Monday, June 17, 2013

Growing Pains



''Every nation has both a right and responsibility to keep its population in balance with its resources. The notion that you can grow forever is crazy economics.'' ―Mark O’Connor


In the world outside a coal mine frogs are the canaries, and they are dying.

As we humans change the chemical composition of the atmosphere, the oceans, and of the land itself, the very planet we depend on for life support is rapidly losing the ability to support life. Scientists and other experts warn that we are fast approaching critical tipping points on numerous fronts and that mass extinctions are a likely result.

Few people seem to grasp the precariousness of our situation―the immediacy of the dangers we all face―and fewer still fully grasp the proximate causes of it. Until we acknowledge the human element at the epicenter of environmental degradation and resource depletion―until we stop thinking in terms of resource shortages and start thinking in terms of excess demand due to overpopulation―and begin an honest dialog aimed at resolving these difficult issues, we are condemned to live a “slapstick comedy” kind of existence.