IntenseDebate

12 years ago @ MercatorNet - MercatorNet: Gender be... · 2 replies · +4 points

David, I don't see that he's assuming any moral ground at all. What he says may well provoke us to moralise - according to our own moral views - but that's different, surely?

12 years ago @ MercatorNet - MercatorNet: Explainer... · 0 replies · +9 points

"..All these have never yet been seen -
But Scientists, who ought to know,
Assure us that they must be so...
Oh! Let us never, never doubt
What nobody is sure about!" 'The Microbe', Hilaire Belloc, 1897

12 years ago @ MercatorNet - MercatorNet: Is it OK ... · 0 replies · +1 points

Happy to agree with you about this....

12 years ago @ BioEdge - BioEdge: California&rs... · 0 replies · +3 points

So a 'pre-birth' order deprives the woman of her 'rights over her own body'?

12 years ago @ Demography is Destiny - Why you shouldn’... · 0 replies · +1 points

"sustainable" - is just a buzzword. Sounds good - you can't be against sustainability. But what is 'sustainable' and what isn't, is easy to say, but difficult to verify.

12 years ago @ Demography is Destiny - Why you shouldn’... · 2 replies · +1 points

Thanks for the correction - as you say, 800,000 is a gross underestimate. I meant to say 800 million (the figure given on the site you quote). However, that's still less than a billion.
Nevertheless, things are improving - even if not fast enough. The Millennium Development Goal of halving the proportion of hungry people by 2015 may well be achieved (see FAO website, report for 2013). The fad for biofuels doesn't help, by using land that could be used for growing food.

12 years ago @ Demography is Destiny - Why you shouldn’... · 4 replies · +1 points

Actually, it's not billions but about 800,000. Still 800,000 too many. What is most likely to help them is economic growth - as in China. Decarbonising the economy is a luxury that only rich countries can afford.

12 years ago @ Demography is Destiny - Why you shouldn’... · 2 replies · +1 points

Is this a helpful diagnosis or just name-calling? You're entitled to call for evidence - proof of this kind of assertion is often hard to come by.

12 years ago @ Demography is Destiny - Why you shouldn’... · 6 replies · +1 points

I fully agree with your last paragraph. The rest of it is only half true.

The earth's resources are finite, but then we only need them for a finite length of time, to provide finite needs for a finite number of people. How all these finite quantities balance out is not necessarily easy to predict in advance. I wouldn't bet against our being able to sustain 20 billion people (100 years ago it would have been brave to predict that we could sustain 7 million) but I very much doubt we will have to try.

Global warming is a reality (as global cooling has been in the past) but not necessarily a catastrophic one (at least until the sun becomes a red giant in around 5 billion years). 'Someday' (probably) is a long way off. Probably we shall populate planets and moons before then.

12 years ago @ MercatorNet - MercatorNet: A deal wi... · 1 reply · +2 points

Because he ought to have known about this?.

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