General

Re: Overpopulation In A Free Society

Freedom4Me73986 — Mon, 26 Dec 2011 02:11:58 GMT

Simple: private companies pay people to be voluntarily sterilized.

Re: Overpopulation In A Free Society

Alan Aversa — Mon, 26 Dec 2011 02:07:29 GMT

A very good rebuttal of overpopulation is OverpopulationIsAMyth.com from the Population Research Institute. Here is their latest movie:

Re: Overpopulation In A Free Society

Bert — Sun, 26 Sep 2010 23:30:25 GMT

Allegedly, countries with overpopulation have shortages of basic human needs like food and water, as well as shortages in land and fossil fuels. Excessive pollution in these countries lead to other problems as well, it is claimed.

I believe it's more than reasonable, it's the only explanation. But the critics of that analysis would argue that only in a society that allows humans to breed unhampered would allow those results. The more people exists, the more mouths to feed, the less we all have, et cetera.

3rd world countries will generally have overpopulation due to the fact their children may not live, so they repopulate to make up for the potential lack of deaths, which in turn doesn't always happen. With the overpopulation you have the lack of food, and also they cannot take care of all their children, so poverty is also an issue.

If you look at countries that have markets, or even compared 3rd world countries now to the USA or some European countries 100 years ago, the standard of living rised with production. People live longer, and are not afraid of dying out, so their thought to reproduce as soon and as much as possible is lessened. Markets show future investments for their own gene pool.

Re: Overpopulation In A Free Society

filc — Sun, 26 Sep 2010 20:40:03 GMT

Dustin Jussila:
Allow me to play devils advocate for a moment, (ahem), "So you would condemn millions to starvation because of some ideological theory of equilibrium? You monster!"

Thats the equivalent of saying "You would condemn millions of people to the ground because of some ideological theory of gravity?".

It's an ironic argument as well, since the complaint is that there is already too much population. If they were interested in saving lives, they may be more concerned with the capital accumulation process, and less concerned with regulating birth-rates.

The truth is we can't pretend the laws of scarcity don't apply to the real world. It's non-sequitur to assume that the problems you state below are overpopulation issues.

Dustin Jussila:
Allegedly, countries with overpopulation have shortages of basic human needs like food and water, as well as shortages in land and fossil fuels. Excessive pollution in these countries lead to other problems as well, it is claimed.

This is where the non-sequitur lies. These problems are caused by other factors, not necessarily by overpopulation. There are dense nations where individuals live wealthier then non-dense nations. Take Japan vs Costa Rica. If wealth was corollary with population, then Japan should be in the pits, and Costa Rica should be wealthy.

Hope that makes sense.

Re: Overpopulation In A Free Society

Angurse — Sun, 26 Sep 2010 20:36:30 GMT

Allow me to play devils advocate for a moment, (ahem), "So you would condemn millions to starvation because of some ideological theory of equilibrium? You monster!"

Wouldn't it be god or nature who is condemning the millions?

Re: Overpopulation In A Free Society

liberty student — Sun, 26 Sep 2010 20:33:21 GMT

Dustin Jussila:
I believe it's more than reasonable, it's the only explanation. But the critics of that analysis would argue that only in a society that allows humans to breed unhampered would allow those results. The more people exists, the more mouths to feed, the less we all have, et cetera.

Then you need to demonstrate to those critics that trade is a positive sum game. I would start by showing how there are more people in the US than ever before, and they are wealthier than ever before. And demonstrate the same for France, Germany etc. so you have the socialist democracies covered.

To undermine ignorance doesn't require advancing your own argument, just undermining the ignorant ones until only your argument remains.

Re: Overpopulation In A Free Society

Nonfederal Nonreserve — Sun, 26 Sep 2010 20:32:17 GMT

Anybody who feels sorry about them can choose not to reproduce and to take himself/herself out of the population. Anybody who doesn't want the population to reach that point can do it right now.

Re: Overpopulation In A Free Society

djussila — Sun, 26 Sep 2010 20:27:58 GMT

Nonfederal Nonreserve:

Food availability gives an upper bound on population. If the population is sustainable above that, then it's not a problem in the first place. If it's not sustainable it will naturally reduce to the sustainable population.

Allow me to play devils advocate for a moment, (ahem), "So you would condemn millions to starvation because of some ideological theory of equilibrium? You monster!"

Re: Overpopulation In A Free Society

Nonfederal Nonreserve — Sun, 26 Sep 2010 20:19:49 GMT

"The more people exists, the more mouths to feed, the less we all have, et cetera."

Food availability gives an upper bound on population. If it's not sustainable it will naturally reduce to the sustainable population. The upper bound itself can change as technology changes. And there's no reason why food can't grow exponentially too, Malthus. It is, after all, just another population of organisms itself.

Re: Overpopulation In A Free Society

MaikU — Sun, 26 Sep 2010 20:12:48 GMT

liberty student:

How much population is too much?

this, haha :D

Re: Overpopulation In A Free Society

Nonfederal Nonreserve — Sun, 26 Sep 2010 20:09:21 GMT

People who are concerned about overpopulation can volunteer to reduce the population by 1. Problem solved.

Re: Overpopulation In A Free Society

djussila — Sun, 26 Sep 2010 20:08:42 GMT

liberty student:

Do you think it is reasonable that those problems might be caused by a lack of markets?

I believe it's more than reasonable, it's the only explanation. But the critics of that analysis would argue that only in a society that allows humans to breed unhampered would allow those results. The more people exists, the more mouths to feed, the less we all have, et cetera.

Re: Overpopulation In A Free Society

liberty student — Sun, 26 Sep 2010 19:55:01 GMT

Do you think it is reasonable that those problems might be caused by a lack of markets?

Re: Overpopulation In A Free Society

djussila — Sun, 26 Sep 2010 19:40:29 GMT

liberty student:

Dustin, I am not trying to be difficult, but which problems?

Allegedly, countries with overpopulation have shortages of basic human needs like food and water, as well as shortages in land and fossil fuels. Excessive pollution in these countries lead to other problems as well, it is claimed.

Re: Overpopulation In A Free Society

liberty student — Sun, 26 Sep 2010 19:29:16 GMT

Dustin, I am not trying to be difficult, but which problems?