ELON MUST (MUSK) BE(IS) THE CAUSE.

I think Mr Musk is doing an incredible job. He has its flaws, but imho he will be remembered as one of the great visionaries of the early 21st century. And not just a visionary with ideas, but someone who turned his ideas into reality and actually had/will have a huge impact.

As for the rest of the world, there is only ONE thing we have to do. Without that, we have no chance at all to survive as a species. And once that is solved, all other problems are manageable with relative ease.
And hardly anyone puts it on the worldwide agenda with any real power or persuasion.

Any clue what I am talking about?

I'll give a clue: many governments are proposing or sponsoring exactly the opposite and the one government that DID work on it (afaik), is (partly?) relinquishing its efforts...

 

you got me, c'mon, the suspenders are killing me.

 

Bring the worlds population back to 4 billion. One billion would be even better.

The impending wars within 100 years over clean water would no longer be a real threat.
Food supply would be in abundance.
The need for deforrestation would no longer exist.

I could go on and add 100 more points with ease.

(drops mike)

 

Your "solution" has some questions that need to be answered...

Restricted breeding? Lottery system, "master race", birth control (sterilization), euthanizing, ...?

 

I never said I had a solution... But I am serious when I say it should be priority 1. And 2 and 3 and 4 and 75.
Nothing we do will save us unless we handle this. And if we do not handle it voluntarily, I am very afraid we will handle it involuntarily, although just a few wars will hardly make a dent in the worlds polultion unless Trump and Kim keep at it (at which point the fall-out (literally and figuratively) will be so big, it is too late anyway)..
Forgetting the (possibly extremely deep) moral issues one might have about at least curbing the population growth, I cannot fathom anyone NOT agreeing with me on this.

I think restrictive breeding is a solution. I did not want to have more than 2 kids for this very reason. I violated my own rule by accepting the unplanned gift of a third, so even with the education, wealth and knowledge that comes from me living in a first world country with probably the best financial planning for the elderly (no need for kids to take care of me with old age), I still violated my own utopian views.
Why would anyone (as a couple) have a RIGHT to have more than 2 kids when it is a direct threat for the survival of our race? I think that is a quite simple and defendable standpoint.

How to do this in practise? Possibly sterilisation. Holland pays childsupport. Necessary after the second world war (if you are so narrow minded you only look at your own countries population, but that is as seen with the knowledge of today). If a country can support you having kids, why not support you NOT having kids? Why not pay a bonus for having your tubes tied after a maximum of 2 kids?
Why is the child support still in effect 70 years after the second world war??? Noone knows other than people expect and depend on it so we cannot stop... What is wrong with NOT having kids if you cannot afford them or are not willing to give up other things to pay for them?

SPOILER ALERT: personally I have mixed feelings about Dan Brown's solution in Inferno. I will certainly not advocate it as a good solution, but I will not rule it out if all else fails. And anyone who takes offence at this is imho not considering the problems of not doing anything about this.

 

Again, I stated that the exploding worlds population is the most important issue BY FAR we are facing. All others are less important and will (partly) solve itself if we address this issue.

Again: I never said I had a solution on HOW to do this.

Their politics worked. They were not perfect, but they did work. That the effect seems abscent is due to many causes, but the claimed 1.5 childs per woman on average in 2010 would eventually (even with e.g. people becoming much, much older, scewing the results) lead to a decrease of the population.
Period.
All the more peculiar they are abandoning them (afaik they changed it to 2 child politics). Mind you, I do not know the specifics nor am I an expert. Far from it, I have to go by what the main media tell me.

As for rate of development: what do you prefer: slower rate of development, or a world where people kill eachother on a small and a large scale?
Once we are in such close proximity of eachother and resources are getting scarcer, aggression can easily flare up every day. My apologies to people who believe otherwise, but we are but mere animals and revert back to these basics quite fast in situations where this is needed or warranted.

 

Most of the humans I meet are longer on vices and shorter on virtues. Many of the people I know do a poor job of self regulating themselves, and I have to believe would be even less likely to succumb to greater regulation by others. Self sacrifice is the exception and always wanting more is the norm. At some point someone always decides they're not getting their fair share, then conflict ensues. It's human nature.

I wish our planet could avoid the inevitable, but I believe we will have to approach self-annihilation before coming to the realization that there's a better way to live with each other.

 

I think we begin with self-determination, and we abolish the presumption that people on the African continent need a lot of rudder input from people who have never bothered to visit, let alone live there.

There are four or five other continents that need to get THEIR poop in a group......first.