Keith, Four points!
First, we have plenty of everything that is needed. However, we are behaving so badly we cannot help but get into severe trouble. As I mentioned, when the cow patties are used for fuel instead of fertilizer, we have passed a point of no return - or at least a point where recovery may be Herculean. Second, in many areas, we have deprived ourselves of the free market which can make better decisions, more quickly, than any government planner, and do so impartially. Third, where the free market doesn't work - such as with land - measures must be taken to make the price mechanism do the job. Sidestepping the price mechanism's failure can bring us nothing but grief. Converting common interests - such as the oceans into price-mechanism controlled situations. Contract and competition will do a better job for us all, whether it be whales or elephants than any governmental dictate. (Compare Kenya and Botswana before the world ivory ban!) Fourth, the crucial need is power. If we have power, we can turn ashes into coal - salt water into drinking water, or do anything else that is necessary. We will need to go to nuclear power or coal sooner, or later. With an operating market, as non-renewable fuels become more expensive, so will solar, hydro-thermal, wind, and other "powers" become more attractive. At the moment, these power sources are not very practical except in special circumstances. The price mechanism can handle water. I believe the toilets in the UK are mostly "wash-down" - a system that uses, I believe, 10-12 Imperial gallons of water with each flush. My toilets, and the toilets of tens of thousands (and maybe millions) of Southern Californians are "low-flush" - using 1.6 American gallons per flush. The saving in England if the conversion were made would amount to a trillion, or two, gallons a year for every 5 million families (if my calculations on the back of an envelope are correct). Anyway, the point is that there are savings in water that can be made without getting too esoteric about it. However, government planners are more inclined to use stand-pipes on every corner, adding an inconvenience to every housewife's day. It's the way they think. We have plenty of wilderness in the world. Across the road from me is a 1,000 square mile national park. If that isn't enough, another park 2,000 square miles in area adjoins the first. I'm about 25 minutes from the skyscrapers of Los Angeles. I walked in Dorset from Wareham to Swanage - some 12 - 15 miles. I went along paths through deciduous forests and over hills. I came over the brow of a hill and looked down on Corfe Castle. I imagined archers up there picking off the guards on the battlements. I had a great Cottage Pie at Corfe - not good for walking. Then continued across fields until I finally got to Swanage. In summertime on a wonderful English summer day, I didn't meet a single walker on the paths, even though I passed at one point within half-mile of a trailer camp. I've walked 11 miles across the South Downs, perhaps 20 miles from Buckingham Palace and never more than a mile from the main London-Brighton Rd. and encountered less than a dozen walkers. I have a feeling we make wilderness too much of an issue. If we had half our present world population, hunger and deprivation would still be with us, for population isn't the problem. Harry -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Keith wrote: >Hi Harry, > >I buy a great deal of what you've written in reply to Lawrence. Many of the >so-called limits to growth (economic and population) which started to be >advanced in the 1960s and 70s have turned out to be chimerical. > >However, there are a couple of factors concerning population which I don't >think can be glossed over -- one current and the other a potential one. > >The current one concerns water shortage. There is little doubt that in many >parts of the world there is a fresh water shortage already. Because of >extraction along their routes, many rivers are largely devoid of water by >the time they reach the sea. Those who are more expert than me in these >matters seriously suggest that water shortages will be a major cause of >wars in the not-too-distant future. The one example I can think of at the >moment is the Euphrates -- from which Turkey, Syria and Iraq are all >extracting increasing amounts. Turkey is building dams and irigation >systems and I can only think that some sort of nasty response will be >called forth at some point. > >The other concerns the production of nitrogenous fertiliser. This is >derived from fossil fuels as chemical feedstock in pretty easy and direct >fashion and is thus relatively cheap. But even now, most of the >agricultural regions of the world can't afford to buy as much as is needed >in order to grow sufficient food, never mind when developing countries >start to demand more meat which needs an extra stage of production and >imposes a 10-fold decrease in efficiency in protein production. > >As fossil fuels decline in the coming years (and just think for a moment >what the demands of China will be in the coming years as the country >industrialises!) then fertiliser will become enormously expensive -- even >in the developed world. Those who say that in a post-fossil fuel world it >could be manufactured via electricity from nuclear, wind or solar power >don't realise that subsequent hydrolysis of water into hydrogen, and the >successive stages of production to produce fertiliser, each with low >efficiency, means that nitrogenous fertiliser would be anything between 20 >and 50 times more expensive than now. > >For stability (and, for goodness sake, a sufficient retention of sufficient >natural wildernesses in the world) we could do with a population at least >half of what we have now. > >Keith ****************************** Harry Pollard Henry George School of LA Box 655 Tujunga CA 91042 Tel: (818) 352-4141 Fax: (818) 353-2242 *******************************
