Water and words... Easy to pour, impossible to recover

I just want to inform you guys, that I might be blogging somewhere soon. I'm a bit busy with finishing school.

Let's start with a simple question. How many people have ever lived on earth?

The number of people ever lived on earth can only be estimated, and shouldn't be taken as completely accurate. On the other hand, an estimate usually holds true.
Now, the way we calculate this is based on two factors: (1) the length of time humans are thought to have been on Earth and (2) the average size of the human population at different periods.
So, guesstimating the number of people ever born requires selecting population sizes for different points, from antiquity to the present, and applying assumed birth rates to each period.

Using this method, here's what a table of results would look like:



We see the estimated answer: 106,456,367,669 have been born on earth. World births have been leveled off at about 134 million per year, and are expected to remain constant Notice that 5.8 percent of those lived in 2002. And that is a lot. Plus, that was seven years ago. Now the world population is estimated to be 6.801 billion.

The above table shows the estimated number of people living in the space of every fifty years, apart from the space between the last to entries (1995-2002), which is is only seven years.

The most staggering population growth is between 1950-1995, where over three billion people are "added" to the population. And, it is estimated that in year 2040 the number of the world population will reach 9 billion, and 10 billion in 2050.

So, what are the dangers of this population development? Overpopulation is caused by excessive population growth.

The effects of overpopulation
From Wikipedia: The Free Encyclopedia (but shortened by me):

• Inadequate fresh water
• Depletion of natural resources, especially fossil fuels
• Increased levels of air pollution, water pollution, soil contamination and noise pollution.
• Deforestation and loss of ecosystems that sustain global atmospheric oxygen and carbon dioxide balance; about eight million hectares of forest are lost each year.
• Changes in atmospheric composition and consequent global warming
• Irreversible loss of arable land and increases in desertification
• Mass species extinctions from reduced habitat in tropical forests due to slash-and-burn techniques that sometimes are practiced by shifting cultivators
• High infant and child mortality. High rates of infant mortality are caused by poverty. Rich countries with high population densities have low rates of infant mortality.
• Intensive factory farming to support large populations. It results in human threats including the evolution and spread of antibiotic resistant bacteria diseases, excessive air and water pollution, and new virus that infect humans.
• Increased chance of the emergence of new epidemics and pandemics. For many environmental and social reasons, including overcrowded living conditions, malnutrition and inadequate, inaccessible, or non-existent health care, the poor are more likely to be exposed to infectious diseases.
• Starvation, malnutrition or poor diet with ill health and diet-deficiency diseases (e.g. rickets). However, rich countries with high population densities do not have famine.
• Poverty coupled with inflation in some regions and a resulting low level of capital formation.
• Low life expectancy in countries with fastest growing populations.
• Unhygienic living conditions for many, based upon water resource depletion, discharge of raw sewage and solid waste disposal.
• Elevated crime rate due to drug cartels and increased theft by people stealing resources to survive.
• Conflict over scarce resources and crowding, leading to increased levels of warfare.
• Less Personal Freedom / More Restrictive Laws. Laws regulate interactions between humans. Law "serves as a primary social mediator of relations between people." The higher the population density, the more frequent such interactions become, and thus there develops a need for more laws to regulate these interactions.

Is this what awaits us? Economic destruction in poverty areas, increased warfare, and less personal freedom? There's really nothing we can do to prevent it, or rather, nothing is being done to prevent it.

If this image will fulfill, I see two options: Either staying in poor countries and live in the increased danger of viruses, illnesses, malnutrition, etc. and basically live in poverty, OR live in a rich country, closely controlled by the government and its organizations, probably being forced to have a microchip inserted to the body, and little personal freedom.

Maybe it's better for the world to end in 2012 after all?

Love,
O.

I had the chance to have a conversation with a Christian the other day. He was a nice, polite, guy. Our conversation quickly directed to the subject of faith (he just came from the church, he was inspired).

So at some point in the conversation he asked me: "Are you a follower of Christ?",
and I went "No" He gave me a hard look. He actually gave me a hard look! Almost a stern look.
"...I'm studying Buddhist psychology now, actually" I added. I was trying to show him that I'm am spiritually growing, even though I don't pray.

"I'm sorry to hear that" he said.

I almost started apologizing to him, the way I am. But then we kept on talking and I started to question him, you know, like "Do you ever question your beliefs", etc., and I came to the conclusion, that he had the answer for everything.
Christian reasoning is circular:

"The Bible is God's word."
"How do you know?"
"Because the Bible says so."
"But why believe the Bible?"
"The Bible is infallible."
"How do you know it's infallible?"
"It's the word of God."

You can't reason with a faith that is based purely on belief.

I'm lucky he didn't get offended. Some Christians get very passionate, when questioned.



I found some "Zen quotes" on the web. Here are some that interest me:

He who wherever he goes is attached to no person and to no place by ties of flesh; who accepts good and evil alike, neither welcoming the one nor shrinking from the other — take it that such a one has attained Perfection. "Bhagavad-Gita"

Normally, we do not so much look at things as overlook them....Zen Quote by Alan Watts.

God has no religion.....Mahatma Gandhi.

No matter how many years you sit doing zazen, you will never become anything special.

If you have no feelings about worldly things, they are all Buddhism; if you have feelings about Buddhism, it is a worldly thing


Love,

O.