Jason, you are one of the most powerful, measured, eloquent, perceptive, and....fair-minded essayists on Substack and should be required reading for everyone in this trainwreck if the Anthropocene. I am very happy to be a paid subscriber. My heart sank when I read of the Court's decision. But it almost seemed inevitable; tragically it was no surprise. If you track the Court's rulings, both ones we agree with and ones we don't, you find that they rule for the large economic interests over the smaller (when the two are pitted against each other) the majority of times. The wetlands, had they large corporate backers would have received a far different decision most likely. The Court's deference to Congressional intent has been tenuous since the days of Antonin Scalia, great jurist that he was. I maintain, as ever, that the overarching problem in the Anthropocene is that there are just too many humans on the planet, and we all want to live comfortable lives that require enormous energy and resource and land requirements to maintain. Just too damn many of us. We're killing the current planet. But the upshot is that the changes we have set in motion will give rise to a planet with a whole lot less of us.
And a Supreme Court building three quarters submerged in the rising sea.
Far too kind, Michael, but thank you. As for the complexity you raise here, I'm reminded of what I called the "Ghastly report" in earlier writings, which said among many wise and difficult things that the capacity of governments to cope with the coming crises was already weak and would worsen as populist movements intensified in the face of those growing crises. So much political manipulation, like the long-term effort to pack the Court, seems clever now, but will later look like craziness even to conservatives. As for population, there are a lot of smart people who believe (or hope, anyway) we can square the circle and fit/feed 9 billion on an ecologically restored planet. I'm doubtful, for many reasons. I think 2 billion, reached in an equitable, voluntary fashion, is a better goal. It's our population just a century ago, and I don't think anyone believed at the time there were too few of us...
Completely agree, 2 billion is an excellent goal I could definitely get behind. I imagine we'ld be hard pressed to achieve it by moral suasion alone. We might be forced to establishing an authoritarian worldwide mechanism to coerce people to virtue. And once established that type of coercive regime might tend to perpetuate itself even when the original reason for its establishment was gone! Is there a correlation between a nation's educational and/or income levels and population growth/decline? Have you written about such?
Not that you're advocating for it, but I have no interest in autocratic population control. There are no large-scale benevolent autocracies, particularly in a world built on currency and class. Population control is deeply unethical, nearly always racist, destabilizing, and counterproductive. Either we get to a rational population size the right way or we don't get there at all.
I've written about population a fair bit: twice last November at the 8 billion mark, once the previous November (about Earth's carrying capacity), and back in Sept of 2021 I wrote my first main piece on it.
Rather than income per se, I think the key correlations are education for girls, economic opportunities for women, and affordable family planning for all. Given the chance, women in most cultures tend to delay childbirth and reduce family size.
All projections show a basic stabilizing of pop growth this century, ending with 7-10 billion by 2100. All of these projections assume a relatively stable existence, with birth rates declining nearly everywhere. I think there are five countries that will account for most growth this century. Right now we have 8 billion growing at 1%, but that's the same as 4 billion growing at 2% (which we had in the 60s). We'd need the entire globe to be shrinking at the rate of Bulgaria or Italy, etc., to drop significantly this century.
Very good info. I certainly don't want coercive pop ulation control! For the reason I gave and also because I think climate change will force it on us. Now they are projecting no Arctic sea ice by the 2030s considerably ahead of earlier estimates.
Jason, thanks for a thoughtful and somewhat hopeful newsletter on this horrible decision. It's so astounding to think that so many people fail to recognize the critical importance of wetlands and clean water. DBW
Jason, I've been trying to write this story for eight months. Now that I've found your work, I can simply share it, and return my focus to getting Rights of Nature for my Swannanoa Watershed and all her wetlands.
I sit at your feet. It's a privilege to be on the planet with you. kbw
No higher praise, Katherine. Thank you so much. The river work you're doing is far more important than my scribbling, though. Thank you for devoting yourself to that great work.
Today, Jonathan Thompson in his excellent Land Desk substack also takes up this case. Great complementary reading for Field Guide readers, from a dry lander's perspective.
Jason, you are one of the most powerful, measured, eloquent, perceptive, and....fair-minded essayists on Substack and should be required reading for everyone in this trainwreck if the Anthropocene. I am very happy to be a paid subscriber. My heart sank when I read of the Court's decision. But it almost seemed inevitable; tragically it was no surprise. If you track the Court's rulings, both ones we agree with and ones we don't, you find that they rule for the large economic interests over the smaller (when the two are pitted against each other) the majority of times. The wetlands, had they large corporate backers would have received a far different decision most likely. The Court's deference to Congressional intent has been tenuous since the days of Antonin Scalia, great jurist that he was. I maintain, as ever, that the overarching problem in the Anthropocene is that there are just too many humans on the planet, and we all want to live comfortable lives that require enormous energy and resource and land requirements to maintain. Just too damn many of us. We're killing the current planet. But the upshot is that the changes we have set in motion will give rise to a planet with a whole lot less of us.
And a Supreme Court building three quarters submerged in the rising sea.
Far too kind, Michael, but thank you. As for the complexity you raise here, I'm reminded of what I called the "Ghastly report" in earlier writings, which said among many wise and difficult things that the capacity of governments to cope with the coming crises was already weak and would worsen as populist movements intensified in the face of those growing crises. So much political manipulation, like the long-term effort to pack the Court, seems clever now, but will later look like craziness even to conservatives. As for population, there are a lot of smart people who believe (or hope, anyway) we can square the circle and fit/feed 9 billion on an ecologically restored planet. I'm doubtful, for many reasons. I think 2 billion, reached in an equitable, voluntary fashion, is a better goal. It's our population just a century ago, and I don't think anyone believed at the time there were too few of us...
Completely agree, 2 billion is an excellent goal I could definitely get behind. I imagine we'ld be hard pressed to achieve it by moral suasion alone. We might be forced to establishing an authoritarian worldwide mechanism to coerce people to virtue. And once established that type of coercive regime might tend to perpetuate itself even when the original reason for its establishment was gone! Is there a correlation between a nation's educational and/or income levels and population growth/decline? Have you written about such?
Not that you're advocating for it, but I have no interest in autocratic population control. There are no large-scale benevolent autocracies, particularly in a world built on currency and class. Population control is deeply unethical, nearly always racist, destabilizing, and counterproductive. Either we get to a rational population size the right way or we don't get there at all.
I've written about population a fair bit: twice last November at the 8 billion mark, once the previous November (about Earth's carrying capacity), and back in Sept of 2021 I wrote my first main piece on it.
Rather than income per se, I think the key correlations are education for girls, economic opportunities for women, and affordable family planning for all. Given the chance, women in most cultures tend to delay childbirth and reduce family size.
All projections show a basic stabilizing of pop growth this century, ending with 7-10 billion by 2100. All of these projections assume a relatively stable existence, with birth rates declining nearly everywhere. I think there are five countries that will account for most growth this century. Right now we have 8 billion growing at 1%, but that's the same as 4 billion growing at 2% (which we had in the 60s). We'd need the entire globe to be shrinking at the rate of Bulgaria or Italy, etc., to drop significantly this century.
You can take a deep dive on the topic here: https://ourworldindata.org/future-population-growth
Very good info. I certainly don't want coercive pop ulation control! For the reason I gave and also because I think climate change will force it on us. Now they are projecting no Arctic sea ice by the 2030s considerably ahead of earlier estimates.
https://www.cnn.com/2023/06/06/world/arctic-sea-ice-free-climate-change/index.html
Jason, thanks for a thoughtful and somewhat hopeful newsletter on this horrible decision. It's so astounding to think that so many people fail to recognize the critical importance of wetlands and clean water. DBW
Jason, I've been trying to write this story for eight months. Now that I've found your work, I can simply share it, and return my focus to getting Rights of Nature for my Swannanoa Watershed and all her wetlands.
I sit at your feet. It's a privilege to be on the planet with you. kbw
No higher praise, Katherine. Thank you so much. The river work you're doing is far more important than my scribbling, though. Thank you for devoting yourself to that great work.
Today, Jonathan Thompson in his excellent Land Desk substack also takes up this case. Great complementary reading for Field Guide readers, from a dry lander's perspective.
Thanks for this, Michael. Here's the link to the @Land Desk post: https://www.landdesk.org/p/supreme-court-imperils-arroyos-wetlands
Yes. 🙂. Yesterday I also introduced the Land Desk readers to your essay as well. Maybe both of your two great newsletters can get new readers!