Save the Planet!

[bbowers2004]

The entire idea of being man is that we can choose which path we lead.

[tdoster]

Originally Posted by atoll

if you want to save the planet,our biggest threat is over population

as a yachtsman visiting remote communities and crossing oceans you are ideally placed to take a leaf out of our forebearers book..........

a bit of spanish flu,or new strain of small pox would go a long long long way towards saving the planet

Why is it so non-politically correct to state what the actual problem is. We study animals and overpopulation on a daily basis and clearly understand the implications of it, but politically, it will not get you re-elected and it is far more profitable to tax pollution then it is population.

I don't understand why governments place a tax on the front-end for things like plastic, instead of a simple deposit that is paid on the front-end that solves the problem on the back-end because it would be profitable for someone to recycle the product. Either I am going to get my .10 back, or someone else will for me - either way, we don't have plastic bottles lying all over the place.

Same for grocery bags. Don't outlaw or tax them, charge a deposit for each one. You would be amazed at how fast things clean themselves up.

[cburger]

Originally Posted by atoll

if you want to save the planet,our biggest threat is over population

as a yachtsman visiting remote communities and crossing oceans you are ideally placed to take a leaf out of our forebearers book..........

a bit of spanish flu,or new strain of small pox would go a long long long way towards saving the planet

Atoll, I laughed my ass off with that one, and by the way was thinking the same thing.

[captain58sailin]

It is my feeling that a pandemic will cure our overpopulation problem. Given the frequency of air travel and use of touch panels in public places, makes it ripe for a bioterrorist or just plain old laws of chance. The other option is put a spay and neuter clinic in front of the feeding places, if you want to eat then snip, snip. With global warming and the waters rising who knows what new disease may come out. Small pox wiped out a percentage of the indigenous population in continental US. Whatever happened to the Ebola virus? That was one of the most promising population control viruses to come along in a long time. I understand it didn't have a long enough incubation period, but hey these things mutate.

[transmitterdan]

Originally Posted by captain58sailin

Whatever happened to the Ebola virus? That was one of the most promising population control viruses to come along in a long time. I understand it didn't have a long enough incubation period, but hey these things mutate.

Ebola was so aggressive that it consumed its victims to below critical mass before they could spread very far and thus it died for lack of fuel. It's Interesting that the oft predicted pandemic hasn't happened even as the world is more connected than ever. Personally, I believe if a pandemic were going to happen it would have by now.

[goboatingnow]

Originally Posted by atoll

if you want to save the planet,our biggest threat is over population

as a yachtsman visiting remote communities and crossing oceans you are ideally placed to take a leaf out of our forebearers book..........

a bit of spanish flu,or new strain of small pox would go a long long long way towards saving the planet

The fundamental issue with depopulation is course , who gets " depopulated" .

Dave

[StuM]

> The fundamental issue with depopulation is course , who gets " depopulated"

Simples - all the Malthusians should lead by example.

[Blue Crab]

Originally Posted by captain58sailin

It is my feeling that a pandemic will cure our overpopulation problem. Given the frequency of air travel and use of touch panels in public places, makes it ripe for a bioterrorist or just plain old laws of chance. The other option is put a spay and neuter clinic in front of the feeding places, if you want to eat then snip, snip. With global warming and the waters rising who knows what new disease may come out. Small pox wiped out a percentage of the indigenous population in continental US. Whatever happened to the Ebola virus? That was one of the most promising population control viruses to come along in a long time. I understand it didn't have a long enough incubation period, but hey these things mutate.

This could be a political platform that many would vote for. I will cast the first vote. And cap58, while you're at it, could we take out super yakkity women?

[SV THIRD DAY]

Haven't the "Population Bomb" folks already been proven wrong because their predictions of us already being dead turned out to be wrong?

[hpeer]

Originally Posted by StuM

> The fundamental issue with depopulation is course , who gets " depopulated"

Simples - all the Malthusians should lead by example.

The point of being a Malthusian is to figure out how it's going down so as to NOT be part of the die off. It's all Planning, planning, planning ya know.

[delmarrey]

Originally Posted by goboatingnow

The fundamental issue with depopulation is course , who gets " depopulated" .

Dave

Don't need to depopulate. Just get women to stop their obsession with having babies.

More than half of births to American women younger than 30 are outside marriage, research has found.

Read more: Most children in U.S. born out of wedlock | Mail Online

I can imagine what it's like in underdeveloped countries.

[Pelagic]

One of the main reasons I ran away to Sea was to avoid the temptation of wanting to save the Planet.
I knew if I ruled the world, I was capable of exercising the toughest of love.

To achieve that meant a conscious effort NOT to procreate…. as it always seemed to be the catalyst for people losing their objectivity on whom should be saved.

Instead I chose to experience the very best of what the remote areas of this Planet had to offer while the tides of change washed away my footprints in the sand, but not my memories.

I am quite sure the world will save itself one day and I will accept that with a wry smile about the importance of being selfish!

[FlightPlan]

bbowers2004
I worry about people who want to save the world and have all the answers about how to do it. A week in rough seas can usually make those big ideas go away.


1. So you plan to go around the world collecting Plankton samples and turn the data in to the large corporate labs to solve what you see as a problem caused by “global warming” which is alleged to be caused by greedy corporate carelessness. Hmmm! Sounds like fun with a noble rationalization to make you feel good. Maybe you can even get a grant from big government.
2. Atoll has it diagnosed correctly, but must have been at sea for a long time. He implies that the dastardly rich doctors defeated all the good diseases that could resolve the population problem. Now we have to wait for the evolution of Roe vs. Wade, same sex marriage, religious persecution, and government run healthcare to replace the diseases and eradicate the population. Oh yeah, I forgot squishing our vegetables into fuel and starving the poor.
3. I always considered youth as a temporary state of being, not a class, and social status is a score card used solely by people who play a game that has no meaning such as life itself, but has rules made up by the players so they can understand their score in a meaningless game. Most seafaring people do not envy boaters by the size of their vessel. There is a bond that exists on the sea that we are free, and independent, but when the vessel is in trouble duty calls and help is given and accepted with grace regardless of the size or crew. One thing I know is that the boat sometimes looks real big in the marina, but get out a couple of hundred miles and it gets real small. I see a large boat and see labor problems, larger expenses than mine, limited harbor destinations, and greater government regulations in operation.
4. Led lights do save energy, but they are hot and emit radio waves causing computer and radio interference. Take you volt meter sometime and check how far away you can get from one before doesn’t register on the meter. The large print giveth and the small print taketh away.
5. MaryEllenCarter has a point too. The sea is a great school yard, but you won’t be learning about plankton, you might learn how to spell it though. You will be learning how pumps are built, electrolysis, energy management, cooking, and weather patterns, just to name a few things that come up during your study time.
6. I sense you inserted the Jeff Daniels video to make a point that the United States has failed and caused the pollution in the world. It caused some I’ll agree, but it is leading in remedy solutions as well, and while it is giving aid to 200 countries worldwide, it is trying to help other countries to come along while not making the mistakes of its past. It is however the free and independent hard working proud capitalist people of the US that put the 1st man on the moon, won two world wars to free the people of Europe and Southeast Asia and returned the land to its native countryman. We are just going thru a minor adjustment period where its fashionable to feel guilty about our success. It will come back stronger after the evolution I mentioned in item 2 above.
7. I for one don’t like gasoline or natural gas fumes floating around my boat. Instead of finding a method to refuel at sea with that stuff, you should work on something like magnetic energy. Till then, I like my diesel.
8. I feel sorry for the dog. I know people do it, and they have to quarantine pets in many countries for at least a week before they can go ashore to take a good pee and so on.
9. The entire idea of being man is that we can choose which path we lead. REALLY? Whose idea was that? How about the entire idea of being free…….
10. I like that deposit idea. I’m old enough to remember the money I made as a kid picking up pop bottles along the highways and railroads and turning them in for 2 cents each.
So I'll end this rant with the 2 cents comment.

[kthoennes]

Ah yes, the utilitarian intellectuals opine about the benefits of depopulation, but they (almost?) never have the intellectual integrity to kill themselves to get the ball rolling. And when their mothers are in a nursing home or their wives get diagnosed with cancer, odd how they never think, "great, less of a load on the planet!"

In the abstract it all sounds so pragmatic, but when it's your kid being wheeled into the operating room, that reasoning about this planet being better off with less of us instantly becomes utter nonsense and garbage.

[captain58sailin]

News flash, we are all going to die eventually. The beauty of a pandemic or life at sea, neither care about your income level or what kind of person you are, it is total random chance whether you live or die, just like life. For the record I have a terminally ill Wife for whom I would do anything to ease her pain. Nothing is going to change the fact that she does not have much time left in this life, and I have had to accept the unacceptable by western standards, but by other views it is the natural progression of life to be embraced not feared or shunned, death is as inevitable as life.