Posted on 01/13/2017 8:49:33 PM PST by iowamark
After Words with Paul Sabin Paul Sabin talked about his book, The Bet: Paul Ehrlich, Julian Simon and Our Gamble over Earth’s Future, in which he analyzes a bet made between economist Julian Simon and biologist Paul Ehrlich. More than 30 years ago, Mr. Simon made a bet with Mr. Ehrlich on the future prices of five metals, asserting that technological change and a booming market would keep the country prosperous. But Mr. Ehrlich predicted that rising populations would lead to overconsumption, taxed resources, and famine. Mr. Sabin argued that the opposing perspectives of the bettors - faith in free markets versus fear of environmental exploitation - are at the heart of the battle over climate change that continues today. He was interviewed by Dina Cappiello.
(Excerpt) Read more at c-span.org ...
I read that mathematical workout some years back. It actually stated that you could house the world's population in typical three bedroom suburban homes, with no more than three persons per house, and they'd all fit inside the state of Texas.
There's vastly more space on this planet than most people realize.
Drive from the eastern border of Texas to the state’s westernmost city of El Paso sometime. You will be astonished at how much space there is in this one state alone. It’s scary big, and most of it is empty, lonely...nothing.
Now look at a map of the whole country and try to wrap your head around how much space that is. It’s mind bogglingly huge.
Want even more space? Drive through Canada. You’ll long for civilization.
You are correct. Byzantium was a world power until the reign of Justinian when the plague hit. .
To partially offset the nonarable areas of the earth, one can, at least for food production, add back in large areas of the sea, and a bit for freshwater bodies. Properly managed aquaculture can produce enormous amounts of protein, as evidenced by either catfish farms, or, even more dramatic (but bonier) the stunning numbers / biomass of Asian Carp now in some of our waterways. (I’ve seen the latter 1st hand - it is “mindblowing”.)
It’s also true that one can look at the Israeli example: Many nonarable areas need not be so. Basically, we just need efficient distribution & usage of existing (and renewable) fresh water sources.
Granted, some fisheries HAVE already been depleted, but a lot of that is poor management. I would contend that aggressive and well run aquaculture programs world-wide could easily feed double the existing population, with no overall negative effect on other food production.
Incidentally, your figure of 1 person per 270 x 270 meter block is “interesting”. That’s 72,900 sq. meters, or a bit over 18 acres per person. If we assume aquaculture can fill in for truly nonarable and uninhabitable areas, and knock off 1/3th for roads, buildings, parks, and such, in arable areas, that leaves us with 12 acres per person.
At least one source states that on average, in the US, one acre can feed one person.
http://www.farmlandlp.com/2012/01/one-acre-feeds-a-person/
So, it would seem we have quite a bit of potential left.
BTW, that article is REALLY interesting, especially the parts about well managed livestock production, and the point that only 10% of US corn production goes to human consumption. Roughly 90 MILLION acres worth goes elsewhere. Yet, we really don’t need to burn food as fuel...
Looking at it another way, I was intrigued to learn that as a rough average, in the US, per year, an acre typically produces around 150 bushels of corn, or 8,400 lbs. of shelled corn. So, the US produces roughly 840 BILLION lbs. of corn each year. That’s approx. 1/3 lb. of shelled corn per person on the planet, 365 days a year.
The WORLD will likely produce around 1 billion metric tons of corn this year, or around 0.86 lbs. per person per day. And that’s just corn. (Most people don’t realize that when it comes to wheat, the US is only about 8% of world production. The EU, China, and India far outproduce us, with Russia somewhat ahead in good years for them.)
Other fun facts:
“A bushel of corn fed to livestock produces 6 pounds of beef, 13 pounds of pork, 20 pounds of chicken, or 28 pounds of catfish.”
http://www2.kenyon.edu/projects/farmschool/food/bushel.htm
So, basically, in one year, 2 acres of land, plus 1 acre of catfish farm, can crank out as much or more catfish than I want to eat* in my entire life, assuming I “only” make it to age 85 or so, and assuming half of the 28 lbs. of catfish mentioned above is waste / discarded.
*I really like properly prepared catfish. :-)
This also assumes the 2008 figure given in this article, of 8000 lbs. of catfish per year per acre, from a commercial catfish farm in Alabama:
bttt
I was still relatively young back then, but it’s when I first began to notice that facts don’t matter to liberals.
Not correct. The world population stops growing a country at a time. That is, demographically, when a country reaches an economic plateau unique to it, quickly its birthrate falls to between 2.1 and 2.3 children per family, which is the stable level of no growth.
Importantly, while government often panics with this, there is little they can directly do to increase their population growth rate. However, both government and the predominant social culture can *lower* the rate even further.
That is, every added “requirement” of potential parents by either government or culture means that fewer parents will want to have children. Added to this provision of birth control, and abortion, and the birthrate can really be driven down.
Most recently, this phenomenon has taken place in Mexico, whose population growth rate has dropped to just 1.15%, just slightly less than Iceland, at 1.17%. Most of eastern Europe are in the *negative* numbers.
https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/rankorder/2002rank.html#mx
Remember Paul Ehrlich is an expert in the population dynamics of butterflies.
See the connections to humans?
Ehrlich is living proof that expertise in one field does not automatically grant expertise in another!
Does the 2nd sentence really need a sarcasm tag?
Facts never matter to liberals. “Never let the truth get in the way of the agenda.”
Remember the phrase “carrying capacity?” It is no longer used, along with “acid rain,” “global cooling,” “peak oil,” “resource depletion,” and numerous others. There is always a “sky is falling” meme to hype for disinformation and arouse low information peons.
God knows and will take care of it.
But appears that you think professional affirmative action government bureaucrats and psychotic billionaires can do a better job than God.
It's all relative. Throughout history few have ever been as well off as we are. In most of the world prosperity is simply having adequate shelter and enough to eat.
Good place for them. I’ll watch.
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