this is dumb. a one dimensional "answer" to a multidimensional problem. it also doesn't seem to understand math.

Sorry, I should have made it clear that this is addressing one aspect of the overpopulation myth..which is that population growth is outstripping food production. I fixed the title. So what is your argument against this?

>> ^kir_mokum:
this is dumb. a one dimensional "answer" to a multidimensional problem. it also doesn't seem to understand math.

One argument against that is that in order to produce more food on less land we dope the land with heavy doses of petroleum based fertilizers, a practice which is unsustainable in the long run.

Debunking the lies, nonsense and misinformation of this video: http://www.vhemt.org/pop101-1.htm

I disagree with the vhemt's core ideology (I do not want the human race to go extinct), but this page does a good job of exposing this crap.

If you want some real math, watch this series: http://youtu.be/F-QA2rkpBSY

You call one paragraph and a video that doesn't exist debunking this? Let's examine the paragraph:

"Together the world’s 6.8 billion people use land equal in size to South America to grow food and raise livestock—an astounding agricultural footprint. And demographers predict the planet will host 9.5 billion people by 2050. Because each of us requires a minimum of 1,500 calories a day, civilization will have to cultivate another Brazil’s worth of land—2.1 billion acres—if farming continues to be practiced as it is today. That much new, arable earth simply does not exist."

http://www.vhemt.org/pop101-3.htm

Did you miss when it said in the video that we're growing more food on less land, and that there are techniques which can turn barren land fertile, such has been practiced in Brazil and Thailand? Farming is going to continue as it does today; more yield per acre, and more barren land turned fertile, and it will continue to outstrip population growth. You've debunked nothing; you have no argument at all. I doubt you even read the page.

http://www.fas.usda.gov/grain/circular/2004/10-04/hist_tbl.xls
efficiency statistics

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/02/science/02tropic.html?_r=2
Scientists Are Making Brazil’s Savannah Bloom

>> ^hpqp:
Debunking the lies, nonsense and misinformation of this video: http://www.vhemt.org/pop101-1.htm
I disagree with the vhemt's core ideology (I do not want the human race to go extinct), but this page does a good job of exposing this crap.
If you want some real math, watch this series: http://youtu.be/F-QA2rkpBSY

>> ^shinyblurry:

You call one paragraph and a video that doesn't exist debunking this? Let's examine the paragraph:
"Together the world’s 6.8 billion people use land equal in size to South America to grow food and raise livestock—an astounding agricultural footprint. And demographers predict the planet will host 9.5 billion people by 2050. Because each of us requires a minimum of 1,500 calories a day, civilization will have to cultivate another Brazil’s worth of land—2.1 billion acres—if farming continues to be practiced as it is today. That much new, arable earth simply does not exist."
http://www.vhemt.org/pop101-3.htm
Did you miss when it said in the video that we're growing more food on less land, and that there are techniques which can turn barren land fertile, such has been practiced in Brazil and Thailand? Farming is going to continue as it does today; more yield per acre, and more barren land turned fertile, and it will continue to outstrip population growth. You've debunked nothing; you have no argument at all. I doubt you even read the page.
http://www.fas.usda.gov/grain/circular/2004/10-04/hist_tbl.xls
efficiency statistics
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/02/science/02tropic.html?_r=2
Scientists Are Making Brazil’s Savannah Bloom
>> ^hpqp:
Debunking the lies, nonsense and misinformation of this video: http://www.vhemt.org/pop101-1.htm
I disagree with the vhemt's core ideology (I do not want the human race to go extinct), but this page does a good job of exposing this crap.
If you want some real math, watch this series: http://youtu.be/F-QA2rkpBSY



The first page I linked to has no video, so I don't know what you're on about with that (my 2nd link, the youtube one, definitely works), but it has much more than "one paragraph" (not that that matters) showing the manipulation and misrepresentation in your video. As for "growing more food on less land", two words: oil and biodiversity. Without going into details, most (if not all) modern agriculture is heavily dependent on fossil fuels, a dwindling, non-renewable resource (fertilization, transport, etc.). The article you link to indirectly makes my second point: with the disappearance of fossil fuels, people are turning to biofuels (e.g. palm oil, mentioned in your article) which destroy biodiversity and cause several other issues ). Meanwhile, the soybeans and beef production (the one to feed the other btw) cause a large amount of ecological damage.

That's the last I'm answering to you (although it's more for the benefit of other readers, since I know how you are with the facts of reality).

This response proves you didn't even read the page that you are using to "debunk" the video. It doesn't address this video. This page, which contains one paragraph and a broken link to a video, is the one addressing it:

http://www.vhemt.org/pop101-3.htm

Again, you present yourself as the voice of chicken little, as your perpetrate another myth upon the overpopulation myth, which is the myth of peak oil. We are not in danger of running out of oil anytime soon; in fact, because of new technology and methods, such as the fracking boom, our domestic energy production is expected to rise significantly.

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2012-02-01/fracking-boom-could-finally-cap-myth-of-peak-oil-peter-orszag.html

Since 1976 our proven oil reserves are double from where they started, and new reserves are being found continuously:

http://en.mercopress.com/2010/10/25/petrobras-confirms-tupi-field-could-hold-8-billion-barrels

http://www.albawaba.com/iran-discovers-huge-oil-field-report-415465

There is also evidence that oil fields are refilling:

http://www.rense.com/general63/refil.htm

The fact is that there is an oil boom in the western hemisphere:

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/09/20/world/americas/recent-discoveries-put-americas-back-in-oil-companies-sights.html

The coal oil sands in Canada alone are estimated to hold 175 billion barrels of oil. What I find interesting hpqp, as you do another hit and run, is that you have all the faith in the world that science will solve all of our problems, except when it comes to your favorite doomsday hypothesis.

As I have already proven, we produce more than enough food to feed everyone. The problem is in the inequity of man and in the inefficient and wasteful distribution. We lose over 1/3 of the food we produce to waste. We have more than enough fuel to supply our agriculture, and the research shows that having smaller and more energy efficient farms will increase yields even further, and not significantly impact biodiversity.


>> ^hpqp:
>> ^shinyblurry:
You call one paragraph and a video that doesn't exist debunking this? Let's examine the paragraph:
"Together the world’s 6.8 billion people use land equal in size to South America to grow food and raise livestock—an astounding agricultural footprint. And demographers predict the planet will host 9.5 billion people by 2050. Because each of us requires a minimum of 1,500 calories a day, civilization will have to cultivate another Brazil’s worth of land—2.1 billion acres—if farming continues to be practiced as it is today. That much new, arable earth simply does not exist."
http://www.vhemt.org/pop101-3.htm
Did you miss when it said in the video that we're growing more food on less land, and that there are techniques which can turn barren land fertile, such has been practiced in Brazil and Thailand? Farming is going to continue as it does today; more yield per acre, and more barren land turned fertile, and it will continue to outstrip population growth. You've debunked nothing; you have no argument at all. I doubt you even read the page.
http://www.fas.usda.gov/grain/circular/2004/10-04/hist_tbl.xls
efficiency statistics
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/02/science/02tropic.html?_r=2
Scientists Are Making Brazil’s Savannah Bloom
>> ^hpqp:
Debunking the lies, nonsense and misinformation of this video: http://www.vhemt.org/pop101-1.htm
I disagree with the vhemt's core ideology (I do not want the human race to go extinct), but this page does a good job of exposing this crap.
If you want some real math, watch this series: http://youtu.be/F-QA2rkpBSY


The first page I linked to has no video, so I don't know what you're on about with that (my 2nd link, the youtube one, definitely works), but it has much more than "one paragraph" (not that that matters) showing the manipulation and misrepresentation in your video. As for "growing more food on less land", two words: oil and biodiversity. Without going into details, most (if not all) modern agriculture is heavily dependent on fossil fuels, a dwindling, non-renewable resource (fertilization, transport, etc.). The article you link to indirectly makes my second point: with the disappearance of fossil fuels, people are turning to biofuels (e.g. palm oil, mentioned in your article) which destroy biodiversity and cause several other issues ). Meanwhile, the soybeans and beef production (the one to feed the other btw) cause a large amount of ecological damage.
That's the last I'm answering to you (although it's more for the benefit of other readers, since I know how you are with the facts of reality).

Shineyblurry, let's imagine for a moment that you're 100% correct and that overpopulation is a myth. It fits nicely with the bible telling us to be fruitful and multiply, so let's throw caution to the wind, avoid the use any contraception and reproduce as vigorously as possible.

You must see that there will be a limit.

If planned, deliberate population control isn't addressed it's very simple math to reason out the end result of exponential growth.

Once you can admit that the problem is inevitable, then it's really just a question of how far you want to push ahead our reaction to do something about it.

How near to the point of no return, how close to catastrophe, for the entire human species, are you willing to get?


Oh, and as far as this video specifically, it seems irresponsible to say that overpopulation isn't really an issue as long as we simply sort out all of the problems of capitalism, diplomacy, and how humans interact with one another on every level.

Another idiot who has failed to understand the exponential function.

All the video says is that there's currently enough food. It suggests that fears of running out of land soon are unfounded.

It takes no position whatsoever on environmental destruction, which is the reason that overpopulation is a problem. With exponential growth, technology eventually won't be able to keep up, and environmental disaster will follow, eventually.

This smells of a whitewash as they don't even address the environmental issue. My guess is that this group is a reaction to something like Steady State Economy activism that has been gaining traction in the last few years, and which is antithetical to modern capitalism which relies on the assumption of a continuously growing consumer base.

I bet if you follow this group's money, you end up with a group of very rich men who stand to lose millions or billions of dollars if we turn away from the current winner-takes-all model and move towards a more forward-thinking cooperative economic model.

Thomas Robert Malthus

This guy is talked about in Jared Diamond's book Collapse.

Jared suggests that overpopulation in Rwanda coupled with rudimentary substance farming techniques helped to set the stage to for war.

Moving this video to shinyblurry's personal queue. It failed to receive enough votes to get sifted up to the front page within 2 days.

*promote

Promoting this video and sending it back into the queue for one more try; last queued - promote requested by chingalera.

Seems somewhat circular.

There isn't a scarcity of resources! Its because war!
Why war?
A scarcity of resources!

Its only exponential if our population is growing at an exponential rate. This is true in Africa and other third world nations, although it is slowing in the richer nations. I don't mind the one-child policy of China to counter this trend and think that it should be forcibly applied to other 3rd world countries that don't take this seriously.

I would be interested in knowing what your solution might entail?

Actually my liberal professor mentioned this and made me think. It is true that people are causing environmental problems--so then the problem becomes solving them--not current population. Forced sterilization for example. Of course the liberal professor hated that idea--but proposed no other idea of her own--frucking waste of space if you ask me.

Soil compaction--all I have to say.

Rare moment I agree with you shinyblurry... (Mostly because my professor, at a liberal school I might add, has addressed this.) I am waiting attentively for kir's response.

The growth rate is stil exponential. Even if it is slower than before, it's still growing at an exponential rate.

And to be perfectly honest, I don't have a solution. The problem is ultimately self-correcting, it's just a question of how we manage it. But if we refuse to even acknowledge it, we will end up with the worst case scenario.

Hey I heard oil regenerates too so drill baby drill! lol.

This seems relevant too:

*related=http://videosift.com/video/If-Man-Obeyed-God

If Man Obeyed God has been added as a related post - related requested by VoodooV.

This is a problem mother nature will deal with. Of course she's a bit of a psycho so it's gonna be double helpings of pestilence, famine and war for everyone. Certainly better than forward planning, eh!

We're the bastard step-children baby, MotherNatures' one of the stellar nuns at the Cardinal's right-hand