immigration" etc tendencies. The journalist is too lazy to even draw in the similarities let alone challange this bullshit. For example what indigenous Australians have called alarm at "overpopulation"? Instead they see the way the Colonisers have abused the land and water for profit as key to the problems not "immigration" etc. > A major obstacle, it believes, is that powerful commercial >interests particularly in real estate, construction and the media are >applying strong pressure on the leadership of both major political parties >to ensure that Australia's population growth continues, even accelerates, >regardless of the environmental consequences and regardless of the opinions >of the passengers. AESP, funded entirely by donations and modest membership >fees, has held conferences, sponsored public lectures and debates, lobbied >politicians, issued press statements, prepared submissions for inquiries, >written articles and letters to editors, distributed leaflets just about >everything a group can do to get across its message, short of demonstrations >and standing for Parliament. > In terms of what has happened in population growth, however, it >has had about as much success as the radio operators had in slowing down the >Titanic. > During most of the 10 years of AESP's existence, Australia has >had the world's highest per-capita rate of immigration, and our population >has grown by 2.3 million to 18.8 million. The rate of population growth >slowed during the decade, but is showing signs of picking up again. The >annual growth rate peaked at 1.7 per cent in 1989, and slowed gradually to >1.1 per cent last year. > The latest Australian Bureau of Statistics figures, however, show >it increasing again. Last month's Australian Demographic Statistics give >our population rate as 1.2 per cent and our net overseas migration is more >than having been down to less than in 1997. > In combination with a relatively high fertility rate for OECD >nations (1.77 children per woman) Australia's population is on track to >continue rapid growth. At the current rate, our population will be about 27 >million, and growing, by the middle of next century. It's a depressing >prospect for the "father" of AESP., retired CSIRO soil scientist Dr. Chris >Watson. > Now 63, he was responsible for monitoring the soils of the Murray >Irrigation Area in the 1970's: "I could see the land deteriorating before my >very eyes, with increasing salinity, especially around Deniliquin and >northern Victoria." > A few years later he became a councilor of the Australian >Conservation Foundation and, at its quarterly meetings in Melbourne, struck >up a friendship with a like-minded Monash University sociology professor Bob >Birrell. > When Bob Birrell came to the ANU's Centre for Resource and >Environment Studies for a year's sabbatical in 1987-88, they started a >newsletter Population Stability for Australia, which spawned AESP. Watson >says, "I found I couldn't get many people interested at CSIRO, or in science >circles generally, but I did notice that there were people writing letters >to the Canberra Times so I phoned them and asked them if they wanted to form >a group. I didn't get a single knock-back." > The first meeting of AESP. was held at the home of radar engineer >Greg Dunstone and librarian wife Eileen. Those present included poet Mark >O'Conner, retired Bureau of Mineral Resources geologist Hugh Oldham, >Australian Democrats political adviser Jenny Goldie (formerly Jenny >Macleod), a former assistant secretary in the Immigration Department, >Duncan Waddell, and CSIRO staff member Peter Martin. > O'Conner says, "We didn't realize the intense negativity of much >of the media. At first, the letters to the editor page, especially of The >Canberra Times, was one of the few places where these new ideas were >permitted. > "We've also held our membership against a long-entrenched >ideology of growth from newspapers like The Australian, which has >consistently run a propaganda campaign on the virtues of high immigration." > As an example, he cited ALP leader Kim Beazley's announcement >earlier this year that the ALP would introduce an environmentally >responsible population policy when next in office. > "It drew a fierce response from senior Murdoch journalists, with >opinion headlines like ‘too many fogeys, not enough people' " he says. >"Beazley subsequently changed his tune, announcing in August that he was in >favor in increased immigration.." > He says thee is also something "deeply wrong" in the culture of >some parts of the ABC's news and current-affairs sections: "You could tune >into a whole year of the ABC's TV News and 7.30 Report and discover only >that our high immigration policy is good and inevitable, and that anyone who >questions it is probably a secret member of the Hitler Youth League. > "The vast majority of Australians who oppose high immigration are >misrepresented as a small and suspect minority, while the tiny minority who >endorse it are falsely misrepresented as responsible mainstream opinion." > Another active early ESP. member was poet, broadcaster and 1997 >Canberran of the Year Anne Edgewroth, who says it is "logical" that ESP., >now a national organization, began in Canberra. > "Canberra is unique. It's larger than a country town but smaller >than any of the other capital cities, so it's still comparatively easy to >get from one end to the other," she says. "It's always had a highly >educated population because of the Public Service and the universities, and >it's always had an attraction for writers; and it has a very pleasant >physical environment there's this quality of the city, surrounded by the >Brindabellas and the alps, which places it apart in a way." > Concern about population only "crept up fairly gradually" on >Duncan Waddell. > He says he began to think seriously about it when he was senior >immigration officer at the Australian consulate in New York from 1966 to >1969: "I became aware of America's huge conurbations and the pressures of >population in those tremendous cities, and I began to wonder whether this >was a direction we ought to be heading in. I gradually realized we were >going to end up with wall-to-wall people, which seemed to me a pretty >horrible prospect. We were destroying all the farmlands and the forests and >the wild places and all the other species, and pretty soon there would be >nothing but people." > The greatest single step forward in ESP's development has been >the establishment in 1996 of the Sustainable Population Fund under the >triple trusteeship of former Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander >Commission chairwoman Dr. Loitja O'Donoghue, (ah nice token, bureaucrat, even One Nation found an Aboriginal person to speak on their platform, just as the Liberal Party found Sir Neville Bonner or before that "black trackers" were used by the State police to hunt down and kill "uncontrollables" who the white cops could not catch otherwise.) Canberra lawyer Margaret >Brewster, and University House Master Rafe de Crespigny. > The fund, which for the first time has allowed tax deductibility >to be claimed for donations to ESP, has attracted major donations from >individuals, and the money has been used to set up a national office in >Canberra and pay a full-time employee, national director Edwina Barton. > Barton says that although ESP. has undoubtedly raised the level >of public discussion of population growth, in one way its very success has >worked against it because the "pro-growth lobby" has intensified its >efforts, in the last two years in particular. > "What we are seeing now is a massively resourced backlash by the >pro-growth lobby to regain public and political support for endless >population growth," she says. "The big problem for us is that we don't have >the human or financial resources to match them." Founding member Hugh >Oldham says, "ESP. has at least made a big dent in the smugness of the >pro-growthers and that's as much as I thought we'd ever be able to do. Most >politicians don't want to listen to what we are saying because they don't >think it will produce anything useful for them in three years." > >Yes must have been a nice "long lunch" and drinkies with the media massagers who got this hack to parrot back all this. Should be a career in there for them in the New World Order alright. Real decision choice here for them which media Baron do I go for Kerry packer richest man in Austrlaia who owns half Australian media or with Rupert Murdoch, now US citrizen, who owns other half? >----------------------------------------------------------------- >NPG Population-News Listserve http://www.npg.org >To subscribe: send e-mail to MAJORDOMO@NPG.ORG >with the message text: subscribe population-news >----------------------------------------------------------------- > > > > > --------------53A6D2AF18D74BD1AE5DDC84-- From rcollins@netlink.com.au Wed Nov 11 22:51:38 1998 Received: from netlink.com.au (merlin.netlink.com.au [203.16.172.196]) by csf.Colorado.EDU (8.8.5/8.8.4/CNS-4.1p-nh) with ESMTP id WAA19389 for ; Wed, 11 Nov 1998 22:51:34 -0700 (MST) Received: from netlink.com.au (h115.mel.netlink.com.au [203.62.225.115]) by netlink.com.au (8.8.8/8.8.8) with ESMTP id QAA03316 for ; Thu, 12 Nov 1998 16:56:17 +1100 Message-ID: <364A771F.837951E4@netlink.com.au> Date: Thu, 12 Nov 1998 16:50:23 +1100 From: rc&am Reply-To: rcollins@netlink.com.au MIME-Version: 1.0 To: PROGRESSIVE POPULATION NETWORK Subject: [Fwd: Fw: Fw ART: New Report Exposes Myths About World Hunger] Content-Type: multipart/mixed; boundary="------------DEFA796B931EF611E594ADFE" This is a multi-part message in MIME format. --------------DEFA796B931EF611E594ADFE Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit --------------DEFA796B931EF611E594ADFE Content-Type: message/rfc822; name="nsmailGP.TMP" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Content-Disposition: inline; filename="nsmailGP.TMP" X-POP3-Rcpt: rcollins@merlin Return-Path: Received: from kryten.ipax.com.au (kryten.ipax.com.au [203.29.72.3]) by netlink.com.au (8.8.8/8.8.8) with SMTP id NAA19492 for ; Thu, 12 Nov 1998 13:50:36 +1100 Received: from server01.rie.net.au (server01.rie.net.au [203.30.170.10]) by kryten.ipax.com.au (8.6.11/8.6.9) with ESMTP id MAA28181; Thu, 12 Nov 1998 12:57:29 +1100 Received: from vucqprlj ([203.30.170.61]) by server01.rie.net.au (8.8.7/8.8.7) with SMTP id NAA10581; Thu, 12 Nov 1998 13:45:32 +1100 From: "margaret" To: , , Subject: Fw: Fw ART: New Report Exposes Myths About World Hunger Date: Thu, 12 Nov 1998 12:21:34 -0800 Message-ID: <01be0e7a$0b4dce40$LocalHost@vucqprlj> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit X-Priority: 3 X-MSMail-Priority: Normal X-MimeOLE: Produced By Microsoft MimeOLE V4.71.1712.3 Hello there! Thought this might be usefull for further discussion on "overpopulation" myths. Margaret From: iww-news@iww.org >Date: Monday, 19 October 1998 22:47 >Subject: New Report Exposes Myths About World Hunger > >>WASHINGTON, Oct. 16 (IPS) - The myth that world hunger is the unavoidable >>result of the forces of nature, coupled with a population explosion, >>prevents policy makers from understanding the real causes of starvation >>worldwide, says a new report. >> >>"The way people think about hunger is the greatest obstacle to ending it," >>says Peter Rosset, director of the California-based Institute for Food and >>Development Policy, in a report released Thursday - World Food Day. >> >>"As millions of people starve, powerful myths block our understanding of >>the true causes of hunger and prevent us from taking effective action to >>end it," Rosset says. >> >>The report - 'World Hunger: Twelve Myths' - says these notions prevent a >>true understanding of the real causes of millions of people starving >>around the world. >> >>"The true source of world hunger is not scarcity but policy; not >>inevitability but politics," says the report. "The real culprits are >>economies that fail to offer everyone opportunities, and societies that >>place economic efficiency over compassion." >> >>Abundance, not scarcity, best describes the world's food supply. The world >>produces enough grain and many other commonly eaten foods to provide at >>least 4.3 pounds of food per person a day, according to the report. >> >>Even as countries have excess food, people still go hungry. In 1997, for >>example, the American Association for the Advancement of Science found >>that, in the developing world, 78 percent of all malnourished children >>aged under five live in countries with food surpluses. >> >>"The problem is that many people are too poor to buy readily available >>food," says Twelve Myths. ''Even though 'hungry countries' have enough >>food for all their people right now, many are net exporters of food and >>other agricultural products." >> >>Believing that scarcity is the problem, many governments and international >>development institutions - like the World Bank - say the answer to solving >>the problem is increasing food production. Dramatic production advances >>of the 1970s known as the 'Green Revolution', did increase grain supplies. >> >>"But focusing narrowly on increasing production cannot alleviate hunger >>because it fails to alter the tightly concentrated distribution of economic >power that determines who can buy the additional food," says the report. >> >>This is why that in several of the biggest Green Revolution successes - >>India, Mexico, and the Philippines for example - grain production and in >>some cases exports, have climbed while hunger has persisted. >> >>That nature is to blame for famine is another popular hunger myth that >>blurs the real causes of starvation. "It's too easy to blame nature; food >>is always available for those who can afford it while starvation during >>hard times hits only the poorest," the report says. >> >>"Millions live on the brink of disaster in south Asia, Africa and >>elsewhere, because they are deprived of land by a powerful few, trapped in >>the unremitting grip of debt, or miserably paid." >> >>Natural events rarely explain deaths, they are simply the final push over >>this brink. Population growth is another mythical cause of hunger, says >>the report. >> >>"Although rapid population growth remains a serious concern in many >>countries, nowhere does population density explain hunger," it says. "For >>every Bangladesh - a densely populated and hungry country - we find a >>Nigeria, Brazil or Bolivia where abundant food resources coexist with >>hunger." >> >>Costa Rica, with only half of Honduras' cropped acres per person, boasts a >>life expectancy - 11 years longer than that of Honduras and close to that >>of developed countries, explains the report. >> >>About half of the myths listed in the report involve false assumptions >>used to develop current food, land and agriculture policy. Large farms, >>the free-market, free trade and more aid from industrialised countries, >>have all been falsely touted as the "cure" to end hunger. >> >>Large landowners who control most of the best land often leave much of it >>idle, says Twelve Myths. "By contrast, small farmers typically achieve at >>least four to five times greater output per acre, in part because they >>work their land more intensively and use integrated, and often more >>sustainable, production systems," it says. >> >>Redistribution of land would give millions of small farmers in developing >>countries the incentive to invest in land improvements, to rotate crops >>and leave land fallow for the sake of long-term soil fertility, according >>to the report. >> >>Comprehensive land reform has markedly increased production in countries >>as different at Japan, Zimbabwe, and Taiwan. A World Bank study of >>northeast Brazil estimates that redistributing farmland into smaller >>holdings would raise output by 80 percent. >> >>Free-markets and lifting tariffs on trade have also been touted as the >>solution to ending world hunger. >> >>"Such a market is good, government is bad formula can never help address >>the causes of hunger," says the report. "Such thinking misleads us into >>believing that a society can opt for one or the other, when in fact every >>economy on earth combines market and government in allocating resources >>and distributing wealth." >> >>Because the market responds to money not actual need, it can only work to >>eliminate hunger when purchasing power is widely dispersed, says the >>report. As the rural poor are increasingly pushed from land, they are less >>and less able to make their demands for food register in the market. >> >>Promoting free trade to alleviate hunger has proven to be a failure, says >>Twelve Myths. In most developing countries exports have boomed while >>hunger has continued unabated or actually worsened, its says. >> >>"While soybean exports boomed in Brazil to feed Japanese and European >>livestock - hunger spread from one-third to two-thirds of the population," >>says the report. >> >>"Where the majority of people have been made too poor to buy the food >>grown on their own country's soil, those who control productive resources >>will, not surprisingly, orient their production to more lucrative markets >>abroad." >> >>Pro-trade policies like the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) >>and the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT) promotes export >>crop production and squeezes out basic food production, it says. Foreign >>aid from industrialised countries, often seen as an essential key to >>ending hunger and famine, has propped up such free trade and free market >>policies. >> >>Foreign aid, says the report, "works directly against the hungry." U.S. >>aid in particular is used to promote exports and food production - not to >>increase the poor's ability to buy food, it adds. "Even emergency, or >>humanitarian aid, which makes up five percent of the total, often ends up >>enriching U.S. grain companies while failing to reach the hungry." >> >>With different policies, says Twelve Myths, the world could feed itself. >> >>"Hunger is caused by decisions made by human beings, and can be ended by >>making different decisions," says Rosset. "Informed social movements like >>those that fought for and won landmark civil rights legislation or >>abolished slavery or helped end the war in Vietnam, can end hunger too." >> >>Following its own call to action, the Institute for Food and Development >>Policy recently launched an "Economic Human Rights" campaign in the >>United States which calls for an end to hunger and poverty in the >>wealthiest country in the world. >> >>"The scientific evidence shows it is possible to eliminate hunger," says >>Rosset. "As societies we have to decide that it is a priority." >>(END/IPS/dk/mk/98) >> >> >>** NOTICE: In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107, this material >>is distributed without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest >>in receiving the included information for research and educational >>purposes. ** >> >> >>***** >>"Messages sent on the IWW-news mailing list are the opinions of the >>individual senders; they do not necessarily represent the views of the IWW. >>IWW-news is for posting information which is relevant to the struggle of >>the working class against our bosses. Visit http://www.iww.org/ for more >>information." >>To subscribe/unsubscribe from the IWW-news mailing list please send e-mail >>to iww-news-request@iww.org with the word "subscribe" or "unsubscribe" as >>the subject of the message. > --------------DEFA796B931EF611E594ADFE-- From Jfoster@OREGON.UOREGON.EDU Thu Nov 12 13:47:06 1998 Received: from oregon.uoregon.edu (oregon.uoregon.edu [128.223.32.18]) by csf.Colorado.EDU (8.8.5/8.8.4/CNS-4.1p-nh) with ESMTP id NAA26206 for ; Thu, 12 Nov 1998 13:47:04 -0700 (MST) Received: from DWOVMCNF.uoregon.edu (d111-206.uoregon.edu) by OREGON.UOREGON.EDU (PMDF V5.1-12 #26538) with SMTP id <01J434QNN9O48WWM7W@OREGON.UOREGON.EDU> for ppn@csf.colorado.edu; Thu, 12 Nov 1998 12:46:59 PST Date: Thu, 12 Nov 1998 12:46:59 -0800 (PST) From: John Bellamy Foster Subject: Re: overpopulation & Malthus X-Sender: Jfoster@oregon.uoregon.edu (Unverified) To: ppn@csf.colorado.edu Message-id: <1.5.4.16.19981112125620.38873e02@oregon.uoregon.edu> MIME-version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Doug, The passage you mention on "building houses near polluted bodies of water" etc., although I doubt that it is to be found on the internet, is from Book IV, Chapter V of the Second Essay. This quote is usually taken out of context and is not as reprehensible as it is usually thought to be, and not anywhere as reprehensible as some of Malthus' other, more provocative statements that produced a storm of criticism in his day. The logic of the passage to which you refer was as follows: if you decide to promote early marriages, and still want to avoid what everyone agrees is the worst of all tragedies (i.e. famine), you should--if you are to be logical (given the fact that population must always stay in equilibrium with food supply) "court the return of the plague," etc. (A key presumption of Malthus' analysis was that moral restraint was not generally possible for the poor, but only for the rich.) This hardly compares to Malthus' other more reprehensible statements such as his contention that infants are of comparatively little value to society (in the context of whether relief should be provided to prevent them from dying of starvation); his claim that the poor had no right to relief; that the poor were not invited to the "mighty feast" of the well to do; that the peasants should be "swept" from the land, etc. By the way, members of this list who are interested in Malthus may pleased to know that the December issue of ORGANIZATION & ENVIRONMENT includes a Bicentennial symposium on Malthus with an extensive introduction to Malthus' population theory by me followed by articles by William Catton, Herman Daly, Tom Athanasiou, Richard Wiltgen, Eric Ross and Martha Gimenez. The same issue also includes articles by David Korten, Edward Herman, Kari Norgaard, Susan Roschke, Peter Grahame and others. Those not familiar with ORGANIZATION & ENVIRONMENT can check out its Web site: http://www.sagepub.co.uk/journals/usdetails/j0151.html List members may be further interested to know that I have written a major article on "Malthus' Essay on Population After 200 Years: A Marxian View" which will appear in the December 1998 issue of MONTHLY REVIEW. John Bellamy Foster At 10:05 AM 11/11/98 -0500, you wrote: >Ed Glaze III wrote: > >>I though that Angela and I could carry on out little debate >>off the list but I guess I was mistaken. >> >>The basis of her recent Malthus message was evidently >>to counter the links I gave her for publications that had >>special issues on Malthus. Here are a few URLs for >>online information. The other links are shown in my >>message to Angela below. > >Do any of these links contain the bit where Malthus recommended building >houses for the poor near polluted bodies of water, so they die earlier? I >believe this has been suppressed in subsequent editions of his masterpiece. > >Doug > > > > From plicysci@frii.com Fri Nov 13 05:01:09 1998 Received: from deimos.frii.com (deimos.frii.com [208.146.240.2]) by csf.Colorado.EDU (8.8.5/8.8.4/CNS-4.1p-nh) with ESMTP id FAA16827 for ; Fri, 13 Nov 1998 05:01:06 -0700 (MST) Received: from frii.com (ftc-0301.dialup.frii.com [216.17.134.97]) by deimos.frii.com (8.9.1a/8.9.1) with ESMTP id FAA11847 for ; Fri, 13 Nov 1998 05:01:01 -0700 (MST) Message-ID: <364C2004.B89B670A@frii.com> Date: Fri, 13 Nov 1998 05:03:16 -0700 From: Jim Talboy X-Accept-Language: en MIME-Version: 1.0 To: ppn@csf.colorado.edu Subject: Let's continue to keep the "debate" public folks. References: <3647A42A.A4B79F3C@jps.net> <364823A9.18782344@frii.com> <364BC6BA.FFF22735@jps.net> Content-Type: multipart/alternative; boundary="------------89EEC5A58FAC5AFFA6240245" --------------89EEC5A58FAC5AFFA6240245 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit No Ted, we'll have to keep the "debate" public. You and Mr. Glaze seem to be frustrated with your reception from the list. I resent that your "front" has not read our replies or simply chosen to ignore our complaints. It seems much of it has gone right over your heads, as if we haven't been clear enough. The "front" has made "reviews" of the list's responses, by reworking our conversations out of context and redistributing them, to Sierra and Audubon at least, as if PPN members are not reasonable. Unfortunately, those lists in question, are not receptive to expedient, systematic revisionism either. They understand your divisive methods well. You were not able to impress them, except in very negative terms because of the shrillness, juvenile pettiness, and abuse you've heaped on those list owners. Now, to complain we too are unreasonable and simply labeling our responses as "illogic," without much analysis, smacks of more primary school debate. PPN participants now has been self righteously condemned as unreasonable. PPN is a fundamentally different group and I'll assume its competencies are not interested in being "strung along" to provide further remedial services for you. We know who the Front is, and will continue to keep the "debate" public, because frankly I've really not got time to "play in the sand box," and assume no other list participant is interested in providing petty fodder for offline "debate" either. These are two of Mr. Toals postings regarding the whys and wherefores of overpopulation, as an example of really wild, hidden MOTIVES. ETs, Secrecy, and Highly Adv Re: ET intentions Good or Ev These are Mr. Glaze's, what I consider grandiose, public postings regarding overpopulation and environmentalism. One of the more self important postings is a link to a website that discusses "logic" and "debate." Apparently it is fine to employ these fallacies in "debate," as long as no one catches on. This is called "relative morality" and it works in primary school at least, but not on an international list server. I'm particularly interested in the quote and the end of his postings on our list, that implies if "we" don't understand the problem, as framed by the Front, then we will not understand the "severity of the solution." Mr. Glaze has chosen to relabel our clear objections as "illogic," and dismisses us as therefore "unreasonable." Search Results --------------89EEC5A58FAC5AFFA6240245 Content-Type: text/html; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit No Ted, we'll have to keep the "debate" public.  You and Mr. Glaze seem to be frustrated with your reception from the list.  I resent that your "front" has not read our replies or simply chosen to ignore our complaints.  It seems much of it has gone right over your heads, as if we haven't been clear enough.  The "front" has  made "reviews" of the list's responses, by reworking our conversations out of context and redistributing them, to Sierra and Audubon at least, as if PPN members are not reasonable.  Unfortunately, those lists in question, are not receptive to expedient, systematic revisionism either.  They understand your divisive methods well.   You were not able to impress them, except in very negative terms because of the shrillness, juvenile pettiness, and abuse you've heaped on those list owners.  Now, to complain we too are unreasonable and simply labeling our responses as "illogic," without much analysis, smacks of more primary school debate.  PPN participants now has been self righteously condemned as unreasonable.  PPN is a fundamentally different group and I'll assume its competencies are not interested in being "strung along" to provide further  remedial services for you.  We know who the Front is, and will continue to keep the "debate" public, because frankly I've really not got time to "play in the sand box," and assume no other list participant is interested in providing petty fodder for offline "debate" either.

These are two of Mr. Toals postings regarding the whys and wherefores of overpopulation, as an example of really wild, hidden MOTIVES.

 ETs, Secrecy, and Highly Adv
 Re: ET intentions Good or Ev

These are Mr. Glaze's, what I consider grandiose, public postings regarding overpopulation and environmentalism.  One of the more self important postings is a link to a website that discusses "logic" and "debate."  Apparently it is fine to employ these fallacies in "debate," as long as no one catches on.  This is called "relative morality" and it works in primary school at least, but not on an international list server.  I'm particularly interested in the quote and the end of his postings on our list, that implies if "we" don't understand the problem, as framed by the Front, then we will not understand the "severity of the solution."  Mr. Glaze has chosen to relabel our clear objections as "illogic," and dismisses us as therefore "unreasonable."
 
 Search Results
 
 
  --------------89EEC5A58FAC5AFFA6240245-- From eglaze@vsta.com Fri Nov 13 06:24:57 1998 Received: from rivendell.vsta.com (rivendell.vsta.com [204.57.96.15]) by csf.Colorado.EDU (8.8.5/8.8.4/CNS-4.1p-nh) with ESMTP id GAA24137 for ; Fri, 13 Nov 1998 06:24:54 -0700 (MST) Received: from eglaze.vsta.com (eglazeADSL.vsta.com [204.57.96.81]) by rivendell.vsta.com (8.8.8/8.8.6) with SMTP id HAA18630; Fri, 13 Nov 1998 07:26:51 -0600 (CST) From: "Ed Glaze III" To: "Audubon Population" , "Population Forum, Sierra Club" , "KZPG Overpopulation News Network" , "PPN Listserv" Cc: Subject: Fw: overpopulation & Malthus Date: Fri, 13 Nov 1998 07:30:20 -0600 Message-ID: <01be0f09$c2500920$516039cc@eglaze.vsta.com> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit X-Priority: 3 X-MSMail-Priority: Normal X-MimeOLE: Produced By Microsoft MimeOLE V4.71.1712.3 Finally, an informative message from the PPN list. The additional information that I added is indented. I will be offline for a few days as I travel to attend a SC chapter meeting and training session in Austin. Some of you may even enjoy me not posting for a while. John, like many other people, seems to view some of Mathus' remarks in a different context than what may be appropriate. To me, Malthus envisioned an overpopulated world, or region of whatever size, and realized that the population must be reduced. Taken from that standpoint many of Malthus' population control statements, though offensive under other circumstances, do make sense. Below John says one such reprehensible statement is "his contention that infants are of comparatively little value to society (in the context of whether relief should be provided to prevent them from dying of starvation)." That makes a lot of sense to me because the younger a person, the less that society has invested in them and the greater will be society's future liability in support costs. Remember that this is in the context of having to reduce population. Hopefully, the world of today will realize the threat we face and we can avoid having to make such reprehensible, but necessary decisions. ________ Ed Glaze -----Original Message----- From: John Bellamy Foster To: PROGRESSIVE POPULATION NETWORK Date: Friday, November 13, 1998 1:04 AM Subject: Re: overpopulation & Malthus Members of this list who are interested in Malthus may be pleased to know that the December issue of ORGANIZATION & ENVIRONMENT includes a Bicentennial symposium on Malthus with an extensive introduction to Malthus' population theory by me followed by articles by William Catton, Herman Daly, Tom Athanasiou, Richard Wiltgen, Eric Ross and Martha Gimenez. The same issue also includes articles by David Korten, Edward Herman, Kari Norgaard, Susan Roschke, Peter Grahame and others. List members may be further interested to know that I have written a major article on "Malthus' Essay on Population After 200 Years: A Marxian View" which will appear in the December 1998 issue of MONTHLY REVIEW. Monthly Review committed to the Marxist approach to political economy and history. BOOKS REVIEWED -- excerpt below Science in a Skeptical Age by John Bellamy Foster We live in a skeptical age. All of the basic concepts of the Enlightenment, including progress, science and reason are now under attack. At the center of this skepticism lie persistent doubts about science itself, emanating both from within and from without the scientific community. For example, Bruce Rich, a director of the conservative environmental organization The Environmental Defense Fund, has turned to complexity theory in his widely influential book, Mortgaging the Earth, "predict, plan, and manage 'global environmental crises'" (p. 30). This may seem to exhibit a degree of rationality from an environmental perspective; but it also suggests that we cannot plan sustainable development, and thus has an eerie connection (made more credible because of the Environmental Defense Fund's close connection to business) to the proposition of another strong proponent of complexity theory, Friedrich Hayek. In his final book, The Fatal Conceit Hayek launched an attack on the whole Enlightenment notion of rationalism as exemplified by "socialistically-inclined" thinkers like Einstein and Bertrand Russell, on the grounds that society was too complex for rational planning and that the market system was in effect an institutional recognition of that fact. The passage you mention on "building houses near polluted bodies of water" etc., although I doubt that it is to be found on the internet, is from Book IV, Chapter V of the Second Essay. This quote is usually taken out of context and is not as reprehensible as it is usually thought to be, and not anywhere as reprehensible as some of Malthus' other, more provocative statements that produced a storm of criticism in his day. The logic of the passage to which you refer was as follows: if you decide to promote early marriages, and still want to avoid what everyone agrees is the worst of all tragedies (i.e. famine), you should-- if you are to be logical (given the fact that population must always stay in equilibrium with food supply) "court the return of the plague," etc. (A key presumption of Malthus' analysis was that moral restraint was not generally possible for the poor, but only for the rich.) This hardly compares to Malthus' other more reprehensible statements such as his contention that infants are of comparatively little value to society (in the context of whether relief should be provided to prevent them from dying of starvation); his claim that the poor had no right to relief; that the poor were not invited to the "mighty feast" of the well to do; that the peasants should be "swept" from the land, etc. John Bellamy Foster > > >At 10:05 AM 11/11/98 -0500, you wrote: >>Ed Glaze III wrote: >> >> >I thought that Angela and I could carry on out little debate >>> off the list but I guess I was mistaken. >>> >>> The basis of her recent Malthus message was evidently >>> to counter the links I gave her for publications that had >>> special issues on Malthus. Here are a few URLs for >>> online information. The other links are shown in my >>> message to Angela below. >> >> Do any of these links contain the bit where Malthus recommended building >> houses for the poor near polluted bodies of water, so they die earlier? I >> believe this has been suppressed in subsequent editions of his masterpiece. >> >> Doug From rcollins@netlink.com.au Fri Nov 13 08:38:03 1998 Received: from netlink.com.au (merlin.netlink.com.au [203.16.172.196]) by csf.Colorado.EDU (8.8.5/8.8.4/CNS-4.1p-nh) with ESMTP id IAA02111 for ; Fri, 13 Nov 1998 08:38:00 -0700 (MST) Received: from netlink.com.au (h048.mel.netlink.com.au [203.62.225.48]) by netlink.com.au (8.8.8/8.8.8) with ESMTP id CAA27450 for ; Sat, 14 Nov 1998 02:43:01 +1100 Message-ID: <364C5213.A0AA63DB@netlink.com.au> Date: Sat, 14 Nov 1998 02:36:51 +1100 From: rc&am Reply-To: rcollins@netlink.com.au MIME-Version: 1.0 To: PROGRESSIVE POPULATION NETWORK Subject: [Fwd: Rational Replies to Mr. Glaze] Content-Type: multipart/mixed; boundary="------------08D3B1914D689DBAC07BBBFE" This is a multi-part message in MIME format. --------------08D3B1914D689DBAC07BBBFE Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit --------------08D3B1914D689DBAC07BBBFE Content-Type: message/rfc822; name="nsmail1S.TMP" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Content-Disposition: inline; filename="nsmail1S.TMP" Message-ID: <364AEEA7.A7FE3D7C@netlink.com.au> Date: Fri, 13 Nov 1998 01:20:24 +1100 From: rc&am Reply-To: rcollins@netlink.com.au MIME-Version: 1.0 To: ttoal@jps.net Subject: Re: Rational Replies to Mr. Glaze References: <364A4A52.AFFA6D9B@jps.net> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Ted Tool wrote: > Angela said: > > "despite all this waving about of rationality and the facts, > such thinking is actually mired in idiocy and ignorance." > > and: > > "no one is suffering because of overpopulation. there is no scarcity. mathus > was wrong when he was writing, and you are wong now." > > Such absolute statements that you are right and the other is wrong, not even > giving any support for your position, i have offered both arguments of my own and others in support of these statements. you have chosen not to respond to those arguments, fine. but, really, don't extract small bits of my posts in order to give yourself the alibi for not addressing the criticisms. > serve no purpose other than to cause > people to ignore you. i don't think i have caused 'people' to ignore me. i think though that you have decided to ignore the criticisms of your and ed glaze's positions. moreover, i don't think you can get me to take responsibility for your decision not to address any of the arguments made. > About the only message coming thru from you that I'm > getting is that you're angry. 'about the only message'? what about the other 'messages'? will you not reply to those? as for 'angry': yes, i am angry and appalled - at your statements, suppositions, contradictory arguments, relative morality, and at the ways in which you resort to injunctions that others be polite when responding to statements and positions which are obscene. this tactic to shield your arguments and position from scrutiny may work on some of the people some of the time... at some point you need to take responsibility for the positions you espouse and the implications of those positions. angela --------------08D3B1914D689DBAC07BBBFE-- From rcollins@netlink.com.au Fri Nov 13 08:38:09 1998 Received: from netlink.com.au (merlin.netlink.com.au [203.16.172.196]) by csf.Colorado.EDU (8.8.5/8.8.4/CNS-4.1p-nh) with ESMTP id IAA02121 for ; Fri, 13 Nov 1998 08:38:06 -0700 (MST) Received: from netlink.com.au (h048.mel.netlink.com.au [203.62.225.48]) by netlink.com.au (8.8.8/8.8.8) with ESMTP id CAA27454 for ; Sat, 14 Nov 1998 02:43:07 +1100 Message-ID: <364C5219.6E75189E@netlink.com.au> Date: Sat, 14 Nov 1998 02:36:57 +1100 From: rc&am Reply-To: rcollins@netlink.com.au MIME-Version: 1.0 To: PROGRESSIVE POPULATION NETWORK Subject: [Fwd: The Poor and The Rich] Content-Type: multipart/mixed; boundary="------------B29F3F0257800ADE16E72EEF" This is a multi-part message in MIME format. --------------B29F3F0257800ADE16E72EEF Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit --------------B29F3F0257800ADE16E72EEF Content-Type: message/rfc822; name="nsmailEE.TMP" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Content-Disposition: inline; filename="nsmailEE.TMP" Message-ID: <364AEEAF.BF530BE8@netlink.com.au> Date: Fri, 13 Nov 1998 01:20:31 +1100 From: rc&am Reply-To: rcollins@netlink.com.au MIME-Version: 1.0 To: ttoal@jps.net Subject: Re: The Poor and The Rich References: <364A4811.F5135DB@jps.net> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit is this the entirety of george alter's post? Ted Toal wrote: > I don't think it has to be that way at all, at least if you are talking > financial burden. I believe the developed countries should be shouldering a > good deal, if not most, of the financial burden of fertility reduction. how helpful. so, let me get this right: you want richer countries to finance the depopulation of the poorer countries do they won't emigrate to those countries? > Now if > you are saying that the poor countries are the ones that have the burden of > lowering their fertility rate, yes, of course I'd have to agree with that, but > surely you can't be saying that they should not have to be subject to such a > burden! in a prior post, you argued that the impact of population figures in poorer countries is less than that of richer countries. so, why should the 'burden of lowering fertility rates' fall on poorer countries? is there not a determined contradiction in your argument here? also, is it not the case that there are a number of quite wealthy countries wherein the ratio of person per land is higher than most poorer countries? so: once again, your claim that there is a problem of overpopulation is contradicted by your solutions. to repeat: these 'solutions' are in fact your aims, and the flag of overpopulation is simply a convenient way of hiding this fact. > <<< Fertility in the rich countries is already below replacement > level. Although we are still growing because of echoes of the baby boom of > the 1950s, in the next century Europe, North America, and Japan will go > below ZPG to negative population growth.>>> > > This will not happen unless we reduce immigration, which at this point seems > unlikely. and here was i thinking that you were advancing a problem of global parameters. your point of departure it turns out is a nationalist one. > In the U.S., fertility is not yet below replacement level, and in > California it is about 2.5 because of larger families of Hispanic immigrants. how irrational of them. > It is my hope that the strong downward trend in fertility in the developing > countries will continue, and a below-replacement rate will be reached in a > decade or so, leading to NPG sometime towards the middle or end of the 21st > century. since this is already happening, and loks likely to continue, remind me again why you want to campaign agaisnt 'overpopulation'? i don't think you beleive overpopulation is the problem any more than i do, it just gives your racism an edge of respectability amongst those looking for a respectable racism. > <<< Furthermore, any further decline > in the birth rate will only exacerbate the problem of funding future old > age pensions, which still depend upon transfers from the young to the old.>>> > > This may be true, it is true. > but its just another problem that has to be solved somehow > other than by continuing to overpopulate the planet. didn't you just note trends towards a decline in birth rates? what exactly would you consider to be the optimal range of population numbers for this planet, and how have you come to this decision? tell me, i'd really like to know the science behind this. > I have to admit that this > is one problem I've paid little attention to. Realize that there will be both > negative and positive benefits of NPG, but I believe the positive ones will far > outway the negative ones. what precisely are the positive and negative effects that you foresee? > So you ARE saying what I thought you couldn't possibly be saying! This makes > no sense. You are saying, "The world may be overpopulated, but because it is > the poor countries for the most part (excluding U.S.) do you exclude the US for personal reasons, or is this a necessary piece in your repetoire? > that need to reduce their > fertility rates, that is too big a burden for them, so we'll just have to > continue growing the population." changes in birth rates will occur and are occuring in countries which develop systems of welfare, develop and grow. this is exactly the process that took place in most 'developed' countries. if you did not have a hidden racist agenda in tow, you would be campaigning for third world development; instead, you make a pretence to wanting to 'share the pain' so that you can ultimately justify a program of eugenics. > <<< There is one alternative that could smooth the transition. If the rich > countries would allow more immigration from the poor countries, the taxes > paid by the immigrants would help to fund old age pensions in rich > countries and also ease population pressures in the poor countries. Since > the fertility of immigrant populations is lower than fertility in sending > regions, this would reduce birth rates globally as well. >>> > > I think you are dead wrong here. Let me give my reasoning. First, this would > have several negative effects: (1) immigrants take on the consumption rate of > the receiving region, so they are basically moving from a low-consumption > region to a high-consumption one. The net effect is to increase impacts on the > environment. aside from the dubious implication that immigrants from poore countries take on rates of consumption anywhere near those of the rich living in richer countries, this is a strict attempt to refuse others the comforts that many of us in wealthier countries take for granted. how does one convert this into a virtuos proposition? easy: by making it seem as if it's really all in the interests of the planet. > (2) Though their fertility might be lower than the sending > region, it is generally HIGHER than the receiving region, leading to an > increase in fertility in the receiving region, which, having a higher > consumption level, further increases environmental impacts. but - are the birth rates of immigrants in, let's say Australia, anywhere near the birht rates of the country of emigration? no. immigration generally entails a significant decline in birth rates. your position is an anti-immigrant one rather than one of concern for global levels of population. > (3) Such > immigration is usually of unskilled laborers, and so it lowers the availability > of unskilled jobs in the receiving country, which are already in short supply. immigration has had either a net positive or no effect on the employment rates of non-immigrant populations. this is substantiated by every peice of research i have seen. unemployment, even unemployment amongst 'unskilled' workers, is not increased by immigration. the reverse is true. technological displacement is responsible for the unemployment created in certain occupational categories, not immigrants. > This further hurts the welfare of the poor in the receiving country. again, not true. > The second problem with your suggestion is that it simply wouldn't help the > sending country. Even a large increase in immigration rates would not put more > than a slight dent in the population of the sending countries. And > furthermore, most of those leaving are the ones who are a bit more well-off, a > bit more educated than the average. Immigration acts as a brain drain on the > sending countries. so, it's fortress amerika time it seems. and all for the good of the planet... > Another thing to consider is that immigration is pretty disruptive to > families. People don't immigrate to a totally different culture out of > choice. That can't be an easy thing to do. I don't think we should be > encouraging it, although agribusiness and certain other businesses that depend > on low wage labor would certainly like it. The solution is to improve > conditions in the sending country, not try to use immigration as a relief valve > for them. and, what exactly in anything you have posted has suggested ways of improving the conditions in poorer countries? all you've demanded is the need to 'stop the poor breeding' and stop the poor emigrating to where you live. > <<< Anti-immigrant rhetoric is fueling the rise of neo-fascist parties in > Europe, and most political parties (e.g. the U.S.) are afraid of the issue.>>> anti-immigrant rhetoric is neo-fascism, not just something that fuels it. > Immigration is certainly a tough issue to deal with. The accusations of racism > fly like crazy, often totally unjustified, yet at the same time fully > understandable given humanity's past history of racism. The neo-fascists just > add fuel to the fire. We need to keep talking about it and try to understand > one another. well, those people running around waving swastikas saying pretty much the same things that ted here is certainly make it hard for him. and, isn't it unfortunate that the nazis gave eugenics such a bad name..... angela --------------B29F3F0257800ADE16E72EEF-- From Peter.VanZant@PSS.Boeing.com Fri Nov 13 13:02:47 1998 Received: from slb-smtpout-01.boeing.com (slb-smtpout-01.boeing.com [192.161.36.8]) by csf.Colorado.EDU (8.8.5/8.8.4/CNS-4.1p-nh) with ESMTP id NAA15266 for ; Fri, 13 Nov 1998 13:02:43 -0700 (MST) Received: from xch-pssbh-01.ca.boeing.com ([192.42.211.28]) by slb-smtpout-01.boeing.com (8.9.0/8.8.5) with ESMTP id MAA19147 for ; Fri, 13 Nov 1998 12:02:40 -0800 (PST) Received: by xch-pssbh-01.ca.boeing.com with Internet Mail Service (5.5.2407.0) id ; Fri, 13 Nov 1998 12:01:58 -0800 Message-ID: <51792E5D4B6ED011B7DB00805FBE3836040EC09E@xch-evt-06.ca.boeing.com> From: "Van Zant, Peter J" To: "'ppn@csf.colorado.edu'" Subject: Greetings From A New Subscriber Date: Fri, 13 Nov 1998 12:02:39 -0800 MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain Hello, I'm Peter, a board member at Seattle ZPG and someone who has been concerned about population for many years. I heard about your discussion from a member of another population discussion in which I participate--KZPG. I have been introduced to most of the ramifications of population which you discuss, as I understand them. My perspective is that, although the carrying capacity of a region is not only dependent on absolute numbers--the economic system, social relations, and technology used are also important--absolute numbers is an important factor. I think I am quite capable of talking about (writing about?) these matters here without insulting anyone or denigrating his/her character. I will say, however, that I have no intentions of backing down from my stand that, among other things, absolute number of people must be stabilized. From Jfoster@OREGON.UOREGON.EDU Fri Nov 13 13:02:48 1998 Received: from donald.uoregon.edu (donald.uoregon.edu [128.223.32.6]) by csf.Colorado.EDU (8.8.5/8.8.4/CNS-4.1p-nh) with ESMTP id NAA15263 for ; Fri, 13 Nov 1998 13:02:43 -0700 (MST) Received: from DWOVMCNF.uoregon.edu (d111-206.uoregon.edu) by OREGON.UOREGON.EDU (PMDF V5.1-12 #26538) with SMTP id <01J44HH0AOSY8WWRYE@OREGON.UOREGON.EDU> for PPN@csf.colorado.edu; Fri, 13 Nov 1998 12:02:38 PST Date: Fri, 13 Nov 1998 12:02:37 -0800 (PST) From: John Bellamy Foster Subject: Re: Fw: overpopulation & Malthus X-Sender: Jfoster@oregon.uoregon.edu (Unverified) To: PPN@csf.colorado.edu Message-id: <1.5.4.16.19981113121209.24b7229a@oregon.uoregon.edu> MIME-version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Ed, I see your point about infants perfectly (which I think corresponds to Malthus' own views) but I don't agree with the morality of it. Malthus of course never used the term "overpopulation" and the idea that his theory was about the "overstocking of the globe with inhabitants" was explicitly repudiated by him on more than one occasion. That idea had been promoted earlier by Robert Wallace and attacked by William Godwin and Condorcet. Malthus tried to change the nature of the debate (which was really about whether the future improvement of society was possible) by developing a theory that said that an equilibrium ALWAYS existed--except for minor fluctuations--between population and food supply. The equilibrating mechanisms were vice and misery, hence society for this reason could not progress. The concept of "overpopulation" as it is now used is thus completely foreign to Malthus' thought. Eventually, his theory moved even further away from the issue raised by Wallace, and came to focus (much like the work of Joseph Townsend) on the use of his "population principle" to attack the English Poor Laws--which immediately connected him to the developing tradition of political economy, where his future work was directed. There is nothing in his entire theory about shortage of raw materials other than food. In fact he explicitly said that raw materials could easily be obtained in whatever quantity was needed. Nor can a "carrying capacity" notion be attributed to him--at least in the sense that this is used today. The ecological Malthus (or neo-Malthusianism) was a later invention--introduced in the 1940s as part of the ideology of the Cold War and the Green Revolution when no one knew any more what Malthus had said or the nature of the debate in which he had been engaged. What was most useful about Malthus for the vested interests was the general character of his argument which provided a naturalistic rationale for poverty (and ecological destruction). The one part of Malthus that is most relevant today--in the age of agribusiness--is his statement that the peasants should be "swept" from the land. John Bellamy Foster At 07:30 AM 11/13/98 -0600, you wrote: >Finally, an informative message from the PPN list. >The additional information that I added is indented. > >I will be offline for a few days as I travel to attend a >SC chapter meeting and training session in Austin. >Some of you may even enjoy me not posting for a while. > >John, like many other people, seems to view some of >Mathus' remarks in a different context than what may be >appropriate. To me, Malthus envisioned an overpopulated >world, or region of whatever size, and realized that the >population must be reduced. Taken from that standpoint >many of Malthus' population control statements, though >offensive under other circumstances, do make sense. > >Below John says one such reprehensible statement is >"his contention that infants are of comparatively little value >to society (in the context of whether relief should be provided >to prevent them from dying of starvation)." That makes a lot >of sense to me because the younger a person, the less that >society has invested in them and the greater will be society's >future liability in support costs. Remember that this is in the >context of having to reduce population. Hopefully, the world >of today will realize the threat we face and we can avoid >having to make such reprehensible, but necessary decisions. > >________ Ed Glaze > > >-----Original Message----- >From: John Bellamy Foster >To: PROGRESSIVE POPULATION NETWORK >Date: Friday, November 13, 1998 1:04 AM >Subject: Re: overpopulation & Malthus > > >Members of this list who are interested in Malthus may be pleased to >know that the December issue of ORGANIZATION & ENVIRONMENT > >includes a Bicentennial symposium on Malthus with an extensive >introduction to Malthus' population theory by me followed by articles >by William Catton, Herman Daly, Tom Athanasiou, Richard Wiltgen, >Eric Ross and Martha Gimenez. The same issue also includes >articles by David Korten, Edward Herman, Kari Norgaard, >Susan Roschke, Peter Grahame and others. > >List members may be further interested to know that I have written >a major article on "Malthus' Essay on Population After 200 Years: >A Marxian View" which will appear in the December 1998 issue >of MONTHLY REVIEW. > > Monthly Review > committed to the Marxist approach to political economy and history. > > > BOOKS REVIEWED -- excerpt below > Science in a Skeptical Age by John Bellamy Foster > > We live in a skeptical age. All of the basic concepts of the > Enlightenment, including progress, science and reason are > now under attack. At the center of this skepticism lie persistent > doubts about science itself, emanating both from within and > from without the scientific community. For example, Bruce Rich, > a director of the conservative environmental organization The > Environmental Defense Fund, has turned to complexity theory > in his widely influential book, Mortgaging the Earth, "predict, > plan, and manage 'global environmental crises'" (p. 30). > This may seem to exhibit a degree of rationality from an > environmental perspective; but it also suggests that we cannot > plan sustainable development, and thus has an eerie connection > (made more credible because of the Environmental Defense > Fund's close connection to business) to the proposition of > another strong proponent of complexity theory, Friedrich Hayek. > In his final book, The Fatal Conceit Hayek launched an attack > on the whole Enlightenment notion of rationalism as exemplified > by "socialistically-inclined" thinkers like Einstein and Bertrand > Russell, on the grounds that society was too complex for > rational planning and that the market system was in effect > an institutional recognition of that fact. > >The passage you mention on "building houses near polluted bodies of >water" etc., although I doubt that it is to be found on the internet, is >from >Book IV, Chapter V of the Second Essay. This quote is usually taken >out of context and is not as reprehensible as it is usually thought to be, >and not anywhere as reprehensible as some of Malthus' other, more >provocative statements that produced a storm of criticism in his day. >The logic of the passage to which you refer was as follows: if you >decide to promote early marriages, and still want to avoid what >everyone agrees is the worst of all tragedies (i.e. famine), you should-- >if you are to be logical (given the fact that population must always stay >in equilibrium with food supply) "court the return of the plague," etc. >(A key presumption of Malthus' analysis was that moral restraint was >not generally possible for the poor, but only for the rich.) This hardly >compares to Malthus' other more reprehensible statements such as >his contention that infants are of comparatively little value to society >(in the context of whether relief should be provided to prevent them >from dying of starvation); his claim that the poor had no right to relief; >that the poor were not invited to the "mighty feast" of the well to do; >that the peasants should be "swept" from the land, etc. > >John Bellamy Foster >> >> >>At 10:05 AM 11/11/98 -0500, you wrote: >>>Ed Glaze III wrote: >>> >>> >I thought that Angela and I could carry on out little debate >>>> off the list but I guess I was mistaken. >>>> >>>> The basis of her recent Malthus message was evidently >>>> to counter the links I gave her for publications that had >>>> special issues on Malthus. Here are a few URLs for >>>> online information. The other links are shown in my >>>> message to Angela below. >>> >>> Do any of these links contain the bit where Malthus recommended building >>> houses for the poor near polluted bodies of water, so they die earlier? I >>> believe this has been suppressed in subsequent editions of his >masterpiece. >>> >>> Doug > > > From nicka@well.com Sat Nov 14 03:19:03 1998 Received: from smtp.well.com (smtp.well.com [206.80.6.147]) by csf.Colorado.EDU (8.8.5/8.8.4/CNS-4.1p-nh) with ESMTP id DAA04349 for ; Sat, 14 Nov 1998 03:19:00 -0700 (MST) Received: from well.com (nobody@well.com [206.15.64.10]) by smtp.well.com (8.8.6/8.8.4) with ESMTP id CAA19983; Sat, 14 Nov 1998 02:18:59 -0800 (PST) Received: from localhost (nicka@localhost) by well.com (8.8.5/8.8.5) with SMTP id CAA10829; Sat, 14 Nov 1998 02:18:57 -0800 (PST) Date: Sat, 14 Nov 1998 02:18:57 -0800 (PST) From: "Nicholas C. Arguimbau" To: Jim Talboy cc: PROGRESSIVE POPULATION NETWORK Subject: Re: Let's continue to keep the "debate" public folks. In-Reply-To: <364C2004.B89B670A@frii.com> Message-ID: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Where did I get the idea that conversations on the Internet were supposed to be civil? Why don't you guys go out in a dark alley and duke it out? From dhenwood@panix.com Sat Nov 14 08:27:35 1998 Received: from mail1.panix.com (mail1.panix.com [166.84.0.212]) by csf.Colorado.EDU (8.8.5/8.8.4/CNS-4.1p-nh) with ESMTP id IAA16298 for ; Sat, 14 Nov 1998 08:27:32 -0700 (MST) Received: from [166.84.250.86] (dhenwood.dialup.access.net [166.84.250.86]) by mail1.panix.com (8.8.8/8.8.8/PanixM1.3) with ESMTP id KAA25176 for ; Sat, 14 Nov 1998 10:27:29 -0500 (EST) X-Sender: dhenwood@popserver.panix.com Message-Id: In-Reply-To: <01be0f09$c2500920$516039cc@eglaze.vsta.com> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Date: Sat, 14 Nov 1998 10:27:34 -0500 To: PROGRESSIVE POPULATION NETWORK From: Doug Henwood Subject: Re: Fw: overpopulation & Malthus Ed Glaze III wrote: >Below John says one such reprehensible statement is >"his contention that infants are of comparatively little value >to society (in the context of whether relief should be provided >to prevent them from dying of starvation)." That makes a lot >of sense to me because the younger a person, the less that >society has invested in them and the greater will be society's >future liability in support costs. Remember that this is in the >context of having to reduce population. Hopefully, the world >of today will realize the threat we face and we can avoid >having to make such reprehensible, but necessary decisions. That's one of the more chilling paragraphs I've read today, though it's only 10:30 in the morning. Let's value lives by how much "society" has invested in them! That would make Bill Gates's kid worth more than, what, all the infants in sub-Saharan Africa, right? A technical question - in your human valuation model, do you merely include the human capital "society" has invested in that person, or do you include a factor for the discounted value of the future wage stream? If the latter, what interest rate do you use? Doug -- Doug Henwood Left Business Observer 250 W 85 St New York NY 10024-3217 USA +1-212-874-4020 voice +1-212-874-3137 fax email: web: From dhenwood@panix.com Sat Nov 14 09:53:11 1998 Received: from mail2.panix.com (mail2.panix.com [166.84.0.213]) by csf.Colorado.EDU (8.8.5/8.8.4/CNS-4.1p-nh) with ESMTP id JAA02329 for ; Sat, 14 Nov 1998 09:53:08 -0700 (MST) Received: from [166.84.250.86] (dhenwood.dialup.access.net [166.84.250.86]) by mail2.panix.com (8.8.8/8.8.8/PanixM1.3) with ESMTP id LAA27332; Sat, 14 Nov 1998 11:53:03 -0500 (EST) X-Sender: dhenwood@popserver.panix.com Message-Id: In-Reply-To: References: <364C2004.B89B670A@frii.com> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Date: Sat, 14 Nov 1998 11:53:09 -0500 To: nicka@well.com, PROGRESSIVE POPULATION NETWORK From: Doug Henwood Subject: Re: Let's continue to keep the "debate" public folks. Nicholas C. Arguimbau wrote: >Where did I get the idea that conversations on the Internet were supposed >to be civil? Why don't you guys go out in a dark alley and duke it out? I think it's really hard to have a "civil" conversation with someone you think holds barbaric views. Sorry. Don't forget Hegel's characterization of civil society: "civil society is the battlefield where everyone's individual private interest meets everyone else's." It "affords a spectacle of extravagance and want as well as of the physical and ethical degeneration common to them both." It's the domain of "capital and class-divisions," a world of "compulsion" and polarization. Its "resources are insufficient to check excessive poverty and the creation of a penurious rabble." Is that the kind of civil you mean? Doug From nicka@well.com Sat Nov 14 15:14:54 1998 Received: from smtp.well.com (smtp.well.com [206.80.6.147]) by csf.Colorado.EDU (8.8.5/8.8.4/CNS-4.1p-nh) with ESMTP id PAA15636 for ; Sat, 14 Nov 1998 15:14:51 -0700 (MST) Received: from well.com (nobody@well.com [206.15.64.10]) by smtp.well.com (8.8.6/8.8.4) with ESMTP id OAA00780; Sat, 14 Nov 1998 14:14:49 -0800 (PST) Received: from localhost (nicka@localhost) by well.com (8.8.5/8.8.5) with SMTP id OAA22635; Sat, 14 Nov 1998 14:14:48 -0800 (PST) Date: Sat, 14 Nov 1998 14:14:47 -0800 (PST) From: "Nicholas C. Arguimbau" To: Doug Henwood cc: PROGRESSIVE POPULATION NETWORK Subject: Re: Let's continue to keep the "debate" public folks. In-Reply-To: Message-ID: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII On Sat, 14 Nov 1998, Doug Henwood wrote: > Nicholas C. Arguimbau wrote: NA -> > >Where did I get the idea that conversations on the Internet were supposed > >to be civil? Why don't you guys go out in a dark alley and duke it out? > DH - > I think it's really hard to have a "civil" conversation with someone you > think holds barbaric views. Sorry. > > Don't forget Hegel's characterization of civil society: "civil society is > the battlefield where everyone's individual private interest meets everyone > else's." It "affords a spectacle of extravagance and want as well as of NA - Hegel's characterization doesn't work very well on the Internet, where hundreds of millions of people are capable of meeting each other head on all at the same time. The only way to stay unscathed in a gladiator pit of such enormity is to stay out of it, which doesn't bode well for the Internet's vast potential for the communication of understanding. PPN is more useful is a place to trade information than as a place to yell; I, for one, will have to unsubscribe if it degenerates into the latter. From ttoal@jps.net Sat Nov 14 18:25:45 1998 Received: from smtp1.jps.net (smtp1.jps.net [209.63.224.236]) by csf.Colorado.EDU (8.8.5/8.8.4/CNS-4.1p-nh) with ESMTP id SAA20116 for ; Sat, 14 Nov 1998 18:25:43 -0700 (MST) Received: from jps.net (208-25-50-97.stk.jps.net [208.25.50.97]) by smtp1.jps.net (8.8.5/8.8.5) with ESMTP id RAA14389 for ; Sat, 14 Nov 1998 17:25:28 -0800 (PST) Message-ID: <364E2D32.42ECF511@jps.net> Date: Sat, 14 Nov 1998 17:24:02 -0800 From: Ted Toal MIME-Version: 1.0 To: ppn Subject: Civil Debate Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Nicholas says "Where did I get the idea that conversations on the Internet were supposed to be civil?" I have the same idea. In fact, I've realized that I can no longer tolerate non-civil debate. It just isn't worth the time, and its too unpleasant. So, two votes for civility. From ttoal@jps.net Sat Nov 14 18:55:20 1998 Received: from smtp1.jps.net (smtp1.jps.net [209.63.224.236]) by csf.Colorado.EDU (8.8.5/8.8.4/CNS-4.1p-nh) with ESMTP id SAA20727 for ; Sat, 14 Nov 1998 18:55:18 -0700 (MST) Received: from jps.net (208-25-50-97.stk.jps.net [208.25.50.97]) by smtp1.jps.net (8.8.5/8.8.5) with ESMTP id RAA23449 for ; Sat, 14 Nov 1998 17:55:02 -0800 (PST) Message-ID: <364E341F.9AAC56A0@jps.net> Date: Sat, 14 Nov 1998 17:53:35 -0800 From: Ted Toal MIME-Version: 1.0 To: ppn Subject: Keep the debate public Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit I've only recently joined PPN, and am hesitant to post a lot of personal debate onto it because I don't yet know what kinds of material the list members consider appropriate for posting. I noticed a lot of postings of lengthy articles, so it seemed that personal debates might be considered undesirable. Hence, I sent several lengthy replies straight to rc&am (Angela) rather than to the list. However, now Jim Talboy says this, with my comments: >> No Ted, we'll have to keep the "debate" public. You and Mr. Glaze seem to be frustrated with your reception from the list. << I've not received much of a reception at all. There have been two or maybe three people that have replied to what I've said, so that isn't much of a response. I can't say that I'm frustrated with the response of anybody except for rc&am (Angela). Her responses have been extremely frustrating, but I felt it inappropriate to bring my debate with her to this list. I'm now reconsidering that. I just checked my last response to Jim Talboy (posted to PPN) and didn't see any sense of frustration in it. I never heard back from him on that one. >> I resent that your front" has not read our replies or simply chosen to ignore our complaints.<< I don't understand what you mean here by the word "front". I have read all email I've received from PPN and its list members, and responded to all of it, so I have no idea what you are talking about here. >> It seems much of it has gone right over your heads, as if we haven't been clear enough.<< If you say something I don't understand, I'll ask you to clarify it. >> The "front" has made "reviews" of the list's responses, by reworking our conversations out of context and redistributing them, to Sierra and Audubon at least, as if PPN members are not reasonable.<< Ed Glaze has summarized some of his observations of PPN interactions, mainly the ones he's had with list members, and posted them to KZPG. I don't know about the Sierra and Audubon lists, I'm not a subscriber. If you don't like his summary, you'll have to join those lists and discuss it there. >> will continue to keep the "debate" public, because frankly I've really not got time to "play in the sand box," and assume no other list participant is interested in providing petty fodder for offline "debate" either. << One list member specifically asked me not to post my reply to the list, and I honored that. That person has indicated a desire to continue discussion off-list, which I will do. >> These are two of Mr. Toals postings regarding the whys and wherefores of overpopulation, as an example of really wild, hidden MOTIVES. << The postings you referred to have nothing to do with overpopulation. They are posting I made to paranet.ufo news group, regarding my interest in UFOs and extraterrestrials. I have no idea why you feel the need to drag something like that into a discussion like this. I can only assume that you hope that most people on the list will be prejudiced against anyone who expresses interest and some degree of belief in these subjects. Not knowing the list members, I have no idea how prejudiced they are in that respect, but I'll assume they will ignore your attempt to bias them. Ted Toal From ttoal@jps.net Sat Nov 14 19:10:44 1998 Received: from smtp1.jps.net (smtp1.jps.net [209.63.224.236]) by csf.Colorado.EDU (8.8.5/8.8.4/CNS-4.1p-nh) with ESMTP id TAA21110 for ; Sat, 14 Nov 1998 19:10:41 -0700 (MST) Received: from jps.net (208-25-50-97.stk.jps.net [208.25.50.97]) by smtp1.jps.net (8.8.5/8.8.5) with ESMTP id SAA27846 for ; Sat, 14 Nov 1998 18:10:25 -0800 (PST) Message-ID: <364E37B9.1DBA2D14@jps.net> Date: Sat, 14 Nov 1998 18:08:57 -0800 From: Ted Toal MIME-Version: 1.0 To: ppn Subject: Re: Irrational? Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit rc&am (Angela) posted several messages to me personally that I replied to. She has now posted two of those to PPN, and suggested I may want to post my replies to her to the list. She also suggests that I may want to post our other personal messages to PPN. Since she has taken the initiative on this, I'll assume this is something the list members would find appropriate, and I'll do it. You'll see several posts originating from me that are either rc&am's original message, or my reply to it, hopefully all in order. Ted Toal Here's the first, from rc&am to me, responding to my PPN post: > I think there is no arguing that the big picture is ultimately far beyond our > capability of understanding at this point. Which actually is all the more > reason to be concerned. It MIGHT be that earth can hold several trillion > people just fine, and with a few adjustments to attitudes here and there the > wildlife will do well too under that condition. But, since we don't KNOW for > certain and do not have the ability to analyze the earth as a system and > understand it thoroughly, and here i was thinking that you did know and were going to enlighten us all.... > and since everything we DO KNOW points overwhelmingly > in the direction that we have a major problem, the prudent position is to do > whatever we can to humanely stop and reverse population growth. how about culling? angela From ttoal@jps.net Sat Nov 14 19:11:58 1998 Received: from smtp1.jps.net (smtp1.jps.net [209.63.224.236]) by csf.Colorado.EDU (8.8.5/8.8.4/CNS-4.1p-nh) with ESMTP id TAA21226 for ; Sat, 14 Nov 1998 19:11:55 -0700 (MST) Received: from jps.net (208-25-50-97.stk.jps.net [208.25.50.97]) by smtp1.jps.net (8.8.5/8.8.5) with ESMTP id SAA28142 for ; Sat, 14 Nov 1998 18:11:39 -0800 (PST) Message-ID: <364E3802.A4D8EF57@jps.net> Date: Sat, 14 Nov 1998 18:10:11 -0800 From: Ted Toal MIME-Version: 1.0 To: ppn Subject: Re: Irrational? Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit My reply to Angela: >> But, since we don't KNOW for >> certain and do not have the ability to analyze the earth as a system and >> understand it thoroughly, > > and here i was thinking that you did know and were going to enlighten us all.... This sounds offensive to me. >> and since everything we DO KNOW points overwhelmingly >> in the direction that we have a major problem, the prudent position is to do >> whatever we can to humanely stop and reverse population growth. > > how about culling? and that sounds insulting. What exactly is your purpose in saying these things? Forgive me if I sound naive, I am actually. Ted Toal. From ttoal@jps.net Sat Nov 14 19:16:07 1998 Received: from smtp1.jps.net (smtp1.jps.net [209.63.224.236]) by csf.Colorado.EDU (8.8.5/8.8.4/CNS-4.1p-nh) with ESMTP id TAA21628 for ; Sat, 14 Nov 1998 19:16:05 -0700 (MST) Received: from jps.net (208-25-50-97.stk.jps.net [208.25.50.97]) by smtp1.jps.net (8.8.5/8.8.5) with ESMTP id SAA29314 for ; Sat, 14 Nov 1998 18:15:49 -0800 (PST) Message-ID: <364E38FC.B7564756@jps.net> Date: Sat, 14 Nov 1998 18:14:20 -0800 From: Ted Toal MIME-Version: 1.0 To: ppn Subject: Re: The Poor Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit rc&am's reply to another of my PPN posts: Ted Toal wrote: > The impact of people on the environment is equal to the PRODUCT > of the average impact of one person and the total number of people. In > developing countries, the former is small and the latter large, while in the > developed countries the reverse is true. i'll grant you the mathematics of this, if only for the sake of discussion, though i think it is a dubious basis for analysis since it turns real and complex into numerical abstractions. but as i say, let me grant you this. even going by this, your next statement is wrong. > In both cases, the impact is highly > significant. if there is a difference - and according to your figures this difference is substantial - then would it not be more appropriate for those concerned about overpopulation to target 'developed' countries? in these terms, would it then not be a more appropriate strategy to campaign for a euthenasia program for the rich of developed countries, or at the very least, their impoverishment? but i jest... since i don't particularly accept the premises. more importantly, does not this calculation show clearly that the decisive variable is not sheer numbers but rather - wow, what an outrageous idea! - mode of production. > Growth of the U.S. population by 1 person per hectare is > more-or-less equivalent, from an impact point of view, to growth of the > population of Bangladesh by about 300 per hectare. once agian, a contradiction between the two parts of the paragraph and the argument. > Both rich and poor > countries are contributing to the problem, and both need to reverse their > population growth. > > Trying to trace the factors that result in the existing fertility rates of both > rich and poor countries is an impossibly complex task. Certainly poverty plays > a role, and certainly the "solution" must therefore address poverty. well, here you begin to veer right outside the calculations you have already established. now, you want to shift the focus entirely on sheer population numbers when you said before that this was not the decisive factor. i suspect that for you the 'real' problem is that all these poor and starving people will want to emigrate to where you are, so you move swiftly into a pretense at concern for their plight. but i say pretence, because it doesn't even come close to addressing ways of solving the problems of impoverishment around the world. instead of camapigning for the sterilsation of poor folks, maybe - wow, another way out idea! - it would be more effective and appropriate to camapign for the wiping of international debts which keep certain countries impoverished and make it almost impossible to develop a welfare system which would make having less kids a rational act instead of an irrational one, as it would be under present circumstances. > No one is > trying to blame overpopulation on poor countries and further, no one expects > them to deal with it by themselves. i don't see you calling for the wiping of debts and other such measures. what i see is someone who wants to 'help poor people' through eugenics. > You cannot decide that overpopulation is > not a problem simply because you don't like what you think might be the > implications of that. i don't shy away from some terrible implications. i distrust and despise your entire argument. you begin by noting the different impacts of different nations and you end by calling for the depopulation of those countries which - by your own admission - are not the biggest problem. i also distrust your premises: you cannot note that there are different impacts and then continue to argue as if the problem is still one of sheer numbers. > It IS a problem, and we must understand and accept the > implications and find the solutions. all of this is the seedy work of preparing us for the final solution. the final solution dressed up as a caring and sharing environmentalism when it is plainly nothing of the sort. > There is absolutely no need to place > blame, to put forth calls of racism, to blame the poor, blame the rich, etc. > That is completely counterproductive. ahh, a call for moderation and politeness? it is presumably okay to demand things of poor people when you admit they are not the problem, presumably for the sake of 'sharing around the blame'; but when the particularism of your argument is exposed, you demand that i do not 'blame the rich' because it is counterproductive???? once again, if you accept your intial calculations then logically you should be arguing for euthenasia programs in rich countries. why not start with the US? why not start with those who consume so much more than anyone else and start bumping off the rich in the US? > The process that is happening now, the extreme demands being placed on the > planet by a human population far beyond any reasonable bounds, is a process > that began 10,000 years ago during the agricultural revolution. so, exactly why are you using a computer if you pose the problem thus? why are you not instead bringing together bands of people to return to a hunter-gatherer economy? let me answer this for you: becasue your agenda (which is to target the poor) requires that you have access to all the mod cons with which to advance the final solution. > The > implications of that revolution were completely lost on the people involved in > it, and have only recently become clear. oh enlightement! i see it all, the key to the explanation of all our misery is to be found in agriculture! do you see yourself as committed to this thesis: i actually don't think you are. i think it is a highly cynical argument made precisely in order to cover over the racist 'implications'. i) if you actually beleived it you would adopt a very different strategy, eg., calling for the return to a hunter-gatherer econnomy (there are many here who do beleive this and have done this - they are disparigingly called ferals - but i have much more respect for them than i do your contradictions); and ii) the 'implications' which you argue flow naturally from your premises are not implications. they are themselves premises which have looked around for the most respectable vehicle they can find. > The pace of the revolution, though > rapid in comparison with human cultural changes that preceded it, has been slow > enough that the adaptable human has done just that, adapted to a radically > changing world. And if we keep on adapting, we just might adapt to living in a > nightmarish hell on a distintegrating planet. i see frogs in boiling water metaphors lurking here.... a popular one for the easily impressed. > With a 10,000 year history behind it, it is absolutely ridiculous to even > consider "blaming" some group for overpopulation. Let's try to be mature about > this, set blame aside, and start looking for solutions. yes, let's be mature. let's stop with the contradictory arguments; stop advancing premises as if they are logical implications; and finally, either take your theory re: agriculture seriously enough to do something about it or drop it as the trans-historical fluff for a racist campaign. angela From ttoal@jps.net Sat Nov 14 19:17:45 1998 Received: from smtp1.jps.net (smtp1.jps.net [209.63.224.236]) by csf.Colorado.EDU (8.8.5/8.8.4/CNS-4.1p-nh) with ESMTP id TAA21679 for ; Sat, 14 Nov 1998 19:17:42 -0700 (MST) Received: from jps.net (208-25-50-97.stk.jps.net [208.25.50.97]) by smtp1.jps.net (8.8.5/8.8.5) with ESMTP id SAA29712 for ; Sat, 14 Nov 1998 18:17:24 -0800 (PST) Message-ID: <364E395B.B6832EA6@jps.net> Date: Sat, 14 Nov 1998 18:15:56 -0800 From: Ted Toal MIME-Version: 1.0 To: ppn Subject: Re: The Poor Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit My reply to Angela: > even going by this, your next statement is wrong. > >> In both cases, the impact is highly significant. You say this, Angela, but then you don't say why you think it is wrong. Let me say why I think it is right. Deforestation in India would be a good example, I think. India's population density is so high that its forests have been largely destroyed in order to provide firewood. And in the U.S., environmental destruction of all sorts is obvious to us all. So, both of these two countries, one rich and one poor, have experienced highly detrimental environmental impacts that would not have happened had their populations been far lower, more in line with population levels that existed during the first four million years of man's history. > if there is a difference - and according to your figures this difference is > substantial - then would it not be more appropriate for those concerned about > overpopulation to target 'developed' countries? You seem to have missed the point. Both rich and poor need to be targeted, because each is impacting the earth negatively with their populations. Rich with a lesser number of people all consuming a lot, and poor with a huge number of people all consuming very little. Your word "target" needs to be defined. I'd put it this way: let's target the rich countries to reduce their consumption, increase their spending for foreign aid that can be used for programs that aid in reducing family size and that improve education, health care, and economic opportunity, particularly for women. Let's target poor countries to implement programs that can reduce their population through these same kinds of programs. > in these terms, would it then not > be a more appropriate strategy to campaign for a euthenasia program for the rich of > developed countries, or at the very least, their impoverishment? Do you mean "rich" as in millionaire+, or "rich" as in your average Joe Blow American? Imagine that we could wipe the developed countries off the map. Would that be good? I think it would be catastrophic for poor countries, who often depend on the rich countries for food. Imagine that we could instantly impoverish the rich countries. Would that be good? Well, it would have pretty much the same effect on the poor countries. If impoverished, the rich countries could no longer export food to the poor ones. But other than that, I think it probably would be good. It would have a highly beneficial effect on the environment, and I even think that the newly impoverished people would be happier. I know that I personally question my own lifestyle often, and often think I would be happier living a much more frugal, impoverished lifestyle. > since i don't particularly accept the premises. > more importantly, does not this calculation show clearly that the decisive variable > is not sheer numbers but rather - wow, what an outrageous idea! - mode of > production. No, it shows that BOTH are important. The product of the two is what really matters. We could have a sustainable lifestyle here on earth with a certain population living at a low consumption level, or with a much smaller population living at a high consumption level, and of course all the ways in between. I don't know which of those is best, although I suspect that somewhere substantially above the current living standard of a "poor country" person, and somewhat below that of an upper middle class American, but perhaps somewhere around that of a typical middle-class to lower-middle-class American, might be ideal. In any case, I believe that even with an extremely low consumption level worldwide, the PRODUCT of that consumption with current population would equal an IMPACT that is totally unacceptable. If this could be proved, we wouldn't be arguing now. But looking at the big picture, all the myriad factors of our lives that are impacted by overpopulation, it is real clear to me that a change in consumption is not enough. Furthermore, if one only addresses consumption and not population, you would leading the world into a deadly trap. Imagine that we could reduce world consumption drastically by becoming more efficient, less wasteful, more frugal, less consuming, more recycling, etc. Suddenly the world becomes a much nicer place to live. The environment gets much nicer. Phew, we say, thank God we solved that overpopulation problem. We keep growing, and 100 years later the population is 40 billion. Population times consumption has now climbed back up to 1998 levels and we suddenly realize that maybe there is an overpopulation problem after all. But, uh oh, we already took all the efficiency improvements, we're already recycling to the max, there really isn't anything we can do now to lessen impact, we're all living very low consumption lifestyles. Trouble. Reducing consumption is only a solution when it is part of the broader solution of reducing population also. >> Growth of the U.S. population by 1 person per hectare is >> more-or-less equivalent, from an impact point of view, to growth of the >> population of Bangladesh by about 300 per hectare. > > once agian, a contradiction between the two parts of the paragraph and the argument. I don't follow. >> Trying to trace the factors that result in the existing fertility rates of both >> rich and poor countries is an impossibly complex task. Certainly poverty plays >> a role, and certainly the "solution" must therefore address poverty. > > well, here you begin to veer right outside the calculations you have already > established. now, you want to shift the focus entirely on sheer population numbers > when you said before that this was not the decisive factor. I hope you understand the above better now that I went into more detail about my take on the consumption vs population issue. > i suspect that for you > the 'real' problem is that all these poor and starving people will want to emigrate > to where you are, so you move swiftly into a pretense at concern for their plight. Angela, does saying things like this make you feel better? Do you enjoy putting other people down? Or do you simply have zero trust in anybody who sees the world somewhat differently than you? Let me tell you that I feel the pain of the world more easily than most people. Concern about the world, its people, and its other life has been a constant source of sorrow for me. I've devoted a good deal of my time over the years working to improve the environment, and working to help people understand the seriousness of overpopulation, because I believe that is the true root of the problem, and the best way to help people the world over. I'm sorry you seem to have to question my motives like you do. This is not conducive to any kind of useful discussion. It distances us, turns off the discussions, closes doors. > but i say pretence, because it doesn't even come close to addressing ways of > solving the problems of impoverishment around the world. instead of camapigning > for the sterilsation of poor folks I don't campaign for sterilization. Never have. I would never support coercive sterilization, except perhaps in some exceptional circumstances, never as a government policy to reduce population. I do support the idea that everybody should be able to get themselves sterilized if they want to. I got myself sterilized. > , maybe - wow, another way out idea! - it would > be more effective and appropriate to camapign for the wiping of international debts > which keep certain countries impoverished and make it almost impossible to develop > a welfare system which would make having less kids a rational act instead of an > irrational one, as it would be under present circumstances. I'm not at all opposed to this idea. It sounds good. I've heard just a bit about this, but don't really know much. This is the kind of idea that I like was hoping to hear more about by joining PPN. There is simply no question but that we must search out the best ways to reduce population growth, and ideas like this need to be heard. Please don't make the assumption that I, or anybody in the overpopulation field, objects to this sort of thing, without asking them about it. > i don't see you calling for the wiping of debts and other such measures. what i > see is someone who wants to 'help poor people' through eugenics. Hmm, I never mentioned eugenics or anything about it, never mentioned sterilization. I have an irresistable urge to tease you right now, get your goat up some more, by talking about eugenics a bit. As I understand it, eugenics is basically the idea that one could "improve" the human species through selective breeding. Being an engineer, I'm captivated by the possibilities of genetic engineering. At the same time, I'm acutely aware that this is extremely dangerous stuff. For one thing, who decides what is "better" and what is "worse" or not okay? For another, we are so far from understanding ourselves and what aspects need and don't need improving that it isn't even funny. And then, any kind of coercion that would force certain people deemed unworthy not to reproduce is repulsive in the extreme. But on the other hand, we've gotten ourselves onto an ugly path away from the natural processes that shaped who we are. Today, you can be born with a bunch of genetic defects, and pass them on to your children, and the quality of the overall human gene pool is going downhill. Eventually it will be a big problem. I think there is a way around this without coercive eugenic programs. I'd call it "self-chosen eugenics." Some day it might be possible for anyone to have their own genes fully analyzed, receive a report of what they've got, and if they so choose, they could have the DNA of one of their germ cells modified to eliminate certain things they didn't want in a child, say a likelihood of early heart failure, for example, and then have that germ cell be used to conceive a child. Although not everybody would take advantage of such a technology, enough people would that it would solve the problem of declining gene pool. Of course, such a technology would be fraught with its own dangers. It's nice to know, though, that there are ways of taking things that at first seem ugly and inhumane, and turning them into something that gives people more choice, more possibilities, and lets them choose. > i don't shy away from some terrible implications. i distrust and despise your > entire argument. you begin by noting the different impacts of different nations > and you end by calling for the depopulation of those countries which - by your own > admission - are not the biggest problem. Let me make it clear what I'm calling for. I'd like to see the U.S. population reduced to about 10-25 million. I'd like to see the world population reduced to about 200 million. I'd like to see the dramatic differences in consumption rates, energy use, etc. evened out, so that there are no extremely poor or rich countries in the world. I'd like EVERYBODY to have the opportunity to thrive as a human being. > i also distrust your premises: you cannot > note that there are different impacts and then continue to argue as if the problem > is still one of sheer numbers. Let's try again. The impact of one person is greater in a rich country. To reduce impact in a rich country, you can reduce consumption or reduce population, or both. I've stated above why I believe it is essential to not ONLY reduce consumption. To reduce impact in a poor country, the same thing applies, but reducing consumption in that case is out of the question. It needs to be increased. Therefore, to reduce impact in a poor country, the only viable option is to reduce population. Immigration is another ugly factor that needs to be looked at. When poor people immigrate to rich countries and adopt richer lifestyles, their impact on the environment goes up. Therefore, impact can be reduced by reducing population in poor countries so as to lessen immigration. I.e., the true impact of a person in a poor country is actually somewhat higher than would appear when looking at the average consumption of those people, because some of those people will be migrants to rich countries. Now I'm sure you're thinking, there he goes again, calling for reducing poor population instead of calling for reducing rich consumption. I'll say it again, BOTH need to be done. Reducing consumption is a whole other topic. How do you do it fairly? So many people in the U.S. live marginally as it is. > all of this is the seedy work of preparing us for the final solution. the final > solution dressed up as a caring and sharing environmentalism when it is plainly > nothing of the sort. Angela, if I haven't convinced you yet that my heart is in a good place, then there is no use in further conversation, and I only hope that you grow out of your anger some day so that you can be more effective in what you want to do. But, maybe I HAVE convinced you? > why not start with those who consume so much more than anyone else and start bumping > off the rich in the US? I'll bet you could wipe out the richest 10% of Americans, and have virtually no impact on the wealth of the remaining people. But I could be wrong. I have a friend who is always talking about the rich and powerful, conspiracies of control of the earth, etc., and he makes a lot of sense at times. I don't know. I'm focusing my efforts on the area where all my education and instincts tell me the most likely area for positive change is: dealing with overpopulation. > so, exactly why are you using a computer if you pose the problem thus? why are you > not instead bringing together bands of people to return to a hunter-gatherer > economy? I described the process that happened, I didn't say I thought we should reverse it. But don't think this hasn't crossed my mind. In fact I've often thought I would be happier living an aboriginal lifestyle. Of course, it isn't possible to have 6 billion people living on earth in an aboriginal lifestyle. But beyond that, I'm an engineer and computer programmer, I'm a technologist, I LIKE technology. As much as I suspect it is bad for my basic happiness as a human, I LIKE it. I don't think humans can reverse course on this new path we are taking. It just seems extremely unlikely. So, what we have to do is find a way to adjust our course to make it sustainable. I believe we've come to the end of the course started at the Agricultural revolution, the course of following the growth paradigm. I believe the new course might best be found by looking for ways to integrate the more ancient paradigm of sustainability into our new lifestyle. We live at a turning point in human evolution. It is an incredible challenge we face. And opportunity. We need to work together to find the right change of consciousness that will allow us to continue to exist. > let me answer this for you: becasue your agenda (which is to target the > poor) requires that you have access to all the mod cons with which to advance the > final solution. No, Angela. > oh enlightement! i see it all, the key to the explanation of all our misery is to > be found in agriculture! do you see yourself as committed to this thesis: i > actually don't think you are. i think it is a highly cynical argument made > precisely in order to cover over the racist 'implications'. i) if you actually > beleived it you would adopt a very different strategy, eg., calling for the return > to a hunter-gatherer econnomy (there are many here who do beleive this and have > done this - they are disparigingly called ferals - but i have much more respect for > them than i do your contradictions); and ii) the 'implications' which you argue > flow naturally from your premises are not implications. they are themselves > premises which have looked around for the most respectable vehicle they can find. I hope I've filled you in enuf on where I'm coming from that you can see that the above is way off base. > i see frogs in boiling water metaphors lurking here.... a popular one for the > easily impressed. It is an appropriate metaphor, a good one. > yes, let's be mature. let's stop with the contradictory arguments; stop advancing > premises as if they are logical implications; and finally, either take your theory > re: agriculture seriously enough to do something about it or drop it as the > trans-historical fluff for a racist campaign. Your words are really wounding to me. I can't take much more of it. I'll tell you again that if you continue to try to argue points this way, you'll do nothing but cut yourself off from everybody except those few who happen to agree with you on everything. Ted Toal. From ttoal@jps.net Sat Nov 14 19:19:27 1998 Received: from smtp1.jps.net (smtp1.jps.net [209.63.224.236]) by csf.Colorado.EDU (8.8.5/8.8.4/CNS-4.1p-nh) with ESMTP id TAA21716 for ; Sat, 14 Nov 1998 19:19:25 -0700 (MST) Received: from jps.net (208-25-50-97.stk.jps.net [208.25.50.97]) by smtp1.jps.net (8.8.5/8.8.5) with ESMTP id SAA00280 for ; Sat, 14 Nov 1998 18:19:09 -0800 (PST) Message-ID: <364E39C4.C9E60821@jps.net> Date: Sat, 14 Nov 1998 18:17:40 -0800 From: Ted Toal MIME-Version: 1.0 To: ppn Subject: Re: What Can We Do? Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Another of rc&am's replies to one of my PPN posts: Ted Toal wrote: > the situation is a continuum rubbish. there is no necessary reason why population numbers form one generation to the next consitute an increase. that in many cases - and increasingly as a global phenomenon - rates of reproduction have declined in particular countries should have disabused you of this fancy. it should also have shown you that these declines in birth rates were not the result of sterilisation or of planned eugenics programs, but of the availablity of welfare outside familial relationships and other changes in the economies. are these the kinds of things you advocate should be taking place in poorer countries? no. > The most important thing to do is to spread awareness, to foster an enlightened > consciousness about OP by talking about it. this mission of yours requires all the technologies and circumstances you deplore as the harbinger of world degeneration. didn't the nazi's make use of certain technologies in order to bring forth their solutions to a problem perceived as one of degeneracy due to the overpopulation of the world by the inferior races? > The overpopulation problem is not > a technological one in any sense -- we have contraceptives. It is basically a > problem in consciousness. gee, so you've cottoned on to the fact that most people would not agree with you? in order to make yourself feel virtuos in light of such beligerence, you would paint dissenters as unenlightened. how simple a mechanism to avoid debate. > Anything you can do to open people's eyes will help. oh, i'll try to help as much as i can. > One obvious thing that always stands out is to improve contraceptive > availability. There are still well over 100 million women who want to be using > them but can't afford or obtain them. so: what are you doing about is? multiple choice: a) campaigning for cheaper of free, and safe, contraceptives? b) supporting the use of untested contraceptive and sterilisation techniques which are cheaper because they are untested and do not have a market in 'developed' countries? c) campaigning for things which would make for a rise in the living standards of these women so that they could afford proper health care, including accesss to safe contraceptives? d) campaigning for innovations in contraception which make safety the principal criteria of eventual application? e) campaigning for an increase in the standard of living, the introiduction of welfare measures which would be conducive to a decline in birth rates, or demanding the waiving of third world debts which make it impossible to fund adequate and safe health care, including access to safe contraceptives? let me guess which one you've done: b. your pemises are showing. angela From ttoal@jps.net Sat Nov 14 19:21:18 1998 Received: from smtp1.jps.net (smtp1.jps.net [209.63.224.236]) by csf.Colorado.EDU (8.8.5/8.8.4/CNS-4.1p-nh) with ESMTP id TAA21753 for ; Sat, 14 Nov 1998 19:21:16 -0700 (MST) Received: from jps.net (208-25-50-97.stk.jps.net [208.25.50.97]) by smtp1.jps.net (8.8.5/8.8.5) with ESMTP id SAA00828 for ; Sat, 14 Nov 1998 18:21:00 -0800 (PST) Message-ID: <364E3A33.83E1FD40@jps.net> Date: Sat, 14 Nov 1998 18:19:31 -0800 From: Ted Toal MIME-Version: 1.0 To: ppn Subject: Re: What Can We Do? Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit My reply to Angela: >> First, realize that we have already done a lot, and if we hadn't, the situation >> would be far worse. Also realize that we haven't done nearly as much as we >> could have, hence the situation is much worse than it could have been. I.e. >> the situation is a continuum, not black/white. Where we are 75 years from now, >> on that continuum, depends greatly on what we do now. > > rubbish. there is no necessary reason why population numbers form one generation > to the next consitute an increase. that in many cases - and increasingly as a > global phenomenon - rates of reproduction have declined in particular countries > should have disabused you of this fancy. Of course there is a reason why population numbers from one generation to the next constitute an increase. I'm sure you've heard of population momentum. The large cohort of young in today's world population virtually guarantees an increase in the next generation, barring global disaster. Rubbish? Rubbish that population at any given time is not either some absurdly high number or a very low number, that instead it has the possibility of existing at many different values in between those extremes?? I'm aware of declining fertility rates. It's extremely good news. > it should also have shown you that these > declines in birth rates were not the result of sterilisation or of planned eugenics > programs, but of the availablity of welfare outside familial relationships and > other changes in the economies. are these the kinds of things you advocate should > be taking place in poorer countries? no. Well, as a matter of fact, yes. And these are the kinds of things I was referring to when I said that if we had done nothing, the situation would be worse. I don't advocate sterilization or eugenics. >> The most important thing to do is to spread awareness, to foster an enlightened >> consciousness about OP by talking about it. > > this mission of yours requires all the technologies and circumstances you deplore > as the harbinger of world degeneration. didn't the nazi's make use of certain > technologies in order to bring forth their solutions to a problem perceived as one > of degeneracy due to the overpopulation of the world by the inferior races? Angela, you're getting a little crazy here! Back off on your crusade! I'm not the monster you have somehow gotten to think I am. Nor is Ed Glaze. >> One obvious thing that always stands out is to improve contraceptive >> availability. There are still well over 100 million women who want to be using >> them but can't afford or obtain them. > > so: what are you doing about is? multiple choice: > > a) campaigning for cheaper of free, and safe, contraceptives? yes. > b) supporting the use of untested contraceptive and sterilisation techniques which > are cheaper because they are untested and do not have a market in 'developed' > countries? I haven't gotten involved in this. > c) campaigning for things which would make for a rise in the living standards of > these women so that they could afford proper health care, including accesss to safe > contraceptives? yes. > d) campaigning for innovations in contraception which make safety the principal > criteria of eventual application? Innovations, yes, I support that. I have to admit that I haven't paid a whole lot of attention to the issue of safety of contraceptives. I certainly don't want to see unsafe contraceptives being spread around the world. > e) campaigning for an increase in the standard of living, the introiduction of > welfare measures which would be conducive to a decline in birth rates, or demanding > the waiving of third world debts which make it impossible to fund adequate and safe > health care, including access to safe contraceptives? Yes. As to welfare measures, I'm not sure what you might be referring to particularly. The microloan program is one that has worked quite well, from what I've heard. I wouldn't call that a welfare program, but something like it. "Welfare program" has gotten to be kind of a dirty phrase, with lots of connotations that make it hard to talk about it rationally. I think a lot of welfare programs were properly criticized by right-wing people for encouraging a dependent lifestyle. Creating welfare programs that foster independence is something I support. > let me guess which one you've done: b. Wrong. Angela, I think I'm starting to like you. From ttoal@jps.net Sat Nov 14 19:28:51 1998 Received: from smtp1.jps.net (smtp1.jps.net [209.63.224.236]) by csf.Colorado.EDU (8.8.5/8.8.4/CNS-4.1p-nh) with ESMTP id TAA22372 for ; Sat, 14 Nov 1998 19:28:48 -0700 (MST) Received: from jps.net (208-25-50-97.stk.jps.net [208.25.50.97]) by smtp1.jps.net (8.8.5/8.8.5) with ESMTP id SAA03035 for ; Sat, 14 Nov 1998 18:28:28 -0800 (PST) Message-ID: <364E3BF3.6B509B86@jps.net> Date: Sat, 14 Nov 1998 18:26:59 -0800 From: Ted Toal MIME-Version: 1.0 To: ppn Subject: Re: The Rich and the Poor Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit My reply to rc&am's post that begins "is this the entirety of george alter's post?" > also, is it not the case that there are a > number of quite wealthy countries wherein the ratio of person per land is higher > than most poorer countries? Let me quote biologist Edward Wilson about this. "It is sophistic to point to the Netherlands and Japan, as many commentators incredibly still do, as models of densely populated bus prosperous societies. Both are highly specialized industrial nations dependent on massive imports of natural resources from the rest of the world. If all nations held the same number of people per square kilometer, they would converge in quality of life to Bangladesh rather than to the Netherlands or Japan, and their irreplaceable natural resources would soon join the seven wonders of the world as scattered vestiges of an ancient history." >> It is my hope that the strong downward trend in fertility in the developing >> countries will continue, and a below-replacement rate will be reached in a >> decade or so, leading to NPG sometime towards the middle or end of the 21st >> century. > > since this is already happening, and loks likely to continue, remind me again why > you want to campaign agaisnt 'overpopulation'? Nobody knows whether it will continue or not. Our situation is really serious. We shouldn't just assume it will continue, we should do what we can to ensure that it WILL continue, and will get down as fast as humanely possible. Even if we were to hit the low U.N. projection on population, which is probably not real likely, we will grow to something like 11 billion before starting a downward trend. I fear we cannot sustain 11 billion people on earth even for one day. > i don't think you beleive > overpopulation is the problem any more than i do, it just gives your racism an edge > of respectability amongst those looking for a respectable racism. I'll just hold my tongue here. > what exactly would > you consider to be the optimal range of population numbers for this planet, and how > have you come to this decision? tell me, i'd really like to know the science > behind this. I mentioned in a previous email some numbers. I haven't spent a great deal of time trying to come up with a really good set of numbers backed up with lots of reasons. I usually think somewhere around 10-25 million for the U.S. and 200 million or so for the world. The human population for several million years is thought to have been around 5 million. This is the natural human population level that the planet can sustain when people are living at an aboriginal technology level. With current technology, we could probably have a much higher population than that with fairly minimal impact on the planet - not zero by any means, but far less impact than today. NPG did a series of papers several years ago, asking experts in various fields to estimate optimum populations for the U.S. I read all these, but don't remember much about them now, other than that all of them gave numbers below the current level (which doesn't mean much, I can't imagine NPG publishing those that estimated numbers HIGHER than today's levels.) But there was a lot of science and a lot factual material in those articles, and they led me to think that the 10-25 million level might be one where impacts could be held way down. I remember one factor in my guestimates. U.S. energy consumption per capita is about 7 times world energy consumption per capita. So, if we were to raise the rest of the world to the U.S. level of energy consumption, planetary impacts would increase by about 7 times. To keep impact the same as now, population would have to be reduced by a factor of 7. But that would just keep us where we are. If we want to improve things, we need a much bigger factor than that, say three times as much, or around 20. 1/20th of the current U.S. population is about 13 million. 1/20th of the current world population is about 300 million. Poorer countries are for the most part more densely populated than richer ones. If they increased their living standards to equal that of the U.S., they would have an incredibly big impact on their environment. It would be best in that case if they reduced their density, hence under that situation, i.e. poor countries attaining "rich" living standards, I would advocate that they reduce their population in a greater proportion than rich countries. Although, some rich countries are probably even more densely populated than poor ones, like Japan, and in that case Japan should reduce by a larger amount too. How do you arrive at optimal population levels, anyway? Even studies of maximum possible population levels have been woefully inadequate. Joel Cohen, in "How Many People Can the Earth Support?", goes over a whole bunch of studies of maximum population, and arrives at the conclusion that all of them fall way short of any kind of reasonable estimate, because the total system is so complex that we can not even begin to model it accurately yet. Optimum population is a much harder number to arrive at than maximum population, because it involves value judgments as to what is optimum. How much wildlife habitat should be left, for example? I'd say that a good first cut at estimating the relative populations of different countries, assuming that you already know the optimum population for the entire planet, could be gotten by taking a look at the type of land present in each country, and how suitable it is for human occupation, for growing of food and providing other things people need. Although you couldn't be real precise about it, I think you could assign some good rough numbers. For example, you might assign regions of New England in the U.S. a number five times higher (per unit area) than what you would assign to, say, Colorado, because New England has a better climate, better soil, and more water than Colorado. It would be interesting if somebody attempted such a project for all countries of the world, and compared current populations with the numbers. That would give everyone a much better idea about just which countries would need more reduction of population, and which ones less, if we were to attain a condition of equal prosperity everywhere. > what precisely are the positive and negative effects that you foresee? For negative, the aging of the global population is definitely a big one. That would force changes in health care systems; the size of the labor force would change in comparison to the population it would support; big shifts in many areas of the economy would probably have to take place; I haven't heard of much work being done on economy and declining population - many economists seem to think that a declining population would kill the economy, but would it really? I'd like to see some results of studies of this question. For positive, the biggest would be that wildlife habitat would begin to recover, along with wildlife itself. Second, humans would finally have some breathing room to begin solving the problems that plague our planet, instead of focussing so much energy on maintaining the growth. I think we would start making extremely rapid progress against poverty. I think crime in cities would begin falling. Well, heck, just about every problem we have today could be attacked with a good likelihood of making it better, instead of having gains eroded away as the population grows. >> So you ARE saying what I thought you couldn't possibly be saying! This makes >> no sense. You are saying, "The world may be overpopulated, but because it is >> the poor countries for the most part (excluding U.S.) > >do you exclude the US for personal reasons, or is this a necessary piece in your repetoire? I was saying that the countries that need to reduce their population are mostly poor countries, but also the U.S., it being a rich country that has a particularly high consumption rate and high population. But above I was paraphrasing what it sounded like someone else was saying. As I've stated before, I believe that ALL countries need to reduce their population - by what precise amounts, I don't know. > immigration has had either a net positive or no effect on the employment rates of > non-immigrant populations. this is substantiated by every peice of research i have > seen. unemployment, even unemployment amongst 'unskilled' workers, is not > increased by immigration. the reverse is true. technological displacement is > responsible for the unemployment created in certain occupational categories, not > immigrants. There has been a bunch of research recently that says just the opposite. I can't remember the name of one of the researchers, somebody in Texas I think. My brother, who is an unskilled worker, just commented to me in an email about how he is angry because his wage has been lowered due to competition from Mexican workers where he works. This is a no-brainer. It's real obvious that if you import massive numbers of unskilled people, unskilled jobs will become scarce, and their wages will drop. Do you support paying migrant farm workers miserable salaries for the work they do? Why not limit the immigration, up the salaries, and pay U.S. citizens to pick the food? > and, what exactly in anything you have posted has suggested ways of improving the > conditions in poorer countries? all you've demanded is the need to 'stop the poor > breeding' and stop the poor emigrating to where you live. I'm all for implementing programs to improve conditions in poor countries. But as long as the population keeps growing like it is, it is a hopeless battle. I realize there is some circularity, that improving conditions will help reduce population growth, but if no focus at all is placed on overpopulation, we may continue trying to help the poor countries and find that the population keeps growing faster than the economy. I say, put our effort into the whole thing, work on it from all the angles. But population is crucial. If we can get the population to stop growing, our chances of improving the lot of the poor suddenly become optimistic instead of pessimistic. > <<< Anti-immigrant rhetoric is fueling the rise of neo-fascist parties in > Europe, and most political parties (e.g. the U.S.) are afraid of the issue.>>> > anti-immigrant rhetoric is neo-fascism, not just something that fuels it. You're commenting here on something I quoted that someone else wrote. > well, those people running around waving swastikas saying pretty much the same > things that ted here is certainly make it hard for him. and, isn't it unfortunate > that the nazis gave eugenics such a bad name..... I'll hold my tongue again. But it hurts. Ted Toal From ttoal@jps.net Sat Nov 14 19:51:23 1998 Received: from smtp1.jps.net (smtp1.jps.net [209.63.224.236]) by csf.Colorado.EDU (8.8.5/8.8.4/CNS-4.1p-nh) with ESMTP id TAA23787 for ; Sat, 14 Nov 1998 19:51:21 -0700 (MST) Received: from jps.net (208-25-50-97.stk.jps.net [208.25.50.97]) by smtp1.jps.net (8.8.5/8.8.5) with ESMTP id SAA09246 for ; Sat, 14 Nov 1998 18:51:05 -0800 (PST) Message-ID: <364E413F.C70015D0@jps.net> Date: Sat, 14 Nov 1998 18:49:35 -0800 From: Ted Toal MIME-Version: 1.0 To: ppn Subject: Re: Rational Replies to Mr. Glaze Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Here is my reply to Angela's post about rational replies to Mr. Glaze: > i think though that you have > decided to ignore the criticisms of your and ed glaze's positions. No. You haven't listened very well to our positions. You didn't really even give us a chance to put forth our positions. By the way, I may have missed a lot of what went on between you and Ed Glaze. But I assure you that I haven't ignored anything you have sent directed to me. It IS taking me a while to wade thru it tho. Hard to find the time for this, but I think it is important and may be fruitful for both of us, so I'll try to stick with it for a while. Oh, another thing, I only just joined this list, so you may have posted things that I didn't see. Also, I've noticed that there are a lot of posts to PPN of very extensive material, and unfortunately I just don't have the time to read it, unless something special catches my eye that really looks interesting. > as for 'angry': yes, i am angry and appalled - at your statements, > suppositions, contradictory arguments, relative morality, and at the ways in which > you resort to injunctions that others be polite when responding to statements and > positions which are obscene. Well, I hope I've made myself more clear and that you realize that my positions are not as far from yours as you think. Angela, I've learned over time to be far less judgmental of other people than I used to be. I've learned to withhold judgment that their positions are obscene, and politely debate them about it. And in the process I have, many times, experienced changes in my own position. I'm no longer as self-righteous as I used to be. I realize much more the complexity of the whole situation, and the different perspectives that different people are coming from. I'll bet you are in your 20's. Your words just sound so much like mine might have when I was at that age. And that's okay. I just hope I can talk you into treating me nicer, because my feelings get hurt easily. :-( Ted Toal ;-) From ttoal@jps.net Sat Nov 14 19:56:49 1998 Received: from smtp1.jps.net (smtp1.jps.net [209.63.224.236]) by csf.Colorado.EDU (8.8.5/8.8.4/CNS-4.1p-nh) with ESMTP id TAA23991 for ; Sat, 14 Nov 1998 19:56:47 -0700 (MST) Received: from jps.net (208-25-50-97.stk.jps.net [208.25.50.97]) by smtp1.jps.net (8.8.5/8.8.5) with ESMTP id SAA10732 for ; Sat, 14 Nov 1998 18:56:32 -0800 (PST) Message-ID: <364E4286.2A8322D0@jps.net> Date: Sat, 14 Nov 1998 18:55:02 -0800 From: Ted Toal MIME-Version: 1.0 To: ppn Subject: Re: Overpopulation and Malthus Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Doug Henwood replied to a post by Ed Glaze, relevant portions quoted here: >> Hopefully, the world >>of today will realize the threat we face and we can avoid >>having to make such reprehensible, but necessary decisions. > >That's one of the more chilling paragraphs I've read today, though it's >only 10:30 in the morning. Let's value lives by how much "society" has >invested in them! That would make Bill Gates's kid worth more than, what, >all the infants in sub-Saharan Africa, right? Doug, it seems you didn't read that last line of Ed's. He does not believe we should be valuing lives by how much society has invested in them. He finds it reprehensible. He is saying that such reprehensible action would become logical and necessary were the situation to get so bad that we HAD TO reduce population. Please, listen more carefully to what he is saying. Ted Toal. From plicysci@frii.com Sun Nov 15 03:01:39 1998 Received: from deimos.frii.com (deimos.frii.com [208.146.240.2]) by csf.Colorado.EDU (8.8.5/8.8.4/CNS-4.1p-nh) with ESMTP id DAA08702 for ; Sun, 15 Nov 1998 03:01:37 -0700 (MST) Received: from frii.com (ftc-0617.dialup.frii.com [216.17.135.17] (may be forged)) by deimos.frii.com (8.9.1a/8.9.1) with ESMTP id DAA09194; Sun, 15 Nov 1998 03:01:31 -0700 (MST) Message-ID: <364EA702.E71B0710@frii.com> Date: Sun, 15 Nov 1998 03:03:47 -0700 From: Jim Talboy X-Accept-Language: en MIME-Version: 1.0 To: ttoal@jps.net CC: PROGRESSIVE POPULATION NETWORK Subject: stringing along the debate to avoid challenges and wild MOTIVES in general References: <364E341F.9AAC56A0@jps.net> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit > Ed Glaze has summarized some of his observations of PPN interactions, mainly > the ones he's had with list members, and posted them to KZPG. I don't know > about the Sierra and Audubon lists, I'm not a subscriber. If you don't like > his summary, you'll have to join those lists and discuss it there. Obviously, we'd appreciate if our challenges were replied too, on this list, and not somewhere else. Mr. Glaze is evading our challenges, however we've noted he's not wasting anytime moving on to distract us from the original indiscretions. He chose to respond, on other lists, by rewording and dismissing our "illogic" and "unreasonableness." See the below clip from that posting he made on ZPG, Audubon, and Sierra listservers. Note that in spite of his admonishments to not bother joining the discussion here, he's heroically continued to participate on the list by evading our challenges. This is a known tactic of the Front that has blown in here and has tried in vain to reformulate the "problem" of which Mr. Glaze contends we don't understand sufficiently to acknowledge the "severity of the solution." The following has been copied from that cross posting. I will deal with Mr. Toal's utopian inclinations toward a "better world" and eugenics directly after the following clip. >Date: Thu, 12 Nov 1998 13:20:13 -0600 >Reply-To: "Population Forum, Sierra Club" > >Sender: "Population Forum, Sierra Club" > >From: Ed Glaze III >Subject: Progressive Population Network listserv -- a review >X-To: Audubon Population , > KZPG Overpopulation News Network >X-cc: Ted Toal >To: CONS-SPST-POPULATION@LISTS.SIERRACLUB.ORG > >Well I have been a subscriber to the PPN listserv for a week >and have really stirred them up. The funny thing is I didn't try >to, or even intend, to start such heated arguments. I won't call >them debates because the other list subscribers do not seem >to be very reasonable. > >Ted Toal is another pop activist who may be >familiar to some of you and he and I are both dealing with the >different (skewed) perceptions of the overpopulation problem >as perceived on PPN. Like Toto and Dorothy we are finding >ourselves in a strange place that is very hard to understand. > >Think twice before you join PPN and try to discuss seriously the >overpopulation issue. Sierra Club list subscribers will recognize >some the "illogic" that seems so prevalent on the PPN list. They >are very free with their interpretations of what you say and then >they attribute to you implications on non-mentioned issues that >often have nothing to do with population. Needless, to say they >do that rather than deal with any factual statements. > >Quoting from the PPN introduction to new subscribers: > > "The Progressive Population Network list is dedicated > to the development of alternative ways to think about > population processes, beyond the standard demographic, > microeconomic and neo-Malthusian perspectives, and > beyond the notion that population control is a panacea > for the world's problems." > >Below is a translation of that sentence for you using some of the >words from messages in the last few days: > >________ Ed Glaze > > >PPN does not talk about population processes, especially >anything to do with limits to growth, demographic trends, >and population control in any form. Such things imply racism, >violence against women, exploitation of the poor, imperialistic >interference, and there may be inappropriate MOTIVES driving >the decision making. > >Most of the environmental consequences of population are due to >political and economic policies, not to the number of people per se. >We are not interested in hearing the voices of rich white men, using >so-called scientific evidence and objectivity about the need to >reduce human population (read non-Caucasian population). The >facts are not enough to justify the MEANS suggested to accomplish >the GOALS, because we've seen this "rationality" cause far more >problems than previously existed. FACTS are not enduring and >they've been "cooked" before. > >Malthusianism and neo-Malthusianism offer an excessively simplistic >understanding of the complex relationship of resources and population, >which has proven to be a theoretical red herring. > >Yes, the world is overcrowded, but what are you suggesting be done? >Are we really that capable? It seems far too complicated, given the >multi-cultural world that lays beyond our control. I frankly don't believe >it's "our" place to make righteous demands given the extent of variation >in culture that "conflicts" with our own Western thinking. Does your >righteousness stem from a concern about immigration? Or is it from >a sense of helplessness? > > >> These are two of Mr. Toals postings regarding the whys and wherefores of > overpopulation, as an example of really wild, hidden MOTIVES. << > > The postings you referred to have nothing to do with overpopulation. They are > posting I made to paranet.ufo news group, regarding my interest in UFOs and > extraterrestrials. I have no idea why you feel the need to drag something like > that into a discussion like this. I can only assume that you hope that most > people on the list will be prejudiced against anyone who expresses interest and > some degree of belief in these subjects. Not knowing the list members, I have > no idea how prejudiced they are in that respect, but I'll assume they will > ignore your attempt to bias them. > > Ted Toal In my opinion, Mr. Toal is interested in eugenics. He seems enamored with genetic engineering and its potential. Why he is making these assertions in regards to advanced technology, UFO's and the accompanying Aliens is only open to speculation. Of course eugenics are a major issue, and frankly not a new issue either. What he points out is that we have this technology to make it a "better world," and we should be "open minded" enough to discuss it. This is true, it needs to be discussed, however that he has failed to mention what MOTIVES he may have to cut back on the human population. What role Space Creatures may have in genetics engineering and eugenics is open for speculation. Quite frankly, in my own opinion I'd like to avoid discussing UFO's, MOTIVES are the issue in GENERAL. I am suggesting that MOTIVES, however wild they may appear to us, nevertheless may underlie casual politeness and claims of "rational" thinking, and the implications of these posts, by Mr. Toal, are therefore open to speculation. The below has been copied from his posting on alt.paranet. I would hasten to advise that personally I believe the UFO phenomena has psychological or spiritual implications and do not believe these implications are the issue. ********************************************************* ETs, Secrecy, and Highly Advanced Technology Author: Ted Toal Email: ttoal@jps.net Date: 1998/03/29 Forums: alt.paranet.ufo Message-ID: <351ED61F.C6F01A83@jps.net> Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii MIME-Version: 1.0 X-NNTP-Posting-Host: 208.25.57.133 My study of UFO phenomena over the last year and half has led me to these tentative conclusions: 1. There are other beings that enter our space fairly often. 2. There are apparently many different types or "species" of beings with many different agendas. 3. These beings may be extraterrestrials, but it might be much weirder than that. They might, in some or all cases, be from some other dimension. 4. These beings apparently have chosen to keep themselves more or less hidden from us. This is very odd and hard to explain, unless there is some unified plan and some enforcer of that plan. Even that seems unlikely. The apparent diversity of these beings would seem to argue that at least some of them would make contact with us. 5. The most important factor to consider when trying to understand these beings is the technological development factor. Extrapolating from the current rate of human technological growth, we can see that in a "mere" 10,000 years, human technology will be so advanced that life then will be utterly unrecognizable from the way it is now. Some of the possibilities and likelihoods to keep in mind are: a. We will attain full understanding of the genetic control of our own development, and will reach a point where we can control and manipulate our own genetics. This technology will then continue to grow until we can create virtually any kind of creature we want, with ease. This is within a couple hundred years from where we are now. b. We will reach a full understanding of how our brains work. We will be able to use genetic engineering to vastly enhance intelligence AND quite possibly the speed at which brains operate. c. Microminiaturization will reach the point where we can create brains out of silicon or something, perhaps quantum-optical brains. d. Also, microminiaturization will permit us to create incredible sensing technology, and incredible spacecraft of the smallest size. e. Merging of electronic technology (or its successor(s), whatever they may be) with biological technology will bring even more possibilities. We will be able to design organisms that live in space and sense a vast array of energy forms, e.g. the full spectrum of EM radiation. 6. Because we can easily see that our own technology is rapidly bringing us to an incredible place where the nature of lives changes completely, we can predict that beings far advanced from us will be utterly different than us. Sudden exposure to them, and revelation of their nature, would surely be a deep and thorough shock to most people. I believe this is the most likely explanation as to why they prefer not to make contact. 7. The frequent entry of bizarre spiritual elements into UFO encounters raises the possibility that many traditional religious beliefs in life after death, reincarnation, devils, angels, fairies, and so forth, may actually have a basis in fact; that the true nature of reality may be far wilder than non-religious people such as myself tend to believe. The nature of time itself may even be very different from our perception of it. 8. Because the field of ufology is like a hall of carnival mirrors crowded with objects, and the target we are trying to see clearly is a particular object visible only in a variety of distorted reflections, it is necessary to keep an open mind that is constantly sorting and assigning tentative odds to various possibilities, but keeping them fluid and always willing to move the odds of something up or down as new information becomes available. And it is best to let go of as many preconceptions one has about the nature of reality and be open - tentatively - to the wildest ideas. 9. The phenomena seems to point out that humans are small-bit players in the cosmic scheme of things, without much control over what happens, with short lives and meager brains and bodies. It can easily get one down, it has me. But the up side is the realization that we are alive, we are taking part in this strange experience called life, and if we are willing to accept our limitations and jump into the process of living life here on earth, we will find that we exist in a rich, wonder-filled universe, on a wonder-filled planet. We can discover how satisfying it is to simply be alive, and can feel grateful that we have the opportunity. -- *** Create HOPE for the future: work for a SMALLER HUMAN POPULATION *** From ttoal@jps.net Sun Nov 15 08:05:23 1998 Received: from smtp1.jps.net (smtp1.jps.net [209.63.224.236]) by csf.Colorado.EDU (8.8.5/8.8.4/CNS-4.1p-nh) with ESMTP id IAA14935 for ; Sun, 15 Nov 1998 08:05:20 -0700 (MST) Received: from jps.net (209-142-59-56.stk.jps.net [209.142.59.56]) by smtp1.jps.net (8.8.5/8.8.5) with ESMTP id HAA07423 for ; Sun, 15 Nov 1998 07:05:03 -0800 (PST) Message-ID: <364EED45.F27216D0@jps.net> Date: Sun, 15 Nov 1998 07:03:33 -0800 From: Ted Toal MIME-Version: 1.0 To: ppn Subject: Re: Avoiding Challenges, Wild Motives Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Jim Talboy quoted Ed Glaze as saying the following on KZPG: >Sierra Club list subscribers will recognize >some the "illogic" that seems so prevalent on the PPN list. They >are very free with their interpretations of what you say and then >they attribute to you implications on non-mentioned issues that >often have nothing to do with population. Needless, to say they >do that rather than deal with any factual statements. I've found this to be true, not with all list subscribers, but with some. For example, I've been accused of being a supporter of coercive sterilization, which I'm not. I never even mentioned the topic in my PPN posts. Another example is Talboy's bringing in my posts on a completely different subject, and then trying to turn them into population-related issues. I've found that the factual things I've said about overpopulation have either been ignored, written off with casual statements such as "This is obviously not true", or written off by name-calling, such as suggesting that I'm a neo-nazi. You also quoted Ed Glaze as saying: >PPN does not talk about population processes, especially >anything to do with limits to growth, demographic trends, >and population control in any form. Such things imply racism, >violence against women, exploitation of the poor, imperialistic >interference, and there may be inappropriate MOTIVES driving >the decision making. Is this not an accurate description of what has been heard on PPN recently? I'd like to know if this is in fact an accurate description of how PPN subscribers view the overpopulation issue. I think a view like this would be short-sided, but on the other hand not totally without value. I'm interested in learning about other viewpoints on overpopulation, and if this is one, okay, let's discuss it. Jim Talboy said: >> In my opinion, Mr. Toal is interested in eugenics. He seems enamored with genetic engineering and its potential. I have quite a bit of interested in genetic engineering. As for eugenics, not much interest, but I have thought about it some and pushed it around a bit with some other people. I find it really odd that some people on this list seem interested in finding out about my interests. I guess it has to do with the following statement of Jim's: >> however that he has failed to mention what MOTIVES he may have to cut back on the human population. It seems that the PPN list has an inordinate amount of interest in what the motives of its subscribers might be, at least if those subscribers post anything that is not completely in line with what is expected of such posts (expectations I'm as yet unfamiliar with). That's okay, I have no objection to discussing my or other's motives, if it'll help cool things down and move the discussion to substantive issues. I'm sure I HAVE mentioned my motives more than once in my PPN posts, but I'll state them again. I'm scared. Scared that planet earth is about to self-destruct from human damage. Scared that the future of life here on earth will be lousy, even intolerable, for my two children. I'm scared that we may loose a quarter or more of all the species on this planet. I'm sad that I can no longer enjoy trips to Yosemite valley, it is too crowded with people and cars. I'm sad that billions of people on this planet live very difficult lives in crowded shantytowns with no sewage facilities, immersed in such poverty that they have no opportunity to thrive as human beings. Those are my motives. I hope they meet with Jim's approval. >> I am suggesting that MOTIVES, however wild they may appear to us, nevertheless may >> underlie casual politeness and claims of "rational" thinking, and the implications >> of these posts, by Mr. Toal, are therefore open to speculation. Jim, are you always such a suspicious person? I'd like to urge other PPN subscribers to comment on what has started here, and what kinds of material and debate they WOULD and WOULD NOT like to see on PPN. To me it seems these attacks on myself and Ed are a waste of other subscriber's time. Ted Toal From gimenez@csf.Colorado.EDU Sun Nov 15 11:43:00 1998 Received: from localhost (gimenez@localhost) by csf.Colorado.EDU (8.8.5/8.8.4/CNS-4.1p-nh) with SMTP id LAA23542 for ; Sun, 15 Nov 1998 11:42:57 -0700 (MST) Date: Sun, 15 Nov 1998 11:42:56 -0700 (MST) From: Martha Gimenez To: PROGRESSIVE POPULATION NETWORK Subject: Self-Moderation Message-ID: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Dear PPNrs: In light of the nature of recent exchanges in PPN, I have introduced quantitative or self-moderation. Using CSF's limit software, all members of PPN, including myself, are limited to no more than 15 of the last hundred messages submitted. This number can be lowered or raised, depending on how the process works out. PPN will remain an unmoderated list in all other respects, with the expectation that its members will abide by the rules of civil communication included in the welcome message everyone receives when joining PPN. I will be forwarding those rules in my next message. Messages to PPN must demonstrate an effort by the sender to do one or several of the following: 1. to engage the membership in the consideration, examination, critique, or elaboration of a sociological insight, proposition, theory, concept, research finding about population issues. 2. to engage the membership in the theoretical discussion of a newly published and controversial book or journal article. 3. to engage the membership in the discussion of a book or journal article the sender found so interesting that he or she felt compelled to share it with PPN. 4. to engage the membership in the discussion of a policy issue. There are other possibilities, of course, but the key word is engage. ^^^^^^ This means that painstaking arguments between two members should be kept private, unless they are framed not as a way of scoring points but as efforts to present well organized, interesting and compelling arguments. In addition, PPN welcomes these kinds of messages: 1. announcements about employment opportunities, post-doctoral fellowships and other job possibilities. 2. messages having to do with professional activities e.g., conference announcements, calls for papers, informations about teach-ins, etc. 3. messages about teaching: asking for and supplying information e.g., help in identifying relevant sources, syllabi, shared experience in teaching techniques, requests for input for collections of syllabi, etc. 4. messages about relevant Internet resources and new softwares, CD roms, e-journals, videos, films, and T.V. programs. And finally, please do not cc a personal reply to PPN unless you think the entire list will find your remarks absolutely riveting and, when responding to a message, delete most of it and include only the relevant parts. Bureaucratically yours, Martha E. Gimenez PPN Editor ********************************************** * Martha E. Gimenez * * Department of Sociology * * University of Colorado at Boulder * * http://csf.colorado.edu/gimenez/ * ********************************************** From gimenez@csf.Colorado.EDU Sun Nov 15 11:44:06 1998 Received: from localhost (gimenez@localhost) by csf.Colorado.EDU (8.8.5/8.8.4/CNS-4.1p-nh) with SMTP id LAA23554 for ; Sun, 15 Nov 1998 11:44:04 -0700 (MST) Date: Sun, 15 Nov 1998 11:44:03 -0700 (MST) From: Martha Gimenez Reply-To: Martha Gimenez To: PROGRESSIVE POPULATION NETWORK Subject: Civility Message-ID: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII PPN's rule of discourse: replicate in our virtual space the rules of civility ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ we abide by when we meet face-to-face ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ ----------------- CSF Communications Guidelines -------------- PPN is hosted on CSF (Communications for a Sustainable Future) which was founded on the idea that quality communications between people of different viewpoints can be an avenue for securing a more promising future. So, when you join a csf-list, you are undertaking a modest obligation to write in a way that is respectful of the views of others. Electronic discussion is, of course, notorious for flame wars. But ad feminam arguments and personal slights are not encoded on silicon chips. The vast majority of subscribers enter with good intentions but somehow, through this new medium, good intentions can be undermined with slight spins to which others can take offense. So please be careful about process -- about how you say what you wish to say. Help us keep the intended meaning of the word "communications" in CSF. From cmfranco@email.msn.com Sun Nov 15 12:37:21 1998 Received: from smtp.email.msn.com ([207.68.143.160]) by csf.Colorado.EDU (8.8.5/8.8.4/CNS-4.1p-nh) with ESMTP id MAA26050 for ; Sun, 15 Nov 1998 12:37:18 -0700 (MST) Received: from default - 153.34.169.68 by email.msn.com with Microsoft SMTPSVC; Sun, 15 Nov 1998 11:37:17 -0800 From: "Keith Hurt" To: Subject: Glaze on Amartya Sen on Coercive Population Control Date: Sun, 15 Nov 1998 14:37:36 -0500 X-Priority: 3 X-MSMail-Priority: Normal X-Mailer: Microsoft Outlook Express 4.71.1712.3 X-MimeOLE: Produced By Microsoft MimeOLE V4.71.1712.3 Message-ID: <05aac1737190fb8UPIMSSMTPUSR04@email.msn.com> On Nov. 9, Ed Glaze posted on KZPG a review of Amartya Sen's article, +ACI-Population Policy: Authoritarianism versus Cooperation+ACI- (Journal of Population Economics, vol. 10 +AFs-1997+AF0-: 3-22), in which he raises many of the issues that surround the resort to coercion in population policy. The folowing addresses some of Glaze's comments. I urge PPN subscribers to read Sen's article before forming their own judgments. 1. Time. Glaze writes that Sen's +ACI-biggest problems are the failure to consider the time factor which leads to continued growth and degradation and that we are already so overpopulated that something must be done.+ACI- Here he reiterates a concern he previously expressed in an Oct. 27th posting. In fact it isn't the case that Sen fails to consider the time factor, as I emphasized in an Oct. 28th response to Glaze's earlier posting. As I noted then, Sen addresses this question directly and at length. He wrote: +ACI-This 'cooperative' route seems to act more securely - and often much faster - than the use of 'coercion' ... Do we have any reason to believe that the coercive route would be much more effective and faster than the cooperative route that relies on the agency of the people directly involved? How does the issue of speed relate to the problem of sustainability of what is achieved? ... It is also necessary to examine the claim in support of compulsory birth control programmes that the speed with which fertility rates can be cut down through coercive means is very high+ADs- in contrast, the voluntary processes are expected to be inherently slower. The world, we are told, does not have the time to spare. But this piece of generalization is not supported by Kerala's experience either. Its birth rate has fallen from 44 per thousand in the 1950s to 18 by 1991 - a decline no less fast than that in China. It could, of course, be argued that looking at this very long period does not do justice to the effectiveness of the 'one-child family' and other coercive policies that were introduced in 1979, and that we ought really to compare what has happened between 1979 and now. Kerala, in fact, had a HIGHER fertility rate than China in 1979 (3.0 as opposed to China's 2.8), and by 1991 its fertility rate of 1.8 is as much below China's 2.0 as it had been above it in 1979. Despite the added 'advantage' of the one-child policy and other coercive measures, the Chinese fertility rate seems to have fallen more slowly than in Kerala. Another Indian state, Tamil Nadu, had an even faster fall, from 3.5 in 1979 to 2.2 in 1991. Tamil Nadu has had an active, but cooperative, family planning programme ... Coercion of the type employed in China has not been used either in Tamil Nadu or in Kerala, and both have achieved much faster declines in fertility than China has achieved since it introduced the 'one child policy' and the related measures.+ACI- 2. The Human Cost of Coercion. Sen observes that +ACI-the lack of freedom associated with this +AFs-coercive+AF0- approach is a major social loss in itself. Human rights groups and women's organizations in particular have been especially concerned with the lack of reproductive freedom involved in any coercive system.+ACI- Glaze states that Sen +ACI-neglects to point out that the need for coercion is dictated by demographic circumstances.+ACI- This doesn't adequately address the issue. First, it is a perfect example of petitio principii. The whole force of Sen's argument is directed against the presumption that demographic circumstances require coercive policies, and the burden of Glaze's comments is to demonstrate what he here presumes. Second, even if one accepts the necessity of coercion, it still is necessary to account for the price in human freedom of the policies that are being proposed. Consequentialist arguments in particular require that an explicit value be assigned to freedom. It is one thing to argue that tragic circumstances require the abrogation of the most basic human rights and quite another to appear to denigrate those rights altogether. There are some proponents of population control who hold the latter view, but most do not, and it would be a fateful mistake to lose sight of that distinction. Sen also argues that coercive intervention in fertility decisions may have unintended consequences - one can never do just one thing - and that these consequences +ACI-can often be quite terrible.+ACI- He specifically mentions child neglect and female infanticide, and one might also add that the promulgation of authoritarian population policies can have broader political consequences, encouraging the entrenchment of authoritarianism in countries in which the ultimate victory of enlightened government cannot casually be assumed+ADs- and the record of authoritarian regimes on environmental issues is generally inferior to that of governments that respect individual rights. Glaze claims that +ACI-perhaps these better reflect the inadequate enforcement of coercion.+ACI- This is an interesting argument and shouldn't be dismissed out of hand, but it requires much more detail before it can begin to be persuasive. It seems more likely that the adverse consequences that Sen enumerates are inherent sequelae of coercion and are practically impossible for state policy to control. 3. The Comparative Value of Coercion. Sen argues that both coercive and cooperative policies empirically have been shown to reduce fertility and that the two approaches are largely mutually exclusive and cannot be implemented in combination. The relevant question, he suggests, is then not whether coercion works, but whether empirically it is sufficiently more effective to justify the human costs of coercion. He writes: +ACI-it is not by any means clear how much ADDITIONAL reduction in the fertility rate has actually been achieved through these coercive methods.+ACI- Glaze says: +ACI-Why does it need to be exact and can anyone doubt that coercive measures have in act lowered fertility rates?+ACI- Again, this doesn't resolve the issue. First, Sen's argument isn't about the exactitude of estimates of policy effects. It concerns the need for an empirical judgment about the relative effects of the alternative policies. Second, Sen doesn't call into doubt that coercive measures have in fact lowered fertility rates. Rather, he argues that cooperative policies also have reduced fertility rates, and that the burden rests with proponents of coercion to show how much more effective coercion has been than the cooperative alternatives. 4. The Force of the Kerala Example. Sen relies upon a comparison of the effects of China's coercive policy with those of the cooperative policy of Kerala state in India. Flaze questions the legitimacy of this comparison, as does Rev. Lawrence Rupp, with his usual tempered judgment: +ACI-Only a 'Nobel Laureate Economist+ACI- could compare two special situations in India with the WHOLE OF CHINA and still be considered a rational, credible person+ACEAIQAhACI- Sen addresses this issue in +ACI-Population and Reasoned Agency: Food, Fertility and Economic Development+ACI- (1994), which is cited in the article under discussion. He writes: +ACI-I should perhaps mention, to respond to a possible methodological concern, that, though Kerala is a state within federal India, it is by no means too small to be taken seriously in international comparisons. For example, is population of 29 million is rather larger than that of Canada. While Kerala is not one of the richest states in India, it has the highest life expectancy in India (more than 70 years - a little higher than China's) and the highest rate of literacy in general and female literacy in particular (higher than that in China as a whole and also, for the corresponding rural populations, higher than every province in China, particularly so in female literacy.) The Keralan birth rate of 20 per thousand in the corresponding period, and this has been achieved not by compulsory birth control or the violation of any individual liberty to decide on these matters, but by the voluntary exercise of the family's right to family planning. Later, provisional statistics suggest that China's further fall in birth rate in very recent years (estimated to be moving towards 19 per thousand) has continued to be matched by Kerala's (calculated to be 18 per thousand in 1991). The respective fertility rates are similarly comparable.+ACI- He continues: +ACI-One should not draw too many conclusions on the basis of this one contrast between Kerala and China, but since the Chinese success in cutting down birth rate is often cited in policy discussions, the comparison does have some relevance and force.+ACI- As Sen says, the utility and limits of the comparison with Kerala state have yet to be definitively resolved, but the data he adduces are real and, questions about Sen's rationality notwithstanding, they do bear on the arguments that have been used to justify resort to authoritarianism. I will stop here. Keith Hurt From ttoal@jps.net Mon Nov 16 23:58:00 1998 Received: from smtp1.jps.net (smtp1.jps.net [209.63.224.236]) by csf.Colorado.EDU (8.8.5/8.8.4/CNS-4.1p-nh) with ESMTP id XAA01666 for ; Mon, 16 Nov 1998 23:57:57 -0700 (MST) Received: from jps.net (208-25-50-162.stk.jps.net [208.25.50.162]) by smtp1.jps.net (8.8.5/8.8.5) with ESMTP id WAA21179 for ; Mon, 16 Nov 1998 22:57:37 -0800 (PST) Message-ID: <36511E01.5A526136@jps.net> Date: Mon, 16 Nov 1998 22:56:01 -0800 From: Ted Toal X-Mailer: Mozilla 4.06 [en] (Win98; I) MIME-Version: 1.0 To: ppn Subject: Re: New Report Exposes Myths About World Hunger Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit I'd like to respond to some of the points made in the recently posted article about the myths of world hunger. The article says there is abundant food available. I'm wondering if that takes into account the inevitable losses of food due to spoilage, vermin, and imperfect distribution? Regarding the latter, I think it should be clear to everybody that we wouldn't want a world where food was distributed with 100% efficiency, because that would put the entire world too close to the edge. If disaster hit, there would be no leeway, no room for improving distribution to help cope with the disaster. The article said that some countries with malnourished children had food surpluses. But, was it the right kind of food? A surplus of bananas might not help those malnourished children. "The problem is that many people are too poor to buy readily available food." Obviously if people are too poor in the extreme, they die of starvation. I assume that the problem is that people are poor enough that they have a lousy diet, leaving them quite alive but rather malnourished. Why would people have children when they are living in such an impoverished state? Is the answer that they have no choice, they have no access to contraceptives or can't afford them? Or is it that they believe that children will improve their economic position? If the latter, does it usually work out that way? It must not. If it did, there would gradually be fewer and fewer people living in poverty. I agree with the article, that increasing food production would not be an answer. That simply allows the population to grow some more, and the problem actually becomes worse. The article says that in many places a powerful few control much of the land. But you could look at that as simply another statement that income is very unevenly distributed. If the poor had more money, they could buy more land, I would presume. Even in the USA we are seeing increasing disparity in wealth distribution. One of the more intriguing hypotheses about overpopulation is that it reduces democracy, which then leads to greater concentration of wealth and power in a few. Having moved from a large city to a small town, I have seen the dramatic difference that population density makes in my own ability to have some degree of influence over my community. In the small town I've been able to have a voice in ways I never could have done in the big city. The article mixed up population density with hunger and food resources, leaving me a bit unsure how well the connection between population density and hunger had been studied. It pointed to Nigeria, Brazil, and Bolivia as places where abundant food resources coexist with hunger, but didn't say anything about what their population density is. If it were true that hunger usually were (was?) found together with high population density, then I would think you'd want to look carefully at population, even if you knew the country had abundant food. The high population density could somehow be affecting how well food was distributed. The key point of the article seemed to be that the main cause of hunger is concentration of wealth in a few hands. We should be looking, then, at what factors predispose such concentration, and how we can change them. The article mentioned land reform in some countries that led to better distribution of land ownership. I wonder how that works, how it happened that those in power allowed such a dramatic change to occur? We can never expect, nor I think would we want, perfectly equal distribution of income. If we get to the point where we are saying that hunger exists because we still have a bit of a disparity in wealth, and by getting rid of that disparity we can support another billion people on the planet, then we really need to reconsider why we think we need another billion people. But it is clear that right now, vast differences in wealth exist, and I'd like to see this change. It affects a lot more than the food supply. Can we be pretty certain that if we were to distribute wealth significantly more evenly, hunger would disappear? Can we be reasonably certain that that wouldn't simply lead to further population growth, and eventually back to the same situation where people are malnourished? I'm not so sure we can be certain of those things. It seems to me that the most prudent approach is to keep working on ways to reduce family size below 2 average, while we tackle the more immediate problems such as uneven distribution of wealth (which itself will tend to reduce family size). The article seems to contradict itself by saying that comprehensive land reform has markedly increased production is several countries, since it said earlier that the problem is not one of production. Ted Toal. From rcollins@netlink.com.au Tue Nov 17 06:15:14 1998 Received: from netlink.com.au (merlin.netlink.com.au [203.16.172.196]) by csf.Colorado.EDU (8.8.5/8.8.4/CNS-4.1p-nh) with ESMTP id GAA16340 for ; Tue, 17 Nov 1998 06:15:08 -0700 (MST) Received: from netlink.com.au (j178.netlink.com.au [203.62.227.178]) by netlink.com.au (8.8.8/8.8.8) with ESMTP id AAA27718 for ; Wed, 18 Nov 1998 00:20:54 +1100 Message-ID: <36517683.D5EA55AF@netlink.com.au> Date: Wed, 18 Nov 1998 00:13:39 +1100 From: rc&am Reply-To: rcollins@netlink.com.au X-Mailer: Mozilla 4.04 [en] (Win95; I) MIME-Version: 1.0 To: PROGRESSIVE POPULATION NETWORK Subject: overconsumption v overpopulation? References: <364E395B.B6832EA6@jps.net> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Ted Toal wrote: > Now I'm sure you're thinking, > > there he goes again, calling for reducing poor population instead of calling > for reducing rich consumption. I'll say it again, BOTH need to be done. > > Reducing consumption is a whole other topic. How do you do it fairly? So many > > people in the U.S. live marginally as it is. ted, i was not arguing through any version of reduced consumption versus reduced population. to acknowledge that consumption rates are vastly different, even within the same country is crucial, as you have done. but, my arguments have not been to counterpose the two strategies. rather, i would think that concepts of consumption - like those of production, technology, etc. - are being too often used in an abstract sense without due consideration given to the qualitative - as distinct from quantitative - differences that pertain to different historical systems of production, consumption and so forth. like you, i like technology. i like it because it has the potential to lessen the amount of work time and drudgery associated with living. but, i am am forced to acknowledge that technology today is not driven by - or indeed organised with the express purpose of - lessening work time and drudgery. in fact, today, increases in technology go hand in hand with global increases in work time and increases in misery precisely because technology - and technological innovations - are driven by the imperatives of profit maximization, the minimization of labour costs through unemployment, and similar imperatives. as a parenthesis, this is why unemployment increases at the same time as increases in time worked by the employed. i also look forward to an abundant world. but abundance, as you know, is not the same thing as overconsumption. similarly, impoverishment does not flow from scarcity. consumption - or, more accurately, decisions made about what should or can be consumed - is not determined by population numbers in the strict sense. population numbers only figure in as a consideration of potential or actual markets when it comes to consumption. otherwise they figure as potential labour. all else is redundant. the economic crises of the last century have been more or less crises of overproduction or underconsumption. there is some debate over whether this is a cause or effect of some other process, and i tend to side with the latter view, but the point remains that these crises are not crises of shortage, or crises of abundance - rather, they are a crisis brought on by the generalised failure of commodities already produced to find 'a buyer' sufficient to return both labour costs and a rising rate of profit.. this is a lengthy discussion and it has been crudely put here, but it does seem to me to suggest in no uncertain terms that the word 'consumption' is not equivalent with needs or enjoyment. moreover, it also points to the fact that decisions about what to produce are not driven by needs or enjoyment, but whether or not they can be sold at a sufficient rate. this is why we have seen the appalling case in the past of the australian govt. dumping 'surplus' wheat: because it makes more sense for them in the appalling terms of today's rationality to take it off the market and maintain a certain price for wheat rather than give it to those who starve. this is also why the australian govt recently went on the rampage against a us decision to step up food aid to Indonesia, since the govt here thought this would undermine the austn market in indonesia for food products! lastly, it also points to the fact that decisions about how things are produced are not determined by the social, environmental or health impacts of such processes, but principally about whether or not such processes are cheaper, faster, etc. in order to maximize the proportion which goes to profits. there are ways of increasing the productivity of soils for example which is not unhealthy or socially destructive, but these are not put into large scale use because of the power of companies like monsanto and others who seek to dominate particular product markets by creating an inexorable link between crop and pesticide (i'm thinking of the soy bean example here). these things are likely to cause more long term damage to the health of the environment (including ourselves) than short-term increases in population numbers, which look set to decline into the next century in any case. angela From Jfoster@OREGON.UOREGON.EDU Tue Nov 17 11:57:40 1998 Received: from donald.uoregon.edu (donald.uoregon.edu [128.223.32.6]) by csf.Colorado.EDU (8.8.5/8.8.4/CNS-4.1p-nh) with ESMTP id LAA07674 for ; Tue, 17 Nov 1998 11:57:37 -0700 (MST) Received: from DWOVMCNF.uoregon.edu (d111-206.uoregon.edu) by OREGON.UOREGON.EDU (PMDF V5.1-12 #26538) with SMTP id <01J4A0DOYEE48WWA24@OREGON.UOREGON.EDU> for ppn@csf.colorado.edu; Tue, 17 Nov 1998 10:57:33 PST Date: Tue, 17 Nov 1998 10:57:33 -0800 (PST) From: John Bellamy Foster Subject: Re: New Report Exposes Myths About World Hunger X-Sender: Jfoster@oregon.uoregon.edu To: ppn@csf.colorado.edu Message-id: <1.5.4.16.19981117110741.35efdc96@oregon.uoregon.edu> MIME-version: 1.0 X-Mailer: Windows Eudora Light Version 1.5.4 (16) Content-type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Ted, I think you are getting the idea! Yes, there are food surpluses. And yes, you are right that it is not "the right kind of food": 'a surplus of bananas" does not "help those malnourished children." The immediate problem is the agribusiness system which produces more food and more hunger too, by undermining subsistence production and promoting the production of luxury crops for export (among other ill effects). This does not mean that population size, density and growth is not an issue, but it has to be looked at, as always, in terms of the concrete historical context. If you want to learn more about the critique of agribusiness you might look at the special issue of MONTHLY REVIEW, July-August 1998, edited by Fred Magdoff, Fred Buttel and myself, entitled "Hungry for Profit: Agriculture, Food and Ecology." Rosset has a piece in that issue. The general position that Rosset takes is admirably summed up by Tom Athanasiou's article in the Malthus bicentennial symposium of the December 1998 issue of ORGANIZATION AND ENVIRONMENT--which is now out. Athanasiou's article is entitled "Their Anti-Malthusianism and Ours." It rejects conservative cornucopian views, as well as its Malthusian opposite, and replaces these with an argument on how world hunger is actually generated through socioeconomic processes. If you are interested in this you can get information about O&E from the following Web page: http://www.sagepub.co.uk/journals/usdetails/j0151.html John Bellamy Foster At 10:56 PM 11/16/98 -0800, you wrote: >I'd like to respond to some of the points made in the recently posted article >about the myths of world hunger. > >The article says there is abundant food available. I'm wondering if that takes >into account the inevitable losses of food due to spoilage, vermin, and >imperfect distribution? Regarding the latter, I think it should be clear to >everybody that we wouldn't want a world where food was distributed with 100% >efficiency, because that would put the entire world too close to the edge. If >disaster hit, there would be no leeway, no room for improving distribution to >help cope with the disaster. > >The article said that some countries with malnourished children had food >surpluses. But, was it the right kind of food? A surplus of bananas might not >help those malnourished children. > >"The problem is that many people are too poor to buy readily available food." > >Obviously if people are too poor in the extreme, they die of starvation. I >assume that the problem is that people are poor enough that they have a lousy >diet, leaving them quite alive but rather malnourished. Why would people have >children when they are living in such an impoverished state? Is the answer >that they have no choice, they have no access to contraceptives or can't afford >them? Or is it that they believe that children will improve their economic >position? If the latter, does it usually work out that way? It must not. If >it did, there would gradually be fewer and fewer people living in poverty. > >I agree with the article, that increasing food production would not be an >answer. That simply allows the population to grow some more, and the problem >actually becomes worse. > >The article says that in many places a powerful few control much of the land. >But you could look at that as simply another statement that income is very >unevenly distributed. If the poor had more money, they could buy more land, I >would presume. Even in the USA we are seeing increasing disparity in wealth >distribution. One of the more intriguing hypotheses about overpopulation is >that it reduces democracy, which then leads to greater concentration of wealth >and power in a few. Having moved from a large city to a small town, I have >seen the dramatic difference that population density makes in my own ability to >have some degree of influence over my community. In the small town I've been >able to have a voice in ways I never could have done in the big city. > >The article mixed up population density with hunger and food resources, leaving >me a bit unsure how well the connection between population density and hunger >had been studied. It pointed to Nigeria, Brazil, and Bolivia as places where >abundant food resources coexist with hunger, but didn't say anything about what >their population density is. If it were true that hunger usually were (was?) >found together with high population density, then I would think you'd want to >look carefully at population, even if you knew the country had abundant food. >The high population density could somehow be affecting how well food was >distributed. > >The key point of the article seemed to be that the main cause of hunger is >concentration of wealth in a few hands. We should be looking, then, at what >factors predispose such concentration, and how we can change them. The article >mentioned land reform in some countries that led to better distribution of land >ownership. I wonder how that works, how it happened that those in power >allowed such a dramatic change to occur? > >We can never expect, nor I think would we want, perfectly equal distribution of >income. If we get to the point where we are saying that hunger exists because >we still have a bit of a disparity in wealth, and by getting rid of that >disparity we can support another billion people on the planet, then we really >need to reconsider why we think we need another billion people. But it is >clear that right now, vast differences in wealth exist, and I'd like to see >this change. It affects a lot more than the food supply. > >Can we be pretty certain that if we were to distribute wealth significantly >more evenly, hunger would disappear? Can we be reasonably certain that that >wouldn't simply lead to further population growth, and eventually back to the >same situation where people are malnourished? I'm not so sure we can be >certain of those things. It seems to me that the most prudent approach is to >keep working on ways to reduce family size below 2 average, while we tackle the >more immediate problems such as uneven distribution of wealth (which itself >will tend to reduce family size). > >The article seems to contradict itself by saying that comprehensive land reform >has markedly increased production is several countries, since it said earlier >that the problem is not one of production. > >Ted Toal. > > > From fgbart@nwrain.com Tue Nov 17 15:58:28 1998 Received: from tacoma.nwrain.net (tacoma.nwrain.net [205.134.220.9]) by csf.Colorado.EDU (8.8.5/8.8.4/CNS-4.1p-nh) with SMTP id PAA20931 for ; Tue, 17 Nov 1998 15:58:24 -0700 (MST) Received: by tacoma.nwrain.net (Smail-3.2.0.91 1997-Jan-14 #1) id ; Tue, 17 Nov 1998 14:58:10 -0800 (PST) X-Sender: fgbart@tacoma.nwrain.net (Unverified) Message-Id: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/enriched; charset="us-ascii" Date: Tue, 17 Nov 1998 16:03:55 -0800 To: ppn@csf.colorado.edu From: "Francis G. Bartlett" Subject: two fundamentals GenevaTwo topics having great influence on the growing human population are seldom mentioned in the flurry of commentary on the subject. 1. The life forces of nature active have sustained life on this planet for the last half billion years without fear of total extinction 2. human intervention with those life forces have destabilized the ecological balances needed for sustaining life. Ever since mankind began to "help" nature produce food using agriculture without compensating for its eventual effects it has taken the time since the last ice age receeded to finally bring the world to a condition where future life is in jeopardy. Prior to the end of the last ice age the natural widely dispersed food stuffs required much effort by humans to hunt for and gather necessary nourishment. This process kept them moving about since their consumption of food in any given area would soon deplete it. Prior to 25,000 years ago humans left no evidence of burial customs so for about 75.000 years humans on dying would suffer similar conditions to that of the wild animals. This may have been part of the reason why the human population ten thousand years ago has been estimated at only four million, spread through Africa, the Near East, Malaysia and as far as eastern Asis. Some of the more adventuresome had reached Australia and the Americas and the population densitys were very low. The strength of nature's life force that has persisted through 500 million years of earth's history cannot be overlooked since that history as revealed in the configurations of the earth beneath our feet and the strata exposed so handsomely in places like Grand Canyon of Arizona includes events that makes any of man's accomplishments quite inconsequential. Now that the human population has reached it present levels the earth is running out of space and resources for people to live in American.luxury. It appears to me that present concerns about the population explosion need to be directed toward easing the traumas already apparent throughout the world of high population densities with due regard to the availability of food enough for the living and little for any increases in humAn numbers. Such A radical approach would face unimaginable reactions due to the long cultural attitudes toward population increases. From Peter.VanZant@PSS.Boeing.com Tue Nov 17 16:13:12 1998 Received: from slb-smtpout-01.boeing.com (slb-smtpout-01.boeing.com [192.161.36.8]) by csf.Colorado.EDU (8.8.5/8.8.4/CNS-4.1p-nh) with ESMTP id QAA21353 for ; Tue, 17 Nov 1998 16:13:09 -0700 (MST) Received: from xch-pssbh-01.ca.boeing.com ([192.42.211.28]) by slb-smtpout-01.boeing.com (8.9.0/8.8.5) with ESMTP id PAA25772; Tue, 17 Nov 1998 15:13:08 -0800 (PST) Received: by xch-pssbh-01.ca.boeing.com with Internet Mail Service (5.5.2407.0) id ; Tue, 17 Nov 1998 15:12:20 -0800 Message-ID: <51792E5D4B6ED011B7DB00805FBE3836040EC0AD@xch-evt-06.ca.boeing.com> From: "Van Zant, Peter J" To: PROGRESSIVE POPULATION NETWORK , "'fgbart@nwrain.com'" Subject: RE: two fundamentals Date: Tue, 17 Nov 1998 15:13:11 -0800 MIME-Version: 1.0 X-Mailer: Internet Mail Service (5.5.2407.0) Content-Type: text/plain You are absolutely right that what you are saying will receive strong reactions here on PPN, from everything I've seen of it so far. I'm not unsympathetic to what you're saying, but I hope you're not holding your breath waiting for humanity to slam the brakes on procreation. We do seem to moving toward replacement fertility, although I'm sure not nearly so fast as you'd like. > ---------- > From: Francis G. Bartlett[SMTP:fgbart@nwrain.com] > Sent: Tuesday, November 17, 1998 4:03 PM > To: PROGRESSIVE POPULATION NETWORK > Subject: two fundamentals > > Two topics having great influence on the growing human population are > seldom mentioned in the flurry of commentary on the subject. > > 1. The life forces of nature active have sustained life on this > planet for the last half billion years without fear of total extinction > > 2. human intervention with those life forces have destabilized the > ecological balances needed for sustaining life. > > Ever since mankind began to "help" nature produce food using agriculture > without compensating for its eventual effects it has taken the time since > the last ice age receeded to finally bring the world to a condition where > future life is in jeopardy. Prior to the end of the last ice age the > natural widely dispersed food stuffs required much effort by humans to > hunt for and gather necessary nourishment. This process kept them moving > about since their consumption of food in any given area would soon deplete > it. Prior to 25,000 years ago humans left no evidence of burial customs so > for about 75.000 years humans on dying would suffer similar conditions to > that of the wild animals. This may have been part of the reason why the > human population ten thousand years ago has been estimated at only four > million, spread through Africa, the Near East, Malaysia and as far as > eastern Asis. Some of the more adventuresome had reached Australia and the > Americas and the population densitys were very low. > > The strength of nature's life force that has persisted through 500 million > years of earth's history cannot be overlooked since that history as > revealed in the configurations of the earth beneath our feet and the > strata exposed so handsomely in places like Grand Canyon of Arizona > includes events that makes any of man's accomplishments quite > inconsequential. Now that the human population has reached it present > levels the earth is running out of space and resources for people to live > in American.luxury. > > It appears to me that present concerns about the population explosion need > to be directed toward easing the traumas already apparent throughout the > world of high population densities with due regard to the availability of > food enough for the living and little for any increases in humAn numbers. > Such A radical approach would face unimaginable reactions due to the long > cultural attitudes toward population increases. > From rcollins@netlink.com.au Tue Nov 17 19:20:32 1998 Received: from netlink.com.au (merlin.netlink.com.au [203.16.172.196]) by csf.Colorado.EDU (8.8.5/8.8.4/CNS-4.1p-nh) with ESMTP id TAA02282 for ; Tue, 17 Nov 1998 19:20:29 -0700 (MST) Received: from netlink.com.au (h066.mel.netlink.com.au [203.62.225.66]) by netlink.com.au (8.8.8/8.8.8) with ESMTP id NAA06440 for ; Wed, 18 Nov 1998 13:26:26 +1100 Message-ID: <36522E96.29B4F199@netlink.com.au> Date: Wed, 18 Nov 1998 13:19:02 +1100 From: rc&am Reply-To: rcollins@netlink.com.au X-Mailer: Mozilla 4.04 [en] (Win95; I) MIME-Version: 1.0 To: PROGRESSIVE POPULATION NETWORK Subject: Re: two fundamentals References: Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Francis G. Bartlett wrote: > using agriculture without compensating for its eventual effects francis, this seems to me to be the most pertinent point in your post. there is a distinction betwen agricultural practices that do, and kinds of agricultural practices that do not, recreate the conditions wherein the land etc is capable of sustaining such agricultural practices without depletion and/or eventual collapse, and in some cases with the capacity for an enhancement of the life of the flora and fauna. this means that agriculture per se is not a problem - what is a problem are the kinds of practices which have no regard for nature as the source of all values. also, it is not entirely true to think that only humans engage in agriculture: as anyone with a vegie patch has observed (sometimes despondently) ants farm aphids in a very clear sense. we could debate the implications of such a relationship (whether it is good or bad for the aphids or ants), but the point still holds that this is a pastoral realtionship that occurs outside and despite human practices and makes the life of both the aphids and ants possible. angela From Peter.VanZant@PSS.Boeing.com Wed Nov 18 07:57:20 1998 Received: from stl-smtpout-01.boeing.com (stl-smtpout-01.boeing.com [192.161.36.9]) by csf.Colorado.EDU (8.8.5/8.8.4/CNS-4.1p-nh) with ESMTP id HAA27476 for ; Wed, 18 Nov 1998 07:57:18 -0700 (MST) Received: from xch-pssbh-03.ca.boeing.com ([134.52.9.169]) by stl-smtpout-01.boeing.com (8.9.0/8.8.5) with ESMTP id GAA07830; Wed, 18 Nov 1998 06:57:16 -0800 (PST) Received: by xch-pssbh-03.ca.boeing.com with Internet Mail Service (5.5.2407.0) id ; Wed, 18 Nov 1998 06:57:15 -0800 Message-ID: <51792E5D4B6ED011B7DB00805FBE3836040EC0AE@xch-evt-06.ca.boeing.com> From: "Van Zant, Peter J" To: PROGRESSIVE POPULATION NETWORK , "'rcollins@netlink.com.au'" Subject: RE: two fundamentals Date: Wed, 18 Nov 1998 06:57:25 -0800 MIME-Version: 1.0 X-Mailer: Internet Mail Service (5.5.2407.0) Content-Type: text/plain > ---------- > From: rc&am[SMTP:rcollins@netlink.com.au] > Sent: Tuesday, November 17, 1998 6:19 PM > To: PROGRESSIVE POPULATION NETWORK > Subject: Re: two fundamentals > > > > Francis G. Bartlett wrote: > > > using agriculture without compensating for its eventual effects > > francis, > > this seems to me to be the most pertinent point in your post. there is a > distinction betwen agricultural practices that do, and kinds of > agricultural practices that do not, recreate the conditions wherein the > land etc is capable of sustaining such agricultural practices without > depletion and/or eventual collapse, and in some cases with the capacity > for an enhancement of the life of the flora and fauna. this means that > agriculture per se is not a problem - what is a problem are the kinds of > practices which have no regard for nature as the source of all values. > Organic farming practices can be used without depleting the soil. In some cases, they can actually enhance it. However, organic farming does not result in as large an amount of a crop being grown per acre, so it implies a smaller total human population which can be supported on the planet. I will grant that there is much land wasted in conventional agriculture, by growing gross quantities of beef cattle, for instance, or coffee beans. > angela > From ttoal@jps.net Wed Nov 18 23:19:47 1998 Received: from smtp1.jps.net (smtp1.jps.net [209.63.224.236]) by csf.Colorado.EDU (8.8.5/8.8.4/CNS-4.1p-nh) with ESMTP id XAA22285 for ; Wed, 18 Nov 1998 23:19:44 -0700 (MST) Received: from jps.net (209-142-55-23.stk.jps.net [209.142.55.23]) by smtp1.jps.net (8.8.5/8.8.5) with ESMTP id WAA10850 for ; Wed, 18 Nov 1998 22:19:37 -0800 (PST) Message-ID: <3653AB6E.41CE754C@jps.net> Date: Wed, 18 Nov 1998 21:23:58 -0800 From: Ted Toal X-Mailer: Mozilla 4.06 [en] (Win98; I) MIME-Version: 1.0 To: ppn Subject: Re: Overconsumption vs Overpopulation? Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit A few comments re Angela's post: >> i am forced to acknowledge that technology today is not driven by - or indeed organised with the express purpose of - lessening work time and drudgery. in fact, today, increases in technology go hand in hand with global increases in work time and increases in misery << Yes, I think you're right. >> ...precisely because technology - and technological innovations - are driven by the imperatives of profit maximization, the minimization of labour costs through unemployment, and similar imperatives. << I can't dismiss the "imperative of profit maximization" as being an unhealthy one that should be discarded. From my studies of economics, I believe that profit maximization usually provides the most efficient way to get to a goal. And the goals, in most cases, are to produce various goods and services that people want. Don't get me wrong, I'm not one of those who believe so much in the free-market system that I think it's without problems. I see that it has serious shortcomings. In my mind the biggest is that it doesn't place appropriate value on certain resources such as, well, let's say rainforest species for example. Another shortcoming would be its use of psychology, in the form of media advertising, to convince people that they need things they really don't need. Despite the shortcomings, because the profit motive provides such a strong motivation to do the job right with the minimum possible resources, I think the free-market approach is the best, but it needs adjustments to deal with the shortcomings. I really like market-based approaches to pollution control, for example. I don't think minimization of labor costs is a bad thing. It is necessary if we are to move towards more efficient use of resources. And if we aren't interested in such efficiency, we're basically saying we don't care if we waste things. In the case of labor, it shouldn't wasted either, which means we shouldn't be using ten people to do a job that one person could do, and of course it also means we shouldn't have a bunch of unemployed people out there. I believe that as population has grown, resources per capita have fallen. Consequently, it becomes harder for each family to make ends meet. Partly because of this, women in the USA entered the labor force en masse in the 60's, and today a family can't survive in the US without two working parents. Also as the population grows, the quantity of "labor" grows, and therefore its value falls and a surplus arises. Isn't this what we've seen? A declining population would lead to the reverse process. I can't blame our economic system for unemployment. Humans evolved to work well in small social groups of maybe 30 people. We are a species that has a mix of individualism and socialism in our character. Modern society, with its huge numbers of people living in megacities, completely ignores this basic facet of being human. I think a smaller population would allow us to move back in that direction, to smaller communities where people have more opportunity to know one another as humans, and support one another. In a megalopolis, you don't care if 2 million of your fellow humans are unemployed, you care about yourself and your family. In a small town, you care a lot more about those around you. >> the economic crises of the last century have been more or less crises of overproduction or underconsumption. there is some debate over whether this is a cause or effect of some other process, and i tend to side with the latter view, but the point remains that these crises are not crises of shortage, or crises of abundance - rather, they are a crisis brought on by the generalised failure of commodities already produced to find 'a buyer' sufficient to return both labour costs and a rising rate of profit..<< Sounds like you are studying economics? >> .. it does seem to me to suggest in no uncertain terms that the word 'consumption' is not equivalent with needs or enjoyment. << Yes, I would agree. The current trend towards voluntary simplicity shows that others think so too. And in my own life, I can see that my overconsumption is like a drug habit that is slowly killing me, but I'm addicted and finding it hard to quit. >> decisions about what to produce are not driven by needs or enjoyment, but whether or not they can be sold at a sufficient rate. << Right, the assumption being that people won't buy what they don't need or won't enjoy. But we know that we DO buy such things. And advertising reinforces our belief that we need to buy them. >> ...decisions about how things are produced are not determined by the social, environmental or health impacts of such processes, but principally about whether or not such processes are cheaper, faster, etc. in order to maximize the proportion which goes to profits. << Right. But how do you do it otherwise? Attempts at planned economies haven't worked, because it is far too complex to analyze all factors and arrive at the best decisions for production. That's why the free-market system has been so successful -- it automatically produces good solutions without analysis, but its shortcomings are precisely the kinds of things we've been pointing out, such as that people's decisions about what to buy are not always motivated by what they need, what is best for their happiness or health, or what is best for other wildlife or the planet as a whole. >>> ....companies like monsanto and others who seek to dominate particular product markets <<< Megacorporations and monopolies go completely against the free-market system. I'm all for breaking them into smaller components. >> these things are likely to cause more long term damage to the health of the environment (including ourselves) than short-term increases in population numbers, which look set to decline into the next century in any case. << The huge numbers of people are what gives these megacorps their power. In fact, a friend of mine argues that the power-elite of the world purposely work to keep people reproducing, because they need the constant growth as a growing market and source of wealth for them. We can't point at any one problem and say "that's it, that's the whole problem." Obviously we have here two serious problems, overpopulation and monopolistic megacorps. And each interacts with the other. I don't have as much faith as you about the decline in population next century, but I'm keeping my fingers crossed. Biologists say that the short-term increase in population that is coming in the next 50 years IS something to worry about. The precise number we peak at may mean the difference between life and death for millions of species. Ted Toal. From rcollins@netlink.com.au Thu Nov 19 06:33:04 1998 Received: from netlink.com.au (merlin.netlink.com.au [203.16.172.196]) by csf.Colorado.EDU (8.8.5/8.8.4/CNS-4.1p-nh) with ESMTP id GAA05007 for ; Thu, 19 Nov 1998 06:32:59 -0700 (MST) Received: from netlink.com.au (j167.netlink.com.au [203.62.227.167]) by netlink.com.au (8.8.8/8.8.8) with ESMTP id XAA08435 for ; Thu, 19 Nov 1998 23:29:34 +1100 Message-ID: <36541DB0.C9CE1169@netlink.com.au> Date: Fri, 20 Nov 1998 00:31:28 +1100 From: rc&am Reply-To: rcollins@netlink.com.au X-Mailer: Mozilla 4.04 [en] (Win95; I) MIME-Version: 1.0 To: PROGRESSIVE POPULATION NETWORK Subject: Re: Overconsumption vs Overpopulation? References: <3653AB6E.41CE754C@jps.net> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Ted Toal wrote: > From my studies of economics, I believe that > profit maximization usually provides the most efficient way to get to a goal. it seems to me that the only goal of profit maximisation is profit maximisation, and even then, given the effects and preconditions of such a goal, it regularly fails to attain even that goal. as for capital accumulation being an efficient and effective system for the fulfillment of needs and enjoyment (and i don't moralise about the goodness of certain 'lifestyles' over others), well... you must be kidding. angela From Peter.VanZant@PSS.Boeing.com Thu Nov 19 08:03:32 1998 Received: from slb-smtpout-01.boeing.com (slb-smtpout-01.boeing.com [192.161.36.8]) by csf.Colorado.EDU (8.8.5/8.8.4/CNS-4.1p-nh) with ESMTP id IAA11030 for ; Thu, 19 Nov 1998 08:03:23 -0700 (MST) Received: from xch-pssbh-01.ca.boeing.com ([192.42.211.28]) by slb-smtpout-01.boeing.com (8.9.0/8.8.5) with ESMTP id HAA16344; Thu, 19 Nov 1998 07:03:20 -0800 (PST) Received: by xch-pssbh-01.ca.boeing.com with Internet Mail Service (5.5.2407.0) id ; Thu, 19 Nov 1998 07:02:30 -0800 Message-ID: <51792E5D4B6ED011B7DB00805FBE3836040EC0BD@xch-evt-06.ca.boeing.com> From: "Van Zant, Peter J" To: PROGRESSIVE POPULATION NETWORK , "'rcollins@netlink.com.au'" Subject: RE: Overconsumption vs Overpopulation? Date: Thu, 19 Nov 1998 07:03:31 -0800 MIME-Version: 1.0 X-Mailer: Internet Mail Service (5.5.2407.0) Content-Type: text/plain > ---------- > From: rc&am[SMTP:rcollins@netlink.com.au] > Sent: Thursday, November 19, 1998 5:31 AM > To: PROGRESSIVE POPULATION NETWORK > Subject: Re: Overconsumption vs Overpopulation? > > > > Ted Toal wrote: > > > From my studies of economics, I believe that > > profit maximization usually provides the most efficient way to get to a > goal. > > it seems to me that the only goal of profit maximisation is profit > maximisation, > and even then, given the effects and preconditions of such a goal, it > regularly > fails to attain even that goal. as for capital accumulation being an > efficient and > effective system for the fulfillment of needs and enjoyment (and i don't > moralise > about the goodness of certain 'lifestyles' over others), well... you must > be > kidding. > > angela > I think we have to give the profit motive its due as a way of motivating people. It creates a lot of problems, too, like making greed the emotion of choice for society--actually, I don't think greed is an emotion, but that's another conversation. However, for motivating someone to work hard over a period of time, financial gain works pretty well. It's better than forcing him/her to work. Idealistic notions, like doing the work for the betterment of humanity, unfortunately lose their potency pretty fast. From nicka@well.com Thu Nov 19 10:26:49 1998 Received: from smtp.well.com (smtp.well.com [206.80.6.147]) by csf.Colorado.EDU (8.9.1a/8.9.1/ITS-5.0/csf) with ESMTP id KAA20704 for ; Thu, 19 Nov 1998 10:26:44 -0700 (MST) Received: from well.com (nobody@well.com [206.15.64.10]) by smtp.well.com (8.8.6/8.8.4) with ESMTP id JAA05097; Thu, 19 Nov 1998 09:26:37 -0800 (PST) Received: from localhost (nicka@localhost) by well.com (8.8.5/8.8.5) with SMTP id JAA09620; Thu, 19 Nov 1998 09:26:35 -0800 (PST) Date: Thu, 19 Nov 1998 09:26:34 -0800 (PST) From: "Nicholas C. Arguimbau" To: "Van Zant, Peter J" cc: PROGRESSIVE POPULATION NETWORK Subject: RE: Overconsumption vs Overpopulation? In-Reply-To: <51792E5D4B6ED011B7DB00805FBE3836040EC0BD@xch-evt-06.ca.boeing.com> Message-ID: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII How about the profit motive with 100% taxes on estates? That would give everyone a "level playing field" at birth. The problem with the profit motive is that it requires less motive for more profit if you are initially wealthy, and ultimately converts a democracy into a "one dollar, one vote" society. On Thu, 19 Nov 1998, Van Zant, Peter J wrote: > > > > ---------- > > From: rc&am[SMTP:rcollins@netlink.com.au] > > Sent: Thursday, November 19, 1998 5:31 AM > > To: PROGRESSIVE POPULATION NETWORK > > Subject: Re: Overconsumption vs Overpopulation? > > > > > > > > Ted Toal wrote: > > > > > From my studies of economics, I believe that > > > profit maximization usually provides the most efficient way to get to a > > goal. > > > > it seems to me that the only goal of profit maximisation is profit > > maximisation, > > and even then, given the effects and preconditions of such a goal, it > > regularly > > fails to attain even that goal. as for capital accumulation being an > > efficient and > > effective system for the fulfillment of needs and enjoyment (and i don't > > moralise > > about the goodness of certain 'lifestyles' over others), well... you must > > be > > kidding. > > > > angela > > > I think we have to give the profit motive its due as a way of motivating > people. It creates a lot of problems, too, like making greed the emotion of > choice for society--actually, I don't think greed is an emotion, but that's > another conversation. However, for motivating someone to work hard over a > period of time, financial gain works pretty well. It's better than forcing > him/her to work. Idealistic notions, like doing the work for the betterment > of humanity, unfortunately lose their potency pretty fast. > > From fgbart@nwrain.com Thu Nov 19 10:34:49 1998 Received: from tacoma.nwrain.net (root@tacoma.nwrain.net [205.134.220.9]) by csf.Colorado.EDU (8.9.1a/8.9.1/ITS-5.0/csf) with SMTP id KAA21391 for ; Thu, 19 Nov 1998 10:34:43 -0700 (MST) Received: by tacoma.nwrain.net (Smail-3.2.0.91 1997-Jan-14 #1) id ; Thu, 19 Nov 1998 09:34:39 -0800 (PST) X-Sender: fgbart@tacoma.nwrain.net Message-Id: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Date: Thu, 19 Nov 1998 10:39:19 -0800 To: ppn@csf.colorado.edu From: "Francis G. Bartlett" Subject: Re: post prelapsarian era Ever since man decided to "help" nature produce food for him, he has interferred with a very powerful natural force, similar to the force of gravity. That force is the one that sustains life in all its myriad forms on this planet. Man's dogged interference with this force And its balancing acts of ecology that form the hard rock base continues apace. That base has allowed man to perform as the history of civilization shows. Naturalism of late, has been a thorn in the side of most of man's activities that create concentrAtions which are an anathema to nature but not to man. For the last ten thousand years earth has been large enough to withstand much of mAn's abuses but in the last century artificial works have begun to show their effects, population, pollution, exhaustion of resources. Natural conditions survived man's inroads well into the era of civilizAtion but none of his institutions were able to redirect his thrust and now the problem has become a huge monster. Reactions to this monster are not in keeping with its size, the sorcerer's apprentice has a problem. Francis G. Bartlett From Peter.VanZant@PSS.Boeing.com Thu Nov 19 10:50:39 1998 Received: from slb-smtpout-01.boeing.com (slb-smtpout-01.boeing.com [192.161.36.8]) by csf.Colorado.EDU (8.9.1a/8.9.1/ITS-5.0/csf) with ESMTP id KAA22644 for ; Thu, 19 Nov 1998 10:50:35 -0700 (MST) Received: from xch-pssbh-01.ca.boeing.com ([192.42.211.28]) by slb-smtpout-01.boeing.com (8.9.0/8.8.5) with ESMTP id JAA29033; Thu, 19 Nov 1998 09:50:28 -0800 (PST) Received: by xch-pssbh-01.ca.boeing.com with Internet Mail Service (5.5.2407.0) id ; Thu, 19 Nov 1998 09:49:38 -0800 Message-ID: <51792E5D4B6ED011B7DB00805FBE3836040EC0BF@xch-evt-06.ca.boeing.com> From: "Van Zant, Peter J" To: "Van Zant, Peter J" , "'Nicholas C. Arguimbau'" Cc: PROGRESSIVE POPULATION NETWORK Subject: RE: Overconsumption vs Overpopulation? Date: Thu, 19 Nov 1998 09:50:39 -0800 MIME-Version: 1.0 X-Mailer: Internet Mail Service (5.5.2407.0) Content-Type: text/plain > ---------- > From: Nicholas C. Arguimbau[SMTP:nicka@well.com] > Sent: Thursday, November 19, 1998 9:26 AM > To: Van Zant, Peter J > Cc: PROGRESSIVE POPULATION NETWORK > Subject: RE: Overconsumption vs Overpopulation? > > How about the profit motive with 100% taxes on estates? That would give > everyone a "level playing field" at birth. The problem with the profit > motive is that it requires less motive for more profit if you are > initially wealthy, and ultimately converts a democracy into a "one dollar, > one vote" society. > In my opinion, there are a multiplicity of problems with the profit motive, it's just that it's difficult to work out a better way of motivating people. The only one I've been able to begin defining is to bring people to an awareness of the necessity of work to prevent sliding into a pit. The sixties and my experiences in "the revolution" have made me feel cynical about that one. The vast majority of people I knew who considered themselves to be part of the revolution seemed to believe that seizing power from the capitalists meant that no one would have to work any more. > On Thu, 19 Nov 1998, Van Zant, Peter J wrote: > > > > > > > > ---------- > > > From: rc&am[SMTP:rcollins@netlink.com.au] > > > Sent: Thursday, November 19, 1998 5:31 AM > > > To: PROGRESSIVE POPULATION NETWORK > > > Subject: Re: Overconsumption vs Overpopulation? > > > > > > > > > > > > Ted Toal wrote: > > > > > > > From my studies of economics, I believe that > > > > profit maximization usually provides the most efficient way to get > to a > > > goal. > > > > > > it seems to me that the only goal of profit maximisation is profit > > > maximisation, > > > and even then, given the effects and preconditions of such a goal, it > > > regularly > > > fails to attain even that goal. as for capital accumulation being an > > > efficient and > > > effective system for the fulfillment of needs and enjoyment (and i > don't > > > moralise > > > about the goodness of certain 'lifestyles' over others), well... you > must > > > be > > > kidding. > > > > > > angela > > > > > I think we have to give the profit motive its due as a way of motivating > > people. It creates a lot of problems, too, like making greed the emotion > of > > choice for society--actually, I don't think greed is an emotion, but > that's > > another conversation. However, for motivating someone to work hard over > a > > period of time, financial gain works pretty well. It's better than > forcing > > him/her to work. Idealistic notions, like doing the work for the > betterment > > of humanity, unfortunately lose their potency pretty fast. > > > > > From nicka@well.com Thu Nov 19 15:40:37 1998 Received: from smtp.well.com (smtp.well.com [206.80.6.147]) by csf.Colorado.EDU (8.9.1a/8.9.1/ITS-5.0/csf) with ESMTP id PAA02473 for ; Thu, 19 Nov 1998 15:40:32 -0700 (MST) Received: from well.com (nobody@well.com [206.15.64.10]) by smtp.well.com (8.8.6/8.8.4) with ESMTP id OAA25637; Thu, 19 Nov 1998 14:40:25 -0800 (PST) Received: from localhost (nicka@localhost) by well.com (8.8.5/8.8.5) with SMTP id OAA07900; Thu, 19 Nov 1998 14:40:22 -0800 (PST) Date: Thu, 19 Nov 1998 14:40:20 -0800 (PST) From: "Nicholas C. Arguimbau" To: "Van Zant, Peter J" cc: PROGRESSIVE POPULATION NETWORK Subject: RE: Overconsumption vs Overpopulation? In-Reply-To: <51792E5D4B6ED011B7DB00805FBE3836040EC0BF@xch-evt-06.ca.boeing.com> Message-ID: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII On Thu, 19 Nov 1998, Van Zant, Peter J wrote: > > > > ---------- > > From: Nicholas C. Arguimbau[SMTP:nicka@well.com] > > Sent: Thursday, November 19, 1998 9:26 AM > > To: Van Zant, Peter J > > Cc: PROGRESSIVE POPULATION NETWORK > > Subject: RE: Overconsumption vs Overpopulation? > > > > How about the profit motive with 100% taxes on estates? That would give > > everyone a "level playing field" at birth. The problem with the profit > > motive is that it requires less motive for more profit if you are > > initially wealthy, and ultimately converts a democracy into a "one dollar, > > one vote" society. > > NA - I'm not particularly happy about selfishness as a way of getting things done, but agree that it may be a necessity. However, how much monetary profit will motivate Bill Gates' son or daughther to do a lick of work, and where is the individual motivation in a global corporation, and how does the profit motive discourage overuse of the commons? It's not that profit motivation is bad per se, but that it distorts values, both individual and societal. > > From Peter.VanZant@PSS.Boeing.com Fri Nov 20 11:11:20 1998 Received: from stl-smtpout-01.boeing.com (stl-smtpout-01.boeing.com [192.161.36.9]) by csf.Colorado.EDU (8.8.5/8.8.4/CNS-4.1p-nh) with ESMTP id LAA20386 for ; Fri, 20 Nov 1998 11:11:14 -0700 (MST) Received: from xch-pssbh-03.ca.boeing.com ([134.52.9.169]) by stl-smtpout-01.boeing.com (8.9.0/8.8.5) with ESMTP id KAA07860; Fri, 20 Nov 1998 10:10:57 -0800 (PST) Received: by xch-pssbh-03.ca.boeing.com with Internet Mail Service (5.5.2407.0) id ; Fri, 20 Nov 1998 10:10:56 -0800 Message-ID: <51792E5D4B6ED011B7DB00805FBE3836040EC0C7@xch-evt-06.ca.boeing.com> From: "Van Zant, Peter J" To: PROGRESSIVE POPULATION NETWORK , "'nicka@well.com'" Subject: RE: Overconsumption vs Overpopulation? Date: Fri, 20 Nov 1998 10:11:02 -0800 MIME-Version: 1.0 X-Mailer: Internet Mail Service (5.5.2407.0) Content-Type: text/plain I have thought about having everybody start out with no wealth inherited from previous generations as one of the ways of implementing a constant population society. Personally, I'm not against it--in fact, I rather like it--but the chances of getting it accepted, at least now, are absolutely nil. Go ahead, write your congressperson and suggest it, write an op-ed piece for your local paper. At least, that gets it out on the table. However, I'm afraid the howls of outrage will dorwn out any discussion very fast. > ---------- > From: Nicholas C. Arguimbau[SMTP:nicka@well.com] > Sent: Thursday, November 19, 1998 9:26 AM > To: PROGRESSIVE POPULATION NETWORK > Subject: RE: Overconsumption vs Overpopulation? > > How about the profit motive with 100% taxes on estates? That would give > everyone a "level playing field" at birth. The problem with the profit > motive is that it requires less motive for more profit if you are > initially wealthy, and ultimately converts a democracy into a "one dollar, > one vote" society. > > On Thu, 19 Nov 1998, Van Zant, Peter J wrote: > > > > > > > > ---------- > > > From: rc&am[SMTP:rcollins@netlink.com.au] > > > Sent: Thursday, November 19, 1998 5:31 AM > > > To: PROGRESSIVE POPULATION NETWORK > > > Subject: Re: Overconsumption vs Overpopulation? > > > > > > > > > > > > Ted Toal wrote: > > > > > > > From my studies of economics, I believe that > > > > profit maximization usually provides the most efficient way to get > to a > > > goal. > > > > > > it seems to me that the only goal of profit maximisation is profit > > > maximisation, > > > and even then, given the effects and preconditions of such a goal, it > > > regularly > > > fails to attain even that goal. as for capital accumulation being an > > > efficient and > > > effective system for the fulfillment of needs and enjoyment (and i > don't > > > moralise > > > about the goodness of certain 'lifestyles' over others), well... you > must > > > be > > > kidding. > > > > > > angela > > > > > I think we have to give the profit motive its due as a way of motivating > > people. It creates a lot of problems, too, like making greed the emotion > of > > choice for society--actually, I don't think greed is an emotion, but > that's > > another conversation. However, for motivating someone to work hard over > a > > period of time, financial gain works pretty well. It's better than > forcing > > him/her to work. Idealistic notions, like doing the work for the > betterment > > of humanity, unfortunately lose their potency pretty fast. > > > > > From nicka@well.com Sat Nov 21 03:04:13 1998 Received: from smtp.well.com (smtp.well.com [206.80.6.147]) by csf.Colorado.EDU (8.8.5/8.8.4/CNS-4.1p-nh) with ESMTP id DAA01900 for ; Sat, 21 Nov 1998 03:04:09 -0700 (MST) Received: from well.com (nobody@well.com [206.15.64.10]) by smtp.well.com (8.8.6/8.8.4) with ESMTP id CAA17962; Sat, 21 Nov 1998 02:04:08 -0800 (PST) Received: from localhost (nicka@localhost) by well.com (8.8.5/8.8.5) with SMTP id CAA29979; Sat, 21 Nov 1998 02:04:06 -0800 (PST) Date: Sat, 21 Nov 1998 02:04:06 -0800 (PST) From: "Nicholas C. Arguimbau" To: "Van Zant, Peter J" cc: PROGRESSIVE POPULATION NETWORK Subject: RE: Overconsumption vs Overpopulation? In-Reply-To: <51792E5D4B6ED011B7DB00805FBE3836040EC0C7@xch-evt-06.ca.boeing.com> Message-ID: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII On Fri, 20 Nov 1998, Van Zant, Peter J wrote: > I have thought about having everybody start out with no wealth inherited > from previous generations as one of the ways of implementing a constant > population society. Personally, I'm not against it--in fact, I rather like > it--but the chances of getting it accepted, at least now, are absolutely > nil. Go ahead, write your congressperson and suggest it, write an op-ed > piece for your local paper. At least, that gets it out on the table. > However, I'm afraid the howls of outrage will dorwn out any discussion very > fast. NA- I agree with you wholeheartedly. The same, of course, has to be said of any program for controlling global warming meaningfully with the contribution of both the United States and China, the two necessary participanants. The same, of course, also has to be said of any attempt to establish a global carrying capacity for human population and then implement it on a rational as opposed to catastrophic basis within the next 2-3 decades. But then these are things I'd rather try to get done despite their lack of "political feasibility," because there is a category of "politically infeasible" goals the failure to reach which is unthinkable. The 100% estate tax isn't one of them. From eglaze@vsta.com Sat Nov 21 11:48:25 1998 Received: from rivendell.vsta.com (rivendell.vsta.com [204.57.96.15]) by csf.Colorado.EDU (8.8.5/8.8.4/CNS-4.1p-nh) with ESMTP id LAA20190 for ; Sat, 21 Nov 1998 11:48:16 -0700 (MST) Received: from eglaze.vsta.com (eglazeADSL.vsta.com [204.57.96.81]) by rivendell.vsta.com (8.8.8/8.8.6) with SMTP id MAA27979 for ; Sat, 21 Nov 1998 12:49:53 -0600 (CST) From: "Ed Glaze III" To: "PROGRESSIVE POPULATION NETWORK" Subject: Re: Fw: overpopulation & Malthus Date: Sat, 21 Nov 1998 12:53:32 -0600 Message-ID: <01be1580$3c3ed320$516039cc@eglaze.vsta.com> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit X-Priority: 3 X-MSMail-Priority: Normal X-Mailer: Microsoft Outlook Express 4.71.1712.3 X-MimeOLE: Produced By Microsoft MimeOLE V4.71.1712.3 My statement on valuing infants based in the "context of having to reduce population" and I also said, "Hopefully, the world of today will realize the threat we face and we can avoid having to make such reprehensible, but necessary decisions." What we, as a species, are doing is already chilling enough without having to deal with overpopulation. I base my opinions primarily on an environmental viewpoint, not on the man-made systems of morals, religion, or economics which, though important in regulating human affairs, do not supercede the limits placed on us by nature -- which we have done our best to bypass and ignore. Humans have no problem thinning herds of game animals or cattle when they exceed their carrying capacity. Humans are also quick to eliminate any animal that poses a threat to them, their property, their crops or cattle. Even a perceived threat or a single instance is usually enough to cause a quick retaliation often bordering on slaughter. But we refuse to recognize that humans are just another animal and the same rules should apply. Co-opting ecosystem resources, habitat degradation, and species extinction are accepted by almost all humans as a cost of progress and necessary to support ourselves. Is it right that the biodiversity of nature sacrifice because one specie chooses to breed uncontrollably? Valuing human lives is nothing new. Humans are also quick to value most everything else around them. We live most of our lives, measure how successful we are, and compete with each other through economics. For example, after an airplane crash the insurance companies even haggle over the settlement amounts. Applying the principle of marginal utility when we have an excess of anything, including people, means that each additional unit of increase has less utility (value) than the previous one. If we place the breakeven point for humans at a sustainable long-term level then most people would say we have overshot our carrying capacity already. Therefore each additional birth is an extra, probably unnecessary burden on the environment. As far as my valuation of infants the point I was making is that if a human life is worth the least at its earliest stages -- before society has investing in its education and support. At that point all that exists of that life is potential which in a world increasing by about 80 million per year in not worth much at all. I did not intend to imply any value differences in births to different people, births to different races, births in different countries or whatever else. What is important is that lifetime consumption will vary under differing circumstances and therefore it would be a consideration in weighing the relative consumption costs of a particular birth. So actually, Bill Gates' kid would likely cost society more because of its higher potential for consumption. Future wage streams and such are economic measures which in an already unsustainable economic system should not be environmentally relevant in the matter of individual births. _______ Ed Glaze -----Original Message----- From: Doug Henwood To: PROGRESSIVE POPULATION NETWORK Date: Saturday, November 14, 1998 10:50 AM Subject: Re: Fw: overpopulation & Malthus >Ed Glaze III wrote: >> Below John says one such reprehensible statement is >> "his contention that infants are of comparatively little value >> to society (in the context of whether relief should be provided >> to prevent them from dying of starvation)." That makes a lot >> of sense to me because the younger a person, the less that >> society has invested in them and the greater will be society's >> future liability in support costs. Remember that this is in the >> context of having to reduce population. Hopefully, the world >> of today will realize the threat we face and we can avoid >> having to make such reprehensible, but necessary decisions. > >That's one of the more chilling paragraphs I've read today, though it's >only 10:30 in the morning. Let's value lives by how much "society" has >invested in them! That would make Bill Gates's kid worth more than, what, >all the infants in sub-Saharan Africa, right? > >A technical question - in your human valuation model, do you merely include >the human capital "society" has invested in that person, or do you include >a factor for the discounted value of the future wage stream? If the latter, >what interest rate do you use? From eglaze@vsta.com Sat Nov 21 14:25:51 1998 Received: from rivendell.vsta.com (rivendell.vsta.com [204.57.96.15]) by csf.Colorado.EDU (8.8.5/8.8.4/CNS-4.1p-nh) with ESMTP id OAA25853 for ; Sat, 21 Nov 1998 14:25:48 -0700 (MST) Received: from eglaze.vsta.com (eglazeADSL.vsta.com [204.57.96.81]) by rivendell.vsta.com (8.8.8/8.8.6) with SMTP id PAA01322 for ; Sat, 21 Nov 1998 15:27:44 -0600 (CST) From: "Ed Glaze III" To: "PPN Listserv" Subject: More on PPN review, etc. Date: Sat, 21 Nov 1998 15:31:25 -0600 Message-ID: <01be1596$4a6d3020$516039cc@eglaze.vsta.com> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: multipart/alternative; boundary="----=_NextPart_000_0492_01BE1563.FFD2C020" X-Priority: 3 X-MSMail-Priority: Normal X-Mailer: Microsoft Outlook Express 4.71.1712.3 X-MimeOLE: Produced By Microsoft MimeOLE V4.71.1712.3 This is a multi-part message in MIME format. ------=_NextPart_000_0492_01BE1563.FFD2C020 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable Ed responds to Jim and others, If Jim had bothered to closely read my message of 13 Nov=20 it plainly says: "I will be offline for a few days as I travel to=20 attend a SC chapter meeting and training session in Austin. Some of you may even enjoy me not posting for a while." =20 I just got back online 20 Nov and am finishing going through over 250 e-mail messages, most from pop listservs. Since PPN was=20 most likely to need responses I have waited to review these=20 messages so that I can catch up on the discussion threads.=20 I imagine I will be submitting more than one reply though I am=20 not sure how the new list limits will affect multiple posting. Ted=20 has done a good job of responding so I will not answer some=20 issues unless necessary. Repetition of long messages does=20 benefit the list and not all our discussions need to be on the list. Since I was out of town it should be obvious that I was not=20 avoiding discussions or evading challenges and I think that=20 Ted did a fine job in replying to Jim and Angela. He has been=20 more patient with them than I would have been and addressed=20 many of the discussions and challenges. Though I know of Ted as a fellow subscriber to the KZPG pop=20 list, he has not been a subscriber of Audubon or SC unless he=20 decided to join very recently. In all of his messages on KZPG=20 Ted has never mentioned his views on UFOs, space, eugenics,=20 genetic engineering, Aliens or any of the other distractions that=20 Jim threw out in an obvious attempt to smear Ted with the=20 other PPN list subscribers. I and Ted Toal may just be another passing "Front" of pop=20 activists who join the PPN list because of our concerns with=20 overpopulation and do not realize that PPN's concerns do=20 not jibe with our own. This is a new experience to me but=20 evidently not new to subscribers on PPN who choose to=20 address the population problem through "alternative ways."=20 Hopefully, we can all learn from each other or maybe Ted and=20 I will just blow on through and leave you to discuss population=20 in your own fashion. I have been a frequent contributor to these other pop lists and never=20 have I been accused of "divisive methods" though I readily admit=20 that my views on overpopulation are more extreme than most, but=20 not all of those other list subscribers. I do feel that I have been able = to "impress them" on the other lists and I welcome any solicitation=20 of a review of my conduct or message content on these lists.=20 I have also never before been accused of "shrillness, juvenile=20 pettiness, and heaping abuse on those list owners." Can you substantiate these charges? Jim, you know Nan, the co-listowner=20 for SC and maybe you should solicit her informed opinion rather=20 than voicing your own unsubstantiated views. If you need the=20 e-mail addresses of other listserv owners just let me know. I have=20 met three of four of them personally and they are very professional. I did submit reviews of the PPN listserv and excerpts from some responses that I have gotten on PPN. I felt these excerpts were=20 representative in tone from the messages posted. If you doubt=20 the implied tone of the messages as given in my review then I just=20 ask list members to recall the recent posts by Angela and Jim. Jim posted my first PPN review but evidently not my follow-up which=20 indicates that most of the problems Ted and I have had with PPN=20 came from just a few people (see below) . Since that time I see=20 that there are also some other PPN list subscribers who are not=20 so quick to attack or reinterpret the meaning of statements. I will=20 follow up with a more positive PPN review later to these other lists,=20 but I stand by my initial impressions. Angela even seems to have=20 moderated her tone a bit in the last couple messages. The quote on my e-mail signature is my own and I feel it depicts=20 well the problems we face with trying to get the rest of the world to=20 recognize and solve overpopulation issues and why environmentalists=20 will face such opposition before society does what must be done. ________ Ed Glaze Port Mansfield, TX "If they don't understand the severity of the problem,=20 they won't understand the severity of the solution. Overpopulation must be dealt with." --------------------------------------- From: Ed Glaze III To: Audubon Population Date: Thursday, November 12, 1998 6:16 PM Subject: Re: Re: Progressive Population Network listserv -- a review I didn't want to make the initial message too long but I have had several requests for more info on PPN so here is some more. Also below is a response from Ted Toal, the other pop activist on PPN that I mentioned, and another from Robert Muldowney about PPN. Most of you know my writing style by now and I like to think I try to = keep an even, respectful, and reasoning tone to my messages. Though I am on the pop reduction end of the spectrum, I try not to spout off my = views unreasonably and I also include lots of news links and URLs. I did the same on PPN and have had nothing but attacks ever since. I do not know the specifics of the PPN listserv but it seems that only about six people have posted (attacked) in response to my messages. There may be lots of lurkers but I would be surprised. No posts yet indicating that anyone else on PPN seems to understand that = overpopulation is a problem that must be dealt with. They prioritize the 101 other = social ills, real and imagined, and don't seem willing to acknowledge that=20 population causes, contributes to, or worsens all of these other = problems. The opposition to discussing demographics on PPN is very evident from the messages I have received. Though I did not review the archives, = there did not seem to be any other discussion threads going on when I posted and now it seems to be the eco-justice crowd (them) pouncing on the pop-control wacko (me). One of the problems I forgot to mention is that there is sometimes quite a wait until your message gets posted. I had one message take about seven hours. Yesterday I got a rejection because the server's hard drive may have been full. The listserv is maintained at a Colorado.EDU site and hosted by Communications for a Sustainable Future. "Central to PPN discussions will be the importance of class, gender = and racial/ethnic divisions and, more generally, the role of power in = shaping demographic behavior, policies and processes. We believe that rapid population growth poses important problems to communities, nation states and the globe, but we also believe that population = stabilization cannot be achieved without addressing the social conditions that = lead to excessive growth." In my earlier review these were my words, not quoted from other = messages, "PPN does not talk about population processes, especially anything to do with limits to growth, demographic trends, and population control in any form. Such things imply ...." The rest was mostly quotes with a few words for transition or = readability. If you are interested I can forward you copies of the messages. Reading them all would take a while though. It seems that posting them once was not enough for one person because she later forwarded them all back to the listserv as attachments, even what I thought was private e-mail between us when she asked what I thought of sterilization. Evidently she was just baiting me since I hadn't mentioned it yet and she knew I would have a stance she could disagree with. Luckily, in my intro I said that I was not married or she might have asked if I was still beating my wife. Don't know why these people who supposedly have environmental concerns like the rest of us seem blind to demographics. ------=_NextPart_000_0492_01BE1563.FFD2C020 Content-Type: text/html; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable

Ed responds to Jim and=20 others,
 
If Jim had bothered to closely read my message of 13 Nov
it plainly says:  "I will be offline for a few days as I = travel=20 to
attend a SC chapter meeting and training session in Austin.
Some = of you=20 may even enjoy me not posting for a while." 
 
I just got back online 20 Nov and am finishing going through = over
250 e-mail messages, most from pop listservs. Since PPN was
most likely to need responses I have waited to review these
messages so that I can catch up on the discussion threads.
I imagine I will be submitting more than one reply though I am =
not sure how the new list limits will affect multiple posting. Ted =
has done a good job of responding so I will not answer some
issues unless necessary. Repetition of long messages does
benefit the list and not all our discussions need to be on the=20 list.
 
Since I was out of town it should be obvious that I was not
avoiding discussions or evading challenges and I think that
Ted did a fine job in replying to Jim and Angela. He has been =
more patient with them than I would have been and addressed
many of the discussions and challenges.
 
Though I know of Ted as a fellow subscriber to the KZPG pop
list, he has not been a subscriber of Audubon or SC unless he =
decided to join very recently. In all of his messages on KZPG =
Ted has never mentioned his views on UFOs, space, eugenics,
genetic engineering, Aliens or any of the other distractions that =
Jim threw out in an obvious attempt to smear Ted with the
other PPN list subscribers.
 
I and Ted Toal may just be another passing "Front" of pop =
activists who join the PPN list because of our concerns with
overpopulation and do not realize that PPN's concerns do
not jibe with our own. This is a new experience to me but
evidently not new to subscribers on PPN who choose to
address the population problem through "alternative = ways."
Hopefully, we can all learn from each other or maybe Ted and
I will just blow on through and leave you to discuss population
in your own fashion.
 
I have been a frequent contributor to these other pop lists and = never=20
have I been accused of "divisive methods" though I = readily=20 admit 
that my views on overpopulation are more extreme than most, = but 
not all of those other list subscribers. I do feel that I have been = able=20
to "impress them" on the other lists and I welcome any=20 solicitation
of a review of my conduct or message content on these lists.
 
I have also never before been accused of "shrillness, juvenile =
pettiness, and heaping abuse on those list owners."  Can=20 you
substantiate these charges? Jim, you know Nan, the co-listowner =
for SC and maybe you should solicit her informed opinion rather =
than voicing your own unsubstantiated views. If you need the
e-mail addresses of other listserv owners just let me know. I have =
met three of four of them personally and they are very = professional.
 
I did submit reviews of the PPN listserv and = excerpts from=20 some
responses that I have gotten on PPN.  I = felt these=20 excerpts were
representative in tone from the messages posted. If you doubt =
the implied tone of the messages as given in my review then I just =
ask list members to recall the recent posts by Angela and = Jim.
 
Jim posted my first PPN review but evidently not my follow-up which
indicates that most of the problems Ted and I have = had with=20 PPN
came from just a few people (see below) . Since that = time I=20 see
that there are also some other = PPN list=20 subscribers who are not
so quick to attack or = reinterpret the=20 meaning of statements. I will
follow up with a more positive = PPN review=20 later to these other lists,
but I stand by my initial = impressions.=20 Angela even seems to have
moderated her tone a bit in the last couple messages.
 
The quote on my e-mail = signature is my own=20 and I feel it depicts
well the = problems we face=20 with trying to get the rest of the world to  
recognize and solve overpopulation issues and why environmentalists =
will face such opposition before society=20 does what must be done.
 
 ________   Ed=20 Glaze   <eglaze@vsta.com>
          &nbs= p;          =20 Port Mansfield, TX
"If they don't understand the severity of the = problem,
they won't understand the severity of the=20 solution.
Overpopulation must be dealt with." 
 
 
---------------------------------------
 
From: Ed Glaze III <eglaze@vsta.com>
To: Audubon = Population=20 <POPULATION@LIST.AUDUBON.ORG>
Date:=20 Thursday, November 12, 1998 6:16 PM
Subject: Re: Re: Progressive = Population=20 Network listserv -- a review

I didn't want to make the initial = message=20 too long but I have
had several requests for more info on PPN so here = is some=20 more.

Also below is a response from Ted Toal, the other pop = activist=20 on
PPN that I mentioned, and another from Robert Muldowney about=20 PPN.

Most of you know my writing style by now and I like to think = I try=20 to keep
an even, respectful, and reasoning tone to my messages. = Though I=20 am
on the pop reduction end of the spectrum, I try not to spout off = my=20 views
unreasonably and I also include lots of news links and URLs. I = did=20 the
same on PPN and have had nothing but attacks ever since.

I = do not=20 know the specifics of the PPN listserv but it seems that only
about = six=20 people have posted (attacked) in response to my messages.
There may = be lots=20 of lurkers but I would be surprised. No posts yet
indicating that = anyone else=20 on PPN seems to understand that overpopulation
is a problem that must = be=20 dealt with. They prioritize the 101 other social
ills, real and = imagined, and=20 don't seem willing to acknowledge that  
population causes, contributes to, or worsens all of these other=20 problems.

The opposition to discussing demographics on PPN is = very=20 evident from
the messages I have received. Though I did not review = the=20 archives, there
did not seem to be any other discussion threads going = on when=20 I posted
and now it seems to be the eco-justice crowd (them) pouncing = on=20 the
pop-control wacko (me).

One of the problems I forgot to = mention is=20 that there is sometimes quite
a wait until your message gets posted. = I had=20 one message take about
seven hours. Yesterday I got a rejection = because the=20 server's hard drive
may have been full.

The listserv is = maintained at=20 a Colorado.EDU site and hosted by
Communications for a Sustainable=20 Future.
<http://csf.colorado.edu/>
<http://csf.colorado.edu/mail/ppn/i= nfo.html>
   =20 "Central to PPN discussions will be the importance of class, gender = and
    racial/ethnic divisions and, more generally, = the role=20 of power in shaping
    demographic behavior, policies = and=20 processes. We believe that rapid
    population growth = poses=20 important problems to communities, nation
    states = and the=20 globe, but we also believe that population = stabilization
   =20 cannot be achieved without addressing the social conditions that=20 lead
    to excessive growth."


In my = earlier=20 review these were my words, not quoted from other=20 messages,
         "PPN = does not=20 talk about population processes,=20 especially
          = anything to=20 do with limits to growth, demographic=20 trends,
          and = population=20 control in any form. Such things imply ...."

The rest was = mostly=20 quotes with a few words for transition or readability.

If you are = interested I can forward you copies of the messages.
Reading them all = would=20 take a while though.

It seems that posting them once was not = enough for=20 one person
because she later forwarded them all back to the listserv=20 as
attachments, even what I thought was private e-mail between = us
when she=20 asked what I thought of sterilization. Evidently she was
just baiting = me=20 since I hadn't mentioned it yet and she knew I would
have a stance = she could=20 disagree with. Luckily, in my intro I said
that I was not married or = she=20 might have asked if I was still beating
my wife. Don't know why these = people=20 who supposedly have
environmental concerns like the rest of us seem = blind to=20 demographics.
 
------=_NextPart_000_0492_01BE1563.FFD2C020-- From eglaze@vsta.com Sat Nov 21 16:00:20 1998 Received: from rivendell.vsta.com (rivendell.vsta.com [204.57.96.15]) by csf.Colorado.EDU (8.8.5/8.8.4/CNS-4.1p-nh) with ESMTP id QAA00230 for ; Sat, 21 Nov 1998 16:00:17 -0700 (MST) Received: from eglaze.vsta.com (eglazeADSL.vsta.com [204.57.96.81]) by rivendell.vsta.com (8.8.8/8.8.6) with SMTP id RAA03262; Sat, 21 Nov 1998 17:02:15 -0600 (CST) From: "Ed Glaze III" To: "PPN Listserv" , "Audubon Population" Cc: "Jay Hanson" Subject: Boomers' Time Bomb Date: Sat, 21 Nov 1998 17:05:53 -0600 Message-ID: <01be15a3$7d5493e0$516039cc@eglaze.vsta.com> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit X-Priority: 3 X-MSMail-Priority: Normal X-Mailer: Microsoft Outlook Express 4.71.1712.3 X-MimeOLE: Produced By Microsoft MimeOLE V4.71.1712.3 Below is an article from Barron's magazine which discusses economic and social aspects of population growth which are not usually considered. The mailing lists at the end of the message may interest some of you also. ______ Ed Glaze Boomers' Time Bomb -- The stocks-for-retirement cycle has a fatal flaw by THORNTON PARKER Barron's -- November 16, 1998 Barron's Online Business news and information. Most features for paid subscribers only. Engineers who design large structures must consider what their profession calls the "scale-effect" problem, or what may happen when a material, formula or a design technique is used to build a structure larger than whatever has been built before. As the size increases, factors that had not previously been considered may come into play that cause the structure to fail. There is a scale-effect problem with the concept of relying on corporate stocks as the main source of funds for retirement plans. The formulas underlying this concept were developed for individual or organizational portfolios and are based on the assumption that, for all practical purposes, there will always be an infinite number of buyers when stocks must be sold. But these same formulas are now being applied to entire generations, a vastly greater scale than ever contemplated by those who originated them. According to Richard Mahoney of the Center for the Study of American Business, more than two-thirds of all listed U.S. stocks are in retirement accounts. Millions of Baby Boomers are buying stocks, directly or through pension and mutual funds, in the front, or build-up half, of what has become a national stocks-for-retirement cycle. But no one has explained how the back, or liquidation half, of the cycle may work. There has not been a publicized engineering like system-failure analysis of how the cycle can handle its intended load. The load is expected to reach a plateau in about 2030 and continue for decades. The Census Bureau projects that during this period, one of every three adults, including all Baby Boomers, will be over 65. Nothing that we know today explains how millions of people will be able to retire comfortably in their mid-60s on intergenerational transfer payments if the ratio of workers to retirees approaches 2-to-1. Because Social Security is based primarily on intergenerational transfers, there are proposals to use its receipts to buy stocks in hopes that price gains will put the program on a sounder financial basis. There is a big unrecognized problem with this: Although stocks have helped pay for many retirements so far, the size of the national stocks-for-retirement cycle is unprecedented and its premise appears to be flawed. With most stocks now paying minimal dividends, if any, the only reason to buy them for retirement accounts is to sell them eventually for gains. The gains, however, are not free -- they are costs to the next round of buyers. When Boomers sell stocks to pay for their retirement, the largest pool of domestic buyers will have to be workers with disposable incomes or workers' retirement plans. Pyramid Scheme But when retirees sell stocks to workers, the gains are intergenerational transfers -- just what demographic projections show will not be sustainable because of the 2-to-1 ratio. Despite the assertions of privatization advocates, using Social Security funds to buy and then sell stocks to workers for gains cannot change the fact that the program will still be a levy on the next generation. Unless this explanation is wrong, Social Security is just the tip of the retirement iceberg. It is a warning that most retirement programs that expect to sell stocks to workers for gains are at risk, and that includes pension plans, annuities and individual retirement accounts. The stocks-for-retirement cycle appears to have turned the U.S. stock market into an intergenerational pyramid scheme. It works for many retirees now, but it can be sustained only while workers' savings flow into the base faster than retirees' liquidations flow out from the top. Population projections indicate that this can't go on forever. There is no precedent for a singularly large generation making a planned shift from saving and buying stocks to selling them, in order to finance consumption, to a pool of buyers that is growing more slowly. If the shift doesn't work, it may lead to disillusionment with the country's financial institutions and a prolonged depression. Many financial planners advise people to convert part of their portfolios from stocks to income-producing investments as they approach retirement. At the individual level, this may be good advice. But it still requires selling stocks to make the conversion. From a national standpoint, the advice does not reduce the need for mass selling. It just starts the selling earlier. Some advocates of stocks for retirement hope that foreign buyers will absorb the Boomers' stocks. But there has been no publicized explanation of who will be able to do it. The total value of U.S. stocks is about half of the world's total. Asia is no longer the economic powerhouse it once was. And the aging populations of Europe may face larger employment, retirement and investment problems than we do. Foreign buyers may be the answer, but so far there has not been enough sound analysis to bet the future on them. The fundamental question is how millions of people will be supported during their later years. If they can't live on intergenerational transfers, either through the government or from stock sales, they will have to work or have other sources of income. Sooner or later this question will call for a reassessment of how savings are invested, how companies are managed and even how the economy should work. The country has the choice of doing the reassessment in time to prevent a disaster or waiting until it is trying to recover from one. If it is done soon, business can lead it. If it is not done until there are serious troubles, these will become political problems and the government will lead the reassessment. The reassessment will probably show that besides products and services, America's aging population will need two main things from companies and investments. First, because many Boomers will not be able to retire in their mid-60s, they will have to work for more years than previous generations. They will need secure jobs with adequate benefits, even if their capabilities decline. This will require companies to reverse the practice of encouraging early retirements and offering part-time employment to minimize benefit costs. Second, those who do retire will need investments that provide income from then-current earnings streams, not stocks to sell into declining markets. This is what utilities provided before deregulation. Meeting these needs may require major changes in the role of companies and the way they are managed. Stock prices will probably become much less important. History is not much help for predicting unprecedented events, and retirement investment predictions based on how stocks have performed in the past are largely meaningless. We do know that there are risks in continuing to invest according to the old formulas. Until the risks are understood, stocks should be considered as dependable for Baby Boomers' retirement portfolios as a bicycle on ice. ----------------------------------------------------------------- NPG Population-News Listserve http://www.npg.org To subscribe: send e-mail to MAJORDOMO@NPG.ORG with the message text: subscribe population-news ----------------------------------------------------------------- Join the new "JunkEconomics" mailing list! THE PURPOSE OF THIS MOVEMENT This is a grass-roots movement to discredit the court astrologers— the official apologists of the ruling class—the economists. We intend to do this by supplying activists and journalists with tools to hold economists up to public ridicule. BRAIN FOOD newsletter Occasional e-mails on environmental topics. An excellent site to peruse for article reprints. Business Week's "The Death of Equities" Revisited In the past year or so, Business Week has become the eternal optimist as opposed to the eternal pessimist as detailed in their "The Death of Equities" cover story. From rcollins@netlink.com.au Sat Nov 21 20:00:23 1998 Received: from netlink.com.au (merlin.netlink.com.au [203.16.172.196]) by csf.Colorado.EDU (8.8.5/8.8.4/CNS-4.1p-nh) with ESMTP id UAA20326 for ; Sat, 21 Nov 1998 20:00:18 -0700 (MST) Received: from netlink.com.au (j140.netlink.com.au [203.62.227.140]) by netlink.com.au (8.8.8/8.8.8) with ESMTP id NAA05972 for ; Sun, 22 Nov 1998 13:58:27 +1100 Message-ID: <36577DDE.53C8E476@netlink.com.au> Date: Sun, 22 Nov 1998 13:58:38 +1100 From: rc&am Reply-To: rcollins@netlink.com.au X-Mailer: Mozilla 4.04 [en] (Win95; I) MIME-Version: 1.0 To: PROGRESSIVE POPULATION NETWORK Subject: Re: Fw: overpopulation & Malthus References: <01be1580$3c3ed320$516039cc@eglaze.vsta.com> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit in a previous post, i glibly suggested culling as one of the implicit suggestions being put forward by glaze. ted toal was upset at this glibness of mine, and responded: > how about culling? "and that sounds insulting. What exactly is your purpose in saying these things?" Ed Glaze III wrote more recently: > Humans have no problem thinning herds of game animals > or cattle when they exceed their carrying capacity. Humans > are also quick to eliminate any animal that poses a threat to > them, their property, their crops or cattle. Even a perceived > threat or a single instance is usually enough to cause a quick > retaliation often bordering on slaughter. But we refuse to > recognize that humans are just another animal and the > same rules should apply. i think, however glib my initial quip about culling, it seems i was not in fact far off the mark at all. angela From ttoal@jps.net Sat Nov 21 21:47:51 1998 Received: from smtp1.jps.net (smtp1.jps.net [209.63.224.236]) by csf.Colorado.EDU (8.8.5/8.8.4/CNS-4.1p-nh) with ESMTP id VAA29278 for ; Sat, 21 Nov 1998 21:47:49 -0700 (MST) Received: from jps.net (208-25-50-170.stk.jps.net [208.25.50.170]) by smtp1.jps.net (8.8.5/8.8.5) with ESMTP id UAA02939; Sat, 21 Nov 1998 20:47:39 -0800 (PST) Message-ID: <36578A52.44F5D595@jps.net> Date: Sat, 21 Nov 1998 19:51:46 -0800 From: Ted Toal X-Mailer: Mozilla 4.06 [en] (Win98; I) MIME-Version: 1.0 To: ppn CC: Ed Glaze III Subject: Re: Culling Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Angela quotes Ed Glaze as saying: "But we refuse to recognize that humans are just another animal and the same rules [thinning the herd when it exceeds carrying capacity] should apply." I have to agree that this is rather rudely put, seeming to imply that Ed believes we should reduce human numbers using the same sorts of methods. If he does believe that, I'd like to hear how he proposes to choose those to be culled. However, I find it hard to believe that that was really his intent. Maybe he was just trying to say that we should recognize that it is just as important to make sure the "human herd" doesn't exceed the carrying capacity as to make sure that other animals don't, without trying to say anything about what methods of doing so might be appropriate. I would totally agree with that. Ted Toal From rcollins@netlink.com.au Sun Nov 22 03:37:52 1998 Received: from netlink.com.au (merlin.netlink.com.au [203.16.172.196]) by csf.Colorado.EDU (8.8.5/8.8.4/CNS-4.1p-nh) with ESMTP id DAA21636 for ; Sun, 22 Nov 1998 03:37:49 -0700 (MST) Received: from netlink.com.au (h110.mel.netlink.com.au [203.62.225.110]) by netlink.com.au (8.8.8/8.8.8) with ESMTP id VAA25779; Sun, 22 Nov 1998 21:36:02 +1100 Message-ID: <3657E918.7672A675@netlink.com.au> Date: Sun, 22 Nov 1998 21:36:08 +1100 From: rc&am Reply-To: rcollins@netlink.com.au X-Mailer: Mozilla 4.04 [en] (Win95; I) MIME-Version: 1.0 To: PROGRESSIVE POPULATION NETWORK Subject: Re: More on PPN review, etc. References: <01be1596$4a6d3020$516039cc@eglaze.vsta.com> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Ed Glaze III wrote: > It seems that posting them once was not enough for one person > because she later forwarded them all back to the listserv as > attachments, even what I thought was private e-mail between us > when she asked what I thought of sterilization. > are you upset that i asked you publicly about your support for quinacrine? maybe you could be a bit more honest in your 'reviews' of ppn on other lists and clarify that it was not a question about sterilisation, but about a specific form of sterilisation, which remains untested, implicated in uterine cancers, and used entirely in poorer countries through private clinics. i did not ask you about sterilisation, because i don't have any argument with sterilisation per se. i asked you about a particularly nasty form which sterilises women by using a chemical which scars the fallopian tubes - this scarring is what makes women sterile. this is the form of sterilisation you support, and i think that your support for this goes further than you have been prepared to admit. > Evidently she was > just baiting me since I hadn't mentioned it yet and she knew I would > > have a stance she could disagree with. no, i did not bait. i asked a very straightforward question. you gave less than a straightforward reply. > Luckily, in my intro I said > that I was not married or she might have asked if I was still > beating > my wife. oh please. angela From donchism@ican.net Sun Nov 22 06:20:50 1998 Received: from mail3.tor.accglobal.net (mail3.tor.accglobal.net [204.92.55.108]) by csf.Colorado.EDU (8.8.5/8.8.4/CNS-4.1p-nh) with ESMTP id GAA24905 for ; Sun, 22 Nov 1998 06:20:46 -0700 (MST) Received: from ppp-197.m2-6.tor.ican.net ([142.154.21.197] helo=donchism.ican.net) by mail3.tor.accglobal.net with smtp (Exim 2.02 #1) id 0zhZRS-0005ez-03 for ppn@csf.colorado.edu; Sun, 22 Nov 1998 08:20:42 -0500 Message-Id: <1.5.4.32.19981122132053.00660588@ican.net> X-Sender: donchism@ican.net X-Mailer: Windows Eudora Light Version 1.5.4 (32) Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Date: Sun, 22 Nov 1998 08:20:53 -0500 To: ppn@csf.colorado.edu From: fran^don Subject: Re: Culling At 07:51 PM 11/21/98 -0800, ttoal@jps.net wrote: >Angela quotes Ed Glaze as saying: "But we refuse to >recognize that humans are just another animal and the >same rules [thinning the herd when it exceeds carrying >capacity] should apply." "Thinning", could be achieved through "attrition". "Attrition", occurs when death rates exceed birth plus immigration rates over a period of time. If political will could cause central government to modified the constitution toward recognition of our finite world it would need to shift focus from individual human rights today, to rights of humans in the future - seventh generation thoughts -, and it might shifted certain powers to community so that each community could: +establish it's own ecological footprint and understand the meaning; {Wackerneigl http://www.ecouncil.ac.cr/rio/focus/report/english/footprint/} +control immigration to the community; +License land use; +License and limit local corporations and projects based on long term ecological imprint - energy throughput and garbage output; +License child birth, as with any long term community issue; Economic reform would also be necessary to establish incentives leading toward a negative growth economy. Also it might shift tax from income to resources use, with more community control. If grass roots NGO's could come together for big picture issue, they might establish a common front for political change. Would you vote for a political movement with the above as part of its agenda? Don Chisholm ////////\\\\\\\\ Don Chisholm 416 484 6225 fax 484 0841 email donchism@ican.net The Gaia Preservation Coalition (GPC) http://www.envirolink.org/orgs/gaia-pc personal page: http://home.ican.net/~donchism/dchome.html "There is an almost gravitational pull toward putting out of mind unpleasant facts. And our collective ability to face painful facts is no greater than our personal one. We tune out, we turn away, we avoid. Finally we forget, and forget we have forgotten. A lacuna hides the harsh truth." - psychologist Daniel Goleman \\\\\\\\\///////// From rcollins@netlink.com.au Sun Nov 22 09:07:33 1998 Received: from netlink.com.au (merlin.netlink.com.au [203.16.172.196]) by csf.Colorado.EDU (8.8.5/8.8.4/CNS-4.1p-nh) with ESMTP id JAA29412 for ; Sun, 22 Nov 1998 09:07:30 -0700 (MST) Received: from netlink.com.au (h033.mel.netlink.com.au [203.62.225.33]) by netlink.com.au (8.8.8/8.8.8) with ESMTP id DAA05150 for ; Mon, 23 Nov 1998 03:05:47 +1100 Message-ID: <3658365D.C92D6F0B@netlink.com.au> Date: Mon, 23 Nov 1998 03:05:49 +1100 From: rc&am Reply-To: rcollins@netlink.com.au X-Mailer: Mozilla 4.04 [en] (Win95; I) MIME-Version: 1.0 To: PROGRESSIVE POPULATION NETWORK Subject: more on quinacrine Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit THE SUNDAY TIMES MUMBAI, SUNDAY, MARCH 16, 1997 -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Women are guinea pigs in contraceptive trial By Sakina Yusuf Khan The Times of India News Service NEW DELHI: Women in the third world have long been guinea pigs for new types of contraceptives. The latest one concerns the insertion of quinacrine, a method believed to be more dangerous than the controversial Norplant. A pioneer of this "technique" in the country is Dr. Biral Mullick. Scores of women from villages and slums in and around Calcutta are flocking to his clinic at 34A, Shashi Bhushan Dey Street. They go back gratified because no one, not even their husbands, will know they have been sterilised! The method appears convenient - no anaesthesia, no surgery, no hospitalisation. Just seven pellets of a cheap and easily available anti-malarial medicine called quinacrine, which is inserted in the uterus. The woman is then promised a lifetime of release from unwanted pregnancies. The cost is a mere Rs 35. What these women do not know is that they are guinea pigs being used to test the efficacy of the drug; they they are being subjected to a method not approved by any drug regulatory authority in the world, and against which the World Health Organisation has issued stern warnings. Laboratory tests have indicated that quinacrine causes mutation of cells. Further tests are on to assess if it is carcinogenic as well. Dr. Mullick's clinic is not the only one in the country carrying out these chemical "trials". Says gynaecologist Puneet Bedi, "Scores of private doctors and NGOs across the country, including a prominent doctor politician from Delhi, are involved in this unethical practice. It's a very disturbing development." According to him, most of the women come to these clinics for a Copper T and are sent back instead with quinacrine, a corroding agent that burns the uterine tissue and forms scabs. The inflammatory response results in the formation of scar tissues blocking the fallopian tubes and leading to irreversible sterilisation. "It's a method which has a barbaric history going back to the Nazi concentration camps," says Dr. Mohan Rao, chairperson of the Centre of Social Medicine and Community Health, JNU. According to Prof Shree Muley of McGill University, Canada, the method is most crude, imprecise and could lead to tubal pregnancy, and internal haemorrhage which could be fatal. Not surprisingly then, it has been banned in Chile and Vietnam. In India, however, it is being used by an increasing number of unscrupulous doctors. "What is more disturbing," says Dr. Rao is that the "trials" are being largely sponsored by two U.S. doctors, Stephen Mumford and Elton Kessel (both head single-man NGOs), who receive funds from the right-wing anti-immigration lobby in America which believes that population explosion in third world will consume their resources, overrun their borders and ultimately cause a crisis in their country." From rcollins@netlink.com.au Sun Nov 22 09:07:44 1998 Received: from netlink.com.au (merlin.netlink.com.au [203.16.172.196]) by csf.Colorado.EDU (8.8.5/8.8.4/CNS-4.1p-nh) with ESMTP id JAA29425 for ; Sun, 22 Nov 1998 09:07:40 -0700 (MST) Received: from netlink.com.au (h033.mel.netlink.com.au [203.62.225.33]) by netlink.com.au (8.8.8/8.8.8) with ESMTP id DAA05155 for ; Mon, 23 Nov 1998 03:05:55 +1100 Message-ID: <36583664.EC23383D@netlink.com.au> Date: Mon, 23 Nov 1998 03:05:56 +1100 From: rc&am Reply-To: rcollins@netlink.com.au X-Mailer: Mozilla 4.04 [en] (Win95; I) MIME-Version: 1.0 To: PROGRESSIVE POPULATION NETWORK Subject: more on quinacrine Content-Type: text/plain; charset=iso-8859-1 Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit SURREPTITIOUS STERLIZATIONS: AN ENDANGERING PROCESS O tempora! O mores! This cri de coeur will perhaps be evoked in those reading the spate of reports lately, on surreptitious "trials" on the non-surgical sterilization of women with quinacrine, being carried out by NGOs and private doctors in a host of places in the country. Many aspects of our socio-economy have come together in this scandalous "trial" of contraceptives now coming into India. These include the invidious nature of the efforts of international financial institutions to undermine the institution of the state in Third World countries indebted to them, the hypocrisy of the neo-liberal discourse on rights and the international euphoria on reproductive health as the solution to the health problems of women, accompanying the sustained propaganda, over the years, that population growth lies at the heart of all social problems in these countries. A Legacy from the Past Non-surgical sterilization of this sort has a tragic and indeed brutal history. Ridding ourselves of euphemisms, this is nothing but chemical sterilization pioneered in the Nazi concentration camps. The victims in that grand design were jews, gypsies, communists and the eugenically unfit. Now the victims, subject to these covert "trials", are poor Third World women, as the Neo-Malthusian chicken comes home to roost. Worldwide, the "trials" have been conducted in 15 countries including Chile, Indonesia and Vietnam. Currently all countries in South Asia are sites of this scandal. Quinacrine over the Years Quinacrine, a synthetic anti-malarial, was used in the treatment of malaria during the thirties and forties, till it was replaced by better drugs such as chloroquine. Current interest in the drug stems from its novel use discovered about two decades ago. But issues of safety, efficacy and ethics have since trailed the "trails" around the globe. The method was developed in Chile by Dr. Jaime Zipper in the seventies. Dr. Zipper had earlier experimented with chemicals like formaldehyde and sulphuric acid to block the fallopian tubes of laboratory animals. Assisted soon by two American doctors, Dr. Elton Kessel and Dr. Steven Mumford, who were to become the lions of the quinacrine sterilization movement, Dr. Zipper, over the next decade and a half, tried out quinacrine sterilization in three public hospitals involving more than a thousand women. Methods of Applications The procedure involves the trans-cervical introduction of pellets of quinacrine into the fundus of the uterus in the early proliferative phase of the menstrual cycle, using a modified copper T IUD inserter. While various schedules have been tried out, the most common involves the insertion of seven pellets of 36 milligrams of quinacrine performed either once or twice. The insertion of quinacrine into the fundus of the uterus is followed by local inflammation. The scar tissue that follows the inflammation leads to tubal occlusion and hence irreversible sterilization. Inherent Risks The quinacrine insertions do not require anaesthesia or trained personnel and can be performed in areas with no access to health facilities. While these are held out as some of its operational advantages, given the nature of family planning programmes and the poor development of public health infrastructure in these countries, it is precisely these features which endow the method with an extremely high potential for abuse as indeed is obvious from the conduct of the "trials" in India. Global Trials In Vietnam, more than 31,000 women underwent quinacrine sterilization between 1989 and 1993. The Ministry of Health subsequently called off the trials following the WHO’s recommendations. A retrospective study of more than 1600 of the women was carried out in 1994. The findings of this study, however, has not yet been published. In June 1994, the WHO ‘Consultation on Female Sterilization Methods’ called for the conduct of four pre-clinical toxicology studies on quinacrine before approval of the drug for clinical testing on women. It categorically stated that human clinical trials should be stopped forthwith pending the outcome of these toxicology studies. Family Health International, an NGO in the United States, which had earlier assisted Dr. Zipper in his studies and had been involved with equally questionable trials with Norplant in Bangladesh, decided to carry out these studies with financial assistance from USAID. The rationale adduced was that a safe and non-surgical method of sterilization would be cheaper than surgical methods of sterilization. The September 1995 issue of FHI’s newsletter Network reported that three out of four studies on quinacrine were positive, that is to say that quinacrine was mutagenic. Mutagenicity, the capacity to induce changes in cells, is indicative of possible carcinogenicity or cancer causation. While not all mutagenic substances are carcinogenic, laboratory studies on rodents are necessary to exclude carcinogenicity. In view of this, the USAID decided to stop the funding of these studies. Further, problems developed with the next step involving trials on female rodents, with the route of insertion, the dosage, the number of insertions required, and above all, the heavy mortality among rodents which had to be subjected to repeated anaesthesia during the course of the trials. In Chile, meanwhile, there was an uproar following the receipt of a September 1994 memo from the Centre for Research on Population and Security, an NGO run by Kessel and Mumford in North Carolina. The memo stated that the Chilean government was considering replacing surgical sterilization with quinacrine sterilization in the country’s two most populous regions. It jubilantly proclaimed that the Chilean government’s plans vindicated the efforts of the pioneers of the quinacrine method of sterilization in the face of the WHO’s "ridiculous" position. The memo turned out to be propagating an untruth; it nevertheless provided an impetus to activists to probe the entire issue of the conduct of these trials. Concern and Resistance A broad-based coalition called "Open Forum for Reproductive Health and Rights" voiced the following four main concerns as they agitated for a halt to the "trials". Unresolved issues of safety, for in addition to possible toxicity and carcinogenicity, quinacrine should also be tested for embryotoxicity in the event of failure of the method; The WHO recommendation that human clinical trials not to be conducted till toxicology trials are satisfactorily carried out; The need for scrutiny of the trial documents by an ethics committee, to assess both safety and ethical standards that had been followed. The Chilean Ministry of Health withdrew its support to the trial in December 1994 while the public hospitals were asked to review their internal ethical procedures. However, Dr. Zipper and his team are reportedly continuing the trials in private clinics with the financial support of the Centre for Research on Population and Security. Trials in India In India, quinacrine sterilization is being carried out with "hundreds of doctors involved" according to an early convert to the cause, Dr. Barrel Mullick. He claimed that he himself has trained over 200 village health workers, from all over the country, in quinacrine sterilization even as he frankly admits that there has been no follow-up of the women who were sterilized. Further, as happened in Chile, none of the women were aware that they were part of a trial. Perhaps more ominously, it was stated that this method was most suitable for the surreptitious sterilization of oppressed women from minority communities who would otherwise require their husbands’ permission. Dr. Mumford gushed in a documentary telecast on BBC, entitled The Human Laboratory, claimed that it would cost merely 10,000 dollars to sterilize 70,000 women. The Indian converts to their cause mention a figure of Rupees 35 per women. Mumford, Kessel and Mullick also state in a paper that "not to be ignored is the most important role that sterilization must play in maintaining peace and security, given the disastrous nature of the world’s overpopulation". What Kessel and Mumford ruthlessly exploit is the "space" created by current efforts to roll back the state in Third World nations under the aegis of the Breton Woods Financial Institutions. Central to these efforts is a systematic effort to increase the role of NGOs and private agencies as it is seen that public agencies, reeling under mandatory budget cuts, are unable to perform their regulatory roles. We are thus witness to agencies like the ICMR, hitherto mandated to regulate, monitor and evaluate clinical trials on human populations, getting reduced to impotent bodies, unable to keep track of the proliferating "research" being carried out by a host of NGOs and private institutions. We are also witness to foreign funding agencies bypassing national regulatory channels to fund such research, being carried out in utter disregard of international norms and ethics. Real Issues at Stake The rhetoric of "choice" and "reproductive health" that surrounds much of such research is beguiling to those uninitiated in public health issues. Thus we are told that quinacrine sterilization can liberate Third World women from the horrendous toll of maternal deaths. What is ignored is the entirely fallacious nature of the argument. What causes maternal deaths is the appalling health status of women in these countries and the absence of emergency obstetric care in the event of complications of pregnancy. Quinacrine - or for that matter, other methods of contraception - do nothing to address these fundamental issues. Indeed, in India, mortality data indicate that even within the reproductive age group of women, causes due to reproduction account for merely 12 per cent of all deaths. The major causes of death remain infectious diseases and undernutrition. While the motives of Kessle, Mumford and the likes are easy enough to understand, what is less explicable is the scores of Indian doctors who are pawns in this international nexus of demographic fascists. This could only be the consequence of the sustained propaganda, over the years, that population growth among the poor is the chief cause of all the social evils that bedevil the country. In Bangladesh, meanwhile, leading editorials in newspapers have called forcefully for a ban on these covert trials as they urge the most stringent punishments to the doctors responsible for carrying them out. What they poignantly ask is for how long will Third World women continue to be treated as guinea pigs in the contraceptive industry. While the Government of India and its regulatory agencies turn a Nelson’s eye to these violations of human rights in the name of "reproductive choice", it is the poor women who, denied of all other choices in life, pay the price in morbidity and mortality for exercising their right to contraception. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- A report released by the Delhi-based women’s organisation, Saheli, highlights what it terms as the ‘unethical, unscientific, and in most cases illegal’ manner in which trials for chemical sterilisation using Quinacrine drug are being conducted in India. Quinacrine was used orally for treating malaria, but it fell into disuse as malaria parasites developed resistance to it. In the late 1960s, its potential for tubal blockage was publicised by a Chilean scientist. It was later promoted as a cheap and easy way to sterilise women. The Saheli report points to an acute lack of scientific information guiding a procedure that is known to have numerous negative short and long-term effects. These range from high failure rate to perforation of the uterine wall and the increased risk of ectopic pregnancies. In fact, the ICMR had abandoned clinical trials of the drug precisely because of the high incidence of ectopic pregnancies that came to its notice. There is also the added risk of cancer. Taking all these factors into consideration, the report concludes that the large scale use of Quinacrine sterilisation in India has frightening potential for women’s lives and health. In Bangalore, an organisation known as Contraceptive and Health Innovations Project (CHIP Trust) has, according to Saheli, recruited around 400 doctors from different parts of Karnataka to conduct sterilisations using the drug and to monitor its effects. A documentary video, The Yellow Haze, made by a young team of film-makers from the Mass Communication Research Centre of Jamia Millia Islamia University, Delhi highlighted the clinical trials for Quinacrine conducted on 32 women for an MD thesis by a student of Lady Hardinge Medical College, Delhi under the supervision of a senior doctor. The women experimented on came from underprivileged backgrounds. Six of these women spoken to also revealed that they were not told anything about the Quinacrine or its potential short and long-term side-effects. The Saheli report states that conducting of such trials clearly flouts established medical and ethical norms and Indian laws. It called for an immediate end to them. Source: Express News Service 11 July 1997. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Administrative Officer • Ability to solve administrative problems in the campus and office • Post graduation + 5 years experience • Spoken and written fluency in English and either Marathi or Hindi • Salary Rs 6000 per month. Doctors • Female and Male doctors for hospital work, public education and de-addiction treatment • Medical degree + minimum 3 years experience • Salary - DHMS/BAMS - Rs 3500 • MBBS - Rs 5500, Post-graduate medical degree - Rs 8000. Staff Nurse • Three and half years training and further 3 years experience in hospital +operation theatre necessary Salary Rs 3500 per month. Senior Lab. Technician • DMLT + 5 years experience. Salary Rs 3000 • Annual increment and provident fund applicable to all. Only those desirous of working for long-term should apply. Dr. Abhay Bang, MD, MPH Director, SEARCH Gadchiroli 442 605, Maharashtra From rcollins@netlink.com.au Sun Nov 22 09:07:50 1998 Received: from netlink.com.au (merlin.netlink.com.au [203.16.172.196]) by csf.Colorado.EDU (8.8.5/8.8.4/CNS-4.1p-nh) with ESMTP id JAA29434 for ; Sun, 22 Nov 1998 09:07:47 -0700 (MST) Received: from netlink.com.au (h033.mel.netlink.com.au [203.62.225.33]) by netlink.com.au (8.8.8/8.8.8) with ESMTP id DAA05161 for ; Mon, 23 Nov 1998 03:06:04 +1100 Message-ID: <3658366E.3F6CD9C9@netlink.com.au> Date: Mon, 23 Nov 1998 03:06:06 +1100 From: rc&am Reply-To: rcollins@netlink.com.au X-Mailer: Mozilla 4.04 [en] (Win95; I) MIME-Version: 1.0 To: PROGRESSIVE POPULATION NETWORK Subject: more on quinacrine Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Quinacrine Sterilization: An Unsafe Method of Female Sterilization? -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Quinacrine sterilization is a non-surgical method of female sterilization that was invented in Chile by Jamie Zipper in the early 1970's. The procedure involves inserting a quinacrine pellet into a woman's uterus where it "inflicts injury- something similar to a chemical burn- that causes scar tissue to form. The scar tissue in turn blocks reproductive processes."[1] Although the method has been used by doctors (especially in developing and third world countries) for over thirty years, questions about its safety and its effectiveness remain unanswered. Quinacrine is used for sterilization purposes today despite the fact that it has not been adequately tested. If a non-surgical method could be deemed both safe and effective it could become a very important part of women's health care world wide, especially in places where surgical forms of sterilization are necessary but unsafe. Unfortunately the quinacrine method does not yet fill this void in female reproductive methods. Toxicology Studies were not done on quinacrine until thirty years after it was introduced as an anti malarial drug. Toxicology studies are a major step in drug testing, a step required by most of the world's drug administrations. The Federations of Gynecology and Obstetrics states that "no experimental method should be tested in humans before adequate toxicology studies [are done] in animals to clarify questions of safety."[2] Studies done by the WHO toxicology panel in 1991 found that "the evidence concerning mutagenicity was inconclusive" and that "further toxicological studies... were required."[3] There were additional questions raised by the WHO toxicology panel with regards to the fact that quinacrine is often given with ibuprofen, ampicillin or ergotamine. They noted that there is no scientific evidence to support using these drugs in conjunction with quinacrine and that toxicology studies should be done on all the drugs to see how they interact together. Another set of toxicology studies was done in 1995 by Family Health International (FHI). FHI discovered that three of the four studies showed mutagenicity, which can indicate that something is carcinogenic or cancer causing. Although not everything that is mutagenetic is carcinogenic, the results of these tests indicate that more direct carcinogenic studies need to be done in order to discover how safe quinacrine is. To date, these studies have not been done; the quinacrine sterilization method continues to be used. Beyond the testing, little is known about the actual physical affects that this procedure can have on women. Quinacrine, in high doses, has been known to cause toxic psychosis (a form of chemical insanity), as well as nervousness, hallucinations and psychotic episodes. The fact that these reactions are known to come from high doses of quinacrine make finding an accurate dosage imperitive. Some women, after having had the procedure, have reported "unexplained bleeding, a sensation of burning internally and pain after insertion." [4] Data collection on this procedure is difficult; this process of sterilization is not legal or medically accepted so there are few records. Data on pregnancy after the insertion of the quinacrine pellet has been kept more accurately. In Chile the rate of pregnancy in women under thirty five was 8.7 percent after five years and 11.7 percent after ten years. The rate of pregnancy for women over thirty five is slightly lower, probably due to the fact that fertility decreases after the age of thirty five. The rate of pregnancy is absurdly high for a method that is professes to sterilize women. Dr. Lisa Rarick, Medical Officer at the USFDA thinks that "the failure rate [of quinacrine sterilizations should not] be too far off that for surgical sterilization, especially since it is sterilization - not a form of contraception that is being offered... five percent would be too high."[5] If five percent is considered too high to be considered "effective" then quinacrine should not be used as a method of sterilization. People have raised concerns over a possible rise in the rate of ectopic pregnancies in women who become pregnant after being "sterilized" by the quinacrine method. Any rise in ectopic pregnancies must be carefully considered because ectopic pregnancies are very dangerous to the mother. In addition, the effects that the quinacrine method has on pregnancies that do occur has not yet been studied even though the method inherently damages the female reproductive organs. The last concern raised about quinacrine is the fact that women may be participating in this method of sterilization without knowing that it is still "experimental" and that they are a part of a clinical test group. There is concern that some of the women are being sterlized with quinacrine without full knowledge of the possible risks. Reports from an independent nurse practitioner in Pakistan is that "patients are recruited... and given little information or time to fully understand and think about the implications of this type of procedure."[6] This attitude seems to be prevalent elsewhere as well. In promotion of quinacrine, a drug without adequate testing, some supporters seem to "use the fact that women's lives in developing countries are more at risk for pregnancy to justify why a sterilization method need not be a safe or effective for them as for women in developed countries"[7] This attitude encourages the continued used of quinacrine among women as a viable method in developing and third world countries despite the fact that there are huge risks involved for these women. If a non-surgical method of female sterilization could be discovered, tested properly and determined to be safe and effective, the benefits would be huge. As of now, quinacrine is not that drug and the quinacrine method is not the answer. Mistakes have been made in the past regarding inadequate drug testing before drugs are used on a widespread scale. DES, breast implants, and other poorly tested drugs and medical procedures have cost women their fertility, their health and their lives. Drugs need to be tested properly. Time , money and resources are all things that can be worked around if a product is needed. There is no excuse for risking lives, health and fertility simply for the convenience of putting a drug out which has not been properly tested. It is too late to repair the damage that has already been done with quinacrine, but it is not too late to continue with the necessary testing and go forward from here. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Notes 1 Taken from BAOBAB Press, Vol.3, Num. 23 (http:www.//africa2000com/BNDX) 2 Berer, Marge; The quinacrine Controversy One Year ON, p.105, Reproductive Health Matters, No.4, November 1994 3 ibid. 2 p101 4 Berer, Marge; The Quinacrine Controversy Continues, p.144, Reproductive Health Matters, No.6, November 1995 5 ibid 2. p.102 6 ibid 2, p104 7 ibid 2, p.100 -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- From eglaze@vsta.com Sun Nov 22 11:05:00 1998 Received: from rivendell.vsta.com (rivendell.vsta.com [204.57.96.15]) by csf.Colorado.EDU (8.8.5/8.8.4/CNS-4.1p-nh) with ESMTP id LAA03142 for ; Sun, 22 Nov 1998 11:04:48 -0700 (MST) Received: from eglaze.vsta.com (eglazeADSL.vsta.com [204.57.96.81]) by rivendell.vsta.com (8.8.8/8.8.6) with SMTP id MAA21431; Sun, 22 Nov 1998 12:06:42 -0600 (CST) From: "Ed Glaze III" To: "PPN Listserv" Cc: "Christopher Christie" Subject: Re: coercion, sterilization, culling Date: Sun, 22 Nov 1998 12:10:22 -0600 Message-ID: <01be1643$5efcd380$516039cc@eglaze.vsta.com> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit X-Priority: 3 X-MSMail-Priority: Normal X-Mailer: Microsoft Outlook Express 4.71.1712.3 X-MimeOLE: Produced By Microsoft MimeOLE V4.71.1712.3 From: Ted Toal > Hi Ed, > I'm still hanging in at PPN. I don't know if you are monitoring it still > or not. Things seem to have calmed down and the hostility level > has dropped dramatically. I am still here, I was just out of town for a week. I posted a couple messages yesterday to catch up after reviewing the listserv messages sent while I was gone. You did an excellent job on your posts and that may be why they (Angela, mostly and Jim, maybe) have calmed down some. It is encouraging that more subscribers are posting now. Too bad they didn't speak up when the A & J welcoming committee bombarded us and so skewed my first impression of the list. Angela has responded to my posts, so I guess the debate goes on.... Her frequent posting may cause her to bump into the 15 percent limit. I will respond to some of her points in this post also. Personally, I feel that soliciting my opinion on the list, as Angela has done -- though Ted asked privately, may be the type of thing the listowners are concerned with. I will discuss several pop-related topics so that there will be more relevance to other subscribers on the list. There was an omitted word in my message yesterday. It should read, "Repetition of long messages does NOT benefit the list and not all our discussions need to be on the list." Spellcheck does not find missing words, nor indentify why a few of the words in my message were in a different size type. It was not intentional on my part though the words changed in size was interesting. My mail program has a default type size of 10 and I make it 12 but editing can change things. I better proofread better. At least I do use caps as needed. > Ted: I think I must have missed some of your posts there that caused > such angry responses. Can you tell me what your positions are on > coercion regarding family size and sterilization? And also tell me > something about quinicrine, which I'm pretty ignorant about, and what > your position is on that, and what your understanding of other's positions > on it is? I'm curious as to what my own reaction would be to your views. MY VIEWS on overpopulation need to be understood because they are central to all posts, to this and the other pop listservs. "I think we will be disagreeing on many population issues because I view the problem in much different terms -- namely that we have excess people now and a population reduction is needed." We must also consider the time factor because continued growth leads to further degradation and a lowering of carrying capacity. We are already so overpopulated that easy solutions are not likely. Like Ted I share the belief that human population should be reduced to well under a billion people. I favor a planned reduction and the sooner the better. And yes, that would entail many, many unpopular methods and morally challenging decisions about who survives and why. I do not have all the answers about how to do this but I feel that if we continue as we are then nature, our own greed and foolishness will reduce our numbers in a much less pleasant manner. (see Chris' apocolyptic message below) ANGELA brought up sterilization in a private e-mail to solicit my views on it and then she forwarded my private response to the PPN list. I have no problem with my views being known by all but it was kind of sneaky the way she solicited response to a hot topic and reposted private e-mail. Now that I look back she did specify Quinacrine sterilization, though my response was more general. Angela seems to be really opposed to QUINACRINE or wants the rest of the list more informed since her recent posts are about Quinacrine. I will repeat what I said before: "Yes, I am in favor of sterilization in some cases and if Quinacrine is cheaper and safer than surgery for females then that is an option that should be available. Especially if sterilization is needed on a large scale in a country that cannot afford, or does not have, the doctors necessary. The choice to use Quinacrine should be available and I am very much in favor of continued trial use with a rapid expansion. Forced sterilization procedures may have been abused, or the policies have been faulty, but there is a need for cheap, long-lasting, and effective birth control in many countries. Plus it does not seem that there are widespread or serious problems with Quinacrine when used properly." Some of Angela's post on Quinacrine are very informative but she and the articles place too much emphasis on approval of use by FDA or other major countries where the decision is actually quite political. COERCION in family planning can take many forms. In fact, much of the pro-natalism our cultures are so filled with should be considered coercion to have kids. The fear of lawsuits is coercion causing drug companies to discontinue research on contraceptive methods. Right-wing politicians and religious types who oppose abortion and other family planning are also practicing coercion by limiting available reproductive control choices. Then there are the abortion clinic protests and murders of abortion doctors which intimidate women with an undesired pregnancy and doctors in their choice of medical specialty. I feel that abortion doctors perform the most beneficial of medical services because abortion, though a last resort, so greatly affects the lives and future wellbeing of so many people. Forced pregnancy and forced motherhood are a much greater injustice, especially in a world already overcrowded with people. COERCION of some kind is a must if we are to stabilize and reduce our populaton. Economic incentives and disincentives along with modifications in education will be most socially acceptable. Next come added restictions and laws which will also likely be necessary when it becomes obvious that the easy ways will not work fast enough. (This touches on the Sen review.) After that, maybe when we are over 9 billion people and living conditions are much worse, will come the more draconian methods. Maybe smaller overpopulated nations or China will be the first to implement such drastic reductions but the need for them will be obvious to us all as our personal liberties and resource consumption are affected by the increased demand and competition. We should not make decisions now, moral or otherwise, that will limit us when we face much different circumstances in the future. Change and adaptation has always been necessary and the morals of today may be totally obsolete in 100 years, maybe even 50, due to environmental change. I am against forced STERILIZATION in most cases, at least under present conditions. The exceptions being cases where the individual is basically unable to take care of him/herself, such as retarted, crippled, or otherwise severely handicapped or diseased. I guess I would also favor sterilizing HIV and AIDS people along with drug addicted. Sex offenders and repeat felons are fair game also. At some point I would even call it a crime to have women who refuse to stop having kids, whether they are poor or rich. If I haven't totally offended you enough to delete this message then read on. Though you might want to skip to Chris' message below. CULLING has also been selected as a topic for me to explain my views. Don Chisholm posted an intelligent reply and Ted tried to cover for me. The important factors involved are carrying capacity and the unquestioned sanctity of human life above all else. Remember that I approach this extreme stance from the view that we already have excess people and perpetuating overpopulation just makes the situation much worse. Am I in favor of culling the human excess, YES. The excess I would start with are the repeat felons and the terminally ill and incapacitated. Basically you would eliminate first those who are the most costly to society while providing little if any benefit. In that respect I would also include infants, as I mentioned in an earlier post, since we do not need many more of them. Another factor would be local carrying capacity which would determine how many people could live in a region in a mostly self-supporting lifestyle. Endangered areas and ecosystems would also be protected by removing the human making unsustainable demands. Nature must be allowed to heal and recover from the greivous wounds we have inflicted so there would be a reduction below the actual carrying capacity that is possible. How many people would be culled -- billions. For this to work it would require mutual coercion, mutually agreed on. Not all the people, or even the countries must agree, but just closing borders and limiting trade would force many to realize, and deal with, the overpopulation that exists. In the long run I feel a planned reduction would result in the greatest good for the greatest number. It is better to have 20 billion people living a decent lifestyle over a 1000-year period with an environment capable of supporting the small human population indefinately. Or else we can look forward to 10 or more billion people living at once and fighting it out to survive while they further destroy the environment which will mean much fewer total people will ever live with a decent lifestyle. That my fellow PPN list subscribers is an alternate way of looking at the population problem. It is sure to engage at least some of you, is certainly theorhetical, controversial, involves policy and possibly offers sociological insights that a few of you have not yet thought of. I do ask that you keep the FLAMES off the list, but I am certainly willing to discuss these issues further, if the list subscribers are willing. Otherwise, I will go back to posting informative articles and news items that relate to population and keep most of my personal views to myself. ________ Ed Glaze Port Mansfield, TX "If they don't understand the severity of the problem, they won't understand the severity of the solution. Overpopulation must be dealt with." ________________________________________ -----Original Message----- From: Christopher Christie To: POPULATION@LIST.AUDUBON.ORG Date: Saturday, November 21, 1998 10:26 PM Subject: Re: Boomers' Time Bomb Ed Glaze III wrote: > Below is an article (snip) > Boomers' Time Bomb -- The stocks-for-retirement cycle has a fatal flaw > (snip) > Pyramid Scheme (snip) > The stocks-for-retirement cycle appears to have turned the U.S. > stock market into an intergenerational pyramid scheme. It works for many > retirees now, but it can be sustained only while workers' savings flow into > the base faster than retirees' liquidations flow out from the top. > Population projections indicate that this can't go on forever. (snip) In recent years I have thought that retirement, as it has been known by the post-war (II) generation of middle and upper-class Americans, will be an elusive dream for those at or below of the ages presently approaching retirement. Contrast the uncertainty presented by the Barron's article with overshoot as described by Jay Hanson in "Requiem" at "Constrained by the laws of thermodynamics, the availability of life-supporting resources will go into a permanent, steep decline. In many ways, the next hundred years will be the inverse of the last hundred. As fossil fuels dwindle, supply lines collapse, and societies disintegrate, muscle will gradually replace machinery. "Home grown" will replace "imported". Obviously, large cities will be mostly abandoned. Well-intended activists from both the Left and Right -- armed with facts and ideologies -- will form political movements, select the best liars for leaders, and take to the streets demanding that government take us back to "the good old days". The worse our problems become, the more they will act instead of think. The less they think, the worse our problems will become. Social order will disintegrate, and Roadside Warriors will go mad, killing, raping, torturing, and burning... It really will be back to the good old days! Shouts of "BRING ME HIS HEAD" will ring through the land, slaves, scalps, souvenirs and trophies of all sorts, ... exciting possibilities limited only by our ingenuity. The good news is that recycling will finally become fashionable! We will see feral children mining the dumps for plastic to burn (Pampers) so they can heat the hovels they are forced to live in. The strongest kids will set traps for fresh meat -- rats -- while the weaker kids will eat anything they can cram into their mouths (old shoes, styrofoam peanuts, newspaper soup). Pandemics will sweep the world, punctuated every so often by explosions as abandoned and rotting nuclear facilities blow up. Leaking dumps and tanks will spew PCBs and radioactive hazwaste into the feral food chain spawning surprising new shapes for young mothers to enjoy nursing.[55] Toxic chemical fires, blowing garbage and trash, genetic mutations, filthy water, cannibalism ... As the Easter Islanders say: "The flesh of your mother sticks between my teeth".[56] The situation will be especially serious for a short time because the population will keep rising due to the lags inherent in the age structure and social adjustment. Then mercifully, the population will drop sharply as the death rate is driven upward by lack of food and health services.[57] Trapped in obsolete belief systems, Americans won't even know why their society disintegrated." Cheers, Christopher Christie Mailing from Desolation Row "If growthmen can spin telling analogies, so can the growth sceptics. A man who falls from a hundred-storey building will survive the first 99 storeys unscathed. Were he as sanguine as some of our technocrats, his confidence would grow with the number of storeys he passed on his downward flight and would be at a maximum just before his free-fall abruptly halted." - E.J. Mishan, 1976 [spelling as found]. From plicysci@frii.com Sun Nov 22 12:47:08 1998 Received: from deimos.frii.com (deimos.frii.com [208.146.240.2]) by csf.Colorado.EDU (8.8.5/8.8.4/CNS-4.1p-nh) with ESMTP id MAA09019 for ; Sun, 22 Nov 1998 12:47:04 -0700 (MST) Received: from frii.com (ftc-0245.dialup.frii.com [216.17.134.93]) by deimos.frii.com (8.9.1a/8.9.1) with ESMTP id MAA07705; Sun, 22 Nov 1998 12:46:56 -0700 (MST) Message-ID: <36586ACD.DFA179@frii.com> Date: Sun, 22 Nov 1998 12:49:34 -0700 From: Jim Talboy X-Mailer: Mozilla 4.5 [en] (WinNT; U) X-Accept-Language: en MIME-Version: 1.0 To: rcollins@netlink.com.au CC: PROGRESSIVE POPULATION NETWORK Subject: Still outside the neat nifty boxes built by what ever MOTIVES References: <3658366E.3F6CD9C9@netlink.com.au> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit I think Ed's problem is that he's intent on being "one up on" everyone, and the PPN list is not a forum for provincial power brokers. If he'd address the issues and challenges, rather than attack the individuals and presentations instead, we'd have much more faith in his approach. His "rational" only extends to the narrow confines of an ecologist. Any behavior outside that model, is "irrational," and has no effect on "his" solution. He's now avoiding answering Mr. Foster, by provoking me into defending my behavior. Unfortunately I have no remorse, and have not got time to answer personal attacks. I think you've really had the last word, and that the list is smart enough to notice his deficiencies. However, in the interest of continuing the discussion regarding "rational" vs. "irrational" behavior, I've written a small description of the public values that have to be considered, that lie beyond Ecology or Economics. Simply berating us with "they don't understand there's a problem," and not giving consideration to the wider view, is a major cause for suspicion as I've pointed out before. The three types of Economic Efficiency, as outlined by Robert Kuttner address efficiency of allocation. These allocative efficiencies were defined differently by Adam Smith, Maynard Keynes, and Joseph Schumpeter. The market cannot accommodate any one view, but there are those who will insist on arguing from only one view point. These Efficiencies were invoked during different periods of USA economic history. Briefly, Smith is the misrepresented champion of the most extreme market forces. Let the winner take all etc. Keynes was a deficit budget spending champion, who's ideas allegedly saved the USA from the Great Depression. Schumpeter argued that technology and what increases in productivity gained by that technology are the forces of stable growth. Those are very compact nutshell summaries, and Kuttners book, "Everything for Sale," is one that I'll have to read several times before I understand the general point. My point here though, is that even a value such as Efficiency can be more or less effectively used under differing circumstances, because there are different interpretations of what Efficiency means, and to argue from one subset of public values, while ignoring extra market values, such as social justice values for example, is naive at best, and expedient at worst. The following four paragraphs describing varied public values and their spectrum balances are drawn from a book by Carol W. Lewis, called The Ethics Challenge in Public Service and is published by The American Society for Public Administration. 1) The public values surrounding "how individuals are treated," are under two general headings: Justice and Compassion. Under Justice, there are values such: uniformity, standardization, rules, neutrality, stability, precedent, and "due process" as defined by the 14th Amendment to the USA Constitution. Under Compassion there are values such as: responsiveness, equity, circumstance, flexibility, and the neutrality of USA Congressional power to lay and collect taxes on incomes without regard to census of enumeration as stipulated by the 16th Amendment to the USA Constitution. 2) The values surrounding Evaluation in determining the "units of analysis for identifying and ranking interests, fall under two general headings: General and Individual. Under General, there are values such as: rights, overarching public good, benefit/cost analysis, allocation, future generations, and global ecology. Under Individual, there are values such as: liberty, client claims, majority interest, distribution, private property, and privacy. 3) The values surrounding motivation, obligations, and primary roles are under Public Service and Personal. Under the heading of Public Service, there are values such as secular law, public interest, regulations, and chain of command. Under Personal, the values are self interest, career, and family. It is a real interesting exercise to note that public servants cannot act unless the law stipulates action, and private citizens can act until restricted by law. 4) The general values, that determine which types of values and standards are being considered, are listed under Productivity and Democracy. Under Productivity, there are values such as "hard," economy, efficiency, competence, expertise, merit, and technocracy. USA's "founding father," Alexander Hamilton's bureaucracy was ideally run by elites drawn from an uncommon group. Thomas Jefferson, another "founding father," held that the bureaucracy ought to be run by those most directly effected by its decisions. He would've championed Democracy, which has values such as: "soft," accountability, representativeness, citizen access, policy advocacy, volunteerism, and public demand. The "tension" along the spectrums I just mentioned: Justice v Compassion, Public v Personal, Productivity v Democracy, and General v Individual, have to be considered during any public decision making process. There are further values that are balanced between Freedom and Equity; or Freedom and Order. For example, in the USA, someone who favored Equity over Freedom on a consistent basis could be called a Liberal, and those who favored Order over Freedom could be called Conservatives. Beyond these local spectrums are global tensions between Doctrine and Spirituality, Environment and Economy, Institutional and Administrative, and Political and Ideological concerns. These are the eight levels of control residing within any civilized being, and are the reason why the Church v State debate in the USA is a moot argument. The Church cannot completely dominate, any more than the State can have control The State lays claim to Law, what is legal v illegal, and the Church lays claim to Morality, what is right v wrong. There's a necessary balance between State and Church, but we simply cannot do with one alone, and there are other extra debate "tensions" that are part of the decision making process as well that make the argument academic. For example, there's a real slow moving debate, Civilization v Culture, that could encompass much of the above list of values. So, as there are more than simply market values at large in public decision making, it is hard to understand why Economists, in general, insist that our behavior as citizens and consumers are not rational, unless you can see that their pet models do not include irrational behavior such as choosing community interests over self interest. If we do not choose to fit into their narrow definitions, having the long view we've gained, WE are "irrational," in contrast with the "rational" of their models. Of course the models are defended in expedient ways, such as arguing from one point of view alone. Unfortunately, some of the views, such as allocative efficiencies, have different perspectives or circumstances where they will FAIL in remarkably destructive ways. Thanks again for your patience. From ttoal@jps.net Mon Nov 23 01:08:05 1998 Received: from smtp1.jps.net (smtp1.jps.net [209.63.224.236]) by csf.Colorado.EDU (8.8.5/8.8.4/CNS-4.1p-nh) with ESMTP id BAA25825 for ; Mon, 23 Nov 1998 01:08:02 -0700 (MST) Received: from jps.net ([209.142.46.154]) by smtp1.jps.net (8.8.5/8.8.5) with ESMTP id AAA08774; Mon, 23 Nov 1998 00:07:49 -0800 (PST) Message-ID: <36590A9F.5A8AEA59@jps.net> Date: Sun, 22 Nov 1998 23:11:28 -0800 From: Ted Toal X-Mailer: Mozilla 4.06 [en] (Win98; I) MIME-Version: 1.0 To: ppn CC: Ed Glaze III Subject: Re: coercion, sterilization, culling Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Ed, thanks for your post explaining your viewpoints more fully. I now understand why your previous posts stirred things up so much. I'm glad you are open to further discussion of this. You've brought up a multitude of things that I'd like to comment on, and some I'd like to try to sway you in a different direction on. You know that I agree with you that we are overpopulated and a population reduction is needed. I also agree that time is important, and that continued growth is leading to further degradation and a lowering of carrying capacity. The question is, what to do? You say: << I favor a planned reduction and the sooner the better. And yes, that would entail many, many unpopular methods and morally challenging decisions about who survives and why.>> I think you know there is no way a "planned reduction" will come about unless there is SUCH a serious global disaster that there is no other way. When you make statements like this, you are doing your cause harm by turning people off to the whole subject. Most people, upon reading that, will figure that if OP is really that bad, then we're doomed anyway. And I'd agree with them. If we have to resort to deciding who gets to survive, we've already lost the battle. At that point, perhaps its best to give up and let nature handle it. Another experiment of nature that didn't work out - mankind! (dragging a lot of other species down with him). I find it most effective to argue that OP must be dealt with now because if we don't, we may find ourselves one day at the point where we are forced to make decisions about who survives. I prefer to believe that we can still avoid that fate. There is no way one can prove that we have or have not reached the point of needing to use these "crisis methods." I think all of us who are well-read on the OP subject know that the issues of carrying capacity, maximum population, optimum population, etc. have been found to be extremely complex, intractable problems. If they weren't, we wouldn't need to be here discussing it. We don't know the true limits, we don't know the optimum levels, and we don't know what the future will bring. Therefore, each of us needs to choose a way of looking at it --- optimistically, there is still time and ways to change humanely --- or pessimistically, we need to enter crisis mode now. You seem to have chosen the crisis model, and I think that's the wrong choice to make. It will hinder your effectiveness at influencing change. I believe you have made this choice because you think it is the correct one, but what I want to convince you of is that it isn't really all that clear that that is the correct one. You can give it up and choose the optimistic choice, without betraying your inner logic. Doing so will greatly increase your effectiveness as an OP activist. << "Yes, I am in favor of sterilization in some cases and if Quinacrine is cheaper and safer than surgery for females then that is an option that should be available. Especially if sterilization is needed on a large scale in a country that cannot afford, or does not have, the doctors necessary......Plus it does not seem that there are widespread or serious problems with Quinacrine when used properly....... the articles place too much emphasis on approval of use by FDA or other major countries where the decision is actually quite political.">> I take note, and hope others do, that you said "safer than surgery". I also note that your understanding is that there don't seem to be serious problems with Quinacrine when used properly. This is apparently a different view than Angela has. She believes there is evidence it can cause cancer, and she is concerned that it hasn't been tested very well. It sounds like you are promoting its use for sterilization, whereas Angela assumes it would be promoted as a contraceptive and that sterilization would be an undesirable side effect of it. Since you mention a concern for safety, what is your opinion about testing? Do you think it needs more testing before widespread use? It is accurate to say that you believe FDA testing is too stringent, due to political reasons? If so, can you go into more detail about how you see those politics working? You've heard Angela's concern about "relative morality", that it is wrong to ban quinacrine in the U.S. because it hasn't been adequately tested and at the same time allow it to be used in poor countries. To me that seems like a legitimate moral concern. A similar concern of mine is of pesticides like DDT being banned in the U.S. but continuing to be manufactured by U.S. companies in poor countries, and used there. So, what's your opinion on this? << COERCION of some kind is a must if we are to stabilize and reduce our populaton. >> I note that you said that there are many forms of coercion, and you listed many, including such things as financial incentives. So far, I agree with you, if coercion is defined that way. << Economic incentives and disincentives along with modifications in education will be most socially acceptable. Next come added restictions and laws which will also likely be necessary when it becomes obvious that the easy ways will not work fast enough.>> The first sentence - yes, I agree. There are two problems with the second sentence, first that you don't detail what the added restrictions/laws would be, leaving the reader's imagination to run wild. Second, you are stating that these will probably become necessary and that the initial methods will not work fast enough, and I don't think it is that clear-cut. By throwing out the second sentence worded the way it is, you again turn people off to the issue. Repeating myself, you can be more effective by restating it in a way people can hear, something like this: "If we can't make these changes soon and effectively, it is quite likely we will be forced into added restrictions and laws that no one wants, that begin to erode human dignity and rights." << I am against forced STERILIZATION in most cases, at least under present conditions. >> Noted. I'm sure your list of exceptions will get a lot of people riled. That's something you might want to take note of, and change your style. There is no sense throwing out things that will turn people off to your basic message. You have a tendency to throw out tidbits that are likely to incite people, and sometimes it seems to me likely you haven't even given a great deal of thought to some of those tidbits, and first thing you know, there'll be a big flame war going over one of those tidbits. Just for example: sterilization of a crippled person. Say he was paralyzed from the waste down in a car accident, but his spouse is not crippled, and they want to have one child, and can do so without burdening society. I doubt you would say he should be sterilized, right? So - just a suggestion - be more careful throwing out those tidbits. >> At some point I would even call it a crime to have women who refuse to stop having kids, whether they are poor or rich.<< I would too, at some point. In fact, I consider it a moral crime now for anyone to have more than two children, unless they can truly claim ignorance (which many, unfortunately, can). But again, best way to present the OP message is something like: "I'd hate to see us ignore OP and allow it to worsen until it eventually got to the point where it became necessary to force women to be sterilized so they would stop having babies." In other words, show that you are human, that you care about other humans, that you care about human rights. I think this can't be stressed enuf. There is a general view amongst the public that overpopulationists are child-haters. The way to change this is to use words that convey that our ultimate message is that we care about humans, care about children, and want to ensure that they face a bright future, hence our concern about OP. I still remember manning the ZPG booth at the Santa Clara County Fair in San Jose, CA in 1977, and having a woman practically spit at me and accuse me of hating children. Being only 24 at the time, I was speechless, unfortunately. << In that respect I would also include infants, as I mentioned in an earlier post, since we do not need many more of them. >> Bad thing to say, Ed. But I empathize with you. I suspect you have no children. I spoke similar words before having my two children. And I do agree with you that infants have less value than adults, and that we don't need many more of them. But....well, let's put it this way. When my first child, my son, was born, I was thunderstruck with his degree of consciousness. I experienced an incredible bond to Rion in the minutes after his birth, and its still with me today (he's 13). I assume most anyone who has had a child has this understanding that babies are really, really human, they aren't empty shells waiting to be turned into humans. The value I place on infants went WAY up the moment Rion was born. This is an important thing for you to understand, Ed, because again, your effectiveness at arguing the issue that is closest to your heart, OP, will increase greatly once you do. If you truly believe that we should be killing infants now because of OP, and you are unable to change that opinion in lite of what I've said, you would do the entire OP movement a big favor by ceasing your activism. I hate to say that, but I think it's true. I look forward to hearing more from you on this one. << For this to work it would require mutual coercion, mutually agreed on.>> Now that's an important statement, duly noted. You're saying that you don't think any of your proposals would work without people pretty much agreeing to do it that way, right? But surely you realize that such agreement on many of the things you've said, particularly culling of infants, is nowhere in sight? In summary, I see two basic problems with what you've said: (1) you have an unwarranted degree of certainty about what the future would entail were overpopulation not dealt with as severely as you think it should be; (2) you're proposing policies in a somewhat idealistic way - taking that certainty you express about the future without such policies, then adding on to it a certainty that these particular policies will be the only ones that would work, and therefore must be done even though they would entail horrible "sacrifice" of billions of people. I guess what I'd like to try to "push" you more towards would be: (1) the future is probably somewhat fuzzier than you think, the possibility exists that it won't be anywhere near as bad as it looks to you; (2) policies that take human rights into more consideration may work better than your suggested directions, and will be infinitely more likely to be implemented; (3) the most effective way to argue the OP issue is from a stance that fully respects human rights and dignity and makes it clear that you do; (4) there is a point at which we must give in to nature, and allow what is going to happen to happen, and that point comes before we start throwing human rights out the door. Ed, I believe your heart is in the right place, you are clearly intelligent and have educated yourself well about the OP problem, and you are a hard-working activist. I don't want to see you become ineffective because you present your message in a way people won't hear, so please accept this email as an attempt at constructive criticism. Ted Toal. From rcollins@netlink.com.au Mon Nov 23 06:01:06 1998 Received: from netlink.com.au (merlin.netlink.com.au [203.16.172.196]) by csf.Colorado.EDU (8.8.5/8.8.4/CNS-4.1p-nh) with ESMTP id GAA03431 for ; Mon, 23 Nov 1998 06:01:02 -0700 (MST) Received: from netlink.com.au (h128.mel.netlink.com.au [203.62.225.128]) by netlink.com.au (8.8.8/8.8.8) with ESMTP id XAA18636 for ; Mon, 23 Nov 1998 23:59:24 +1100 Message-ID: <36595C20.7903EFBE@netlink.com.au> Date: Mon, 23 Nov 1998 23:59:12 +1100 From: rc&am Reply-To: rcollins@netlink.com.au X-Mailer: Mozilla 4.04 [en] (Win95; I) MIME-Version: 1.0 To: PROGRESSIVE POPULATION NETWORK Subject: culling and readings References: <1.5.4.32.19981122132053.00660588@ican.net> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit fran^don wrote: > At 07:51 PM 11/21/98 -0800, ttoal@jps.net wrote: > >Angela quotes Ed Glaze as saying: "But we refuse to > >recognize that humans are just another animal and the > >same rules [thinning the herd when it exceeds carrying > >capacity] should apply." > > "Thinning", could be achieved through "attrition". > > "Attrition", occurs when death rates exceed birth plus immigration rates > over a period of time. unlike, ted and now don, i quoted ed glaze's comments on 'thinning' in full. here it is again for those who prefer to slide the exact meaning into the more respectable reading of 'mortality rates exceeding birth rates': "Humans have no problem thinning herds of game animals or cattle when they exceed their carrying capacity. Humans are also quick to eliminate any animal that poses a threat to them, their property, their crops or cattle. Even a perceived threat or a single instance is usually enough to cause a quick retaliation often bordering on slaughter. But we refuse to recognize that humans are just another animal and the same rules should apply." that is, thinning here is not simply an inter-generational issue, it explicitly includes culling. i am left wondering why it is that people who claim that they do not agree with such practices are so determined not to see what is written before them, preferring instead to slip the 'intent' onto different ground and defending the author of the above comments by doing so. read it again: "bordering on slaughter" and the "same rules should apply". i can only guess that - implicitly - they either agree with these comments or think that it is more important to generate a 'united front' against the unbeleivers... angela From talwarr@blr.vsnl.net.in Mon Nov 23 10:54:03 1998 Received: from mbg.vsnl.net.in (mbg.vsnl.net.in [202.54.12.3]) by csf.Colorado.EDU (8.8.5/8.8.4/CNS-4.1p-nh) with ESMTP id KAA23094 for ; Mon, 23 Nov 1998 10:53:56 -0700 (MST) Received: from blr.vsnl.net.in (PPP36-171.bng.vsnl.net.in [202.54.36.171]) by mbg.vsnl.net.in (8.8.8/8.8.8) with ESMTP id XAA20679; Mon, 23 Nov 1998 23:26:06 +0530 (IST) Message-ID: <3659A1FB.7D749B76@blr.vsnl.net.in> Date: Mon, 23 Nov 1998 23:27:15 +0530 From: Ravi Talwar Reply-To: talwarr@blr.vsnl.net.in X-Mailer: Mozilla 4.05 [en] (Win95; I) MIME-Version: 1.0 To: eglaze@vsta.com CC: PROGRESSIVE POPULATION NETWORK Subject: Re: coercion, sterilization, culling References: <01be1643$5efcd380$516039cc@eglaze.vsta.com> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Ed Glaze III wrote: > (snip) > MY VIEWS on overpopulation need to be understood because they are > central to all posts, to this and the other pop listservs. > "I think we will be disagreeing on many population issues because > I view the problem in much different terms -- namely that we have > excess people now and a population reduction is needed." We > must also consider the time factor because continued growth leads > to further degradation and a lowering of carrying capacity. We are > already so overpopulated that easy solutions are not likely. > > Like Ted I share the belief that human population should be reduced to > well under a billion people. I favor a planned reduction and the sooner the > better. And yes, that would entail many, many unpopular methods and > morally challenging decisions about who survives and why. I do not have > all the answers about how to do this but I feel that if we continue as we > are then nature, our own greed and foolishness will reduce our numbers > in a much less pleasant manner. (see Chris' apocolyptic message below) > Dear Ed,I am in general agreement with you that the world is over-populated, and we need to think of ways to bring the numbers down. A figure of one billion is a nice round figure, and is as good as any other. Obviously, the Chinese have chosen a method that they feel works for them, and we can only wish them luck. It also appears that private initiatives (like the distribution and use of quinacrine) is also being tried. The people involved are all medical doctors, presumably conscious of their professional responsibilities to their patients, and therefore I shall refrain from making any hasty judgements on their actions. I can only hope and pray that the objectives are being achieved with no physical harm to the women concerned. However, I am unable to go along with you on the "culling" part. It seems far too extreme, considering that a situation that calls for such measures is unlikely to ever come about. We have to keep in mind that none of us asks to be born into this world, but once here, surely we all have equal rights to live out our natural term without someone else deciding on terminating it, under rather subjective grounds. I live in a country which is certainly one of the most over-populated in the world, but I cannot see any signs that things will ever reach a stage when we need to turn on each other, as if we are animals living in jungles. People are much more reasonable and willing to change than you assume. My paternal grandfather who was born in the last century had eleven children, and my father had four. We have three grown-up daughters (we would have stopped at two if one of them had been a boy), and no grandchildren as yet, although the oldest is 30. This is the norm in my circle of friends and relations. Of course we do not represent the vast majority of our people, who are possibly a generation back in their outlook. But they are catching up, atleast in the urban areas. However, as you rightly point out, time is not on our side. Many methods have to be tried, at the government level and non-governmental levels, but they need to be humane, lawful, and in line with modern civilised norms. Regards Ravi Talwar From eglaze@vsta.com Mon Nov 23 16:13:52 1998 Received: from rivendell.vsta.com (rivendell.vsta.com [204.57.96.15]) by csf.Colorado.EDU (8.8.5/8.8.4/CNS-4.1p-nh) with ESMTP id QAA17222 for ; Mon, 23 Nov 1998 16:13:49 -0700 (MST) Received: from eglaze.vsta.com (eglazeADSL.vsta.com [204.57.96.81]) by rivendell.vsta.com (8.8.8/8.8.6) with SMTP id RAA28447; Mon, 23 Nov 1998 17:15:44 -0600 (CST) From: "Ed Glaze III" To: "PPN Listserv" Cc: "Christopher Christie" , "Les U. Knight" Subject: Re: coercion, sterilization, culling Date: Mon, 23 Nov 1998 17:19:20 -0600 Message-ID: <01be1737$b2c13840$516039cc@eglaze.vsta.com> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit X-Priority: 3 X-MSMail-Priority: Normal X-Mailer: Microsoft Outlook Express 4.71.1712.3 X-MimeOLE: Produced By Microsoft MimeOLE V4.71.1712.3 I was asked what I thought on specific issues and I spoke openly. I was not asked how I think the government or NGOs ought to approach the overpopulation problem. Needless to say I do not think current approaches will be sufficient. Like I said in my earlier message, my beliefs are based on there already being too many humans and that there is a real need to reduce that number greatly. Unless that premise is recognized the conclusion that follows will certainly be rejected. I realize how anti-social such population reduction discussions are, especially reductions on a scale that would actually allow the environment to heal and be sustainable over the long term. Ted and Ravi sent a very reasonable replies which I will respond to, though there will probably be other replies. Mainly Ted pointed out that my taking such a pessimistic view and saying such unacceptable things would not be welcomed and would turn off most everyone listening to what I say, detract from my effectiveness as a population activist, and possibly hurt the cause of promoting overpopulation awareness. I agree but feel that on a listserv dedicated to talking about population issues, even controversial ones, I should be allowed to expand the boundaries of thought on the issue, especially if asked to do so. If the persons most concerned and knowledgeable, the pop activists, do not discuss all the ramifications of the problem and whatever solutions there may be then we are limiting ourselves. I would like to make plain that these are my personal views and I do not voice them when working as a population activist for any of the eco-groups I am associated with -- ZPG, Sierra Club, or Audubon. When I speak in the group's name I stick to the policy they have, hand out the appropriate fact sheets, encourage people to learn more about the population issue on their own, and answer questions within the limits of the groups policy. I certainly support their population awareness and education efforts. Do I have a problem with the pop policy of these groups? You bet. It is a shame that ZPG no longer advocates zero population growth. Sierra Club has chosen to ignore the very real contributions of immigration to regional population growth. Of the big groups I have the most hope for Audubon, though they don't want to get too involved with controversial issues on a national basis either. The groups that I think are most realistic in their approach are Negative Population Growth and Carrying Capacity Network . They each have very informative publications and are willing to take a stance that says we need to do more than we are now doing. What Ted especially failed to do was explain how he expects to get population down to the pop numbers he mentions: "I haven't spent a great deal of time trying to come up with a really good set of numbers backed up with lots of reasons. I usually think somewhere around 10-25 million for the U.S. and 200 million or so for the world." I have given such desired pop levels more thought and am willing to say what I feel might be necessary to reach them. Yes, I too believe that "there is no way a 'planned reduction' will come about unless there is SUCH a serious global disaster that there is no other way." What I fear is that by then it will be too late. Ted said, "We don't know the true limits, we don't know the optimum levels, and we don't know what the future will bring." I say we don't have to know because we can see where the trends are taking us. The probabilities are not good and I refuse to be optimistic because that will make me easier to get along with. Pessimism has its place also and by not sugarcoating the problems maybe more people will recognize that overpopulation is a very real threat to our future and the ecosystem. Change will come and overpopulation will be dealt with, I just think humans need to take much more responsibility for what we have done, lessen ecological impacts as soon as possible, and work toward solutions that will actually solve the problem without taking many decades or centuries. Though Ted takes a more optimistic approach in his reply it doesn't entirely jibe with what he has said recently, "Our situation is really serious. We shouldn't just assume it will continue, we should do what we can to ensure that it WILL continue, and will get down as fast as humanely possible. Even if we were to hit the low U.N. projection on population, which is probably not real likely, we will grow to something like 11 billion before starting a downward trend. I fear we cannot sustain 11 billion people on earth even for one day." Ted understands the problems as well as I do. When the perceived goal is maximizing all human life, including each individual, you will of course have very different priorities than if the perceived goal is a much more general maximization for all life, including plant and animal, for the long term. Too often we are not looking beyond ourselves. We cannot continue to disrupt the other life on this planet and expect things to continue on as they have in the past. As far as Quinacrine and cancer, I think most women would be much more negatively impacted by unwanted births and the very real risks incurred with additional births. Quinacrine has been used for many years and has undergone testing, just not the FDA level which so many people expect. In an earlier post I mentioned that such testing has not been done because the two men who distribute it cannot afford the $8 million dollars and the many years it would take. The need for a cheap and effective sterilization method is here now. Relative morality has its place but I do not think it applies well to the case of Quinacrine which I think is very tainted by political, racial, and gender issues. DDT should be banned everywhere, now and forever. Freon and CFCs are another environmental issue needing control. I personally feel that tobacco should also be banned. Ted's rewording of my statement about restrictions and laws is good. I have not tried to lay out a detailed future scenario in which certain types of restrictions would come about under certain circumstances. The concept of erosion of human dignity and rights is one I have mentioned before. I was asked specifically about culling and I responded. I did not take the time to detail the circumstances and exceptions but make a general effort to point out my views. PLEASE remember that all of this is based on a widespread and agreed to realization that human population must be reduced quickly. Granted, we would not cull certain people no matter their condition, Steven Hawking's deterioration is the best example I can think of. It is true that I have strayed into considering the overall environment as more important than human rights. In the big picture I feel that it is. The ecological devastation we are causing will come back to haunt us and debating human rights will not be a luxury we can afford. So few are willing to speak for nature or even acknowledge that humans are not living as we should upon this planet. Just because we can exploit everything around us, including our fellow humans, does not mean we must. Or that we must continue to do so. I am not a child hater as such. I do feel that each pregnancy is another step toward a very bad future for all life on this world. On an individual basis children are wonderful, biology and evolution makes sure of that. At what point will we all finally realize that there is no right way to do the wrong thing? Too many people is not solved by adding more. I did not say that I "truly believe that we should be killing infants now because of OP." I listed some types of people that I would deem excess from an "extreme stance from the view that we already have excess people and perpetuating overpopulation just makes the situation much worse." Yes, this is an important statement, "For this to work it would require mutual coercion, mutually agreed on." And I do realize that this is nowhere near being the case, nor is it likely to be until the walls of our economy and environment come crashing down around us. When I am asked why I do not believe in God, I usually respond that I see no proof of the existence of any supernatural being and refuse to accept man-made stories from thousands of years ago when the writers did not understand the universe around them. Faith for me is not an issue. A similar logic is involved when I am asked why I do not have a more optimistic view of the future -- I see not proof that such is likely. The trends are negative, the chance for change is small, and the recognition of the problem is questionable at best. I think there is enough truth in the doom and gloom warnings of scientists and ecologists to warrant great concern. Not everyone agrees but I feel that the likelihood that I am wrong is decreasing as the years go by and our population continues to grow and we further degrade the world around us. I have said for over 20 years that my extremist solutions are idealistic. There is almost no way they would be implemented. But then again, I grew up reading science fiction and that possibly allows me to better think of futures that might come to be and to not reject so quickly the outrageous possibilities toward which the environmental trends are leading us. If the worsening trends were less ominous then I might be less certain that trouble lies ahead. The future may be fuzzy and the worst might not come in my lifetime but I do not see that any turnaround is going on to the extent that optimism is warranted. Human rights issues, economics, religion, politics, and other social issues are important and necessary if we are to solve environmental problems. I do not dispute that because it is the reality of how our culture works. I just fear that they will not be enough, I hope I am wrong. Even so, I disagree that "the most effective way to argue the OP issue is from a stance that fully respects human rights and dignity." The fully part tends to set the importance of, and our dependence upon, nature aside and imply that it is humans that are all-important. We aren't and our self-centeredness may just lead us into finding that out the hard way. I do agree with both Ted and Ravi that "policies that take human rights into more consideration may work better than your suggested directions, and will be infinitely more likely to be implemented." Ravi says methods, "need to be humane, lawful, and in line with modern civilised norms" and I agree that this will be the case until worsening circumstances dictate otherwise. China has made its changes that most of the rest of the world disagrees with but for them the circumstances required changing the norms. We must understand the integration of humans and the rest of the world. I like the approach Audubon takes by calling their population effort a Population and Habitat Campaign. "National Audubon Society has launched a major new initiative to build a public mandate for population and family planning and to connect the issues of population growth with habitat" Human rights will not be thrown out but will like erode away slowly. The lives that most of us lead are filled with many day-to-day intrusions into our freedoms that we accept in a mostly unquestioning manner would likely be shocking to our grandparents. I wonder what sacrifices the children of today will accept when they are adults and whether they will still be worrying about the future prospects for their children and grandchildren. _____ Ed Glaze From: Christopher Christie To: Ed Glaze III Date: Monday, November 23, 1998 11:06 AM Subject: Re: coercion, sterilization, culling > Ed, > Thanks for sending the post from PPN. > Sounds like a more interesting discussion these days. > Culling? Whew! This could get ugly. :-) > > I used to subscribe but got disconnected when I moved. > I think you mentioned it previously, but can you tell me > how I can re-subscribe? > > Have you checked out Martha's page? > http://csf.colorado.edu/authors/Gimenez.Martha/ Ed responds (and this is not an attack on Martha): I visited Martha's homepage and she has several of her writings online, though the background makes them hard to read at times. Here are a couple interesting quotes from a paper she wrote in 1971 which give me a better insight into understanding some PPN views: "Abstractly considered, the relationship between scarce resources and a continuously increasing population turns the arguments in favor of population control into "self-evident truths" which can only be rejected by the unthinking and the dogmatic. From a Marxist viewpoint, such "self-evident truths" are but reifications of concrete historical, social, political, and economic relations which should be taken into account if the population issue is to be at all understood." "Looking at the contemporary situation in underdeveloped countries, the Marxist critique of Malthusian and Neo-Malthusian analysis and policies does not deny the existence of the problems that stem from high dependency ratios and high rates of population growth. However, it shows that to deal with such phenomena as "population" problems overlooks the social, political, and economic structural factors that make possible such a population structure and processes and that, therefore, as long as population control remains the main or only concern of the various international and national organizations which in one way or another are trying to foster economic development in underdeveloped societies, their action will only consolidate the economic backwardness they are avowedly aiming to solve." I also received this message: From: Mike Maher To: Ed Glaze Date: Tuesday, November 17, 1998 9:06 AM > Ed, > I've read your recent posts on PPN. While I don't subscribe > to that listserv, I am familiar with their mindset. These people live > in a parallel universe, a kind of collective solipsism, where reality > is "socially constructed," where gender is a product of discourse, > where science is merely stories scientists tell (misogynistic, racist, > homophobic stories, at that!), and where population growth is just > another dysfunction of capitalism. > I got an interesting dose of this while a doctoral student at the > University of Texas, where I found myself in a couple of classes > taught and peopled by Marxists. It was actually a good experience, > if one is mindful of Voltaire's dictum, he who is not familiar with his > enemy's argument is not familiar with his own. It forced me to do > a lot of reading to find the holes in their arguments. There are plenty. > But once someone buys into that way of framing reality, they're as > inflexible and as unmoved by empirical evidence as any of the > religious zealots. > > Dr. T. Michael Maher > Assistant Professor of Communication > University of Southwestern Louisiana From rcollins@netlink.com.au Mon Nov 23 22:31:37 1998 Received: from netlink.com.au (merlin.netlink.com.au [203.16.172.196]) by csf.Colorado.EDU (8.8.5/8.8.4/CNS-4.1p-nh) with ESMTP id WAA09976 for ; Mon, 23 Nov 1998 22:31:30 -0700 (MST) Received: from netlink.com.au (h032.mel.netlink.com.au [203.62.225.32]) by netlink.com.au (8.8.8/8.8.8) with ESMTP id QAA10538 for ; Tue, 24 Nov 1998 16:29:59 +1100 Message-ID: <365A4441.25ECE7A7@netlink.com.au> Date: Tue, 24 Nov 1998 16:29:38 +1100 From: rc&am Reply-To: rcollins@netlink.com.au X-Mailer: Mozilla 4.04 [en] (Win95; I) MIME-Version: 1.0 To: PROGRESSIVE POPULATION NETWORK Subject: Re: coercion, sterilization, culling References: <36590A9F.5A8AEA59@jps.net> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Ted Toal wrote: > There is no way one can prove that we have or have not reached the point > of needing to use these "crisis methods." I think all of us who are well-read > on the OP subject know that the issues of carrying capacity, maximum > population, optimum population, etc. have been found to be extremely complex, > intractable problems. If they weren't, we wouldn't need to be here discussing > it. We don't know the true limits, we don't know the optimum levels, and we > don't know what the future will bring. true, there are indeed no firm facts that the scenarios being bandied about are probable. also, given that the very notion of 'carrying capacity', for example, is so often used as a single and decisive variable in such scenarios - which it can be shown is not the case, even by the reckonings of those who argue that there is an overpopulation problem - it would seem that these scenarios are more fantasies (albeit dystopic ones) than probable outcomes. the question then becomes: why do some people seem fascinated and fixated on these scenarios as akin to dogmas? i would suggest that this is because these fantastic futures serve as retroactive alibis for an extremely authoritarian (and ultiamtely racist) politics. > I take note, and hope others do, that you said "safer than surgery". i noted that the original phrasing was preceded by an 'if': ie., 'if it is safer than surgery'. there is no evidence that is is safer, since there have been no tests. > She believes there is evidence it can cause cancer, i said that quinacrine was linked to cancers, and, to add, that it mutates cells (ie., scars the tissue of the fallopian tubes to bring about sterilisation) thus it falls into the range of carcinogenic chemicals. > and she is > concerned that it hasn't been tested very well. it has not been tested at all as far as i know. > It sounds like you are > promoting its use for sterilization, whereas Angela assumes it would be > promoted as a contraceptive and that sterilization would be an undesirable side > effect of it. i never said it was a contraceptive. it is a form of sterilisation - and often it is not entirely successful in this, since the scarring is uneven and many pregnancies have resulted even after its use. sterilisation is, in any case, a permanent form of contraception. i have no particular problem with sterilisation per se - so i don't know where you got this idea. ................ > I suspect you have no > children. I spoke similar words before having my two children. if ed thinks one child is the limit, and you think that two are - on what basis are these projections made such that it is assumed there is sufficient moralising force behind either position such that others are expected to comply? isn't this all a little vague and ill-defined, too vague to serve as the kind of rules you expect to enforce on others? ......... > Now that's an important statement, duly noted. You're saying that you don't > think any of your proposals would work without people pretty much agreeing to > do it that way, right? not exactly: there was a significant qualifier here, and i will assume it is there in order to apply to those countries who decide not to comply. a bit like the imf's use of austerity packages and privatisation as a condition of loans - the more 'rational' and 'enlightened' countries (i can guess who that is) will enforce such a system on those countries who do not wish to adopt the policies the ed sees as 'rational'. so then: it's consensus until you disagree, in which case it will be coercion. and, given that these scenarios and thoeries about how the world will come to grief are about as correct as the imf's glowing analyses of s.e asian economies just prior to the collapse, isn't all this positing of a specific set of views as the only rational ones entirely dubious? angela From Peter.VanZant@PSS.Boeing.com Tue Nov 24 08:12:22 1998 Received: from stl-smtpout-01.boeing.com (stl-smtpout-01.boeing.com [192.161.36.9]) by csf.Colorado.EDU (8.8.8/8.8.8/ITS-4.2/csf) with ESMTP id IAA04303 for ; Tue, 24 Nov 1998 08:12:19 -0700 (MST) Received: from xch-pssbh-03.ca.boeing.com ([134.52.9.169]) by stl-smtpout-01.boeing.com (8.9.0/8.8.5) with ESMTP id HAA11593; Tue, 24 Nov 1998 07:12:18 -0800 (PST) Received: by xch-pssbh-03.ca.boeing.com with Internet Mail Service (5.5.2407.0) id ; Tue, 24 Nov 1998 07:12:18 -0800 Message-ID: <51792E5D4B6ED011B7DB00805FBE3836040EC0D1@xch-evt-06.ca.boeing.com> From: "Van Zant, Peter J" To: PROGRESSIVE POPULATION NETWORK , "'eglaze@vsta.com'" Subject: RE: coercion, sterilization, culling Date: Tue, 24 Nov 1998 07:12:29 -0800 MIME-Version: 1.0 X-Mailer: Internet Mail Service (5.5.2407.0) Content-Type: text/plain > ---------- > From: Ed Glaze III[SMTP:eglaze@vsta.com] > Sent: Monday, November 23, 1998 3:19 PM > To: PROGRESSIVE POPULATION NETWORK > Subject: Re: coercion, sterilization, culling > > It is true that I have strayed into considering the overall environment as > more important than human rights. In the big picture I feel that it is. > The > ecological devastation we are causing will come back to haunt us and > debating human rights will not be a luxury we can afford. So few are > willing to speak for nature or even acknowledge that humans are not > living as we should upon this planet. Just because we can exploit > everything around us, including our fellow humans, does not mean we > must. Or that we must continue to do so. > > I snipped most of this to highlight one part of the discussion, which I think is critical. I do get anxious when I read some of the things you say because I see them as feeding the arguments of those who would like to do away with the population stabilization movement entirely. Give them an excuse to call us "racist, sexist, elitist, totalitarian, anti-human, anti-freedom," they will do so. Furthermore, taking away freedoms, even for the best of causes, is a serious matter. Once you take them away, it's very difficult to ever get them back. A totalitarian future is not something I look forward to, maybe destroying the species would be better. I truly believe we'd wipe ourselves out before we totally destroyed life on this planet. However, I'm still hopeful that there's a middle ground between totalitarianism and eco-catastrophe. I do hope to move ZPG into a more activist position than it seems to want to take at this time, although the prospects seem dim at times. I also believe that, if you want to change people or society, do it incrementally. I know you think we can't wait, but review some of your history of Nazi Germany or the Soviet Union under Stalin before you take curtailment of freedom lightly. One incremental change which I intend to start making noise about is to cut off the $2700/per child icome tax exemption after two children--maybe make it $1350 for the second one. That's not coercing people not to have children, although some people will take it as such. It's merely declining to subsidize more than replacement fertility. From Peter.VanZant@PSS.Boeing.com Tue Nov 24 09:44:09 1998 Received: from stl-smtpout-01.boeing.com (stl-smtpout-01.boeing.com [192.161.36.9]) by csf.Colorado.EDU (8.8.8/8.8.8/ITS-4.2/csf) with ESMTP id JAA10209 for ; Tue, 24 Nov 1998 09:44:05 -0700 (MST) Received: from xch-pssbh-03.ca.boeing.com ([134.52.9.169]) by stl-smtpout-01.boeing.com (8.9.0/8.8.5) with ESMTP id IAA17086; Tue, 24 Nov 1998 08:44:03 -0800 (PST) Received: by xch-pssbh-03.ca.boeing.com with Internet Mail Service (5.5.2407.0) id ; Tue, 24 Nov 1998 08:44:02 -0800 Message-ID: <51792E5D4B6ED011B7DB00805FBE3836040EC0D2@xch-evt-06.ca.boeing.com> From: "Van Zant, Peter J" To: PROGRESSIVE POPULATION NETWORK , "'rcollins@netlink.com.au'" Subject: RE: coercion, sterilization, culling Date: Tue, 24 Nov 1998 08:44:08 -0800 MIME-Version: 1.0 X-Mailer: Internet Mail Service (5.5.2407.0) Content-Type: text/plain > ---------- > From: rc&am[SMTP:rcollins@netlink.com.au] > Sent: Monday, November 23, 1998 9:29 PM > To: PROGRESSIVE POPULATION NETWORK > Subject: Re: coercion, sterilization, culling > > > > Ted Toal wrote: > > > There is no way one can prove that we have or have not reached the point > > of needing to use these "crisis methods." I think all of us who are > well-read > > on the OP subject know that the issues of carrying capacity, maximum > > population, optimum population, etc. have been found to be extremely > complex, > > intractable problems. If they weren't, we wouldn't need to be here > discussing > > it. We don't know the true limits, we don't know the optimum levels, > and we > > don't know what the future will bring. > > true, there are indeed no firm facts that the scenarios being bandied > about are > probable. also, given that the very notion of 'carrying capacity', for > example, is > so often used as a single and decisive variable in such scenarios - which > it can be > shown is not the case, even by the reckonings of those who argue that > there is an > overpopulation problem - it would seem that these scenarios are more > fantasies > (albeit dystopic ones) than probable outcomes. the question then becomes: > why do > some people seem fascinated and fixated on these scenarios as akin to > dogmas? i > would suggest that this is because these fantastic futures serve as > retroactive > alibis for an extremely authoritarian (and ultiamtely racist) politics. > > I think the reason for the "fixation," as you call it, is that the concept of "carrying capacity" is a valid one, although we cannot assign a fixed number for how many people can exist in a given region without specifying their economic level and how they choose to use their wealth. However, as soon as we begin to talk of a concept like carrying capacity, we start to say that somewhere there is a limit, and as soon as we do that, it sets off peoples' panic buttons. I will use your attempt to call concern about carrying capacity a ploy to assert authoritarian, racist politics as an example. Angela, we all would like to have it all--and not have to work for it, either. However, IMO, we can't all have it all, we're going to have to accept limits on our numbers, our wealth, and even our freedom. If we're willing to voluntarily control our numbers and wealth, we can (again IMO) head off a lot of the restrictions on freedom. From bobhog@hivnet.ubc.ca Tue Nov 24 10:17:48 1998 Received: from hivnet.ubc.ca (hivnet.ubc.ca [142.103.173.1]) by csf.Colorado.EDU (8.8.8/8.8.8/ITS-4.2/csf) with ESMTP id KAA12957 for ; Tue, 24 Nov 1998 10:17:43 -0700 (MST) Received: from [137.82.68.60] (demo [137.82.68.60]) by hivnet.ubc.ca (8.9.0/8.9.0) with ESMTP id JAA10504 for ; Tue, 24 Nov 1998 09:22:11 -0800 (PST) Message-Id: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Date: Tue, 24 Nov 1998 09:16:42 -0700 To: ppn@csf.colorado.edu From: Bob Hogg LEAVE progressive population network ***************************************************************** Program Director Population Health Division of Epidemiology and Population Health BC Centre for Excellence in HIV/AIDS Associate Professor Department of Health Care and Epidemiology University of British Columbia Vancouver, BC, Canada WWW addresses for more information: http://cfeweb.hivnet.ubc.ca http://www.healthcare.ubc.ca ***************************************************************** From Jfoster@OREGON.UOREGON.EDU Tue Nov 24 14:52:54 1998 Received: from donald.uoregon.edu (donald.uoregon.edu [128.223.32.6]) by csf.Colorado.EDU (8.8.8/8.8.8/ITS-4.2/csf) with ESMTP id OAA04788 for ; Tue, 24 Nov 1998 14:52:49 -0700 (MST) Received: from DWOVMCNF.uoregon.edu (d111-206.uoregon.edu) by OREGON.UOREGON.EDU (PMDF V5.1-12 #D3397) with SMTP id <01J4JYJCY2JU8WWC11@OREGON.UOREGON.EDU> for ppn@csf.colorado.edu; Tue, 24 Nov 1998 13:52:47 PST Date: Tue, 24 Nov 1998 13:52:46 -0800 (PST) From: John Bellamy Foster Subject: established facts X-Sender: Jfoster@oregon.uoregon.edu To: ppn@csf.colorado.edu Message-id: <1.5.4.16.19981124140401.2a778680@oregon.uoregon.edu> MIME-version: 1.0 X-Mailer: Windows Eudora Light Version 1.5.4 (16) Content-type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" The Progressive Population Network appears to be inundated of late by views that are anything but progressive and the importance of the list as a forum for meaningful discussion of population issues seems therefore to be threatened. I want to try to get things back on track by listing ten well-established, incontrovertible facts that form the basis for any meaningful discussion of population issues. First, for those like myself who approach population questions primarily from the standpoint of global ecological crisis it has to be admitted that overpopulation, though a factor in this crisis, is a relatively minor one compared to the two other sources of environmental impact (according to the PAT formula): affluence and technology. World economic output is increasing much faster than population and contrary to the latter there is no expectation that it will level off. On top of this there has been a technological shift in the last half century to the production of toxic and radioactive "byproducts" that threaten the biosphere and the health of all the species within it at levels that we are only just beginning to understand. Neither of these factors--affluence or anti-ecological technology--can be attributed directly to population growth. Second, there is no direct relationship between population growth and world hunger, or between population growth and famine. This has been established in the work of Amartya Sen and in the various critiques of the agribusiness system. Third, population growth issues cannot be addressed in simple, neo-Malthusian terms (which focus simply on narrowly conceived demographic factors) but need to be viewed in terms of the theory of demographic transition, which explains this in terms of social and economic relationships. Fourth, the essential point here is that most of the third world is stuck within what Barry Commoner called a demographic trap created by colonialism/neocolonialism. Fifth, while the demographic transition theory has traditionally been conceived in terms of economic development, this is now commonly broadened to take account of social factors more generally. For example, we know that where women have greater rights and more control over their own bodies the rate of population growth decreases. We also know that some societies have been able to bring population growth under control at relatively low levels of economic development by emphasizing social redistribution, e.g. Cuba and the state of Kerala in India. Sixth, the areas of the world that have the largest "ecological footprints" and are having the most devastating effect on the environment are the rich countries that have relatively low rates of population growth (much closer to replacement level). Seventh, classical Malthusianism (i.e. the ideas of Malthus himself) had nothing to do with ecology. Modern neo-Malthusianism arose in the 1940s in the work of thinkers who came out of the eugenics tradition. Malthus was resurrected because his notion of population pressing on subsistence was more a more effective ideology for justifying the control and displacement of third world populations after the Holocaust than more traditional racist ideologies. Malthusianism thus came to be a key element in the ideology of the Cold War and the Green Revolution. It was also used to develop a conservative approach to ecological crisis that downgraded social as opposed to biological factors. Eighth, neo-Malthusianism has always tended to favor "final solutions" to population problems. For example William Vogt wrote in his classic neo-Malthusian tract, THE ROAD TO SURVIVAL (1948) that Chile's "greatest asset, is its high death rate." In an infamous passage entitled "The Dangerous Doctor" he observed: "The modern medical profession, still framing its ethics on the dubious statements of an ignorant man [Hippocrates] who lived more than two thousand years ago...continues to believe it has a duty to keep alive as many people as possible. In many parts of the world doctors apply their intelligence to one aspect of man's welfare--survival--and deny their moral right to apply it to the problem as a whole. Through medical care and improved sanitation they are responsible for more millions living more years in increasing misery. Their refusal to consider their responsibility in these matters does not seem to them to compromise their intellectual integrity....They set the stage for disaster; then, like Pilate, they wash their hands of the consequences." Ninth, neo-Malthusianism generally (there are exceptions) is associated with the peculiar "morality" of scientific racism. It denies the principle that justice is indivisible for all of humanity and is either explicitly or implicitly based on the notion that some people are more dispensable than others. In the words of Garrett Hardin, a popular neo-Malthusian thinker any attempt to help the poor would result in a situation in which: "the less provident and less able will multiply at the expense of the abler and the more provident, bringing eventual ruin upon all who share in the commons." The world of civilization and culture is thus reduced to a Hobbesian struggle of all against all (or of race against race) in which there is no room for morality properly conceived, and where "lifeboat ethics" or the principles of Malthus' "mighty feast" apply. Tenth, by definition a PROGRESSIVE approach to population--as opposed to a reactionary one--recognizes all of the above and rejects the so-called "morality" of the "final solution." This means that population stabilization can only occur within the context of democratic social planning which recognizes the values of human freedom and equality. I suggest that those who are unwilling or unable (for whatever reason) to acknowledge these elementary truths should seek out lists of a more neo-Malthusian character (I am sure there are plenty of those). Or if they cannot find anything quite to their liking, they should create their own Regressive Population Network, where all the misanthropists of the world can unite. John Bellamy Foster From ttoal@jps.net Wed Nov 25 00:12:46 1998 Received: from smtp2.jps.net (smtp2.jps.net [209.63.224.235]) by csf.Colorado.EDU (8.8.8/8.8.8/ITS-4.2/csf) with ESMTP id AAA04218 for ; Wed, 25 Nov 1998 00:12:44 -0700 (MST) Received: from jps.net (209-142-55-232.stk.jps.net [209.142.55.232]) by smtp2.jps.net (8.9.0/8.8.5) with ESMTP id XAA00950 for ; Tue, 24 Nov 1998 23:15:44 -0800 (PST) Message-ID: <365BA0D6.D45D686D@jps.net> Date: Tue, 24 Nov 1998 22:16:54 -0800 From: Ted Toal X-Mailer: Mozilla 4.06 [en] (Win98; I) MIME-Version: 1.0 To: ppn Subject: One Child, Two, None? Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Angela says: "if ed thinks one child is the limit, and you think that two are - on what basis are these projections made such that it is assumed there is sufficient moralising force behind either position such that others are expected to comply?" Finally, another direction for discussion. There are those, such as the VHEM (Voluntary Human Extinction Movement) who believe no one should have any children. There is a big faction that believes 1 should be the limit. I argue for 2 as follows: If everybody had 3, that would lead to exponential growth. If all have 2, that leads to a stable population. Since some choose to have 0 and some to have 1, then if NO ONE had more than 2, the fertility rate would be something less than 2, and population would eventually decline, which I firmly believe we desperately need. I respect the opinion of those who say we should limit it to 0 or 1 for a while to speed up the time at which we decline to a level at which human and other life can thrive. I'm looking for something that is feasible, though, and I think a limit of 2 is more likely to become the morally accepted norm than 0 or 1. Once we are down to a close-to-optimum level, a limit of 3 might still keep us within replacement-level-fertility. In fact, the more people come to want very small families, the less need there is for any limit at all. Ted Toal. From ttoal@jps.net Wed Nov 25 00:16:24 1998 Received: from smtp2.jps.net (smtp2.jps.net [209.63.224.235]) by csf.Colorado.EDU (8.8.8/8.8.8/ITS-4.2/csf) with ESMTP id AAA04452 for ; Wed, 25 Nov 1998 00:16:20 -0700 (MST) Received: from jps.net (209-142-55-232.stk.jps.net [209.142.55.232]) by smtp2.jps.net (8.9.0/8.8.5) with ESMTP id XAA01884 for ; Tue, 24 Nov 1998 23:19:19 -0800 (PST) Message-ID: <365B9DE6.90701CE7@jps.net> Date: Tue, 24 Nov 1998 22:04:22 -0800 From: Ted Toal X-Mailer: Mozilla 4.06 [en] (Win98; I) MIME-Version: 1.0 To: ppn Subject: Re: coecion, sterilization, culling Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit A few comments on Ed's further explanation of his views on OP: << I .... feel that on a listserv dedicated to talking about population issues, even controversial ones, I should be allowed to expand the boundaries of thought on the issue, especially if asked to do so.>> Sure you can do it, but look what happened! I think you only solidified some already-solid views help by some PPN subscribers. I've had my own reality shaken up a number of times, most recently my change in understanding of the UFO issue, as was so rudely brought to the attention of this list. Shaking up one's reality is good, especially when that reality has become too solidified. On a discussion list, shouldn't we all be working in a gentle way to shake each other a bit, make each other expand our consciousness in new directions? Ed, you thought you were doing exactly that, but your approach was too rough, and it changed the interaction from discussion to hostility and agression. << The probabilities are not good and I refuse to be optimistic because that will make me easier to get along with. Pessimism has its place also and by not sugarcoating the problems maybe more people will recognize that overpopulation is a very real threat to our future and the ecosystem.>> You are so similar to me in this that it is uncanny. My pessimism comes easily, I'm a natural pessimist in all areas of my life. In fact, that's something I've been working on in my personal growth - trying to change my outlook to a more optimistic one that I can more easily live with, and that works better with those around me. There is a middle ground where you don't sugar-coat, but at the same time you do give people some reason for optimism. Without some optimism, no message gets thru. << When the perceived goal is maximizing all human life, including each individual, you will of course have very different priorities than if the perceived goal is a much more general maximization for all life, including plant and animal, for the long term. Too often we are not looking beyond ourselves. We cannot continue to disrupt the other life on this planet and expect things to continue on as they have in the past. >> I agree. A question to ask ourselves is, WHAT DO WE WANT? WHAT IS OUR GOAL? I see it as MAXIMIZING HUMAN POTENTIAL and HELPING ALL LIFE THRIVE. With our current overpopulation, tremendous human potential is wasted, human and other life does not thrive. And I believe that we cannot be happy on this planet if we are thriving but the rest of life is not. We are too intimately intertwined with other life, having evolved together since the beginning. Deep in our hearts, we know that all life on this planet is sacred. We cannot be fulfilled as humans if we do not fulfill our responsibility of respecting other lifeforms. << A similar logic is involved when I am asked why I do not have a more optimistic view of the future -- I see not proof that such is likely. The trends are negative, the chance for change is small, and the recognition of the problem is questionable at best.>> There is one trend that STANDS OUT as something that we can grab for some optimism. In 1950, the average fertility rate in developing countries was about 6.2. Today it is about 3.3. A TREMENDOUS CHANGE. And as I understand it, most of it came in the last 15 years. If it were to continue, in another 5 years the world would be below replacement level fertility. Will it continue? We need to MAKE IT continue. We need to understand WHY it has happened, and keep doing whatever was done to make it happen. We also are seeing a lot of action to try to help the world through the coming bottleneck, when momentum carries us to 11 billion or so. It is clear that there is a tremendous amount that can be done to stem the damage during the bottleneck years. It is possible, in other words, to see a way out, a way for us to make it out of this seeming trap we are in. There are a thousand pessimistic ways to see the future, and maybe only one optimistic way to see it, so yes, the probabilities aren't good. If you are standing at an intersection of paths, and all are gloomy but one, which leads thru a warfield but wends its way out to a beautiful place, you can choose to feel optimistic, and set out on that one path that offers hope. From Peter.VanZant@PSS.Boeing.com Wed Nov 25 11:06:36 1998 Received: from slb-smtpout-01.boeing.com (slb-smtpout-01.boeing.com [192.161.36.8] (may be forged)) by csf.Colorado.EDU (8.8.8/8.8.8/ITS-4.2/csf) with ESMTP id LAA01819 for ; Wed, 25 Nov 1998 11:06:32 -0700 (MST) Received: from xch-pssbh-01.ca.boeing.com ([192.42.211.28]) by slb-smtpout-01.boeing.com (8.9.0/8.8.5) with ESMTP id KAA24189; Wed, 25 Nov 1998 10:06:31 -0800 (PST) Received: by xch-pssbh-01.ca.boeing.com with Internet Mail Service (5.5.2407.0) id ; Wed, 25 Nov 1998 10:05:34 -0800 Message-ID: <51792E5D4B6ED011B7DB00805FBE3836040EC0D7@xch-evt-06.ca.boeing.com> From: "Van Zant, Peter J" To: PROGRESSIVE POPULATION NETWORK , "'ttoal@jps.net'" Subject: RE: One Child, Two, None? Date: Wed, 25 Nov 1998 10:06:35 -0800 MIME-Version: 1.0 X-Mailer: Internet Mail Service (5.5.2407.0) Content-Type: text/plain > ---------- > From: Ted Toal[SMTP:ttoal@jps.net] > Sent: Tuesday, November 24, 1998 10:16 PM > To: PROGRESSIVE POPULATION NETWORK > Subject: One Child, Two, None? > > Angela says: > > "if ed thinks one child is the limit, and you think that two are - on what > basis are > these projections made such that it is assumed there is sufficient > moralising > force > behind either position such that others are expected to comply?" > > Finally, another direction for discussion. There are those, such as the > VHEM > (Voluntary Human Extinction Movement) who believe no one should have any > children. There is a big faction that believes 1 should be the limit. I > argue > for 2 as follows: If everybody had 3, that would lead to exponential > growth. > If all have 2, that leads to a stable population. Since some choose to > have 0 > and some to have 1, then if NO ONE had more than 2, the fertility rate > would be > something less than 2, and population would eventually decline, which I > firmly > believe we desperately need. > > I respect the opinion of those who say we should limit it to 0 or 1 for a > while > to speed up the time at which we decline to a level at which human and > other > life can thrive. I'm looking for something that is feasible, though, and > I > think a limit of 2 is more likely to become the morally accepted norm than > 0 or > 1. Once we are down to a close-to-optimum level, a limit of 3 might still > keep > us within replacement-level-fertility. In fact, the more people come to > want > very small families, the less need there is for any limit at all. > > Ted Toal. > > > Yes, I think it's necessary to be realistic about what people are going to be willing to do. From what I've seen, I think that "stop at two" is an idea which will be accepted by the majority. Some will choose to stop with none or one--some, of course will want more than two. Making "stop at two" the idea that population activists encourage will, I think, be most likely to result in stabilization. Sure, praise those who stop with none or one, but if we try to make that the norm, we'll create more resistance to our ideas than anything else. From refugee@thegrid.net Wed Nov 25 12:31:33 1998 Received: from smtp.thegrid.net (smtp.thegrid.net [209.162.1.11]) by csf.Colorado.EDU (8.8.8/8.8.8/ITS-4.2/csf) with SMTP id MAA06117 for ; Wed, 25 Nov 1998 12:31:28 -0700 (MST) Received: (qmail 28070 invoked from network); 25 Nov 1998 19:31:08 -0000 Received: from pop.thegrid.net (209.162.1.5) by smtp.thegrid.net with SMTP; 25 Nov 1998 19:31:08 -0000 Received: from thegrid.net (lax-ts3-h1-43-158.ispmodems.net [209.162.43.158]) by pop.thegrid.net (8.9.1a/8.9.1) with ESMTP id LAA00844; Wed, 25 Nov 1998 11:31:03 -0800 (PST) Message-ID: <365BDCBB.CE17C3A@thegrid.net> Date: Wed, 25 Nov 1998 11:32:50 +0100 From: Christopher Christie Reply-To: refugee@thegrid.net X-Mailer: Mozilla 4.05 (Macintosh; U; PPC) MIME-Version: 1.0 To: PROGRESSIVE POPULATION NETWORK CC: Jfoster@OREGON.UOREGON.EDU Subject: Re: established facts References: <1.5.4.16.19981124140401.2a778680@oregon.uoregon.edu> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=iso-8859-1 Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit X-MIME-Autoconverted: from quoted-printable to 8bit by csf.Colorado.EDU id MAA06130 John Bellamy Foster wrote: > I want to try to get things back on track by listing ten well-established, > incontrovertible facts that form the basis for any meaningful discussion of > population issues. John, I think some people confuse unfounded assertions with "incontrovertible facts" and a blind, arrogant and self-righteous confidence with a progressive attitude. Needless to say, your list is not of "established facts," but of your own biased views. I will attempt to deal with your "incontrovertible facts" one at a time over a period of time. > > First, for those like myself who approach population questions primarily > from the standpoint of global ecological crisis it has to be admitted that > overpopulation, though a factor in this crisis, is a relatively minor one > compared to the two other sources of environmental impact (according to the > PAT formula): affluence and technology. World economic output is increasing > much faster than population and contrary to the latter there is no > expectation that it will level off. On top of this there has been a > technological shift in the last half century to the production of toxic and > radioactive "byproducts" that threaten the biosphere and the health of all > the species within it at levels that we are only just beginning to > understand. Neither of these factors--affluence or anti-ecological > technology--can be attributed directly to population growth. I don't deny that the relative importance of variables in the I=PAT equation will vary but what numbers and sources will you provide to support the above statement that "World economic output is increasing much faster than population?" What time frame are you using? Is the reason for this perhaps that famine and disease in highly populated areas (Africa, Korea, etc.) is slowing the rate of population growth? Who says that "there is no expectation that it will level off" and how do they justify such a view in the face of resource limits? Can you point to any models that will support that assertion. Certainly the information provided by Meadows, Meadows and Randers in "Beyond the Limits" (Chelsea Green Publishing, 1992) would not. I think that a case can be made that in fact, both affluence and technology can in part, if not in full, be directly attributed to population growth. Whether you want to accept it or not, growth in animal (incl. human) populations tend to expand to the limit of the local (not global) environment's ability to sustain it. Momentary or prolonged affluence in terms of available resources initially can be seen to allow for increased populations which ultimately create scarcity. These pressures in humans populations cause humans to pause and scratch their heads long enough to develop technologies (food growing technology, energy technologies, etc.) to support the increased population which in turn brings increased affluence as long as resources and pollution sinks remain available to support the technologies, and call remains at a manageable complexity. Increased affluence in turn feeds increasing populations (for example, see "Perceived prosperity raises fertility" in "Population Politics" by Virginia Abernethy, Plenum Press, 1993) at least until the society in which the growth is taking place reaches a level of technological development similar to modern industrialized societies. (Does population growth always stop and stabilize in modern industrial societies as predicted by the demographic transition? Not if the society allows or feels a need for high levels of immigration due to intractable economic problems or misguided ideologies.) According to one basic text, "Cultural Anthropology," by Ember and Ember (Prentice Hall 1999 sic.) "most anthropologists think" that population growth at both local and global levels caused the change in technology from simple and benign food collecting technologies to food producing technologies. I conclude the population growth is a major factor that drives technology and affluence directly. > Second, there is no direct relationship between population growth and world > hunger, or between population growth and famine. This has been established > in the work of Amartya Sen and in the various critiques of the agribusiness > system. It would be helpful if you provided a summary of the work you refer to and a source. In any event, hunger is a local event so it does not surprise me that one might have difficulty finding a relationship between "world hunger" and population growth. However, World Watch Institute notes that "Grainland per person has been shrinking since mid-century, but the drop projected for the next 50 years means the world will have less grainland per person than India has today. Future population growth is likely to reduce this key number in many societies to the point where they will no longer be able to feed themselves" (World Watch Paper #@ 143 "Beyond Malthus") While it is true that localized famine in populations can be linked to political conflict disrupting food distribution, or selling food for export, it is also true that these conflicts would not be able to create such disruptions where high numbers of people had not created a dependence on complex food production technologies, and where culture and economic systems did not allow food export. But given these realities, the population growth in these regions is associated with famine. One might also want to consider what would occur in the absence of conflict or food export. Ultimately the population must stabilize within carrying capacity or famine will result. Additionally, the current example of famine in North Korea appears to be a case where a local population has exceeded the lowpoints in food productivity caused by cyclical environmental events, in this case drought. There is no just and equitable global distribution system and there will likely never be one. It is probable that the only way egalitarian societies will be achieved is to lower population levels down toward the level where those societies were able to flourish in the past, and those are very low, but ecologically sustainable levels. I would like to respond to the rest of your list of "facts" when time becomes available. Until then- (From Ed Glaze) Published Sunday, November 22, 1998 Population growth affecting world's ecosystems, professor says Tom Meersman / Minneapolis Star Tribune Human population growth is having a dramatic effect on rain forests, wetlands, oceans, prairies and all of the world's other major ecosystems, said an ecology professor from the University of Minnesota who spoke to more than 200 at a conference on population and consumption in St. Paul. David Tilman said that until the past few decades, humans have lived off Earth's natural systems for thousands of years without destroying them. "We are the first people to ever experience human domination of ecological systems," he said. Habitat destruction through farming, deforestation, pollution and development has changed the character of 45 percent of the world's land surface, he said, and has created conditions in which 10 percent of the Earth's plant and animal species are thought to be moving toward extinction. The conference was sponsored by the Science Museum of Minnesota, the Lee and Rose Warner Nature Center and the Minneapolis-based World Population Balance. Tilman linked what he sees as the world's environmental degradation to human population pressures. The "green revolution" in agriculture allowed the world to feed more people, he said, but it also resulted in intensive farming that has depleted soils and increased the use of nitrogen and pesticides. Food demands also have encouraged overfishing of oceans and a mass production of livestock on factory farms, he said. However, in recent years, other experts in this field have said that resources are available to feed the world for several decades, thanks to advances in agricultural research. Anne Ehrlich, an author and population expert at Stanford University, said Saturday in St. Paul that environmental degradation is everywhere, largely because of the growth of the human population. "Poor nations threaten their local environment, and developed nations threaten the global environment because of their high consumption rates," she said. Ehrlich agreed with Tilman that humans have crossed some kind of threshold in this century, and so dominate the planet that their emissions into the atmosphere and use of water are changing the climate and its hydrologic patterns. "We've basically taken over the planet," she said. "We're burning our natural-resource capital instead of living on the interest. The soil, ground water and biodiversity we're depleting will take centuries to replenish." Ehrlich said the only "good news" was a U.N. report released last month that showed that the rate of growth for the world's population has slowed. She said that some of the decline is the result of education and family-planning programs in developing countries, but that it also can be attributed to high death rates from disease. William Ryerson, president of the Population Media Center, criticized media coverage of population issues, especially the recent U.N. report. Although the rate of growth may have slowed, he said, the world's population is now almost 6 billion, and by 2025 it will have increased by 3 billion. "There's a crying need to convince people in this country that this is a serious problem," he said. Ryerson cited examples of countries where soap operas and radio dramas are being used to educate people about family planning. In one popular TV series in the Philippines, he said, the lives of two sisters were dramatized: one who bore eight daughters to a husband who demanded a son until she died in childbirth, and the other who followed a successful career in broadcasting and did not accept the traditional role of women. The radio and TV programs are not instructional and boring, Ryerson said, but a form of "commercial-entertainment education" that has dramatically increased sales of birth-control devices in some areas. Ryerson said concerns about overpopulation are not restricted to developing nations, since citizens in industrialized countries consume far more natural resources on a per-capita basis. He said a recent study predicted that "we would need three planet Earths" to sustain the world's population if everyone lived at the same standard as those who live in Vancouver, British Columbia. In addition to continued efforts to encourage family planning in cultures in which it is acceptable, Tilman said, developing nations need to ask what they are leaving for future generations. "We have to have a totally new ethic that tells us what our obligations are," he said. "The whole world is flying blind, and we have no idea where we're going." © Copyright 1998 Star Tribune. All rights reserved. Christopher Christie Mailing from Desolation Row "If growthmen can spin telling analogies, so can the growth sceptics. A man who falls from a hundred-storey building will survive the first 99 storeys unscathed. Were he as sanguine as some of our technocrats, his confidence would grow with the number of storeys he passed on his downward flight and would be at a maximum just before his free-fall abruptly halted." - E.J. Mishan, 1976 Spelling as found. From eglaze@vsta.com Wed Nov 25 13:22:02 1998 Received: from rivendell.vsta.com (rivendell.vsta.com [204.57.96.15]) by csf.Colorado.EDU (8.8.8/8.8.8/ITS-4.2/csf) with ESMTP id NAA10521 for ; Wed, 25 Nov 1998 13:21:55 -0700 (MST) Received: from eglaze.vsta.com (eglazeADSL.vsta.com [204.57.96.81]) by rivendell.vsta.com (8.8.8/8.8.6) with SMTP id OAA29801 for ; Wed, 25 Nov 1998 14:23:51 -0600 (CST) From: "Ed Glaze III" To: "PPN Listserv" Subject: Re: established facts Date: Wed, 25 Nov 1998 14:27:35 -0600 Message-ID: <01be18b2$09941ea0$516039cc@eglaze.vsta.com> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit X-Priority: 3 X-MSMail-Priority: Normal X-Mailer: Microsoft Outlook Express 4.71.1712.3 X-MimeOLE: Produced By Microsoft MimeOLE V4.71.1712.3 Some subscribers to the PPN listserv are evidently getting tired of listening to some of the recently subscribed pop activists who have caused such a ruckus by not viewing overpopulation in a "progressive" way. Now a subscriber seems to be laying down almost an ultimatum listing the premises on which he feels discussion of population issues on PPN should only be based and asking us to accept these "incontrovertible facts" or leave. John Foster is not a listowner, but is an intelligent fellow who has written books and articles, though they may have a Marxist slant. It seems the listowners should be the ones to issue such ultimatums. One listowner commented previously and if some of us subscribers do not follow her instructions, shown in the message below, it seems that we would be given a private warning to comply with specific indications of how list protocol was violated. If the subscriber(s) does not then adjust message content then accepted list protocol would be a punishment of being set to NOPOST for a period of time. A second offense would likely be a longer NOPOST followed by expulsion for a third offense. Of course subscribers are free to unsubscribe at any time. From: Martha Gimenez To: PROGRESSIVE POPULATION NETWORK Date: Sunday, November 15, 1998 12:53 PM Subject: Self-Moderation Messages to PPN must demonstrate an effort by the sender to do one or several of the following: 1. to engage the membership in the consideration, examination, critique, or elaboration of a sociological insight, proposition, theory, concept, research finding about population issues. 2. to engage the membership in the theoretical discussion of a newly published and controversial book or journal article. 3. to engage the membership in the discussion of a book or journal article the sender found so interesting that he or she felt compelled to share it with PPN. 4. to engage the membership in the discussion of a policy issue. There are other possibilities, of course, but the key word is engage. ---------------------- I will indent my comments after John's pronouncements but unlike John, I make no claim that mine are "incontrovertible." Sorry for not snipping much of John's message but since I am differing with his specific points it is easier to follow if the points are there. I have included links to support some of what I say. I doubt that many will look these over but it should indicate that what I say is more than just my personal opinion. I see that Christopher Christie has voiced his concern on some of John Foster's points also. I encourage further discussion of this issue offlist with the listowner and the concerned parties. ________ Ed Glaze Port Mansfield, TX "If they don't understand the severity of the problem, they won't understand the severity of the solution. Overpopulation must be dealt with." ________________________________ From: John Bellamy Foster To: PROGRESSIVE POPULATION NETWORK Date: Tuesday, November 24, 1998 4:28 PM Subject: established facts The Progressive Population Network appears to be inundated of late by views that are anything but progressive and the importance of the list as a forum for meaningful discussion of population issues seems therefore to be threatened. I want to try to get things back on track by listing ten well-established, incontrovertible facts that form the basis for any meaningful discussion of population issues. John's use of ANY implies that everything else not recognizing these ten facts is to some extent meaningless. Limiting the factors being considered will of course skew the discussion. First, for those like myself who approach population questions primarily from the standpoint of global ecological crisis it has to be admitted that overpopulation, though a factor in this crisis, is a relatively minor one compared to the two other sources of environmental impact (according to the PAT formula): affluence and technology. World economic output is increasing much faster than population and contrary to the latter there is no expectation that it will level off. Each multiplier must be considered and population is projected to more than double in most of our lifetimes and that doubling contributes to the increases of the other sources. The Developing World will have most of that population growth and in those areas population will be much more important that globalized numbers may reflect for affluence and technology (A & T). John's concern with the global ecological crisis should consider the very long time it will take for population to level off and eventually reach sustainable levels. Such a turnaround could likely take 200 years of more with a huge P component continuing its consumption and increasing the A & T. Unless of course there are major collapses of the economy or ecology causing massive die-offs, which seems likely especially in some regions. So is it really just a question of choosing to deal with overpopulation or overconsumption? On top of this there has been a technological shift in the last half century to the production of toxic and radioactive "byproducts" that threaten the biosphere and the health of all the species within it at levels that we are only just beginning to understand. Neither of these factors -- affluence or anti-ecological technology -- can be attributed directly to population growth. No, but our unsustainable dependence upon such harmful technologies is bolstered by supporting our high population levels and there are certainly other less than direct links. The interdependence of issues requires that these acts be put together, but the connections are not always so glaringly obvious. Second, there is no direct relationship between population growth and world hunger, or between population growth and famine. This has been established in the work of Amartya Sen and in the various critiques of the agribusiness system. Why must all relationships be direct and global? Especially on a regional levels there are very strong arguments showing that a high population level (not just pop growth) contributes very much to malnutrition, difficulties in distribution, and other unmet infrastructure needs. Also supporting the much higher population levels in the future will likely be even more difficult and may well lead to both food and water shortages. Granted that agribusiness and economic orientations are a major contributing factor to problems with food distribution. Third, population growth issues cannot be addressed in simple, neo-Malthusian terms (which focus simply on narrowly conceived demographic factors) but need to be viewed in terms of the theory of demographic transition, which explains this in terms of social and economic relationships. Population issues entail more than just growth and there are many issues leading to a boggling complexity when socially-acceptable solutions are being sought. However, demographic factors do shown us that in ecological terms we are heading downhill towards a crash and such social issues as the demographic transition are not going to slow us sufficiently to avoid major problems. Besides to rely on the demographic transition to increase the living standards of all in the developing countries would lead to even more disastrous ecological disruptions as the time involved would likely be centuries. Fourth, the essential point here is that most of the third world is stuck within what Barry Commoner called a demographic trap created by colonialism/neocolonialism. There is no doubt that the third world has be exploited by the first world. There are great inequities in trade, economic distributions, resource usage, and many other things, but every one of these inequities are worsened by large and growing populations in both the third and first worlds. Much of what Barry Commoner is concerned with is the ending of poverty and it would seem that high population levels would make that even more difficult. Fifth, while the demographic transition theory has traditionally been conceived in terms of economic development, this is now commonly broadened to take account of social factors more generally. For example, we know that where women have greater rights and more control over their own bodies the rate of population growth decreases. We also know that some societies have been able to bring population growth under control at relatively low levels of economic development by emphasizing social redistribution, e.g. Cuba and the state of Kerala in India. And many more societies have not been able to bring population growth under control under any circumstances. Carrying Capacity should a much more important consideration than economic development if for not other reason than it will affect both rich and poor countries alike. Carrying capacity is being decreased by growing populations and decreasing resources, especially drinkable water. A couple good examples does not counter- balance a predomination of problems. Sixth, the areas of the world that have the largest "ecological footprints" and are having the most devastating effect on the environment are the rich countries that have relatively low rates of population growth (much closer to replacement level). But some of the natural resources that are most threatened, like rainforests, are predominately in poor countries where there are high population levels and high population growth. Loss of such resources could have a much greater ecological impact and negatively affect our future, climate-wise, than we can afford, Seventh, classical Malthusianism (i.e. the ideas of Malthus himself) had nothing to do with ecology. Modern neo-Malthusianism arose in the 1940s in the work of thinkers who came out of the eugenics tradition. Malthus was resurrected because his notion of population pressing on subsistence was more a more effective ideology for justifying the control and displacement of third world populations after the Holocaust than more traditional racist ideologies. Malthusianism thus came to be a key element in the ideology of the Cold War and the Green Revolution. It was also used to develop a conservative approach to ecological crisis that downgraded social as opposed to biological factors. Whether Malthus intended to discuss ecology is not relevant, science builds on itself and a single principle can apply under many different circumstances. Also such a principle can be used for many different motives, which does not invalidate its proper use on any other motive(s). "Malthus may have been wrong on specifics, but in general principle he was right." Eighth, neo-Malthusianism has always tended to favor "final solutions" to population problems. For example William Vogt wrote in his classic neo-Malthusian tract, THE ROAD TO SURVIVAL (1948) that Chile's "greatest asset, is its high death rate." In an infamous passage entitled "The Dangerous Doctor" he observed: "The modern medical profession, still framing its ethics on the dubious statements of an ignorant man [Hippocrates] who lived more than 2,000 years ago...continues to believe it has a duty to keep alive as many people as possible. In many parts of the world doctors apply their intelligence to one aspect of man's welfare -- survival -- and deny their moral right to apply it to the problem as a whole. Through medical care and improved sanitation they are responsible for more millions living more years in increasing misery. Their refusal to consider their responsibility in these matters does not seem to them to compromise their intellectual integrity....They set the stage for disaster; then, like Pilate, they wash their hands of the consequences." "The main population issues -- urbanization, rapid growth and uneven distribution -- when linked with issues of environmental decline, pose multiple sets of problems for policymakers. The very nature of these interrelated problems makes them virtually impossible to deal with in balkanized bureaucracies accustomed to managing only one aspect of any problem. Population and resource issues require integrated, strategic management, an approach few countries are in a position to implement. But time is at a premium. The decision period for responding to the crises posed by rapidly growing populations, increased consumption levels and shrinking resources will be confined, for the most part, to the next two decades. If human society does not succeed in checking population growth, the future will bring widespread social and economic dislocations as resource bases collapse. Unemployment and poverty will increase, and migrations from poorer to richer nations will bring Third World stresses to the developed world." Ninth, neo-Malthusianism generally (there are exceptions) is associated with the peculiar "morality" of scientific racism. It denies the principle that justice is indivisible for all of humanity and is either explicitly or implicitly based on the notion that some people are more dispensable than others. In the words of Garrett Hardin, a popular neo-Malthusian thinker any attempt to help the poor would result in a situation in which: "the less provident and less able will multiply at the expense of the abler and the more provident, bringing eventual ruin upon all who share in the commons." The world of civilization and culture is thus reduced to a Hobbesian struggle of all against all (or of race against race) in which there is no room for morality properly conceived, and where "lifeboat ethics" or the principles of Malthus' "mighty feast" apply. The need for controlling population need not be defined in the terms and conditions of neo-Malthusianism or any other philosophical category. What is more important is that demographic trends on the local, regional, national, and global levels are clearly indicative that there are very real, and worsening, problems related to high population levels. Human nature has always caused the powerful to take advantage of the less powerful, even within the same race. Race need not be an issue at all in identifying the need to make major changes in how humans live on this planet. It is all a question of numbers -- can the resources available support the populations making demands upon them for the indefinite future? How you get humans to deal with the problem may well involve overcoming racism, along with many other social factors, but it does not change the pressing need to take action to reduce the disruptions we are causing on the environment. Tenth, by definition a PROGRESSIVE approach to population -- as opposed to a reactionary one -- recognizes all of the above and rejects the so-called "morality" of the "final solution." This means that population stabilization can only occur within the context of democratic social planning which recognizes the values of human freedom and equality. Here is a quote from E. O. Wilson "To move ahead as though scientific and entrepreneurial genius will solve each crisis that arises implies that the declining biosphere can be similarly manipulated. But the world is too complicated to be turned into a garden. There is no biological homeostat that can be worked by humanity; to believe otherwise is to risk reducing a large part of Earth to a wasteland. The environmentalist vision, prudential and less exuberant than exemptionalism, is closer to reality. It sees humanity entering a bottleneck unique in history, constricted by population and economic pressures. In order to pass through to the other side, within perhaps 50 to 100 years, more science and entreprenueurship will have to be devoted to stabilizing the global environment. That can be accomplished, according to expert consensus, only by halting population growth and devising a wiser use of resources than has been accomplished to date. And wise use for the living world in particular means preserving the surviving ecosystems, micromanaging them only enough to save the biodiversity they contain, until such time as they can be understood and employed in the fullest sense for human benefit." I suggest that those who are unwilling or unable (for whatever reason) to acknowledge these elementary truths should seek out lists of a more neo-Malthusian character (I am sure there are plenty of those). Or if they cannot find anything quite to their liking, they should create their own Regressive Population Network, where all the misanthropists of the world can unite. It seems that all of us should work together on solving the issues involved with overpopulation. If the PPN listserv truly does believe as John Foster says and is not also interested in considering some of the points I have made then it is possible that some of us population realists will take our leave of this listserv. We would do so reluctantly because we would be leaving some people who are evidently concerned about population issues but who are sidetracked off the environment and into social concerns. Solving social concerns will not matter if the ecology we depend on is allowed to fail while we deal with other issues. I will leave you with the text of the "Letter to World Leaders from Scientists" We, scientists of the world, are deeply concerned about trends in global population growth and related environmental degradation. Increasing consumption of goods in developed countries, plus rapid growth in the number of humans in the world, threatens to outstrip the resources of our planet and the ability of our technology to support people with a decent standard of living. It is becoming more difficult to feed, clothe, house, and provide health care for all people because the amount of natural resources that are potentially available for each individual is decreasing. Population increase is the root cause of much disease, malnutrition, social inequity, loss of biodiversity, and environmental destruction. These problems are inescapable despite our efforts as scientists to help solve the world's problems with new technologies. Land, water, and energy resources must be sustainably managed, consumption reduced, and a significant reduction in the quarter million people added to the population daily must occur. Clearly, we all are a part of one world and the people of each nation, along with their leaders, should develop a population policy for their nation. We hope that you [world leaders] will provide the leadership to initiate incentives to reduce family size and conserve natural resources in order to achieve a high standard of living for everyone. ________________________________ From Jfoster@OREGON.UOREGON.EDU Wed Nov 25 14:55:56 1998 Received: from oregon.uoregon.edu (oregon.uoregon.edu [128.223.32.18]) by csf.Colorado.EDU (8.8.8/8.8.8/ITS-4.2/csf) with ESMTP id OAA17856 for ; Wed, 25 Nov 1998 14:55:48 -0700 (MST) Received: from DWOVMCNF.uoregon.edu (d111-206.uoregon.edu) by OREGON.UOREGON.EDU (PMDF V5.1-12 #D3397) with SMTP id <01J4LCX9UM6A8WWJLN@OREGON.UOREGON.EDU> for ppn@csf.colorado.edu; Wed, 25 Nov 1998 13:55:39 PST Date: Wed, 25 Nov 1998 13:55:39 -0800 (PST) From: John Bellamy Foster Subject: Christi X-Sender: Jfoster@oregon.uoregon.edu To: ppn@csf.colorado.edu Message-id: <1.5.4.16.19981125140703.11071070@oregon.uoregon.edu> MIME-version: 1.0 X-Mailer: Windows Eudora Light Version 1.5.4 (16) Content-type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Christopher Christi, You sent me a long personal message responding to about half the "established facts" on population that I presented in an earlier message, with the promise of responding to my futher points when time permitted. I have written a rejoinder to each of your points, but have decided that I will not send this to you or anyone else unless I have your permission to post it to the entire list. Apart from an open debate I have no interest in such an exchange. If you would rather your views not become public I will of course understand the reasons for your discretion. John Bellamy Foster From Jfoster@OREGON.UOREGON.EDU Wed Nov 25 15:08:49 1998 Received: from oregon.uoregon.edu (oregon.uoregon.edu [128.223.32.18]) by csf.Colorado.EDU (8.8.8/8.8.8/ITS-4.2/csf) with ESMTP id PAA18765 for ; Wed, 25 Nov 1998 15:08:44 -0700 (MST) Received: from DWOVMCNF.uoregon.edu (d111-206.uoregon.edu) by OREGON.UOREGON.EDU (PMDF V5.1-12 #D3397) with SMTP id <01J4LDDFZIZQ8WWFQB@OREGON.UOREGON.EDU> for ppn@csf.colorado.edu; Wed, 25 Nov 1998 14:08:41 PST Date: Wed, 25 Nov 1998 14:08:41 -0800 (PST) From: John Bellamy Foster Subject: Re: established facts X-Sender: Jfoster@oregon.uoregon.edu To: ppn@csf.colorado.edu Message-id: <1.5.4.16.19981125142005.29ef99b4@oregon.uoregon.edu> MIME-version: 1.0 X-Mailer: Windows Eudora Light Version 1.5.4 (16) Content-type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit X-MIME-Autoconverted: from quoted-printable to 8bit by csf.Colorado.EDU id PAA18770 My rejoinders to Christopher Christi follow. At 11:32 AM 11/25/98 +0100, you wrote: >John Bellamy Foster wrote: > >> I want to try to get things back on track by listing ten well-established, >> incontrovertible facts that form the basis for any meaningful discussion of >> population issues. > >John, > >I think some people confuse unfounded assertions with "incontrovertible facts" >and a blind, arrogant and self-righteous confidence with a progressive >attitude. Needless to say, your list is not of "established facts," but of >your own biased views. RESPONSE: You say my presentation of elementary facts on population reflects my bias. No doubt. I would not have laid them out as explicitly as I did, however, if was not prepared to defend these in the face of any rational criticism. Below are my responses to your criticisms. > >I will attempt to deal with your "incontrovertible facts" one at a time over >a period of time. RESPONSE: You are welcome to make the attempt and take whatever time that you need. >> First, for those like myself who approach population questions primarily >> from the standpoint of global ecological crisis it has to be admitted that >> overpopulation, though a factor in this crisis, is a relatively minor one >> compared to the two other sources of environmental impact (according to the >> PAT formula): affluence and technology. World economic output is increasing >> much faster than population and contrary to the latter there is no >> expectation that it will level off. On top of this there has been a >> technological shift in the last half century to the production of toxic and >> radioactive "byproducts" that threaten the biosphere and the health of all >> the species within it at levels that we are only just beginning to >> understand. Neither of these factors--affluence or anti-ecological >> technology--can be attributed directly to population growth. > >I don't deny that the relative importance of variables in the I=PAT equation >will vary but what numbers and sources will you provide to support the above >statement that "World economic output is increasing much faster than >population?" What time frame are you using? Is the reason for this perhaps >that famine and disease in highly populated areas (Africa, Korea, etc.) is >slowing the rate of population growth? Who says that "there is no expectation >that it will level off" and how do they justify such a view in the face of >resource limits? Can you point to any models that will support that assertion. > Certainly the information provided by Meadows, Meadows and Randers in "Beyond >the Limits" (Chelsea Green Publishing, 1992) would not. RESPONSE: Over the last century world population has increased by a factor of 3, world output by a factor of 20. UN projections point to eventual replacement level population, virtually no one (aside from Herman Daly and handful of others) is talking about a replacement level economy. For that to occur would mean the disintegration of the current system of accumulation, which is "unthinkable" within the present order. It could only take place under a fundamentally different social order, no longer geared to the accumulation of capital. Hence, for those in the mainstream (even mainstream ecologists) the fundamental conflict between increasing world output and ecological sustainability within the current system is generally ignored. It is much easier to take a neo-Malthusians tact which pretends that population growth is the whole problem, and the avoid the tougher issue of accumulation, which would mean a confrontation with power. Likewise the issue of anti-ecological technology (automobiles, pesticides, petrochemicals, the production of toxins) raises radical social issues, unlike approaches that place the blame on population. > >I think that a case can be made that in fact, both affluence and technology >can in part, if not in full, be directly attributed to population growth. >Whether you want to accept it or not, growth in animal (incl. human) >populations tend to expand to the limit of the local (not global) >environment's ability to sustain it. Momentary or prolonged affluence in terms >of available resources initially can be seen to allow for increased >populations which ultimately create scarcity. These pressures in humans >populations cause humans to pause and scratch their heads long enough to >develop technologies (food growing technology, energy technologies, etc.) to >support the increased population which in turn brings increased affluence as >long as resources and pollution sinks remain available to support the >technologies, and call remains at a manageable complexity. Increased affluence >in turn feeds increasing populations (for example, see "Perceived prosperity >raises fertility" in "Population Politics" by Virginia Abernethy, Plenum >Press, 1993) at least until the society in which the growth is taking place >reaches a level of technological development similar to modern industrialized >societies. (Does population growth always stop and stabilize in modern >industrial societies as predicted by the demographic transition? >Not if the society allows or feels a need for high levels of immigration due >to intractable economic problems or misguided ideologies.) > RESPONSE: I don't understand where you get the asumption that growth in animal (including human) populations automatically tends to expands to the limit of the local environment's ability to sustain it. Here it is interesting that you seem to think that the same exact laws apply to humans as rabbits and mice. You don't seem to have advanced as far as Malthus in his thinking who was forced to acknowledge moral restraint as a characteristic specific to human beings. According to one basic text, "Cultural Anthropology," by Ember and Ember >(Prentice Hall 1999 sic.) "most anthropologists think" that population growth >at both local and global levels caused the change in technology from simple >and benign food collecting technologies to food producing technologies. > >I conclude the population growth is a major factor that drives technology and >affluence directly. RESPONSE: Western anthropologists as is well known have historically embraced all sorts of chauvanistic views, including Malthusianism, social Darwinism, racism, etc. To know what to make of this I would have to know why they think as they do, i.e. what is the basis for their views. In any case the point that you make is a pretty lame one. Who would deny that population is a major factor? But technology and socioeconomic order are obviously factors too. And they all influence each other. What you want to argue of course is that population is the most important factor, the efficient cause, but you haven't shown this, and thus fall back on the point that is a cause (among others). > >> Second, there is no direct relationship between population growth and world >> hunger, or between population growth and famine. This has been established >> in the work of Amartya Sen and in the various critiques of the agribusiness >> system. > >It would be helpful if you provided a summary of the work you refer to and a >source. In any event, hunger is a local event so it does not surprise me that >one might have difficulty finding a relationship between "world hunger" and >population growth. However, World Watch Institute notes that "Grainland per >person has been shrinking since mid-century, but the drop projected for the >next 50 years means the world will have less grainland per person than India >has today. Future population growth is likely to reduce this key number in >many societies to the point where they will no longer be able to feed >themselves" (World Watch Paper #@ 143 "Beyond Malthus") While it is true that >localized famine in populations can be linked to political conflict disrupting >food distribution, or selling food for export, it is also true that these >conflicts would not be able to create such disruptions where high numbers of >people had not created a dependence on complex food production technologies, >and where culture and economic systems did not allow food export. But given >these realities, the population growth in these regions is associated with >famine. One might also want to consider what would occur in the absence of >conflict or food export. Ultimately the population must stabilize within >carrying capacity or famine will result. Additionally, the current example of >famine in North Korea appears to be a case where a local population has >exceeded the lowpoints in food productivity caused by cyclical environmental >events, in this case drought. RESPONSE: I don't think I need to provide a source for Amartya Sen since he has just received the Nobel Prize in economics and the whole world is talking about his ideas. Look these up for yourself--on the internet, in the newspapers, bookstores and the libraries. It is an essential part of your education if you are to discuss these issues at all since Sen is the world's leading economist in this area. Be that as it may, your argument on famine and population is incredibly convoluted. You say that a host of "cultural factors" inclduing dependence on complex food technologies (obviously associted with the agribuiness system) and export of food (also associated with agribusiness) set the stage for famine. And then you add that population growth in these regions is also a contributing element. Logically, all this amounts to is saying that population is a factor within a larger historical-economic-cultural context. I would agree and so would everyone else. Yet, take away the export of food and the dependence on complex food technologies (i.e. the breakdown of subsistence food systems and the creation of dependence on a market mediated by filthy lucre and controlled from abroad) and there is no famine. It is worth nothing as Sen has shown in his studies that there is no correlation between famine and actual food shortages (since the famine often occurs in years where food production is higher), nor is there any correlation between famine and population growth or density. > >There is no just and equitable global distribution system and there will >likely never be one. It is probable that the only way egalitarian societies >will be achieved is to lower population levels down toward the level where >those societies were able to flourish in the past, and those are very low, but >ecologically sustainable levels. RESPONSE: What we know for certain is that more egalitarian societies that emphasize socioeconomic distribution, women's rights (including control over their own bodies), education, public health services, etc. are able to stablize populations at lower levels of economic development while improving the conditions of the poor. By saying that there is no such thing as an absolutely just or equitable distribution system you are simply talking in terms of absolutes, making your argument absolutely irrelevant. > >I would like to respond to the rest of your list of "facts" when time becomes available. Fine. I welcome your criticisms. Try again when you are ready. Meanwhile, I am hoping that the Progressive Population Network can get back to the business of dealing with those issues where new research and discussion is actually necessary. > >Until then- >(From Ed Glaze) >Published Sunday, November 22, 1998 >Population growth affecting world's ecosystems, professor says >Tom Meersman / Minneapolis Star Tribune > >Human population growth is having a dramatic effect on rain forests, >wetlands, oceans, prairies and all of the world's other major >ecosystems, said an ecology professor from the University of Minnesota >who spoke to more than 200 at a conference on population and consumption >in St. Paul. > >David Tilman said that until the past few decades, humans have lived off >Earth's natural systems for thousands of years without destroying them. > >"We are the first people to ever experience human domination of >ecological systems," he said. Habitat destruction through farming, >deforestation, pollution and development has changed the character of 45 >percent of the world's land surface, he said, and has created conditions >in which 10 percent of the Earth's plant and animal species are thought >to be moving toward extinction. > >The conference was sponsored by the Science Museum of Minnesota, the Lee >and Rose Warner Nature Center and the Minneapolis-based World Population >Balance. > >Tilman linked what he sees as the world's environmental degradation to >human population pressures. The "green revolution" in agriculture >allowed the world to feed more people, he said, but it also resulted in >intensive farming that has depleted soils and increased the use of >nitrogen and pesticides. Food demands also have encouraged overfishing >of oceans and a mass production of livestock on factory farms, he said. > >However, in recent years, other experts in this field have said that >resources are available to feed the world for several decades, thanks to >advances in agricultural research. > >Anne Ehrlich, an author and population expert at Stanford University, >said Saturday in St. Paul that environmental degradation is everywhere, >largely because of the growth of the human population. "Poor nations >threaten their local environment, and developed nations threaten the >global environment because of their high consumption rates," she said. > >Ehrlich agreed with Tilman that humans have crossed some kind of >threshold in this century, and so dominate the planet that their >emissions into the atmosphere and use of water are changing the climate >and its hydrologic patterns. "We've basically taken over the planet," >she said. "We're burning our natural-resource capital instead of living >on the interest. The soil, ground water and biodiversity we're depleting >will take centuries to replenish." > >Ehrlich said the only "good news" was a U.N. report released last month >that showed that the rate of growth for the world's population has >slowed. She said that some of the decline is the result of education and >family-planning programs in developing countries, but that it also can >be attributed to high death rates from disease. > >William Ryerson, president of the Population Media Center, criticized >media coverage of population issues, especially the recent U.N. report. >Although the rate of growth may have slowed, he said, the world's >population is now almost 6 billion, and by 2025 it will have increased >by 3 billion. > >"There's a crying need to convince people in this country that this is a >serious problem," he said. > >Ryerson cited examples of countries where soap operas and radio dramas >are being used to educate people about family planning. In one popular >TV series in the Philippines, he said, the lives of two sisters were >dramatized: one who bore eight daughters to a husband who demanded a son >until she died in childbirth, and the other who followed a successful >career in broadcasting and did not accept the traditional role of women. > >The radio and TV programs are not instructional and boring, Ryerson >said, but a form of "commercial-entertainment education" that has >dramatically increased sales of birth-control devices in some areas. > >Ryerson said concerns about overpopulation are not restricted to >developing nations, since citizens in industrialized countries consume >far more natural resources on a per-capita basis. He said a recent study >predicted that "we would need three planet Earths" to sustain the >world's population if everyone lived at the same standard as those who >live in Vancouver, British Columbia. > >In addition to continued efforts to encourage family planning in >cultures in which it is acceptable, Tilman said, developing nations need >to ask what they are leaving for future generations. "We have to have a >totally new ethic that tells us what our obligations are," he said. "The >whole world is flying blind, and we have no idea where we're going." > >© Copyright 1998 Star Tribune. All rights reserved. > >Christopher Christie >Mailing from Desolation Row >"If growthmen can spin telling analogies, so can the growth sceptics. A man >who falls from a hundred-storey building will survive the first 99 storeys >unscathed. Were he as sanguine as some of our technocrats, his confidence >would grow with the number of storeys he passed on his downward flight and >would be at a maximum just before his free-fall abruptly halted." - E.J. >Mishan, 1976 Spelling as found. > From Peter.VanZant@PSS.Boeing.com Wed Nov 25 15:42:13 1998 Received: from slb-smtpout-01.boeing.com (slb-smtpout-01.boeing.com [192.161.36.8] (may be forged)) by csf.Colorado.EDU (8.8.8/8.8.8/ITS-4.2/csf) with ESMTP id PAA21402 for ; Wed, 25 Nov 1998 15:42:03 -0700 (MST) Received: from xch-pssbh-01.ca.boeing.com ([192.42.211.28]) by slb-smtpout-01.boeing.com (8.9.0/8.8.5) with ESMTP id OAA27136; Wed, 25 Nov 1998 14:42:01 -0800 (PST) Received: by xch-pssbh-01.ca.boeing.com with Internet Mail Service (5.5.2407.0) id ; Wed, 25 Nov 1998 14:41:05 -0800 Message-ID: <51792E5D4B6ED011B7DB00805FBE3836040EC0DC@xch-evt-06.ca.boeing.com> From: "Van Zant, Peter J" To: PROGRESSIVE POPULATION NETWORK , "'Jfoster@OREGON.UOREGON.EDU'" Subject: RE: established facts Date: Wed, 25 Nov 1998 14:42:07 -0800 MIME-Version: 1.0 X-Mailer: Internet Mail Service (5.5.2407.0) Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" > ---------- > From: John Bellamy Foster[SMTP:Jfoster@OREGON.UOREGON.EDU] > Sent: Wednesday, November 25, 1998 2:08 PM > To: PROGRESSIVE POPULATION NETWORK > Subject: Re: established facts > > My rejoinders to Christopher Christi follow. > > At 11:32 AM 11/25/98 +0100, you wrote: > >John Bellamy Foster wrote: > > > >> I want to try to get things back on track by listing ten > well-established, > >> incontrovertible facts that form the basis for any meaningful > discussion of > >> population issues. > > > >John, > > > >I think some people confuse unfounded assertions with "incontrovertible > facts" > >and a blind, arrogant and self-righteous confidence with a progressive > >attitude. Needless to say, your list is not of "established facts," but > of > >your own biased views. > > RESPONSE: You say my presentation of elementary facts on population > reflects > my bias. No doubt. I would not have laid them out as explicitly as I > did, > however, if was not prepared to defend these in the face of any rational > criticism. Below are my responses to your criticisms. > > > >I will attempt to deal with your "incontrovertible facts" one at a time > over > >a period of time. > > RESPONSE: You are welcome to make the attempt and take whatever time that > you need. > > > >> First, for those like myself who approach population questions > primarily > >> from the standpoint of global ecological crisis it has to be admitted > that > >> overpopulation, though a factor in this crisis, is a relatively minor > one > >> compared to the two other sources of environmental impact (according to > the > >> PAT formula): affluence and technology. World economic output is > increasing > >> much faster than population and contrary to the latter there is no > >> expectation that it will level off. On top of this there has been a > >> technological shift in the last half century to the production of toxic > and > >> radioactive "byproducts" that threaten the biosphere and the health of > all > >> the species within it at levels that we are only just beginning to > >> understand. Neither of these factors--affluence or anti-ecological > >> technology--can be attributed directly to population growth. > > > >I don't deny that the relative importance of variables in the I=PAT > equation > >will vary but what numbers and sources will you provide to support the > above > >statement that "World economic output is increasing much faster than > >population?" What time frame are you using? Is the reason for this > perhaps > >that famine and disease in highly populated areas (Africa, Korea, etc.) > is > >slowing the rate of population growth? Who says that "there is no > expectation > >that it will level off" and how do they justify such a view in the face > of > >resource limits? Can you point to any models that will support that > assertion. > > Certainly the information provided by Meadows, Meadows and Randers in > "Beyond > >the Limits" (Chelsea Green Publishing, 1992) would not. > > RESPONSE: Over the last century world population has increased by a factor > of 3, world output by a factor of 20. UN projections point to eventual > replacement level population, virtually no one (aside from Herman Daly and > handful of others) is talking about a replacement level economy. For that > to occur would mean the disintegration of the current system of > accumulation, which is "unthinkable" within the present order. It could > only > take place under a fundamentally different social order, no longer geared > to > the accumulation of capital. Hence, for those in the mainstream (even > mainstream ecologists) the fundamental conflict between increasing world > output and ecological sustainability within the current system is > generally > ignored. It is much easier to take a neo-Malthusians tact which pretends > that population growth is the whole problem, and the avoid the tougher > issue > of accumulation, which would mean a confrontation with power. Likewise > the > issue of anti-ecological technology (automobiles, pesticides, > petrochemicals, the production of toxins) raises radical social issues, > unlike approaches that place the blame on population. > > Rest snipped so that we can concentrate on this point. Some people try to make out that absolute numbers are everything, because they see the current economic system as being of advantage to them. It certainly is of advantage to me, I admit that. I see, however, that a more just distribution system--and division of labor, too, is as much of necessity as stabilization of numbers. I *do* become annoyed with people who maintain that it's *all* the distribution system, numbers are irrelevant, as much as I do the people who maintain the opposite. It may be that the conflict is irresolvable because, people being people, too many will stick to a one-sided view, one way or the other. In both case, in my opinion, it's due to a perception of other people as untrustworthy, and falling back on the idea that I have to protect myself, first. From Jfoster@OREGON.UOREGON.EDU Wed Nov 25 16:10:04 1998 Received: from donald.uoregon.edu (donald.uoregon.edu [128.223.32.6]) by csf.Colorado.EDU (8.8.8/8.8.8/ITS-4.2/csf) with ESMTP id QAA23629 for ; Wed, 25 Nov 1998 16:10:00 -0700 (MST) Received: from DWOVMCNF.uoregon.edu (d111-206.uoregon.edu) by OREGON.UOREGON.EDU (PMDF V5.1-12 #D3397) with SMTP id <01J4LFIF9CZM8WWKCZ@OREGON.UOREGON.EDU> for ppn@csf.colorado.edu; Wed, 25 Nov 1998 15:09:58 PST Date: Wed, 25 Nov 1998 15:09:58 -0800 (PST) From: John Bellamy Foster Subject: Re: established facts X-Sender: Jfoster@oregon.uoregon.edu To: ppn@csf.colorado.edu Message-id: <1.5.4.16.19981125152122.114f5a88@oregon.uoregon.edu> MIME-version: 1.0 X-Mailer: Windows Eudora Light Version 1.5.4 (16) Content-type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Some Responses to Glaze. >From: John Bellamy Foster >To: PROGRESSIVE POPULATION NETWORK >Date: Tuesday, November 24, 1998 4:28 PM >Subject: established facts > >The Progressive Population Network appears to be inundated of late by >views that are anything but progressive and the importance of the list as >a forum for meaningful discussion of population issues seems therefore >to be threatened. > >I want to try to get things back on track by listing ten well-established, >incontrovertible facts that form the basis for any meaningful discussion >of population issues. > > John's use of ANY implies that everything else not recognizing > these ten facts is to some extent meaningless. Limiting the > factors being considered will of course skew the discussion> > Response: You are exactly right. That is what I said. Any analysis that doesn't take into account or evades these well-established facts is useless in terms of advancing a meaningful discussion (that is apart from mere propaganda). > >First, for those like myself who approach population questions primarily >from the standpoint of global ecological crisis it has to be admitted that >overpopulation, though a factor in this crisis, is a relatively minor one >compared to the two other sources of environmental impact (according >to the PAT formula): affluence and technology. World economic output >is increasing much faster than population and contrary to the latter there >is no expectation that it will level off. > > Each multiplier must be considered and population is > projected to more than double in most of our lifetimes > and that doubling contributes to the increases of the > other sources. The Developing World will have most > of that population growth and in those areas population > will be much more important that globalized numbers > may reflect for affluence and technology (A & T). > > John's concern with the global ecological crisis should > consider the very long time it will take for population to > level off and eventually reach sustainable levels. Such > a turnaround could likely take 200 years of more with > a huge P component continuing its consumption and > increasing the A & T. Unless of course there are major > collapses of the economy or ecology causing massive > die-offs, which seems likely especially in some regions. > So is it really just a question of choosing to deal with > overpopulation or overconsumption? > > Response: Population certainly is an important factor in global ecological crisis. All elements in the environmental impact (that is PAT) formula are important. But those who think that the whole problem can be reduced to population, or that population growth is the main source of ecological problems are barking up the wrong tree. You have done nothing to challenge this point. > >On top of this there has been a technological shift in the last half century >to the production of toxic and radioactive "byproducts" that threaten the >biosphere and the health of all the species within it at levels that we are >only just beginning to understand. Neither of these factors -- affluence or >anti-ecological technology -- can be attributed directly to population >growth. > > No, but our unsustainable dependence upon such harmful > technologies is bolstered by supporting our high population > levels and there are certainly other less than direct links. > The interdependence of issues requires that these acts be > put together, but the connections are not always so glaringly > obvious. > Response: This merely says population is a factor. Of course. That is what I said. > >>Second, there is no direct relationship between population growth and >world hunger, or between population growth and famine. This has been >established in the work of Amartya Sen and in the various critiques of >the agribusiness system. > > Why must all relationships be direct and global? Especially > on a regional levels there are very strong arguments showing > that a high population level (not just pop growth) contributes > very much to malnutrition, difficulties in distribution, and > other unmet infrastructure needs. Also supporting the much > higher population levels in the future will likely be even more > difficult and may well lead to both food and water shortages. > Granted that agribusiness and economic orientations are > a major contributing factor to problems with food distribution. > > > >Response: Again you are saying that population is a factor, nothing more. Who would disagree? The problem is that you want to say that population growth is the main factor and that the agribusiness system is a mere "contributory factor" (of secondary importance) and this is clearly wrong. >Third, population growth issues cannot be addressed in simple, >neo-Malthusian terms (which focus simply on narrowly conceived >demographic factors) but need to be viewed in terms of the theory >of demographic transition, which explains this in terms of social >and economic relationships. > > Population issues entail more than just growth and there > are many issues leading to a boggling complexity when > socially-acceptable solutions are being sought. However, > demographic factors do shown us that in ecological terms > we are heading downhill towards a crash and such social > issues as the demographic transition are not going to > slow us sufficiently to avoid major problems. Besides to > rely on the demographic transition to increase the living > standards of all in the developing countries would lead to > even more disastrous ecological disruptions as the time > involved would likely be centuries. > > > Of course population growth is a problem and will contribute to ecological disruption. Who would argue otherwise? The question is how serious is it as a factor (in relation to other factors), how drastic are the remedies necessary, what kinds of socially-based, egalitarian solutions can be presented to solve the problem? >Fourth, the essential point here is that most of the third world is stuck >within what Barry Commoner called a demographic trap created by >colonialism/neocolonialism. > > There is no doubt that the third world has be exploited > by the first world. There are great inequities in trade, > economic distributions, resource usage, and many other > things, but every one of these inequities are worsened > by large and growing populations in both the third and > first worlds. > > Much of what Barry Commoner is concerned with is the > ending of poverty and it would seem that high population > levels would make that even more difficult. > > Response: Again, this says population is a factor in terms of ecology, poverty, etc., nothing more. >Fifth, while the demographic transition theory has traditionally been >conceived in terms of economic development, this is now commonly >broadened to take account of social factors more generally. For example, >we know that where women have greater rights and more control over their >own bodies the rate of population growth decreases. We also know that >some societies have been able to bring population growth under control >at relatively low levels of economic development by emphasizing social >redistribution, e.g. Cuba and the state of Kerala in India. > > And many more societies have not been able to bring population > growth under control under any circumstances. Carrying Capacity > should a much more important consideration than economic > development if for not other reason than it will affect both >rich > and poor countries alike. Carrying capacity is being decreased > by growing populations and decreasing resources, especially > drinkable water. A couple good examples does not counter- > balance a predomination of problems. > > > Response: This seems to be based on a fundamental misunderstanding of ecological economics. The carrying capacity concept does not apply simply to people independent of world economic output. It makes no sense whatsoever to talk about people consituting a burden on the earth's carrying capacity independently of production and consumption. >Sixth, the areas of the world that have the largest "ecological footprints" >and are having the most devastating effect on the environment are the rich >countries that have relatively low rates of population growth (much closer >to replacement level). > > But some of the natural resources that are most threatened, > like rainforests, are predominately in poor countries where > there are high population levels and high population growth. > Loss of such resources could have a much greater ecological > impact and negatively affect our future, climate-wise, than > we can afford, > > > >Resonse: Yes, of course. Tropical rainforests exist in developing countries. The Amazon rainforest is in Brazil where the U.S. (and a handful of other advanced economic powers) own all the significant sectors of the economy, and which has one of the most unequal distributions of income and wealth in the world. >Seventh, classical Malthusianism (i.e. the ideas of Malthus himself) had >nothing to do with ecology. Modern neo-Malthusianism arose in the 1940s >in the work of thinkers who came out of the eugenics tradition. Malthus was >resurrected because his notion of population pressing on subsistence was >more a more effective ideology for justifying the control and displacement >of third world populations after the Holocaust than more traditional racist >ideologies. Malthusianism thus came to be a key element in the ideology >of the Cold War and the Green Revolution. It was also used to develop a >conservative approach to ecological crisis that downgraded social as >opposed to biological factors. > > > Whether Malthus intended to discuss ecology is not > relevant, science builds on itself and a single principle > can apply under many different circumstances. Also such > a principle can be used for many different motives, which > does not invalidate its proper use on any other motive(s). > "Malthus may have been wrong on specifics, but in general > principle he was right." > > Response: the argument here is that it doesn't matter to self-styled neo-Malthusian ecologists that Malthus had nothing to do with ecology, and that it also doesn't matter if he was wrong on all the specifics as long as he was right in general. What general aspect did he get right, and how can this stand in the face of being "wrong on specifics"? > >Eighth, neo-Malthusianism has always tended to favor "final solutions" to >population problems. For example William Vogt wrote in his classic >neo-Malthusian tract, THE ROAD TO SURVIVAL (1948) that Chile's >"greatest asset, is its high death rate." In an infamous passage >entitled "The Dangerous Doctor" he observed: > >"The modern medical profession, still framing its ethics on the dubious >statements of an ignorant man [Hippocrates] who lived more than 2,000 >years ago...continues to believe it has a duty to keep alive as many >people as possible. In many parts of the world doctors apply their >intelligence to one aspect of man's welfare -- survival -- and deny their >moral right to apply it to the problem as a whole. Through medical >care and improved sanitation they are responsible for more millions >living more years in increasing misery. Their refusal to consider their >responsibility in these matters does not seem to them to compromise >their intellectual integrity....They set the stage for disaster; then, >like Pilate, they wash their hands of the consequences." > > > "The main population issues -- urbanization, rapid growth and > uneven distribution -- when linked with issues of environmental > decline, pose multiple sets of problems for policymakers. The > very nature of these interrelated problems makes them virtually > impossible to deal with in balkanized bureaucracies accustomed > to managing only one aspect of any problem. Population and > resource issues require integrated, strategic management, an > approach few countries are in a position to implement. But time > is at a premium. The decision period for responding to the > crises posed by rapidly growing populations, increased > consumption levels and shrinking resources will be confined, > for the most part, to the next two decades. If human society > does not succeed in checking population growth, the future > will bring widespread social and economic dislocations as > resource bases collapse. Unemployment and poverty will > increase, and migrations from poorer to richer nations will > bring Third World stresses to the developed world." Response: This is an evasion. It has nothing to do with the point that it is ostensibly replying to. >Ninth, neo-Malthusianism generally (there are exceptions) is associated >with the peculiar "morality" of scientific racism. It denies the principle >that justice is indivisible for all of humanity and is either explicitly or >implicitly based on the notion that some people are more dispensable >than others. In the words of Garrett Hardin, a popular neo-Malthusian >thinker any attempt to help the poor would result in a situation in which: >"the less provident and less able will multiply at the expense of the abler >and the more provident, bringing eventual ruin upon all who share in >the commons." The world of civilization and culture is thus reduced >to a Hobbesian struggle of all against all (or of race against race) in >which there is no room for morality properly conceived, and where >"lifeboat ethics" or the principles of Malthus' "mighty feast" apply. > > The need for controlling population need not be defined > in the terms and conditions of neo-Malthusianism or any > other philosophical category. What is more important is that > demographic trends on the local, regional, national, and > global levels are clearly indicative that there are very real, > and worsening, problems related to high population levels. > Human nature has always caused the powerful to take > advantage of the less powerful, even within the same race. > Race need not be an issue at all in identifying the need to > make major changes in how humans live on this planet. > It is all a question of numbers -- can the resources available > support the populations making demands upon them for > the indefinite future? How you get humans to deal with the > problem may well involve overcoming racism, along with > many other social factors, but it does not change the > pressing need to take action to reduce the disruptions we > are causing on the environment. Response: The only "argument" here is a reference to "human nature" which is not explained. What is human nature? I presume you are saying that your argument is not necessarily neo-Malthusian (surprising given your recent posts) but rather is based on a Hobbesian view of human nature. Big difference.> >Tenth, by definition a PROGRESSIVE approach to population -- >as opposed to a reactionary one -- recognizes all of the above >and rejects the so-called "morality" of the "final solution." This >means that population stabilization can only occur within the >context of democratic social planning which recognizes the >values of human freedom and equality. > > Here is a quote from E. O. Wilson > diversit/extra/suicide.htm#anchor995969> > "To move ahead as though scientific and entrepreneurial genius > will solve each crisis that arises implies that the declining > biosphere can be similarly manipulated. But the world is too > complicated to be turned into a garden. There is no biological > homeostat that can be worked by humanity; to believe otherwise > is to risk reducing a large part of Earth to a wasteland. The > environmentalist vision, prudential and less exuberant than > exemptionalism, is closer to reality. It sees humanity entering > a bottleneck unique in history, constricted by population and > economic pressures. In order to pass through to the other > side, within perhaps 50 to 100 years, more science and > entreprenueurship will have to be devoted to stabilizing the > global environment. That can be accomplished, according > to expert consensus, only by halting population growth and > devising a wiser use of resources than has been accomplished > to date. And wise use for the living world in particular means > preserving the surviving ecosystems, micromanaging them > only enough to save the biodiversity they contain, until such > time as they can be understood and employed in the fullest > sense for human benefit." This is not a response to the point made. There is also nothing to disagree with. > >I suggest that those who are unwilling or unable (for whatever reason) to >acknowledge these elementary truths should seek out lists of a more >neo-Malthusian character (I am sure there are plenty of those). > >Or if they cannot find anything quite to their liking, they should create >their own Regressive Population Network, where all the misanthropists >of the world can unite. > > It seems that all of us should work together on solving the > issues involved with overpopulation. If the PPN listserv > truly does believe as John Foster says and is not also > interested in considering some of the points I have made > then it is possible that some of us population realists will > take our leave of this listserv. We would do so reluctantly > because we would be leaving some people who are > evidently concerned about population issues but who are > sidetracked off the environment and into social concerns. > Solving social concerns will not matter if the ecology we > depend on is allowed to fail while we deal with other issues. > I will leave you with the text of the "Letter to World Leaders > from Scientists" Response: That was not the point of my intervention of course, which was to set the boundaries for a meaningful discussion within PPN--where certain basic facts are agreed upon. I too have frequently quoted the statement of the World Scientists in my writings. Ecological issues are serious, and population growth is a problem. But we should understand the social nature of this problem, which will allow us to intervene socially, in ways that enhance democracy, equality and freedom--not in ways that simply target the poor. > From rcollins@netlink.com.au Wed Nov 25 20:28:15 1998 Received: from netlink.com.au (merlin.netlink.com.au [203.16.172.196]) by csf.Colorado.EDU (8.8.8/8.8.8/ITS-4.2/csf) with ESMTP id UAA07366 for ; Wed, 25 Nov 1998 20:28:11 -0700 (MST) Received: from netlink.com.au (h088.mel.netlink.com.au [203.62.225.88]) by netlink.com.au (8.8.8/8.8.8) with ESMTP id OAA10261 for ; Thu, 26 Nov 1998 14:27:13 +1100 Message-ID: <365CCA5A.BF0C061E@netlink.com.au> Date: Thu, 26 Nov 1998 14:26:18 +1100 From: rc&am Reply-To: rcollins@netlink.com.au X-Mailer: Mozilla 4.04 [en] (Win95; I) MIME-Version: 1.0 To: PROGRESSIVE POPULATION NETWORK Subject: who is looking for a new home? Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit from Detroit News Reactionary Environmentalism Today is Earth Day, an event that nearly every school in the country will observe in some way, shape or form . But the Sierra Club, which helped popularize the event, is engaged in a bitter internal debate about whether to restrict immigration in order to curb population growth in America. The debate underlines the danger that modern-day environmentalism will evolve into a reactionary force. Many environmentalists believe the chief threat to nature comes from a growing population. Their thinking traces back to Thomas R. Malthus, a 19th century English economist. In his famous work, "Essay on the Principle of Population," Malthus predicted that because the human population grows faster than its means of subsistence, mass poverty and famines would become inescapable facts of the human condition, barring floods, famines or some other catastrophe. Economic advances following the Industrial Revolution thoroughly discredited Malthus. Though England's population more than doubled in the 19th century, standards of living rose even faster. Yet that has not stopped environmentalists from declaring human beings the bane of the Earth and predicting one man-made apocalypse after another. Paul Erlich, a Stanford University biologist, in his 1968 best-seller published by the Sierra Club, The Population Bomb, forecast ecological disaster and rampant scarcity from the "population explosion." His wife, a member of the club's board, has advocated enforced sterilization. Their predicted catastrophe, too, failed to materialize in the predicted time frame, but the vision of apocalypse springs eternal. It's possible this dour view of humanity is costing the environmental movement some of its membership. The U.S. membership of Greenpeace, the world's best-known environmental action group, plummeted this year, forcing the organization to slash its budget and close several offices in the country. Other groups have reported increasing financial pressure. Thus Sierra Club leaders are trying to turn back the anti-immigration agitators. They claim their traditional environmental agenda has been hijacked by groups that want to control immigration for reasons that have little to do with environmental protection. But unfortunately for the Sierra Club, this claim has it exactly backward. Leaders of some of the most rabid anti-immigration groups, such as Petoskey's John Tanton of the Federation for Immigration Reform and Roy Beck of the Immigration Reform Alliance, tout impeccable environmentalist credentials. The distaste for human beings is part and parcel of the environmental movement, or at least its more extreme forms. To purge the anti-immigration element from its midst, the environmental movement will have to do more than offer brave denunciations. It will have to start regarding human beings as the solution - as opposed to the problem - for mankind's many dilemmas. Natural resources may be finite, but the inventiveness of the human mind is literally infinite. Failure to understand that will trap environmentalists in intellectual backwaters, increasingly out of touch with the generous and hopeful nature of most Americans. Copyright 1998, The Detroit News From rcollins@netlink.com.au Wed Nov 25 20:28:22 1998 Received: from netlink.com.au (merlin.netlink.com.au [203.16.172.196]) by csf.Colorado.EDU (8.8.8/8.8.8/ITS-4.2/csf) with ESMTP id UAA07380 for ; Wed, 25 Nov 1998 20:28:16 -0700 (MST) Received: from netlink.com.au (h088.mel.netlink.com.au [203.62.225.88]) by netlink.com.au (8.8.8/8.8.8) with ESMTP id OAA10275 for ; Thu, 26 Nov 1998 14:27:19 +1100 Message-ID: <365CCA63.ABCA5CB2@netlink.com.au> Date: Thu, 26 Nov 1998 14:26:27 +1100 From: rc&am Reply-To: rcollins@netlink.com.au X-Mailer: Mozilla 4.04 [en] (Win95; I) MIME-Version: 1.0 To: PROGRESSIVE POPULATION NETWORK Subject: who is looking for a new home? Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Saturday April 25 11:21 PM EDT Sierra Club Rejects Anti-Immigration Proposal By Therese Poletti SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) - The Sierra Club, one of the largest and most influential environmental groups in the United States, said Saturday its membership had rejected a hotly debated proposal on its annual ballot to lobby the government to curtail immigration. A majority of members who participated in a mail-in ballot voted not to adopt a policy to limit immigration into the United States. They voted instead to maintain the group's current neutrality on immigration, and added that immigrants should not be scapegoats for overpopulation and environmental damage in the country. "The Sierra Club should not be involved in immigration policy, said Adam Werbach, Sierra Club president, at a news conference. "Population growth does have an impact on the environment," he said, adding, "Our belief is to work on family planning and consumption." Sierra Club leaders said that the proposal was the most extensively debated issue in the 106-year history of the environmental group, which is headquartered in San Francisco. The highest percentage of its members in a decade voted, some 85,000 members, or 15 percent, of its 500,000 members. A majority of 60.1 percent voted not to adopt a policy to limit immigration into the United States. The measure, called Alternative A, was placed on the club's 1998 ballot last summer by a splinter group of Sierra Club members called Sierrans for U.S. Population Stabilization. "It's a terrible loss because it means another year," said Alan Kuper, one of the splinter group's organizers and a member of the Ohio Sierra Club. "When you have great population growth, it's a great burden on the natural resource base." Kuper cited U.S. Census Bureau statistic saying the U.S. population has doubled in less than 70 years and that 80 percent of the growth had been due to immigrants and their descendants. Kuper said his group plans to place another similar proposal on the ballot next year. Another group, the Federation for Immigration Reform in Washington, called the vote a "self-defeating position." "We regret that the Sierra Club leadership succeeded in convincing a majority of its members to support its head-in-the-sand position toward the effects of the nation's current record-breaking wave of immigrants," said Dan Stein, executive director of the Federation for Immigration Reform. The Sierra Club said that not one of its 64 chapters supported the proposal and 27 chapters voted instead for Alternative B, which was a proposal to reaffirm the Sierra Club's neutrality on immigration. In addition, Alternative B seeks to address immigration as a symptom of overpopulation and focuses on the root causes of environmental destruction and overpopulation. "Birth control, not border patrol, is the common sense solution," said Carl Pope, executive director of the Sierra Club. "The Sierra Club membership has overwhelmingly voted that we cannot protect our environment by putting up our borders." From rcollins@netlink.com.au Wed Nov 25 20:28:33 1998 Received: from netlink.com.au (merlin.netlink.com.au [203.16.172.196]) by csf.Colorado.EDU (8.8.8/8.8.8/ITS-4.2/csf) with ESMTP id UAA07408 for ; Wed, 25 Nov 1998 20:28:29 -0700 (MST) Received: from netlink.com.au (h088.mel.netlink.com.au [203.62.225.88]) by netlink.com.au (8.8.8/8.8.8) with ESMTP id OAA10299 for ; Thu, 26 Nov 1998 14:27:30 +1100 Message-ID: <365CCA6E.CDAB8DC4@netlink.com.au> Date: Thu, 26 Nov 1998 14:26:38 +1100 From: rc&am Reply-To: rcollins@netlink.com.au X-Mailer: Mozilla 4.04 [en] (Win95; I) MIME-Version: 1.0 To: PROGRESSIVE POPULATION NETWORK Subject: monsanto Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit please distribute as widely as possible Dear friends, On Monday the 16th the public was informed by Indian newspapers that Monsanto (well known in India for the Terminator Technology) has been conducting 40 field trials with genetically manipulated cotton across five Indian states for the last three months. Monsanto is testing a hybrid cotton seed that has been genetically engineered to produce the Bacillus thuringiensis (Bt) enzyme. The permission granted by the federal government in Delhi pertains the states of Karnataka, Tamil Nadu, Andrah Pradesh, Gujarat, Maharashtra and Madhya Pradesh. Now that peoples' movements are starting to mobilise on this matter, the same central government that granted the permission is inviting Monsanto to leave the country. Monsanto has formed a joint venture with Mahyco (a 30 years old seed company) to carry out these field trails. According to the media, Monsanto now owns 26 percent of Mahyco. In the rest of the message I include some excerpts of the newspaper coverage of this affaire. We will keep you informed of the developments in this part of the world, which will most probably include a number of non-violent direct actions to burn down the genetically modified crops and kick Monsanto physically out of the country. We encourage you to do similar actions all over the world - maybe we can make Monsanto's shareholders feel our pressure reflected on the value of their stocks. Friendly greetings, Prof. Nanjundaswamy President, Karnataka State Farmers Association swamy.krrs@aworld.net 'Curiously though agriculture is a state subject, Karnataka Government seems unaware of the trials going on in the State. Agriculture Minister C. Byre Gowda admitted that he had been informend of the on-going trials but was unaware of where they were being undertaken - in Karnataka or in Maharashtra.' (The Indian Express, Bangalore edition, cover page, 16th November) The trials started three months ago although the 'Ministry of Science and Technology has admitted that it does not have the requisite regulatoy regimen to assess the risk of dealing with such transgenic material for which biosafty guidelines have only now been issued.' (The Indian Express, Bangalore edition, cover page, 18th November). In that sense, the University of Agriculture Science (UAS) Bangalore warned that 'The genetic modification involved in geneticlly engineered hybrid seeds is a concealed one that cannot be ascertaiened with existing regulations of the seed act and quarantine.' (ibid.) B.R. Hedge, Director of Research at UAS, affirmed that 'The Indian Council for Agricultural Research (ICAR) was only now starting to look at ways which regulatory mechnisms should be put in place to check the clandestine import of such genetic material. Nevertheless, for the moment we have nothing ready' (The Indian Express, Bangalore edition, page 9, 18th November) The KRRS has issued a deadline to the State Government and Monsanto to disclose the places where the trials are being conducted and the exact description of the seeds that are being tested. '"Monsanto should reveal immediately where the trials are being conducted" failing which "direct action would follow on the company's office in Malleswaram" he [Prof. Nanjundaswamy] threatened. "The government can foist 100 cases of attempt to murder [against us], but we will throw it [Monsanto] out... first from Karnataka, next from Maharashtra" ... The former professor of law wondered how the State's Agriculture Minister could be unaware of the trials. "The Government cannot continue for three minutes" considering its irresponsible behaviour, he said'. (The Indian Express, Bangalore edition, page 4, 20th November) 'Monsanto will have to leave the country within a week. Otherwise we will be forced to throw them out. We have given a day's ultimatum to the company to furnish details about the seed trials undertaken in the state and the country.' (Prof. Nanjundasway in The Times of India, Bangalore edition, page 5 20th November). Although the field trials are testing BT cotton, the Indian press and politiciancs seem to be rather confused and are mixing up this issue with the terminator technology, which has been used by opponents of Monsanto as an example of the destructive potential of this corporation. However, this confusion is making it easier for Monsanto to reject any accusation by denying the use of this technology. Here are some statements about this issue taken from the last days press. 'Second and Third World markets are the main targets for the terminator seed.' William Phelps, Spokesman, Department of Agriculture, USA (quoted in The Indian Express, Bangalore edition, cover page, 18 November) 'It is not merly the economic factors that threaten the poor farmers of the world, but it is nature of the Terminator gene itself, since the pollen from the crops carrying the Terminator will infect the fields of farmers who either reject, or cannot afford the technology.' (UAS, quoted in The Indian Express, Bangalore edition, cover page, 18 November) 'This is a terminator of bio-diversity, terminator of food security. It is a damaging technology because pollination pollution can render all indigenous varieties sterile. This gene will slowly remove all characteristics of germination from seeds. This means the harvest seeds cannot be used for sowing during the next seseason. It will also force seed dependency on farmers who cannot afford to buy seeds. Mono-culture was introduced in the country in 1965 with an aim to provide food security. When Green Revolution -Technology introduced mono-culture it was thought the method would be very effective. Terminator-gene is being dubbed as a second Green Revolution -Technology. This, too, will prove ineffective. Genetically modified seeds are polluting the local species. It will not solve the food problem, in fact it will terminate food security along with bio-diversity.' (Prof. Nanjundaswamy, quoted in The Times of India, Bangalore edition, page 5, 20th November) The sincerity of Monsanto can be easily assessed by the usual roguish reply it gave to the critics: 'Monsanto will only bring to India, products and technologies which are consistent with what India wants and its laws aprove.... Monsanto has not, and will not, bring to India any technology that will adversely affect the environment, current agricuture practices and force farmers to use any technology it provides.' (Monsanto statement quoted in Deccan Herald, Bangalore edition, page 9, 21th November) Yesterday the Union Minister for Rural Development, Babagouda Patil, declared that 'Monsanto wil be asked to leave India' (headline, The Times of India, Bangalore edition, page 5, 23 November). 'He said that he recieved Information that Monsanto is developing and conducting field trials on the "terminator gene" seeds at a private farm in Ranebennur taluk of Haveri district. "I have informed the Prime Minister and Union Agriculture Minister", he said. He said he knew the complications arising out of the issue due to WTO stipulations. "But the government will not compromise on this issue as crores of farmers' lives will be in danger. The terminator gene seed will pose a serious threat to Indian agriculture." The Union cabinet is expected to deliberate on the issue besides initiating measures to close Monsanto's buisness operations in the country... He said that the Center would not hesitate to withdraw from WTO if its provisions threaten our very existence.' (The Times of India, Bangalore edition, page 5 23rd November) From refugee@thegrid.net Fri Nov 27 08:49:20 1998 Received: from smtp.thegrid.net (smtp.thegrid.net [209.162.1.11]) by csf.Colorado.EDU (8.8.8/8.8.8/ITS-4.2/csf) with SMTP id IAA18230 for ; Fri, 27 Nov 1998 08:49:03 -0700 (MST) Received: (qmail 28348 invoked from network); 27 Nov 1998 15:49:02 -0000 Received: from pop.thegrid.net (209.162.1.5) by smtp.thegrid.net with SMTP; 27 Nov 1998 15:49:02 -0000 Received: from thegrid.net (lax-ts1-h1-40-156.ispmodems.net [209.162.40.156]) by pop.thegrid.net (8.9.1a/8.9.1) with ESMTP id HAA10505; Fri, 27 Nov 1998 07:48:59 -0800 (PST) Message-ID: <365E4BB3.A7BF7EBA@thegrid.net> Date: Fri, 27 Nov 1998 07:50:33 +0100 From: Christopher Christie Reply-To: refugee@thegrid.net X-Mailer: Mozilla 4.05 (Macintosh; U; PPC) MIME-Version: 1.0 To: refugee@thegrid.net Subject: Researchers Attribute Global Warming to Humans Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Friday, November 27, 1998 Researchers Attribute Global Warming to Humans, Not Nature >From Reuters WASHINGTON - New measurements make it increasingly clear that people - and not a natural force such as sunspots or volcanoes - are responsible for global warming, U.S. researchers said Thursday. Tom Wigley of the National Center for Atmospheric Research in Boulder, Colo., and colleagues analyzed 115 years of global temperature data and concluded the release of greenhouse gases such as carbon dioxide explains most of the 1-degree increase in the planet's average temperature over the last century. See http://www.latimes.com/HOME/NEWS/ASECTION/t000108524.1.html for rest of short article. Christopher Christie Mailing from Desolation Row "If growthmen can spin telling analogies, so can the growth sceptics. A man who falls from a hundred-storey building will survive the first 99 storeys unscathed. Were he as sanguine as some of our technocrats, his confidence would grow with the number of storeys he passed on his downward flight and would be at a maximum just before his free-fall abruptly halted." - E.J. Mishan, 1976 Spelling as found. From refugee@thegrid.net Fri Nov 27 11:46:23 1998 Received: from smtp.thegrid.net (smtp.thegrid.net [209.162.1.11]) by csf.Colorado.EDU (8.8.8/8.8.8/ITS-4.2/csf) with SMTP id LAA25601 for ; Fri, 27 Nov 1998 11:46:20 -0700 (MST) Received: (qmail 8320 invoked from network); 27 Nov 1998 18:46:17 -0000 Received: from pop.thegrid.net (209.162.1.5) by smtp.thegrid.net with SMTP; 27 Nov 1998 18:46:17 -0000 Received: from thegrid.net (lax-ts1-h1-40-81.ispmodems.net [209.162.40.81]) by pop.thegrid.net (8.9.1a/8.9.1) with ESMTP id KAA06362; Fri, 27 Nov 1998 10:46:15 -0800 (PST) Message-ID: <365E753E.5D0F07A5@thegrid.net> Date: Fri, 27 Nov 1998 10:47:50 +0100 From: Christopher Christie Reply-To: refugee@thegrid.net X-Mailer: Mozilla 4.05 (Macintosh; U; PPC) MIME-Version: 1.0 To: refugee@thegrid.net Subject: "humans had made the devastation even worse" Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit The following article makes apparent some of the complex relationships between human population growth, poverty and economic development, and natural vs man-induced disasters. Deforestation worsened Mitch's toll, scientists say By David L. Marcus, Globe Staff, 11/11/98 TEGUCIGALPA, Honduras - Just about everyone agrees that Hurricane Mitch was the worst natural disaster in Central America in decades. But now, scientists are arguing that humans had made the devastation even worse. Clear-cutting logging, hillside farms, and rampant housing development exacerbated mudslides and floods, the scientists say. The damage was most extreme in Honduras, where loggers and farmers have stripped away about 225,000 acres of forests every year. For the entire article see: http://www.boston.com/dailyglobe/globehtml/315/Deforestation_worsened_Mitch_s_toll.shtml Christopher Christie Mailing from Desolation Row "...the utterly dismal theorem. This is the proposition that if the only check on the growth of population is starvation and misery, then any technological improvement will have the ultimate effect of increasing the sum of human misery, as it permits a larger population to live in precisely the same state of misery and starvation as before the change." - Kenneth Boulding 1956 From refugee@thegrid.net Fri Nov 27 18:17:28 1998 Received: from smtp.thegrid.net (smtp.thegrid.net [209.162.1.11]) by csf.Colorado.EDU (8.8.8/8.8.8/ITS-4.2/csf) with SMTP id SAA08200 for ; Fri, 27 Nov 1998 18:17:24 -0700 (MST) Received: (qmail 514 invoked from network); 28 Nov 1998 01:17:23 -0000 Received: from pop.thegrid.net (209.162.1.5) by smtp.thegrid.net with SMTP; 28 Nov 1998 01:17:23 -0000 Received: from thegrid.net (lax-ts1-h2-41-1.ispmodems.net [209.162.41.1]) by pop.thegrid.net (8.9.1a/8.9.1) with ESMTP id RAA05668; Fri, 27 Nov 1998 17:17:17 -0800 (PST) Message-ID: <365ED0E5.11F8036@thegrid.net> Date: Fri, 27 Nov 1998 17:19:17 +0100 From: Christopher Christie Reply-To: refugee@thegrid.net X-Mailer: Mozilla 4.05 (Macintosh; U; PPC) MIME-Version: 1.0 To: PROGRESSIVE POPULATION NETWORK CC: Jfoster@OREGON.UOREGON.EDU Subject: Re: More on "established facts" References: <1.5.4.16.19981125142005.29ef99b4@oregon.uoregon.edu> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit > >John Bellamy Foster wrote: > >> First, for those like myself who approach population questions primarily > >> from the standpoint of global ecological crisis it has to be admitted that > >> overpopulation, though a factor in this crisis, is a relatively minor one > >> compared to the two other sources of environmental impact (according to the > >> PAT formula): affluence and technology. World economic output is increasing > >> much faster than population and contrary to the latter there is no > >> expectation that it will level off. On top of this there has been a > >> technological shift in the last half century to the production of toxic and > >> radioactive "byproducts" that threaten the biosphere and the health of all > >> the species within it at levels that we are only just beginning to > >> understand. Neither of these factors--affluence or anti-ecological > >> technology--can be attributed directly to population growth. > > > > Who says that "there is no expectation > >that it will level off" and how do they justify such a view in the face of > >resource limits? Can you point to any models that will support that assertion. > > Certainly the information provided by Meadows, Meadows and Randers in "Beyond > >the Limits" (Chelsea Green Publishing, 1992) would not. > > RESPONSE: Over the last century world population has increased by a factor > of 3, world output by a factor of 20. UN projections point to eventual > replacement level population, virtually no one (aside from Herman Daly and > handful of others) is talking about a replacement level economy. For that > to occur would mean the disintegration of the current system of > accumulation, which is "unthinkable" within the present order. It could only > take place under a fundamentally different social order, no longer geared to > the accumulation of capital. Hence, for those in the mainstream (even > mainstream ecologists) the fundamental conflict between increasing world > output and ecological sustainability within the current system is generally > ignored. It is much easier to take a neo-Malthusians tact which pretends > that population growth is the whole problem, and the avoid the tougher issue > of accumulation, which would mean a confrontation with power. Likewise the > issue of anti-ecological technology (automobiles, pesticides, > petrochemicals, the production of toxins) raises radical social issues, > unlike approaches that place the blame on population. I essentially concede to you on your good point concerning relative importance of the impact of affluence and technology on the global environment as it relates to global effects such as warming. I think it is important not to understate the importance of local effects of population growth such as habitat destruction and species endangerment or extinction that are driven by local growth rates and/or inmigration. I don't have the figures, but while per capita production of greenhouse gasses and other pollutants is relatively high in industrialized nations, one should not ignore the contribution and future contribution by the several billion people in the fast growing developing and lesser developed nations. There is also a need to realize that while technology and affluence are important factors, the three variables have tended to work together synergistically to increase overall impact - with population increasing if and when technology and affluence create a positive environment for such growth, and with population growth providing added incentives for more efficient and affluence providing technology as population pressures mount. While demographic transition theory has accounted for stabilizing populations in many developed nations, it may be breaking down at the national level in the face of Globalism and increasing international migration. While the theory may or may not apply at the global level, several thoughtful people have indicated that generalized misery and resource scarcity will occur prior to any stabilization, and hopefully, reduction, in world population. Do you disagree with the view (I would say self-evident fact) that world resources are ultimately limited? You did not respond to my questioning your apparent assertion that "there is no expectation that it [world economic output] will level off." I think a lot of us so-called neo-Malthusians would welcome "a fundamentally different social order, no longer geared to the accumulation of capital" and have said so in different ways. I certainly would. Some of us deplore growing multinational corporate control of nations and economies. Many that I am aware of are not as blind to the significant contributions of technology and affluence (consumption) as others seem to be to the role of population growth, which has become nearly a taboo subject in many circles. It is almost as if some would pretend that an additional human being does not represent an additional increment of consumption, pollution and environmental degradation in the real world. > > > >I think that a case can be made that in fact, both affluence and technology > >can in part, if not in full, be directly attributed to population growth. > >Whether you want to accept it or not, growth in animal (incl. human) > >populations tend to expand to the limit of the local (not global) > >environment's ability to sustain it. Momentary or prolonged affluence in terms > >of available resources initially can be seen to allow for increased > >populations which ultimately create scarcity. These pressures in humans > >populations cause humans to pause and scratch their heads long enough to > >develop technologies (food growing technology, energy technologies, etc.) to > >support the increased population which in turn brings increased affluence as > >long as resources and pollution sinks remain available to support the > >technologies, and call remains at a manageable complexity. Increased affluence > >in turn feeds increasing populations (for example, see "Perceived prosperity > >raises fertility" in "Population Politics" by Virginia Abernethy, Plenum > >Press, 1993) at least until the society in which the growth is taking place > >reaches a level of technological development similar to modern industrialized > >societies. (Does population growth always stop and stabilize in modern > >industrial societies as predicted by the demographic transition? > >Not if the society allows or feels a need for high levels of immigration due > >to intractable economic problems or misguided ideologies.) > > > RESPONSE: I don't understand where you get the asumption that growth in > animal (including human) populations automatically tends to expands to the > limit of the local environment's ability to sustain it. Here it is > interesting that you seem to think that the same exact laws apply to humans > as rabbits and mice. You don't seem to have advanced as far as Malthus in > his thinking who was forced to acknowledge moral restraint as a > characteristic specific to human beings. The evidence of this is everywhere in the anthropological and historical record from the territorial behavior of hunter-gatherers and horticulturalists, to food shortages associated with agricultural societies, and, with or without moral restraint, it seems to apply. It appears that food collectors and horticulturalists dealt with environmental resource restrictions quite well (by moving for instance) prior to contact with intensive agricultural societies and the encroachment of populous centralized agricultural state societies. Intensive agriculturalist are clearly associated with food shortage and famine in the anthropological and historical literature. I suspect that economic as well as other incentives and disincentives play a far more important role than "moral restraint" in reproductive matters. I was thinking of these groups and the less developed nations in particular when I made the prior statement above. I do however recognize that there are many complexities and that modern industrial societies live well beyond the local carrying capacity due to the importation of globally held resources. > > According to one basic text, "Cultural Anthropology," by Ember and Ember > >(Prentice Hall 1999 sic.) "most anthropologists think" that population growth > >at both local and global levels caused the change in technology from simple > >and benign food collecting technologies to food producing technologies. > > > >I conclude the population growth is a major factor that drives technology and > >affluence directly. > > RESPONSE: Western anthropologists as is well known have historically > embraced all sorts of chauvanistic views, including Malthusianism, social > Darwinism, racism, etc. To know what to make of this I would have to know > why they think as they do, i.e. what is the basis for their views. In any > case the point that you make is a pretty lame one. Who would deny that > population is a major factor? I was hoping, certainly, that you would not. I was however responding to your assertion that "Neither of these factors - affluence or anti-ecological technology - can be attributed directly to population growth." > But technology and socioeconomic order are > obviously factors too. And they all influence each other. What you want to > argue of course is that population is the most important factor, the > efficient cause, but you haven't shown this, and thus fall back on the point > that is a cause (among others). Population may or may not be the most important factor when all is considered, I am not sure about that, but it is enough that people recognize that it is obviously a very important factor. It is clear that when you look at the increase in GDP compared to population over the last century (assuming your figures are correct), that affluence and technology are also very important factors. I never said they weren't. You just can't separate people from their affluence and technology and we seem to agree on that. > > > >> Second, there is no direct relationship between population growth and world > >> hunger, or between population growth and famine. This has been established > >> in the work of Amartya Sen and in the various critiques of the agribusiness > >> system. > > > >It would be helpful if you provided a summary of the work you refer to and a > >source. In any event, hunger is a local event so it does not surprise me that > >one might have difficulty finding a relationship between "world hunger" and > >population growth. However, World Watch Institute notes that "Grainland per > >person has been shrinking since mid-century, but the drop projected for the > >next 50 years means the world will have less grainland per person than India > >has today. Future population growth is likely to reduce this key number in > >many societies to the point where they will no longer be able to feed > >themselves" (World Watch Paper #@ 143 "Beyond Malthus") While it is true that > >localized famine in populations can be linked to political conflict disrupting > >food distribution, or selling food for export, it is also true that these > >conflicts would not be able to create such disruptions where high numbers of > >people had not created a dependence on complex food production technologies, > >and where culture and economic systems did not allow food export. But given > >these realities, the population growth in these regions is associated with > >famine. One might also want to consider what would occur in the absence of > >conflict or food export. Ultimately the population must stabilize within > >carrying capacity or famine will result. Additionally, the current example of > >famine in North Korea appears to be a case where a local population has > >exceeded the lowpoints in food productivity caused by cyclical environmental > >events, in this case drought. > > RESPONSE: I don't think I need to provide a source for Amartya Sen since he > has just received the Nobel Prize in economics and the whole world is > talking about his ideas. Look these up for yourself--on the internet, in > the newspapers, bookstores and the libraries. It is an essential part of > your education if you are to discuss these issues at all since Sen is the > world's leading economist in this area. Be that as it may, your argument on > famine and population is incredibly convoluted. You say that a host of > "cultural factors" inclduing dependence on complex food technologies > (obviously associted with the agribuiness system) and export of food (also > associated with agribusiness) set the stage for famine. And then you add > that population growth in these regions is also a contributing element. > Logically, all this amounts to is saying that population is a factor within > a larger historical-economic-cultural context. I would agree and so would > everyone else. I was responding to your statement that "there is no direct relationship ... between population growth and famine." I was trying to establish that there is a direct relationship between population growth and famine and you now seem to admit as much so maybe this is just semantics. For example, in the I=PAT equation, Impact is directly related to Population. You could construct an equation that shows the relationship of various factors to extreme food shortage, Famine, and Population would be on the other side of the equal sign and directly related to Famine. For example, probability of F= P times some coefficient C, C standing for Culture including social, political and economic institutions as well as degree of technological development. > Yet, take away the export of food and the dependence on > complex food technologies (i.e. the breakdown of subsistence food systems > and the creation of dependence on a market mediated by filthy lucre and > controlled from abroad) and there is no famine. It is worth nothing as Sen > has shown in his studies that there is no correlation between famine and > actual food shortages (since the famine often occurs in years where food > production is higher), nor is there any correlation between famine and > population growth or density. I could find nothing in the internet literature to support your statements about "correlation." According to the Nobel Prize background material ( http://www.nobel.se/announcement-98/ecoback98.pdf page 20) Sen recognized that a food shortage can trigger a famine. (As Hardin noted, a shortage of food is a longage of people. People prefer not to acknowledge a longage of people.) The background material said: "Sen challenges the common view that a drastic decline in the supply of food is necessarily the most significant explanation for famine. But he does not claim to be the first to perceive that numerous other factors can cause famine in large groups of a population; nor does he maintain that a shortage of food cannot trigger famine. According to Sen, the conception which prevailed when the book was published, known as FAD (food availability decline), cannot explain phenomena observed during many famines, such as: (i) famine has occurred in years when the supply of food per capita was not lower than during previous years without famine; (ii) food prices increased considerably in some years, although the supply of food was not lower as compared to previous years; (iii) in all cases of famine, large groups have not suffered starvation; and (iv) in some case, food has been exported from famine-stricken areas." So Sen purports to show that a famine can occur in the absence of a longage of people. I don't doubt that it can. The background material also reported that some critics had criticsms concerning the adequacy of Sen's data: "A few critics have questioned the empirical foundations for Sen's results regarding the causes of famine. Indeed, data on food supply in a developing country stricken by famine are notorious for causing measurement problems. But such criticism nevertheless seems misdirected. In particular, Sen's insights into the causes of famine are highly valuable, regardless of whether some of the empirical results might be unreliable." So some can be forgiven for bad data. Here's what some his Hindu Compatriots had to say: "It is an established truism that Nobel awards are politically biased and instruments to retain the West's hegemony over developing countries." and "The Panchajanya editorial on Sen was somewhat churlish about another Nobel recipient, Mother Teresa. Thanks to the Mother, it says, India found a place on the world map as a country ridden with filth, disease and deaths, a country which could survive only on international charity." A good example of famine being directly related to population growth and technological "improvement" was given by Kenneth Boulding appearing in the "Image" in 1956: "The experience of Ireland is an extremely interesting case in point. In the late seventeenth century, the population of Ireland was about two million people living in misery. Then came the seventeenth century equivalent of [foreign aid], the introduction of the potato, a technological revolution of first importance enabling the Irish to raise much more food per acre than they had ever done before. The result of this benevolent technological improvement was an increase in population from two million to eight million by 1845. The result of the technological improvement, therefore, was to quadruple the amount of human misery on the unfortunate island. The failure of the potato crop in 1845 led to disastrous consequences. Two million Irish died of starvation; another two million emigrated; and the remaining four million learned a sharp lesson which has still not been forgotten." > > > >There is no just and equitable global distribution system and there will > >likely never be one. It is probable that the only way egalitarian societies > >will be achieved is to lower population levels down toward the level where > >those societies were able to flourish in the past, and those are very low, but > >ecologically sustainable levels. > > RESPONSE: What we know for certain is that more egalitarian societies that > emphasize socioeconomic distribution, women's rights (including control over > their own bodies), education, public health services, etc. are able to > stablize populations at lower levels of economic development while improving > the conditions of the poor. By saying that there is no such thing as an > absolutely just or equitable distribution system you are simply talking in > terms of absolutes, making your argument absolutely irrelevant. Lets put it this way, the only examples I know of in the anthropological literature of egalitarian societies that have existed for a sigificant period of time were/are subsistence technology societies with low populations. The egalitarian relationships were likely an appropriate response to environmental conditions. They disappeared with increasing technological complexity, pastoralism and the growth of intensive agriculture. If we were to mimic those conditions in the proper way we might once again live in egalitarian societies. I have nothing against the egalitarian ideal as long as attempts to create it are functional for humans and the rest of the biosphere. I don't think it can happen until and unless we reduce human populations dramatically but humanely. Christopher Christie Mailing from Desolation Row "...the utterly dismal theorem. This is the proposition that if the only check on the growth of population is starvation and misery, then any technological improvement will have the ultimate effect of increasing the sum of human misery, as it permits a larger population to live in precisely the same state of misery and starvation as before the change." - Kenneth Boulding 1956 From eglaze@vsta.com Sat Nov 28 13:15:29 1998 Received: from rivendell.vsta.com (rivendell.vsta.com [204.57.96.15]) by csf.Colorado.EDU (8.8.8/8.8.8/ITS-4.2/csf) with ESMTP id NAA20592 for ; Sat, 28 Nov 1998 13:15:24 -0700 (MST) Received: from eglaze.vsta.com (eglazeADSL.vsta.com [204.57.96.81]) by rivendell.vsta.com (8.8.8/8.8.6) with SMTP id OAA05211; Sat, 28 Nov 1998 14:17:16 -0600 (CST) From: "Ed Glaze III" To: , "PROGRESSIVE POPULATION NETWORK" Subject: Re: established facts Date: Sat, 28 Nov 1998 14:21:04 -0600 Message-ID: <01be1b0c$9feb2d60$516039cc@eglaze.vsta.com> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit X-Priority: 3 X-MSMail-Priority: Normal X-Mailer: Microsoft Outlook Express 4.71.1712.3 X-MimeOLE: Produced By Microsoft MimeOLE V4.71.1712.3 Rather than repost all the back and forth I will snip most of it and you can look up the specifics if you want. > Some Responses to Glaze. > From: John Bellamy Foster > > Any analysis that doesn't take into account or evades these > well-established facts is useless in terms of advancing a > meaningful discussion What John fails to acknowledge that there are other factors worthy of discussion in population issues besides his ten established facts. > But those who think that the whole problem can be reduced to > population, or that population growth is the main source of > ecological problems are barking up the wrong tree. The reduction of population, noit just the slowing of growth, will be the most difficult of our environmental problems, hence it is very important that we deal with population reduction along with the other social and environmental issues. 1. >> Neither of these factors -- affluence or anti-ecological technology -- >> can be attributed directly to population growth. >> >> No, but our unsustainable dependence upon such harmful >> technologies is bolstered by supporting our high population >> levels and there are certainly other less than direct links. > Response: This merely says population is a factor. Of course. > That is what I said. Yes, but that is not all that I said. You chose not to reply to my statement that it is our high population level which cause us to rely on such harmful technologies. With a lower population we would have much less reliance. 2. >> Why must all relationships be direct and global? Especially >> on a regional levels there are very strong arguments showing >> that a high population level (not just pop growth) contributes >> very much to malnutrition, difficulties in distribution, and >> other unmet infrastructure needs. Also supporting the much >> higher population levels in the future will likely be even more >> difficult and may well lead to both food and water shortages. >> Granted that agribusiness and economic orientations are >> a major contributing factor to problems with food distribution. >> >> >> >> Response: Again you are saying that population is a factor, nothing more. >> Who would disagree? The problem is that you want to say that population >> growth is the main factor and that the agribusiness system is a mere >> "contributory factor" (of secondary importance) and this is clearly wrong. Yes, I disagree, because I am saying more. I specifically said a high population level contributes very much, not just population growth as you imply. Our present agri-business system evolved to support our large population and is becoming stronger because we have such an excess of population in areas which cannot grow their own food. 3. >> Population issues entail more than just growth and there >> are many issues leading to a boggling complexity when >> socially-acceptable solutions are being sought. However, >> demographic factors do shown us that in ecological terms >> we are heading downhill towards a crash and such social >> issues as the demographic transition are not going to >> slow us sufficiently to avoid major problems. Besides to >> rely on the demographic transition to increase the living >> standards of all in the developing countries would lead to >> even more disastrous ecological disruptions as the time >> involved would likely be centuries. >> >> >> > Of course population growth is a problem and will contribute to ecological > disruption. Who would argue otherwise? The question is how serious is > it as a factor (in relation to other factors), how drastic are the remedies > necessary, what kinds of socially-based, egalitarian solutions can be > presented to solve the problem? Back you go to pop growth. The problem is supporting the population we already have without destroying the environment we depend on. Maybe you feel that we are not already overpopulated? When might we be -- 8 billion, 12 billion, 20...? -- and for how long do you anticipate supporting such large populations? What if drastic solutions are the only options we have left because we delayed so long in taking viable actions? You also did not address my point about the demographic transition (improving the economies and social conditions of developing countries to reduce birth rates) being too slow. 4. > Response: Again, this says population is a factor in terms of ecology, > poverty, etc., nothing more. What more it says is that high population levels make the great inequities in trade, economic distributions, resource usage, and many other things worse and that until population is reduced it is unlikely that these problems and the demographic trap will be solved. 5. >> And many more societies have not been able to bring population >> growth under control under any circumstances. Carrying Capacity >> should a much more important consideration than economic >> development if for not other reason than it will affect both rich >> and poor countries alike. Carrying capacity is being decreased >> by growing populations and decreasing resources, especially >> drinkable water. A couple good examples does not counter- >> balance a predominace of problems. >> >> >> > Response: This seems to be based on a fundamental misunderstanding > of ecological economics. The carrying capacity concept does not apply > simply to people independent of world economic output. It makes no > sense whatsoever to talk about people consituting a burden on the > earth's carrying capacity independently of production and consumption. Your response seems to indicate a misunderstanding of carrying capacity, which is an ecological principle not economic. I did not discuss ecological economics, or any other economics, as you implied. All the effects of people constitute their impact, not just the economics of production and consumption. CC is being reduced by supporting our high population levels and yet you seem to think it better to take a slow approach to solving overpopulation that takes many decades. 6. >> But some of the natural resources that are most threatened, >> like rainforests, are predominately in poor countries where >> there are high population levels and high population growth. >> Loss of such resources could have a much greater ecological >> impact and negatively affect our future, climate-wise, than >> we can afford, >> >> >> > Response: Yes, of course. Tropical rainforests exist in developing > countries. The Amazon rainforest is in Brazil where the U.S. (and a > handful of other advanced economic powers) own all the significant > sectors of the economy, and which has one of the most unequal > distributions of income and wealth in the world. I must not have made myself plain enough because you did not disagree. My point was that the vital natural resources, like rainforests, must be protected from the threats from both the exploitation of the rich countries and the high population levels in the developing countries. I am not so sure that the rich countries "own all the significant sectors of the economy" in Brazil but I am sure that through trade and trans-national corporations the moneid elite and politicians in Brazil are strongly influenced. If you had looked at the links I provided you would have found this quote, among lots of other good and explanatory information: "In short, there is no lifeboat escape possibility for the rich. All nations will have to come to grips with the limits to carrying capacity. Unless measures are taken by the rich to facilitate sustainable development, the continued destruction of humanity's life support systems (and a reduction in biophysical carrying capacity) is virtually guaranteed." 7. >> >> Whether Malthus intended to discuss ecology is not >> relevant, science builds on itself and a single principle >> can apply under many different circumstances. Also such >> a principle can be used for many different motives, which >> does not invalidate its proper use on any other motive(s). >> "Malthus may have been wrong on specifics, but in general >> principle he was right." >> >> >Response: the argument here is that it doesn't matter to self-styled >neo-Malthusian ecologists that Malthus had nothing to do with ecology, and >that it also doesn't matter if he was wrong on all the specifics as long as >he was right in general. What general aspect did he get right, and how can >this stand in the face of being "wrong on specifics"? I did not say that Malthus was wrong on all the specifics, you did. Your point about donwgrading social factors as opposed to biological could be explained by the increasing influence of science in helping us to understand just how our ecology functions. Whether social scientists like it or not, it will be the biological (environmental) factors that force us to act or suffer the consequences. Being right in general and wrong on specifics is easy and is the major problem with prejudgement and stereotyping. Again the links you failed to look at hold the answer. Here is another quote from the second link: "Kaplan has the last word in trying to answer the critics of Malthus. 'A man can only write at the time in which he is living, and Malthus was very daring for his time,' he said. 'In an indirect, subtle sense, Malthus was right.'" Robert D. Kaplan, a wrtier called by the article the guru on disintegration in the world. An August 1996 article by Kaplan, "Proportionalism -- What should the United States do in the Third World, where there's too much to do and too much that can't be done?" Or maybe you might read from February 1994, "The Coming Anarchy -- How scarcity, crime, overpopulation, tribalism, and disease are rapidly destroying the social fabric of our planet." 8. >> >> "The main population issues -- urbanization, rapid growth and >> uneven distribution -- when linked with issues of environmental >> decline, pose multiple sets of problems for policymakers. The >> very nature of these interrelated problems makes them virtually >> impossible to deal with in balkanized bureaucracies accustomed >> to managing only one aspect of any problem. Population and >> resource issues require integrated, strategic management, an >> approach few countries are in a position to implement. But time >> is at a premium. The decision period for responding to the >> crises posed by rapidly growing populations, increased >> consumption levels and shrinking resources will be confined, >> for the most part, to the next two decades. If human society >> does not succeed in checking population growth, the future >> will bring widespread social and economic dislocations as >> resource bases collapse. Unemployment and poverty will >> increase, and migrations from poorer to richer nations will >> bring Third World stresses to the developed world." > >Response: This is an evasion. It has nothing to do with the point that it >is ostensibly replying to. You sort of caught me there because I agree that my reply did not tie in with the Vogt quote you included. I actually agree with it in that extending human lifespans through medial improvement, however noble on an individual basis, has caused lots of problems and has contributed to overpopualtion. Instead I was trying to resond to your first sentence about "neo-Malthusianism has always tended to favor 'final solutions' to population problems." Again I ignored your use of neo-Malthusian context, which evidently has negative connotations on the PPN listserv. What other kind of solutions would you prefer to population problems? Temporary, inadequate, politically correct, or maybe totally ineffective because so far I have not heard much on solutions from you. 9. > Response: The only "argument" here is a reference to "human nature" > which is not explained. What is human nature? (snip) Maybe the only argument you have is on "human nature." You seem to imply that all human live is to be valued equally, which is one of the big hang-ups of the anti-choice folks, and we end up arguing from mutally exclusive assumptions. My point was that it is more important to deal with environmental realities that philosophical definitions. I have no problem with you labeling me as neo-Malthusian, but do not limit me to such a label. There are good and bad things about all these approaches and none of them are completely right. Just like I do not imply motives to you or call you a Marxist because you have been published in such a magazine. We must consider all relevant factors, not just 10, and realize that it will be a complex solution that we find to overpopulation, if any. Of course, the implementation and success of the solution will be largely determined by how well we deal with "human nature," whatever it is. 10. >>Tenth, by definition a PROGRESSIVE approach to population -- >>as opposed to a reactionary one -- recognizes all of the above >>and rejects the so-called "morality" of the "final solution." This >>means that population stabilization can only occur within the >>context of democratic social planning which recognizes the >>values of human freedom and equality. You must have a typo in your first sentence because everything that I have read on the PPN list relects a great concern with the "morality" of any solution. Me, I am not so limited and will gladly consider immoral and socially unacceptable solutions which has caused many of you to object to my posts. >> I suggest that those who are unwilling or unable (for whatever reason) >> to acknowledge these elementary truths should seek out lists of a more >> neo-Malthusian character (I am sure there are plenty of those). > That was not the point of my intervention of course, which > was to set the boundaries for a meaningful discussion within PPN -- > where certain basic facts are agreed upon. But we should understand > the social nature of this problem, which will allow us to intervene socially, > in ways that enhance democracy, equality and freedom -- not in ways > that simply target the poor. John did not bother to comment on my statement: "John Foster is not a listowner ...It seems the listowners should be the ones to issue such ultimatums." Then again, other than a request to keep message lengths down I got no response from listowners. They may be waiting to see what becomes of the discussion, which is after all the purpose of a listserv. It also seems that John is trying to keep certain ideas, possibly relevant, from being discussed on the PPN listserv. Social issues are important and need to be a part of any solution, but you cannot fail to discuss or solve the problem just because there may not be socially-acceptable solutions. It may not be possible to enhance democracy, equality and freedom if we continue to put off taking viable actions to reduce our overpopulation. Environmental problems are bad with 6 billion people, what will it be like with 9 or 12 and just think how much harder it will be to solve when our options are fewer and carrying capacity even further reduced. The nature of the problem is more than social and demographics can go a long way in helping people to understand the overpopulation issue. ________ Ed Glaze Port Mansfield, TX "If they don't understand the severity of the problem, they won't understand the severity of the solution. Overpopulation must be dealt with." From nicka@well.com Sat Nov 28 17:04:17 1998 Received: from smtp.well.com (smtp.well.com [206.80.6.147]) by csf.Colorado.EDU (8.8.8/8.8.8/ITS-4.2/csf) with ESMTP id RAA01540 for ; Sat, 28 Nov 1998 17:04:13 -0700 (MST) Received: from well.com (nobody@well.com [206.15.64.10]) by smtp.well.com (8.8.6/8.8.4) with ESMTP id QAA04176; Sat, 28 Nov 1998 16:04:07 -0800 (PST) Received: from localhost (nicka@localhost) by well.com (8.8.5/8.8.5) with SMTP id QAA04794; Sat, 28 Nov 1998 16:04:06 -0800 (PST) Date: Sat, 28 Nov 1998 16:04:06 -0800 (PST) From: "Nicholas C. Arguimbau" To: Christopher Christie cc: PROGRESSIVE POPULATION NETWORK Subject: Re: established facts In-Reply-To: <365BDCBB.CE17C3A@thegrid.net> Message-ID: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII I=PAT seems "uncontestable," but name me a significant "P" which has successfully and intentionally reduced its "A" and "T," and name me a single "P" which does not collectively believe (and rightly so) that it is entitled to as high an "A" and "T" as the nation with the highest. If these are values with which we are stuck on a global basis (and no one appeared willing to move from them in the Kyoto protocols), then I=PAT is not a true working formula. Rather, the true working formula may be: I is greater than or equal to P x present maximum A x T. In other words, P is all there may be control over. From eglaze@vsta.com Sat Nov 28 18:04:47 1998 Received: from rivendell.vsta.com (rivendell.vsta.com [204.57.96.15]) by csf.Colorado.EDU (8.8.8/8.8.8/ITS-4.2/csf) with ESMTP id SAA04256 for ; Sat, 28 Nov 1998 18:04:44 -0700 (MST) Received: from eglaze.vsta.com (eglazeADSL.vsta.com [204.57.96.81]) by rivendell.vsta.com (8.8.8/8.8.6) with SMTP id TAA10915 for ; Sat, 28 Nov 1998 19:06:37 -0600 (CST) From: "Ed Glaze III" To: "PPN Listserv" Subject: Thinning the herd -- articles Date: Sat, 28 Nov 1998 19:10:26 -0600 Message-ID: <01be1b35$0c5890a0$516039cc@eglaze.vsta.com> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit X-Priority: 3 X-MSMail-Priority: Normal X-Mailer: Microsoft Outlook Express 4.71.1712.3 X-MimeOLE: Produced By Microsoft MimeOLE V4.71.1712.3 Several days ago I caused a stir on the list when I mentioned that humans have no problem thinning herds of game animals or cattle when they exceed their carrying capacity and yet we refuse to recognize that humans are just another animal and the same rules should apply. Date: Saturday, November 21, 1998 12:53 PM Subject: Re: Fw: overpopulation & Malthus It would have been better to word it by saying that we need to recognize that our overpopulaton is also putting similar strains of the global environment as animal herds often do on a more localized area. Below are a couple articles which point out how we deal with animal overpopulation. I am not advocating culling humans. But I do say we must take some drastic actions to insure that such methods do not become more appealing as our environmental and social problems worsen around us as our population continues to grow. ________ Ed Glaze "If they don't understand the severity of the problem, they won't understand the severity of the solution. Overpopulation must be dealt with." November 27, 1998 Conservation takes a holiday by JEFF HARDER CNEWS Columnist Ontario Parks officials could learn a thing or two from the Ontario Federation of Anglers and Hunters. It seems many of the people who run the provincial parks have decided to put politics ahead of conservation. Take the white-tail deer cull at the southwestern Ontario's Pinery Provincial Park, first reported here two weeks ago, which saw about 260 animals shot in the last five days. The deer cull is needed to reduce the park herd, previously pegged at about 900 head, to 200 in order to sustain the park's fragile ecosystem. Simply put, overpopulation is killing the park's plant life and threatening the well-being of the deer herd. The hunt was carried out exclusively by aboriginal shooters, said ministry spokesman Brian Huis, most of whom used .270 and .240 calibre rifles. The parks officials think they're being clever by recruiting native hunters. The strategy, documented or not, suggests that critics will be muffled for fear of being labelled racist. So, it's not about using the best marksmen, satisfying a variety of interested parties or managing the natural resource. It's about ignoring the taxpaying, licence-buying federation of hunters in order to duck the written bullet of negative press coverage. It's also called gutless. Huis and his colleagues spurned federation offers to help with the cull, as outlined in a Nov. 18 letter to Natural Resources Minister John Snobelen. The thoughtful correspondence, obtained by CANOE, recommends annual hunts within park boundaries in order to avoid the random slaughter that is currently taking place. "Plans for initial and annual reduction of 30% for the herd will not effectively reduce the herd quickly enough to satisfy the objective of protecting the park ecosystem. It may only perpetuate the overpopulation problem, especially because no selective harvest plan is included," federation executive vice-president R.G. Morgan wrote. By standing by and watching the over-breeding and subsequent over-grazing take place, conservation officers are abrogating the very definition of their jobs. The federation has a solution. "The OFAH recommends that, after an initial cull, Parks Ontario use licences public hunters in annual controlled hunts to maintain sustainable deer populations in the parks. The OFAH believes that the (ministry) should use native and non-native hunters in any future cull. This will shift the responsibility for carcass handling, processing and distribution to hunters," Morgan said. In other words, it's cost-effective. Snobelen is listening, sources say. He hopes to schedule a non-native hunt for January in order to complete the cull. The federation, however, has not been notified. That's up to the parks officials, and their hands are full right now - with political footballs. NINE LIVES? NOT AT THE HUMANE SOCIETY Provincial parks aren't the only place where over-breeding is a problem. An abundance of frisky cats is keeping the crematorium on broil at St. Catharines' Lincoln County Humane Society. Society manager Frank Hampson said the exploding cat population is affecting the entire continent. "When I started (30 years ago), there were more dogs handled. Now, we see 1,000 more cats a year than dogs. Cats are on the upswing. Throughout North America, it's an emerging problem," he explained. "We spend $40,000 a year running our crematorium. Our gas bill is $1,200 a month." Wild cats are driving it, Hampson said. They breed, unchecked, all over rural Ontario. Barn cats, for example, are largely ignored until there are so many they become a menace to the farmer's daily chores. That's when the drowning starts. Since cats don't like water, they migrate. Many of the strays find their way into cities and towns, and eventually, a cage at the humane society. "It's usually because someone was too stupid to (spay or neuter)," Hampson said. Of course, death is the only way out of a cage at the humane society The strays are commonly gassed with carbon dioxide or put down with lethal injection. Until Wednesday night, the Lincoln County shelter used nothing but carbon dioxide on the strays. But its board has decided to fork over an extra $4,000 a year for a designer, two-injection process. First, the cats will get a calming anasthetic, then they will be hit with a lethal dose of poison. Just like hiring aboriginal hunters for deer culls, this move satisfies a host of critics while achieving the same goal: extermination. "People think that the needle is the panacea," Hampson said. "The truth is the government (agriculture ministry) still says the quickest and most humane method is the bullet. But we can't have that, can we?" From refugee@thegrid.net Sun Nov 29 11:18:04 1998 Received: from smtp.thegrid.net (smtp.thegrid.net [209.162.1.11]) by csf.Colorado.EDU (8.8.8/8.8.8/ITS-4.2/csf) with SMTP id LAA26640 for ; Sun, 29 Nov 1998 11:18:01 -0700 (MST) Received: (qmail 23791 invoked from network); 29 Nov 1998 18:18:00 -0000 Received: from pop.thegrid.net (209.162.1.5) by smtp.thegrid.net with SMTP; 29 Nov 1998 18:18:00 -0000 Received: from thegrid.net (lax-ts1-h1-40-51.ispmodems.net [209.162.40.51]) by pop.thegrid.net (8.9.1a/8.9.1) with ESMTP id KAA21098; Sun, 29 Nov 1998 10:17:57 -0800 (PST) Message-ID: <3661119F.E3B45E71@thegrid.net> Date: Sun, 29 Nov 1998 10:19:47 +0100 From: Christopher Christie Reply-To: refugee@thegrid.net X-Mailer: Mozilla 4.05 (Macintosh; U; PPC) MIME-Version: 1.0 To: PROGRESSIVE POPULATION NETWORK CC: "Nicholas C. Arguimbau" Subject: Re: established facts References: Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Nicholas C. Arguimbau wrote: > > I=PAT seems "uncontestable," but name me a significant "P" which has > successfully and intentionally reduced its "A" and "T," and name me a > single "P" which does not collectively believe (and rightly so) that it > is entitled to as high an "A" and "T" as the nation with the highest. Offhand I can't think of any of significance and would not expect that such examples would be easy to find if they exist. There are some individuals and perhaps a few communal groups that have done so. The observation that individuals and the populations that they make up tend to strive for and seek increased material affluence up to and even beyond the highest known level seems to be at the core of the problem. > > If these are values with which we are stuck on a global basis (and no one > appeared willing to move from them in the Kyoto protocols), then I=PAT is > not a true working formula. Rather, the true working formula may be: > > I is greater than or equal to P x present maximum A x T. In other words, > P is all there may be control over. I do not doubt that that I=PAT is anything more than a pretty good, but imperfect abstract explanatory structure. There has been some work to improve it but I don't have it handy right now (buried in boxes). One should be able to find more examples of people controlling their own population that of people willfully reducing their affluence and technology, which would indicate that perhaps controlling population, as you seem to suggest, would be a good place to start. I agree. One can find anthropological studies of how people control their populations (from abortion, encouraged homosexuality, infanticide, etc.), but I have not seen any that detail how people control their affluence, and that is probably because it has never been a problem due to the tendency to overpopulation creating groups living at the margins and due to the fact that we have not had such powerful technology until relatively recently. It may well be that due to human populations living at or near the margins for most of our evolutionary history, that we are genetically predispositioned to seek more comfort and security than we actually need at the time. As for possibilities for control over P, A or T, Population Communications International seems to had some success in reducing birthrates in some countries through use of mass media programming. They have been successful, if I have this right, in getting soap opera producers to include family planning messages in the soaps that people watch, and there are claims that this is responsible for reduced fecundity in those nations, Mexico being one example. If this is true, and I tend to think it is given the power of mass media for the purposes of "brainwashing," then it may be possible to reduce all three using the same vehicle. The problem would be in convincing Wall Street that it is in their best interest to do so, which is not likely to happen in many places under the current conditions, given corporate control of the media in the industrialized countries (if not everywhere) and given that capitalist economies seem to be a giant pyramid scheme involving the necessity of ever increasing numbers of consumers consuming increasing quantities of the biosphere. Christopher Christie Mailing from Desolation Row "Since we inhabit a limited world - (No other is practically available to our species) - the standard commercial competition favors individuals who refuse to reduce the longage of their demands. Unquestioning faith in the free enterprise system favors those who refuse to acknowledge essential shortages. As a result the dominant kind of competition favors the long term suicide of the demanders. Ecologically oriented citizens ... are (for the present at least) at a competitive disadvantage." - Garrett Hardin From les@vhemt.org Sun Nov 29 12:09:02 1998 Received: from mail.europa.com (exim@atheria.europa.com [199.2.194.10]) by csf.Colorado.EDU (8.8.8/8.8.8/ITS-4.2/csf) with ESMTP id MAA28444 for ; Sun, 29 Nov 1998 12:08:58 -0700 (MST) Received: from dialup-b108.europa.com ([204.202.55.108] helo=[204.202.55.95]) by mail.europa.com with esmtp (Exim 2.05 #5) id 0zkCDC-0000dA-00 for ppn@csf.colorado.edu; Sun, 29 Nov 1998 11:08:51 -0800 X-Sender: les@mail.vhemt.org Message-Id: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Date: Sun, 29 Nov 1998 11:10:40 -0800 To: PROGRESSIVE POPULATION NETWORK From: "Les U. Knight" Subject: RE: One Child, Two, None? Angela asked: "if ed thinks one child is the limit, and you [Ted] think that two are - on what basis are these projections made such that it is assumed there is sufficient moralising force behind either position such that others are expected to comply?" Although a moralizing force sufficient to motivate people to be responsible in their reproductive choices may not exist, there are compelling reasons why the intentional creation of one more of us by anyone anywhere can't be justified today. Here are three: Considering the tens of thousands of species going extinct each year due to our conversion of their habitat to ours, is it right for us to continue increasing our demands at their expense? As long as 40,000 children in the human family die of preventable causes on an average day, how can we justify the creation of one more new human? Extrapolating existing trends into the lifetime of a person born today, how likely is it that they will have the opportunity for a reasonably pleasant life? What are the odds that a massive die off will follow our over shoot of the carrying capacity of Earth's biosphere? Can we morally justify sentencing someone to life in this future? What about the right of the unaborted child to not be conceived in the first place? It seems to me that procreation today is the moral equivalent of selling berths on a sinking ship -- selling them to our children no less. I'm not suggesting restrictions on reproductive freedom. Rather, we need more reproductive freedom. Millions of couples are denied their right to not conceive, resulting in an estimated 75 million unwanted pregnancies per year. (UNFPA) Nor am I accusing people who have already bred of destroying habitat and society. To heir is human -- we all make mistakes. What really matters is how many people we don't create in the future -- whether we're affluent and wielding technology, or are malnourished and just scraping the earth to get by. Ted Toal wrote: "Finally, another direction for discussion. There are those, such as the VHEM (Voluntary Human Extinction Movement) who believe no one should have any children. There is a big faction that believes 1 should be the limit. I argue for 2 as follows: If everybody had 3, that would lead to exponential growth. If all have 2, that leads to a stable population. Since some choose to have 0 and some to have 1, then if NO ONE had more than 2, the fertility rate would be something less than 2, and population would eventually decline, which I firmly believe we desperately need. I respect the opinion of those who say we should limit it to 0 or 1 for a while to speed up the time at which we decline to a level at which human and other life can thrive. I'm looking for something that is feasible, though, and I think a limit of 2 is more likely to become the morally accepted norm than 0 or 1. Once we are down to a close-to-optimum level, a limit of 3 might still keep us within replacement-level-fertility. In fact, the more people come to want very small families, the less need there is for any limit at all." To which Peter VanZant replied: "Yes, I think it's necessary to be realistic about what people are going to be willing to do. From what I've seen, I think that "stop at two" is an idea which will be accepted by the majority. Some will choose to stop with none or one--some, of course will want more than two. Making "stop at two" the idea that population activists encourage will, I think, be most likely to result in stabilization. Sure, praise those who stop with none or one, but if we try to make that the norm, we'll create more resistance to our ideas than anything else." This is a dilemma. It's like a doctor who knows her patient will require six doses a day to get well, but only prescribes three because that's all they will accept. "Stop at two" was inadequate 30 years ago. Haven't we made any progress in awareness? At what point do we stop pandering to popular values and begin to tell it like it is? True, replacement level fertility will allow our numbers to stabilize over time. However, as Ed Glaze has documented, we don't have that much time. With two billion of us under the age of 20, even a one-child average birth rate per couple would continue to generate a net increase in our density for a generation or two. By saying that people should limit their reproduction to one or two, we are saying that Earth's situation is not really so dire, demonstrating a profound denial of reality, and sending a mixed message to those we want to become more aware. I realize that six billion people won't agree to refrain from further procreation. Still, I have yet to hear of any way that our creating even one more of ourselves will benefit humanity, the planet, or the new person. Again, I'm not advocating restrictions on reproductive choices, and I'm not blaming people who have bred. Existing life deserves respect. For a better world, Les U. Knight From refugee@thegrid.net Sun Nov 29 12:54:13 1998 Received: from smtp.thegrid.net (smtp.thegrid.net [209.162.1.11]) by csf.Colorado.EDU (8.8.8/8.8.8/ITS-4.2/csf) with SMTP id MAA29759 for ; Sun, 29 Nov 1998 12:54:10 -0700 (MST) Received: (qmail 29836 invoked from network); 29 Nov 1998 19:54:07 -0000 Received: from pop.thegrid.net (209.162.1.5) by smtp.thegrid.net with SMTP; 29 Nov 1998 19:54:07 -0000 Received: from thegrid.net (lax-ts3-h2-44-197.ispmodems.net [209.162.44.197]) by pop.thegrid.net (8.9.1a/8.9.1) with ESMTP id LAA27493; Sun, 29 Nov 1998 11:54:05 -0800 (PST) Message-ID: <36612826.70ABC2C2@thegrid.net> Date: Sun, 29 Nov 1998 11:55:39 +0100 From: Christopher Christie Reply-To: refugee@thegrid.net X-Mailer: Mozilla 4.05 (Macintosh; U; PPC) MIME-Version: 1.0 To: PROGRESSIVE POPULATION NETWORK CC: les@vhemt.org Subject: Re: One Child, Two, None? References: Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Les U. Knight wrote: > Ted Toal wrote: > "I'm looking for something that is feasible, though, and I think a > limit of 2 is more likely to become the morally accepted norm than 0 or 1. > Once we are down to a close-to-optimum level, a limit of 3 might still keep > us within replacement-level-fertility. In fact, the more people come to > want very small families, the less need there is for any limit at all." > > To which Peter VanZant replied: > "Making "stop at two" > the idea that population activists encourage will, I think, be most likely > to result in stabilization. Sure, praise those who stop with none or one, > but if we try to make that the norm, we'll create more resistance to our > ideas than anything else." To which Les U. Knight wrote: > This is a dilemma. It's like a doctor who knows her patient will require > six doses a day to get well, but only prescribes three because that's all > they will accept. "Stop at two" was inadequate 30 years ago. Haven't we > made any progress in awareness? > > At what point do we stop pandering to popular values and begin to tell it > like it is? True, replacement level fertility will allow our numbers to > stabilize over time. However, as Ed Glaze has documented, we don't have > that much time. With two billion of us under the age of 20, even a > one-child average birth rate per couple would continue to generate a net > increase in our density for a generation or two. > > By saying that people should limit their reproduction to one or two, we are > saying that Earth's situation is not really so dire, demonstrating a > profound denial of reality, and sending a mixed message to those we want to > become more aware. Les makes the important and overriding point: What is socially popular or currently acceptable is not often sufficient to effect a cure or solve the problem. What would be helpful in this case are a few (or at least one) "simple" population projections for the world based on the "stop at two" or "stop at one" scenarios, showing what might happen if we were able to acquire the lowered fertility immediately or say in ten years. That way we would have some numbers to more objectively evaluate. Can anyone on the list provide properly prepared projections? I have sent this to one demographer in hopes that she might have time to help. Does anyone know of someone who might help or a reference to existing projections such as these? Christopher Christie From les@vhemt.org Sun Nov 29 15:20:02 1998 Received: from mail.europa.com (exim@atheria.europa.com [199.2.194.10]) by csf.Colorado.EDU (8.8.8/8.8.8/ITS-4.2/csf) with ESMTP id PAA04317 for ; Sun, 29 Nov 1998 15:20:00 -0700 (MST) Received: from dialup-b018.europa.com ([204.202.55.18]) by mail.europa.com with esmtp (Exim 2.05 #5) id 0zkFC8-0007Il-00 for ppn@csf.colorado.edu; Sun, 29 Nov 1998 14:19:57 -0800 X-Sender: les@mail.vhemt.org Message-Id: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Date: Sun, 29 Nov 1998 14:19:22 -0800 To: PROGRESSIVE POPULATION NETWORK From: "Les U. Knight" Subject: Re: One Child, Two, None? Christopher, I would love to see projections for an average birth rate of one. None I've seen are that optimistic. Maybe demographers feel that there isn't much point in creating projections which are so unlikely. China has yet to achieve zero population growth, even with their restrictions, due to momentum. The projection will have to take into consideration that one third of Asia's and Latin America's people are under the age of 15, as are half of Africa's. A projection of global population trends if total infertility were achieved would also be fun to see. This might seem simple: just divide six billion by the number of people who die each year and we'll have the number of years until Homo sapiens is extinct. However, death rates would drop dramatically if no more of us were born, and would continue to decline as we re-prioritized health care. So, I hope your efforts to find unrealistically optimistic projections are more successful than mine. I look forward to seeing them posted if you find them. Les U. Knight From donchism@ican.net Sun Nov 29 15:27:02 1998 Received: from mail1.tor.accglobal.net (mail1.tor.accglobal.net [204.92.55.105]) by csf.Colorado.EDU (8.8.8/8.8.8/ITS-4.2/csf) with ESMTP id PAA04551 for ; Sun, 29 Nov 1998 15:26:59 -0700 (MST) Received: from ppp-088.m2-10.tor.ican.net ([142.154.22.88] helo=donchism.ican.net) by mail1.tor.accglobal.net with smtp (Exim 2.02 #1) id 0zkFIu-0002Cg-01; Sun, 29 Nov 1998 17:26:57 -0500 Message-Id: <1.5.4.32.19981129222720.00993234@ican.net> X-Sender: donchism@ican.net X-Mailer: Windows Eudora Light Version 1.5.4 (32) Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Date: Sun, 29 Nov 1998 17:27:20 -0500 To: ppn@csf.colorado.edu From: fran^don Subject: Responsibility in "Thinning the herd" At 07:10 PM 11/28/98 -0600, eglaze@vsta.com wrote: >Several days ago I caused a stir on the list when I mentioned snip >I am not advocating culling humans. But I do say we must take >some drastic actions to insure that such methods do not >become more appealing as our environmental and social >problems worsen around us as our population continues to grow. >________ Ed Glaze Ed: Actually, two reductions are well under way now: -(1) Thinning of the human herd: One recent snapshot of a micro event, in a long term macro process, is the humans who died and will die, as a result of hurricane Mitch. -(2) Reduction in human Carrying Capacity: Mudslides reduced arable mountain sides to bare rock. Honduras can now support fewer humans than before. Buckminister Fuller referred hurricanes 'heat energy machines' Probably the intensity of today's hurricanes and typhoons are exacerbated by excessive Human Activity, causing global warming. Noted in today's paper, World Watch Inst. research indicates financial cost from ecological tragedies in 11 months of 98 higher than in all of the 80s decade. Reports indicate that the nature of farming on the mountainsides has changed to specialty industrialized agriculture, which has displaced much the natural flora and fauna, altering both the web of life and the web of structural support on the mountain slopes. The macro event, of course, is Human Activity which has been roughly exponential for more than a century. System hysteresis (delay between cause and effect in systems) in the Gaian system seems very slow in terms of human perception (boiling frog Syndrome), however rapid they may now actually be in evolutionary terms. Since today's increasing natural disasters are the result of Gaian systemic disturbances over the past 100 years, it would seem to be pure hubris to predict a future stable era, without massive reduction in human activity - in both our body count and the things we do sustain ourselves. Of course, the micro thinning in Honduras leaves global population growth very positive for the time being - population growth made possible by capital spending of non renewable resources. The government of virtually every industrialized country promotes growth in Human Activity through economic development. For those of you who feel squeamish about the thought of personal participation in the culling human numbers, just remember: Every time you personally go to vote for a government which promotes industrial growth, you are voting to enhance nature's way culling of humans and to reduce our planet's human Carrying Capacity - toward zero. Perhaps it's time for "we the people" to accept a little personal responsibility in this process, which we are cognizant of, and seriously explore alternate political processes, ones which recognize the folly of continuous growth. At the moment, the only viable political option would seem to be some of the Green Parties which recommend reversal to current trends. See www.greenparty.on.ca Don Chisholm ////////\\\\\\\\ Don Chisholm 416 484 6225 fax 484 0841 email donchism@ican.net The Gaia Preservation Coalition (GPC) http://www.envirolink.org/orgs/gaia-pc personal page: http://home.ican.net/~donchism/dchome.html "There is an almost gravitational pull toward putting out of mind unpleasant facts. And our collective ability to face painful facts is no greater than our personal one. We tune out, we turn away, we avoid. Finally we forget, and forget we have forgotten. A lacuna hides the harsh truth." - psychologist Daniel Goleman \\\\\\\\\/////////