Print

Please login or register.
1 Hour 1 Day 1 Week 1 Month Forever
Login with username, password and session length

[George_Chickens]

VOLCANO WORK EVERY TIME

[Reelya]

Ah, it was the 1783 Iceland eruption I was thinking about.

https://www.economist.com/christmas-specials/2007/12/19/the-summer-of-acid-rain

Ah, it turns out the main culprit was hydrofluoric acid in that case. They had burning first, the freezing due to the SO2, then it rained hydrofluoric acid, not SO2-based acid, though that's also a problem for other reasons.

We've still got to worry that out population could collapse due to a series of super-volcano eruptions like they had around 1815, the so called "year without summer". That could make our emissions problems seem quaint if another event of that magnitude occurs. Though, that could solve some of our resource problems if it wipes out enough people

[dragdeler]

-snip-

[wierd]

I hate to say this Drags, but the sad reality is that at current levels of resource consumption and waste product generation, there really are too many people on the planet.

If there is to be a mass die-off, I would rather that it be due to a natural catastrophe than a mass government sponsored culling (of any sort).  Nature at least does not care who it targets, and does not react favorably to being told no. (see also, the rise of resistant microbes, cause by the worlds more wealthy abusing antibiotics for bullshit reasons.)

when humans try to be the arbiters of such judgment, it is always for political reasons, that somehow always seem to miraculously spare the wealthy and influential. (rolls eyes)

You can have all the righteous indignation you want at the prospect of considering the world overpopulated, and insist that nitrogen fertilizer is perfectly sustainable when it really and truly is not--  but that wont change the face of reality, as it does not care how angry you get at it.

[redwallzyl]

Not really, we are just bad at organizing stuff, there is not technical limitation to fixing it.

[wierd]

Not true.

The "We can feed everybody right now, we just suck at distribution!"  statement blindly ignores that the statement is predicated on the sustained use of nitrogen fertilizers, which has several decades of data showing it is not sustainable, and causes catastrophic depletion and desertification of cropland over time.

[SalmonGod]

We also vastly over-provide food to some populaces and under-provide to others, invest too much in over-processed luxury items and livestock, and throw away a disgusting proportion of what is produced.

There's immense potential for the human race to reduce resource consumption and waste without reducing population or giving up very much quality of life, and food is a great example.

[Kagus]

Breweries in Norway are suffering because there's currently a fairly significant CO2 shortage... I say we get two birds stoned at once and throw beer at the sky until it absorbs the atmospheric CO2 and rains back down, bringing the fizzy goodness back to earth.

[dragdeler]

-snip-

[Descan]

I hate to say this Drags, but the sad reality is that at current levels of resource consumption and waste product generation, there really are too many people on the planet.

Nnooope. Even if you kill off the bottom 80 percent of the population (bottom in terms of resource use) the resource usage wouldn't be impacted much at all. [src] Which means that, since the effect on resource usage is not changed by such a population change, population doesn't actually have an effect on resource usage. Or if it does, it's a minor and probably negligible impact, considering you only cut it by 25% from a cull of 80% of humans.

It's not the population that's the problem, it's the overall distribution (some use way too much while others use barely any at all) and the usage of a small elite cohort at the top of the graph. "Trimming the population" would do nothing at best or make the problem bigger at worst, through various mechanisms. Not least of which is the remaining population (who, let's be honest, is gonna be the rich fucks. I.E. the ones using too many resources) are gonna go "Hey, more for us!" and then use EVEN MORE than they were before. Not to mention the impact of the actual culling mechanisms; you gotta kill 'em somehow. And even if you could Thanos them dead in a second, you'd still have problems just from the loss of people.

Not to mention that that bottom 80% of the population tends to live in Africa and Asia, and 'we have too much population!' has historically and continues now to be disguised systemic racism at best, out-and-out personal racism and hatred of the 'lesser races' at worst.

E: If any of you have an hour to kill, this video goes into the history and current state of population, resource usage, and the historical and current state of the 'we have too much population!' argument. And yes, it's sourced, his sources are in the description and peppered through the video if you want to argue the facts he used.

[ChairmanPoo]

No Descan! We clearlyhave to eat the poor! It is the only way!






















And I mean literally eating the poor! Over a glass of chianti!

[Descan]

The video I linked also has better sources than the graph I half-remembered and found through a cursory google search, btw. So don't take my little 2 second googling to be indicative of the effort that Peter bloke put into making his argument.

Also I think he does mention the whole 'eating the poor' thing too :v

[ChairmanPoo]

That's because the poor are tasty! Lean meat!  Peter knows!

[Dunamisdeos]

We have a ridiculous amount of unused arable land in the US.

It's something like 6-7% of our land even being inhabited or developed at all, including farmland according to google. If we wanted to the world could produce enough food to feed us all, but humans being what we are this would simply result in like 10 people having extra mountains of food they won't share, because immigrants or something.

[Rolan7]

I have my phone, on a third charge, and I'm eminently aware of how little it reveals at minimum brightness.

My familiar room, which I know in both light and dark, but not this... eerie stillness, with rain and distant thunder rolling.

Dog just started howling down the way. An incessant voice coaxing them inside. An argument now.  In the rain.

I  just hope the rain continues. I fear the sound of silence. As xkcd says, it starts with the natural whine/tone. Rain drowns it out. No incessant buzzing. No dark dreams.
No visage of yourself, mouth open, buzzing