Are We Knowingly Living a Lie?

[JowGaWolf]

Humans can't control the population on the local city level.

Unsubstantiated. Tell us more. This is a discussion!

Waycross, Georgia has been facing several challenges in recent years. According to the World Population Review, Waycross had a population of 13,502 in 2023, which is a decline of 2.79% since the most recent census in 2020 1. The population is currently declining at a rate of 0.94% annually 1.

Waycross Georgia has been trying to increase their population for decades. Waycross is not the only city trying to increase its population. But there are also cities growing too fast. Which puts a strain on local resources. One of the tasks that Cities are responsible for is to bring resources and jobs into the city. Which also brings more resources. I've worked in City and County governments for most of my life and it's always the same. A city is either struggling to grow or drowning because they are growing too fast and lack the resources. Population shifts are usually caused by influx of immigrants and change in demographics. Crime also plays a part but not as much as changes in demographics and cost of living. Cities will sometimes do population shift which is simply moving one group of people to the city and the other group of people to the suburbs by revitalization programs. Some of these programs are initiated to make people rich. The city will trick the residents into thinking that they are getting a good deal by moving to the suburbs. The residents often don't understand that within 10 years their property will be worth millions. Real estate companies and other companies come in and buy the property for cheap and make a large profit.

Overall population increases in the city are welcomed. The more people the more taxes you'll collect, the more taxes you collect the more money you'll have. The more money you have the more services you can offer citizen The more services you have the more attractive the city looks to citizens. The more citizens you'll need the more Corporations you need to attract. The more corporations that you have the more jobs you have, the more jobs that you have, the more resources citizens will have. But everything has a limit so if you get too many people the system will break.

I used to use Sim City to help teach city management to youth. Excellent game. While many fail at it, there are a lot of real-life concepts in it, and population is one of them.

 

[geezer]

"Anthropomorphic climate change", is not a thing.

The word you wanted was "anthropogenic".

Dang, now you got me thinking, "What would anthropomorphic climate change" even look like???


...like a man, of course!

Wait. That doesn't help.

 

[JowGaWolf]

On the other hand, totally uncontrolled, laissez faire systems are also horrible.

I come from a family that believes in regulation and social responsibility. Some of us in society are driven by being good citizens and helping one another. Others are driven by greed and hyper self-interests. So, I believe the regulations that we need are those that are geared towards the most negative human behaviors that have the greatest impact on others. For example, if my greed is such that I'm willing to do anything and sacrifice anyone for me to make money, then I need to be regulated. I don't believe in regulation for the sake of regulation and for the sake of "I know better than everyone else power struggles." Somethings are better left to run a course on their own and allow individuals to make small changes that eventually, and slowly affect the general society in the way that it needs to be affected.

A country's citizens are the fine-tuning mechanisms that make larger government policies successful. However, if we don't have the ability to decide certain things, then those micro adjustments won't be made. I want regulations that ensure the safety of the food and drugs that I take. I want regulations that help to prevent businesses from operating in a predatorial manner. I want regulations that help prevent banks from taking my money and spending it on themselves, while leaving me without money in my account.

I want regulations that keep the water that I drink from looking like this. There must be balance. We can't just let other people do as they please especially when they care little for the general population.

And right now we are very out of balance. Even my old 50 year old Maytag is banging itself apart on the spin dry cycle. What's a guy to do?

Don't feel bad. My new washing machine is less than 5 years old. It bangs around as well. It's only good for Buyer's Remorse lol

 

[JowGaWolf]

So my point is that the problem with waiting for nature to do the job is that "Nature" can be very harsh!

Nature is harsh, that's why it's so effective, and it's also why I don't think it needs additional assistance with reducing numbers. I'm leaning more towards trying to preserve life. Not because I'm noble with a deep sense of care for the earth. I'm saying it from the perspective that there are so many components that affect population that I'm afraid something that seems like a small change turns out to be a nightmare.

Nature doesn't care about "humanity". Maybe that's why the force we call "nature" has been been historically personified by very fierce and cruel deities (as shown in my previous post).

That's why I like it. It's not biased lol. As for nature getting hungry? You'll like this. Answer. The first time I've saw this painting was in my 7th grade Spanish class. This is one of my favorite paintings. I used to stare at it each class. I'm not sure if it's a good thing, but this picture is relaxing for me. Lots of good memories tied to the class. It was also the first time that I tried green tea. My Spanish teacher was from Argentina, and she brought some green tea leaves for the class for the students to try. Any other day I wouldn't have been able to remember that, but this picture triggers those memories.

Sooooo. looks like "Hungry mother nature is it." lol

 

[JowGaWolf]

(I love Goya and this painting)

Same here. There aren't many paintings that I like but this one understands me lol

 

[BaehrTKD]

But the responsibility is that of the consumer. Just because Apple puts a new phone in front of us making the previous version from 10 months ago ‘obsolete’, it doesn’t mean we have to buy it.

That's true, but once again: 8 billion people = 8 billion Apple iPhones.
16 billion people = 16 billion Apple iPhones.
Apple would rather have a planet with 16 billion people on it because each of them will have at least one iPhone.

Even if people buy phones less frequently to reduce their consumption, 16 billion people will still have at least one iPhone each. More people means more money for Apple.

We should not be so manipulable that we consume it. But situational stupidity kicks in, we buy into the cool advertising with a frizzy-haired youth flipping his skateboard with a perfect smile while posting a picture of the kid in the sweat shop who glued the product together (so you can’t replace the throttled battery) and we have to queue outside the shop to be the first to have it.

And ultimately that's exactly what will happen, so consumption and waste are guaranteed to increase as the population increases.

Isn’t that redistributing the population rather than creating more of it to consume more?

Capping immigration ultimately caps the population in countries like India and China as well, because they will run out of space and resources internally when they can no longer ship people to foreign countries. Currently, China and India's prime export is people. They are essentially baby factories.

Since we can't force our rules on other nations, it's the best we can do. We can preserve our lifestyle and our quality of life, until the rest of the world finally clues in and follows suit.

I dont understand why economies need to grow year-on-year. If they all become static won’t that cure the issue of inflation etc, assuming the population levels become static….there you go….population is the issue…..

Exactly. Ultimately what needs to happen is a shrinking economy. Less money in the system. Reduced profits.

The currently constructed system is all about consumption. It's all about "more more more". It'll be an incredible shock to people in the future when it all comes crashing down.

 

[BaehrTKD]

The world doesn't need saving. It will save itself itself. Mother nature has always been able to adjust populations as needed.

I should rephrase:

"The only thing that can save humanity is a reduced human population, back down to where it was a century ago."

You're right, the planet is in no danger. Humans are in danger of a mass extinction event which will likely occur due to climate change induced famine, destruction of habitat, and disease. As our planet quickly warms up, we'll lose the ability to produce food. Animals will go extinct, and humans (despite all of our wonderful inventions) will succumb to the same fate.

 

[JowGaWolf]

"The only thing that can save humanity is a reduced human population, back down to where it was a century ago."

Let's put your numbers into a different perspective. For us to get back to population levels from 100 years ago. We would have to lose 81.44% of the human population. A lot of things would break. There are currently 3.4 billion people employed. There are numerous elements to work in and none of it looks good.

Someone should ask the Chat Ai about that idea. Ask " What would happen if the world population dropped to 1.8 billion people."

 

[geezer]

Capping immigration ultimately caps the population in countries like India and China as well, because they will run out of space and resources internally when they can no longer ship people to foreign countries. Currently, China and India's prime export is people. They are essentially baby factories.

So you think that we can create a huge, impenetrable wall and live in "Fortress USA" while the rest of the world overpopulates and goes to hell?

Have you never considered how interconnected we all are ...economically, politically, ecologically? Another thing, China, India, and Pakistan have nukes. If they become truly desperate, they may use them. They don't have to use them against us, but just against each other to affect us. Bigtime.

Since we can't force our rules on other nations, it's the best we can do. We can preserve our lifestyle and our quality of life, until the rest of the world finally clues in and follows suit.

The kindest thing I can say is that you haven't really thought this out.

 

[BaehrTKD]

Let's put your numbers into a different perspective. For us to get back to population levels from 100 years ago. We would have to lose 81.44% of the human population. A lot of things would break. There are currently 3.4 billion people employed. There are numerous elements to work in and none of it looks good.

Someone should ask the Chat Ai about that idea. Ask " What would happen if the world population dropped to 1.8 billion people."

True, but it wouldn't happen overnight. It would take a century of birth control (one child per family and encouraging people to go childless) to get it back down to where it was.

It would be a unique world to see apartment buildings being demolished and replaced by houses, which are ultimately demolished and replaced by natural undeveloped land (grass, trees). Forests would regrow. Polluted lakes and rivers would return to being clean. Wildlife populations would return to previous levels.

It's important to consider how many things we've broken to get the world into the state it currently is.

 

[BaehrTKD]

So you think that we can create a huge, impenetrable wall and live in "Fortress USA" while the rest of the world overpopulates and goes to hell?

Have you never considered how interconnected we all are ...economically, politically, ecologically? Another thing, China, India, and Pakistan have nukes. If they become truly desperate, they may use them. They don't have to use them against us, but just against each other to affect us. Bigtime.


The kindest thing I can say is that you haven't really thought this out.

So your strategy is basically to give up and bow to the whims of China and India?

I don't want my country to be overpopulated, to have its natural resources depleted, to have its landscape completely ruined and polluted, and I don't want to live in an overcrowded city.

Ultimately the decision is going to be made for us. Humans are unwilling to do what's necessary to change now, and it will result in extinction later. (Not in my lifetime, but within the next 500 years I'd say humans will be gone.)

 

[Oily Dragon]

Dang, now you got me thinking, "What would anthropomorphic climate change" even look like???


...like a man, of course!

Wait. That doesn't help.

Like this

 

[Gyakuto]

"Anthropomorphic climate change", is not a thing.

The word you wanted was "anthropogenic".

Ohhhh…another denier in our very midsts

 

[Gyakuto]

Although it doesn’t make any difference to this debate, it does explain the actual mechanism of global warming.

 

[Gyakuto]

The amount of incident electromagnetic radiation that a planet reflects off it’s surface and back out into space is know as it’s albedo (how reflective it is). It was proposed, a long time ago, that by simply painting building’s rooves with white paint, the albedo can be increased thus reducing the rate of heating of the earth.

Nothing seems to have come of this…

 

[Fungus]

bow to the whims of China and India?

Haven't we already, as doing martial arts like Karate and TKD, bowed to the whims of and old Indian buddhist monk?

 

[Steve]

Dang, now you got me thinking, "What would anthropomorphic climate change" even look like???


...like a man, of course!

Wait. That doesn't help.

It would look like that painting by Goya.

 

[Steve]

That's true, but once again: 8 billion people = 8 billion Apple iPhones.
16 billion people = 16 billion Apple iPhones.
Apple would rather have a planet with 16 billion people on it because each of them will have at least one iPhone.

Even if people buy phones less frequently to reduce their consumption, 16 billion people will still have at least one iPhone each. More people means more money for Apple.


And ultimately that's exactly what will happen, so consumption and waste are guaranteed to increase as the population increases.


Capping immigration ultimately caps the population in countries like India and China as well, because they will run out of space and resources internally when they can no longer ship people to foreign countries. Currently, China and India's prime export is people. They are essentially baby factories.

Since we can't force our rules on other nations, it's the best we can do. We can preserve our lifestyle and our quality of life, until the rest of the world finally clues in and follows suit.


Exactly. Ultimately what needs to happen is a shrinking economy. Less money in the system. Reduced profits.

The currently constructed system is all about consumption. It's all about "more more more". It'll be an incredible shock to people in the future when it all comes crashing down.

There is growing momentum behind what is being referred to as the "right to repair". Whether that helps or not remains to be seen, but it's something I'm keeping an eye on.

 

[Oily Dragon]

Ohhhh…another denier in our very midsts

You so funny, but seriously, this is one of the things AI gets right.

Because Google will literally fix this search for you, without even asking. It's been trained to understand "humans make this mistake, fix it".

I like it when computers fix my errors.

 

[Instructor]

Let's put your numbers into a different perspective. For us to get back to population levels from 100 years ago. We would have to lose 81.44% of the human population. A lot of things would break. There are currently 3.4 billion people employed. There are numerous elements to work in and none of it looks good.

Someone should ask the Chat Ai about that idea. Ask " What would happen if the world population dropped to 1.8 billion people."

This discussion about population reminded me of a very intriguing video:

If you have 50 minutes to kill It really gives some new insight. Bottom line is more humans means more minds working on the problems humans face. So more people might actually be part of a solution.

Personally I don't like crowds, inflation, or sprawl so I'm in favor of less humans.