Re: The sixth extinction

On Sun, 15 Jun 2008 23:24:12 -0400, "David L. Burkhead"
<dburkhead@xxxxxxx> wrote:

hal@xxxxxxxxxx wrote:
On Sun, 15 Jun 2008 22:05:36 -0400, "David L. Burkhead"
<dburkhead@xxxxxxx> wrote:


Show me any case where extrapolating exponential growth beyond a
few decades actually matched what actually happened with population.

http://dieoff.org/page80.htm

Okay, I wasn't clear. My bad. I was referring to human populations.

In his recent book Collapse (2005), Jared Diamond argues that many
earlier civilizations have collapsed due to environmental problems,
and warns of current environmental problems. For example, he argues
that it was overpopulation that led the now recovering inhabitants of
Easter Island (a.k.a. Rapa Nui) to destroy their once beautiful island
paradise.
? From circa AD 1000 to circa 1650/1700 AD, Rapa Nui's
population increased significantly. Some estimate the population
reached a high of 10,000 or even 15,000. Moai carving and transport
were in full swing from 1400 to 1650, less than 100 years before the
first recorded European visitors to the island. By the late nineteenth
century the population had fallen to a low of 132. Deforestation,
civil wars, European diseases and slave raiding all contributed to the
population crash. Core sampling and archaeology from the island has
revealed a slice of Rapa Nui history that speaks of deforestation,
extinction of native bird populations, soil depletion, and erosion as
well as loss of access to deep sea fish as wood became scarce. From
this devastating ecological scenario it is not hard to imagine the
resulting overpopulation, food shortages, and ultimate collapse of
Rapa Nui society. Evidence of cannibalism at that time is present on
the island, though very scant. Van Tilburg cautiously asserts, "The
archaeological evidence for cannibalism is present on a few
sites."[24]

THE INTRODUCTION, INCREASE,
AND CRASH OF REINDEER ON ST. MATTHEW ISLAND
By David R. Klein
Alaska Cooperative Wildlife Research Unit, University of Alaska,
College

One of the handful of examples that are always cited. And yet you can't
seem to get through your head that there's a _reason_ it's always the same
handful of examples.

Populations don't behave that way. If you think they do,
then explain what mechanism would cause population growth to level
off and stop altogether.

Tell you what. Look at the figures Malthus put forward back in
his seminal work on the subject of population dynamics. Now look
how the actual population has changed in the centuries since.

This is a basic DE problem: which curve actually fits the
history of population growth in the world.

Populations simply don't behave that way.

That you claim it doesn't make it so. That a handful of
examples (and always the same examples--something you would do
well to think
on) are given by the doomsayers to "proove" their point, does not
mean that it's a linear relationship.

I can cite you dozens of studies in which the demonstrated function
was exponential growth with OVERSHOOT in which the population
greatly exceeded carrying capacity of the environment then crashed.

"Dozens of studies" on the same handful of examples that are
always cited.

Ever wonder why it's always the same handful of examples?

there are dozens of examples offered, but because those are the
studies done.

"Dozen's of examples." Out of how many species?

Without natural predatory control, it wil ALWAYS
happen.

Proof by repeated assertion

it's very simple math David. IF birthrate exceeds deathrate (the
existence of no predatory controls) the population WILL grow.
Population growth WILL NOT level off without some mechanism to do so.
Population WILL continue to grow past CC. Crash WILL occur. I've
sent you all the links, all of which are referenced to the extreme
that PROVES THIS. You choose to ignore them. You are in denial.
Probably because you are frightened.


Any animals whose birth rate exceeds the death rate will grow
exponentially.

Only true if one assumes that birth rate and death rate are constants.
This assumption is unjustified.

um, they typically are. Birthrate, for example, is pretty constant
among humans and other higher animals. Death rate is too, unless
something happens like massive war or famine. If you don't know what
humans birth/death rate is look it up. I've posted it a dozen times
for you. Tired of doing your homework, I am.


Without predatory control, it will ALWAYS grow until
it exceeds CC.

And yet, the people promoting that idea cannot seem to come up with
anything other than the same handful of examples, repeated endlessly.

It will overshoot, the DIEOFF will occur. It's what
happens. It always happens.

And again with the repeated assertion.

So, when was the last time the !Kung population exceeded carrying
capacity and crashed? They are a group that has been studied a lot, so you
should be able to find plenty of examples, right?

[ 8< No sense waiting for Hal to address any of these issues. He can't so
he'll just pretend they don't exist >8 ]

what issues? What is it you are trying to assert? That overshoot and
crash don't occur because you can think of one example it doens't
happen? I've explained to you several times that there sometimes are
controls. Without controls it will overshoot. That's the math. Maybe
the !Kung are smart enough not to keep having kids until everyone
starves. I don't know. It's irrelevent.



Ask yourself why birthrate is high in places like Ethiopia and
Rwanda, and low in places like the US, Japan, Germany, France,
Italy, etc. And before you say that they can't afford birth
control, remember that some of the poorest people in the world (for
example, the !Kung of Africa) are perfectly capable of limiting
their birthrate without any "help" at all.


it's cultural. Male dominated societies have greater number of
children. The first thing women do when liberated and treated as
equals is they have few children.

http://www.uaf.edu/rahi/papers/tatiana98.html

So why do the !Kung have so few children? How about the Yanomamo? (In
neither group could women be said to be "liberated.")

The thing is, you are confusing the causal arrow. Both lower birthrate
and sexual equality derive from a society developing to a tech base where
brute manual labor is the primary source of economic gain. Mother, father,
and four kids working on a farm produces more, per person, than mother,
father, and three kids.


[ 8< ]

Yet, strangely enough, when it is in their self-interest to do
so, they do so: The only groups that have large population growth
are those where families _benefit_ from having more children (or
groups that have only recently ceased being in such a situation and
are still having a "cultural lag").

and so, the obvious thing to do is.....

Find the sources of energy (nuclear in the short term, OTEC and fusion
in the medium term, other sources in the long term) to allow the
industrialization to move folk out of "manual labor agriculture) where folk
_do_ benefit from having more children, to an industrial/technological
society where limiting having children is where they find the benefit. And
they'll find that benefit all on their own.

But folk like you will never let it happen.

finding new sources of energy will NOT solve the problem. It will
only put off the result until another resource runs out.


#include crickets.h

Putting your fingers in your ears and shouting "I can't hear you" is
hardly "crickets."

That you reject the answer does not mean that your question is not
answered.

you reject everything I say out of fear. The consequence is too
horrible for you to comprehend because you are so grossly unprepared.
You must deny it because you don't know how to cope with it. The ONLY
answer to extreme overpopulation is entirely liberal principles, and
you can't cope with that either. So take your fingers out of your
ears and listen, and your children might have a chance of survival.

Hal
.

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