Interesting argument here.
The Earth is underpopulated
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 Philosophaster |
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Posts: 51 (08/19/08 12:06:00) |
History is a graveyard of aristocracies. - Vilfredo Pareto
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samadhim7 |
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Posts: 310 (08/19/08 12:11:44) |
Yeah, most convincing butt-kicking I've ever seen Victor get ... lol!
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Victor Danilchenko |
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Posts: 56 (08/19/08 12:14:18) Forethought |
Sam, if you can't understand something, that doesn't mean a butt-kicking occurred. MK is faith-bound, and is not actually reasoning about the matter, but rather looking for excuses to dismiss the argument.
Ceterum censeo: veritas et libertas ultra omnis sunto.
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Victor Danilchenko |
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Posts: 57 (08/19/08 12:53:17) Forethought |
In your entire post, this was the only coherent point. I had already addressed it on YAP. While the negative externalities do exist, the balance of externalities is clearly positive, given the trajectory of our society -- and as exemplified by the status of big cities: even though people complain about the cities, they flock there, so clearly they consider money and career opportunities and social life to be more valuable than the pollution and crime and crowding and high prices. If at some point the balance of externalities becomes negative, we will probably see masdsive flight from big cities -- not just to suburbian bedroom comunities, but entire blocks standing empty, like Detroit all over the place. That's not by my reasoning, that's by your total misunderstanding of basic economics; and I am tired of trying to give you Econ 101. Yes, dude, that's a real cost which parents consider when deciding to make a child -- no different from them considering our genetically influenced tastes in food when deciding whether to have a steak. Regardless of the source whence one's taste for steak springs, one still enjoys the steak. Similarly, regardless of whence our liking for reproducing springs, we still wish to do it and derive enjoyment from it. The problem is externalities, and this cost is internal. Please try to think instead of going into a defensive crouch. I already gave you all the mental tools needed to comprehend the problem, and only your reluctance to do so stands in the way. No, it just demonstrates that you are one of those people who dislike economics because it requires you to take a hard look at how people make decisions, and why. Pleasure from doing altruistic acts is also an economic factor, dude, and economics perfectly well explains people giving to charity, or cutting hours to enjoy leisure, or foregoing getting a better-paying job in order to enjoy a nicer natural environment (as I did). You can strike a pose and bitch and moan about how economics is inhumane. You can hate economics all you want -- but economics looooooves you; and if you refuse to make intelligent economic decisions, you will simply make dumb economic decisions instead. Economics is not against benefiting others. Instead, it simply observes reality -- when the benefits of your actions go to others, you will generally do less than is economically optimal. Conversely, if the costs of your actions are borne by others (like pollution), you will do more than is economically optimal. Each time you make such dumb defensive knee-jerk, god kills a kitten. Won't you please think of the kittens? Erm, yeah. That's kinda the whole idea of externality. When the benefits of an action accrue to others, they will benefit from it, but you won't have enough incentive to do it. That's kinda, you know, the whole point of externalities. If you don't pay all the costs for e.g. polluting, you will do too much of whatever it is causes pollution -- and if you don't reap all the benefits of your widely beneficial actions (like, say, fighting for good governance), you won't do enough of it. Please stop with the stupidity, dude. Please stop with the stupidity, dude. This was the dumbest comment of this whole post chock-full of monumentally dumb comments. Losing faith is hard. Defend it, dammit! onwards, christian... I mean zero-population-growth... soldier!
Ceterum censeo: veritas et libertas ultra omnis sunto.
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Philosophaster |
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Posts: 52 (08/19/08 13:37:53) |
This may seem like an elementary point to make, but whether a person accepts this argument will depend on whether he thinks the detriments of a faster
population growth outweigh the benefits of it, and what value he places on each of the different detriments and benefits.
History is a graveyard of aristocracies. - Vilfredo Pareto
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samadhim7 |
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Posts: 312 (08/19/08 13:44:43) |
Victor,
Sam, if you can't understand something, that doesn't mean a butt-kicking occurred. MK is faith-bound, and is not actually reasoning about the matter, but rather looking for excuses to dismiss the argument.I've been following your discussion with MK closely. I find him to be very convincing and you less so. At first I thought you were just playing the devil's advocate but it appears you actually believe what you're saying. Trusting population growth to solve the problem of population growth is a pretty ignorant argument to make, especially coming from you. You fail to acknowledge that societies have in fact failed due to population growth and resource depletion. Why didn't population growth solve their problems? It is a matter of pure faith to assert that more people means more genius means more solutions. In fact, the genius per capita will probably remain the same. What about the genius available right now? If it isn't enough now, why should it be enough later? What time frame do you think we actually have to solve the problem? I've heard 10 years when it comes to global warming. Do you really think that is enough time to grow out of the problem? Here's a clue, it isn't. |
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Victor Danilchenko |
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Posts: 59 (08/19/08 14:04:19) Forethought |
Philosophaster wrote: A person who thinks so would be incorrect, because such top-down analysis is completely replaced by my point about the individual balance of externalities. The net effect of the population growth comprises the net effects of each person's existence, and each invididual's valuation of population growth is simply counted into the average valuation of the the aforementioned effects. Of those, the parents already accounted for the internal factors (and obviously decided that the positives outweigh the negatives), so only the external factors remain to be accounted for. Ergo, if the balance of externalities per person is positive, then automatically the balance of the effects of current population level must be positive as well.The advantage of my approach is that the top-down alternative sucks: in order to calculate the value of the population level, you must both make some very arbitrary value judgments about what is good and bad (as opposed to each person's individual preferences, as revealed by their actions) -- and you must also overlook a whole bunch of factors which do matter but cannot be accounted for in a top-down analysis, such as each parent's personal satisfaction derived from having children. In short, the top-down analysis attempts to duplicate the bottom-up analysis I already made, but cannot be even remotely close to accuracy for the above-mentioned reasons. Instead, in the bottom-up analysis, we simply exploit the fact that the parents already account for the internal costs and benefits, so simply determining the externality balance immediately gives up an up-or-down answer.
Ceterum censeo: veritas et libertas ultra omnis sunto.
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Victor Danilchenko |
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Posts: 60 (08/19/08 14:10:28) Forethought |
samadhim7 wrote: Which ones? Easter Islands? Pony up some examples. And if you do, for every example you have, I will offer a dozen counter-examples how people manage to actually do more with the resources they have, such as replacing copper with glass for information transmission. You people never learn. Every hear of Simon-Ehrlich wager? Ehrlich was the author of a popular book, The Population Bomb, which argued that mankind was facing a demographic catastrophe with the rate of population growth quickly outstripping growth in the supply of food and resources. Simon, a libertarian, was highly skeptical of such claims.You know what they say of those who learn nothing from history. Erm, DUH. But do you understand what the words 'per capita' mean? if the number of geniuses per capita remains the same, then more people means more geniuses. Go back to the peanut gallery until you can deal with your faith. There is no overpopulation problem.
Ceterum censeo: veritas et libertas ultra omnis sunto.
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Philosophaster |
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Posts: 53 (08/19/08 14:28:49) |
Victor Danilchenko wrote: The argument supposes that the balance of externalities for each new child will always be positive for human civilization at any population size, and the way I see this debate is that MK is arguing that (a) there is a point of diminishing returns where the negative effects of having more people around start to outweigh the positive ones of having more geniuses around and (b) we are past this point. I have to say that I am kind of confused at this point. Are you making a generalization that the world will always be "underpopulated" by virtue of human nature simply because parents always fail to account for positive externalities -- regardless of what the actual, specific population level may be?
History is a graveyard of aristocracies. - Vilfredo Pareto
Last Edited By: Philosophaster
08/19/08 15:10:31.
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samadhim7 |
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Posts: 313 (08/19/08 15:08:44) |
sam: You fail to acknowledge that societies have in fact failed due to population growth and resource depletion.Read this. Get back to me when you do. Every hear of Simon-Ehrlich wager?So what? Because a wager failed once doesn't mean it will always hold true. Circumstances change. You know what they say of those who learn nothing from history.This is exactly what I would say to you. See above. do you understand what the words 'per capita' mean? if the number of geniuses per capita remains the same, then more people means more geniuses.Again, so what? We have geniuses right now yet the problem is getting worse. All you are doing is saying if we wait long enough someone will come along and solve the problem. That's faith in technology. As MK pointed out, technology cuts both ways. Go back to the peanut gallery until you can deal with your faith. There is no overpopulation problem.Lol ... tell that to China. |
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Victor Danilchenko |
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Posts: 61 (08/19/08 15:49:52) Forethought |
Philosophaster wrote:he didn't argue that, he simply asserted that the externality balance is negative. I countered that by pointing out that there's no mass flight from big cities -- the locations which bear the brunt of the externality balance; i.e. if the externality balance were even close to negative, we would be seeing massive flight from big cities. It is possible that at some point, the externality balance will start getting close enough to negative value to matter. We will know that that point is coming, because major cities will start losing population in droves. In this regard, you can think of the major cities as the canaries in the coal mine. But that's not happening, is it? What MK really means is that in his opinion, things are terrible.
Ceterum censeo: veritas et libertas ultra omnis sunto.
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Philosophaster |
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Posts: 54 (08/19/08 16:07:34) |
Victor Danilchenko wrote: Do cities bear the brunt of the balance? It seems to me that there are significant negative externalities going on outside major cities, such as dumping, deforestation, and water pollution. But even if we grant that cities bear the brunt of it, city life has a way of "masking" certain negative externalities of the modern lifestyle:
people stay indoors breathing filtered air almost all of the day, so they (unlike other animals and plants) fail to experience the true extent of air
pollution, and cities have a water filtration system, preventing water pollution from having any immediate negative
effects on people but not insuring against environmental effects of a polluted water supply, some of which may end up affecting humans in the long run by
affecting their food supply and the ecological balance between organisms. Modern technology allows an "out of sight, out of mind" approach to these
things, but it seems doubtful that such an approach could be sustained indefinitely. Which is why I wonder whether "flight from the cities" is really
an accurate barometer for assessing the overall externalities balance of population growth.
History is a graveyard of aristocracies. - Vilfredo Pareto
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Victor Danilchenko |
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Posts: 62 (08/19/08 16:07:39) Forethought |
samadhim7 wrote: I had, a long time ago. it didn't impress me nearly as much as the Guns, Germs, and Steel. Deal with reality, dude. Our ability to sustain ourselves is actually increasing -- and increasing faster than the population is growing. Easter
Islands self-destructed, because they didn't try to actually solve the problem.
It's a miracle that Singapore isn't collapsing, isn't it?
Get back to me when you are able to reason about the problem. We are not Easter Islands. No, it simply shows that your most fundamental assumption is BS. Easter Islanders were dealing with a truly fixed resource pool, because they never figured out new and creative ways to use their resources. We figure out new ways to use our resources all the time, thus in effect constantly increasing the size of our resource pool. This is what Simon-Ehlich wager demonstrates: the error of the malthusian delusion. Which problem? Some mysterious nebulous problem which only you see? GW is getting worse, it's true. However, there are very many other things which are getting better. <sigh> Yeah. Whatever. Have you noticed how incredibly rapidly China has been growing, despite their supposed overpopulation problem? How distinctly non-collapsed it is? China has much population density than South Korea, Taiwan, Puerto Rico, Netherlands, Lebanon, Belgium, Japan, India, Israel, Philippines, UK, Germany, Pakistan, Italy, and Switzerland, as well as many other, less notable, countries. Try thinking before speaking, dude. Faith in delusional dogma is no substitute for actual reason and evidence. There is no overpopulation problem.
Ceterum censeo: veritas et libertas ultra omnis sunto.
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Victor Danilchenko |
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Posts: 63 (08/19/08 16:15:04) Forethought |
Philosophaster wrote: Why? We can grow crops at a much higher density than could be possible without artificial enhancements. This could be sustained indefinitely. Why assume that one artificial influence can be sustained indefinitely, but another cannot? If environmental degradation leads to loss of food supply, the cities will feel it first; but otherwise, the technological solutions you mentioned are
genuine solutions, and genuinely ameliorate the effects of negative externalities. let each individual decide how much it's worth to them to breathe
artificially cleansed air (which almost nobody breathes BTW) and somesuch.
We don't live in the world of "Escape from LA", and you cannot simply assign arbitrary personal valuation to the factors you mentioned. Instead, people do so individually, and reveal their valuation through their choices -- to congregate in cities or not. That's why it's so silly to talk about how terribly inhumane cities are. if cities were so terrible, people wouldn't live in them. However, even though the cities concentrate crime, pollution, high prices due to overcrowding, and other negative externalities of population, people still choose to live there.
Ceterum censeo: veritas et libertas ultra omnis sunto.
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Philosophaster |
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Posts: 55 (08/19/08 16:29:52) |
Victor Danilchenko wrote: Because there is such a thing as "too much pollution." But I guess we can assume that when pollution hits some tipping point and starts affecting cities in a serious negative way, people will automatically
decide to reform themselves and will always have time to do so. For the most part it looks like this is what has
happened so far in human history: we are still here after all, and our living spaces are getting gradually cleaner.
History is a graveyard of aristocracies. - Vilfredo Pareto
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samadhim7 |
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Posts: 314 (08/19/08 16:50:19) |
Victor,
sam: Read this. Get back to me when you do.The example of Easter Island wasn't about having technologically smarter people. It was not a problem of technology but a political problem, knowing your limits and living within them. And for the record, we are NOT living sustainably. It's a miracle that Singapore isn't collapsing, isn't it?Singapore imports what they need to survive. What happens when they can't do that anymore? All of Diamond's examples, outside Maya, were tiny societies which lacked the scientific firepower to deal with their problems. Not a single one of them -- not one -- was a society with widespread institutionalization of science.Again, you are misunderstanding Diamond's thesis. He is not saying those societies lacked technology. In fact, we don't lack technology either. We know how to deal with global warming, water shortages, soil degradation, overfishing, etc., etc. It isn't technology that we lack. It is the political will to live sustainably, to deal with those problems, which in fact have a lot to do with using technology irresponsibly. Get back to me when you are able to reason about the problem. We are not Easter Islands.Yeah, right. As if I'm the only one telling you what you're not accounting for. sam: So what? Because a wager failed once doesn't mean it will always hold true.The problem isn't coming up with solutions. We know the solutions. The problem is there is no political will nor consensus to actually implement them. More people will not create political will, in fact it will fragment it. More people will in fact exacerbate the problem of irresponsible technological use. More power plants, more dams, more fishing, etc., etc. Only when the problems become truly unmanageable will you understand that it is our politics that is lacking, not our technology. sam: Again, so what? We have geniuses right now yet the problem is getting worse.Global warming. A problem brought about by more people using technology, by the way. Water shortages, ditto. Soil depletion and desertification, ditto. Deforestation, ditto. Overfishing, ditto. Toxic waste, ditto. Need I go on? GW is getting worse, it's true. However, there are very many other things which are getting better.What is getting better? sam: Lol ... tell that to China.Of course they're growing, so what? Unsustainable growth is the problem we're talking about, isn't it? Are you trying to argue that China's growth is sustainable? Did you read what Diamond had to say about China? How distinctly non-collapsed it is? China has much population density than South Korea, Taiwan, Puerto Rico, Netherlands, Lebanon, Belgium, Japan, India, Israel, Philippines, UK, Germany, Pakistan, Italy, and Switzerland, as well as many other, less notable, countries.Don't talk about population density and China without mentioning vast areas are uninhabitable deserts (which are growing by the way) and mountains. Do you really want to compare Chinese cities with cities in Switzerland? Have you been following the news lately about the pollution in Beijing? Do you think the same stories would have been playing in the news if the Olympics had been held in Zurich? Try thinking before speaking, dude. Faith in delusional dogma is no substitute for actual reason and evidence. There is no overpopulation problem.I'm really surprised at you. We both know you're smart. But it just goes to show that being smart can cause just as many problems as it solves when you operate with blinders. You need to take yours off.
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08/19/08 17:00:04.
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Victor Danilchenko |
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Posts: 64 (08/19/08 17:02:25) Forethought |
And that's reflected in people's choices. No, we assume that if this happens, people will eave the cities, thus indicating to us that the tipping point is here. This isn't going to happen, however, because over the last few decades, the level of pollution in major american cities has dropped significantly. indeed. As we get richer, we become both more able and more willing to clean up our act.
Ceterum censeo: veritas et libertas ultra omnis sunto.
Last Edited By: Victor Danilchenko
08/19/08 17:29:49.
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Victor Danilchenko |
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Posts: 65 (08/19/08 17:29:03) Forethought |
Easter island had limits we don't. The earth's carrying capacity a century and change ago was just about 1 billion. Where is that limit now? Think. it won't hurt too much. if by 'sustainably' you mean being able to live within a single fixed pool of resources, why should we? Sure, oil is running out. Nuclear power is here, and fusion is just a few decades away. 'Sustainability' is a very stretchable notion, and scientific advancement is constantly stretching it. But instead of those ever-expanding limits, you and your kind want to put us in a straightjacket. it will be about as much a miracle as you actually understanding anything about economics. Them being unable to import any more simply isn't going to happen, at least not for economic reasons. That's not how economics works. malthus said the exact same thing. Malthusian meltdown was originally forecast to occur at about 1bn population, IIRC. Since then, just like Jehova's Witnesses' armageddon, the goalpost was moved on a regular basis, but somehow we nver came close to it. it seems like you are the kind of guy who would be saying "But JWs could be right this time..." That's why we aren't using genetically engineered crops, hydroponics, etc. Because we lack the will to apply our solutions. If you want to hate the humanity, do it in a private corner, dude.
Oh, let's see. Food issue? Gen-mod crops. Goods distribution? Computerized distribution networks. Low incomes? World's GDP is growing steadily and quite rapidly. Environment? Getting cleaned up. The list of problems which are improving is quite significant. As opposed to Switzerland, which is all fertile flatlands... Dude, why are you polluting the world with your stupidity? I have said quite clearly that there is the pollution hump. China is just around peak right now, it's already showing signs of beginning to clean up. Of course it is dirtier than Switzerland -- the latter has long past that point, and their environment is quite clean now. This comes with economic growth and prosperity however. So if you want to prevent pollution, your choice is either to keep the third world poor and undeveloped, or to bring them into the developed world ASAP. I think we both know which option you prefer. San Francisco, London, New York -- all major occidental cities used to be horribly dirty and polluted. not any more. You live in SF. How's the smog situation been doing over the last few years? Had many acid rains lately? Look at the list of the world's most polluted cities. See any developed-world cities there? London used to be fucking covered in soot. Where is all that now? Tends to happen a lot when reason confronts your faith, dude. You should take lessons from Martin Luther. He was much more concise. Reason is a whore, isn't that what you are trying to say? If reason contradicts your delusion, then down with reason!
Ceterum censeo: veritas et libertas ultra omnis sunto.
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MKULTRA ver II |
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Posts: 357 (08/19/08 21:22:34) |
Victor:
In your entire post, this was the only coherent point.No, it's just the only point that fits your theory. That's not by my reasoning, that's by your total misunderstanding of basic economics; and I am tired of trying to give you Econ 101.Really? Lets examine that in a hypothetical. We'll take some super-rational game-theoretic genius economic agents, utterly unfettered by quaint notions of morality, utterly selfish. These agents want money, power, and genetic propagation. Their goal is to maximize their own good at minimum personal cost, but if others pay the cost, fine. In fact, if there must be a cost, then far better that others pay it than themselves, all things being equal. For instance, like you, they see no value in animals or nature beyond what can be extracted from them in terms of money and power. If they wipe out eco-systems that they see no personal value in, that's fine. We can expect co-operation between different families of genius genetic lines. Sharing of ideas and technology, since any one genius can't think of everything. They will, of course, interact ruthlessly and cold bloodedly with each other, but since they have things they want to trade they will usually be able to come up with deals satisfying both parties, and will act with honour mostly since they need good repuations for future interactions. However, when they turn their gaze to the non-genius genetic lines, the general population, we have a completely different story. In much the same way as they viewed animals, there is no reason to have any sentimentallity for the typical human at all. They either have some use, in which case they should be bought at the cheapest price and greatest power advantage, or they can simply be ignored or even wiped out. This is the way that the genius lines can not only eliminate their externalities but boost their personal good. Non-genius humans have stuff the genius humans want: Land, energy. The non-geniuses produce little the geniuses would want. They are simply in the way, like orang utans in a rainforest we want to cut down for lumber. So using homo-economicus reasoning with pure, amoral genius rational agents out for personal material gain, there is no reason to expect any net benefit to the typical human if these agents act with best efficiency and minimize negative externality. ________________________________________________________________ Anyhow, hypotheticals aside, you are still ignoring the biggest benefit of having a child: Propagating ones genes. This is always a positve outcome to the typical genetic agent, the very goal and purpose of personal existence itself. And there is generally little or no negative externality, since you are passing on your genes, not someone elses (Apart from close kin, and if they don't value genetic propagation then they are getting no benefit, from their POV). Other people who also have children might get a slight benefit by the extra genetic variation you're sustaining in the pool, but this is cancelled by the genetic variation they are adding for you, and also by the fact that your genes will often be competing with theirs for share of the genetic pool. Strangers who don't have children and don't value genetic propagation get no benefit at all from you having children, from the standpoint of the genetic propagation game. So in that regard, there is no externality at all. Only selfish genetics. Your argument fails to take this into account. It treats the innate, genetic imperative to have children as just some other agent preference, similar to liking the taste of steak. This is false for most people who feel the need to have children, the biological need for them is far greater than simply choosing one type of tasty meal over another. It's just that satisfying that need is a benefit that can't be easily quantified. Even if there were an negative externality, you haven't demonstrated that it is very large, since you haven't quantified the relative benefit the parent gets (having satisfied the genetic propagation imperative) versus the questionable benefits others get. Finally, assuming any truth to you claims, and ignoring the quite obvious global human-caused problems we already have, let's imagine children are underproduced. Simply making more children doesn't change the negative externality. By your reasoning there will always be an underproduction of children, even if everyone has 10 children or more, unless other infrastructure details are changed as well. Well big deal, I've said repeatedly that big populations would be fine if the infrastructure was better and could handle it. The solution is therefore not to produce more children, but to fix the infrastructure. There a multiple ways the infrastructure might be changed. It doesn't follow that if the dubious externality of having children was eliminated then the correct optimum would be really high. It may even be lower that what we currently have. And assuming the other questionable claim that a new class of economic rationalist geniuses will solve the typical person's problems, you have failed to establish the best way to produce them. You haven't estabilished that giving more people more resources is at all sustainable, and you haven't established that giving more people less resources produces better intelligence than giving less people more resources.
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08/19/08 21:36:46.
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GammaWaif |
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Posts: 98 (08/19/08 21:34:32) |
Victor Danilchenko wrote: This isn't entirely relevant to the discussion, but it is an interesting juxtaposition for me to read your post and have read these articles, within a day of each other: America's Fastest Dying Cities and its sister article In Pictures: America's Fastest-Dying Cities There is certainly a flight from these cities, but it is not population related, it is opportunity related. Kinda fucks up your bellwether a little. Urban flight doesn't happen for reasons of over-population alone.I think what's been bugging me about your argument, as I've been pondering it the past day, is that it's wasteful--wasteful (or at least dismissive) of the resources we already have. As others have mentioned, rather than throw more babies at the problem, why not cultivate the babies we already have? I think genius can be built as well as occurring naturally. If we invested more in our current infrastructure, we would not only glean more genius from our existing brain pool, we would make the world more genius-friendly. I suppose it could be argued that adversity provokes invention, and maybe creating more babies would instigate a crisis that would fuel the creative juices of geniuses toward solving it. But is the adversity route necessary? Let's say you're a genius, Victor, and I suspect you are. I'm not finding fault with you, understand, I'm just illustrating that not all genius will be moved to make the sort of contribution you're
suggesting. Maybe that's why we need to mass produce them. |
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What have you done to save the world? You've certainly done your share of the
But are you moved to create some new technology that will improve our
global lot? Have you pursued anything like that? If not, why not?