Saturday, February 18, 2012

"Every Sperm Is Sacred" - or so they say

Using information from a 2006 piece by Jeremy Rifkin The Risks of Too Much City:
Two hundred years ago, the average person on Earth might meet 200 to 300 people in a lifetime. Today a resident of New York City can live and work among 220,000 people within a 10-minute radius of his home or office in midtown Manhattan.

Only one city in all of history -- ancient Rome -- boasted a population of more than a million before the 19th century. London became the first modern city with a population over 1 million in 1820. Today 414 cities boast populations of a million or more, and there's no end in sight."
(Background of illustration from: Cry of the Masses by Josef Vachal)
Keeping well away from political/religious viewpoints, especially from current arguments about contraception, and concentrating only on astrology, a few thoughts on what changes could become noticeable at some point in the future as a result of unchecked population explosion.

A few thoughts:

a) There will be more people on Earth who have identical, or similar birth charts than ever before in human history. Of course, their similarities will be stretched into wide variation due to ethnicity, locality, background, and other factors, but basic character traits could survive externalities. In densely populated areas such as New York, place of birth being closely similar too, the effect could be more extreme.

b) There will be more people born every second, and nano-second, tiny fragments of time, with minutely different alignments of planets and points. In the distant past, even in the more recent past or present history births might not have taken place in these microscopically tiny segments of time. Whether this would bring forth elements of human nature not before experienced, with previously unimagined abilities or traits, for good or ill, isn't clear, but it is a possibility.

c) Gradually increasing numbers of people born within each generation will mean that the outer planets, Uranus, Neptune, Pluto, known as "generational planets" will reflect generational traits over a broader swath of the population, resulting in more noticeable generational differences in temperament than in the past or present.

d)Greater weight of positive/negative polarities could cause public opinion to appear ever more polarised.

There are bound to be other potentialities..... some considerably more sinister.
"Which is the greater danger - nuclear warfare or the population explosion? The latter absolutely! To bring about nuclear war, someone has to DO something; someone has to press a button. To bring about destruction by overcrowding, mass starvation, anarchy, the destruction of our most cherished values-there is no need to do anything. We need only do nothing except what comes naturally - and breed. And how easy it is to do nothing."
~ Isaac Asimov

See also further, non-astrological, issues relating to overpopulation presented interestingly by Roedy Green in an article here, at mindprod.com

12 comments:

Anonymous said...

GP: When I was at school in Switzerland we were about 4 million Swiss. Today that country counts almost 8 million - and when I was there last time I saw the horror: concrete all over the place, even in the Alps.

When I came to retire in Brazil, the population here was 160 million, today its well over 220. And the funny thing is that the catholics, percentage-wise are shrinking.

Presently we have Carnival here. The (progressive) government is distributing 20 million condoms for free. But not so much because of populational concerns, it's because of Aids. So, one might say that for at least some health reasons, some counterbalancing against excessive population growth is taking place.

And I trust that when needed, some similar "checks" will be provided by Grand Nature.

Jefferson's Guardian said...

The title of your post reminded me of a quip recently made by Bill Maher: "Life begins at erection."

I wonder how Virginia's House of Delegates will handle this proposal of personhood? ;-)

Wisewebwoman said...

Overpopulation is never addressed in this mad place we call planet earth. When I hear pols go on about contraception and abortion ad nauseum it just about makes my head explode.
Yeah, we need more people like the forest needs fire.
XO
WWW

Twilight said...

Anonymous/Gian Paul ~~ Bravo for your progressive government !

Nature knows best, and will retaliate, if we don't voluntarily put a check on growth, with visitations of assorted "pestilence".

Unknown said...

I was in Guangzhou (old Canton) in China on business in October, last year. A city of about 16 million people. What stands out is that most of the people tended to walk only one way on the pavements (sidewalks) in the same direction as the cars on that side of the road. Probably because of the large numbers out at any one time. And this was still the case at night as much as during the day.

Going back to the hotel one day we saw one 24/7 KFC on one side and an identical one on the opposite side. So clearly people don't cross the road to eat. Mind you with that number of people they probably needed to double up on all the multi storey 'food' outlets.

The train stations were also very impressive. Everyone had to wait in a holding area until the electronic sign said they could move to the platform. Tickets only and each seat was allocated. We had another British person with us that thought the train would be delayed because of the number of people waiting. So I timed it. From the time the gates were opened it took 5 mins to get everyone down the corridors, up steps onto the platform and onto the train. Needless to say it left on time and arrived at every stop on the way exactly at the time it was scheduled to. Wish it was like that here....

Quite an experience.

Twilight said...

Jefferson's Guardian ~~ I heard Bill Maher make that remark, yes...lol!

Don't know about Virginia, but here in Oklahoma a "personhood" bill giving an embryo constitutional rights has already passed the state senate and is expected to pass in the house.

Twilight said...

Wisewebwoman ~~~ Yep - this issue is constantly ignored. I guess The Powers That Be have a plan - a nice big juicy profitable and destructive (to humans) war.
:-(

Twilight said...

Rossa ~~~Hi! Hmmmm - interesting, thank you for that input. Must have been a fascinating trip!
Their efficiency sounds impressive. They've learned to deal with the difficult situation they face, I guess - but at what cost on so many levels?

Anonymous said...

GP: Reading the various comments (and replies) I would like to add that Rossa's "Chinese observations" are highlighting what we observe in the West at a yet minor, benign, candid scale.

The Chinese themselves are so-to-say immune to mass-events, manipulable as they have always been. Could it be that Nostradamus's fear of the Yelow Threat (peril jaune) is still alive and part of the things-to-come? The way we are going, economically, morally and demographically points all that way to me.

It's the reign of the masses, or quantity over quality, all along.

Today they need (here in Brazil) a mere 4 weeks to breed a chicken, ready for consumption. And it's big export stuff here. Goes all to China, the Arabs etc. Doping? Never heard. Consumer's cancers (to come) might be the way nature is planning to restore some equilibrium. It's a mess, so to say...

Anonymous said...

Here's the inimitable Bill Hicks on sperm - and I agree with his take on this.
http://www.liveleak.com/view?i=afe_1247106721
Interesting to me that it is primarily people in the first world who are so concerned about over-population: could it have anything to do with resources necessary to their 'lifestyle' being depleted as they have exported that lifestyle around the world and the costs are coming home to roost.
The answer to over-population is simple: women's right to control their own bodies and reproductive systems. Wherever and whenever this is the reality, women consistently choose quality over quantity of life and that means smaller families.

Twilight said...

Anon/Gian Paul ~~
Thanks for your further thoughts on this.

This is an issue with unknown consequences. We're heading into situations where, quite literally, no humans have ever gone before.

And it's looking to be (as you said) A Mess.

Twilight said...

Sabina ~~Hi! Thanks for the link - I was/am a fan of Bill Hicks. I wish he could have stayed among us for much longer.

I think the concern about over-population logically has to arise from developed countries, where more educaton and research is possible. Third world has other, more instantly pressing issues to worry over. The reason you give probably factors into it all too.

I agree whole-heartedly with your last point.