Environmental responsibility

[Scott Lloyd]

On 10/27/2018 at 9:13 PM, MiserereNobis said:

And old school, too. Leads to songs like, "they feed me on cornbread and beans, lord lord"

Sometimes goin' down that road of environmental responsibility leaves you feelin' bad but making some good music  

 

Yeah, like this golden oldie from 1970:

 

[Scott Lloyd]

On 10/26/2018 at 12:51 PM, smac97 said:

I'm curious as to what you mean by "population control."  Government-mandated?  Government-enforced?  Imprisonment?  Forced sterilization and abortions, like what we've seen in China?  Infanticide?  Euthenasia?  

So say Malthusian theorists.  And yet...

And here:

And here:

Interesting stuff.

Thanks,

-Smac

Any talk of Malthus and his theory reminds me of these immortal words from Ebenezer Scrooge:

Quote

If they be like to die, they'd better do it and decrease the surplus population.

As an author, Charles D*i*c*kens was very negatively disposed toward utilitarians.

 

[Scott Lloyd]

On 10/27/2018 at 6:24 PM, Calm said:

Smac, it bugs me that you post the extreme population control positions as if this was typical of those who label themselves “environmentalists” and label it as “many environmentalists”.  I come from a family of environmentalists, all of whom have wanted to have large families as well  

 

I don't see Smac as doing that. I see him as responding to a single post that was specifically relating to overpopulation projections.

For those who remember the days when Paul Ehrlich was hyperventilating in the mass media (as I do, very clearly) it is worth taking time to re-examine past theories about overpopulation and evaluating wherein they failed.

Edited November 3, 2018 by Scott Lloyd

[Calm]

40 minutes ago, Scott Lloyd said:

I don't see Smac as doing that. I see him as responding to a single post that was specifically relating to overpopulation projections.

A short relatively vague three sentence post merited a question for clarification as was asked in the third post he responded with, but unfortunately did not patiently wait for as far as I can see, because he appears to assume Thinking is going to respond in the worse way possible given what follows.  That single post did not merit three massive rants (or if you would prefer "hyperventilati[ons]") where he did a lot more than just revisit unfulfilled predictions.

Especially given overpopulation was not a part of Elder Snow's comment and therefore imo, it was a minor derail by thinking that Smac turned into a disaster of strawmen and stereotypes about evil, manhating environmentalists.

This thread was intended to be an invitation to examine and discuss Elder Snow's remarks and if desired, how the Church approaches environmentism or if that word is too much of a boogeyman for someone's fragile soul, our stewardship of the earth.

Edited November 3, 2018 by Calm

[Scott Lloyd]

18 minutes ago, Calm said:

A short relatively vague three sentence post merited a question for clarification, not three massive rants where he did a lot more than just revisit unfulfilledpredictions.

 

I don't see Smac's post as being, in any way, a rant. I see a lot of compelling information presented very concisely. Again, Ehrlich predicted in 1970 that there would be worldwide starvation in 1985 if we did not immediately change our ways. Well, 1985 came and went 33 years ago, and here we are, with the world population way beyond what Ehrlich predicted would bring on doomsday. Again, I think it's worthwhile to ask why.

Quote

Especially given overpopulation was not a part of Elder Snow's comment and imo, it was a minor derail by thinking that Smac turned into a disaster of strawmen and stereotypes about evil, manhating environmentalists.

I don't see Smac's post as disputing what Elder Snow said. (In fact, Smac can correct me if I'm wrong, but my guess is he does not even disagree with Elder Snow.) Rather, Smac was directly addressing the specific post to which he was responding, a post that appeared to superimpose population-control dogma on what Elder Snow actually did say. I would be very surprised to learn that Elder Snow was actually advocating population control.

And if you have a beef about thread derailment, perhaps you should take it up with the post author who iniitially brought population control into the discussion.

 

Edited November 3, 2018 by Scott Lloyd

[Scott Lloyd]

32 minutes ago, Scott Lloyd said:

I don't see Smac's post as being, in any way, a rant. I see a lot of compelling information presented very concisely. Again, Ehrlich predicted in 1970 that there would be worldwide starvation in 1985 if we did not immediately change our ways. Well, 1985 came and went 33 years ago, and here we are, with the world population way beyond what Ehrlich predicted would bring on doomsday. Again, I think it's worthwhile to ask why.

I don't see Smac's post as disputing what Elder Snow said. (In fact, Smac can correct me if I'm wrong, but my guess is he does not even disagree with Elder Snow.) Rather, Smac was directly addressing the specific post to which he was responding, a post that appeared to superimpose population-control dogma on what Elder Snow actually did say. I would be very surprised to learn that Elder Snow was actually advocating population control.

And if you have a beef about thread derailment, perhaps you should take it up with the post author who iniitially brought population control into the discussion.

 

Incidentally, Ehrlich's projections are a plot theme in the play and subsequent movie "Saturday's Warrior." That, in my opinion, is one of the elements that makes the play seem so dated today.

 

[Gray]

3 hours ago, Scott Lloyd said:

This Paul Ehrlich, sky-is-falling, zero-population-growth dogma was rampant nearly two generations ago. None of his doomsday prophecies were fulfilled.

Whether or not a population doomsday ever comes depends on our ability to continue to advance technology around food production. Before the invention of the  Haber–Bosch process for making ammonia (and from there nitrogen-based fertilizer), parts of the world were beginning to starve. Crop production couldn't keep up with population growth.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fritz_Haber#Nobel_Prize

Edited November 3, 2018 by Gray

[Thegospelofmichael]

I’m surprised how many people have taken the topic of being good stewards over the earth to be a negative aspect of our faith. As Elder Snow stated, we are to be good stewards over the earth and we will be judged if we are not. Having served a mission in Asia, it is incredible the amount of garbage that piles up in the streets. Often as members in first world countries, we think that we are just “praising Gaia” but it’s a true problem.

As for those advocating population control, that is an issue that was long ago proved wrong. The book “The Population Bomb” which brought the idea into mainstream thought called for extinction level hunger in the 1970s due to overpopulation. That didn’t happen and in fact we are set to top out at 9 billion and work backward... sure, the second coming might change that, though