THE CROWDED PLANET
ZERO POPULATION GROWTH OF GREATER BOSTON
| Volume 10, Issue 3 | May/June 2000 |
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THE CROWDED PLANET ZERO POPULATION GROWTH OF GREATER BOSTON
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Up Front |
Feature Articles |
In The News |
About Us |
Join us for the ZPG/Boston Chapter’s Annual Banquet, on Monday, May 15th at John Harvard’s Brew House, 33 Dunster Street in Cambridge. This location is near Harvard Square. Cocktails will be at 6:30 PM, and the meeting will begin at 7:00 PM. There will be a cash bar. The cost for the entire event, tips and taxes included, will be $20.00 per person.
Prof. Lawrence Wangh of Brandeis University will be the guest lecturer for the evening. His topic will be “How To Teach Population Issues". Prof. Wangh is in the Biology Department at Brandeis; his classes include BISC 2a: Human Reproduction, Population Explosion, Global Consequences.
Also at this meeting, we will hold the annual election of officers for this coming year. All current officers are up for re-election.
Please RSVP to Frances Cameron, 9 Princeton Road, Arlington, MA 02474, 781-646-3672. Your check for $20 should be made out to ZPG Boston.
The fourth annual Capitol Hill Days event brought ZPG activists from all across America to Washington, DC for four days of intensive training on March 25-28. The first two days were spent in briefings on population issues and advocacy training, and the last two were spent meeting with legislators.
—Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr., "Family Planning: A Special and Urgent Concern." Acceptance speech, May 5, 1966, upon receiving the Planned Parenthood Federation of America Margaret Sanger Award (first three paragraphs). The entire text is online at the PPFA website."Recently, the press has been filled with reports of sightings of flying saucers. While we need not give credence to these stories, they allow our imagination to speculate on how visitors from outer space would judge us. I am afraid they would be stupefied at our conduct. They would observe that for death planning we spend billions to create engines and strategies for war. They would also observe that we spend millions to prevent death by disease and other causes. Finally they would observe that we spend paltry sums for population planning, even though its spontaneous growth is an urgent threat to life on our planet. Our visitors from outer space could be forgiven if they reported home that our planet is inhabited by a race of insane men whose future is bleak and uncertain.
There is no human circumstance more tragic than the persisting existence of a harmful condition for which a remedy is readily available. Family planning, to relate population to world resources, is possible, practical and necessary. Unlike plagues of the dark ages or contemporary diseases we do not yet understand, the modern plague of overpopulation is soluble by means we have discovered and with resources we possess.
What is lacking is not sufficient knowledge of the solution but universal consciousness of the gravity of the problem and education of the billions who are its victims."
The January/February AMC Outdoors magazine discusses some 27 environmental problems that concern the Appalachian Mountain Club and our outdoor loving members. They range from light blight and sprawl to water quality and trail crowding. These many problems are discussed largely as though they have no relationship to each other or to overarching issues.
In the Editors' Note, a discussion highlights a less than cheerful outlook. Similarly the Sierra Club, talking about building a greener future in its Sierra millennium issue, comments "OK, we blew it last millennium. How can we do better this time?"
Finally, environmental groups are acknowledging that we are losing the fight. That we measure and have knowledge of our lack of overall success is good news. Now the opportunity is in deciding how to win the battles and the war—what would be a successful and long lasting strategy?
Organizations like AMC and Sierra must develop real vision and allocate money, publicity and action to overarching issues—those few problems that, once resolved, can have a major positive effect on the many problems we have individually been attacking and (often over the longer term) losing.
According to the Census Bureau, the United States is on a course of surpassing a population of one-half billion within the lifetime of many of today's AMC enthusiasts (We are now at 274 million, growing at a California per decade). The effect: all 27 of these problems (and many others) will get worse.
We don't have to let this happen. As individuals, and as an organization, we must have the vision to actively join the fight to stabilize population levels. Seven years ago the AMC acknowledged the overarching and disastrous effects of population growth. We have now also seemingly acknowledged that there are not enough resources to fight and win by just fighting individual issues.
If the AMC actively works for population stabilization and joins with other groups in doing so, our next evaluation will be a lot more positive. If we continue to ignore population growth as a factor in our activities, we and our children will be spending a lot more time indoors.
[* Specific problems noted: Light blight, wilderness roads, acid rain, ozone, air pollution, sulfur, sprawl, wilderness preservation, sustainable forestry, river access, river crowding, water supply, water quality, dams, mountaineering, effects of technology, global warming, environmental education, biodiversity, economy, trail management, trail crowding, multiple use, universal access, cell phone towers, money, PCB pollution.]
Mike Hanauer
6 April Lane
Lexington, MA 02421
Yesterday, the Asheville Citizen-Times ran a story about the Census Bureau’s projection for U.S. population in the year 2100 (“Census Bureau predicts U.S. will double population by 2100”, AC-T, 1/13/2000). They forecast that we will more than double our current number, to 571 million people.
To put it mildly, this scenario is at odds with the predictions of many scientists. To give only one example: Edward O. Wilson is a widely respected entomologist, biologist, and author. In the November/December 1999 issue of Audubon Magazine, he says "If we continue at the current rate of deforestation and destruction of major ecosystems like rainforests and coral reefs, where most of the biodiversity is concentrated, we will surely lose more than half of all the species of plants and animals on earth by the end of the 21st century."
The food chain is a pyramid, with each species depending (directly or indirectly) on all of the species below for its survival. Humans, as the most recently evolved large predator, sit at the top of that pyramid. If it becomes riddled with large gaps, it will collapse catacysmically. Species near the top (including humans) have the farthest to fall; they are most likely to be in the losing half.
We are currently in the midst of the fastest and most devastating extinction on record; more so even than the great extinctions of prehistory. (Look it up; it's true.) It is being driven by global warming, deforestation, overpopulation, and overconsumption.
The Census Bureau has it half right. The population is increasing rapidly, and will continue to do so for awhile. However, this trend is not sustainable. The Earth has limits. Many of us will escape them. Unfortunately, our children and grandchildren may not be so lucky.
Gregory Wilcox
Candler, North Carolina
The Harvard Museum of Natural History is pleased to announce Dr. Paul Ehrlich as the keynote speaker for the Roger Tory Peterson Memorial Lecture 2000. Dr. Ehrlich, Bing Professor of Population Studies at Stanford, is the winner of such prestigious awards as the Tyler Prize for Environmental Achievement, and the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences' Crafoord Prize in Population Biology and the Conservation of Population Diversity.
Who was Roger Tory Peterson? A world-renowned ornithologist, naturalist, author, lecturer and artist. His system of field identification made bird watching a worldwide activity. Peterson's bird paintings, based on a lifetime of detailed observation and study, have become synonymous with a standard of unparalleled excellence in the minds of avid birders around the world.
Please join us for our third memorial lecture, in celebration of the lifelong accomplishments of Roger Tory Peterson. We are thrilled to host guest lecturer Dr. Paul Ehrlich, the prolific author of 37 books and more than 600 articles, on subjects ranging from over-population and consumption in the United States, to the population dynamics of checkerspot butterflies in Central California. Dr. Ehrlich's lifelong commitment to the natural world has not been limited to academic journals and books. He appeared on "The Tonight Show with Johnny Carson" an amazing 25 times, and was nominated for an Emmy in 1990 for his series of 12 feature reports on global ecological issues for NBC News.
The lecture is free and open to the public; however, advance reservations are required. For ticket information, please call (617) 496-6972.
Greg has already done a great job turning the newsletter into a stimulating forum for the discussion of issues relating to the topic of overpopulation. I look forward to helping him continue in this effort.
Why is overpopulation so difficult a subject to grasp? Why do even the good folks who work on major social issues tend to balk at tackling the question of overpopulation head on? Why, even now, when most of our mainstream roads and work places are usually choking with the negative effects of there being too many people, do the majority of our politicians still fail to see the strong connection between quality of life and numbers of people?
Well, there are many answers to all this, and most of them have hit upon some part of the truth. One that's particularly convincing, for example, is that, rightly or wrongly, here in the United States we equate economic growth with the growth of our population. Not to put too fine a spin on it: people = customers. And to the extent that this notion remains fundamental to our cultural philosophy, we will continue to encounter the proverbial deaf ear. We ZPG types can jump up and down, stamp our feet, and yell for as long as we like about how customers are also consumers, and about how overconsumption of finite natural resources is also a part of the population problem. But no one is listening.
No matter how well and clearly we articulate the environmental crisis, those of us who are really concerned about it continue to struggle just to be heard, and I think the reason for this goes much deeper than mere philosophy. The fact is that the urge to infinitely grow the population is part of a much larger general urge to expansion that encompasses almost every aspect of culture in these here United States. The issue isn't just expanding our families, but expanding our economy, our circle of friends, the size of our SUVs, our coin and stamp collections, our very egos.
We would all agree that troubled children shooting up their schools is an obvious problem. What's not so obvious at all is whether we should be worried about all those "good" kids who spend their free time building their block and doll collections. As a kid, I myself, unknowingly, was following in the footsteps of Winston Churchill by constantly setting up battle strategy games with metal soldiers on my playroom floor. Expanding my army, my military knowledge, power and areas of influence. Only years later would I encounter the existentialist philosophy that led me to question that sort of behavior. In the meantime, I was having fun . . . expanding stuff.
Of course, it is not just those of us whose ancestors conquered North America and built the United States who fit into this category of consummate expansion addicts. World history is replete with examples, from the Mongol hordes to the Vikings, the Romans, and the colonialists of more recent times. To some degree, most cultures have attempted to expand their boundaries at one time or another. A lot of wars have been fought because of this. On the other hand, one might argue that it was this same compulsion to expand which has finally brought us to the point technologically where we might be able to manage ourselves ecologically. But first we must learn to control ourselves psychologically and sociologically.
The big question is whether this urge to expand everything, from blocks to population to egos, is something we can unlearn. Or is it something innate? I for one believe we can, if not unlearn, at least substantially modify this old behavior. Will it be very difficult to do so? Obviously. Is it possible? I think so, with the help of some new technologies, outer and "inner," and a sufficient amount of political will. For better or worse, we know quite a bit about those outer technologies. But what are some of these new "inner" technologies of which I speak, and how could anything like that possibly relate to something like the ecology? Aren't we having enough trouble mainstreaming ourselves without risking going off the New-Age deep end as well?
Yet I think we must first broaden and deepen (did I say expand?) our knowledge about ourselves just a bit more, admittedly making what is an already too complicated debate just a bit more complicated. Our reward for doing this, if we can get it right, will be our learning how to assume much better control over our incessant urges to enlarge ourselves in all directions, and how they connect at various levels. This will in turn make the current debates over, say, free enterprise versus quality of life, a lot simpler to understand and in many ways far easier to resolve.
I do believe that we currently possess all the tools, both technological and psychological, to make this change in ourselves, and thus help create a much better world in the process. It's just a question of whether we will be able to understand these aspects of thought and behavior a little better and put it them all together in a new way.
But I have gone on long enough for one column. I will elaborate on many of the above points in subsequent issues, but hopefully not in such a way that they will be taking up too much space in this newsletter. Curbing our habits of expansion, after all, begins at home. My intent in this first column has just been to pique your curiosity about what will be a main question of mine in our ongoing forum on population issues. How might we change our ways as a culture so that we can begin developing effective, democratic ecological self-management programs, both as a nation and a world?
Lee Strauss
I'm a little confused. Do you support the notion of every person having only one child or would you prefer people remain childless?
Thank you.
Madelyn Cain
Madelyn, that is a good question, and thank you for asking. I believe there are some matters in which a person's words speak louder than her (or his) actions. This is one of them.
Overpopulation is the main driving force behind most of our environmental problems. If there is to be any hope for saving this world, our current growth rate must be slowed and ultimately stopped. At six billion human beings, we are far beyond Gaia's carrying capacity.
Unfortunately, most people—in this country and around the world—are not even aware that population is an issue, let alone a problem. The most acute need at the moment is simply to raise awareness about overpopulation.
Most people chose their family size without knowing about the devastating effects of overpopulation. They should not be blamed for this. ("Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do.") People who do know generally choose small families. And there are those who don't, but instead choose to be effective evangelists for population stabilization. These people do more good than harm, since their message has far more effect than their personal actions.
The only people I would not understand are those who know the consequences of overpopulation, then choose to have large families and crow about it. Fortunately, there are not many of these (at least I have never heard of any).
So to answer your question, I don't much care how many children you have, or plan to have in the future. That is a matter for you to decide for yourself. It is between you and your Creator, and not for me to judge.
What I do care about is how strong a voice you are for righting the wrongs in our society. I care about how well you publicize and advocate issues like educating and empowering women, protecting the environment, and stopping the takeover of the world by giant international corporations driven solely by the profit motive.
But most of all, I care how you feel about the population issue. Do you understand the seriousness of the threat it poses? Have you taken the time to educate yourself on the subject? Do you belong to any of the various population organizations (including Zero Population Growth, Negative Population Growth, Population Communications International, Carrying Capacity Network, Population Action International, United Nations Population Fund, Population-Environment Balance, and many others)? Have you volunteered to work with any of these organizations?
The number of children you personally have makes very little difference in a world that is already severely overcrowded. Even if you had 60 children (which is probably physically impossible, even with today's fertility drugs), it would only represent an additional 0.000001%. But the number of unwanted (and sadly, most are) children that you prevent makes a much bigger difference.
Mathematically, of course, the correct number of children to have is two or fewer. If each couple produces sufficient offspring to reproduce themselves and no more, the number of people on Earth will not continue to increase.
Time is short. We cannot afford to quibble over details. How many angel-faced children can dance on the head of a pin? Who cares! Get out there and speak up for population stabilization!
P.S. Who are you? Where did you get my email address?
Dear Greg,
Thank you for your wonderful—and thoughtful—reply.
I'm a writer working on a book about childless women. I've spent two and a half years doing research on this topic. I find the tremendous growth in women remaining childless (American and European) an interesting, and significant, development. I think your message has been effective. A large number of the women I interviewed have chosen childlessness primarily out of concerns for the environment and they are passionate on the topic.
I am baffled about why emergency contraceptive pills (ECPs) are not a hot topic in the US. This seems to me to be a FABULOUS breakthrough in preventing unwanted pregnancies. Is there some conspiracy against them? Everyone I talk to thinks I'm referring to RU-486 (mifeprestone). Can you shed any light on this?
Just so you know, I have one child, we recycle like crazy, and are looking into buying an electric car. (And I told my 14 year old about ECPs.)
Thanks for being there, and I got your e-mail address off the Net.
Hi Madelyn!
Thanks for writing back. I'm glad you are writing about childlessness; we need more on the subject. You probably know there are several books already. If memory serves, the ZPG Reporter did a review recently on Pride and Joy: The Lives and Passions of Women Without Children by Terri Casey. Others include:
Also, Bill McKibben has a book called Maybe One: A Personal and Environmental Argument for Single-Child Families. You can find a review of it in The Crowded Planet's July/August 1998 issue.
You are right that ECPs are not popular here. Our current moral climate (the abortion debate, the Catholic Church, the Religious Right, "family values", and so on) works against it. The current issue of the ZPG Reporter focuses on contraception, including ECPs. It discusses them in several articles.
If you are interested in electric cars, you may want to check out the Electric Auto Association.
May I have permission to use your initial letter in the next issue of The Crowded Planet?
You say you got my email address from the internet. Can you be more precise? (The internet is a big place. :-) ) I presume it has something to do with my connection to ZPG.
I am thinking of writing a book myself. The working title is Are We Bulldozing God?: Spirituality, Forgiveness and Hope in Humanity's Last Century. The thesis is that the new century will be our last if we don't get our act together. I recently wrote a letter on this topic to the Asheville Citizen-Times; they published an abridged version of it.
Greg,
PLEASE do write about this. I think one of the biggest challenges I see for ZPG (which is where I did get your e-mail address, on the site, I believe—I see so much stuff every day) is getting Americans to see that even though we are not the ones overpopulating the planet at this particular time, we are consuming the majority of the resources. Some are ignoring the issue because the overpopulation is occurring in developing countries, not here. There are two issues: overpopulation and resources. Americans HAVE to start thinking about the resources in a more responsible manner. Of course you can quote me. May I quote you?
Let's keep in touch.
Madelyn
Hi Madelyn!
OK, I did write about this. In fact, I took our entire conversation and put it in the next issue of The Crowded Planet. May I have your permission to publish it?
You didn't say what you thought of my letter or my proposed book. In the letter, I predict the complete demise of the human race in the current century. Do you think this is overly pessimistic? Why or why not? If true and publicized (and believed), do you think it would affect people's behavior?
I am also interested in your opinion, as an author, of my book title. I have thought about it a lot; titles can make or break a book. I have also considered The Last Century as an alternate. It's not as eye-catching but maybe more salable.
Greg,
While I think the world may end in a nanosecond for no discernible reason, I think it is far too pessimistic to believe the human race is going to end because of Americans over-populating.
I believe the human race is phenomenally adaptable, and manages to morph into whatever form is needed to survive. I DO believe we are in grave danger and we should all be taking GREAT precautions, but I also see all the wonders that have developed out of the blue that have corrected impossible situations. I prefer to wake up and believe that, while all the while working to prevent the other, life is a wonder beyond our grasp. Does this sound Pollyanna-ish to you? Do you believe in a master plan? In a god?
Yes, you may quote me, but if you do not use the entire sentence, please use the meaning when you edit.
I like both titles. You have to grab the public's attention—not to mention the publishers'. Choose what YOU like. Good luck.
Keep in touch.
Hi Madelyn!
Once again, thank you for writing back. I do appreciate your views, despite whatever impression you get from what I'm about to say.
First, though, thank you for your advice about book titles. I'm glad to hear you like mine. Let me ask about your book: what is its title? How near are you to completion? Do you have a publisher? Have you written other books? How many have been published?
OK, back to the serious stuff. I do agree with you that "the world may end in a nanosecond for no discernible reason". This is frighteningly possible, as Jonathan Schell forcibly reminds us in his book The Fate of the Earth. Nuclear war is a real danger. Despite the end of the cold war and rumors to the contrary, it is getting more real all the time.
As horrible as that is to contemplate, however, it pales in comparison to what Harry Petrequin calls "the four horsemen of the Apocalypse": global warming, species extinction, deforestation, and overpopulation. Petrequin is a retired Foreign Service officer who lives in Black Mountain and often writes for the Asheville Citizen-Times, a local paper. Any one of these 'horsemen' could easily do us in, and the combination of all four is much worse. Not only are their effects cumulative, but they are mutually reinforcing. Together they impel each other on ever faster, in a forward feedback spiral with no brakes. And this analysis doesn't even include such relatively minor—but well publicized—problems as air and water pollution, the hole in the ozone layer, and genetically modified organisms. Needless to say, there are many others that get no publicity at all.
I don't think anyone can really appreciate the magnitude and seriousness of these threats without doing a considerable amount of reading on the subject. Here is a list from my web site that I compiled for the purpose; you can find it on the book list of my home page. I'm sure there are others that would work equally well (and I'd like to know about them!).
Essential Reading List
And that isn't even the real problem. Technology insulates us from biology, but it also distances us. We forget that Gaia is a self-regulating organism that has evolved over billions of years to adapt precisely to changing conditions. All technology can do is disrupt and interfere with this process. In other words, it gums up the works.
I ask you to name me any technological invention, discovery, or process that has on balance done more good than harm. I can certainly do the opposite, even almost effortlessly. I just reel them off, and check their effect afterwards. Freon, DDT, Alar, nuclear fission, internal combustion, Styrofoam, computers, the Internet, asbestos, strip mining. I could go on; you get the idea.
More and more, I see scientists hinting at the possibility that this is our last century. Even if they privately believe it, they are afraid to admit so publicly. It is too "pessimistic"; not politically correct. But scientists—excepting many of them who focus so intently on their specialty that they fail to notice its implications for the rest of us—are in the best position to know. They have "done the math"; they can see what's coming. And they realize that technology is not helping.
So if technology isn't the answer, what is? It's too obvious: biology. Biology is what this world runs on; it's how it was designed. If we can learn how to get back in synch with our biological heritage, there may be hope for us yet.
I've said too much already, but let me at least touch on your religious questions. Yes, I believe in God. However, my beliefs are not quite what my Presbyterian parents tried to instill in me as a child, or would prefer even now.
I believe what Jesus said in a very literal way: God is love. (Or to say it scientifically, God is negative entropy.) Love is the energy, the binding force, which holds us all together and creates order from chaos. Without love, the universe disintegrates into randomness. God is not some kindly gentleman with a long beard watching over us from behind the clouds. No! God is immanent in the universe. He is everywhere and He is everything. He is within us all.
But we have to remember that we humans are not God's only creation. He is the God of antelopes and zebra snails, of walruses and lichen, of mountain goats and cryptosporidium. The Lord God made them all, and He called them good. He loves each of them equally as much as He loves each of us.
Meanwhile, we are busily driving half of our fellow species to extinction (as E. O. Wilson forecasts). Yes, Gaia will survive. But she may have to do so at our expense. Like a person running a fever to kill the bacteria that cause a cold, earth heats up and shakes us off. In Gaian logic, we are an expendable parasite. If we behave, she can tolerate us. But if we act up and multiply out of control, we can be sacrificed for the greater good. So the "master plan" is to preserve life—not necessarily higher, so-called "intelligent" life forms, which can always re-evolve given a few eons. Much more important is the ancient genetic blueprint: the DNA of millions of primitive species, painstakingly evolved over four billion years. How can we lose that? But if we aren't careful, it may happen. Gaia recognizes that the human species could actually wipe out ALL life, causing the planet to become totally dead. In that case, she is better off without us. Life continues. On with the show!
What a passionate and intelligent man you are. I do share your concerns about a lot of the genetic improvements that I think violate nature's code. But like most people, I guess I feel certain "progress" is inevitable. I want to think over and re-read what you've said before I answer any more.
The book is currently being offered to publishers. The working title is _________________ (though please keep that between us). It's about the radical change that is taking place with women choosing to remain childless.
I had a book published a few years ago called First Time Mothers, Last Chance Babies. My area of interest is women's choices and what they portend. I had my first and only child at 39. She's now 14.
Keep up the good work. Write and have it published. You need to wake up people like me. By the by, is Gore the planet candidate?
Hi Madelyn!
As a 501C-3 corporation, ZPG does not endorse or oppose candidates for office. But in my personal opinion, neither of them come close to adequately addressing environmental issues—let alone overpopulation.
-—greg
