If your really 'that concerned' about this......go to the countries that do NOTHING to (re)cover their carbon footprint. It's easy to say that we aren't doing enough. Have the stone to confront those who are doing nothing about the issue.

Some garbage can be used to generate compost for the garden.

I think married couples should be considerate about the number of babies they contribute to the population explosion. Because ultimately we will have to think in terms of rations and what's fair. I can hardly wait for that!

We can all, in fact, help to limit the sustainability overload by reducing the amount of personal garbage we generate, daily, and over the years. Look at your weekly trash container and multiply it by the approximate world population now. Multiply your and the present population's personal trash x 52 weeks x 50 years.

Find out what the world population is projected to be in 50 years. What will they do with the garbage?

This must be the answer! We must learn to convert garbage to energy or earth will die of pollution.

leighmf -- My prediction of the world poplulation in 50 years is less than a billion (yes, it is a very pessimistic estimate). Do you realize that the exponential growth we have witnessed has now turned into linear growth.

California would have a negative growth rate if it were not for immigrants.

Folks who have 19 kids and counting are selfish The Planets resources are finite . Lets all do our part by recycling, composting, planting trees, reusing , donating to Goodwill and others.

Reality is that we human beings are misusing and overusing the resources available to us on this planet to the degree that we are rendering the planet incapable of sustaining us; and, if we comtinue to do that, we will become just another species that survived for a period of time and then became extinct. However, in the case of our species there is a difference -- we will be the first species to ever exist on this planet that could have prevented its extinction but did not.

Robert4Reality 505-821-3798 Babedudeg@aol.com

Got my water bill and it shows that, for the last two months, I used only about 40% of what I did last year. It would have been less than that except I tried to have a garden again this year which was a flub as I began to cut back on watering. But, I have to water my trees..at least. Gardens are yearly, my fruit trees are far more important.

I've noticed, a number of times, that Starbucks employees waste a lot of water in their sinks. They turn the water on full blast and let it go down the drain while they do other things.

Large part of the lifestyle we have become accustomed to here in the West, or the North, whichever you prefer, the United States and Europe, anyway - depends on imperialism. It depends on our stealing the resources, both material and human, from less developed parts of the world. Their populations doubled every 15-20 years while ours was at zero growth from the '70s. Yet our countries were the most "overpopulated" in the world because of their consumption and polution.

Now that technology has made it possible to manage production and manufacture from the other side of the world we have a global economy. Loyalty to native nation state is no more a pragmatic necessity for business and manufacturers and the ruse of the significance of national divisions between people - that was more an implement to divide the global working class than anything else - has been dropped and the real operant division between people, class, has been frankly, if not brazenly, revealed on a global scale. India and China are industrialized and acquiring a large and ever growing middle class and the United States is becoming a third world country.

Ours, here in the West (or North), will not be "the most overpopulted countries in the world" anymore when everybody in India and China has a car and a refrigirator and air conditioning - when they adopt our extravegant, imperial lifestyle. We, flaunting our extravegance in their faces for so long, have created their expectations and those expectations are a major impediment to their reverting to a more "sustainable" lifestyle, which they resisted and refused in climate talks, for example.

To them it sounds outrageous, like we want them to go back to their mud huts and shanty towns. They, pretty understandably, say, "Fuck you, YOU go live in mud huts and shanty towns if you want somebody to!" Sustainability will indeed have to be not at all inconveniencing of that lifestyle of that developing, burgeoning, consuming global middle class if it is to succeed.

I agree with what Thom said, however I believe we have already reached a point where “what can we do?” becomes a moot point. Sometimes I wonder if the polluting industries either don’t care, or feel it’s not worth the expense to alter their behavior. It’s like an addict knowing that the next dose of heroin will kill them, but they just can’t seem to quit.

Even now, people are dying due to the pollution of our environment, and the continued exploitation of the planet for greed and profit is not sustainable. Each of us on our own can reduce our own individual “carbon footprint” by adjusting our lifestyles by consuming less, and creating less waste. However in the end, this is just a band aid on a gaping wound that industrialization has created on our environment.

Quote richinfolsom:In my lifetime of a mere 50 years the world population has doubled to 7 billion.

I'm only 58, but if I manage to survive another twenty years, the population will have doubled TWICE in my lifetime. I am so glad I didn't contribute to that...at least not directly.

D'Anne Marc, I think it may mean, "replenish the earth [with our own offspring]". There's a definite cotradiction between "dominion" and "subjugate" and "replenish the earth". At least there's one between the newer, patriarchal "dominion and subjugate" religious world view and the older animism that was close to the earth and to nature and did, in fact, "replenish the earth".

The older form was, I think, perhaps most importantly, not anthropocentric, willing to share the earth with other sentient beings. I heard a story once of a Native American elder speaking with a white representative of white settlers, white society or maybe even the U.S. government, I'm not clear on that point, sometime in the 19th century. The Native American elder was telling the white guy about how it had been a rough previous winter and many from his band had starved to death.

The white man then asked, "Well then, why don't you clear out that area over there and plant more corn?" pointing to a wooded area near to the land the band was living on.

The elder replied, "Oh we can't do that, that part over there belongs to the deer and if we did that the deer would starve." The whole understanding was that you're supposed to starve to death when there's a rough winter.

That story may be legend and lore or it may, in fact, be true enough. It was told to me by a pretty credible friend who was real into Native American culture so I consider it on good authority but it does illustrate the different attitudes and world views of the different cultures coming from two different levels of technology.

Mark J. Saulys ~ I see what you are saying. It would almost seem likely to be true. Certainly that is the way many people have interpreted it throughout the years; and, that certainly is the way many religious groups still interpret it today. Certainly the religious right have wrapped their collective heads around that idea in order to disenfranchise women and control their bodies through the anti-abortion movement. However, it is simply a wrong interpretation. The word "replenish" could not possibly mean that in this context. The Google Dictionary definition of "replenish" is, "fill (something) up again." "restore (a stock or supply of something) to a former level or condition."

In this context, God is addressing Adam and Eve--the FIRST man and woman. No human has ever lived on the earth before according to the story. It simply would be impossible to "restore" something that has never existed before. Your interpretation could only be correct if the word was translated incorrectly; or, if God himself--allegedly--used a poor choice of words.

Personally, when a scripture works for my needs--as this one does perfectly as written--I don't mess with it. Simply put, for any Bible thumper to make the claim that this scripture commands mankind to repopulate the world the only way they could defend that contention is by admitting that the modern King James version of the Bible is erroneously translated and therefore could not possibly be the exact word of a perfect God; or, God made a mistake; or, that the entire story of creation was just a fairy tale to begin with. In any case, I call such an argument with a religious fanatic, Check Mate! (Guaranteed to have them scratching their heads for months.)

Imagine the power of one little word!

How about "interstellar"? That's a movie coming out in November. Can't wait!