[dohboi]

Let's still remember, though, that of those 7 billion, the top billion are using about 80% of the resources. So if you are looking for the most effect if culling it would be of those to billion.

But in fact by and large, the culling is starting from the bottom which has caused the least GW and resource depletion.

And consider that, while individualists are necessarily the first adopter of nearly any innovation (or in-old-ation in this case?), the crucial point is when the adopters become so numerous that the herd-followers start to join in, first in trickles, then in droves.

Just about everyone can lighten their ecological footprint and increase their level of resilience. If the 'droves' suddenly join the first adopters and start living very light on the land:

>eating mostly local vegetables and grains when available (with some local free-range meat)
>stop flying
>stop most driving
>stop buying tons of useless disposable crap and
>start having only one baby per couple at most, and that only after reaching at least the age thirty
...(add your own favorite...)

We could quite rapidly get to a situation where not only all are fed, but where humans are not contributing much at all to global warming (or most other negative impacts), particularly if careful eco-system restoration is the basis of a new economy and ideology.

Population could also drop rapidly and immediately without a 'die off.'

The problem is, of course, getting (nearly) everyone on board.

But GW and other cascading catastrophes are going to overtake any such optimistic scenarios, even if a there were some imaginable strategy to implement them.

[SeaGypsy]

Agreed Doboi, except there is an issue with these lowest impact people's being among the most rapid breeders. Perhaps the most dangerous situation is where there is moderate but rapidly growing consumption along with high reproduction: think Middle East, emerging Latin America and Africa and South Asia. We are already starting to see a peak in consumption in first world countries, along with major reductions in birth rates (even if made up for instantly through government sponsored migration under the guise of 'sustaining growth').

[dohboi]

Indeed.

MENA and most of South Asia are places where it is particularly difficult to see any happy ending even if political and sociological miracles somehow occur.

Bangladesh has actually brought its birth rate down quite drastically recently (from over 30 births/1000 people/year to about 22) through voluntary programs, but it is still well above replacement rate, and of course there are already so many people there it is going to be / has already become a pretty horrific mess. Sea level rise and the droughts and floods that AGW are bringing will only make things worse.

http://www.indexmundi.com/g/g.aspx?v=25&c=bg&l=en

FFs, fossil water, green revolution, and traditions that venerate large families have conspired to create a population boom throughout the region. And now the demographic curve is very bottom heavy--half the population below 20 in some places. Can we convince all those people not to have kids, or to wait till they're over thirty to do it? Can we convince their religious leaders to not incourage procreation? Like their counterparts in the Catholic Church, most Muslim and Hindu leaders want their followers to make more little Muslims and Hindus.

Look at how fast the births pulse over India on 'The Breathing Earth':

http://www.breathingearth.net

[SeaGypsy]

Religion has a lot to answer for, as does the massive failure in education.

Ibon mentions his recent visit to Bicol in the Philippines (home of his wife's family and half of my wife's also), where every agrible inch is under cultivation and people are still breeding like rabbits with no concept of ecology or balance in nature. It is very common in these places to find people with University educations in any field, with no basic understanding of resource/ population dynamic equations.

From what I can see, there needs to be a secular dominance, thoroughly defeating religious ignorance- and this secularism needs to be thoroughly based on ecological education. Instead, what we see in most places is education as means to an end of increasing wealth and consumption, with no basis in ecology at all. In a few places like the Philippines, there have been recent signs of real politic emerging with regards to the secular vs the church, through allowing birth control- but at the same time those fighting for the environment are being murdered in droves.

[ralfy]

In relation to that, the main financiers of population control in developing countries are philanthropists, Big Pharma, and lending institutions connected to multinational finance firms. The goal is to increase prosperity by keeping birth rates low, with prosperity contributing to more profits for corporations. The catch is that increased resource consumption due to prosperity negates savings due to lower birth rates.

[dohboi]

R, do you have any documentation on that. Corporations also benefit from over-population, since it insures that there will always be a cheap work force. And wouldn't it be better for them to have lots of consumers than to have just a few? Especially when it comes to drugs, there are only so many you can cram into one human body. So the more bodies, the better for Big Pharma, it seems to me.

Or are you claiming that there is a vast, sneaky, underhanded conspiracy by the world's largest and most powerful multinationals to... improve the lives of the masses?

[ralfy]

R, do you have any documentation on that. Corporations also benefit from over-population, since it insures that there will always be a cheap work force. And wouldn't it be better for them to have lots of consumers than to have just a few? Especially when it comes to drugs, there are only so many you can cram into one human body. So the more bodies, the better for Big Pharma, it seems to me.

Or are you claiming that there is a vast, sneaky, underhanded conspiracy by the world's largest and most powerful multinationals to... improve the lives of the masses?

Several points may be gleaned from UN World Population Reports. That is, given higher birth rates and both GDP increase and government funding unable to keep up with rising needs, population control leads to economic stabilization, and with that more prosperity, and thus more profits for corporations.

Increasing population is advantageous in a global capitalist economy, but a high birth rate that cannot be met by economic growth is not. With that, the goal of population control isn't to decrease population but to slow down birth rate. That may free up capital for economic development.

Keep in mind that just for the current global population there is already a lot of potential demand. Most human beings have no access to one or more basic needs, over 60 pct earn only around two dollars daily, etc. In which case, multinational corporations already have a large market for their goods and services.

The catch is resource availability. In terns of ecological footprint:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_co ... _footprint

we are already at overshoot given current ave. ecological footprint.

[SeaGypsy]

It is a clear fact to anyone who has lived in very high birth rate countries that most family resources go to the needs of children. That is needs, not wants. No documentation required, it's simple logic.

[Ibon]

The most recent essay by John Michael Greer is unprecedented in my opinion in how he articulates a theme I have been proposing here on many of my recent posts regarding the emergence of a sense of the sacred in relation to our biosphere.

http://thearchdruidreport.blogspot.com/ ... oming.html

[SeaGypsy]

I recently completed my second Ayahuasca journey, so the timing of Greer's article linked above is somewhat uncanny for me, thanks Ibon- this has struck a chord on more than one level. Currently a few weeks into a complete detox and life review, these are the thoughts I need to find.

[dohboi]

Thanks for that link, Ibon. I keep forgetting to check in on Greer to see what he's up to recently--usually something insightful (though he does occasionally stray too far from his impressively wide areas of expertise and so spouts the occasional howler).

I see some kind of widespread essentially spiritual awakening as essentially one of the few positive (but still imho extremely remote) possibilities as we head into the maelstrom. Much more likely is that extremely negative, bigoted and violent belief systems will become every more prevalent and ever more virulent.

[Ibon]

I recently completed my second Ayahuasca journey,

Imagine the global society we would have if each human being was initiated at a certain age with shamanistic teachings including the use of this most remarkable of vines, native to the Amazon..... where are you getting this in Australia? Is it cultivated there in the north?

[Newfie]

OK, NOW I understand the change in your writing style.

[SeaGypsy]

We have our own similes. I'm not at liberty to say, sorry.

[SeaGypsy]

I recently completed my second Ayahuasca journey,

Imagine the global society we would have if each human being was initiated at a certain age with shamanistic teachings including the use of this most remarkable of vines, native to the Amazon..... where are you getting this in Australia? Is it cultivated there in the north?

The societies which have evolved around Ayahuasca (& other related alkaloids- a clue)- begin preparing children virtually from birth- for this initiation process. I studied the subject for about a decade and a half before ever being in the 'right place, right state of mind, right company, right substance'. I have seen people take these substances like party drugs- unprepared, on a whim. The result is almost always a total rejection of the 'experience'; retreat to dopamine state- often with virtually no significant learning gained. The book- DMT the Spirit Molecule- shows how few modern people are ready for the experience. Other writings by Terence McKenna show that the preparation of the person, the setting and the substance can be achieved in almost any setting. His popularity in sub-culture shows there is an innate desire for the 'learnings' associated with such practices.

Yes these so called 'Shamanic initiations' could vastly change people, the world we live in, the way we live. However we live in cowardly times, ruled over by the most mundane of brain chemistry. I chose to take my consciousness outside the realm of serotonin & dopamine. My first journey was traumatic, resulted in a deep depression which dragged on for over a year, ended a long relationship which involved children, utterly changed my life- is one of the key causes of me being here on this site. My second journey- 7 years later- utterly different- extremely positive, revolutionary.

[Newfie]

I dunno guys, lots of LSD was rolling around back in the '60's and '70's. A rich white kids drug. I'm pretty sure a bunch of that has legacy has made its way to Washington and Wall Street by now. I don't know things are the better for it.

But then again, maybe it could explain our economic theories!

[Ibon]

I chose to take my consciousness outside the realm of serotonin & dopamine.

Understood. When the objective is "to get high" one misses the deeper opportunity completely. My experiences were always and only when deep in wilderness, preferabbly when I was already at base line several days into a canoe trip or backpack. Or recently in Mount Totumas when a movement in the wind whispered that the moment was ripe. The insights and communion with flora and fauna is not really a subject of this thread or something that should even be spoken out of context.

We do not live in times where elders can teach this or where our intuition is exercised to be able to read the signals that are always out there. Botanicals do provide a window that requires courage to enter if one's objective is too cut through all the mental constructs and pay witness viscerally to the ebb and flow of life, with all its painful lessons and transcendent wisdom......

SeaGypsy, I sense a brotherhood with you.......

[Ibon]

I dunno guys, lots of LSD was rolling around back in the '60's and '70's. A rich white kids drug. I'm pretty sure a bunch of that has legacy has made its way to Washington and Wall Street by now. I don't know things are the better for it.

But then again, maybe it could explain our economic theories!

probably true.....didn't Steve Jobs mention something about having taken acid in his youth.

What we are speaking about though is more related to using certain substances less as a dopamine high of getting off and more as a tool of communion with some deep truths of our place in the natural world. But any words about this, whether my own or Sea Gypsy's, in essense trivializes something that is a deeply personal subject.

And if we go on the next poster will be Visionmaster coming up with some weird esoteric picture of heiroglyphics from some ancient alien culture.....
better we stop while we are ahead, eh?

[SeaGypsy]

Mmmm.....

We do have an unusual synchronicity Ibon. Married women from the same island on the other side of the world from where we were born. Devoted ourselves to a 3rd place based on perceptions and values more akin to ancient people's than where we came from. 2 daughters. A continuing connection back to the islands. Affinity with wordless nature over any construct. Ethno-botanical influences. It would be interesting to sit together with one of the tribal shaman and get a third perspective!

Maybe we can do a journey some time with Newfie...
The future is as yet unwritten....

[Ibon]

Maybe we can do a journey some time with Newfie...
The future is as yet unwritten....

one never knows