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From: cliff@rlgvax.UUCP
Newsgroups: sci.bio
Subject: Re: No Limits to Growth
Message-ID: <414@rlgvax.UUCP>
Date: Wed, 15-Apr-87 10:00:45 EST
Article-I.D.: rlgvax.414
Posted: Wed Apr 15 10:00:45 1987
Date-Received: Fri, 17-Apr-87 00:28:51 EST
References: <533@cpocd2.UUCP> <121700003@inmet>
Organization: Computer Consoles Inc, Reston VA
Lines: 40

In article <121700003@inmet>, janw@inmet.UUCP writes:
> 
> [howard@cpocd2.UUCP ]
> >Meanwhile, the desert marches on.
> 
> A misleading statement - considering that the amount of arable
> land  in  the  world keeps growing. Much is lost, more is gained.
> The green revolution is opening former wastelands to agriculture.

Consider that this growth in arable land is frequently (usually?) at the
expense of forest land, not wasteland.  

> Famine exists - but is it caused by popu-
> lation growth? *That's* the point.
> 
> Well, it is definitely *not*. There would be more sense in  blam-
> ing  famine  on  *underpopulation*. World population has grown,
> famine has receded. Worldwide, there's a  tremendous  glut  of
> 

What?  How do you measure famine receding, in a lesser absolute number
of people who go to bed hungry, or proportionally to the population? 

Many would scoff at the assertion that famine has lessened in the modern
world.  While certainly politics and war can be, and probably frequently
are, especially in northeast Africa and Mozambique, the major component 
causing famine, to claim that overpopulation does not contribute to famine
(poverty) is simply ludicrous.  At the very least, you can claim that
overpopulation make war, and the ensuing famine, much more likely.

Absolute causal statements about complex social issues should always be
held suspect.



-- 
O----------------------------------------------------------------------->
| Cliff Joslyn, Computer Consoles Inc., Reston, Virgnia, but my opinions.
| UUCP: ..!seismo!rlgvax!cliff
V All the world is biscuit shaped