good posts on pop

WSNers: Much better posts on the pop issue lately. The Barendse, Gomberg,
Reisz, Drouet and Hutchinson posts have been very informative. I was
particularly fond of the Barendse post, in which he argues that sometimes
population is a major factor and other times not. I tend to disagree on the
Rainforest case--someone mentioned the Brazilian policy of paying squatters
for clearing the forest, but even there I will admit that the complete
picture is a complex. But that is all I wanted out of the discussion of
population, an admission that it is sometimes a factor in exacerbating
other problems and that it poses a long term (but not that long) problem
for extinction of species, resource depletion etc. rather than a capitalist
ruse to keep people from focusing on the real issues.

On the technology of the future, Barendse is correct to point out that it
is hard to plan for 2050 without knowing what the technology will be, but I
don't think a world with 15 billion is a good prospect with any kind of
technology. If I remember correctly, the number is likely to be higher than
15, but no need to quibble. Note, though, that technology isn't likely to
be distributed evenly, with the lowest level of technology available in
precisely those areas most overpopulated. When I was in India, for example,
none of the cars had any emission controls at all. There was not much in
the way of a sewer system either, unless one counts the ditches running
along all roads.

Let's look at the issue another way. If we had a choice of a world with 1
billion, 6 billion, 20 billion or 60 billion, which one would we pick? I
think most would pick either 1 or 6, and only a few the other numbers. Or
another sort of choice: a world with 6 billion and a few animals and plants
left, or a world of 20 billion with almost none and rather strict
management of the food supply. Maybe genetic engineering will help us, but
let's not forget the dangers it poses. I am certainly not an enemy of
technology, but I am also not an uncritical believer in the benefits of
technological progress.

Finally, no one has mentioned the micro-level aspect of population.  Can
two parents really do a decent job of raising more than two children? I
have one 2 year-old boy, and he is all my wife and I can handle. If one is
to maintain a life of one's own at all, five kids is simply too many. For
those cases where people have more kids for economic reasons, that is where
gov't policy needs to step in and make the micro-rationality cohere with
macro-rationality. One approach to this is supplying social security, as
someone already noted, so parents do not need to rely on them for their old
age. Note that this solution doesn't simply hand out contraceptives and
hope for the best; rather, it manipulates incentives as they appear in the
social arena. Contraceptives will be part of the picture, but social policy
will need to align interests properly for them to be effective.

That is enough for one post. It is good to see WSN finally get somewhere on
an issue.

Randy Groves