KeithL
Administrator
Posts: 9,990
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Post by KeithL on Jun 4, 2020 14:10:27 GMT -5
Honestly I believe they would be a LOT easier - but not for the reasons you might think are obvious....
I believe that many Earthlings have a ridiculously inflated sense of entitlement... And, even worse, many of us don't even realize that we do.
Imagine that we live in a colony on Mars... We have a population of 100 people, enough food for 100 people for five years, and the next supply ship is due in five years.
Do you even imagine anyone considering having children - KNOWING that, if they do, someone will starve before the next supply ship arrives?
Do you imagine anyone ASSUMING that "we'll work it out before the food runs out"? And can you imagine anyone complaining if they were told: "You aren't ALLOWED to have children until we figure out how to get more food."?
There is NO SUCH THING as "a natural right to have children". In fact there are no such things as "natural rights" at all. ALL so called "rights" are created by and claimed by people... (I recall a quote from long ago: "If you aree stranded alone in a lifeboat in the middle of the ocean the only rights you have are to catch fish or starve".) And, in this case, what we have are a lot of people, stranded in a big lifeboat, on a huge ocean... and nobody is coming to rescue us.
Once the food runs out, and we start complaining that "everyone has a right to eat", there isn't going to be anyone out there to listen.
We DO NOT have some imaginary right to keep producing more and more children...
All we have is a historical precedent that suggests, at least so far, it hasn't been a problem to do so... And a whole lot of new information that suggests that this may no longer be true...
And, yes, I think this would be much less of a problem in a Mars colony... for two reasons.
First of all, in a new Mars colony, the limits would be more obvious, and so would be the consequences for ignoring them.
Ans, second, the sort of people who would end up living in a Mars colony would be the ones who were well aware of these facts. And, if anyone had any sense, those would be the only ones ALLOWED to move there.
So... When the food and space run out on Earth... And people on Earth start starving, or killing each other for a space to homestead... The Mars colonists will be sitting comfortably, with their rationed food, and their carefully controlled population... (Assuming, that is, that we HAVE a Mars colony before it happens....)
I don't think that would work out in the long run... Many areas are just too hard to make inhabitable...
And you still have to feed everyone...
And you still have to get rid of the garbage... And, no matter how well it works out, it isn't a permanent solution...
(Because, unless something changes, the population will simply keep increasing until it exceeds whatever capacity you have.)
So are you saying that solving these same problems on Mars would be easy.It's pretty obvious to me that the simple solution is to control our population... Figure out how many humans the Earth can comfortably and sustainably support... Then simply make a decision to maintain that number as a steady population... We've had the technology we need to do so for decades... It's simple, effective, safe, and doesn't even cost much...
But, for a variety of reasons, we just can't seem to actually get people to DO it...
(There are a million excuses, and a million rationalizations, and even forcing them doesn't seem to work very well.) The bottom line is that the Earth is NOT going to get any bigger... so eventually it will fill up.
But it wouldn't be that hard to simply stop having so many children...
I'm not a fan of telling people that they can't have children if they want to have children. I am more of a fan of once someone reaches say 80yo they are made into food to sustain the younger population.
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Post by 405x5 on Jun 4, 2020 14:47:24 GMT -5
Captain Kirk Supplied the vaccine 💉 Where is he when we need him?!?!
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Post by gus4emo on Jun 4, 2020 22:13:08 GMT -5
Honestly I believe they would be a LOT easier - but not for the reasons you might think are obvious....
I believe that many Earthlings have a ridiculously inflated sense of entitlement... And, even worse, many of us don't even realize that we do.
Imagine that we live in a colony on Mars... We have a population of 100 people, enough food for 100 people for five years, and the next supply ship is due in five years.
Do you even imagine anyone considering having children - KNOWING that, if they do, someone will starve before the next supply ship arrives?
Do you imagine anyone ASSUMING that "we'll work it out before the food runs out"? And can you imagine anyone complaining if they were told: "You aren't ALLOWED to have children until we figure out how to get more food."?
There is NO SUCH THING as "a natural right to have children". In fact there are no such things as "natural rights" at all. ALL so called "rights" are created by and claimed by people... (I recall a quote from long ago: "If you aree stranded alone in a lifeboat in the middle of the ocean the only rights you have are to catch fish or starve".) And, in this case, what we have are a lot of people, stranded in a big lifeboat, on a huge ocean... and nobody is coming to rescue us.
Once the food runs out, and we start complaining that "everyone has a right to eat", there isn't going to be anyone out there to listen.
We DO NOT have some imaginary right to keep producing more and more children...
All we have is a historical precedent that suggests, at least so far, it hasn't been a problem to do so... And a whole lot of new information that suggests that this may no longer be true...
And, yes, I think this would be much less of a problem in a Mars colony... for two reasons.
First of all, in a new Mars colony, the limits would be more obvious, and so would be the consequences for ignoring them.
Ans, second, the sort of people who would end up living in a Mars colony would be the ones who were well aware of these facts. And, if anyone had any sense, those would be the only ones ALLOWED to move there.
So... When the food and space run out on Earth... And people on Earth start starving, or killing each other for a space to homestead... The Mars colonists will be sitting comfortably, with their rationed food, and their carefully controlled population... (Assuming, that is, that we HAVE a Mars colony before it happens....)
Colonizing will be a long process, bringing supplies would only last for so long, we're talking about growing some type of food, which would be a wait and see, start with a few people, not ordinary people, well, you get my point....
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novisnick
EmoPhile
CEO Secret Monoblock Society
Posts: 27,235
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Post by novisnick on Jun 4, 2020 22:33:19 GMT -5
Honestly I believe they would be a LOT easier - but not for the reasons you might think are obvious....
I believe that many Earthlings have a ridiculously inflated sense of entitlement... And, even worse, many of us don't even realize that we do.
Imagine that we live in a colony on Mars... We have a population of 100 people, enough food for 100 people for five years, and the next supply ship is due in five years.
Do you even imagine anyone considering having children - KNOWING that, if they do, someone will starve before the next supply ship arrives?
Do you imagine anyone ASSUMING that "we'll work it out before the food runs out"? And can you imagine anyone complaining if they were told: "You aren't ALLOWED to have children until we figure out how to get more food."?
There is NO SUCH THING as "a natural right to have children". In fact there are no such things as "natural rights" at all. ALL so called "rights" are created by and claimed by people... (I recall a quote from long ago: "If you aree stranded alone in a lifeboat in the middle of the ocean the only rights you have are to catch fish or starve".) And, in this case, what we have are a lot of people, stranded in a big lifeboat, on a huge ocean... and nobody is coming to rescue us.
Once the food runs out, and we start complaining that "everyone has a right to eat", there isn't going to be anyone out there to listen.
We DO NOT have some imaginary right to keep producing more and more children...
All we have is a historical precedent that suggests, at least so far, it hasn't been a problem to do so... And a whole lot of new information that suggests that this may no longer be true...
And, yes, I think this would be much less of a problem in a Mars colony... for two reasons.
First of all, in a new Mars colony, the limits would be more obvious, and so would be the consequences for ignoring them.
Ans, second, the sort of people who would end up living in a Mars colony would be the ones who were well aware of these facts. And, if anyone had any sense, those would be the only ones ALLOWED to move there.
So... When the food and space run out on Earth... And people on Earth start starving, or killing each other for a space to homestead... The Mars colonists will be sitting comfortably, with their rationed food, and their carefully controlled population... (Assuming, that is, that we HAVE a Mars colony before it happens....)
Colonizing will be a long process, bringing supplies would only last for so long, we're talking about growing some type of food, which would be a wait and see, start with a few people, not ordinary people, well, you get my point.... Don’t forget the ketchup!
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KeithL
Administrator
Posts: 9,990
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Post by KeithL on Jun 4, 2020 23:27:55 GMT -5
That was kind of my point....
If we do set up a colony on Mars, or a colony mission in space, it will be manned by the kind of people who pay attention to things like that... And who are willing to limit their population, or their consumption, to levels appropriate to the limits of their environment.
NOT with people who simply assume that there will always be enough of everything - so they don't need to worry about it... In other words, participating in a Mars colony, or a long term space mission, self selects for the sort of people who are willing to plan and follow a plan. (Whereas, at least so far, reproducing until you have more members than your competitors, is what most Earthlings have evolved to be good at.)
My guess is that, in a thousand years, either: 1) The occupants of Earth will have gotten tired of breeding and raising children and the population will have declined on its own (as population growth in countries with high levels of education and wealth seems to tend to level off)
2) The population of Earth will have continued to increase until everything collapses... ending is mass starvation... or war... or both
(by which time we will have exhausted all of the available resources and be living in some combination of lifeless desert and garbage dump) 3) The well educated among us will have decreased in number, whereas the less well educated will have increased, resulting in a new dark ages (and, if that happens, with their increased numbers, it is almost inevitable that some natural disaster will eventually wipe most of them out) But, either way, what happens will happen more or less on its own, rather than as a result of careful planning. Because, as far as I can tell, the majority of humans will NEVER collectively agree to do ANYTHING in an organized and planned fashion.
To be quite candid, I personally don't particularly expect any of those outcomes in particular... However I very much suspect that one or another of them will turn out to be right... Simply because "everyone will come to their senses before it's too late" seems to be so darned UNLIKELY.
(Sadly, or perhaps not, I don't expect to be around long enough to see it all happen.... )
But, hopefully, by the time that happens, that Mars colony, or space colony misison, will be around to allow the better part of the human race to carry on....
Honestly I believe they would be a LOT easier - but not for the reasons you might think are obvious.... I believe that many Earthlings have a ridiculously inflated sense of entitlement... And, even worse, many of us don't even realize that we do. Imagine that we live in a colony on Mars... We have a population of 100 people, enough food for 100 people for five years, and the next supply ship is due in five years.
Do you even imagine anyone considering having children - KNOWING that, if they do, someone will starve before the next supply ship arrives?
Do you imagine anyone ASSUMING that "we'll work it out before the food runs out"? And can you imagine anyone complaining if they were told: "You aren't ALLOWED to have children until we figure out how to get more food."? There is NO SUCH THING as "a natural right to have children". In fact there are no such things as "natural rights" at all. ALL so called "rights" are created by and claimed by people... (I recall a quote from long ago: "If you aree stranded alone in a lifeboat in the middle of the ocean the only rights you have are to catch fish or starve".) And, in this case, what we have are a lot of people, stranded in a big lifeboat, on a huge ocean... and nobody is coming to rescue us.
Once the food runs out, and we start complaining that "everyone has a right to eat", there isn't going to be anyone out there to listen.
We DO NOT have some imaginary right to keep producing more and more children...
All we have is a historical precedent that suggests, at least so far, it hasn't been a problem to do so... And a whole lot of new information that suggests that this may no longer be true... And, yes, I think this would be much less of a problem in a Mars colony... for two reasons. First of all, in a new Mars colony, the limits would be more obvious, and so would be the consequences for ignoring them.
Ans, second, the sort of people who would end up living in a Mars colony would be the ones who were well aware of these facts. And, if anyone had any sense, those would be the only ones ALLOWED to move there.
So... When the food and space run out on Earth... And people on Earth start starving, or killing each other for a space to homestead... The Mars colonists will be sitting comfortably, with their rationed food, and their carefully controlled population... (Assuming, that is, that we HAVE a Mars colony before it happens....)
Colonizing will be a long process, bringing supplies would only last for so long, we're talking about growing some type of food, which would be a wait and see, start with a few people, not ordinary people, well, you get my point....
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Post by ttocs on Jun 4, 2020 23:46:35 GMT -5
My guess is that, in a thousand years, either: - - 3) The well educated among us will have decreased in number, whereas the less well educated will have increased, resulting in a new dark ages
(and, if that happens, with their increased numbers, it is almost inevitable that some natural disaster will eventually wipe most of them out) It only took 500 years:
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Post by ttocs on Aug 2, 2020 14:53:16 GMT -5
SPLASH DOWN !! (a while ago)
Still waiting for toxic purge levels to go a little lower before disembark. Prob about 5 minutes longer.
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novisnick
EmoPhile
CEO Secret Monoblock Society
Posts: 27,235
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Post by novisnick on Aug 2, 2020 15:54:40 GMT -5
This isn’t the Apollo or Shuttle! We’re in the touchscreen era! Is that a Stormtrooper?
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novisnick
EmoPhile
CEO Secret Monoblock Society
Posts: 27,235
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Post by novisnick on Aug 2, 2020 15:58:27 GMT -5
SPLASH DOWN !! (a while ago) Still waiting for toxic purge levels to go a little lower before disembark. Prob about 5 minutes longer. Loved it!
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Post by gus4emo on Aug 2, 2020 19:08:05 GMT -5
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