The Future of Now: June 2007

Tuesday, June 19, 2007

The world would have no population problems if there were unlimited farmlands, resources, and water. Unfortunately, we live on an earth struggling to find room for its growing population. The earth’s estimated population is currently at 6,602,224,175. Experts believe that the world’s carrying capacity (maximum population size in a given area, based on level of resources, predators, and land) will be reached by 2015, at over 8 billion people. Can the world sustain this many people? Will there be mass starvation because of a lack of food?

To answer this question we must look at another population which experienced what we are currently are going through. In 1906 President Theodore Roosevelt established the Grand Canyon National Game Preserve on the Kaibab Plateau. He wanted to preserve the Kaibab deer for future generations. So in the following years the U.S. Forest Service limited hunting and killed of the deer’s natural predators: the wolf, bobcat, and mountain lion. They also removed other grazing animals from nearby ranches to give the deer enough to eat. What the ranchers saw in the years that followed was shocking. Each year the Forest Service estimated that the population of deer had risen exponentially. In 1913, when the president himself visited the plateau, he noted the abundance of deer. The fall of 1920 saw the population of deer begin to starve. Five years later, in 1925, the deer population reached a staggering 150,000 (in 1905 it was about 10,000). The following year 60% of the herd starved to death, bringing the population down to about 40,000. The Forest Service then realized their grave mistake and opened the park to predators and hunters. It took another ten years to bring the population back to the originally stable 10,000 dear. What can we learn about this experiment? A lot. First, we know that once predators and land are taken care of, the population will rise to new heights. Second, if there is a lack of food, the population will plummet to a more stable number. Can we apply this experiment to the human population boom of the 21^st century? Yes.

Let’s examine the history of the world’s population. In the years before the Common Era, the world’s population was at a steadily growing at around 100-150 million people. By the 14^th century, the world’s population had doubled to around 300 million people. The 19^th century would see an almost doubling in population from 900 million to around 1.6 billion by the turn of the century. From then on it took just 50 years for the world’s population to double to 2.4 billion by 1950, and to double again in 35 years to 5 billion. The world’s increase in population can be seen clearly by the map below.

This population trend has similar features as the Kaibab deer. Will the populace take a deep fall by 2015? Who will be most affected? Can we avoid this reality?

Advances in modern medicine, irrigation, and engineering have allowed the population to boom. Medicine has saved millions of lives in all over the world. From malaria pills to generic drugs, medicine has allowed humans to live longer and reproduce more. But is this a blessing or a curse? We must face the reality that if the population is not controlled by diseases and the like, than it will have to be controlled by starvation. Every day, doctors are engineering new drugs to save the lives of thousands, and with the cure for cancer looming ahead, even more lives will be saved. Who will eventually pay for these new miracles? The answer is that countries that are dependant on others for food and water will go first. Each country will fend for itself, and the countries that rely on them will perish. For instance, the United States can produce enough food and water to sustain itself for decades, Japan, on the other hand, will not be able to sustain itself. This comes back to Darwin’s theory of survival of the fittest. In this case, the United States is more fit for survival than Japan, consequently, the U.S. will survive and Japan will perish.

This fate can be avoided, and many countries are already gearing up for what is ahead. China has implemented a one child only policy to try and control it’s ever growing populace. Although this policy seems unfair and or immoral, it has still slowed China’s population. Radical ideas of population slaughter, orchestrated conflicts, and genocide have been proposed by the Illuminati. China’s growth policy is altogether smart and, in the long run, it will work well.

What will be the solution to the population boom here in the U.S.? Will our constitution allow such rigorous laws? Our constitution would never allow the one child only policy, as it violates the bill of rights. One possibility is that our government would place taxes on each child. This law however, would almost never pass in today’s congress. Now, with the population over 300 million, the United States is looking into new ways of dealing with this threat. Many people don’t know a well guarded government secret called artificial inflation. Because farmers in the Midwest produce so much excess food, the government actually destroys some to keep prices up! If there was an overabundance of food then the price would plummet and hurt the economy of the farmers. As stupid as this may sound, the fact that the United States has the ability to be able to actually destroy crop means that they have enough for future growth. The growth of the U.S. has actually slowed down substantially since the 1990’s when America saw a great population boom. The reproduction rate is currently at 1.564%, factor in Immigration, and you have an estimate of the population in the next years. Current estimates for the year 2020 indicate that the population will be around 339million people. Fortunately, the United States will not have a problem in the coming years with population. The countries that will have problems are third world.

Recently, the Indian government released an estimate of their population; 1,129,866,154. Although reaching over a billion people is a great human achievement, it is should be an alarm to the world, as India is only a third the sixe of the U.S. Since the 1950s the government has taken steps to try and slow down the birth rate. New programs such as “India’s Family Planning Program” encouraged sterilization instead of methods of contraception. In some cases, such as in 1976, the Indian government implemented forced sterilization in poor villages. It appears that these various programs actually worked well. In 1991, India’s growth rate was at 2.15%, and by 1887, the figure dropped to 1.7%! It seems as though India has taken control of their growth problem.

In the long run, the UN reported that the population would eventually reach equilibrium. By 2300, poorer countries will realize the need of smaller families. “If fertility levels continue to fall, global population will stabilize three centuries from now at around 9 billion - a far less alarming figure than many have been predicting.” What is that figure? 1.4 trillion people by 2300! The study released by the UN stated that, “although fertility rates will decrease, the life expectancy will be greater.” This comes as a relief for many countries who are at doubts about whether to start a population control program.

In conclusion, there will be no mass starvation or disease, but an understanding by all people that this earth has limited resources, and that we must treasure and share the earth.

Sunday, June 17, 2007

Tech Tidbit

Fun and easy downloads are just around the corner!

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The race to produce clean, abundant, and renewable fuels has already begun. Since the 1990’s wind farms have popped up around the world, powering towns and even whole cities. In the deserts of Arizona, new solar collectors are dotting the maps. There is only one problem. Can we produce enough of these renewable energy sources before fossil fuel and coal become extinct?

Currently 85 % of energy used in the United States comes from fossil fuels. They are estimated to run out by the year 2065. What will we do to stop this ever approaching deadline? Many energy experts believe in Uranium. This radioactive isotope powers 15 % of the world’s electricity. Most of the reactors are located in Russia, China, France, and the U.S. Nuclear energy has many downsides. Right now, political battles are being waged in the Middle East. Mahmoud Ahmadinejad wants the ability to take advantage of this great resource. But with the destruction of Japan in 1945; we experienced sheer devastation and realized that nuclear energy is deadly and dangerous in the wrong hands. The disaster at Chernobyl in 1986 proved again, that nuclear energy needs to be contained. The last commercial reactor build in the U.S. went on-line in 1997 (Watts Bar 1). The people of the United States have come to fear nuclear energy and its devastating force. The 3 Mile Island meltdown in 1979 showed that even the best build, and well managed stations cannot contain the great energy. The future of nuclear energy fueling the world’s needs by 2065 could be achieved, but it would require the trust the skeptic people.

The quaint sight of windmills dotting the lush, green landscape is all about to change. Brand new windmills are reshaping the coasts of Denmark, Spain and Germany. Wind power is responsible for a mere 1 % of energy production, yet its potential is enormous. Since 1997 production increased by 22%. The demand for clean energy has been meet. Only, there are some problems. First of all, there are limits in terms of location. One can’t just place a 250 foot tower in the middle of nowhere. Meteorologists team up with Geologists, who in turn meet with designers. By the time all this is done, only a fraction of locations meet up to specifications. Secondly, these things are ugly and noisy. Most windmills are white with red strips to warn incoming aircraft or birds. As you can imagine, this is quite visually intrusive. In terms of noise production, as the blades slice through the air it creates an annoying, constant rumble of about 44 db. Lastly, most wind farms today are not replacing coal or fossil fuel power plants, they are simply responding to the needs of the worlds growing energy demand. “Farming wind” may be a small solution to the energy crisis, but it will defiantly not replace fossil fuels by 2065.

Water is the foundation of life. Is it possible to turn to it for energy? The answer is, yes. Already, hydroelectric power contributes almost 19% of energy production around the world. Many different ways of capturing water have made their way into rivers and stream everywhere. Waterwheels, the first use of hydro energy, paved the way for the industrial revolution, powering mills and machinery. Next came the most common form of capturing the water’s energy; dams. These behemoths use sheer weight and engineering to “hold up” entire rivers. Now, high tech wave power converts the ocean’s waves into usable electricity. However, these machines have an Achilles Heel, they are extremely expensive. Unlike easier methods, such as tried-and-tested Wind power, one wave energy collector would take years to pay itself off. Dams, also, have an Achilles Heel. Every new dam built floods miles and miles of land, whether that’s whole cities, as seen in the building of the Three Gorges dam, or rainforest (the Itaipu Dam). The construction of new dams is under much controversy between environmentalists and economists. If no new dams mega-hydroelectric dams are constructed, hydroelectricity will loose the renewable energy race.

The sun is the single largest supplier available to man. Every second the sun dispenses the equivalent of 70 hydrogen bombs. Humans have attempted to harness that energy for decades. In ancient times, humans collected solar energy through the use of stones. They would heat stones in the heat of the day, at night; the stones would provide a warm bed for the cold nights. In modern times, the use of solar panels has provided energy to thousands of homes. One could walk into Home Dept™ and purchase their own solar collector. Just recently, the New York Times published an article about a house which creates its own energy, and is not dependant on public services. It uses the sun to heat its water and power lights and appliances. In many cities in the Middle East this method of sun collection is widely used. It is estimated that if every home in the U.S. purchased one 2’x6’ solar collector, it would decrease energy consumption by 10%. Using the sun is very practical for many reasons. First, it is easy to set up. One could hire an electrician to install it. Second, one could place a solar collector almost anywhere, as long as the panel is facing the sun. There are many other ways to capture the sun’s massive energy. In Australia, there are plans to build a machine capable of heating air under a massive glass panel. The heat would eventually rise to a central tower where it would spin large turbines. As radical as these ideas may seem, they just might work. If the sun’s massive energy could be harnessed quickly, fossil fuels might be given more time until they run out, giving us humans more time to think about what we will do without them.

The future of fossil fuel is facing a dead end. The world is struggling to cope with the ever growing demand for oil and fossil fuels. The race for a quick renewable energy race was won by a very unlikely competitor. The fact that solar collectors are cheap to manufacture, and provide such drastic results, means that humans can rely on them when our familiar fuels run out. Nuclear, wind, and water energy are all great energy advancements; however, the quest for a cheap, clean, harmless energy gives solar collectors an edge. We will soon see great leaps in the technology of solar collectors. New plans to build massive “solar plants” are already on their way. We are exiting the age of oil and gas, and entering the age of the sun.

The Crucial Edge

Biology plays a ‘behind the scenes’ role in all human endeavors, whether that would be conquering a nation, building an empire, or simply fighting to survive. Although not known to the world before our technological advancements, Biology gave the European empires a crucial edge, which helped them conquer the new world. These unknown super weapons, such as Francisco Pizarro’s deadly small-pox or Columbus’s malaria and typhus, wiped out over 80% of the indigenous people in the new world. Other critical advancements of the Europeans such as: farming techniques, a form of central government, and Europe’s vast fertile farmland paved the road toward Eurasian societies’ domination of the whole world. Biology gave Eurasian societies the crucial edge needed for global supremacy.

The domestication of plants for human benefit propelled Eurasian society. The many crops found around the Mediterranean and throughout the Fertile Crescent, 57 in all, gave the Europeans a variety of plants in which interbreeding was possible. As domestication began to take place, humans evolved from a hunter-gatherer society to an agricultural community. At this point in time, around 10,000 to 5,000 years ago, humans began to settle down and experiment with different plants to try and make a more suitable crop for consumption. Farmers first planted the bottle gourd but a thousand years later, came up with the cereal crops we know nowadays as wheat. Plant and animal interbreeding, however, can have a disastrous side effect. As the plants and cattle reproduce, the same diseases that would otherwise not have been expressed became abundant. Unknown to the farmers of those days, this seemingly harmless interbreeding led to the uprising of many diseases: influenza, rhinovirus, and parasites.

The first advancement the Europeans experienced was the production of anti-bodies as a defense against the lethal diseases that would later wipe out over 300 million people. As a result of humans’ successful attempt to domesticate animals, farmers became exposed to the germs of their livestock. After exposure to the disease, the farmer spreads the disease to his family and others before succumbing to the diseases. Only the tough survive and reproduce to create a human immune to the disease. Through this interaction, these “killers of humanities” slowly infected humans. An example of these interactions is smallpox. It was first documented in Europe in 581, wiped out thousands of people in many epidemics. Although these plagues killed, Europe recovered, and added to their anti-body stockpile, a valuable asset which would come up a millennium later. By-and-large, most of the infectious diseases, such as tuberculosis and measles, experienced the same evolution using their human hosts (The same happened in tropical climates, where yellow fever and malaria flourish. They too, killed Europeans). The Europeans landed in the New World with an arsenal of deadly biological weapons, and killed off 95% of the native Indians by the 1950’s.

After centuries of fighting diseases, war, and famine, Eurasia finally advanced for the dark ages to the feudal ages. This leap in technology allowed for advanced farming techniques such as the “cash crop.” The farmer, after producing more than his family needed, sold the excess produce to bring in revenue. This allowed for professions other than jobs, such as; priests, blacksmiths, and scholars. Farmers paid these people to do services for them, allowing for further technological advancements. This cycle of globalization propelled Europe into a fast moving society-bringing on the ages known as the Castle age and Imperial age. During this age written language became popular, kings ruled, weapons advanced. By 1095, Europe had so much excessive food, weapons, and gold that they were able to go on four Crusades. By the late 14^th century guns and cannons were produced giving the Europeans an edge over their primordial cousins in Africa and the Americas. The Europeans produced superior technology, cash crops, and weapons, allowing them to explore the world beyond the horizon.