Some thoughts on generations

[Borodog]

Consider that the average length between human generations is approximately 20 years, meaning on average that there are about 5 human generations per century. If you don't like that number, it's ok; the number is certainly more than 3 and less than 7. Choose one to your liking.

What does that mean? Well it means that for every century you look back in time, an individual will have 32 times as many ancestors (2^5). You have 2 parents, 4 grandparents, 8 great-grandparents, 16 great^2-grandparents, and 32 great^3-grandparents. 20, 40, 60, 80, 100 years. Going back another century still, each of them would have 32 great^3-grandparents, meaning you will have 1024 great^8-grandparents. Round it off and call it an even thousand.

So for every two centuries farther back in time, you gain approximately a thousand times as many ancestors. What are the implications of this?

Well, if you go back 4 centuries, you have a million ancestors.

And if you go back 6 centuries, you and every other individual on Earth have a billion great^8-grandparents.

Except that 6 centuries ago, there weren't a billion people in the whole world. In fact, nowhere near. The inescapable conclusion is that the human race, over a scale of a few dozen generations, must be massively and totally inbred. In fact, since until recently the world has been isolated into much smaller groups that did not interbreed at all or only rarely interbred, the effect is even more pronounced.

I thought of these implications while reading Richard Dawkins' The Ancestor's Tale, which contained these interesting bits of mathematical flotsom about populations:

In a population of stable size N (which the Earth's human population is emphatically not, but historically has been approximately true in some isolated places like islands), the number of generations back in time to the Most Recent Common Ancestor is log_2(N). This assumes random mating, which is a terrible assumption, but it provides a good order of magnitude estimate.

Slightly less than that many generations back again (0.77 in fact) from the MRCA is an astonishing point, where, prior to that point in time, every individual in the population either must be an ancestor of all members of the modern population, or of none! More interesting still is that at that point about 80% of the individuals will be ancestors of the entire modern population! /images/graemlins/shocked.gif

Strangest of all might be that you can be an ancestor of an individual, yet that individual might not contain any of your genes; in fact you could be a direct ancestor of every member of the entire population and yet have none of them carrying any of your genes!

Hence, having children may not be the genetic immortality you thought it to be.

[BluffTHIS!]

Boro,

This is familiar to those of us with an interest in genealogy and especially in the scientific side of same. The phenomenon you refer to is known as pedigree collapse, i.e. where you go back in your family tree a sufficient distance and find the same individuals repeated.

As well, the limitations on the number of genes in a chromosone lead to the other phenomenon where a certain distance back you start to "drop ancestors" where although they are definitely your ancestor and you would not be here but for them, you nonetheless don't necessarily contain any of their DNA. While you get exactly 1/2 your DNA from each parent, the portion of a parent's DNA you get from each of their parents varies. Thus you might well have more DNA from one grandparent than the others, and so forth each generation back. Which is why traits can be passed on to you and you might be said "to favor" a certain ancestor in appearance.

The only thing about the MRCA stuff that appears somewhat iffy to me, is that it seems somewhat less likely to me that the same figures can be applied to native Americans, unless you assume both a continuous influx of immigrants from Asia after the land bridge in the Bering Sea disappeared, and also random mating. That isn't to say it isn't true, but I don't think it's a slam dunk unless you go much further back for them. And this can be true as well for isloated sub-populations like the Basque who possess not only some unique genetic properties, but also a language that might be pre-Indo-European.

There is also another aspect to the MCRA thing, which is that not only are you most likely descended from the entirety of the human population a certain distance back in modern history whose descendant lines never died out, but that there are studies showing that going back hundreds of thousands of years, all humans descend from a common female ancestor, which of course corresponds precisely to Eve.

[Shadowrun]

taht is pretty intresting about there nothing being a billion people.

However have you Borodog considered the fact that they may have been significantly more people if you count the deaths?

Basically im trying to say that while its true there might have been only 2000 people alive last year (for arguments sake) 500 people died and 500 more people were born so in reality it was 3000?

That is the thought that popped to my head while reading your post not sure if its accurate or not though?

[Borodog]

The point is that all of your 1 billion great^8-grandparents must come from (approximately) the same generation; i.e. they all had to have been alive at more or less the same time. That means if you go back far enough, the same individuals must be represented amongst you ancestry many, many, many times, as BluffThis pointed out.

[MidGe]

Richard Dawkins' The Ancestor's Tale is a great read. I could not put it down, and read it in three days and a bit. /images/graemlins/smile.gif

I picked it up on a recommendation by chezlaw on this forum.

[hmkpoker]

What's the minimum familial distance one needs to have to avoid the obvious defects like down syndrome? Second cousins?

Also, are siblings capable of reproduction?

[KUJustin]

First cousins are actually relatively safe unless your gene pool is not particularly clean (read: you have close relatives with genetic defects).

In many cultures cousins are the preferred choice for spouses. I believe US is the only (or one of very few) countries where it's taboo.

[madnak]

Sibling pairings are relatively common, and studies have indicated that siblings actually have high inherent levels of attraction.

[Darryl_P]

Someone should tell that to the thousands of species in which the males engage in mortal competition to shag the female. If they only knew their maths they'd realize it's totally pointless. Silly animals.

[FortunaMaximus]

[ QUOTE ]
Also, are siblings capable of reproduction?

[/ QUOTE ]

Yeah. It tends to create dynastic families that want to kill each other though.

[ QUOTE ]
Someone should tell that to the thousands of species in which the males engage in mortal competition to shag the female. If they only knew their maths they'd realize it's totally pointless. Silly animals.

[/ QUOTE ]

Yeah. That doesn't mean we should all go celibate, because sex is pointless, I hope. Reproduction may be. That machine seems to be working quite well these days. There are slightly more than 3 fools born every minute. How are we to keep up with that?

[Darryl_P]

[ QUOTE ]
There are slightly more than 3 fools born every minute. How are we to keep up with that?

[/ QUOTE ]

Assuming non-fools are more likely to have non-fool offspring, then the non-fools should aspire to have at least 4 born every minute to have a good chance in the eventual battle which will ensue, or else do something to drastically reduce the number of fools from 3 to less than 1.

Wouldn't that make sense?

[FortunaMaximus]

[ QUOTE ]
else do something to drastically reduce the number of fools from 3 to less than 1.

[/ QUOTE ]

This is the better option logically. Otherwise they'll eat everything, and we'd have to seriously consider them as a source of nutrition too.

[Borodog]

[ QUOTE ]
Someone should tell that to the thousands of species in which the males engage in mortal competition to shag the female. If they only knew their maths they'd realize it's totally pointless. Silly animals.

[/ QUOTE ]

I'm not sure what the joke is here. Nothing in my OP implies that competition for mates is "pointless."

In fact, just the opposite.

Just because you can be an ancestor to the entire future human race does not mean that your genes will be represented in a single member. The only way you can gain some statistical measure of a "guarantee" of genetic immortality is by outcompeting your contemporaries and increasing the frequency of your genes in the very next generation. I.e. pound out as many kids as you can.

And then teach them all to pound out as many as they can, and to pass that mandate on down the line ad infinitum.

[Darryl_P]

Statement number 1 by Boro:

[ QUOTE ]
Hence, having children may not be the genetic immortality you thought it to be.

[/ QUOTE ]

Statement number 2 by Boro:

[ QUOTE ]
The only way you can gain some statistical measure of a "guarantee" of genetic immortality is by ... I.e. pound out as many kids as you can.


[/ QUOTE ]

That looks contradictory to me, unless the first one refers to just having an average number of children, or fewer.

[FortunaMaximus]

[ QUOTE ]
I think I may fairly make two postulata. First, That food is necessary to the existence of man. Secondly, That the passion between the sexes is necessary and will remain nearly in its present state. These two laws, ever since we have had any knowledge of mankind, appear to have been fixed laws of our nature, and, as we have not hitherto seen any alteration in them, we have no right to conclude that they will ever cease to be what they now are, without an immediate act of power in that Being who first arranged the system of the universe, and for the advantage of his creatures, still executes, according to fixed laws, all its various operations.
[...]
Assuming then my postulata as granted, I say, that the power of population is indefinitely greater than the power in the earth to produce subsistence for man. Population, when unchecked, increases in a geometrical ratio

[/ QUOTE ]

- Thomas Malthus, 1798.

We weren't joking, Boro. We were implying the above dilemma. Come on. You know this principle. The reality is today that we have a reasonable assumption of inheriting the powers of this "Being" in question, and in a few generations, we may have to.

China has tried a test run of this solution and was condemned by the rest of the world. One baby to one parental unit. And this is viewed upon, at least in the West, as a tragic thing to do.

Gandhi's unspoken army was the masses of Indians who wouldn't need weapons. They'd assemble in numbers and march over any army without thoughts to individual loss, simply because they have millions upon millions where the first wave came from.

Every generation gets bigger. The illusion of improved wealth as a mean, for each individual, has increased thanks to the innovations of the Industrial and Computer Age. And this delusion will persist for another 9 or 10 generations. A generation should be defined as ~22 years, but I'm far to lazy and self-indulgent to spell out the mathematical justifications for this.

[Borodog]

So, it looks contradictory to you, unless you take my meaning to be the plainly obvious one?

/images/graemlins/confused.gif

[ QUOTE ]
Hence, having children may not be the genetic immortality you thought it to be.

[/ QUOTE ]

[Darryl_P]

[ QUOTE ]
This is the better option logically. Otherwise they'll eat everything, and we'd have to seriously consider them as a source of nutrition too.

[/ QUOTE ]

LOL /images/graemlins/laugh.gif (yucch)

[Borodog]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
I think I may fairly make two postulata. First, That food is necessary to the existence of man. Secondly, That the passion between the sexes is necessary and will remain nearly in its present state. These two laws, ever since we have had any knowledge of mankind, appear to have been fixed laws of our nature, and, as we have not hitherto seen any alteration in them, we have no right to conclude that they will ever cease to be what they now are, without an immediate act of power in that Being who first arranged the system of the universe, and for the advantage of his creatures, still executes, according to fixed laws, all its various operations.
[...]
Assuming then my postulata as granted, I say, that the power of population is indefinitely greater than the power in the earth to produce subsistence for man. Population, when unchecked, increases in a geometrical ratio

[/ QUOTE ]

- Thomas Malthus, 1798.

We weren't joking, Boro. We were implying the above dilemma.

[/ QUOTE ]

I am nearly 100% certain that this is most emphatically NOT what Darryl had his panties in a wad over. He read my OP and interpreted it to mean that because I was saying that the species (any species, really) is "totally inbred" (which it is) and that if you go back far enough most individuals of a population are ancestral to the entire population, that competition is "meaningless", which not only is false, it does not follow from anything I wrote.

[ QUOTE ]
Come on. You know this principle. The reality is today that we have a reasonable assumption of inheriting the powers of this "Being" in question, and in a few generations, we may have to.

[/ QUOTE ]

A) Malthus recanted, because he was wrong, because
B) People have reason. The negative population growth of much of Europe is empirical evidence that Malthus was wrong without even resorting to the (trivial) logical analysis that confirms it.

[ QUOTE ]
China has tried a test run of this solution and was condemned by the rest of the world. One baby to one parental unit. And this is viewed upon, at least in the West, as a tragic thing to do.

[/ QUOTE ]

That's because it was a ridiculously stupid thing to do. China doesn't have a population problem, it has a socialism problem. Their largely socialized economy could not produce enough food to feed their population (hence tens of millions starved in a pattern to be repeated in other such socialist paradices as the USSR, North Korea, Cuba, and many ohers). it was not until China made market reforms and allowed the quasi-private ownership of small plots of land that they could remove the one child policy.

[ QUOTE ]

Gandhi's unspoken army was the masses of Indians who wouldn't need weapons. They'd assemble in numbers and march over any army without thoughts to individual loss, simply because they have millions upon millions where the first wave came from.

[/ QUOTE ]

Uh, so?

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Every generation gets bigger.

[/ QUOTE ]

That's because the carrying capacity gets bigger as technology improves.

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The illusion of improved wealth as a mean, for each individual, has increased thanks to the innovations of the Industrial and Computer Age.

[/ QUOTE ]

Illusion? What measure of "wealth" are you using? Because by any objective measure, you and I both are wealthier than Tutankhamen in every way except the command of others' labor (i.e. servants).

[ QUOTE ]
And this delusion will persist for another 9 or 10 generations. A generation should be defined as ~22 years, but I'm far to lazy and self-indulgent to spell out the mathematical justifications for this.

[/ QUOTE ]

I'd like to see which orifice you pulled the magic number of 9-10 generation till the end of the world from.

And I'm an astrophysicist. 20=22.

[FortunaMaximus]

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Their largely socialized economy could not produce enough food to feed their population

[/ QUOTE ]

Indeed. And how do we avoid that same problem?

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That's because the carrying capacity gets bigger as technology improves.

[/ QUOTE ]

Uh, no. People would not stop reproducing.

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What measure of "wealth" are you using?

[/ QUOTE ]

Access to a continual food supply and clean water supplies, of course.

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The negative population growth of much of Europe is empirical evidence that Malthus was wrong without even resorting to the (trivial) logical analysis that confirms it.

[/ QUOTE ]

Malthus recanted where Europe was in question. I'm 100% certain he'd take back his recantation if he was given a week to analyze the global trends of today, especially where Asia is concerned.

[ QUOTE ]
China made market reforms and allowed the quasi-private ownership of small plots of land that they could remove the one child policy.

[/ QUOTE ]

Quite so. Recall the point you made that drove them to this policy, the lack of food.

[ QUOTE ]
I'd like to see which orifice you pulled the magic number of 9-10 generation till the end of the world from.

[/ QUOTE ]

Simply a guess looking at population growth trends and relative numbers of those with access to the above mentioned wealth indices and likelihood of those two elements being sustainable in 2 centuries. Note the element of uncertainity in bold.

[ QUOTE ]
And I'm an astrophysicist. 20=22

[/ QUOTE ]

So we disagree on the length of time it takes for two healthy adults to reproduce two healthy children, albeit not by much.

Aside: I didn't need the textbooks. You could have answered my thousand-word ramble about crazy speeds with this simple, yet evocative phrase: Dark Matter. I like to tease academics relentlessly, and I hope you don't take offense to that. /images/graemlins/tongue.gif

[Darryl_P]

[ QUOTE ]
I am nearly 100% certain that this is most emphatically NOT what Darryl had his panties in a wad over. He read my OP and interpreted it to mean that because I was saying that the species (any species, really) is "totally inbred" (which it is) and that if you go back far enough most individuals of a population are ancestral to the entire population, that competition is "meaningless", which not only is false, it does not follow from anything I wrote.


[/ QUOTE ]

Well my comment certainly got ya riled up, which at least shows that there's more behind the OP than just a cool-headed Spock-type logician making unbiased, neutral, and personally removed observations about the world.

We might speculate on what was behind each other's words, but it's unlikely that it will ever get resolved to mutual satisfaction, so we might as well cut our losses and save some energy.

[FortunaMaximus]

However, a realistic solution that would assure us a continual food supply in line with our global needs would effectively neutralize my position.

This is simply not the case today, and our capabilities will not only have to catch up, but exceed the current growths in food production in a ratio to population production.

[Borodog]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
Their largely socialized economy could not produce enough food to feed their population

[/ QUOTE ]

Indeed. And how do we avoid that same problem?

[/ QUOTE ]

Not have socialism. If your point is that government will bring about an economic collapse through the tragedy of the commons and progressively "commonizing" more and more resources, well that might be the case. It's a topic fro a different thread, though.

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
That's because the carrying capacity gets bigger as technology improves.

[/ QUOTE ]

Uh, no. People would not stop reproducing.

[/ QUOTE ]

Uh, no. The carrying capacity of the Earth has grown with technology. I don't see how this can be disputed. And people don't have to stop reproducing. The just have to lower their rate of reproduction to the death rate to be in equilibrium. As is already the case in some parts of Europe.

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
What measure of "wealth" are you using?

[/ QUOTE ]

Access to a continual food supply and clean water supplies, of course.

[/ QUOTE ]

And how exactly is it an "illusion" or "delusion" that people have better access to continual food and clean water supplies? The fact that there are 6 billion people demonstrates this. People die in short order when this is not the case.

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
The negative population growth of much of Europe is empirical evidence that Malthus was wrong without even resorting to the (trivial) logical analysis that confirms it.

[/ QUOTE ]

Malthus recanted where Europe was in question. I'm 100% certain he'd take back his recantation if he was given a week to analyze the global trends of today, especially where Asia is concerned.

[/ QUOTE ]

Are you saying that Asians are not human? Because that's the only conceivable way your statement can possibly make any sense.

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
China made market reforms and allowed the quasi-private ownership of small plots of land that they could remove the one child policy.

[/ QUOTE ]

Quite so. Recall the point you made that drove them to this policy, the lack of food.

[/ QUOTE ]

What exactly is your point? On the one hand you claim that some sort of Malthusian disaster is inevitable, and then you acknowledge that the disaster is not Malthusian at all, but Marxian. Which is it?

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
I'd like to see which orifice you pulled the magic number of 9-10 generation till the end of the world from.

[/ QUOTE ]

Simply a guess looking at population growth trends and relative numbers of those with access to the above mentioned wealth indices and likelihood of those two elements being sustainable in 2 centuries. Note the element of uncertainity in bold.

[/ QUOTE ]

Show me your calculation please. How can you possibly look at "population growth trends" and completely ignore the important ones, like the negative ones?

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
And I'm an astrophysicist. 20=22

[/ QUOTE ]

So we disagree on the length of time it takes for two healthy adults to reproduce two healthy children, albeit not by much.

[/ QUOTE ]

No, we don't. 20 is approximately 22. I just think you're being a nit. If you'd said 10 or 30, then we'd disagree.

[ QUOTE ]
Aside: I didn't need the textbooks. You could have answered my thousand-word ramble about crazy speeds with this simple, yet evocative phrase: Dark Matter. I like to tease academics relentlessly, and I hope you don't take offense to that. /images/graemlins/tongue.gif

[/ QUOTE ]

No offense taken. I like arguing on the internet.

[FortunaMaximus]

[ QUOTE ]
Are you saying that Asians are not human? Because that's the only conceivable way your statement can possibly make any sense.

[/ QUOTE ]

No, I am not. For personal reference, I grew up in a household where the primary father figure was Chinese, and my siblings are half-Chinese. So let's quash that before we misunderstand each other.

The point I was trying to make is regardless of the system of government, China found itself in a crisis where its population was outracing its food supplies. Also, India may find itself encountering a similar crisis, and while it is a democratic government (in theory, I wonder how they enforce the duality of the caste system within democracy though) I wonder how they will resolve this? Let the people die of starvation? And this is repeatable globally.

The access to continual food supply and water supply is growing, and more and more of the population has access to it, I'll concede. But those are finite resources, vast as they may be. I was not debating the expansion of carrying capacities, but rather acknowledging that they ultimately are finite unless feasible expansion methods outwards into the Solar System are taken into account.

The carrying capacity of the Earth is finite. As overall life expectancy improves, this will introduce an element of bunching to population numbers. That will drive down the negative trends of death. And as overall health care improves, more infants will have the access and capability to grow to adulthood. And this is not a bad thing, but it has to be accounted for carefully in the very long term.

It may be that you are correct that the predicament I see is Marxian, but only up to a certain point. Personally, I think the optimum carrying capacity of this planet is quite large, because we can both sustain food supply and live on the bodies of water, given time and means and technological development. I repeat, it is still finite.

I'm a theorist more so than I am a practial scientist, which I think is apparent. I also have faculties that mimic autistics to some extent when it comes to mathematics, especially exponential maths.

So, for me to translate this onto a viable, readable media format will take some time and effort. Still, I'm overdue for an OP, so you might have given me an idea here.

[ QUOTE ]

No offense taken. I like arguing on the internet.

[/ QUOTE ]

Good, so do I. Especially the purity of rhetoric without the need for political infighting, neh?

[Borodog]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
Are you saying that Asians are not human? Because that's the only conceivable way your statement can possibly make any sense.

[/ QUOTE ]

No, I am not. For personal reference, I grew up in a household where the primary father figure was Chinese, and my siblings are half-Chinese. So let's quash that before we misunderstand each other.

The point I was trying to make is regardless of the system of government, China found itself in a crisis where its population was outracing its food supplies. Also, India may find itself encountering a similar crisis, and while it is a democratic government (in theory, I wonder how they enforce the duality of the caste system within democracy though) I wonder how they will resolve this? Let the people die of starvation? And this is repeatable globally.

The access to continual food supply and water supply is growing, and more and more of the population has access to it, I'll concede. But those are finite resources, vast as they may be. I was not debating the expansion of carrying capacities, but rather acknowledging that they ultimately are finite unless feasible expansion methods outwards into the Solar System are taken into account.

The carrying capacity of the Earth is finite. As overall life expectancy improves, this will introduce an element of bunching to population numbers. That will drive down the negative trends of death. And as overall health care improves, more infants will have the access and capability to grow to adulthood. And this is not a bad thing, but it has to be accounted for carefully in the very long term.

It may be that you are correct that the predicament I see is Marxian, but only up to a certain point. Personally, I think the optimum carrying capacity of this planet is quite large, because we can both sustain food supply and live on the bodies of water, given time and means and technological development. I repeat, it is still finite.

I'm a theorist more so than I am a practial scientist, which I think is apparent. I also have faculties that mimic autistics to some extent when it comes to mathematics, especially exponential maths.

So, for me to translate this onto a viable, readable media format will take some time and effort. Still, I'm overdue for an OP, so you might have given me an idea here.

[ QUOTE ]

No offense taken. I like arguing on the internet.

[/ QUOTE ]

Good, so do I. Especially the purity of rhetoric without the need for political infighting, neh?

[/ QUOTE ]

The point is that it's not "regardless of the form of government." Socialism destroys productivity, and the more radical the socialism, the more rapidly is productivity destroyed. In the four years 1917-1921, the years of so-called "War Communism", when Lenin implemented total socialism, the entire economy was reduced to barbarism. They were producing so little people were eating their shoes, the factories had been looted of capital machinery which was sold off for food, there was mass exodus from the cities, and the countryside was reduced to roving banditry. Only by relenting and allowing some economic calculation using foreign (market) prices and (again) quasi-private ownership of small plots of land was a total collapse averted. That happened in 4 years.

When people are allowed to act freely, they choose not to have children when they can't afford them (in the sense that they value their standard of living without the child more than they value the reduced standard of living + having the child).

The reason that poorer countries have high population growth rates is because those individuals tend to have far higher time preference, which means they engage in all sorts of high time preference (i.e. poorly planned and thought out) behaviors like having unprotected sex. However, as standards of living rise, time preference is lowered.

The Third World does have a desparate problem because of the insecurity of property rights there, which retards the accumulation of capital, which keeps standards of living low and hence time preference (and birth rates) high. "Foreign aid" doesn't help the matter, either (makes it far worse, in fact).

But there is nothing inherent in any sort of Malthusian mathematical way that says the Earth must experience a population crash. There is nothing inherent that prevents all human beings from somehow acquiring a culture that respects private property rights, which engenders the accumulation of capital, which raises standards of living, which lowers time preference to the point where people can rationally, freely choose not to pound out kid after kid because it is not economical to do so.

[FortunaMaximus]

[ QUOTE ]
But there is nothing inherent in any sort of Malthusian mathematical way that says the Earth must experience a population crash.

[/ QUOTE ]

Agreed. However, the growth pace has to flatten out at some point when we recognize we have reached maximum sustainability, or at the very least, a stable equilibrium that allows for some margin of error.

Earth certainly does have a finite upper limit on its growth capabilities, and this is probably best attained in a free market that assures at least some equality in line with access to basic resources. Competition for redundant wealth, i.e. what you do not need to live, will sustain the primal desires to battle over fripperies. I like an open system where anything goes, but individual rights to life are rendered irrelevant once one crosses a morally established line.

Defining this moral line is difficult to do objectively, but we have enough history, especially in areas of common law, that this should be initutive and not enforced, but a sort of communal oversight may still be necessary.

Of those 6 billion, the majority cannot think for themselves in this regard, and must be told what to do and where to go. That makes implementing any sort of system whereas absolute freedom of choice rules the day problematic, because as a population grows, the choices you make will have a ripple effect on an increasing number of people. Especially for governments. And no one body should have that much power to interfere with the natural progression of human nature. Because left to its own devices, it learns to compensate for supply and demand requirements on its own.

So it's a conundrum. And the more the numbers increase, the more any established system, current or new, have to account for this growth. The probability of collapse is not 0%, and will always be non-zero. That's the nature of biology. However, if the implementations and infrastructure are done correctly, this number can be driven down to the lowest possible non-zero situation.

Hardly Utopia. Utopias seem to be boring. A garden with a mix of orderly crops and natural growth, harvested properly, can truly be a thing of beauty.

Addenum: The pace of population doubles are coming in faster intervals and we can only withstand a few more before we must look outwards. Space must be colonized and more resources found if the growth of humankind is to flourish.

[Nielsio]

awesome