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Note: The following consists of quotes from the article and responses by KVDP, but the formatting isn't clear. --Chriswaterguy 20:41, 12 October 2012 (PDT)

You know, when we started the World Wildlife Fund, its objective was to save endangered species from extinction, and I'm now near the end of my career and we've failed completely. We haven't saved a single endangered species. And if we'd put all that money we'd collected into condoms, we might have done some good.
— Sir Peter Scott, W co-founder of the WWF, in a personal conversation cited by Professor Roger Short.[1]

One very different "solution" that is sometimes heard for the climate crisis, for reducing our environmental impact in all ways, is to drastically cut the human population. In some cases there is even an optimistic quality to these writings, looking forward to a better time after the population has been reduced by 90% or more. These comments left on a New Scientist article are an example:

A managed reduction in the human population to a sustainable 300 million would do much to reduce the amount of CO2 being pumped into the atmosphere.

Of course it would - but there is no humane way to slash our numbers in a short period of time.

  • -> reduction to 300 million people is much, much more than 90%, not realistical

A crash would certainly have its benefits, just as the Black DeathW had positive effects - it left more food and more land per person, and less serfs per feudal estate, and giving serfs the openings to swap their allegiance to a lord offering a better deal. Most of us, though, want a solution that doesn't involve massive death by chaos or eugenics, just as we don't want another Black Death. The suggested solution in this case:

People respond well to draconian measures of population control when it is explained to them in a simple clear manner - like I say China is a case in point. The error here being that China has not reduced its population, merely slowed its growth.

> Not true, it has reduced it's population, (2 parents: 1 child: 50% reduction), it's just not appearant yet as the parents have not yet died.

Some sobering points about this kind of population crash utopia were made in response, in the same comments section:

Also how does dropping the population to 300 million help, if for example America wiped everyone else out we would still have a problem because America produces so much CO2.

> First, having a single country not reducing it's pop size, while others do isn't realistical. Secondly, I think if you do the math, you'll find out with just the USA the emissions would be acceptable

This still leaves the issue of how we can sustainably and drastically reduce our impact, without starving ourselves or killing each other off. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by KVDP, 12 October 2012

  1. The long and the short of Roger - The Science Show - ABC Radio National (Australian Broadcasting Corporation)
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