The World and the UN Must Reduce Population Growth

The United Nations' 17 Sustainable Development Goals imply that there is no longer any need to reduce global population growth, even though it is a serious problem that undermines most of the SDG targets. By adding a further SDG aimed at slowing the increase in population, the world could yet save the UN’s 2030 Agenda.

https://www.project-syndicate.org/commentary/new-sdg-dampen-population-growth-by-frank-gotmark-and-robin-maynard-2019-09

GOTHENBURG/LONDON – On September 24-25, world leaders will gather at the United Nations in New York to review progress toward the UN’s 2030 Agenda and its 17 Sustainable Development Goals. The SDGs, which aim “to end poverty, protect the planet, and ensure prosperity for all,” are commendable, and summarize the kind of world many of us wish to see in 2030. But if this vision is to have any chance of materializing, governments must now add an 18th goal: “Dampen population growth.”

The challenges that humanity faces today stem mainly from overconsumption and overpopulation. Yet policymakers often fail to consider the two factors together, and largely neglect population growth in particular.

The overall human impact on the global environment is the product of population size and average per capita consumption. The UN’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change has concluded that population growth and economic (consumption) growth are the two main causes of global warming. Per capita resource consumption and greenhouse-gas emissions are highest in developed economies, while rapid population growth in developing countries contributes to the loss of forests and biodiversity.

When governments adopted the SDGs in 2015, many experts were surprised by the lack of attention to population growth. Demographer Joseph Chamie, a former director of the UN Population Division, expressed concern that the UN was ignoring the issue. University of Cambridge economist Partha Dasgupta and co-authors concurred, arguing that this omission “should be a point of public concern.” More recently, demographer Massimo Livi Bacci of the University of Florence wrote that “population … has become irrelevant for the sustainability of development, notwithstanding the evidence to the contrary.”

Between 1960 and 2000, the world’s population doubled from three billion to six billion. This growth contributed to greater pollution of land, lakes, rivers, and oceans, as well as urban overcrowding and a higher demand for agricultural land and freshwater (in turn encroaching on natural ecosystems). Despite significant technical advances in agriculture, famines killed millions of people over this 40-year period. And in developing countries, rapid population growth left poor people at greater risk of death, injury, and disease resulting from pollution, floods, droughts, and other disasters.

There are now 7.7 billion people on Earth. The UN forecasts that this figure will rise to 11 billion by 2100 (and that assumes steady fertility declines in many countries that have tended to resist this trend). A population increase on this scale would create more pollution, require a doubling of global food production under difficult conditions (including climate disruption), and result in more people suffering during conflicts and famines.

To be sure, there has been plenty of necessary research into how the world can better accommodate billions more people, in terms of pollution, agriculture, energy efficiency, and climate change. But such research fails to quantify the benefits of minimizing further population increases – a critical oversight.

While many researchers and policymakers seem to regard a rapidly increasing global population as inevitable, ordinary citizens recognize the serious problems and risks that this will cause. In a 2014 survey by the Global Challenges Foundation, a majority of 9,000 respondents in nine countries (the United States, Brazil, South Africa, Germany, Poland, Sweden, India, Russia, and China) considered population increase to be an actual or potential future threat to mankind. The same year, a Pew Research Center survey reported that 82% of American scientists regarded the growing world population as a major problem because “there won’t be enough food and resources.”

Yet the huge projected increase in the world’s population this century is avoidable. The size of the population in 2100 can be influenced now by international debate, government programs, and individual choices.

More specifically, an additional SDG to dampen population growth would promote funding for voluntary, rights-based family planning. This approach has a proven track record of success, not only in reducing births rapidly, but also in advancing the empowerment of women and spurring economic progress. No coercive “population control” measures are needed. Rather, wider awareness of the linkage between family size and ecological sustainability can help parents recognize the benefits of having fewer children.

Clearly, population growth cannot be stopped overnight, nor feasibly by 2030. But we could establish trends toward a population peak and decline in all countries by then. This includes not only developing countries, where population growth threatens security, but also rich countries with large ecological footprints, where population decline and its benefits are resisted because of ill-founded fears of demographic aging.

Reproductive rights and family planning are mentioned in both SDG 3 (good health and wellbeing) and SDG 5 (gender equality), but neither goal explicitly aims to reduce population growth. As they currently stand, the SDGs imply that there is no longer any need to curb the global population increase, even though it undermines most of the goals.

As a result, there is a big risk that the world will achieve little of the 2030 Agenda, especially in countries where high birth rates persist. But we should not give up. Changes in population policies and norms can reduce birth rates. And by adopting a new SDG to this effect, the world could yet save the 2030 Agenda.

Climate Change: Measuring Carbon

One aspect of climate change science is understanding how to measure the global carbon cycle. The Deep Carbon Observatory (DCO) is a global group of more than 1,000 scientists who study carbon cycling from the Earth’s core to the edge of space. Live Science discusses an article on current understanding. DCO data suggests that with some exceptions, carbon release into the atmosphere has been about the same as carbon sinking into the planet's interior at tectonic plate boundaries for the last 500 million years. CDO believes the balance results in breathable air and a land and sea climate that supports biodiversity.

Global carbon cycle -- carbon dioxide in gigatons
(Source: Figure 7.3, IPCC AR4)

CDO data shows the current rate of human caused carbon flow is about 80-fold higher than release of carbon by present-day volcanoes. Over time, various events or ‘perturbations’ have thrown the cycle out of balance, causing increases in greenhouse gas carbon dioxide (CO2) and global climate disruption over hundreds of years. The perturbations are often resulting in widespread extinctions.

Since 1750, CDO estimates that human activity has released about 2,000 gigatons of CO2 into the air. The Chicxulub asteroid impact that is believed to have caused dinosaur mass extinction 65 million years ago is believed to have released about 1,400 gigatons of CO2. The CO2 release eventually led to global warming. A separate study from 2018 that analyzed fossil records suggests that the Earth's temperature increased by 5 degrees Celsius (9 degrees Fahrenheit) for thousands of years.

The Chicxulub asteroid (~6-9 mile diameter) interacting 

with Earth and its life forms

Live Science writes that DCO researchers believe the “pace and scale at which humans are disturbing the planet's carbon balance are comparable to some of the most cataclysmic geologic events in history. It's likely, the researchers wrote, that the results of this era of man-made meddling could look similar to the troubled centuries following Chicxulub and other ancient cataclysms. This era, the researchers concluded, ‘is likely to leave its legacy as a mass extinction from greenhouse-induced climate change on a biosphere already at a tipping point caused by habitat loss.’ ”

Given the apparent wealth and political power of climate science deniers in the US to block action climate change legislation, it looks like other countries are going to have to try to deal with global warming without us. Public opinion is shifting toward increasing concern, but that has been mostly irrelevant so far.

An Alternative Visual Model for a CAS

Complex Adaptive Systems are complicated to model and to understand. 

The application of a model like this to a particular entity like a social system or an ecosystem or an economy can be confusing, but typically you'll find common ways to do it with in any particular arena.

The nice thing about this model is it's basically a dissection of the overarching process. It's just that we don't normally need to see the insides of all this to be able to use it.

One of the downsides of the above is that it underplays the impact of environment, which serves a primary, not secondary role in shaping CAS behavior.

Furthermore, the above model doesn't say anything about the roles of the individual agents, even though they can be broadly categorized into at least two discrete groups.

Another issue with the model above is it's oriented as though the "complex adaptive behavior" is what we're trying to figure out. In most cases, we already know the emergent behavior, and we have some idea of the local relationships. What we're usually looking for then, is either the moving parts that connect one to the other, or often as not, simply plotting a course based on past behavior.

The former is difficult no matter what. The latter is simple, as CAS follow a simple overall dynamic where this is concerned. CAS have inertia due to the positive and negative feedback loops

I propose a very simple alternative model when you don't need the inner workings of the CAS, and you know the emergent behavior with some idea of the local relationships. This alternative can be useful in terms of charting the overarching course of a CAS, and locating it within the downcycle or upcycle phases of its evolution.

Here's the most basic example

In the context of modeling economies, agents would be market transactions (or if you want to try for it - market actors, though that can get dicey) - the predictable ones versus the disruptive ones. When a market tanks, the sell offs of previously profitable stocks is disruptive. As the market tanks there are greater numbers of these sell offs and they encourage more sell offs, taking into account that negative feedback inertia, up until it reaches an equilibrium again. That process is the downcycle phase. The high water mark rises, tapers, then crashes usually slowly rising in response to a market tanking and finally recovering.

In the context of modeling societies, agents would be individual social behaviors (or if you want to try it, social actors) - the predictable ones versus the disruptive ones. A crime is disruptive. Response to a crime is disruptive. As crime increases, and response to it increases, the high water mark raises until it finally finds its equilibrium, often again with a finally drop as said crime is now once again "under control" - until conditions create the rise again and crime reasserts itself.

This is very simplistic, but I'd argue it's very useful as CAS go because it makes understanding the motion of them much easier.

I've never really tried to flesh this out before, I just keep this stuff filed away in my head. Any attempt to articulate it is a work in progress.

The Phone Call Transcript: Impeachable Abuse of Power or Not?

Many people are familiar with the unauthenticated transcript of the president's phone call with the Ukrainian president. Democrats generally see impeachable abuse of power in the call, and republicans generally see either no quid pro quo offer at all, or an offer that does not amount to any impeachable offense.

Here is the unauthenticated transcript, with key passages underlined:


UNCLASSIFIED
Declassified by order of the President
September 24, 2019

MEMORANDUM OF TELEPHONE CONVERSATION
SUBJECT: Telephone Conversation with President Zelenskyy of Ukraine
Participants: President Zelenskyy of Ukraine
Notetakers: The White House Situation Room
Date, Time July 25, 2019, 9:03-9:33 am EDT
and Place: Residence

The President: Congratulations on a great victory. We all watched from the United States and you did a terrific job. The way you came from behind, somebody who wasn't given much of a chance, and you ended up winning easily. It's a fantastic achievement. Congratulations.

President Zelenskyy: You are absolutely right Mr. President. We did win big and we worked hard for this. We worked a lot but I would like to confess to you that I had an opportunity to learn from you. We used quite a few of your skills and knowledge and were able to use it as an example for our elections and yes it is true that these were unique elections. We were in a unique situation that we were able to achieve a unique success. I'm able to tell you the following; the first time you called me to congratulate me when I won my presidential election, and the second time you are now calling me when my party won the parliamentary election. I think I should run more often so you can call me more often and we can talk over the phone more often.

The President: (laughter) That's a very good idea. I think your country is very happy about that. President Zelenskyy: Well yes, to tell you the truth, we are trying to work hard because we wanted to drain the swamp here in our country. We brought in many many new people. Not the old politicians, not the typical politicians, because we want to have a new format and a new type of government. You are a great teacher for us and in that.

The President: Well it is very nice of you to say that. I will say that we do a lot for Ukraine. We spend a lot of effort and a lot of time. Much more than the European countries are doing and they should be helping you more than they are. Germany does almost nothing for you. All they do is talk and I think it's something that you should really ask them about. When I was speaking to Angela Merkel she talks Ukraine, but she ·doesn't do anything. A lot of the European countries are the same way so I think it's something you want to look at but the United States has been very very good to Ukraine. I wouldn't say that it's reciprocal necessarily because things are happening that are not good but the United States has been very very good to Ukraine.

President Zelenskyy: Yes you are absolutely right. Not only 100%, but actually 1000% and I can tell you the following; I did talk to Angela Merkel and I did meet with her I also met and talked with Macron and I told them that they are not doing quite as much as they need to be doing on the issues with the sanctions. They are not enforcing the sanctions. They are not working as much as they should work for Ukraine. It turns out that even though logically, the European Union should be our biggest partner but technically the United States is a much bigger partner than the European Union and I'm very grateful to you for that because the United States is doing quite a lot for Ukraine. Much more than the European Union especially when we are talking about sanctions against the Russian Federation. I would also like to thank you for your great support in the area of defense. We are ready to continue to cooperate for the next steps specifically we are almost. ready to buy more Javelins from the United States for defense purposes.

The President: I would like you to do us a favor though because our country has been through a lot and Ukraine knows a lot about it. I would like you to find out what happened with this whole situation with Ukraine, they say Crowdstrike... I guess you have one of your wealthy people... The server, they say Ukraine has it. There are a lot of things that went on, the whole situation. I think you're surrounding yourself with some of the same people. I would like to have the Attorney General call you or your people and I would like you to get to the bottom of it. As you saw yesterday, that whole nonsense ended with a very poor performance by a man named Robert Mueller, an incompetent performance, but they say a lot of it started with Ukraine. Whatever you can do, it's very important that you do it if that's possible.

President Zelenskyy: Yes it is very important for me and everything that you just mentioned earlier. For me as a President, it is very important and we are open for any future cooperation. We are ready to open a new page on cooperation in relations between the United States and Ukraine. For that purpose, I just recalled our ambassador from United States and he will be replaced by a very competent and very experienced ambassador who will work hard on making sure that our two nations are getting closer. I would also like and hope to see him having your trust and your confidence and have personal relations with you so we can cooperate even more so. I will personally tell you that one of my assistants spoke with Mr. Giuliani just recently and we are hoping very much that Mr. Giuliani will be able to travel to Ukraine and we will meet once he comes to Ukraine. I just wanted to assure you once again that you have nobody but friends around us. I will make sure that I surround myself with the best and most experienced people. I also wanted to tell you that we are friends. We are great friends and you Mr. President have friends in our country so we can continue our strategic partnership. I also plan to surround myself with great people and in addition to that investigation, I guarantee as the President of Ukraine that all the investigations will be done openly and candidly.. That I can assure you.

The President: Good because I heard you had a prosecutor who was very good and he was shut down and that's really unfair. A lot of people are talking about that, the way they shut your very good prosecutor down and you had some very bad people involved. Mr. Giuliani is a highly respected man. He was the mayor of New York City, a great mayor, and I would like him to call you. I will ask him to call you along with the Attorney General. Rudy very much knows what's happening and he is a very capable guy. If you could speak to him that would be great. The former ambassador from the United States, the woman, was bad news and the people she was dealing with in the Ukraine were bad news so I just want to let you know that. The other thing, There's a lot of talk about Biden's son, that Biden stopped the prosecution and a lot of people want to find out about that so whatever you can do with the Attorney General would be great. Biden went around bragging that he stopped the prosecution so if you can look into it... It sounds horrible to me.

President Zelenskyy: I wanted to tell you about the prosecutor. First of all, I understand and I'm knowledgeable about the situation. Since we have won the absolute majority in our Parliament, the next prosecutor general will be 100% my person, my candidate, who will be approved, by the parliament and will start as a new prosecutor in September. He or she will look into the situation, specifically to the company that you mentioned in this issue. The issue of the investigation of the case is actually the issue of making sure to restore the honesty so we will take care of that and will work on the investigation of the case. On top of that, I would kindly ask you if you have any additional information that you can provide to us, it would be very helpful for the investigation to make sure that we administer justice in our country with regard to the Ambassador to the United States from Ukraine as far as I recall her name was Ivanovich. It was great that you were the first one who told me that she was a bad ambassador because I agree with you 100%. Her attitude towards me was far from the best as she admired the previous President and she was on his side. She would not accept me as a new President well enough.

The President: Well, she's going to go through some things. I will have Mr. Giuliani give you a call and I am also going to have Attorney General Barr call and we will get to the bottom of it. I'm sure you will figure it out. I heard the prosecutor was treated very badly and he was a very fair prosecutor so good luck with everything. Your economy is going to get better and better I predict. You have a lot of assets. It's a great country. I have many Ukrainian friends, their incredible people.

President Zelenskyy: I would like to tell you that I also have quite a few Ukrainian friends that live in the United States. Actually last time I traveled to the United States, I stayed in New York near Central Park and I stayed at the Trump Tower. I will talk to them and I hope to see them again in the future. I also wanted to thank you for your invitation to visit the United States, specifically Washington DC. On the other hand, I also want to ensure you that we will be very serious about the case and will work on the investigation. As to the economy, there is much potential for our two countries and one of the issues that is very important for Ukraine is energy independence. I believe we can be very successful and cooperating on energy independence with United States. We are already working on cooperation. We are buying American oil but I am very hopeful for a future meeting. We will have more time and more opportunities to discuss these opportunities and get to know each other better. I would like to thank you very much for your support.

The President: Good. Well, thank you very much and I appreciate that. I will tell Rudy and Attorney General Barr to call. Thank you. Whenever you would like to come to the White House, feel free to call. Give us a date and we'll work that out. I look forward to seeing you.

President Zelenskyy: Thank you very much. I would be very happy to come and would be happy to meet with you personally and get to know you better. I am looking forward to our meeting and I also would like to invite you to visit Ukraine and come to the city of Kyiv which is a beautiful city. We have a beautiful country which would welcome you. On the other hand, I believe that on September 1 we will be in Poland and we can meet in Poland hopefully. After that, it might be a very good idea for you to travel to Ukraine. We can either take my plane and go to Ukraine or we can take your plane, which is probably much better than mine.

The President: Okay, we can work that out. I look forward to seeing you in Washington and maybe in Poland because I think we are going to be there at that time.

President Zelenskyy: Thank you very much Mr. President.

The President: Congratulations on a fantastic job you've done. The whole world was watching. I'm not sure it was so much of an upset but congratulations.

President Zelenskyy: Thank you Mr. President bye-bye.

- - End of conversation - -

If it were president Clinton 

If it was president Hillary Clinton instead of the current US president speaking to a foreign president about a political rival of hers, would republicans see anything wrong in that phone call? Would republicans be fine with a president Clinton having tried to hide the phone call from the public? Does it matter that the president is lying to the public about fact issues related to Biden?[1] Does it matter that a whistleblower saw the call as a serious abuse of power?

When the president said “I would like you to do us a favor though because our country has been through a lot and Ukraine knows a lot about it,” does what the US has ‘been through’ refer to anything other than investigations of Trump’s own political problems? Would it be inaccurate to translate that sentence as: “I would like you to do me a favor though because I have been through a lot, and investigations into my presidency are getting closer to critically damaging me, and opinion polls show Joe Biden beating me, and you know exactly what I am talking about.”?

More broadly, does impeachable abuse of power need to be blunt, such as this: “Mr. President, I will release US military aid to your country only if you investigate and find the evidence that the Russians did not hack and attack Clinton’s campaign and only if you find the evidence that Joe Biden acted illegally and corruptly in shutting down a fine corruption investigation by a fine investigator. If you promise me those two things, I will promise you I will release the military aid as a quid pro quo to help my re-election campaign in 2020.”

Is that what it takes to abuse power? No, it isn't. For republicans, that kind of language by a republican president might rise to the level of something of some concern, maybe even to the level of impeachable abuse of power for some. However, it is as certain as most things in politics can get, that if it was president Clinton making those statements and trying to hide the phone call from everyone, 100% of republicans in congress and probably 98% of rank and file republicans would be screaming, not asking, for her immediate impeachment for treason, not just abuse of power.

Is this a matter of partisan hypocrisy by spineless republicans defending a corrupt republican president? Or, are democrats seeing things that are not there?

Footnote:
1. Slate reports on one of Trump’s lies concerning Biden and efforts to disrupt a Ukraine investigation into (non-existent) evidence of misconduct by Biden or his son: “1. The Lutsenko retractions. Trump claims that he pressed Ukraine for the investigations because he sincerely believed—and believes today—that Ukraine had information implicating Biden and other U.S. Democrats in conspiracies. But Trump escalated these allegations even as Yuri Lutsenko, the Ukrainian prosecutor on whose statements the president relied, was admitting that they were false. In April, Lutsenko, who is seen as corrupt by many Ukrainians, retracted his claim that the Obama administration had ordered him not to investigate a list of possible suspects. Despite this, a week later, Trump hyped Lutsenko’s work as “big stuff” that could expose a Democratic plot. In May, Lutsenko retracted additional allegations: that he had evidence of misconduct by Biden or his son and that the family was under investigation. Again, a few days later, Trump repeated the allegations. He wanted dirt on Biden, regardless of whether it was true.”