Posted on 10/28/2011 8:36:16 PM PDT by DogByte6RER
Eat the Old: Could Mass Cannibalism Solve a Future Food Shortage?
The global human population is set to hit 7 billion on Oct. 31, and by century's end it will stand at 10 billion, according to the United Nations. That's a lot more mouths to feed.
There's a very good chance that generating food from traditional farming and livestock practices will not be able to keep pace with this boom. What if a worldwide food shortage were to become so terribly dire that people resorted to eating . . . people?
In such a dreadful event, the most-sensible first choice for meals might seem to be the elderly. After all, a fifth of those 10 billion humans will be at least 65 years old, and less physically able than the rest to contribute to what remains of society.
Mercifully, researchers say that feeding on the old – or, really, anyone – would not solve world hunger. In the short term, eating old people might satisfy the gruesome dilemma of how to feed the population and lower it at the same time. But cannibalism on a global scale could never work in the long term.
"If everyone is eating each other, the species won’t last very long," said James Cole of the University of Southampton 's Center for the Archaeology of Human Origins.
Part of the problem is that humans are just not very meaty compared with cows, pigs, deer and other animals. Even if we heavily supplemented our diet of human "long pork" with grains, we'd have to consume more fellow humans per year than we could ever hope to replace with new babies.
(Excerpt) Read more at livescience.com ...
Soylent Green is already for sale ... over at ThinkGeek.com
Oops ... Soylent Green is currently out of stock at: http://www.thinkgeek.com/caffeine/wacky-edibles/e9aa/?srp=1
Where does that fake factoid come from?
We can feed several billion more with slight advances.
And obviously, the bozo that wrote this doesn't realize that we've been making much more than slight advances for the last 100 years.
Think log curves.
/johnny
“If everyone is eating each other, the species won’t last very long,”
Yet, Barney Frank still exists.
Does the report come with any recipes?
Warning. Be damned careful about which old people you pick for lunch. Some of us armed to the teeth and are mean as tormented vipers.
Barney Frank’s partner consumes a little bit of Barney each night.
Obama will just keep redefining what “old people” mean. 70 one day, 35 the next.
“I had to eat Bobby, he was 10 but I’m 5. He was OLD!”
Oh horse shit!
We throw enough food out each day to feed a billion more people...
Then get the Governments off of peoples backs with all there OVER regulations and taxes and fees etc and they will be enough food. If not then we eat the politicians first..
Well here is a hint on how many we can feed.
If we gather all the people in the world currently alive for one of those aerial group photos and you packed them in tightly they would cover an area less in size than the state of Rhode Island.
It takes less than 1 acre of farmland to feed a person for a year that means if we put all the people on one continent (say South America) everyone could live comfortably with plenty of room that would leave the rest of the entire planet to grow food in. The reason I use such an example is to give one an idea how big the planet is compared to the human population. (I am not advocating moving all the people around or anything its just so one can see that this crap about overpopulation is one of the biggest farces ever uttered.)
In other words there is plenty of space to grow food. Its just that most countries won't grow and produce enough food for themselves.
Mmmmm ... Soylent Green ...."
Are there 7 billions of farmland in S. America? As opposed to acres of the Andes mountains or desert or Tierra del Fuego or flooded several months of the year Amazon river bottom?
Warning. Be damned careful about which old people you pick for lunch. Some of us armed to the teeth and are mean as tormented vipers.
Mmmmmmmm...extra crunchy!
But us skinnier old roosters are only good for soup, like our old hens. You gonna eat soup for decades, or what?
In other words there is plenty of space to grow food. Its just that most countries won’t grow and produce enough food for themselves.
You are right ofcouse, but, around here, most of the homes, stores and factorys are build on the flat and best agricultural land, as is the roads and airports an what have you, soon all agricultural land will be under concrete and pavement, you can’t grow good crops on rocky and poor soil, I could go on
Except for thick alkali flats and the like, there’s farmland everywhere. Not much of the earth has a climate more brutally cold, dry and windy than mine.
People with a will to do so can install various kinds of water systems for wells or even desalinization plants. Most stories of local water shortages are false and are driven by corrupt political business agendas.
That’s why we’re eventually headed for technocracy...or else. For now, though, lazy-minded morons are most supported in leadership, academia and other comfortable positions. That’s the greatest current threat to the human population—not overpopulation.
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