Ecologist advocates EBOLA to kill world population (maybe?)

[Lord Zentei]

We're a very much more unhealthy species in various ways to what we were in the past, mainly down to our general abundance and diet. Stress is also fast becoming the leading disease in society now, and that leads to mental and physiological problems that never existed like they do now in this rushed age. People living longer allows new ailments and stresses to arise too.

And yet, is a longer average lifespan not precisely indicative of better overall health? Though of course, newer challenges will emerge even as older ones are overcome.

[Uraniun235]

And this Mims tool is right about one important thing: Pianka is going beyond his realm of competence and into the territory of the social sciences. From the perspective of economics, humanity is not straining the Earth's resources to the breaking point.

I once plugged in figures for humanity's growth into a crude logistics curve and found that it was asymptotic to about nine billion; a quick google pulls up numbers from 100 million (for hunter-gatherers) to 30 billion (maximum efficiency farming). How close is humanity coming to straining the Earth's resources, economically?

The most pressing concern currently is oil, and the need for a replacement for it. Other than that, the price of natural resources is for the most part going down, not up, so the progress of technology is outstripping our population growth. That is to say, the point at which humanity differs from other species that might be more limited to the logistics curve: we can change the rules of our environment. Of course, a levelling off will eventually occour, and I have heard the nine billion figure before, so its is probably a reasonable enough guess.

There's other resources too, like fresh water, which may become more and more scarce as global warming continues.

[Pick]

There's other resources too, like fresh water, which may become more and more scarce as global warming continues.

I actually spoke with a professor of climate change who swore this was the case. Of course, you can run into people with just about any opinion, but I do find it an interesting one --especially since there aren't too many viable substitues for good old water.

[Lord Zentei]

There's other resources too, like fresh water, which may become more and more scarce as global warming continues.

That is quite possibly so, though afaik, the price of freshwater is not climbing precipitously. Also, newer innovations to procure freshwater may also become economically viable as time goes by.

Actually, it is not the postulate that the scarcity of certain resources is eventually going to become an issue for future growth that is as irksome as the doomsday type sudden catastrophe predictions.

[ArchMage]

sounds like he read Tom Clancy's Rainbow Six book.

[Pick]

sounds like he read Tom Clancy's Rainbow Six book.

This is why we encourage reading prior posts on a given topic. This was already precisely mentioned.

[Glocksman]

Slightly OT, but is this the same Forrest Mims who wrote all of those Engineer's Notebooks that I remember at Radio Shack?

[Uraniun235]

There's other resources too, like fresh water, which may become more and more scarce as global warming continues.

I actually spoke with a professor of climate change who swore this was the case. Of course, you can run into people with just about any opinion, but I do find it an interesting one --especially since there aren't too many viable substitues for good old water.

There was an article in the Oregonian which pointed out that the glaciers on Mount Hood - a major source of freshwater in the immediate region - were definitely shrinking. When we lose those glaciers, we'll have a real pickle on our hands.

[Thinkmarble]

Slightly OT, but is this the same Forrest Mims who wrote all of those Engineer's Notebooks that I remember at Radio Shack?

Ayup, he is.

Anyway, I am not quite as confident as others here about the carrying capacity of earth.
I have to think of Collaps by Diamond.
The question is how sustainable is our development, what happens as more and more people take a shot at living like us ? How much of our natural capital do we use up each year ?
IIRC bringing up 9 billion people to an western standart of life would increase ressource usage by an factor of 20.
We have a choice limiting ourself using birth control or Malthus revenge, nature limiting us.

The good news is, that the modern life style seems to be limiting growth on its own pretty well.

[wautd]

He'd make a good, classic Bond villain

[Uraniun235]

He'd make a good, classic Bond villain

Already been done, in a sense, in Moonraker.

[Lord Zentei]

Anyway, I am not quite as confident as others here about the carrying capacity of earth.
I have to think of Collaps by Diamond.
The question is how sustainable is our development, what happens as more and more people take a shot at living like us ? How much of our natural capital do we use up each year ?
IIRC bringing up 9 billion people to an western standart of life would increase ressource usage by an factor of 20.
We have a choice limiting ourself using birth control or Malthus revenge, nature limiting us.

The good news is, that the modern life style seems to be limiting growth on its own pretty well.

One can gauge the availability of natural resources by studying the trends in prices, since these are determined by supply and demand. As supply grows more rapidly than demand, price should go down, which is - for the most part - what is observed. The thing is that newer technologies will shift the supply curve: it is not a constant, which is where Malthus got it wrong. Making gloomy predictions about the future is usually dependant on conditions remaining constant which they in reality never are.

Economically, at least, the only real source of concern is finding a new energy source (one might also want to add global warming and other issues, though that is a climatological source of worry, not an economic one).

[Lonestar]

Ayup, he is.

Anyway, I am not quite as confident as others here about the carrying capacity of earth.
I have to think of Collaps by Diamond.

Not good book. He managed to avoid covering the biggest fucking collapse in History (Western Roman Empire), probably because it didn't fit in with his "Destroy Enviroment destroys civilization" theory.

[SirNitram]

AP Article

And so he's now getting threats and attacks.

(4/04/06 - AUSTIN, TX) - A University of Texas biology professor has been targeted by talk radio, bloggers and vitriolic e-mails -- including a death threat -- after a published report that he advocated death for most of the population as a means of saving the Earth.

But Eric Pianka said Monday his remarks about what he believes is an impending pandemic were taken out of context.

"What we really need to do is start thinking about controlling our population before it's too late," he said. "It's already too late, but we're not even thinking about it. We're just mindlessly rushing ahead breeding our brains out."

The public furor began when The Gazette-Enterprise of Seguin, Texas, reported Sunday on two speeches Pianka made last month to groups of scientists and students about vanishing animal habitats and the explosion of the human population.

The newspaper's Jamie Mobley attended one of those speeches and also interviewed Forrest Mims, an amateur scientist and author who heard Pianka speak early last month before the Texas Academy of Science.

After the newspaper's report appeared, it was circulated widely and posted on "The Drudge Report." It quickly became talk radio fodder.

The Gazette-Enterprise quoted Pianka as saying disease "will control the scourge of humanity. We're looking forward to a huge collapse."

Pianka said he was only trying to warn his audience that disease epidemics have happened before and will happen again if the human population growth isn't contained.

He said he believes the Earth would be better off if the human population were smaller because fewer natural resources would be consumed and humans wouldn't continue to destroy animal habitats. But he said that doesn't mean he wants most humans to die.

But Mims, chairman of the academy's environmental science section, told The Associated Press there was no mistaking Pianka's disdain for humans and desire for their elimination.

"He wishes for it. He hopes for it. He laughs about it. He jokes about it," Mims said. "It's got to happen because we are the scourge of humanity."

David Marsh, president of the Texas Academy of Science, did not return telephone and e-mail messages seeking comment. No recording or transcript of either that speech or another delivered last Friday at St. Edward's University in Austin was available for review by the AP. The Gazette-Enterprise said it reviewed a transcript of the original speech, which was provided on the condition that it not be distributed.

Allan Hook, a St. Edward's biology professor who heard both speeches, said Pianka "wasn't so perhaps adamant in his own personal views of what he thinks might happen" in his second lecture.

But Hook declined to elaborate on what Pianka said in the earlier speech, which Pianka delivered while being honored as the academy's 2006 Distinguished Texas Scientist.

University of Texas officials don't plan to take any action against Pianka, university spokesman Don Hale said.

"Dr. Pianka has First Amendment rights to express his point of view," Hale said. "We have plenty of faculty with a lot of different points of view and they have the right to express that point of view, but they're expressing their personal point of view."

Now, I think he's full of it on the subject of the population needing culled for us to succeed. But this is getting looney.

[Aeolus]

There's other resources too, like fresh water, which may become more and more scarce as global warming continues.

That is quite possibly so, though afaik, the price of freshwater is not climbing precipitously. Also, newer innovations to procure freshwater may also become economically viable as time goes by.

Actually, it is not the postulate that the scarcity of certain resources is eventually going to become an issue for future growth that is as irksome as the doomsday type sudden catastrophe predictions.

Almost all of the doomsday scares of the 70's concerned scarcity of resourses. Look what happened to those.

[The Dude]

Pianka is grossly overstating his case, but...

it appears that this Mims character is a hardcore young-earth creationist fundie, who threw a huge "beware the commie, ivory tower, EVILUTIONIST academy!!!!!" tantrum when Scientific American refused to hire him some years back.

His hearsay account of Pianka "advocating" a massive culling-by-plague is simply not credible.

[TheBlackCat]

Things just got more intersting. After all their talk about wanting freedom for people in academia to say unpopular things without fear of punishment, you might think the ID community actually might support people saying unpopular things. Apparently not, judging by William Demski's blog:

Eric Pianka: The Department of Homeland Security needs to interview you

I blogged yesterday about UTAustin professor Eric Pianka (aka “Dr. Doom”) and his advocacy of killing 90% of the world’s human population with airborne Ebola. Could Pianka be charged with terrorism/conspiracy to commit a terrorist act? What happens if a student actually takes his suggestion to heart and kills a bunch of people? Why shouldn’t we think that Dr. Doom himself would commit the act of human destruction he is advocating? How is what he is saying any different from somebody at an airport saying that he plans to plant a bomb there. Note: This is not a matter of saying he actually has planted a bomb but saying that he plans to plant one — that surely would be enough in the current climate to get him arrested. So what about Pianka? At what point do his remarks advocating human destruction constitute a terrorist threat that get him arrested? And if not arrested, how about committed?

As soon as this is posted, I’m going to have a chat with the Department of Homeland Security. [Called them — They are aware of it; it will be interesting to see if they do anything about it.] For your information, I’ve posted an article below by a reporter who was there at Pianka’s remarks (AP refused to pick up the story, so the page is presently overloaded).

Emphasis added. So much for supporting academic freedom. The comments are amusing, not the slighest bit of skepticism that the quotes may be taken out of context.