The thing is, that it is virtually impossible to "control" population.
We can lock down our borders and make some public effort to dissuade
people from making babies. But it might be easier to solve the problem
of global warming and get everybody from Israel and Palestine together
for a big group hug. There is a growing public awareness that this
planet of ours can only support so many of us. Hardship for the poor
and a good dose of guilt for the rich are more likely to slow population
growth than active policy. The best thing that we can do right now is
pick a lot of special places to protect and teach the children of today
to care enough to preserve them. Try to make a child feel badly for
existing and we will detach him from his role in the world ecosystem.
Is this just exacerbating the problem? If population growth scares you
(as it should), do something positive for a kid.
"We can't f*** up the planet; all we can do is f*** up ourselves. The
planet will recover in a blink of cosmic time" -- L. Kelley (Beer talk
from a very astute, but generally anonymous buddy of mine) It is our
quality of life that we're talking about. Let's be altogether selfish.
Bernie Krause wrote:
>
> As Bill McKibben once said: "We often choose to love nature to death."
>
> Bernie
>
> On Nov 10, 2008, at 9:48 AM, Robert Heckendorn wrote:
>
> > I would like to give an example of endangered local habitat and make a
> > prediction that I think is relevant to this group and the wild places
> > we enjoy. The area around Fort Collins, Colorado is exploding in
> > population. Huge additions are being built. The recreation in the
> > area is wonderful (I lived there for 12 years). One of the gems is
> > the Poudre River Canyon. It is about 50 miles of wonderful rural and
> > scenic riparian area. The people of Fort Collins love their river.
> >
> > Now for my prediction. even though people love the outdoors and love
> > their river, when population pressures force the need for more water
> > and people have to give up all their lawns and cleaning things and the
> > public pool and when it gets down to just crops and drinking water
> > they will dam the Poudre river and you can kiss the Poudre River
> > canyon goodbye. No one is asking now if there is a problem with
> > uncontrolled population growth, they will just take the natural places
> > because they have to survive *that day* when it is too late. In a
> > choice between your children's survival and nature, nature loses. The
> > way to avoid that decision is to consider population today not how we
> > accommodate the population when it is too late.
> >
> > I don't mean this to sound so negative but like high explosives,
> > exponential growth needs to be handled with great care and we can't
> > just say "Things will work out". Not that anyone has in this very
> > nature sensitive group. I just feel compelled by Walt's remarks to
> > express my feelings about this seldom mentioned threat to nature.
> >
> >
> >
>
>
>
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