Beijing Announces Measures to Stop “Unauthorized Births”

• Serathx wrote on 2010-07-12 18:29

  Quote from Spartaaaaa;90558:

  *Insert paragraphs here*

  
  I think that you just made my point.
  No matter what, humans will pretty much pollute nature and get rid of water and food.
  Unless we get smarter later.
  From what I gathered all your writing basically says,
  "Shortages of these things aren't because of nature but because of human error."
  And, uh, a lot of humans are still here. Some of which are insanely stupid and will probably make those errors you pointed out.
• Hiccup wrote on 2010-07-12 18:33

  Quote from Kazuni;90549:

  
  
  Population's shrinking in Europe and America. Canada = immigration.

  
  
  Wrong. America's population is increasing just at a lower rate. Guess why? Immigration.
• Cucurbita wrote on 2010-07-12 18:36

  Quote from Spartaaaaa;90558:

  Contrary to popular opinion/propaganda, overpopulation is not an imminent threat to the world. Now before you burn me at the stake as a heretic, let me make my case.
  
  The issue of finite resources (food, water, space): Throughout history, the majority of food shortages have not been caused directly by large population. Often times it would be war, natural disasters and/or corrupt governments/elites. War and natural disasters would destroy crops and create a shortage in addition to jacking up prices of still remaining crops. Throughout my studies of world/US history, I have never seen a single instance of population being a direct cause of starvation. Even in the case of China, it was over-urbanization and the overly zealous communist government that led to massive starvation. Massive unnecessary urbanization destroyed natural resources and created a shift from eating vegetables to eating meat. A cow must be fed ten pounds of vegetables to generate one pound of beef. As you can imagine, that caused quite a dramatic decrease in available food supply. The misguided communist government, convinced that birds were a pest, ordered a massive campaign to exterminate them. Unfortunately, birds were a major predator to insects that eat crops, so food supply dropped again. In the case of India; the government withholds a large surplus of crops and refuses to feed the people with it!
  
  To those who believe that water is going to run out, I suggest you to take a look at a diagram of the water cycle. Now I do acknowledge that there are water shortages in many areas, however, the problem does not lie in population but rather in natural disasters/abnormal weather patterns/water pollution.
  
  Space is probably the least of these problems. Believe me when I say that there is plenty of space for everyone. Understandably, those living in big cities will be skeptical (remember the concept of "over-urbanization"?), but I happen to be living in a small town, and the mythical "lack of space" is a non-entity.
  
  On a final note: I happen to be a second child, and as such, if my parents decided to stay in China, I would not exist right now because I would be classified as an "Unauthorized birth" so this topic is quite personal for me.

  
  
  >Overpopulation is not an issue!
  
  Visit Shanghai. Your opinion will change instantly when you see it with your own eyes.
• Spartaaaaa wrote on 2010-07-12 18:38

  Quote from Serathx;90571:

  I think that you just made my point.
  No matter what, humans will pretty much pollute nature and get rid of water and food.
  Unless we get smarter later.
  From what I gathered all your writing basically says,
  "Shortages of these things aren't because of nature but because of human error."
  And, uh, a lot of humans are still here. Some of which are insanely stupid and will probably make those errors you pointed out.

  
  
  I wasn't disputing the dangers of pollution and waste, I was disputing the idea that population must be controlled to solve these problems. I did mention that nature does play a role (natural disasters), and let me remind you that there is a difference between human population and human stupidity/corruption.
• Chockeh wrote on 2010-07-12 18:42

  Quote from bradstrt;90579:

  Wrong. America's population is increasing just at a lower rate. Guess why? Immigration.

  
  

  [Image: http://www.google.com/publicdata?ds=uspopulation&met=population&tdim=true&dl=en&hl=en&q=America+Population+statistics]

  [Image: http://www.google.com/publicdata?ds=uspopulation&met=population&tdim=true&dl=en&hl=en&q=America+Population+statistics]

  
  

  [Image: http://www.google.com/publicdata?ds=uspopulation&ctype=l&strail=false&nselm=h&met_y=population&scale_y=lin&ind_y=false&rdim=state&tdim=true&tstart=331257600000&tunit=M&tlen=348&hl=en&dl=en]

  EDIT: LINK WONT WORK D:!
• Juno wrote on 2010-07-12 18:43

  Quote from Margatroid;90586:

  >Overpopulation is not an issue!
  
  Visit Shanghai. Your opinion will change instantly when you see it with your own eyes.

  
  
  Is that overpopulation or over-urbanization? Could the problem be solved with better use of space and resources instead?
• Chiri wrote on 2010-07-12 18:46
  Given that there's a finite amount of usable space, it's hard to say overpopulation and over-urbanization are not linked.
• Spartaaaaa wrote on 2010-07-12 18:48

  Quote from Margatroid;90586:

  >Overpopulation is not an issue!
  
  Visit Shanghai. Your opinion will change instantly when you see it with your own eyes.

  
  
  I have been to Shanghai (and many other areas of China) and my opinion still remains the same. While I admit that overpopulation is a problem in certain isolated regions, I am firmly against the notion that overpopulation is a threat to all of humanity. To point to one isolated case and say that it applies to the whole world is a ridiculous extrapolation. A major problem with over-urbanization is that it crams people together into an unnatural and uncomfortable population density. If people were to just spread out a little, the problem would dissolve quite quickly.
• Cucurbita wrote on 2010-07-12 18:51
  Not a threat to humanity but...
  Resource still always finite, demand always exceeds supply.
• Axx wrote on 2010-07-12 19:46
  Technology still marches on. People were predicting famines and population crises back in the early 1900's, until the agricultural revolution (which was much more of a technological revolution) kicked in. We produce a little more food per year than it actually takes to feed the ENTIRE world, is logistics and economics that keeps it from happening.
  
  Spartaaaa's point is that there is still a lot of space, everyone just keeps cramming into the places that are running out of it. [Not without good reason, mind you].
• Juno wrote on 2010-07-12 19:58

  Quote from Chiri;90598:

  Given that there's a finite amount of usable space, it's hard to say overpopulation and over-urbanization are not linked.

  
  
  Here's a map of China's population density.
  
  For reference, here's a map of the USA population density.
  
  And here's a map of the whole world's population density.
  
  Judging from those I don't think the issue is a lack of physical space. Or even usable space. But to get a better idea I looked up a map of arable land in china. It suggested that the areas with lower population were heavily cultivated but with low quality soil while the high population areas (Shanghai for instance) boasted top-quality land.
  
  In the end though, the two things are linked...but I don't think the problem is insurmountable without this sort of population control.
  
  

  Quote from Margatroid;90607:

  Not a threat to humanity but...
  Resource still always finite, demand always exceeds supply.

  
  
  As stated earlier there's been some dire mismanagement of resources. Before telling people they can't have children it may be more beneficial to address those issues first.
• Magenera wrote on 2010-07-13 06:58
  If I remember correctly, the global human population is starting to stabilize somewhat. More than likely, from what it I'm looking at, if China goes the way it goes (population growth and all) nature might takes it course and the population will drop. 2050 51 countries some being Gemany, Russia, Japan, and Italy, will be lower than 2005, from the projections the UN says.