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Page added on February 7, 2016
Population, agriculture and energy: Are we killing the earth?
What is the future of earth?
As the world’s population grows, the already depleted natural resources are reduced further. As citizens of the planet, we are the only ones who can change how we live in order to make the way we live sustainable. Continuing to consume like we are does not seem sustainable without new innovations being created.
In the 1960s the planet reached what the scientists said was the max capacity of human beings at 3 billion. We were told this was the optimal number of people for earth to sustain. We are now at 7.4 billion with projections of around 8.9 billion by 2050. In order for this enormous population to survive, we had to adapt. What is known as the Green Revolution occurred.
We began monoculture, created fertilizer and pesticides, dwarf crops, irrigation and genetically modified crops in order to produce enough food to feed the world. These practices have impacted the earth negatively in a number of ways. Water systems have been affected by either being diverted or polluted by agriculture. In addition, farms on such a scale have diminished biodiversity and have damaged ecosystems. Agriculture is just one aspect of the consumption that occurs around the globe. Since food is kind of important to us, how we grow that food should be as well.
Food is not the only resource we are consuming. Energy consumption is another issue as standards of living in nations around the globe continue to rise. This energy currently comes mostly from a nonrenewable source: fossil fuels.
In addition, many resources such as stone, metals, and minerals are being used in large amounts to make products for consumption. While many of these resources are abundant enough we are not worried about depleting them yet, they are not always safe for the environment or people when extracting. The pollution caused by not only extracting these resources but using them as well has been major cause for concern regarding climate change. Furthermore, alternative energy sources are costly to implement and are not as profitable as the current systems.
These matters, among others, will be explored in future posts. We will also take a look at some of the things we can do to help diminish these problems and create a healthier, more sustainable earth for future generations. Building awareness about these issues is the first step in changing our views on how we should treat the planet.
38 Comments on "Population, agriculture and energy: Are we killing the earth?"
rockman on Sun, 7th Feb 2016 10:08 am
I always chuckle when I see exposes about mankind “destroying the earth”. Maybe it’s because I’ve studied destructive events that make man’s actions totally irrelevant. Man’s action may be damaging to mankind but not to the earth. Sea level rise flooding coastal areas? Compare that to the area we call Colorado being covered by a warm sea hundreds of feet deep.
Mankind can’t destroy the earth but it can readily destroy mankind. Not the worse choice of phrasing but really isn’t necessary to emphasize the seriousness of the situation IMHO.
chilyb on Sun, 7th Feb 2016 10:21 am
the only destructive event I can think of that would make man’s actions “irrelevant” would be a meteor strike. We are just getting the ball rolling right now. We are certainly capable of destroying life on earth, in fact it is happening right now.
ghung on Sun, 7th Feb 2016 10:25 am
It’s the end of the world as we know it; not the end of the world. That distinction won’t matter much to most people.
Kenz300 on Sun, 7th Feb 2016 10:39 am
Too many people and too few resources…….
Birth Control Permanent Methods: Learn About Effectiveness
http://www.emedicinehealth.com/birth_control_permanent_methods/article_em.htm
curlyq3 on Sun, 7th Feb 2016 10:48 am
The following taken from Wikipedia :
“The carrying capacity of a biological species in an environment is the maximum population size of the species that the environment can sustain indefinitely, given the food, habitat, water, and other necessities available in the environment.”
“In population dynamics and population ecology, overshoot occurs when a population exceeds the long term carrying capacity of its environment.”
Every problem we face relates to over population … Humans have likely exceeded the carrying capacity of our environment many times over … it is my opinion that all our efforts should focus on population management that attempts to avoid exterminating existing populations … the “Extermination Method” is the only process Humanity has ever used successfully … maybe it is how we are by instinct and is therefore in our genetic blueprint … seems so pathetic and unnecessary. I chose to not have children … I thought if I ever wanted children I could adopt them … there are plenty extra to go around !
curlyq3
tahoe1780 on Sun, 7th Feb 2016 12:23 pm
How much is left? http://www.visualcapitalist.com/forecast-when-well-run-out-of-each-metal/
http://www.bbc.com/future/story/20140314-the-worlds-scarcest-material
Jerry McManus on Sun, 7th Feb 2016 12:43 pm
“Building awareness about these issues is the first step in changing our views on how we should treat the planet.”
Sorry, but this is hopelessly naive. People have been trying to build awareness about these issues for at least the last 40 years.
Never mind plain old denial, most conservative and religious folks jus’ flat out hate anyone who talks about the “environment” like that. In some parts of the world you are lucky if it doesn’t get you killed by hired guns.
Don’t get me wrong, if it is your passion to educate yourself about these issues and at least try to talk to others about them then, by all means, knock yourself out. I will be the last person in the world to stop you.
Just don’t labor under any delusions of grandeur that it will change anything.
Boat on Sun, 7th Feb 2016 1:01 pm
If the product has enough value to consumers, innovation and tech will replace that metal/resources with another. This is the story of the human race.
Boat on Sun, 7th Feb 2016 1:09 pm
Long after the sun has died the earth will still be here. In time any event on earth that happened before that will be like a fleeting second. Relax a little and gear up for the super bowl.
Apneaman on Sun, 7th Feb 2016 1:16 pm
Apes will never change – can’t. Biologically programmed cancer monkeys in the big picture. Today, the earth is the most “healthy” anyone will ever see it again. Tomorrow will be worse and it will go like that until it’s an ape free planet.
Points To Ponder – The Terrifying Future Facing Humanity – The Meocene
http://survivalacres.com/blog/points-to-ponder-the-terrifying-future-facing-humanity-the-meocene/
rockman on Sun, 7th Feb 2016 1:53 pm
Chily – I think you missed the point: neither man nor a major meteor strike can “destroy the earth”. Destroy mankind yes…the earth no. I think some folks consider man an an integral part of the earth. But he isn’t: man has not be a factor in the earth for 99.99% of its history. Now will he likely be part of of 99.99% of its future either
onlooker on Sun, 7th Feb 2016 1:56 pm
We are killing our chances of surviving on Earth as well as many other species that is for sure.
Apneaman on Sun, 7th Feb 2016 3:14 pm
T-Shirt Weather in the Arctic
“Each spring for the last 30 years, our team of biologists has traveled to remote field camps in Arctic Alaska. The Arctic is warming faster than anywhere else in the world as seawater replaces sea ice, painting the Arctic Ocean blue and fueling a dangerous feedback loop. The white sea ice reflects the sun’s energy back into space through what is known as the albedo effect. But as the ice melts, the dark Arctic seawater is now absorbing that heat, turning up the earth’s temperature.
With the early spring, snow melted roughly two weeks earlier than in the past and plants turned green soon after. Lakes thawed about 10 days earlier, and Arctic grayling, a fish, bred weeks earlier.”
http://www.nytimes.com/2016/02/06/opinion/t-shirt-weather-in-the-arctic.html?ref=international&_r=0
Russell on Sun, 7th Feb 2016 3:18 pm
The good news is we are finding solutions that can be used if we set our minds to it. Present pressures on our way of doing things are not enough to force changes. They are approaching, and those that want to survive will have to adapt or be destroyed.
Apneaman on Sun, 7th Feb 2016 3:31 pm
Maybe one of you survive into old age and find yourself sitting around the campfire (cause you’re a nomad) someday telling stories to the great grand apebabies about how it was before “the great change”. “Kids I remember when the weather was so calm that rivers only ran one way”.
“Gasp!”
Fierce winds force waterfall to flow backwards in Scotland
http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation-now/2016/02/04/scotland-waterfall-windy-backwards/79806836/
Chicago River Runs Backwards: A Climate Change Reminder for Senator Kirk
http://switchboard.nrdc.org/blogs/hhenderson/chicago_river_runs_backwards_a.html
Climate change the chief culprit for stormy winter weather
http://www.irishtimes.com/news/science/climate-change-the-chief-culprit-for-stormy-winter-weather-1.2518556
onlooker on Sun, 7th Feb 2016 3:45 pm
Or about kids I remember when it never rained in the North Pole. http://robertscribbler.com/2015/12/29/warm-storm-brings-rain-over-arctic-sea-ice-in-winter/
Dredd on Sun, 7th Feb 2016 6:32 pm
No means no.
“Are we killing the earth?”
Yes means yea (The Ghost-Water Constant – 4).
makati1 on Sun, 7th Feb 2016 7:14 pm
Boat, the current theory has it that the earth will be consumed by our sun going nova about 4.5 billion years from now. Not that it will matter to us. We sill soon be extinct. There will likely be several new ecosystems come and go between now and then. None will have anything like us in it’s mix.
rockman on Sun, 7th Feb 2016 7:21 pm
BTW a bit of trivia: the highest probability of the extinction of not just mankind but all life on the planet is a CME directly at earth. A Coronal Mass Ejection which is completely unpredictable: just as likely to happen this week as in 100 years.They happened a number of times in recent history. But the earth wasn’t close to be in the direct path. I think in 1998 we caught just a glancing blow that knocked out power in parts of Canada. The US took a stronger hit in the late 1800: it melted telegraph wires. But since society wasn’t hooked on electricity as we are now no big problems.
But even if the earth were in the direct path of a major CME and all life were killed the planet still wouldn’t be “destroyed”. It isn’t always about man, ya know. LOL.
Harquebus on Sun, 7th Feb 2016 7:27 pm
For the first time that I can remember, I actually agree with something that Kenz300 says.
makati1 on Sun, 7th Feb 2016 7:57 pm
rockman, you are correct. There are several ‘natural’ events that could take us out practically overnight.
1. Your coronal mass ejection.
2. A pulsar spike from a dying star.
3. A comet or large meteor striking land.
4. A super volcano eruption. (6 in the world. 3 of which are in the US.)
http://www.ranker.com/list/the-world_s-6-known-supervolcanoes/analise.dubner
5. An Ebola type virus with the right carrier configuration, say a six week gestation period when it can be spread by just physical contact or airborne by breathing in the virus spores breathed out by a carrier. With global travel in the millions daily, by the time it was discovered, it would be everywhere.
BC on Sun, 7th Feb 2016 8:15 pm
https://www.goodreads.com/author/quotes/1895.Ernest_Becker
What are we to make of creation in which routine activity is for organisms to be tearing others apart with teeth of all types – biting, grinding flesh, plant stalks, bones between molars, pushing the pulp greedily down the gullet with delight, incorporating its essence into one’s own organization, and then excreting with foul stench and gasses residue. Everyone reaching out to incorporate others who are edible to him. The mosquitoes bloating themselves on blood, the maggots, the killer-bees attacking with a fury and a demonism, sharks continuing to tear and swallow while their own innards are being torn out – not to mention the daily dismemberment and slaughter in “natural” accidents of all types: an earthquake buries alive 70 thousand bodies in Peru, a tidal wave washes over a quarter of a million in the Indian Ocean. Creation is a nightmare spectacular taking place on a planet that has been soaked for hundreds of millions of years in the blood of all creatures. The soberest conclusion that we could make about what has actually been taking place on the planet about three billion years is that it is being turned into a vast pit of fertilizer. But the sun distracts our attention, always baking the blood dry, making things grow over it, and with its warmth giving the hope that comes with the organism’s comfort and expansiveness.
The Earth will be just fine, continuing Nature’s process of creating and recreating, grinding everything into stardust fertilizer. 😀
Freddy on Sun, 7th Feb 2016 8:27 pm
The alarmists have been claiming that population expansion was going to cause a disaster for over a hundred years and their predictions have always been wrong not unlike the predictions made by the Church of AGW.
BC on Sun, 7th Feb 2016 8:46 pm
Freddy, nothing to be alarmed about as a human ape. We’re just doing what we do at 7 billion apes’ worth and counting on a finite planet.
If one perceives that 7 billion apes are a positive outcome, then 9-10 billion is that much better.
Keep f&$king and consuming more per capita. F&$king and consuming is good.
It’s ALL f&$king good!!! 😀
Apneaman on Sun, 7th Feb 2016 9:43 pm
Freddy, what rock did you just crawl out from under ya fucking retard? Record global temps two consecutive years and 2016 will break them. Record fire season in the US (acres burned & money spent) and many biblical deluges that have smashed the shit out of infrastructure, homes, businesses and taken some lives. The list is too fucking long. I wonder if you’ll be convinced when one of these deals kills one of yours? Chances are increasing every year. Personally, I hope all the deniers live longest – more suffering that way.
Apneaman on Sun, 7th Feb 2016 9:56 pm
Methane Is Leaking All Over The Place
“It’s now been 103 days since workers from the Southern California Gas Company discovered a natural gas leak coming from the Aliso Canyon underground storage field near the Porter Ranch neighborhood of Los Angeles. In late November, 58,000 kilograms of methane per hour were leaking into the atmosphere.1 As of Jan. 21, that number was down to 20,000 kilograms per hour, but overall the leak has released more than 91,000 metric tons of methane — emissions equivalent to burning more than 862 million gallons of gasoline.”
“The city of Boston alone had at least 1,868 documented unrepaired leaks in its gas lines as of March 2015, and the oldest has been leaking since 1985.4 As large as that number may sound, it underrepresents the problem because it includes only known leaks that have been reported to gas companies, said Audrey Schulman, president of the Home Energy Efficiency Team, a nonprofit group in Cambridge, Massachusetts, that focuses on energy efficiency issues and collected data on Boston and other Massachusetts cities.”
“Driving 785 miles in the city of Boston, Phillips and his team identified 3,356 leaks. In Washington, D.C., his group drove 1,500 miles of road and found 5,893 natural gas leaks. Another research group found “hundreds to thousands” of likely leaks in Manhattan in New York City using street measurements.”
http://fivethirtyeight.com/features/methane-is-leaking-all-over-the-place/
Apneaman on Sun, 7th Feb 2016 9:59 pm
Mercury in Rain Increasing in North America, Study Says
“A new report published in the journal Science of the Total Environment found mercury concentrations are “rising in rainfall and other forms of precipitation in North America,” primarily being detected in the central and western United States.
Peter Weiss-Penzias, lead researcher and environmental toxicologist at UC Santa Cruz, worked with a team of scientists to analyze wet deposition samples from multiple locations throughout the United States and was astonished to find that in spite of strengthened federal regulation of mercury in recent years, “increases at many sites.”
“We didn’t know what we were going to see,” Weiss-Penzias told weather.com. “We did basic trend tests and looked at the data, and we were surprised not to see more decreases.”
Weiss-Penzias couldn’t say for certain whether the mercury pollution was coming from Asia, but noted that increases were likely not due to U.S. activities.
“It could be changes in atmospheric chemistry due to climate change,” he said. “Long-range transport of pollutants from Asia would affect regions in the Rocky Mountains and central U.S. since the mountains intercept upper atmosphere air, which is where the pollutants tend to travel.” [more]”
https://weather.com/science/environment/news/mercury-increasing-in-rainfall
Boat on Sun, 7th Feb 2016 10:03 pm
apeman,
Check out flaring worldwide stats. Those leaks don’t amount to much in comparison. Yes, apes make mistakes.
Apneaman on Sun, 7th Feb 2016 10:14 pm
Boat, I don’t want to and you can’t make me. Apes have made the ultimate mistake.
BTW, I called you a Rhodes scholar earlier…….thought you’d want to know.
theedrich on Mon, 8th Feb 2016 3:14 am
The fundamental principle of life’s progress over the eons is evolutionary epistemology – the gradual increase in species’ knowledge in the wider sense: a shark “knows” more than the smaller fish it eats, because it has a better smell, swims faster, has more effective (and self-replacing) teeth, etc. After the age of the reptiles (whose demise may have been caused by an asteroid hit, but the actual mechanisms are still unclear), mammals and birds with fur, feathers and all kinds of specialized abilities, and greater, built-in solicitousness (= knowledge) for their young (cf. mammae, breasts), came to dominate the earth. Primate brains were yet another improvement in epistemological development, one eventually producing human consciousness. Science itself is actually a continuation of this biological process.
Nonetheless, our species as a whole is still driven by its phylogenetic memories. Its less evolved portions continue to propagate like flies, thereby threatening to terminate the entire process of higher life with their useless eating. On the other hand, the most evolved portions are duped by pious frauds perpetrated by religions, the MSM, political systems, and twisted ideologies, into extinguishing themselves. To the delight of anti-Whites, materialists and parasites everywhere, White reproduction has gone into reverse while the technological killing of the biosphere is making exponential advances on almost every front. Such advances are required in order to “eliminate poverty” and help the dark population explosion and the eradication of the White race.
Never before has a species invited its own death. Only the Yahwistic mumbo-jumbo of Christianity and Judaism promotes genosuicide in this way. Compare Islam, which aims at the conquest of all mankind: its faithful may individually commit suicide to advance their cause, but the whole, with perhaps 5-10 children per woman, is aggressively expansionist. Once the genosuicidists have won, of course, there will no longer be any host for the parasites to feed on. The petri dish nutrients will have been exhausted.
If a bathtub is overflowing, the first thing to do is to turn off the water. If White civilization had a mind to save itself, the first thing it would do is jettison Christianity and Judaism. Only then could its elites see clearly enough to decide to stop the genosuicide. But such rejection of mythology is most unlikely. We know from history that White Christians prefer planet heaven to planet earth. The quixotic result will be that White genosuicide will in fact accelerate the demise of the remainder of homo sapiens. The tree of evolution will have been truncated.
GregT on Mon, 8th Feb 2016 5:29 am
“The quixotic result will be that White genosuicide will in fact accelerate the demise of the remainder of homo sapiens.”
Stupid Whiteys. Accelerating the demise of the remainder of homo sapiens. The Earth would have been so much better off without us.
Kenz300 on Mon, 8th Feb 2016 7:43 am
Too many people……….create too much pollution and demand too many resources….
China made great progress in moving its people out of poverty…….one reason was slowing population growth…..
If you can not provide for yourself you can not provide for a child.
CLIMATE CHANGE, declining fish stocks, droughts, floods, air water and land pollution, poverty, water and food shortages all stem from the worlds worst environmental problem……. OVER POPULATION.
Yet the world adds 80 million more mouths to feed, clothe, house and provide energy and water for every year… this is unsustainable… and is a big part of the Climate Change problem
Birth Control Permanent Methods: Learn About Effectiveness
http://www.emedicinehealth.com/birth_control_permanent_methods/article_em.htm
Apneaman on Mon, 8th Feb 2016 12:53 pm
ExtinctionRadio.org
Dmitry Orlov interview
https://soundcloud.com/xtinctionadioorg/dmitry-orlov-interview
Apneaman on Mon, 8th Feb 2016 2:06 pm
Melting Greenland ice changing ocean circulation, Earth’s gravitational field
Disappearing ice cap wreaks havoc on the ocean’s very structure, scientists say
http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/north/melting-greenland-ice-changing-ocean-circulation-earth-s-gravitational-field-1.3437904
Apneaman on Mon, 8th Feb 2016 2:31 pm
Are drought conditions in the US Southwest here to stay?
A new study suggests that extremely dry conditions may now be standard in the central and western US, as precipitation and storms there have seen a marked decrease through the past decades.
http://www.csmonitor.com/Science/2016/0207/Are-drought-conditions-in-the-US-Southwest-here-to-stay
Apneaman on Mon, 8th Feb 2016 2:37 pm
US Forest Service stretched to breaking point after record year for wildfires
‘Climate change is real and it is with us,’ says top government official after 10.1m acres of forest went up in flames in 2015, costing 65% of the agency’s budget
http://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/feb/08/us-forest-service-stretched-after-wildfires-record-year-climate-change
Boat likes to refer to this as “a few fires”.
Apneaman on Mon, 8th Feb 2016 8:58 pm
The Sixth Extinction9 min
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z9gHuAwxwAs
Apneaman on Mon, 8th Feb 2016 9:05 pm
Scientists just uncovered yet another troubling fact about Antarctica’s ice
“Antarctic ice shelves play a critical role in ensuring that Antarctica’s inland ice, which flows toward the sea through multiple vast glaciers, moves relatively slowly. They are sometimes likened to the flying buttresses of Gothic cathedrals, because they in effect act as a brace, holding back the flow of glaciers — a role they exert because they tend to be attached to islands or seafloor rises.
“These ice shelves, they are hundreds of meters thick, it’s different than sea ice,” says Johannes Fürst of the French National Centre for Scientific Research, lead author of the new study. “The ice shelves are really, really huge, and that’s why they can support this buttressing basically.
But ice shelves sometimes break off or “calve” large pieces of ice that can be as big as cities. Indeed, they can also collapse entirely, as happened with the Larsen A ice shelf in 1995 and the Larsen B ice shelf in 2002. Meanwhile, the huge Larsen C ice shelf has a large and advancing crack across it.”
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/energy-environment/wp/2016/02/08/scientists-just-found-yet-another-reason-to-worry-about-antarcticas-ice/