The Guardian had this article that points out that the root of the world's problems are overpopulation.
How to save the planet? Stop having children | Frankie Mullin | Society | The Guardian
There have always been concerns about the world's population and predictions that humans would run out of food for the teeming masses. So this isn't all that new. Maybe we aren't in danger of running out of food or space to live. But it is clear now that we are affecting the global environment and we are squeezing out other species of plants and animals who live in the world. When humans run out of land to live on and grow food, we will probably begin to inhabit and farm the oceans. By doing that, humans can continue to survive, but the cost may be the loss of most of the other "non-useful" species of life.
The overpopulation problem has been delayed by the many plagues and wars that have destroyed massive amounts of population and slowed down the growth. However, now with modern medicine, we have conquered most of those diseases, and there will not likely be any plagues that will make a large dent in the population. I had always expected a World War III to occur during the cold war, and envisioned a post-nuclear war world that could take centuries to get back to today's population. It appears, at least for the present, that we may not have a nuclear holocaust.
Small changes can have huge effects on the world over time. Reducing the birthrate would have a tremendous effect on the world's environment in 50 to 100 years from now. I agree that medical practitioners in the US should help families make intelligent decisions on family size and assist their patients reach those goals using modern medical techniques.
However, the world also needs to put pressure on the religions of the world who are trying to grow and spread their religions by having more babies. Muslims, Catholics, Hasidic Jews, and Mormons, for example seem to want to have as many babies as possible to promote their religion. More babies means more people paying to support the church, and more people to proselytize and spread the religion. The Catholic Church, carefully developed a theology several hundred years after Christ that started the restrictions on birth control See this article on Slate It wasn't until the 1930s that the Catholic Church made birth control "a sin" . Other religions later seemed to adopt the same belief in order to try to maintain their "population" in competition with the Catholics. Somehow, world opinion needs to be changed to discourage this sort of destructive behavior and families who do have more than a few children need to be financially penalized for that decision. Should the world pay for those very large families health care? Free education? Reduced income taxes?
How to save the planet? Stop having children | Frankie Mullin | Society | The Guardian
There have always been concerns about the world's population and predictions that humans would run out of food for the teeming masses. So this isn't all that new. Maybe we aren't in danger of running out of food or space to live. But it is clear now that we are affecting the global environment and we are squeezing out other species of plants and animals who live in the world. When humans run out of land to live on and grow food, we will probably begin to inhabit and farm the oceans. By doing that, humans can continue to survive, but the cost may be the loss of most of the other "non-useful" species of life.
The overpopulation problem has been delayed by the many plagues and wars that have destroyed massive amounts of population and slowed down the growth. However, now with modern medicine, we have conquered most of those diseases, and there will not likely be any plagues that will make a large dent in the population. I had always expected a World War III to occur during the cold war, and envisioned a post-nuclear war world that could take centuries to get back to today's population. It appears, at least for the present, that we may not have a nuclear holocaust.
Small changes can have huge effects on the world over time. Reducing the birthrate would have a tremendous effect on the world's environment in 50 to 100 years from now. I agree that medical practitioners in the US should help families make intelligent decisions on family size and assist their patients reach those goals using modern medical techniques.
However, the world also needs to put pressure on the religions of the world who are trying to grow and spread their religions by having more babies. Muslims, Catholics, Hasidic Jews, and Mormons, for example seem to want to have as many babies as possible to promote their religion. More babies means more people paying to support the church, and more people to proselytize and spread the religion. The Catholic Church, carefully developed a theology several hundred years after Christ that started the restrictions on birth control See this article on Slate It wasn't until the 1930s that the Catholic Church made birth control "a sin" . Other religions later seemed to adopt the same belief in order to try to maintain their "population" in competition with the Catholics. Somehow, world opinion needs to be changed to discourage this sort of destructive behavior and families who do have more than a few children need to be financially penalized for that decision. Should the world pay for those very large families health care? Free education? Reduced income taxes?
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