Life after $4 gas!
Because of local “sensitivity” - pro-life vs. pro-choice, population growth is a touchy subject. Even the bravest of commentators is cautious about entering the fray, but the truth remains that our resource base is finite. While global warming (believe it or not) can be linked very easily to population size, it seems quite likely that we will somehow manage to self-destruct as a species long before the humidity gets us!
June 19th, 2008 at 2:37 pm
Dr. C don’t be a party pooper!
We all know Al Gore - our next
Vice-President, again - conjured-up global warming.
Interfering with the mating habits of jack rabbits is
ill-advised as well..
I’ve resigned myself to drill, drill, drill - start right
off Gulf Shores if they want. If any of that stuff spills or leaks
scoop it up and start over again - if any fish die wash off
the grease and sling’em in the frying pan -that’s the American spirit
you question sir!
And - pssst - no one really gives a pig’s foot
what happens to this planet after we’re all gone. That’s not for us
to worry about, is it? Right now we’re going to party like it’s
1999! Mister, I suggest you lift up them over-analytical carbon
feet of yours and get to walking!
June 21st, 2008 at 9:11 pm
Nice column. Back in the 70s there was a lot of talk about ZPG–zero population growth–then came along
R. Reagan who decided overpopulation’s good for business(more customers)! Unfortunately, democracy is
“government by crisis”–as some previous comments here prove– meaning stuff’s got to really hit the fan to wake
average clueless Americans up.
June 22nd, 2008 at 11:08 am
shortnsweet-
Those of us old enough to remember ZPG have also borne witness to enough human behavior to see how terribly reactive homo sapiens is and how our greatest talent often seems to be destruction.
Almost every major problem we have–whether famine, drought, war or whatever–can be traced to an overabundance of humans. Earth was not intended to support 9 billion pyromaniacal naked apes.
I have little faith humanity will do anything in sufficient scale to stave off the coming maelstrom. History is not kind in that regard. At times, I’ve even contemplated whether humans are an “extinction species” who will mostly scour the face of the planet before wisping away themselves.
I can’t help being being repulsed by the selfishness in those who insist on reproducing like crazy in today’s world. If they any idea of the misery likely to be visited on all those born in the last 15 years, they might not be so insistent on lending to the problem.
It’s also richly ironic that those who seem to insist the hardest on humanity’s dominion over nature, mostly as dictated by their supernatural being of choice, are the ones who have the hardest time distancing their “intellect” from their biological imperative.
By the way, I’m still trying to figure who in the world you are as you obviously know me… Clues of any sort?