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So the Pope says AGW must be dealt with, while ignoring the fundamental reason

Elind

Philosopher
Elind
Joined
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S.E. USA. Sometimes bible country
It's commendable that the Pope enters the AGW debate, but sad that he also seems to ignore the most fundamental reason of all, for which the Catholic church has major responsibility. Namely that fossil fuels are not the primary problem, but population growth is.

There are not enough resources on this planet to support the millions of new humans yearly that want access to them, and never will be regardless of what we do, theoretically, about renewable energy.

Indefinite "growth" is what will kill us, along with dogmas like those of the Catholic church, not to mention Islam and other primitive beliefs.
 
So when the population was, say, one tenth of the current number, were we better off or worse off as far as energy was concerned?
 
Let's imagine a future. Ten billion people. All the electricity comes from some combination of solar, wind, water, geothermal, or nuclear. Maybe even some early fission plants. Cars are either electric or hydrogen fuel cell. The entire petroleum industry is down to making plastics.

Is AGW still a thing?
 
Elind said:
It's commendable that the Pope enters the AGW debate, but sad that he also seems to ignore the most fundamental reason of all, for which the Catholic church has major responsibility. Namely that fossil fuels are not the primary problem, but population growth is.
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Evidence the Catholic church has major responsibility?

Evidence that population growth is the primary problem to be addressed?

There are not enough resources on this planet to support the millions of new humans yearly that want access to them,
Click to expand...

Evidence?

and never will be regardless of what we do, theoretically, about renewable energy.
Click to expand...

Evidence?

Indefinite "growth" is what will kill us, along with dogmas like those of the Catholic church, not to mention Islam and other primitive beliefs.
Click to expand...

Sometime I fear I am getting lazy, but evidence?
 
I opened the thread expecting something different but agree with the OP. It's not just the RCC, of course -- there are also Muslims, Orthodox Jews, Quiverfull Xians, Mormons, and on and on. Population is the ultimate problem.
 
ehcks said:
Let's imagine a future. Ten billion people. All the electricity comes from some combination of solar, wind, water, geothermal, or nuclear. Maybe even some early fission plants. Cars are either electric or hydrogen fuel cell. The entire petroleum industry is down to making plastics.

Is AGW still a thing?
Click to expand...

The short answer is probably yes, because a lot of it is already baked in.

Depends I guess on how much CO2 is already in the atmosphere by the time we reach this future.

At latest count the concentration currently stands at 403.7 ppm.
Source

The same site claims that the upper safety limit is 350 which we passed back in the 80s.

The reason is, warming doesn't magically stop as soon as we stop adding CO2 to the atmosphere. It traps heat from the sun, like a greenhouse, it doesn't generate heat. The sun will keep shining and the CO2 that's already there will keep trapping more heat.
 
Less than 1/6th of the world's population is Catholic, it hardly seems fair to blame them for populating when a) everybody else is doing it, too and b)they're not even the ones doing it the most.
 
TragicMonkey said:
Less than 1/6th of the world's population is Catholic, it hardly seems fair to blame them for populating when a) everybody else is doing it, too and b)they're not even the ones doing it the most.
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I will mention in passing in the Pope's defense that he said something controversial (among Catholics and rabbit breeders) some time ago about maybe having lots of babies wasn't such a good idea.

Catholics don't have to breed 'like rabbits', says Pope Francis

Catholics do not have to breed “like rabbits” and should instead practise responsible parenting, Pope Francis said on Monday.

Speaking to reporters en route home from the Philippines, Francis said there were plenty of church-approved ways to regulate births.
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Puppycow said:
Catholics don't have to breed 'like rabbits', says Pope Francis
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Sorry, there's something else in that article I can't let pass without mentioning:

But he firmly upheld church teaching banning contraception and said no outside institution should impose its views on regulating family size, blasting what he called the “ideological colonisation” of the developing world.

African bishops, in particular, have long complained about how progressive, western ideas about birth control and gay rights are increasingly being imposed on the developing world by groups, institutions or individual nations, often as a condition for development aid.

“Every people deserves to conserve its identity without being ideologically colonised,” Francis said.
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:id:

The Catholic Church is complaining about “ideological colonisation” of the developing world. Sure.

Hey, we got here first and “ideological colonised” these people with our European ideas about God and stuff, but don't you secular people come and spread your foreign ideas! Colonialism and the spread of the Catholic Church to places like the Philippines, Africa and the Western Hemisphere went hand in hand. It's the ultimate hypocrisy to now turn around and say "don't impose your Western ideas on these people, that's our job!". :rolleyes:
 
Elind said:
It's commendable that the Pope enters the AGW debate, but sad that he also seems to ignore the most fundamental reason of all, for which the Catholic church has major responsibility. Namely that fossil fuels are not the primary problem, but population growth is.
Click to expand...

That's just crap. A cursory glance at the per capita rate of emissions exposes this line of argument for the crap it is. Sorry.
 
Seismosaurus said:
So when the population was, say, one tenth of the current number, were we better off or worse off as far as energy was concerned?
Click to expand...

In 1750, we had abundant energy. Wind, wood, coal, animal, all very low polluting in comparison to today.

Well, except for the cities. Smoke, human waste, horse **** ankle deep in the streets, dead animals lying where they fell.
 
bit_pattern said:
That's just crap. A cursory glance at the per capita rate of emissions exposes this line of argument for the crap it is. Sorry.
Click to expand...

Per capita rate? Your cursory reasoning is simplistic in the extreme. It is not simply a matter of emissions, even while it is total emissions that matter, not a simplistic calculation per person. It is all resources, from water to minerals to food production. You should read more.
 
ehcks said:
Let's imagine a future. Ten billion people. All the electricity comes from some combination of solar, wind, water, geothermal, or nuclear. Maybe even some early fission plants. Cars are either electric or hydrogen fuel cell. The entire petroleum industry is down to making plastics.

Is AGW still a thing?
Click to expand...

Are you not aware that all what you imagine requires minerals and other materials that are rarer than gold? Do you really believe the planet can support, at any reasonable level, unlimited population?
 
Tsukasa Buddha said:
Evidence the Catholic church has major responsibility?

Evidence that population growth is the primary problem to be addressed?



Evidence?



Evidence?



Sometime I fear I am getting lazy, but evidence?
Click to expand...

I suggest you read up on economic projections and available resources for yourself.

As to the Catholic church responsibility, that should be obvious. To put it simply, a policy of denying women the ability to control their bodies, and helping men make sure they don't, upon pain of hellfire and damnation.
 
On the radio this morning we had a guy who had 17 kids with 15 different women in 15 different states. He's a long distance truck driver who I think should drive off a bridge.

Can't even name ONE of the baby mommas.
 
Elind said:
Per capita rate? Your cursory reasoning is simplistic in the extreme. It is not simply a matter of emissions, even while it is total emissions that matter, not a simplistic calculation per person. It is all resources, from water to minerals to food production. You should read more.
Click to expand...

SO population DOESN'T have anything to do with it now? Boy, this is confusing :confused:

But, jokes aside, my point escapes you - the vast majority of carbon pollution has been emitted by lower population density economies. Eliminating 100 million Americans would have a far greater impact on reducing emissions that eliminating 100 million Chinese, because pound for pound one American produces far more CO2 than one Chinese person. And that doesn't even begin to account for the fact that CO2 will stay in the atmosphere for up to 100 years, so the cumulative impact of lower population, higher industrial density economies is much, much higher than in China or India.

Another logical black hole in your argument that fossil fuels aren't the "primary" problem (I really think you have primary confused with secondary, or even tertiary) with climate change is the fact that, even if the population was 10 billion, were everybody to use non-emitting energy sources - there wouldn't be a problem with climate change.

That's not to say that there aren't many, many problems caused by population growth, or even that your agenda of calling out the Catholic Church's really ****** policies around reproduction are not without merit - it just simply means that trying to cast a problem that has been overwhelmingly caused by economies with relatively low populations on population growth is utter, utter garbage.
 
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