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Debate Score:30
Arguments:22
Total Votes:33
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 Solutions for over-population... (22)

Debate Creator

Bradf0rd(1431) pic



Solutions for over-population...

 It seems inevitable to me. Soon, or a few more thousand years (or longer, I don't know). What should we do when we realize there are too many people and too little resources or space? Genocide? Law-enforced suicide, or a morally driven 'opt-in' suicide. Moving underground, colonizing space, fixing children at birth... total war? All of the solutions seem immoral and or unnatural.

 What would be the best way to deal with too many people?

 

 

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3 points

I believe technology will help a lot. From poo-powered buses to using human hair as conductors, we will find out more and more ways to put human life in tune with our planet.

Of course, our planet is very limited, and we might reach a point where technology can't keep up or a point when it's too late. I doubt (or really don't want to believe) that this will happen though. As it can be seen in developed countries, as a higher quality of life comes, people tend to have fewer children.

The moral solution seems to be concentrating technological efforts in sustainability and heavily supporting the development of poor countries.

Side: Technology
2 points

Ways to slow down the possibilities:

Legalize all abortion

Legalize Suicide

Legalize Euthanasia in all circumstances (if you don't have money to keep a brain dead person alive, pull the plug).

Use the death penalty more often (child rape, no insanity pleas, etc.)

Side: Enforce Death Policies
Bradf0rd(1431) Disputed
2 points

Abortions are legal, and sometimes (in China for instance), they are mandatory under certain circumstances, but people will still go on with the pregnancy and have children, even if it means escaping shelter (leaving the country, family, home). Suicide isn't illegal, really, because law can only react to an event (unless you can definitely prove that someone will or is about to do something), so what, handcuff the cadavers?

Assuming medical technology get's better, someone who is "on the plug" in a few thousand years won't be on it for long. And about using the death penalty, Hitler tried this on innocent people... When you're killing off all of the worst people, who will be next in line? It'll get closer and closer to innocent every day.

Side: Enforce Death Policies
ThePyg(6738) Disputed
1 point

All abortions aren't legal. consider late term abortions. They are only legal in certain states.

People are constantly put on suicide watch. Just eliminate this and we won't have a problem.

And saying that having the death penalty will result in us eventually just killing innocent people all the time is like saying that having marijuana legalized will eventually lead to us legalizing Crack and Meth.

Fact is, if you can prove that someone is a murderer or child rapist, they should be executed. I'm not saying execute based on ONLY the decision of the jury. I'm saying proven beyond a reasonable doubt (which is how cases are trialed anyway).

When you're killing off all of the worst people, that's it. No one else is next in line. Might as well say "If you're curing all diseases, what will be next? Taking away the ability to think?"

Side: Enforce Death Policies

It really doesn't matter what we do. If resources get scarce, we will be forced to act. If we manage to find the resources to maintain a larger population, nature will be forced to act (an epidemic or something). Either way, when we get to the point where something has to give..., something will give.

Side: Enforce Death Policies
Bradf0rd(1431) Disputed
2 points

You say that something will happen, but what should happen? Would a pandemic be best?Should we release the virus ourselves? When it comes down to, it's you and your family or your neighbors, who will it be?

Side: Enforce Death Policies

OHH, the study of economics, the scarcity of resources.-------

Side: Enforce Death Policies
1 point

Just frigging make the world a harder place so the unfit ones die off from weakness.

Oh and by the way, are none of u guys actual Nobel Prize winners?

Side: Enforce Death Policies
1 point

Well, smart social systems, space smart architecture, taking advantage of new technologies that make use of things like sky-scraper farms, steps in the technology we already have that can quickly turn ocean water into clean drinking water on a large scale, and switching to green energy, would allow literally trillions of people to live on the earth just fine. And likely if we become bright enough as a whole to pursue these things, by the time we reach the breaking point of however many trillions that would be before the earth still cannot maintain the human population; by that point it seems by the rate our technology increases we will be able to live in space, under the ocean, etc if we choose.

But given that we're mostly kind of idiotic and superstitious still and we're breeding faster than our brains are evolving,

1. convince churches to stop with the anti-condom bs already.

2. put a limit on the number of children people are allowed, similar to what China does, and enforce fixing males after X number of kids (fixing as in making it so they don't make sperm, not so they can't have kids.

Side: Technology

Neuter those that continue to have kids when drawing welfare.

Quit trying to get people to live longer. We just throw them in rest homes anyway.

Encourage more people to let car warm up in closed garage.

Make all drugs legal.

These should help slow down the growth rate.

Side: Enforce Death Policies

Tell the world that an invisible meteor is about to hit - build huge shelters in every country and let 97% in. When everybody is in, release the nerve gas and let the 3% live! Don't complain, this is more of either a joke or a sci-fi story!

Side: Enforce Death Policies
1 point

Why joke? That's a valid solution. Not one that 97% of people would agree with, but... lol

Side: Enforce Death Policies
1 point

I don't think overpopulation will happen to our planet any time soon. Assuming that it will happen any time soon,then the government is all ready working on possible solutions to the problem. The main solution they have come up with so far is to place us on alternative planets/moons in the solar system. Needless to say,the main two candidates for this is Earth's moon(Luna) and our friendly neighbor,Mars. However,this won't be happening for at least another 10 years so we'll be fine for now. Plus,in case you guys forgot,their are still gay people whom can't directly reproduce with each other

Side: Enforce Death Policies
1 point

Perhaps we need to look at ourselves right now. I say we need to get a system lined up that makes it difficult to have a child. Simple as that. It seems barbaric, but if you actually want a child, you most likely should get an education, a job, and a good head on your shoulders. If we have to be pre-screened before we can buy dogs from Petland, I don't think any Joe Blow out there has the rights to have a child, bring it into the world and not care for it properly.

Side: Pre-screen people before having child
zombee(1026) Disputed
1 point

Slowing the growth rate is a lot more effective than increasing the death rate as a lot of the previous comments suggest.

However the idea of selectively allowing someone to have a child borders on eugenics. Who outlines the requirements and judges applicants? Doesn't this system leave significant opportunity for bias and corruption? I think a better solution would be a serious and unified worldwide effort for accessible contraception and sex education, since we're talking about what should happen and not what's necessarily feasible right now.

Side: Pre-screen people before having child
honie(103) Disputed
2 points

I agree even though I clicked "dispute" because I still stand by my argument, but I do realize the points you are making. I know it would be near impossible to create a policy when it comes to allowing births, and this would be the biggest debate since abortion and the death penalty. But in an unrealistic, Utopian sort of world, I think this would be the best thing out there for us.

Side: Pre-screen people before having child
1 point

I believe every country in the world should follow the Chinese one child policy and married couples should be encouraged to adopt children from orphanages instead of having children themselves. We should also knock down lots of old houses that are completely run down (i know Australia has loads of them) and replace them with multistory high apartments. This will contain lots of pepole in smaller spaces. Each apartment only needs to have two or three bedrooms since couples will only be having one child. We should also build these in the countryside and provide those areas with enough technology to function while ensuring not too much country land is used up so that we still have enough produce. Maybe we could also try expanding to African countries. They could use the population and technology which in the long run, will eradicate poverty ofcourse that will take about 200 years.

Side: Technology
1 point

Population is a major issue, but it is not a sudden issue and will need to be (and will be) solved incrementally through policy, not through sudden and drastic human rights violations.

The current evidence, linking socio-economic status with declining birth rates, indicates a big part of the solution. Education and a developed and stable political economy are the drivers of population stability. Radical solutions suggested here involving murder, suicide, etc., are de-stabilizing, and therefore likely to lead to increased birth rates - ie make the problem worse.

Apart from education and stability, the solution lies in social policy. Currently we encourage people to have children through child tax benefits, childcare supports, children's sports tax credits, and political focus on 'working families' and 'family values'. We need policies that support child development and combat childhood poverty, but discourage (or at least don't encourage) people from having children. This starts with balancing incentives for families with incentives for not having children. I think a two-child policy is good. After that there could be tax penalty, for example. This would have to be fairly complex, with different income brackets and measures in place to prevent child poverty from increasing.

Side: Technology
1 point

China's one child policy seems about right. It could be expanded to a two child policy since apparently the reproduction rate needs to be 2.1 just for maintenance of population. That would be generous enough and still lead to a slight depopulation. I deem 3 billion people on earth as the maximum.

Side: Technology
1 point

the SINGLE best way to control the birth rate?

EDUCATE and EMPOWER girls.

Side: Technology
0 points

use nuclear weapons to decrease the global population by 95 %.

Side: Technology