We all complain about capitalism, but what about overpopulation?

[valdek]

Clearly, capitalism and the ever attendent, ongoing war of the rich against the poor, is an ongoing problem, a rotten form of social organization - but irresponsible sexual behavior and reproductive practices compared the ongoing war of the poor against the rich, is an equally destructive force which we have unleashed on our potential for survival on this planet.
What I am saying is that people in developing countries, nearly all of the time, have more children than they can afford. If a parent can hardly afford to feed herself, how is she supposed to have a decent standard of living, how is she supposed to make the most of her meagre opportunities, while carrying and supporting a child, or two, or three?
I think we fail to consider whether population growth, itself, needs to be halted, in order to begin to address the problems he brings to our attention.

Does anyone else agree?

[jake williams]

Does anyone else agree?
I hope not. Even were the birthrates in poor countries simply the product of irrationality, given the horror of modern poverty it would be totally excusable at a moral, if not a political level. But it's not irrational. It's a disturbingly bigoted assumption that high birthrates in poor countries are the result of ignorance or irresponsibility. Children aren't just emotional comfort for individuals and communities; they're the labour and future of families and communities. Birthrates respond fairly consistently to economic - not cultural - conditions. When lower infant mortality and higher education and income make lower birthrates the more rational decision, generally, that's the decision people (women) make.

Look up Marx on Malthus, that horrid apologist of early capitalist misery. The argument is old, and the obvious counterarguments not much older.

[StoneFrog]

Clearly, capitalism and the ever attendent, ongoing war of the rich against the poor, is an ongoing problem, a rotten form of social organization - but irresponsible sexual behavior and reproductive practices compared the ongoing war of the poor against the rich, is an equally destructive force which we have unleashed on our potential for survival on this planet.
What I am saying is that people in developing countries, nearly all of the time, have more children than they can afford. If a parent can hardly afford to feed herself, how is she supposed to have a decent standard of living, how is she supposed to make the most of her meagre opportunities, while carrying and supporting a child, or two, or three?
I think we fail to consider whether population growth, itself, needs to be halted, in order to begin to address the problems he brings to our attention.

Does anyone else agree?

you sound like a fascist..

underdeveloped countries have higher mortality rates, and need for bigger families to support growing their own food and resources. Plus there is enough money in the world to support ALL the people including the so called overpopulated third world. Just the money is held by the minority in developed countries.

[agnixie]

Clearly, capitalism and the ever attendent, ongoing war of the rich against the poor, is an ongoing problem, a rotten form of social organization - but irresponsible sexual behavior and reproductive practices compared the ongoing war of the poor against the rich, is an equally destructive force which we have unleashed on our potential for survival on this planet.
What I am saying is that people in developing countries, nearly all of the time, have more children than they can afford. If a parent can hardly afford to feed herself, how is she supposed to have a decent standard of living, how is she supposed to make the most of her meagre opportunities, while carrying and supporting a child, or two, or three?
I think we fail to consider whether population growth, itself, needs to be halted, in order to begin to address the problems he brings to our attention.

Does anyone else agree?

Yeah, we could like... control their reproduction. Then put them in camps. Wait... :rolleyes:

[Tommy4ever]

Demographic Transition Model!

Basically, before a country starts to develop birth rates are very high and death rates are also very high. So population doesn't change much. When medicines, better sanitation etc enter into the country birth rates remain very high but death rates plummet. A population explosion then occurs when population increases rapidly. Eventually the birth rate falls to closer in line with the death rate and you eventually arrive at the position where the likes of Japan and Western Europe are where the death rate exceeds the birth rate and population decline is only held off by immigration.

I'm not sure if I'm answering your question. But this is normal for all countries. It won't last forever. However, it is admittedly pretty hard to argue that a massive population isn't a drain on the earth's resources and doesn't push down wages.

Afterall, the population of the world is more than double what it was in 1960. But without going to the lengths China went to to dampen population growth its hard to see how it can be realistically slowed.

[hatzel]

It's all because of the 'irresponsible sexual behaviour'. The whole world's problems. Pinned on 'irresponsible sexual behaviour'...

Also, given how many of your previous posts have been 'watch this video, it shows that socialism doesn't work!' and 'didn't socialism fail in the Soviet Union because socialism will never work?' and all that, you should do your best to avoid posting silly stuff for the time being, unless you want to rouse suspicions :)

[CommunityBeliever]

Overpopulation isn't the problem so much as population distribution and wealth distribution which are problems created by capitalism, so really capitalism is the problem not overpopulation.

[brigadista]

Valdek-so only people with money should have kids? don't be ridiculous

[graymouser]

Clearly, capitalism and the ever attendent, ongoing war of the rich against the poor, is an ongoing problem, a rotten form of social organization - but irresponsible sexual behavior and reproductive practices compared the ongoing war of the poor against the rich, is an equally destructive force which we have unleashed on our potential for survival on this planet.
What I am saying is that people in developing countries, nearly all of the time, have more children than they can afford. If a parent can hardly afford to feed herself, how is she supposed to have a decent standard of living, how is she supposed to make the most of her meagre opportunities, while carrying and supporting a child, or two, or three?
I think we fail to consider whether population growth, itself, needs to be halted, in order to begin to address the problems he brings to our attention.

Does anyone else agree?
No revolutionary should agree with this.

Overpopulation is a phenomenon of poverty, and has little to do with "irresponsible sexual behavior." This is a deeply sexist view, and also contains overtones of racism. The truth is, as women become more affluent they gain more control over their sexuality, and as a consequence they have fewer children. What we need to do is raise the standard of living in the underdeveloped world, and as a consequence of this the population rate will move toward what is sustainable in the long term.

You invoke the "potential for survival on this planet" - but it is a myth of the neo-Malthusian wing of environmentalism that excess population is responsible for most of today's ecological degradation. In reality, per capita, the people who are reproducing at the highest rates also have the smallest carbon footprints of anyone on the planet. The desperately poor do not drive SUVs or use much electricity, or buy many products from factories that spew carbon into the atmosphere. Even individual consumption in general has a low carbon footprint compared to industrial production. It is the rich, the militaries, and the big corporations which are the polluters, not the world's impoverished masses.

If we were to invest massively in sustainable energy and agricultural practices, we could realistically manage the entire planet's resources for about 10 billion people. This happens to be the point at which demographers expect population to level off, for a variety of reasons. Once you had global socialism - giving everyone a relatively comfortable level of prosperity - you would see the attendant trends level off and the population move to around 9 billion or slightly less, which is a good number given the actual capacity of natural resources.

What's worrying is that the neo-Malthusian trend tends to dovetail with the modern white nationalist narratives, of a planet full of "dark" people who will reduce it to a ruin. This is a tendency that needs to be opposed in absolute terms. There is nothing enlightened about white people; it's just that as the most affluent, more white people have hit the point on the affluence curve where population begins to decline while other ethnic groups, purposefully underdeveloped by capitalism, have not.

We do need to move away from what Mike Davis calls a "planet of slums" - but the way there is not draconian population reduction schemes. It is only an ecosocialist alternative to capitalist "growth" that can lead the way to general prosperity and a sustainable future for humanity.

[Sixiang]

Marxists have been battling this Malthusian crap since Marx and Engels themselves were writing.

Basically, as people are educated more, women are liberated, and the standard of living goes up, people stop having as much children. As we get closer to socialism, the more educated people will become and with that, the more sexually liberated women become. They will no longer be forced by backwards religions and conventions to simply be a means of reproducing for men. Also, without the need to have many kids work for the family to survive, people will have less children.

Marx and Engels talked about this in relation to capitalism. As capitalists add machines to their production, they don't need as many workers, so the amount of value that each individual worker can output diminishes and is dispersed among the workers as a whole. Engels explained that this was why women and children entered the workforce, why unemployment is high at times in industrialized areas, and why capitalists could make their workers work for even longer hours to increase the amount of surplus value taken. In order to survive, the workers will need to have more children to work, which increases the reserve army, which the capitalists are in favor of.

There's more to it and it's more complex than that, but that's the general idea.

[RadioRaheem84]

Good lord the neo-Malthusian crap was an obsession with the college liberals at my old college.

The way they would talk about people procreating it was as if they hated poor people breeding or something.

[Commissar Rykov]

I am quite disturbed to see this posted here. This is an argument I have seen Fascists, Nazis and other Totalitarian scum promote as a good way of ridding the world of "useless Third Worlders" and members of the Working Class. I don't know how anyone in good conscience could promote the ideas of Fascists and Nazis while thinking of themselves as Revolutionary Leftists.

[Gorilla]

Rich libruls love this shit (e.g. Buffet and Gates). Which is one more piece of evidence that liberalism is a vicious anti-working class ideology.

[RadioRaheem84]

Beyond vicious. They will fund everything from fascism to wars to eugenics to neo-malthusian pseudo-science to keep their social status.

[Spawn of Stalin]

I'd actually agree with the OP that there is plenty of irresponsible sexual behaviour, but the problems that arise from that have more to do with social issues that so-called overpopulation, which is a word often manipulated by reactionaries of all kinds, green fascists for example. Essentially what you are saying is that because people in developing countries (I'm guessing you actually mean black people) do not have the means to provide for their children like our parents did for us, we should force them not to reproduce. Survival of the fittest?

[Red Future]

Overpopulation isn't the problem so much as population distribution and wealth distribution which are problems created by capitalism, so really capitalism is the problem not overpopulation.

Exactly

[caramelpence]

To the OP: do you not think that the predictions of Malthusianism should be judged in the same way as other scientific hypotheses, i.e. according to whether they are proven or disproven through the accumulation of empirical evidence? In that case, it would seem clear that Malthusianism is complete and utter nonsense, because, despite repeated predictions on the part of Malthus himself and his more recent followers that the continued growth of population would produce food shortages, due to the geometric character of population growth and the arithmetic character of resource growth, the exact opposite is true - the ability of mankind to produce food and other goods far exceeds our potential needs. The fact that there are still serious problems of starvation and that these problems are (for leftists, anyway) due to the social structure under which human beings live says something else about Malthusianism - namely, that it takes the existence of human beings to be the problem as such, and thereby diverts concern away from the ways in which they actually produce and distribute resources.

In this respect, Malthusianism is pretty much the same as much contemporary environmentalist discourse. The predictions concerning the exhaustion of coal and other resources have been rendered absurd time and time again. In 1939, for example, the Interior Department of the US government said that the world had 13 years' worth of petroleum reserves, but as everyone knows, it turns out that this was a gross underestimate of mankind's ability to locate new resources of reserves at the same time as developing more effective mechanisms of extracting and managing existing reserves - and if there is one common theme to environmentalism (and the Malthusianism that is often associated with it) it is its disgraceful capacity to underestimate the brilliance and daring of human beings and its general acceptance of extremely misanthropic sentiments. Environmentalism is anti-scientific, anti-human, reactionary, and revolutionary socialists should regard environmentalists as the political enemy.


Basically, as people are educated more, women are liberated...


Overpopulation is a phenomenon of poverty


Basically, before a country starts to develop birth rates are very high

You crypto-Malthusians are just as bad as honest Malthusians. By accepting the existence of "overpopulation" as an empirical fact and arguing that population growth rates will fall with development and that this is the key problem with Malthusian predictions, you are "attacking" Malthusianism in the wrong way. You leave yourselves open to the possibility of growth rates not falling with development - because, based on the way you argue, it would seem that you would have to accept population control in that scenario. The problem with Malthusianism is not that Malthus and his followers assume that population growth will continue indefinitely, it is the assumption that resource growth can only be arithmetic. Resource growth has not historically proceeded arithmetically, it has soared, alongside and to a considerable extent because of rapid population growth - because of, qua Boserup, for the reason that population growth produces more capacity for genius and innovation on the part of human beings, both through the activity of groups and through the birth of brilliant individuals who allow our ability to manipulate and benefit from the natural world to increase in dramatic and sudden ways.

That is why Malthusianism is bunk.

[Queercommie Girl]

There is nothing enlightened about white people; it's just that as the most affluent, more white people have hit the point on the affluence curve where population begins to decline while other ethnic groups, purposefully underdeveloped by capitalism, have not.


Indeed. Modern Japan would be a good counter-example against white nationalist BS. Japanese are "yellow people" like Chinese people, and an East Asian culture rather than a Western culture, but because Japan is very rich the birth rate in Japan is generally speaking very low. This shows birth rates have nothing to do with race and culture, and has everything to do with economics.

[graymouser]

In this respect, Malthusianism is pretty much the same as much contemporary environmentalist discourse. The predictions concerning the exhaustion of coal and other resources have been rendered absurd time and time again. In 1939, for example, the Interior Department of the US government said that the world had 13 years' worth of petroleum reserves, but as everyone knows, it turns out that this was a gross underestimate of mankind's ability to locate new resources of reserves at the same time as developing more effective mechanisms of extracting and managing existing reserves - and if there is one common theme to environmentalism (and the Malthusianism that is often associated with it) it is its disgraceful capacity to underestimate the brilliance and daring of human beings and its general acceptance of extremely misanthropic sentiments. Environmentalism is anti-scientific, anti-human, reactionary, and revolutionary socialists should regard environmentalists as the political enemy.

You crypto-Malthusians are just as bad as honest Malthusians. By accepting the existence of "overpopulation" as an empirical fact and arguing that population growth rates will fall with development and that this is the key problem with Malthusian predictions, you are "attacking" Malthusianism in the wrong way. You leave yourselves open to the possibility of growth rates not falling with development - because, based on the way you argue, it would seem that you would have to accept population control in that scenario. The problem with Malthusianism is not that Malthus and his followers assume that population growth will continue indefinitely, it is the assumption that resource growth can only be arithmetic. Resource growth has not historically proceeded arithmetically, it has soared, alongside and to a considerable extent because of rapid population growth - because of, qua Boserup, for the reason that population growth produces more capacity for genius and innovation on the part of human beings, both through the activity of groups and through the birth of brilliant individuals who allow our ability to manipulate and benefit from the natural world to increase in dramatic and sudden ways.

That is why Malthusianism is bunk.
This is a disgusting post, which should not be tossed aside lightly but rather hurled with great force.

It is a lie to call ecosocialism "crypto-Malthusianism" and to tar all environmentalism with a "Malthusian" brush. First, it's simply not true that the environmental movement is rooted in Malthus at all: the main book that set it off was Rachel Carson's Silent Spring, which was not about growth at all but rather about the chemicals that were being sprayed unaccountably into our ecosystems. Much of the environmental movement has focused on the degradation perpetrated by irresponsible capitalism that sees only its bottom line.

Second, there is nothing "Malthusian" at all about what I said or what other ecosocialist have said - and many, such as Ian Angus, are actually leading the fight against Malthusianism in the environmental movement. The best demography that I've read, from a non-Malthusian viewpoint, suggests that the current trends of growth will tend to reach a maximum around 10 billion human beings. I'm not concerned about that - I think it can be made to work, just not under capitalism. So the idea that I'm using some kind of quasi-Malthusian argument is simply incorrect, and your message saying that I am somehow Malthusian is a slander.

Third, your argument that human ingenuity alone will solve any problems is simply wrong. John Bellamy Foster (an ecosocialist and editor of Monthly Review) has written extensively about what he calls the "Jevons paradox," which is that greater efficiency in resource usage leads to higher use of that resource. This is a purely capitalist phenomenon, because what it means is that constant capital costs have gone down and therefore capitalists are free to manufacture more, leading to more consumption.

Fourth, your counter-examples are irrelevant to the problems of carbon accumulation. They found more coal? SO WHAT? They've been able to mine more coal because they blow the fucking tops off of mountains, and destroy whole ecologies in the process. They found more oil? Guess what, it is harder and more expensive to extract. Take natural gas fracking - there are whole areas contaminated with methane because they figured out how to easily and cheaply extract natural gas from beneath shale rock. There are people today who have flammable water - but that's okay, human ingenuity will save them, right? Wrong.

Fifth, of course, this rant does nothing to address the main problem that every climate scientist has confirmed: the current rate of accumulation of atmospheric carbon is unsustainable and unless carbon emissions are cut sharply within the next decade or two, will have catastrophic results. "Human genius" isn't magic, and won't change the fact that the polar ice caps and glaciers are already melting. We are in an epic crisis, but you want to put your head in the sand until someone waves their magic wand and fixes it all. Not gonna happen.

The environment is one of the burning issues of our time, and unless we build a socialism that embraces sustainable development instead of relying on the unicorn farts and fairy dust of "human genius" to save us, we are going to find out what the "or barbarism" part of Rosa Luxemburg's "socialism or barbarism" looks like in the not too distant future. Calling ecosocialists reactionary and trying to equate us with Malthusians is slander, when the truth is the opposite: anti-environmentalist socialists today are objectively a tool of capital in its quest to strip bare the earth in search of for profit. Marx recognized this, albeit in a limited way because the science of his day was limited; we have no such excuses.

[Zav]

I think we fail to consider whether population growth, itself, needs to be halted, in order to begin to address the problems he brings to our attention.

Does anyone else agree?
I do not. Though I agree that sustainability is an extremely important issue, the most important, actually, I don't see how stopping population growth is a necessary action before we can crush Capitalism.

[Sosa]

overpopulation is a myth

[caramelpence]

I was sent a private message by graymouser saying that he's put me on ignore because he doesn't like the fact that I oppose population controls, but I'll respond to his post in order to continue the debate.


It is a lie to call ecosocialism "crypto-Malthusianism" and to tar all environmentalism with a "Malthusian" brush.

I didn't. Why don't you point to where I said this, you liar? Malthusianism and environmentalism are associated, but I maintained a distinction between the two.


the main book that set it off was Rachel Carson's Silent Spring, which was not about growth at all but rather about the chemicals that were being sprayed unaccountably into our ecosystems.

Personally speaking I would argue that the philosophical roots of environmentalism can be traced back to the aesthetic dimensions of 19th-century romanticism, but yes, we can probably agree that environmentalism as a coherent body of ideas and as a political movement was a phenomenon of the post-war period and the 1960s and 70s in particular. It's probably worth pointing out that in the German context (and in other countries as well) the real emergence of the Green movement and its electoral success occurred in the aftermath of the defeat or disillusionment of more classically Marxist forms of radical thought, such as Maoism. I also find it interesting that you bring up Silent Spring as a major point in the history of environmentalism because the claims and predictions of environmentalists when it comes to the use of man-made chemicals in the environment (above all DDT, which is the main subject of the book) is another area where they have got it wrong scientifically and where the implementation of their policies has had tragic consequences for the lives of human beings, in the developing world in particular - the effective ban on DDT that emerged from her arguments and the arguments of others has meant millions of unnecessary deaths throughout the developing world because of its implications for the struggle against Malaria. Carson and her supporters, including you by the looks of things, can, to a considerable extent, be held morally responsible for those deaths. Her book was not about growth in the explicit sense but it shares the same underlying thrust as much of contemporary growth skepticism insofar as it is premised on the view that man should not seek to exploit and manipulate the environment as much as possible and that the condition of man is an essentially fragile one.


Second, there is nothing "Malthusian" at all about what I said or what other ecosocialist have said - and many, such as Ian Angus, are actually leading the fight against Malthusianism in the environmental movement.

Yes, what you said is very much Malthusian. You argued that the problem with Malthusian projections was that population growth rates were likely to slow through economic development and that this would prevent a population crisis - that line of argument is necessarily based on the premise that if population growth rates were to remain constant or increase with economic development, Malthusian projections would have greater validity, and there would be a need to accept some of their policy recommendations.


Third, your argument that human ingenuity alone will solve any problems is simply wrong

I'm not actually sure why you've brought up the Jevons paradox in relation to this point because the argument I made about human ingenuity was concerned with Malthusian predictions of population crisis and the nature of resource (especially food) growth versus population growth. I pointed out that human ingenuity has meant that the ability of man to produce food has expanded far beyond the growth of population, and that this is problematic for Malthusians because their entire argument is premised on the view that food growth can only ever be arithmetic whereas population growth is necessarily geometric, so that the latter will outstrip the former. The Jevons paradox doesn't really seem applicable to food consumption because food isn't like other resources in that it isn't being used to produce anything in the same way as, say, copper - we produce food in order to feed people, and we generally shouldn't be concerned about trying to lower the amount of food that people consume in the same way that we might be interested in the amount of copper that goes into an individual mobile phone, for example. The only way that the Jevons paradox seems applicable to food is in terms of the production of food itself, where we would be talking about how much land or seed or fertilizer or fuel or time has to be used to produce a given quantity of food.

As for the paradox itself, it's hard to see that it's actually a paradox or anything to worry about. I don't see why it should be a matter of concern that more efficient resource usage can mean a larger quantity of a resource being used in production. There's no reason why resource efficiency should be pursued solely with the aim of keeping resource usage constant or lowering resource usage. I find it telling that you say that increased resource usage as a consequence of increased resource efficiency is a phenomenon only of capitalism (why?) and you then say that it leads to more consumption, as if that's a bad thing. Socialists should be in favor of as much consumption as possible because the entire point of a communist society is to transform capitalism's technical capacity for material abundance into the actual enjoyment of abundance by human beings, which would entail the limitless consumption of the goods that they desire. A large part of Marx's critique of capitalism is concerned precisely with the ways in which capitalism fails to take full advantage of its immense productive capacity - chiefly through economic crises that leave large quantities of goods unsold and involve capitalists cutting back the scale of their production in order to satisfy the demands of profitability. The basis of socialist critique should not be that capitalism involves too much consumption, which is what many environmentalists argue, leading them to celebrate recessions, George Monbiot only being the most prominent example of this trend - instead we should attack capitalism for having a limiting effect on mass consumption.


Fourth, your counter-examples are irrelevant to the problems of carbon accumulation.

I didn't bring up carbon accumulation. I gave an argument to show that the record of environmentalists when it comes to scientific predictions has generally been poor. It has been. The environmentalists who made predictions about man running out of resources like coal at some point during the 20th century have been proven completely wrong. Just like they were on DDT, just like Malthusians were on population crisis. If you accept that we should judge scientific discourses and political ideologies by whether their arguments and predictions are supported by empirical evidence, environmentalism has a very poor record. As for the examples you give, naturally I don't support the extraction of natural resources in dangerous ways, but my concern is not with the environment as such, it's with the lives of human beings who are endangered by the failure of capitalist corporations to take advantage of the best modern technology in the way they manage those resources. I do support the expanded usage of those resources, and don't accept that the tops of mountains being blown off is sufficiently terrible to make it obligatory for socialists to campaign against coal consumption, to take just one example.


Fifth, of course, this rant does nothing to address the main problem that every climate scientist has confirmed: the current rate of accumulation of atmospheric carbon is unsustainable

You know as well as I do that there is nothing like a consensus on the causes of climate change and its medium- and long-term effects. More importantly, to the extent that we accept that climate change does have mainly human causes and requires a response on the part of human beings, it does not logically follow that we should accept the recommendations of many environmentalists and call for reductions in consumption or for people to otherwise adjust their lifestyles. Nor does it follow that we should be orientated solely towards sustainable energy technologies that are often still unreliable. A socialist response to climate change should call for the full utilization of proven technologies like nuclear power and for the expanded use of radical technologies like bioengineering, so that consumption can increase rather than have to be diminished by forcible means - and have no doubt about it, the only way that governments would ever be able to cut back consumption as a response to climate change would be through undemocratic measures because thankfully working people are sufficiently eager about their personal consumption that they would never give up their cars voluntarily. It is the role of socialists to be aggressive about human achievements and human control over nature at a time when so many governments are showing their cowardice by, for example, cutting back on nuclear power, despite the fact that no body or individual has been able to show with evidence that anyone died as a direct result of the Fukashima events.

[graymouser]

I was sent a private message by graymouser saying that he's put me on ignore because he doesn't like the fact that I oppose population controls, but I'll respond to his post in order to continue the debate.
None of the ecosocialist responses to the OP support population control.

As long as caramelpence continues to lie and slander people in this manner, there is no honest debate to be had.

[caramelpence]

None of the ecosocialist responses to the OP support population control.

As long as caramelpence continues to lie and slander people in this manner, there is no honest debate to be had.

But you do, you said as such in your private message to me, and in any case as I've already explained, your argument embodies implicit support for population control under certain conditions. Let me ask you in the form of a direct question. As you've argued that the problem with Malthusian theory is that it does not take note of how population growth rates decline with economic development, would you, when faced with a situation where growth rates did not decline or increased with development, follow the logic of your own argument and accept certain Malthusian policy recommendations in the form of population controls?

I haven't slandered you at all in this thread, and if you can't take up the issues raised, that's indicative of your inability to defend your political positions.

[graymouser]

But you do, you said as such in your private message to me, and in any case as I've already explained, your argument embodies implicit support for population control under certain conditions. Let me ask you in the form of a direct question. As you've argued that the problem with Malthusian theory is that it does not take note of how population growth rates decline with economic development, would you, when faced with a situation where growth rates did not decline or increased with development, follow the logic of your own argument and accept certain Malthusian policy recommendations in the form of population controls?
Are you still beating your wife, senator? This is a loaded and dishonest question, and you are attempting to "debate" in bad faith.

I do not support population controls. Period. You have attempted repeatedly to attach a position to me that I do not hold. I will not continue to debate with a liar and a slanderer.

[caramelpence]

This is a loaded and dishonest question

In what way is it a loaded question? It's quite simple - if faced with a situation where there was economic development but population growth remained at previous levels or increased, would you support population control? If not, then clearly the reason you originally gave for the fallibility of Malthusianism - that it does not take recognize that population growth rates fall as economic development takes place - cannot be the main basis of Malthusianism's flaws.

[Kotze]

As for the paradox itself, it's hard to see that it's actually a paradox or anything to worry about. I don't see why it should be a matter of concern that more efficient resource usage can mean a larger quantity of a resource being used in production.An implication of the Jevons paradox is that trying to counter pollution via sin taxes can have the effect of actually increasing pollution. It makes more sense to set strict physically defined limits on emissions and then to plan with these constraints.
A socialist response to climate change should call for the full utilization of proven technologies like nuclear power and for the expanded use of radical technologies like bioengineeringYeah, blowing off mountain tops to burn more coal, not so much. An emission constraint to reduce global warming would be more demanding than the constraints of coal and oil available.

Btw. Hey guys, you say something is wrong, but would you be in favour of it if it wasn't wrong? WOULD YOU??? THIS IS AN IMPORTANT QUESTION :P

[caramelpence]

An implication of the Jevons paradox is that trying to counter pollution via sin taxes can have the effect of actually increasing pollution.

That's great, but not a single person in this thread has mentioned tax policies in relation to emissions.


Btw. Hey guys, you say something is wrong, but would you be in favour of it if it wasn't wrong? WOULD YOU??? THIS IS AN IMPORTANT QUESTION :P

Let me try and explain this to someone as ignorant as you. What's at issue is the reason as to why graymouser and other posters think that Malthusianism and population controls are wrong, i.e. what the basis of their critique is. We are often interested not only in why someone has a given position or advocates a given policy but their background reasons for doing so. It was this exact point that Lenin tried to get at in his own article on Malthusianism (http://www.marxists.org/archive/lenin/works/1913/jun/29.htm) where he argued that whilst there were many professionals who advocated the widespread dissemination of information about birth control, they did so not out of a desire to enhance the freedom of women, but because they thought that the dissemination of birth control would be the most effective ways to limit population growth. We should be interested in background reasons for advocating policies not only for the sake of theory or ideology but also because someone holding a certain set of background reasons can mean that a change in circumstances can make it desirable for them to change the policies they advocate. Members like graymouser have said that they do not accept Malthusianism or population control because they think that development will lead to birth rates falling - and so I am asking them whether they accept that, were population growth rates to remain stable or increase alongside development, they would come to advocate population control in policy terms. This is a logical question to ask because in that instance their initial background reason would no longer be viable. Whereas I say that even if population growth rates were to increase, Malthusianism would still be bunk, because I have a different background reason for rejecting Malthusianism.

I am confident that anyone who is not as stupid as you will be able to grasp this.

[graymouser]

In what way is it a loaded question? It's quite simple - if faced with a situation where there was economic development but population growth remained at previous levels or increased, would you support population control? If not, then clearly the reason you originally gave for the fallibility of Malthusianism - that it does not take recognize that population growth rates fall as economic development takes place - cannot be the main basis of Malthusianism's flaws.
This is more intellectual dishonesty and slander.

If the specific demographic science that shows that Malthus was simply wrong, itself is wrong - then would anti-Malthusians become Malthusians? NO. This should be obvious, you're arguing like a creationist - if scientific idea A is not true, then pseudoscience B is true. A scientific viewpoint denies this. Your pretense to not understand this is disingenuous, and I will not take up any of your points until you acknowledge this.

[caramelpence]

If the specific demographic science that shows that Malthus was simply wrong, itself is wrong - then would anti-Malthusians become Malthusians? NO

So if it were not the case that population growth rates fall with development (as predicted by "demographic science", the DTM and all that) such that population growth rates actually remain stable or increase, you would not advocate population control as Malthusians do? In that case, you must have some reason to reject Malthusianism other than the assumption that population growth rates will and do fall with development. That reason cannot in and of itself be sufficient to reject Malthusianism given the hypothetical situation I've postulated. Nor is it in fact the only or the main basis for rejection that population scientists put forward, as I explained in my very first post. This is very simple, so please think for a while before you answer this time. I'm not doing anything slanderous or disingenuous here, and there is no basis for a comparison with creationism.

EDIT: Let me try and explain this from another angle, as you are clearly having some problems. At its most basic level, Malthusianism is made up of two premises and one conclusion - that population growth is geometric, that resource growth is arithmetic, and, in conclusion, that, unless population growth is artificially limited, population will eventually exceed resources and crisis will result. By saying that population slows with development without it being necessary to have artificial limitation you are attacking the Malthusian thesis by saying that the first premise is false, at least over the long term. What I have been asking you is what you would do if the first premise turns out to be correct - i.e. if the assumption that population growth diminishes with development turns out to be wrong. If you limit your attack to the first premise alone, rather than attacking the second premise as I did in my first post, then it would seem that, if you are faced with evidence that forces you to accept the validity of the first premise, the Malthusian conclusion follows, because you have no other way of attacking the argument.

[Robocommie]

As you've argued that the problem with Malthusian theory is that it does not take note of how population growth rates decline with economic development, would you, when faced with a situation where growth rates did not decline or increased with development, follow the logic of your own argument and accept certain Malthusian policy recommendations in the form of population controls?

That's an absolutely absurd question, and it's entirely based on a hypothesis that breaks with reality. It's like asking if you'd be a capitalist if it really was the most fair and equal system. It's wholly irrelevant.

[caramelpence]

That's an absolutely absurd question, and it's entirely based on a hypothesis that breaks with reality. It's like asking if you'd be a capitalist if it really was the most fair and equal system. It's wholly irrelevant.

It's not enough just to assert that something's "absurd" without giving an explanation why. Even if the question were purely hypothetical it would be a reasonable one to ask but the fact is that there are also medium or highly developed countries that still exhibit birth rates beyond what the DTM would lead us to expect. Saudi Arabia, Paraguay, Samoa, Kuwait, and Malaysia, to pick a few examples, are countries that are unlike developing countries in many respects, but they all have birth rates above the world average. It is an empirical fact that being developed or having the status of an NIC does not automatically entail a country having a low birth rate, and the fact that you and others are evading the questions at hand just shows that you can't defend your disgusting crypto-Malthusianism. Your comparison with capitalism is absurd because development being compatible with high birth rates is an empirical fact whereas the issue of capitalism's fairness or unfairness is a question of an entirely different order - and in any case, I don't think that people don't become capitalists because they think capitalism is unfair!

Clearly, ignorance and neo-Malthusianism are rife on Revleft.

[Robocommie]

It's not enough just to assert that something's "absurd" without giving an explanation why.

Actually, there is a point where continuing to entertain stupid questions based on dishonest arguments is just degrading to everyone involved.

If white people really were superior, wouldn't it be sensible to be a white supremacist? Are you only not a white supremacist because all races are equal? Because at one point Europeans ruled all of Africa, but Africa never ruled Europe. That's an empirical fact. Why are you such a disgusting crypto-white supremacist, caramelpence? I demand you explain why.

Clearly, fools and trolls are rife on Revleft.

[Sir Comradical]

This "irresponsible sexual behaviour" you speak of does not in any way amount to a "war of the poor against the rich". Quite the contrary actually since human beings are the raw materials under capitalism.

[caramelpence]

If white people really were superior, wouldn't it be sensible to be a white supremacist?

If you can't see why that has nothing to do with my question, and how the comparison is laughable, then that's your problem, and you're not interesting or intelligent enough to waste time having a discussion with.

In any case, if graymouser the Malthusian can't deal with that specific issue, they can take up the other issues I raised in my response to their post, as that contained more issues and anti-human sentiments on their part than just the issue of Malthusianism.

[Robocommie]

Guys I just want you all to know that caramelpence just sent me a private message saying he was putting me on ignore list because I opposed the concept of white man's burden. I don't think that's very nice but what can I do?

[Queercommie Girl]

Guys I just want you all to know that caramelpence just sent me a private message saying he was putting me on ignore list because I opposed the concept of white man's burden. I don't think that's very nice but what can I do?

WTF? :confused:

[Robocommie]

If you can't see why that has nothing to do with my question, and how the comparison is laughable, then that's your problem, and you're not interesting or intelligent enough to waste time having a discussion with.

I'm just making a point, European countries are usually pretty rich, and a lot of nations populated by non-white people are usually pretty poor. I think the fact that you're just evading the question shows pretty well that you can't defend your disgusting crypto-white supremacism.

Also, Glenn Beck raped and murdered a girl in 1990.

[Robocommie]

WTF? :confused:

Not really. But if caramelpence can talk bullshit and invoke phantom private messages to slander people he's made his mind up about, I should think what's good for the goose is good for the gander.

[S.Artesian]

Guys I just want you all to know that caramelpence just sent me a private message saying he was putting me on ignore list because I opposed the concept of white man's burden. I don't think that's very nice but what can I do?

WTF does that mean: that he means there really is a white man's burden? Or that you're denying that the US. British and European bourgeoisie ever used that horseshit ideology to cover up and dissemble their brutality to indigenous peoples of other continents?

The US President McKinley explicitly used that justification for annexing the Philippines as a US territory, determined he said to bring the "gifts" of US "civilization" to "our little brown brothers" in the Philippines.

[S.Artesian]

Overpopulation is an economic category, not a scientific one; much like "race" is nothing but a social construct dressed up to look like science in order to justify and preserve exploitation and discrimination.

[graymouser]

Not really. But if caramelpence can talk bullshit and invoke phantom private messages to slander people he's made his mind up about, I should think what's good for the goose is good for the gander.
I actually did PM caramelpence saying that I was putting him on my ignore list until he retracts his statement that I am a "crypto-Malthusian." I do not appreciate being given a label I have explicitly rejected and having words put into my mouth, and I do not argue against people who argue in bad faith.

[Robocommie]

I actually did PM caramelpence saying that I was putting him on my ignore list until he retracts his statement that I am a "crypto-Malthusian." I do not appreciate being given a label I have explicitly rejected and having words put into my mouth, and I do not argue against people who argue in bad faith.

As you shouldn't, that shit is infuriating.

[caramelpence]

I do not appreciate being given a label I have explicitly rejected and having words put into my mouth

If you hadn't rejected the label, you wouldn't be a crypto-Malthusian, would you? If you can't defend your reactionary positions, then that's just too bad.

[Kotze]

That's great, but not a single person in this thread has mentioned tax policies in relation to emissions.You asked what the relation between the Jevons paradox and capitalism is. It shows a weakness of relying on indirect measures like taxation to control the pollution problem.


We should be interested in background reasons for advocating policies not only for the sake of theory or ideology but also because someone holding a certain set of background reasons can mean that a change in circumstances can make it desirable for them to change the policies they advocate.What matters are the effects of actions, intentions and consequences don't always match and intentions can hardly be observed. An outlook with focus on motives is problematic because the judgement it leads to is for the most part speculation. Don't you understand how paranoid that kind of reasoning is?

Also lol at calling others ignorant while spouting lines like "there is nothing like a consensus on the causes of climate change" — maybe ecology and economics aren't your forte. Why don't you concentrate on things you have talent for, like fapping to Evita? :rolleyes:

[S.Artesian]

I'd actually agree with the OP that there is plenty of irresponsible sexual behaviour, but the problems that arise from that have more to do with social issues that so-called overpopulation, which is a word often manipulated by reactionaries of all kinds, green fascists for example. Essentially what you are saying is that because people in developing countries (I'm guessing you actually mean black people) do not have the means to provide for their children like our parents did for us, we should force them not to reproduce. Survival of the fittest?


The only kinds of irresponsible sexual behaviors are behaviors that spread disease or use a relation of power to compel sexual acquiescence by another person.

[robbo203]

Clearly, capitalism and the ever attendent, ongoing war of the rich against the poor, is an ongoing problem, a rotten form of social organization - but irresponsible sexual behavior and reproductive practices compared the ongoing war of the poor against the rich, is an equally destructive force which we have unleashed on our potential for survival on this planet.
What I am saying is that people in developing countries, nearly all of the time, have more children than they can afford. If a parent can hardly afford to feed herself, how is she supposed to have a decent standard of living, how is she supposed to make the most of her meagre opportunities, while carrying and supporting a child, or two, or three?
I think we fail to consider whether population growth, itself, needs to be halted, in order to begin to address the problems he brings to our attention.

Does anyone else agree?

I think there are problems with this argument. Having large families is not something that happens primarily out of irrational ignorance. In societies where some kind of social welfare system is minimal if not non existent, you have to depend on your childtren and your kinship network to support you in old age. The more the better. Children, moreover, play an important role in the domestic household economy of rural peasants - tending to stock , fetching firewood and water and so on.

A further reason, of course, is high infant mortality rates. Birth rates are high precisely for the reason that there is almost a fatalistic expectation that some of your childen will die an early death. As infant mortality declines so birth rates follow but there is a bit of lag . This is what is called the demographic transition and why population can grow qyuickly even though birth rates are falling. Its just that the death rate has fallen even lower!


Throughout the world we are starting to see birth rates fall. In a few countries. well advanced in terms of the demographic transition, birth rates are below replacement level (I think this is the case with Spain where I live). There are many other factors affecting population growth but I think these are the main ones. The poor are not poor because they have large families. Indeed, ironically some development economists cite underpopulation - as in parts of Africa - as being the cause of poverty as it makes it uneconomic to install infrastructure liike communication links that could enable peasants to access markets and agricultural uinputs. I dont necessarily buy this argument but it is an interesting take on the subject

In a world in which we can produce enough to easily satisfy our basic needs I dont think overpopulation has relevance as an explanation for poverty at all. Poverty is a symptiom of capitalism, not too many people

[Nothing Human Is Alien]

Tertullian made the argument in the year 200. Malthus made it in the 1800s. Neither were correct.

Resources are fluid.

Examples: Many years ago, iron was used to basic tools by humans who couldn't fathom that the same material would one day be used to build skyscrapers and bridges that span huge distances. Coal was once used for jewelery by people who never thought it would later power the industrial revolution, and once the industrial revolution came it was used to produce steam power by people who had no idea that power would one day come from uranium. That's because uranium was used to color glass, not as an energy source.

Get it?

The human species is truly brilliant. We continue to find ways to move forward with the things available, and create them where they don't exist.

The problem is not and has never been that there are “too many people,” or “not enough resources.” The problem is social: the capitalist minority controls the tools and technology used to produce the things we want and need.

In a modern society, the labor of 1 person can feed and house more than 1 person. Because of that, and because resources are fluid, there's no excuse for the wants and needs of all to go unsatisfied. There are simply obstacles (i.e. capitalism) in the way.

[Reznov]

Demographic Transition Model!

Basically, before a country starts to develop birth rates are very high and death rates are also very high. So population doesn't change much. When medicines, better sanitation etc enter into the country birth rates remain very high but death rates plummet. A population explosion then occurs when population increases rapidly. Eventually the birth rate falls to closer in line with the death rate and you eventually arrive at the position where the likes of Japan and Western Europe are where the death rate exceeds the birth rate and population decline is only held off by immigration.

I'm not sure if I'm answering your question. But this is normal for all countries. It won't last forever. However, it is admittedly pretty hard to argue that a massive population isn't a drain on the earth's resources and doesn't push down wages.

Afterall, the population of the world is more than double what it was in 1960. But without going to the lengths China went to to dampen population growth its hard to see how it can be realistically slowed.

Its amazing, as this was probably the best post and got no thanks.

Well, at least better then some of the people here trying to link the poster to being a Fascist.

[graymouser]

The human species is truly brilliant. We continue to find ways to move forward with the things available, and create them where they don't exist.

The problem is not and has never been that there are “too many people,” or “not enough resources.” The problem is social: the capitalist minority controls the tools and technology used to produce the things we want and need.
I'm deeply uncomfortable with this extreme version of technological optimism. Many of the tools and solutions we have come up with are double-edged swords. An example that pops to mind: the people who installed asbestos in millions of buildings had no idea what mesothelioma was, they were just putting up this amazing fireproofing material. It probably saved lives Yet now asbestos is considered one of the worst kinds of contaminant you can have in a building, and removed by workers in hazmat suits. Carbon-based fuels drove the industrial revolution but are now driving us to the brink of catastrophe.

Capitalist development is the root of the problem, as has been addressed by the major ecosocialist authors writing today: John Bellamy Foster, Ian Angus, Joel Kovel, and a number of others who've been looking at the ways that capitalist growth has resulted in the continual degradation of the environment. The problem is finding ways to expand that are sustainable, that is, that will allow the people in the world to have enough. Current trends say that this is unrelated to population growth - and I'm inclined to believe it. What we need is not limits to population but an entirely new model of growth, which looks at increasing efficiency as a necessary precondition for increasing output. This is only possible through socialist planning, since the market will inherently tend to favor companies that are growing no matter what the costs. It is only by removing the market that we can re-set our priorities.

[danyboy27]

Overpupulation is a myth, its been debunked over and over. The only ones still cligning to this theory are either ignorant of the real fact or extremist looking for an excuse to pick on brown peoples.

[graymouser]

Overpupulation is a myth, its been debunked over and over. The only ones still cligning to this theory are either ignorant of the real fact or extremist looking for an excuse to pick on brown peoples.
Unfortunately, that's not true. Aside from the OP, there are a lot of people in the environmental movement who sincerely believe that population growth is the problem, and population control is the solution. It's a major fight that ecosocialists continually have to take up, because it leads to harmful policy ideas in the name of against ecological degradation. It doesn't have currency in socialist circles, because we understand it's principally an anti-poor agenda, but in mainstream environmentalism it's depressingly common.

[danyboy27]

Unfortunately, that's not true. Aside from the OP, there are a lot of people in the environmental movement who sincerely believe that population growth is the problem, and population control is the solution. It's a major fight that ecosocialists continually have to take up, because it leads to harmful policy ideas in the name of against ecological degradation. It doesn't have currency in socialist circles, because we understand it's principally an anti-poor agenda, but in mainstream environmentalism it's depressingly common.

that what i said, ignorant of the facts or rightwinger.

[Vanguard1917]

We all complain about capitalism, but what about overpopulation? (http://www.revleft.com/vb/showthread.php?t=154407)


While capitalism is real, 'overpopulation' is a myth. There is no evidence whatsoever that the problems of the world today (povery, hunger, disease, war) are caused by population growth. Malthusians rely mainly on pessimistic, scaremongering speculation about the future, because history has shown over and again that there is no factual basis to their theory.

Most importantly, however, Malthusianism is a barrier to challenging capitalism. In blaming population growth for social problems, Malthusians shift the blame away from the social system and towards human beings. Apparently the problem is not capitalism, but the very existence of the masses themselves. For radicals from Marx and Engels onwards, Malthusian ideas were inherently conservative. It says a lot about the disorientation of the contemporary left that large sections of it have capitulated to what Lenin called a most reactionary and cowardly theory.

[Nothing Human Is Alien]

Many of the tools and solutions we have come up with are double-edged swords. An example that pops to mind: the people who installed asbestos in millions of buildings had no idea what mesothelioma was, they were just putting up this amazing fireproofing material. It probably saved lives Yet now asbestos is considered one of the worst kinds of contaminant you can have in a building, and removed by workers in hazmat suits. All of this has resulted from the private ownership of the means of production.

Look, my grandfather was an insulator who worked about as close as you can get to asbestos for a big part of his life. He died from lung cancer, gasping for air. Many other relatives have done or continue to do the same job. I did it myself for a short while.

So I'm not unaware of the effects of asbestos. And the fact is that no one who has been around the stuff is. Negative effects have been documented back over a century. The capitalists certainly knew it, but kept it under wraps as long as they possibly could because for them profit is king and workers are an another expendable resource.

"For much of the 20th century, efforts to put the genie back into the bottle were thwarted by an asbestos industry that knew of the dangers of its commodity but constructed an elaborate conspiracy of silence.

"What asbestos industry executives knew and when they knew it is a matter of public record, having come to light in the late 1970s after the first asbestos-disease lawsuits were filed.

"But those executives had an accomplice: the U.S. government, which also knew asbestos was hazardous but turned a blind eye to the dangers throughout most of the 20th century.

"Even today, the government has not fully acknowledged the scope of the problem or the extent to which its indifference and denial played a role in the worst work place health tragedy in U.S. history." - Shipyards, a Crucible for Tragedy, Part 1. By BILL BURKE, The Virginian-Pilot http://www.asbestos-attorney.com/pilot3-1.htm


Carbon-based fuels drove the industrial revolution but are now driving us to the brink of catastrophe.
This again has to do with private property in the means of production. Carbon fuel is controlled by massive corporations that have done everything from limit research to initiate wars to scrap plans for public transportation. Anything that gets in the way is attacked, including the very environment we live in. Profit is their concern, so that's what they pursue.

Do you honestly think a human community wouldn't focus the necessary time and resources on developing the best sources of energy? On maintaining the environment necessary to preserve our species?


Aside from the OP, there are a lot of people in the environmental movement who sincerely believe that population growth is the problem, and population control is the solution.
Which says more about "environmentalism" and single-issue activism than anything else. Once again, the self-activity of the working class is the only real answer. By pursuing its own interests the international working class can put a stop to the degradation of the world we live in. In order to survive it will ensure the survival of humanity.

[Nothing Human Is Alien]

http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_fOORhFmbA6s/TJjSQcnKMvI/AAAAAAAAB7Y/dPU9eoHCcVY/s1600/Overpopulation+and+Texas.png

[S.Artesian]

I'm deeply uncomfortable with this extreme version of technological optimism. Many of the tools and solutions we have come up with are double-edged swords. An example that pops to mind: the people who installed asbestos in millions of buildings had no idea what mesothelioma was, they were just putting up this amazing fireproofing material. It probably saved lives Yet now asbestos is considered one of the worst kinds of contaminant you can have in a building, and removed by workers in hazmat suits. Carbon-based fuels drove the industrial revolution but are now driving us to the brink of catastrophe.

.

Well, I don't think you should be uncomfortable with it, primarily because it is NOT technological optimism. Its optimism is purely "species-centric."

Regarding asbestos, yes perhaps at the beginning there was not established connection between asbestos and mesothelioma, but the problem was when evidence of a connection was becoming evident; the fact that research was suppressed or disputed on the basis of commercial concerns.

We might just be able to proceed with a bit more caution once the compulsion to accumulate, accumulate is abolished, you know? Like establish the hazardous nature before people show up with lung cancer and take the necessary precautions.

And I certainly don't think carbon-based fuels are driving us to catastrophe. Your confusing the use value of the commodity with its existence as a value, as an embodiment of profit. That's what's driving the production, and overproduction of carbon-based fuels.