FUSsa-talk Mailing List: Fwd: [BOBPARKS-WHATSNEW] What's New Robert L. Park 30 JuL 2010

[Robert Tapp (tappx001]

Begin forwarded message:

> From: Robert Tapp <tappx001 [at] umn.edu>
> Date: July 31, 2010 9:02:51 AM CDT
> To: Humanist Institute Discussion Group Discussion Group <hidisc [at] 
> humanistinstitute.org>
> 
> 
> Population is the elephant in the room -- and the one that most of our 
> religious traditions want to ignore -- for varied reasons. Some of them say 
> sex is bad, part of the <lower> part of  the human creature. Others say we 
> must multiply at the god's will. Others say nothing artificial (like 
> contraceptives) can be used. The new UN estimates of population futures are 
> now in the news, and Robert Parks uses the occasion for some sharp historical 
> footnoting. (He also comments on the phytoplankton problem that Phil Regal 
> has noted).
> 
> We humanists have viewed our sexuality as an important and potentially 
> pleasurable part of human living -- a dimension that needs the same kind of 
> moral evaluation as our creativity or our urges to control children, nature, 
> neighbors, other forms of life. We have also been pioneers in supporting 
> gender equality, fully aware that one of its side-effects is more rational 
> and responsible reproduction. Strong religions will always lose their battles 
> in climates of freedom and economic dignity.
> 
> Bob
> 
> Begin forwarded message:
> 
>> From: Robert Park <bobpark [at] UMD.EDU>
>> Date: July 31, 2010 7:19:58 AM CDT
>> To: BOBPARKS-WHATSNEW [at] LISTSERV.UMD.EDU
>> Subject: [BOBPARKS-WHATSNEW] What's New Robert L. Park 30 JuL 2010
>> Reply-To: whatsnew [at] BOBPARK.ORG
>> 
>> WHAT’S NEW   Robert L. Park   Friday, 30 Jul 2010   Washington, DC
>> 
>> 1. THE QUESTION: "CAN SCIENCE FEED THE WORLD?"
>> This question was on the cover of yesterday's Nature.  It was asked in the 
>> context of an estimate by the UN Food and Agriculture Organization that to 
>> accommodate a projected population of 9 billion in 2050 world food 
>> production must increase 70%.   Will they use the same calculus in 2050 to 
>> plan for a projected population of 12 billion in 2090?  This is the 
>> catastrophe that the unfairly maligned Thomas Robert Malthus foresaw in his 
>> 1798 Essay on the Principle of Population: Species have far more offspring 
>> than are needed to maintain their numbers.  It’s an observation that Darwin 
>> would cite as one of the keys to natural selection. When the numbers exceed 
>> the available food supply there is massive suffering.  Bob Malthus called 
>> for abstention from sex.  It's 100% effective, but strongly selected 
>> against.  Although a lot of people starved, remarkable advances in 
>> agriculture and transportation bought us a couple of hundred years to look 
>> for a better solution.  It came in 1960 in the form of the Pill, the 
>> combined oral contraceptive.  It offers an effective, if not quite perfect, 
>> technological solution to the population problem.  Malthusian catastrophe 
>> had been averted - well sort of.  
>> 
>> THE EDITORIAL: "FEEDING A HUNGRY WORLD."
>> Responding to the question on its cover, "Feeding a hungry world" says the 
>> real challenge in the coming decades is to "expand agricultural output 
>> massively without increasing by much the amount of land used."  How can 
>> this be done?  "What is needed is a second green revolution — an approach 
>> that Britain’s Royal Society aptly describes as the "sustainable 
>> intensification of global agriculture."  In his acceptance speech for the 
>> Nobel Peace Prize in 1970 Norman Borlaug, father of the Green  Revolution, 
>> said: "There can be no permanent progress in the battle against hunger 
>> until the agencies that fight for increased food production and those that 
>> fight for population control unite in a common effort. Fighting alone, they 
>> may win temporary skirmishes, but united they can win a decisive and 
>> lasting victory to provide food and other amenities of a progressive 
>> civilization for the benefit of all mankind."  Which leaves me deeply 
>> puzzled about why, in a special dealing with population, Nature left out 
>> any mention of population control?
>> 
>> PHYTOPLANKTON: BIG TROUBLE AT THE BOTTOM OF THE FOOD CHAIN? 
>> Researchers at Dalhousie University in Halifax, Nova Scotia say 
>> phytoplankton are disappearing from the ocean. Strictly speaking it's not 
>> really a science story -- yet. There’s no independent confirmation, and 
>> until that happens scientists don't get too excited. But Dalhousie is a 
>> respected school, and you can bet a lot of scientists are looking at sea 
>> water today. Phytoplankton are tiny plants that don't bother any other 
>> living creature. Using energy from sunlight, they take inorganic stuff, 
>> like water and carbon dioxide, to make new molecules as well as new 
>> phytoplankton. They scarf up CO2, which is good, and dump oxygen, which is 
>> also good. Their problem may be global warming, 
>> 
>> THE UNIVERSITY OF MARYLAND.
>> Opinions are the author's and not necessarily shared by the
>> University of Maryland, but they should be.
>> ---
>> Archives of What's New can be found at http://www.bobpark.org
>> What's New is moving to a different listserver and our
>> subscription process has changed. T
>