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Nov. 28th, 2005 12:01 amThanksgiving was good but very unproductive. Looking ahead, I have ...
- Japanese Oral exam, noon tomorrow
- 8-10 page paper for Arts of Tang, due Tuesday 1:30pm
- Chinese Civ final paper, due Wed 11:30 am.
So I should really be doing work. Instead, I was reading about colored bubbles and the environmental cost of having a baby. That baby article had an interesting bit...
Hall and his colleagues found that a single new American born in the 1990s will be responsible, over his or her life, for 22 million pounds of liquid waste and 2.2 million pounds each of solid waste and atmospheric waste. He or she will have a lifetime consumption of 4,000 barrels of oil, 1.5 million pounds of minerals and 62,000 pounds of animal products that will entail the slaughter of 2,000 animals.
"In terms of energy usage alone, [which is] a convenient measure of environmental impact," Knight says, "the average Ethiopian uses one 310th of what we use. So when an American couple stops at two kids it's like an Ethiopian couple stopping at 620."
Which makes me think this may be a good standard for having children. Like, a graduated scale based on consumption. Lower natural consumption usually also means they're living in a less sophisticated society which may actually need the extra manpower. Find a middle-of-the-roader country, set that to "2 babies per couple", and then everyone else scale accordingly. I mean, Ethiopia's a bit on the low scale, but, say, um, Brazil? Or whatever. Say 1 baby per person (2 babies per couple) is set to Brazil, which means 1 baby every 6 people in the US and 10 babies for every person in Ethiopia. Now not every couple will have 20 babies in Ethiopia, but nor would Americans restrict themselves to 1 baby between every 3 couples. We've always relied on the fact that the more educated and socially conscious people get, the fewer babies they will want to have. Having a concrete scale, even if it's not enforced, would be good because both the top and the bottom tends to be self-enforcing. (won't get into the whole law/morality thing here). This would encourage more social mobility, as well. You can even graduate it within each country. Like, if your livelihood is not very consumptive, you can have more children, or something.
I dunno, man. It's always weird thinking about this sorta stuff. It's social manipulation what no one is comfortable with. But everyone pretty much agrees that the world cannot sustain much more population. I guess another way is to do "leap generations". Like, all the couples of this generation can only have 1 child. The next generation can have whatever, and then the next generation is 1 child again, or something. But that'd screw up social security. Or, what'd be funny/horrible would be that the number of children you can have is determined by the year you were born in. Or having quotas by year. Like, only 3 million babies can be born each year. And now we're wandering to the ludicrous side of SF.
- Japanese Oral exam, noon tomorrow
- 8-10 page paper for Arts of Tang, due Tuesday 1:30pm
- Chinese Civ final paper, due Wed 11:30 am.
So I should really be doing work. Instead, I was reading about colored bubbles and the environmental cost of having a baby. That baby article had an interesting bit...
Hall and his colleagues found that a single new American born in the 1990s will be responsible, over his or her life, for 22 million pounds of liquid waste and 2.2 million pounds each of solid waste and atmospheric waste. He or she will have a lifetime consumption of 4,000 barrels of oil, 1.5 million pounds of minerals and 62,000 pounds of animal products that will entail the slaughter of 2,000 animals.
"In terms of energy usage alone, [which is] a convenient measure of environmental impact," Knight says, "the average Ethiopian uses one 310th of what we use. So when an American couple stops at two kids it's like an Ethiopian couple stopping at 620."
Which makes me think this may be a good standard for having children. Like, a graduated scale based on consumption. Lower natural consumption usually also means they're living in a less sophisticated society which may actually need the extra manpower. Find a middle-of-the-roader country, set that to "2 babies per couple", and then everyone else scale accordingly. I mean, Ethiopia's a bit on the low scale, but, say, um, Brazil? Or whatever. Say 1 baby per person (2 babies per couple) is set to Brazil, which means 1 baby every 6 people in the US and 10 babies for every person in Ethiopia. Now not every couple will have 20 babies in Ethiopia, but nor would Americans restrict themselves to 1 baby between every 3 couples. We've always relied on the fact that the more educated and socially conscious people get, the fewer babies they will want to have. Having a concrete scale, even if it's not enforced, would be good because both the top and the bottom tends to be self-enforcing. (won't get into the whole law/morality thing here). This would encourage more social mobility, as well. You can even graduate it within each country. Like, if your livelihood is not very consumptive, you can have more children, or something.
I dunno, man. It's always weird thinking about this sorta stuff. It's social manipulation what no one is comfortable with. But everyone pretty much agrees that the world cannot sustain much more population. I guess another way is to do "leap generations". Like, all the couples of this generation can only have 1 child. The next generation can have whatever, and then the next generation is 1 child again, or something. But that'd screw up social security. Or, what'd be funny/horrible would be that the number of children you can have is determined by the year you were born in. Or having quotas by year. Like, only 3 million babies can be born each year. And now we're wandering to the ludicrous side of SF.
