Thanks to Philip Wollen of the Winsome Constance Kindness Trust of Australia for this link to a BBC/Horizon film on global dimming. This phenomenon resulting from airplane contrails and other pollution is causing the global warming triggered by CO2 to occur more slowly than would otherwise occur. In other words, without this pollution reflecting sunlight, the rate of warming would increase. But the pollution causing global dimming reduces the rainfall that provides food for over half the world’s people. While we must reduce pollution to save the monsoons of the Sahel, East Africa and South Asia, the consequences may be accelerated warming. This film is well worth watching

http://video.google.com/videoplay

Thanks to Mark O’Connor for this editorial from the April 22 Australian.
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I haven’t joined the Voluntary Human Extinction Movement yet, but I’m getting close. There are just too many of us for our own good, let alone for the wellbeing of all things on, in and above terra firma and terra firma itself. Worse, when we aren’t making global mischief by being so darn numerous, we’re getting up to no good with our antics.

The latest black mark for Homo sapiens comes from Sumatra. (Note, I’ve downgraded our taxonomic classification from Homo sapiens sapiens as we aren’t terribly sapient these days.) Not only are people pushing our orangutan cousins to the brink of extinction, they’re busy capturing and trading the littlies as pets, often after dispatching the reluctant mother. The latest report from international wildlife trade monitoring network Traffic estimates that only about 7000 of the critically endangered primates remain in the wild.

For full article, visit:
http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story

Many thanks to Mark O’Connor for this article from The Canberra Times.
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AT last. Australia is out of recession. “What?” I hear you ask, “I thought Australia had escaped the recession.”

Not so. Those eagerly awaited National Account or GDP figures which came out this week do not tell the fully story. And, incidentally, this is the 50th anniversary of the publication of those figures.

Australia has been in recession since about mid-2008, but the economists will not tell you that.

You see, the GDP figures add up national income and determine whether the economy has expanded or contracted. But they do not account for population growth. In the past year population growth has been greater than the growth in the economy. So income per head has gone down, not up as the Government and economists would mislead you into believing. Now you know why you have been feeling the pinch.

For full article, visit:
http://www.crispinhull.com.au/2009/09/05/population-consumes-growth-performance/#more-9418

More information:
Rebecca Scott
University of Melbourne
Mobile: 0417 164 791

World leading reproduction expert Professor Roger Short, of the University of Melbourne, says Australia’s population growth is out of control increasing the rate of global warming.

According to the latest figures from the Australian Bureau of Statistics, the Australian population is increasing by one person nearly every two minutes.

“Australia is a disgrace. We have one of the highest rates of population growth of any developed country. What are we going to do about it?” he says.
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Thanks to Mark O’Connor for the “frank” speech on Australia’s population problem by Andrew McNamara, former Queensland Minister for Sustainability and Climate Change before he lost his seat at the last State election. The attached lecture he gave to the Queensland Conservation Council suggests his was a very significant loss from Australian politics.

Speech by Andrew McNamara to the Queensland Conservation Council July 09 (PDF, 69 KB)

Thanks to Tim Murray for his response to Australia’s Climate Change Minister Penny Wong.
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QUESTION FOR CLIMATE CHANGE MINISTER PENNY WONG

I understand that Australia, if it keeps to its present course, is projected to grow its population by some 14 million people, or 65%, in just 25 years. Climate Change Minister Penny Wong of the growthist Labor administration of Kevin Rudd, was asked this question on September 21/09:

Interviewer:
“Minister, Australia’s population is projected to increase by 65% to the level of 30m people by 2050. During that same period, the government is committed to cutting our carbon emissions by 60%. Aren’t those goals or those facts mutually exclusive? How are we going to massively cut carbon as our population continues to massively grow?”
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Many thanks to Bill Rees for this December 2009 article by climate scientist James Hansen. It makes fascinating reading.

The Temperature of Science (PDF, 210 KB)

The world’s population surpassed 6.8 billion in early 2009, with no significant slowing in the pace of growth in recent years. Estimates by the United Nations Population Division indicate that humanity has been consistently gaining more than 79 million people-a population almost the size of Germany’s-each year since 1999.2 During the 1990s, annual additions fell from nearly 90 million people to less than 80 million, feeding optimism that world population might peak not long after the middle of this century.3 But the recent stability of annual population increments adds to the uncertainty and when-and how-world population growth will end.

U.N. demographers currently offer eight variant projections for the future, with the median and most cited one placing world population slightly above 9.1 billion in 2050.5 Non-demographers often misinterpret this number, however, as an expert prediction or forecast of what population will be. Rather, all projections are conditional assessments based on current numbers, age structure, and trends and reasonable assumptions about the future.6 Thus the projections the United Nations offers produce a range of 2050 world population from slightly less than 8 billion to slightly more than 11 billion.7 The Washington-based Population Reference Bureau (PRB) recently released its own projections, suggesting a population at mid-century of slightly more than 9.4 billion.

For full article, visit:
http://www.worldwatch.org/node/6257?emc=el&m=297190&l=4&v=a8085f1b07

Thanks to Bob Walker for this article from The Economist. Bob’s response to the article is below the link.
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The airstrip at Lokichoggio, in the scorched wastes of north Kenya, was once ground zero for food aid. During Sudan’s civil war, flights from here kept millions of people alive. The warehouses are quieter now, but NGOs keep a toehold, in case war restarts—and to deal with what pundits call the “permanent emergency” of “environmentally induced” migration.

Take the local Turkana people. Their numbers have surged in recent decades, and will double again before 2040. But as the area gets hotter and drier, it has less water, grazing and firewood. The drought cycle in northern Kenya has gone from once every eight years to every three years and may contract further. That means no recovery time for the Turkana and their livestock; the result is an increasingly frantic drift from one dry place to another.

For full article, visit:
http://www.economist.com/world/international/displaystory.cfm?story_id=13925906

RESPONSE:
June 26, 2009 18:10

Tragically, those who have contributed the least to climate change–and who are least able to adapt to climate change–may be among those who will suffer the most. While the great bulk of humanity is at risk, the poor and rapidly growing populations of sub-Saharan Africa and South Asia will likely suffer the worst effects of drought and flooding.
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The paper below can be found at http://www.who.int/bulletin/volumes/87/11/08-062562.pdf.

Climate Change and Family Planning Least Developed Nations Define the Agenda (PDF, 94 KB)