YouTube - The Most IMPORTANT Video You'll Ever See (part 1 of 8)
Something almost anyone should watch, especially those who are a little bit mathematically inclined (but not too much, this isn't heavy stuff).
YouTube - The Most IMPORTANT Video You'll Ever See (part 1 of 8)
Something almost anyone should watch, especially those who are a little bit mathematically inclined (but not too much, this isn't heavy stuff).
Last edited by notthecheatr; 11th March 2011 at 11:17 PM.
Glory is fleeting, but obscurity is forever.--Napoleon Bonaparte
I didn't watch it, but I'll comment on what I presume is his eventual mentioning of population growth. If he mentions that the Earth's population is going to double in five decades or less, he's sorely mistaken and is drawing a poor correlation from an inaccurate model. As a physicist, he should know better than to make poor models.
A man said to the universe:
"Sir, I exist!"
"However," replied the universe,
"The fact has not created in me
A sense of obligation."
-- Stephen Crane
No, what he's saying is that we (obviously) can't maintain our present growth rates for very long, whether we want to or not, and that if we don't find ways of reducing our growth rate nature is going to do it for us, and the results won't be pretty.Quote by: Angry Citizen
Glory is fleeting, but obscurity is forever.--Napoleon Bonaparte
We don't have to find ways of reducing our growth rate. We already have one. It's called education and secularism. Note of course that it's only poor, uneducated nations with fertility rates far above replacement values.
A man said to the universe:
"Sir, I exist!"
"However," replied the universe,
"The fact has not created in me
A sense of obligation."
-- Stephen Crane
Even the USA has a positive growth rate. Even a 1% growth rate means a doubling time of about 70 years. Unless you've got a negative or 0% growth rate, you're eventually going to run out of space and resources.
It's not just about population, it's about energy as well. The point is that people don't understand basic exponential growth. If something is growing at 7% every year, that means it doubles every 10 years. It also means that in 10 years, you're going to have used more of a given resource than you ever used in all of history up until that point. If we use more oil in 10 years than we've used in all time before those 10 years, how long do we have before we run out? It doesn't matter how much oil you manage to find, you're going to use it all up and more very very quickly.
He uses the analogy of bacteria. If you put some bacteria in a jar with a doubling rate of one minute at 11am, then by noon the entire jar will be full. Imagine at 11:58 the bacteria start to realize things are getting crowded. So they do a bit of research, and find three more jars. How long are those jars going to last them? Until 12:02. That's all. They found more jars than they ever had in all of their history, and yet they only get two minutes out of it.
He puts lists on the board, the list of things which we like (family/parenthood, health, education, peace, food, etc.) and points out that they all make the population problem worse. Then he points out that all the things we don't like (abortion/birth control, disease, war, famine, etc.) make the problem better. Then the obvious: the growth rate is going to go to zero, whether we want it to or not. Even at 1% growth rate we will double every 70 years, giving us just a few hundred years before we're far beyond the carrying capacity of the earth. So either we need to limit our growth rate (using abortion/birth control, etc.) or nature is going to do it with the even less palatable options - disease, famine, etc. One way or another, that growth rate is guaranteed to go to zero. The question is, will it go to zero by our choice or by nature's hand?
Glory is fleeting, but obscurity is forever.--Napoleon Bonaparte
The USA, consequent to its substandard education and high rates of religion, has one of the highest growth rates in the western world. Nearly all other developed nations have negative growth rates.Unless you've got a negative or 0% growth rate, you're eventually going to run out of space and resources.
A man said to the universe:
"Sir, I exist!"
"However," replied the universe,
"The fact has not created in me
A sense of obligation."
-- Stephen Crane
So perhaps it's the USA specifically that needs to worry about growth rates, and not the rest of the educated world? It doesn't matter who's to blame, the important thing is that growth rates will go to zero, whether we choose to push them that way or not.
What has education done for growth rates? Truly education is correlated with lower growth rates, but correlation does not imply causation, and we also know that education helps us improve all the "good things" which make the population problem worse: health, prosperity, peace, etc. Until people start to realize the reality of what these percentages reflect, how exponential growth works, they're going to make very bad decisions based on the wonderful things education and technology give us.
Glory is fleeting, but obscurity is forever.--Napoleon Bonaparte
No, we're fine. The US TFR is 2.06. That's at or below replacement population. Countries that need to worry about their growth rates are Niger, with a TFR of 7.6 (I shit you not), and Uganda, with a TFR of 6.69.So perhaps it's the USA specifically that needs to worry about growth rates, and not the rest of the educated world?
Okay. If you don't believe that TFR's decline with education, would you like me to show you a state-by-state comparison of TFR's in America? I guarantee you that the southern states have higher TFR's than the northern states.What has education done for growth rates? Truly education is correlated with lower growth rates, but correlation does not imply causation
A man said to the universe:
"Sir, I exist!"
"However," replied the universe,
"The fact has not created in me
A sense of obligation."
-- Stephen Crane
I'm not much of an expert, so perhaps you'll enlighten me. Our annual population growth rate is 0.9%. How is that "at or below replacement?" Assuming no change in growth rate, the doubling time is about 78 years.
And again, correlation does not imply causation. Perhaps when growth rates are low, there is more of the "education resource" to go around and so more people become educated. Perhaps there is some third factor affecting both.
It would be absurd to argue that education is a bad thing, but it's also ridiculous to think that education alone is going to keep population growth rates in check.
Glory is fleeting, but obscurity is forever.--Napoleon Bonaparte
Because annual population growth rate and total fertility rates are two different things. Our growth rate comes entirely from immigration.I'm not much of an expert, so perhaps you'll enlighten me. Our annual population growth rate is 0.9%. How is that "at or below replacement?"
https://www.cia.gov/library/publicat.../2127rank.html
Why? The overwhelming trend is that > education means < TFR.It would be absurd to argue that education is a bad thing, but it's also ridiculous to think that education alone is going to keep population growth rates in check.
A man said to the universe:
"Sir, I exist!"
"However," replied the universe,
"The fact has not created in me
A sense of obligation."
-- Stephen Crane
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