From: gary@ke4zv.uucp (Gary Coffman)
Newsgroups: sci.space
Subject: Re: overpopulation
Date: 7 Oct 92 08:00:14 GMT
Reply-To: gary@ke4zv.UUCP (Gary Coffman)
Organization: Gannett Technologies Group

In article <1992Sep27.165420.16307@samba.oit.unc.edu> Bruce.Scott@bbs.oit.unc.edu (Bruce Scott) writes:
>dietz@cs.rochester.edu (Paul Dietz) writes:
>>Bruce.Scott@bbs.oit.unc.edu (Bruce Scott) writes:
>>>But this is just because the great die-off has started.
>>"Great die off" is bullshit, of course.  The world population has
>>never been healthier, wealthier or longer lived, on average, and
>>the trends are positive in most of the world.
>
>Au contraire. For Asia, excepting India, you are correct. For Africa and
>Brazil, you're dead wrong. I think you may be misled by trade figures
>and the like in cases like India and Brazil. There is no question that
>for the "middle class" in those countries things have never been better.
>But this class is no larger than 30 pct for Brazil and 10 for India. Yes

Which is the largest middle class either country has ever had. IE things
are better now than in the past.

>I know, that is only two countries, but they are big countries and when
>they go wrong it is not trivial. India has been charmed by the lack of
>really big natural disasters for some time now. But in the 1950's there
>was a famine whose effects were averted because the US fed the whole
>population for two years. That was with 300 million people. They lose if
>that happens now. 

The difference is the Green Revolution. Their food production is 5 times
higher than in the 1950s. A prolonged drought could cut into their food
exports, but is unlikely to throw them into starvation.

>I do note the absence of comment from you concerning
>last year's disaster in Bangladesh. I repeat that 3 million homeless on
>shifting mud flats do not happen unless population limits have already
>been crossed. Unlike Floridans, many of them simply starved to death.

The difference between poor people living in a flood plain and Florida
residents in the path of a hurricane should be obvious. It's the fact
that the area involved was smaller, didn't stay flooded, and State Farm
claims adjusters were out the next day. Bangladesh's problems stem from 
their poverty and their location, not their population density per se.
Bangladesh has rich delta soil and with modern agricultural techniques
could be a rich exporter of food. The fact that the country is almost
entirely at sea level and located in a typhoon plagued area is a problem
shared by Holland, and to a lesser extent by Florida and the Mississippi
delta. The solution can also be similar, dikes and shelter mounds.
You confuse the results of avoidable poverty with population density.

>A little travel where things have gone wrong can really open eyes. I
>suggest it, even only once. I've seen this for myself in Eastern Turkey.
>These armies of dirty children who feed off passers by will not grow up
>into the rosy Third-World technocrats one reads about in G Harry Stine
>novels. 

However, population density is not the source of Turkish poverty. The
perfect counterexamples being Singapore and Hong Kong. High population
density doesn't have to cause poverty. Local government policies can cause
poverty, and have in most poor nations. Africa is the prime example of
this. Famines in Africa stem from warfare, corruption, and faulty policy. 
Much of Africa employs neolithic farming practices while buying jet aircraft 
and tanks. Only 10% of arable land is under cultivation on the continent. 
The population density of most of Africa is less than that of the Eastern 
United States. Yet the Eastern US is a large food exporter. The average
African is not stupid, but he is often ignorant and exploited by his government
and his superstitions. Reducing population density won't solve his problems.
Ending the ideological warfare and ending gross corruption in government
would allow Green Revolution techniques to be taught and applied to a 
continent with soils that have been barely touched, and resources that
have barely been tapped. Africa is much like 17th century North America,
with the difference that the Indians have jet aircraft and tanks to use
in their tribal warfare.

Gary