[Star Dragon]

Everything that study said is true.. So what do you want, to live in a perfect world? Your a part of the Human race so guess what?  It's not gonna happen... Maybe there's a chance if enough evolve into Homo-Superior but not bloody likely! Meaning that we went from clubbing animals manually for food and communicating by pointing at each other, To electrocuting cattle for our Whoppers and Internet porn (signs of a technologicly advanced civilization!) , BUT our social evolution hasn't caught up with the physical. We are the undisputed masters of this planet (and our local area of space unless you green guys wanna speak up!) We have the technology to create long term plans for lengthining life spans, reduction of diseases, mining OTHER planets for resources, energy effinciency, blah blah blah. BUT do we band to gether and "Just do It!" (copyright Nike TM), f**k no, cause we are homo-sapiens, just a few chromosones off from homer-Sapien  actually Cro-magnon. What I am talking about is an Internal evolution mentally and spiritually. Where we can set aside our petty differences (skin color,religion, cable or satelite TV, ECT...) and get in there for the species (from my favorite line in Starship troopers). Cause I tell you this much I don't see much hope for 'future' generations if the same old Sh*t just keeps comming around, everyone wants to flush the toilet, but no one want to be the one to plunge it first!


IS it time for Springer yet (Steve!Steve!Steve!)

[Carl]

you're all a bunch of hippies.

[Nico]

First, make your dumbass president ( "misty Bish" ) accept the Tokyo act for the pollution reduction, that would be a little, but real step forward.

[Carl]

silly little humans.

1. the hole in the ozone layer is a natural cycle the earth goes through.

2. there is global warming on pluto, but i don't see any smoke stacks there.

3. a lot of the pollution on earth seems to be in under developed third world countries where there is no industry that could produce pollution.

4. those naturalists say that we are no different from the animals, yet they say we are doing all these bad things to the earth. if we are no different than the animals and are part of nature, than all this pollution and stuff is really just natural.

[Shrike]

Originally posted by venom2506
First, make your dumbass president ( "misty Bish" ) accept the Tokyo act for the pollution reduction, that would be a little, but real step forward.

Funny, I read articles about this and related topics in this weeks Macleans.

The Kyoto agreement isn't the be-all end-all of pollution limitations, now if enviromentalists stopped with the 'all or nothing' approach and instead encouraged all efforts to reduce pollution we'd get more done.

One hypothetical example used was a company that shut down 25% of its plants to install new filters to reduce emissions would normally have people screaming Why not the other 75%?

Not the most encouraging thing to say, wouldn't you agree?  If someone's going to ***** if I fix some of my plants - and probably ***** more because I didn't do all of them than if I just left them alone - I certainly wouldn't be jumping to fix them.  It's not cheap, and frankly, environmentalists need to stop treating corporations and scientists (such as those making GE foods) as the enemy.  It draws a line in the sand and hampers any efforts to actually tackle the problem.

Oh, and a little fact about the Kyoto agreement... the US Senate voted 95 to 0 against it in 1997.  That was barely into Clinton's second term.  If you're going to bash Bush, as least get some facts straight first.

[Nico]

hey, and what about the last one? not really up to date, Shrike.
And the question is not about people complaining about doing only 25% or whatever, the pb is that 25% is better than nothing. i don't know what kind of weird counter argument that is, but I bet you could have found a better one, heh?

Oh, and I need no reason to bash Bush, just listen to him when he goes "on air", he needs no help to bash himself up

[wEvil]

Originally posted by Kellan

New York City in 2022. Half the 40 million people in the swarming metropolis are unemployed, the air is thick with pollution, food and water are as precious as jewels. This was the world of the future as envisaged in the sci-fi thriller, Soylent Green, in 1973.

Distopia is the way everythings' going.  Unfortunately, if the current trends are viewed as objects, the "intertia" behind them is nearly unstoppable without a unified response from the worlds population, and we all know how likely that is.

It's not all bad news. The Bank says that economic growth is vital for tackling poverty, with a 3.6% a year increase in per capita incomes needed in developing countries if the world is to achieve the 2015 targets set by the United Nations

Economies aren't flexible enough for the kind of action we need, the whole thing needs to be thrown out of the window and a better system put in place.  If the brilliant economic and financial minds of today actually put some effort into thinking differently instead of staunchly defending a broken system, we might make some progress.

Nearly two million hectares of land worldwide (23% of all crop land, pasture, forest and woodland) have been degraded since the 1950s, a fifth of all tropical forests have been cleared since 1960 and one third of terrestial biodiversity is squeezed into vulnerable habitats making up just 1.4% of the earth's surface.

Which means everyone will have to SHUT THE F**K UP about genetic engineering & biotechnology- we need this technology to survive now, and none of your moral arguments will change this fact.

The first is the issue of when consumption is overconsumption. Telling consumers in the west that they have to cut back is not relished by politicians. But the Bank wonders whether consumption will become the modern equivalent of the Cold War arms race; will people in the developing world see the norm as patterns of consumption in the west?

The answer is not fusion power or western levels of consumerism in third world countries - this would simlpy make for a hypermalthusian scenario.

The second vexed issue highlighted by the report is the future of agriculture and of genetically modified organisms. The United States is eager to export GM foods to developing countries, often in the teeth of ferocious local opposition. Should this be encouraged? The Bank is not sure. "Applying the precautionary principle - balancing risks to food safety and the environment against prospects for development and poverty alleviation - will be a difficult task, requiring a broader debate on credible information."

I.E, the "god-squad" (note that god is spelt without a capital "g")

Well, your precious morals will kill us all for no other reason than your inflexibility.  pro-GM people are quite happy to take precautions and make intelligent concessions, whereas anti-GM people just want to get in the way - any way they can

Third, the Bank is concerned about the system of intellectual property rights presided over by the World Trade Organisation. How can the interests of patent holders be balanced against those of the users of products? The system in place has strengthened the hand of western corporations at the expense of poor countries. The potential for unequal outcomes is "worrisome", the Bank says.

How can the interests of patent holders be balanced under any rational thought process?  

The current IP system is counter-productive and repressive in the extreme, i've been saying this for four years and i'll keep saying it until someone sits up and takes notice.

Finally, what are the prospects for global migration? The report says that global inequality, combined with demographic trends, will create ever more pressure for migration. "Dealing with this pressure is a challenge worldwide."

What about migration to other worlds?  pumping up a space program and making some effort to terraform or at least move off this planet would releive population strain (this is a highly long-term view, however)

the most precious resource of all over the next half century could be time.

Or origional thinking and losing the irrational fear of the new.


America is merely the most extreme case of how small-minded western nations, which live by 18th century principles still, have become.  

The worst thing is there's no escape, if you don't want to live the way they dictate you can't go somewhere else because all that land is claimed.  

There's nowhere left to run and we can't reach the people in charge to make them see what they're doing.  

What do you do? thats' the priceless question.

[wEvil]

Originally posted by Shrike
If you're going to bash Bush, as least get some facts straight first.

You're nitpicking while avoiding the larger issue which transcends these arguments.

Bush..Clinton....the people who pulled the strings said "no"  and thus obviously don't have the peoples' best interests at heart, or failing that have become overly-insulated.

Face it, democracy is the stillborn child of feudalism.

[Blue Lion]

Originally posted by Kellan

Blue Lion: without quoting your every word, I think you're wrong. So there.

Thanks, and I think you're a dreamer, what's your point?

Finally, we don't have time as an unlimited resource. Okay, the world isn't going to blow up or anything, but by doing nothing, more and more people slip below the line of absolute povery (living on less than $1 per day), more will starve and die, environmental damage in our own countries will worsen, with more flooding, smog, etc. I'd hope that at least you can agree that things can't go on as they are without some fairly serious effects.

Maybe you aren't getting the point, people are going to die from starvation tommorow, and the next day, and the next. Telling me people are starving is nothing new, but you will not solve the worlds economic problems overnight, or even in ten years. It's a long process and a lot of people aren't going to want to help, deal.

Anyway - even if I don't agree with you, it gives me an idea of what I'm up against.

Let me remind you of something, every nation that has money, worked for it, even the US I did not turn 18 and the government came to me and said "Boy you lucked out being an American eh? Here's your million dollars, your car and your house" No, we all worked for it, everyone earned it, and when it's gone they don't just go into their pockets and pull out more. They aren't going to give their hard earned money to nations who don't have any, out of the goodness of their hearts.

Why am I going to spend my money developing a nation that will turn around and compete with me on the global economy to try and take my money? Do Coke and Pepsi run around forming soft drink corporations to compete againest them out of the goodness of their hearts? We have people here who live below the poverty line. We have enough goddamn problems without the collective weight of the world. I'm very sorry these people are living in **** nations and dying, blame their governments for screwing them over, not me.

[Bobboau]

there will always be people starving to death, if we feed the ones there are now then they will rase there population untill there all starving again

[aldo_14]

Originally posted by CP5670
I agree with most of BL's stuff there. Also, we may be wiping out the so-called "natural" resources of the planet, but I doubt we will be so reliant on them for very long.

Bah....ever compared grass to astroturf?  There's your argument against the exploitation of the natural world right there.

[Kellan]

Firsty, I enjoy being a hippy. Secondly, it's fun to bash Bush - but in all seriousness, I realise that the Kyoto Protocol is just the first tiny step towards climate change reduction. Anyone who says otherwise is a fool. It's not the be-all-and-end-all because it won't solve everything. The fact that people can't sign onto an already outdated stepping stone is a bad sign.

Originally posted by Carl
1. the hole in the ozone layer is a natural cycle the earth goes through.

Proof, please.

3. a lot of the pollution on earth seems to be in under developed third world countries where there is no industry that could produce pollution.[/b]

Now that is naive. In fact, Third World countries do have heavy industries if you take a look - because they have a lot of raw ores, produce our goods, etc. The problem is that their machinery is old and very pollutant because they can't afford the cleaner machinery we have the luxury of. Christ, most of it is pre 1979 oil-powered stuff.

wEvil - this is an article I reproduced unedited not because I agreed with every word, but because I thought it raised some interesting issues, considering it was written by a right-wing financial institution. In other words, it wasn't too lefty like you and I would like to scare off everyone else.

Which means everyone will have to SHUT THE F**K UP about genetic engineering & biotechnology- we need this technology to survive now, and none of your moral arguments will change this fact. Well, your precious morals will kill us all for no other reason than your inflexibility. pro-GM people are quite happy to take precautions and make intelligent concessions, whereas anti-GM people just want to get in the way - any way they can[/b]

I never said I was anti-GM - I actually think it's a pretty good thing if it saves lives, and that most of the negative press is scaremongering by people who should know better but are tied to ideological positions by their other beliefs. However, could everyone stop going on about Malthus? He was wrong. He was wrong 100 years ago, and he's wrong now.

Let me remind you of something, every nation that has money, worked for it, even the US  I did not turn 18 and the government came to me and said "Boy you lucked out being an American eh? Here's your million dollars, your car and your house" No, we all worked for it, everyone earned it, and when it's gone they don't just go into their pockets and pull out more. They aren't going to give their hard earned money to nations who don't have any, out of the goodness of their hearts.

Why am I going to spend my money developing a nation that will turn around and compete with me on the global economy to try and take my money? Do Coke and Pepsi run around forming soft drink corporations to compete againest them out of the goodness of their hearts? We have people here who live below the poverty line. We have enough goddamn problems without the collective weight of the world. I'm very sorry these people are living in **** nations and dying, blame their governments for screwing them over, not me.[/b]

[/size]



Of course you were lucky to be born American. There's nothing that makes you inherently American from pre-birth (except having American parents...but you could be anyone from that).

I hope that you realise that competition breeds both wealth and good prices for consumers under a market system. It encourages firms to improve their products to retain market share, and to make efficieny gains. It avoids the pitfalls of monopolies. Consumers get a better deal because prices fall. Therefore, if America was in competition for some products you'd gain in lower prices just as much as you'd lose in lost business.

As for "their governments screwing them over", you have to remember that we also screwed their governments over first. Frankly, the insinuation in your post that Third World countries are on the ropes because their governments are uniformly corrupt and ours are sanguine borders on racism. Anyway, the world is far too interconnected to pin the blame on any one government. The poverty in the Third World is due to a combination of overpopulation, poor land, misgovernment and maltreatment by foreign powers. You can't divorce any country from the world around it in our globalized world.

And besides, disregarding that - what did these people do to deserve such crap land and crap lives? We've already mentioned that people don't, generally speaking have power over their governments. It's no different in Algeria than it is in America. Are you saying that from birth these people somehow deserve their fate, and we're under no obligation to help our fellow man?

Remember that next time you need the care of a doctor or someone - Medicare, preferably.

[Blue Lion]

Originally posted by Kellan

Frankly, the insinuation in your post that Third World countries are on the ropes because their governments are uniformly corrupt and ours are sanguine borders on racism.

Because I think their governments aren't running things right? They are 3rd world countries for a reason, and the reasons differ. Not because they're a different race.

 

The poverty in the Third World is due to a combination of overpopulation

Cause that's my fault these people can't stop having kids that they can't afford

poor land

My fault too

misgovernment

Bingo

and maltreatment by foreign powers.

When you can answer why these nations are mistreated by foreign powers, you'll have your answer. But I'll save you the trouble.....

misgovernment

And besides, disregarding that - what did these people do to deserve such crap land and crap lives?

Do they deserve it? No. is it what they have? Yes

We've already mentioned that people don't, generally speaking have power over their governments.

And who's fault is that? Mine?

It's no different in Algeria than it is in America. Are you saying that from birth these people somehow deserve their fate, and we're under no obligation to help our fellow man?

No, I'm saying they do not deserve my money because they are in a hellhole.

Remember that next time you need the care of a doctor or someone - Medicare, preferably.

Yah, I'll pay for it, with my money, not run up to my rich lawyer neighbor and demand money from him cause he's richer than me

[CP5670]

We can't destroy the natural world that we are currently so reliant on, on the promise that we'll have some kind of deus ex machina salvation. Besides, given the huge technological requirements of building our own biospheres or modifying our bodies to tolerate the new one, developing countries (and the poor in our own) would probably be left out. You'd be sacrificing billions of people, simply because you aren't prepared to change the way we live now.

It does not matter; if we keep going at even half the current rate of technological advance and destroy the natural resources twice as fast as we are doing now, we will still be fine with lots of time/resources to spare. Heck, we already have the basic necessary things: food (genetically engineered plants), water (we are not going to be able to vaporize all of the oceans even if we tried, and there are methods of purifying the water) and air (this can be extracted from the water). It is now only a matter of engineering, or in other words, to make these things mainstream, which might take a little while, but there is definitely no reason to already start saying "the biosphere is going away; we're all gonna die!"

we should still have a moral obligation

Well, we do not.

Which means everyone will have to SHUT THE F**K UP about genetic engineering & biotechnology- we need this technology to survive now, and none of your moral arguments will change this fact.

heh, messing up the environment might actually be a good thing in this way...

Bah....ever compared grass to astroturf? There's your argument against the exploitation of the natural world right there.

What is this "astroturf?" And anyway, why do we need grass? (few people actually eat grass)

Are you saying that from birth these people somehow deserve their fate, and we're under no obligation to help our fellow man?

That is precisely what I am saying. First of all, everybody deserves everything and nothing; this whole concept of "deserve" has no absolute meaning. Who is to decide who is "deserving" of something? Secondly, one could argue like this for anything; let me think...how about saying that the prey species in any ecosystem does not "deserve" to get eaten by the predator species?

[Shrike]

Originally posted by wEvil
You're nitpicking while avoiding the larger issue which transcends these arguments.

Bush..Clinton....the people who pulled the strings said "no"  and thus obviously don't have the peoples' best interests at heart, or failing that have become overly-insulated.

Face it, democracy is the stillborn child of feudalism.

Not really..... in case you didn't notice it, the comment about Bush was merely added onto the end of my post.

The US government has the best interests of the people at heart - the US people.  The priorities may be wrong, but those are the priorities that the people wanted.

The main point of my argument is that there is too much of a divide between 'greens' and 'corps'.  We can clean the world up, but both sides need to meet in the middle.  We cannot simply dismantle our factories and refineries, but we cannot go on polluting like we are either.

Like everything, we need a compromise, and unfortunately the 'greens' are the main roadblock there.

I suggest you read this article from TIME magazine.  It's quite interesting and shows the problems with current environmental groups.

http://www.time.com/time/2002/greencentury/engroups.html

[Carl]

Originally posted by Kellan
Now that is naive. In fact, Third World countries do have heavy industries if you take a look

please look again at what i said:

"a lot of the pollution on earth seems to be in under developed third world countries where there is no industry that could produce pollution."

i did not say:

"a lot of the pollution on earth seems to be in under developed third world countries. third world countries don't have of industry that could cause pollution"

which is what you thought i said for some reason.

[Mr. Vega]

Originally posted by Blue Lion


Cause that's my fault these people can't stop having kids that they can't afford

In some government(there's at least one in the Balkans) abortion is illegal and thus some have to have children they can't afford. The children end up on the streets, where sniffing glue is common.

[Blue Lion]

Originally posted by Mr. Vega


In some government(there's at least one in the Balkans) abortion is illegal and thus some have to have children they can't afford. The children end up on the streets, where sniffing glue is common.

Again that's a local government thing and not a US or anyone elses problem. Stop these parents from having so many kids instead of having us pay for them.

[Mr. Vega]

So we should stop caring about them?

[Blue Lion]

So I should forget the people here in THIS nation with problems to help those in others?