@MentORPHEUS You wouldn't be stabilizing anything with a population at a fraction of what it is today. At too low of a fraction, humans would go extinct, and how low that number is can't be predicted with any accuracy. All of these modern conveniences we enjoy wouldn't exist if, beginning thousands of years ago, the white birth rate had been lower than it what it actually was. Similar catastrophic consequences will ensue if future birth rates are too low.
Ehrich was wrong about everything. He assumes humans are interchangeable, among many other wrong assumptions, and he isn't good with math, especially logarithmic and exponential effects.
Commodity price trends over the last few centuries say you're wrong.
Paul Ehrlich's predictions in The Population Bomb and elsewhere often get pointed to in this discussion. He wasn't wrong about resource depletion, but his prediction timelines were off because of ongoing advances in resource extraction. Sure, humankind has kept up with rising demand far beyond the limits seen by Ehrlich in his time, but at the cost of massively increasing entropy. For example, massive strip mining and leaching operations to capture minerals, and the Faustian bargain of fracking to keep wells producing that were declining with traditional methods but at a higher price per BTU and much more dire deferred environmental cost.
China is facing a catastrophic future due to its idiotic one child policy.
Probably the worst example. China has managed to industrialize and raise the individual standard of living far faster and better than almost EVERY nation in modern history, in large measure BECAUSE of the one child policy.
does not portend well for the future of these countries
Exactly WHAT is troubling about stabilizing population numbers at some fraction of where they are today, in the name of prosperity for all into the distant future? Many of the arguments I've heard against it are economic and boil down to top quintile no longer able to exploit the growing masses for profit and wealth concentration upward. The quiet part seldom said out loud is fear that "their" race will get "taken over" by other races. Proponents of either of these arguments never seem to bring a viable answer to the question of HOW to sustain an ever-growing population on a limited planet to the table.
Read More@MentORPHEUS Commodity price trends over the last few centuries say you're wrong. This is an area that is counterintuitive. To many people, it seems like the world is overpopulated, but in fact, the low birth rate in Europe the U.S., Japan, and South Korea is very troubling and does not portend well for the future of these countries unless something changes soon. China is facing a catastrophic future due to its idiotic one child policy. Even the people who ran the data for it realize now that they screwed up the numbers badly and made wrong assumptions. Small changes in this area have exponential effects.
like a bunch of kids chasing a soccer ball
Rian Stone reference detected
in their zeal to push their agenda
I guess I phrased the question to focus on the news rather than those reported upon. I'm not talking about second-order reporting, I'm talking about the first-order conspicuous presence and involvement in day to day White House activity and announcements that makes news.
Think again: Has Elon Musk's previously close and conspicuous involvement in White House activity gone way down in the past week or so compared to during the first 2 months of the Administration?
@MentORPHEUS Regular people love the idea of firing federal workers and shutting down departments. Media is not presenting an accurate picture at all. People in flyover country are hardly fans of DC bureaucrats.
@Stigma For something like this to have a chance of working, the tariffs need to be enshrined in law by Congress so those who make business investment decisions can factor them into risk-return calculations in determing where to build production facilities. Since these were just announced by the President and could be undone in a few years by the next President, the prudent move would be to hold off on investments and have lobbyists work on exemptions/getting them repealed. I'm skeptical that significant production will move to the U.S. because of these tariffs. It's absurd Europe has tariffs still on U.S. goods, but seems like there are other ways we could apply pressure to get them removed. More of a focused approach targeting especially bad actors like China would have been better. And an advanced economy like the U.S. doesn't need to make everything (e.g., shirts, shoes, other basic products unrelated to national security).
Read More@Vermillion-Rx I've read about a drug called naltrexone being used successfully to lessen the urge to drink. Might be worth trying. Regardless of how you choose to address it, I believe you'll be able to do so effectively.
@RickySpanish Oh, she understood why it was an issue. You handled it fine. I probably wouldn't see for a while and not exclusively.
@Typo-MAGAshiv I have a feeling that the people bombing Tesla dealerships and those funding it are going to regret it, big time.
@coolsocks00 Reading between the lines, the minerals deal was likely for optics-to let Putin think the U.S. will have some sort of stake in Ukraine going forward and agree to stay out of certain areas. The purpose of meetings like this one with the press there is for everyone to say nice things and smile for the cameras, not to bring up security guarantees or other things in dispute. Zelensky thought he'd embarrass Trump and perhaps get some sort of agreement on security guarantees. Instead, he turned off people like Lindsey Graham and Rubio. He clearly didn't know how to read the room.
There won't be any security guarantees for Ukraine. It would be career suicide for U.S. politicians to agree to put U.S. troops on the ground there. Most politicians aren't particularly ideological. They take positions that they believe will enable them to get re-elected or at least won't hurt their prospects of re-election. U.S. involvement in Ukraine will be winding down. Despite what the mainstream press might say, regular people don't want us involved, and that includes large numbers in both major parties.
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