Political Crossfire Forums

[John Galt]

***

But there was a gravely disturbing side to that otherwise scientifically significant meeting, for I watched in amazement as a few hundred members of the Texas Academy of Science rose to their feet and gave a standing ovation to a speech that enthusiastically advocated the elimination of 90 percent of Earth's population by airborne Ebola. The speech was given by Dr. Eric R. Pianka, the University of Texas evolutionary ecologist and lizard expert who the Academy named the 2006 Distinguished Texas Scientist.

***

One of Pianka's earliest points was a condemnation of anthropocentrism, or the idea that humankind occupies a privileged position in the Universe. He told a story about how a neighbor asked him what good the lizards are that he studies. He answered, “What good are you?”

Pianka hammered his point home by exclaiming, “We're no better than bacteria!”

Pianka then began laying out his concerns about how human overpopulation is ruining the Earth. He presented a doomsday scenario in which he claimed that the sharp increase in human population since the beginning of the industrial age is devastating the planet. He warned that quick steps must be taken to restore the planet before it's too late.

Saving the Earth with Ebola

Professor Pianka said the Earth as we know it will not survive without drastic measures . Then, and without presenting any data to justify this number, he asserted that the only feasible solution to saving the Earth is to reduce the population to 10 percent of the present number.

He then showed solutions for reducing the world's population in the form of a slide depicting the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse . War and famine would not do, he explained. Instead, disease offered the most efficient and fastest way to kill the billions that must soon die if the population crisis is to be solved.

Pianka then displayed a slide showing rows of human skulls, one of which had red lights flashing from its eye sockets.

AIDS is not an efficient killer, he explained, because it is too slow. His favorite candidate for eliminating 90 percent of the world's population is airborne Ebola ( Ebola Reston ), because it is both highly lethal and it kills in days, instead of years. However, Professor Pianka did not mention that Ebola victims die a slow and torturous death as the virus initiates a cascade of biological calamities inside the victim that eventually liquefy the internal organs.

After praising the Ebola virus for its efficiency at killing, Pianka paused, leaned over the lectern, looked at us and carefully said, “We've got airborne 90 percent mortality in humans. Killing humans. Think about that.”

With his slide of human skulls towering on the screen behind him, Professor Pianka was deadly serious. The audience that had been applauding some of his statements now sat silent.

After a dramatic pause, Pianka returned to politics and environmentalism. But he revisited his call for mass death when he reflected on the oil situation.

“And the fossil fuels are running out,” he said, “so I think we may have to cut back to two billion, which would be about one-third as many people.” So the oil crisis alone may require eliminating two-third's of the world's population.

How soon must the mass dying begin if Earth is to be saved? Apparently fairly soon, for Pianka suggested he might be around when the killer disease goes to work. He was born in 1939, and his lengthy obituary appears on his web site .

When Pianka finished his remarks, the audience applauded. It wasn't merely a smattering of polite clapping that audiences diplomatically reserve for poor or boring speakers. It was a loud, vigorous and enthusiastic applause.

Questions for Dr. Doom

Then came the question and answer session, in which Professor Pianka stated that other diseases are also efficient killers.

The audience laughed when he said, “You know, the bird flu's good, too.” They laughed again when he proposed, with a discernable note of glee in his voice that, “We need to sterilize everybody on the Earth.”

After noting that the audience did not represent the general population, a questioner asked, "What kind of reception have you received as you have presented these ideas to other audiences that are not representative of us?"

Pianka replied, "I speak to the converted!"

Pianka responded to more questions by condemning politicians in general and Al Gore by name, because they do not address the population problem and "...because they deceive the public in every way they can to stay in power."

He spoke glowingly of the police state in China that enforces their one-child policy. He said, "Smarter people have fewer kids." He said those who don't have a conscience about the Earth will inherit the Earth, "...because those who care make fewer babies and those that didn't care made more babies." He said we will evolve as uncaring people, and "I think IQs are falling for the same reason, too."

With this, the questioning was over. Immediately almost every scientist, professor and college student present stood to their feet and vigorously applauded the man who had enthusiastically endorsed the elimination of 90 percent of the human population. Some even cheered. Dozens then mobbed the professor at the lectern to extend greetings and ask questions. It was necessary to wait a while before I could get close enough to take some photographs.

I was assigned to judge a paper in a grad student competition after the speech. On the way, three professors dismissed Pianka as a crank. While waiting to enter the competition room, a group of a dozen Lamar University students expressed outrage over the Pianka speech.

Yet five hours later, the distinguished leaders of the Texas Academy of Science presented Pianka with a plaque in recognition of his being named 2006 Distinguished Texas Scientist. When the banquet hall filled with more than 400 people responded with enthusiastic applause, I walked out in protest.

***

http://www.sas.org/tcs/weeklyIssues_2006/2006-04-07/feature1p/index.html

Forrest M. Mims III is Chairman of the Environmental Science Section of the Texas Academy of Science, and the editor of The Citizen Scientist. He and his science are featured online at www.forrestmims.org and www.sunandsky.org . The views expressed herein are his own and do not represent the official views of the Texas Academy of Science or the Society for Amateur Scientists.

Copyright 2006 by Forrest M. Mims III.

[lucidnightmare]

Not surprised,self hate is part of the lefts character.So is drawing equivalence between nonequivalent things,ie endangered gnats and humans,or Americans in the trade towers and terrorist.

I try to understand them but I always fail.I just end up shaking my head and moving on. :lol:

[[Bible]Monkey]

Wow. I hope they changed the locks on the microbiology lab at the University of Texas. If you see this guy with a test tube in his hand, run.

It looks like ole Dr Evil with a glass of Ebola and soda is putting the moves on that sweet innocent Coed there.

[Pebble]

lucidnightmare wrote: Not surprised,self hate is part of the lefts character.So is drawing equivalence between nonequivalent things,ie endangered gnats and humans,or Americans in the trade towers and terrorist.

I try to understand them but I always fail.I just end up shaking my head and moving on. :lol:

Where on earth in that article does it say that he is left wing?

[lucidnightmare]

Oh please.Radical environmentalism.

[Pebble]

lucidnightmare wrote: Oh please.Radical environmentalism.

Ah, so he must be left wing then. :roll:

[Swandazi]

Shouldnt this guy be thrown in jail for plotting to murder 90% of humans on earth? Hes nut... Why are universitys allowing more of these morons to talk at schools? its insane, their probly paying the guy to come and talk 2...

:shock:

[Wolverine]

What a psycho, naturally he would protect himself and his family from the disease.

Its a great idea to him, as long as it is not happening to him.

[Rankor and Pissing]

I'm hoping he's going to offer and be first in line to start it. No more club soda and lemon for you pal - show us how it's done and infect yourself with ebola. :lol:

Yeah... that'll happen. Is he selling a book perhaps and needs some PR?

[Ragnar Danneskjold]

April Fools?

[John Galt]

Tom Hagen wrote: April Fools?

The date is from March. I do not think so at all; usually they are quite blatent and they are of course filed on the first of April.

[The Impeacher]

to be honest, the point about "we are not better than bacteria" is that differnet forms of life cannot be ranked, they are all interrelated.

so i come to some related questions for you:

1) is Africa, or areas of it, overpopulated? relatedly - is it wrong that they hand out forms of birth control devices to stop both the spread of AIDS and to provide access to some voluntary population control?

i think its overpopulated and i applaud what they do to voluntarily control population and disease. however, is it morally okay to let people have children that they cannnot possibly care for - to in effect give birth to human suffering?

2) is there such a thing as overpopulation, relative at some point to idea of scarcity?

3) given the efficiency and technology [such as the master of all technologies, RECYLCING and "various Green Technologies"] has defrayed some of what Malthus argued, is not the general ideas of Malthus' argument still valid - but just pushed furhther out?

[OneZero]

Well then why doesn't he lead the way?

[George W Bush]

cant believe some of you turning this into a LEFT vs RIGHT issue. Get over yourselves.

At any rate, he has a point that were birthing ourselves into extinction. I wouldnt support exterminating humans. I would support birth limits but only if a couple could not afford to feed the kid.

Who is asking these important questions of humans ability to survive if resources dwindle due to overpopulation?
When the time comes, alot of you will wonder why something wasnt done about it.

[John Galt]

George W Bush wrote: cant believe some of you turning this into a LEFT vs RIGHT issue. Get over yourselves.

At any rate, he has a point that were birthing ourselves into extinction. I wouldnt support exterminating humans. I would support birth limits but only if a couple could not afford to feed the kid.

Who is asking these important questions of humans ability to survive if resources dwindle due to overpopulation?
When the time comes, alot of you will wonder why something wasnt done about it.

Who are you to say what someone can and cannot afford?

What is this, China?

[George W Bush]

John Galt wrote: George W Bush wrote: cant believe some of you turning this into a LEFT vs RIGHT issue. Get over yourselves.

At any rate, he has a point that were birthing ourselves into extinction. I wouldnt support exterminating humans. I would support birth limits but only if a couple could not afford to feed the kid.

Who is asking these important questions of humans ability to survive if resources dwindle due to overpopulation?
When the time comes, alot of you will wonder why something wasnt done about it.

Who are you to say what someone can and cannot afford?

What is this, China?

Yes, Earth can handle unlimited life.

Is that what you are saying John Galt?

Who are you to give birth to something that will end up consuming the dwindling resources?

Should we get to the question of WHO can have WHAT resource?
Should we get to WAR?

If the said scenario was true, what would you do in response to it?

[Pebble]

George W Bush wrote: cant believe some of you turning this into a LEFT vs RIGHT issue. Get over yourselves.

That was rather the point I was trying to make.

[George W Bush]

Pebble wrote: lucidnightmare wrote: Not surprised,self hate is part of the lefts character.So is drawing equivalence between nonequivalent things,ie endangered gnats and humans,or Americans in the trade towers and terrorist.

I try to understand them but I always fail.I just end up shaking my head and moving on. :lol:

Where on earth in that article does it say that he is left wing?

Thats what I want to know.

Why do some people call this a RIGHT vs. LEFT thing. Are they THAT deluded in their sense of self????

[George W Bush]

lucidnightmare wrote: Not surprised,self hate is part of the lefts character.So is drawing equivalence between nonequivalent things,ie endangered gnats and humans,or Americans in the trade towers and terrorist.

I try to understand them but I always fail.I just end up shaking my head and moving on. :lol:

I might as well say it:

This has NOTHING to do with RIGHT, OR LEFT.

How the hell did you conclude this???? Explain your position.

[Demonic Spoon]

lucidnightmare wrote: Oh please.Radical environmentalism.


As we all know, absolutely EVERYTHING falls on the left/right scale, doesn't it? The left/right scale is bulls**t, and judging all of someone's political views based on one is naive.


As to the other points...

WE ARE FAR FROM OVERPOPULATED. The whole world's population could live in the state of Texas, with a lot of room left over.

Also consider that the population is leveling out.