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Originally posted by ******** I think we are forgetting that oil is going up and up at $120 / barrel it has some effect on the price of fuel. The thing is though that there are different mechanism.. simply though here is the real issue- Countries have lost self sustainability to population growth ratio - not only are some countries underdeveloped in farming skills and development of agricultural landscape but they arn't sufficient with other infrastructure and agrifood industries, such as aqua culture. If these countries would harvest alternate food sources the issues wouldn't be there. As sick as it sounds - if humans accepted canibalism - with our current death rate we also have a very large untapped food source. None the less there is ample food, but the problem is capitalism and greed. Normal people need fuel - so jacking up the price of gas by removing ethanol isn't going to help an already slumping western economy - although countries like canada have jacked 100+ million into the world food program.. what the problem is is that countries arn't tapping all the food sources they have available - their governments need to tap things like aquaculture - also terraforming - look to israel for a model of mastery of landscape - etc... The planet has so many potential untapped food sources.. people can immigrate... so what is the issue? While we need to cushion this.. people arn't thinking straight nor are they seeing a realistic solution.. the countries that get food aid have gotten it for a long time.. and their economy and self sustainability hasn't needed to balance out.. what needs to be done is planning based upon self sustinance.. not on barely surviving.. obviously the agri planning needs vast improvement. Although some places are recovering from colonial exploitation and damage ... we need to develope and move people.. movement of people is key.. regionalization is key... but countries in the west put of barriers to unskilled immigration.. if every plane that flew aid flew back 100 people etc.. and every truck took back 50 etc.. then we would slowly stabalize.. but greed and capitalism is slowing rational progress WE MUST HAVE A REVOLUTION.. JOIN WITH ME WORLD AND I WILL SOLVE ALL YOUR PROBLEMS!!!!!!!!!!!

Quite possibly the stupidest thing i have read all day.....

what benefit do you forsee with bringing in a larger volume of unskilled immigrants to put even larger strain on a blue collar job force that is seeing massive unemployment right now, not to mention increasing the social burden of these new immigrants who all would receive nice EI check every month and numerous other gov benefits that even i cant access as a canadian citizen.

then you point out canabalism as a solution? do you not see the stupidity and potential problems with this concept? ie people treating other people as livestock in under developed countries?

while ethanol production is stupid, and it does decrease the corn supply, but its not teh prime culprit in the food prices.... oil is... transportation costs are pushing the prices up way beyond inflation. In fact the only rational comment you had was regionalization.... eliminate the transportation demand and regionalize the food production chain. This works for north america, but affrica would still be fucked, I dont think there exists, in my opinion, a one size fits all solution to this problem...

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Originally posted by pkcRAISTLIN I have 3 hobbies: gaming, DJing & correcting maladjusted fools on the internet.

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Originally posted by pkcRAISTLIN Yeah, I’d like to know what horrible, scarring incident in your childhood turned you into such an ignorant, intellectual-hating philistine?

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Originally posted by colonelcrisp then you point out canabalism as a solution? do you not see the stupidity and potential problems with this concept? ie people treating other people as livestock in under developed countries?

Yeah, that was my thought too. I've read allegations that this actually happened in Sudan during war-related famines in the eighties.

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Originally posted by Lebezniatnikov Yeah, that was my thought too. I've read allegations that this actually happened in Sudan during war-related famines in the eighties.

To be completely honest, im not suprised at all, they still try and lynch people in some parts of affrica for being witches who steal/shrink penises.

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Originally posted by pkcRAISTLIN I have 3 hobbies: gaming, DJing & correcting maladjusted fools on the internet.

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Originally posted by pkcRAISTLIN Yeah, I’d like to know what horrible, scarring incident in your childhood turned you into such an ignorant, intellectual-hating philistine?

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Originally posted by colonelcrisp Quite possibly the stupidest thing i have read all day.....

perhaps you should read the rest of his posts.

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Originally posted by ******** Although some places are recovering from colonial exploitation and damage ... we need to develope and move people.. movement of people is key.. regionalization is key... but countries in the west put of barriers to unskilled immigration.. if every plane that flew aid flew back 100 people etc.. and every truck took back 50 etc.. then we would slowly stabalize.. but greed and capitalism is slowing rational progress

or, people like to protect their cultures as well. capitalism isn't the root of all evil.

How can you regionalize sugar production? Sugar can only grow well in certain places. How do you regionalize citrus production? There are certain things that can't be grown in every region. There is little chance that livestock farming could be regionalized because of the large amount of space needed to sustain livestock on a large scale. The big livestock production areas of the world, i.e., Argentina, the US and Canadian plains, and australia, are far removed from urban centers. There is no way to move that closer to population centers and transportation costs are inevitable. However, efficient transportation is key.

Last edited by jerZ07002 on Apr-28-2008 at 18:19

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Originally posted by jerZ07002 perhaps you should read the rest of his posts. or, people like to protect their cultures as well. capitalism isn't the root of all evil.

To put some of his stupidity into numbers.... lets negate trucks and look at the plane theory



100 people per aid flight. thats 100 EI checks the gov has to pay out each month + 100 more people to carry under the public health system.

so lets say at 1500/ mo / unskilled immigrant who cant find a job here cause the A: dont speak english and B: unskilled labour jobs are hard to come by these days... that is 150 000 per month just in EI, plus indirect costs due to healthcare etc, lets just round that up to 250 000 per month.

lets say figuratively you can put 1M worth of aid on a plane. lets also state that the money of aid out plus the ammount spent on immigrants in = 1M per month


so in month 1

Aid = 1M
EI for Immigrants = 0
# Immigrants = 100

Month 2

Aid = 750K
EI = 250K
# Imigrants = 200

Month 3

Aid = 500K
EI - 500K
#immigrants = 300

Month 4

Aid = 250K
EI = 750K
# Immigrants = 400

Month 5

Aid = 0
EI = 1M
#immigrants = 500


now we are stuck paying for 500 people to live here at a cost of 1M / month for the next 6 years at least. The X millions of people in their home country only enjoy the benefit of 2.5M getting paid out to them over 5 months where the 500 people we allow to free load off society here get the equivalent of 2.5 M spent on them (and in reality directly into their pockets) over the same time frame. does this sound sustainable to you?

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Originally posted by pkcRAISTLIN I have 3 hobbies: gaming, DJing & correcting maladjusted fools on the internet.

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Originally posted by pkcRAISTLIN Yeah, I’d like to know what horrible, scarring incident in your childhood turned you into such an ignorant, intellectual-hating philistine?

i totally agree. it's much cheaper to send food than it is to integrate them into our society and attempt to approximate a standard of living for them that matches ours.

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Originally posted by colonelcrisp To put some of his stupidity into numbers.... lets negate trucks and look at the plane theory 100 people per aid flight. thats 100 EI checks the gov has to pay out each month + 100 more people to carry under the public health system. so lets say at 1500/ mo / unskilled immigrant who cant find a job here cause the A: dont speak english and B: unskilled labour jobs are hard to come by these days... that is 150 000 per month just in EI, plus indirect costs due to healthcare etc, lets just round that up to 250 000 per month. lets say figuratively you can put 1M worth of aid on a plane. lets also state that the money of aid out plus the ammount spent on immigrants in = 1M per month so in month 1 Aid = 1M EI for Immigrants = 0 # Immigrants = 100 Month 2 Aid = 750K EI = 250K # Imigrants = 200 Month 3 Aid = 500K EI - 500K #immigrants = 300 Month 4 Aid = 250K EI = 750K # Immigrants = 400 Month 5 Aid = 0 EI = 1M #immigrants = 500 now we are stuck paying for 500 people to live here at a cost of 1M / month for the next 6 years at least. The X millions of people in their home country only enjoy the benefit of 2.5M getting paid out to them over 5 months where the 500 people we allow to free load off society here get the equivalent of 2.5 M spent on them (and in reality directly into their pockets) over the same time frame. does this sound sustainable to you?

Assuming potential food production is finite, on a long enough timeline no amount of continuous population growth is sustainable. A population reduction through starvation, reduced birth rate, or due to conflict over resources is inevitable.

A reduction in the food supply or an increase in the cost of production and transportation of food will almost always place pressure on the poorer strata of society (at this point, it is largely a global market hence the poorer regions bear the brunt of this effect.) Even if the food supply can be increased to the point where these pressures can be alleviated at this time (and it almost certainly could be if it were a high enough priority), overall sustainability will not improve because the removal of this pressure mitigates or prevents the population correction that would have otherwise occurred, and thus leads to even faster population growth which will ensure a future food crisis.

Genuine sustainability can be accomplished only by ensuring that the rate of population growth does not exceed the rate of increase in the 'effective' food supply as measured by the adjusted per capita price of food. However, because the effective food supply is historically erratic, there would have to be a substantial buffer between the two as well. Of course, measures to regulate population growth with any reliability are highly controversial at best. However, to the extent that a hypothetical political philosophy holds both that population control should not be formalized and that we ought to eliminate hunger, I can't help but think that it is entirely incoherent.

I was just watching something on this on our nancy-state CBC (Canadian Broadcast Corp) news the other day.

We've been lucky as Canadians up until now that a combination of the strength of our dollar (globally) and the willingness of the main grocers to cut into their profits up until now.

We too should start seeing some sticker shock at the checkout soon...

/not looking forward to this at all...

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"...End? No, the journey doesn't end here. Death is just another path...one that we all must take.
The grey rain-curtain of this world rolls back, and all change to silver glass...and then you see it...
...white shores...and beyond...the far green country under a swift sunrise."

Bio-fuels are a disaster of an industry. They make absolutely no long-term solution to the carbon emissions problem. It is a short-term quick fix that will never last without putting extensive pressure on food prices. I think the catalyst of this entire crisis are the oil prices. Not only are the major integrated oil & gas companies making record profits, but they do so at the expense of the consumer. This is not capitalism. It is robbery. Capitalism is an equal exchange between a buyer and seller. Oil sure as hell is not worth $120. I don't care about China, India, emerging markets, etc. IT IS NOT WORTH $120 A BARREL!! I blame the energy cartels of America for the inflation of food and gas prices. Yes, I know the crude oil price has been traded to the level of $120, but I have a very VERY high level of suspicion in the forces behind such a high oil price. My questions are basically...

Who is making the largest oil trades?
How much are they trading?
When are they trading?

Is there a oil industry/American government plot to make oil prices rise? I can't tell you yes or no. I have no solid evidence. The only thing I can point is...

1. Since George W. Bush has taken office, gas prices have risen about 100%



2. Companies such as Exxon Mobil (XOM) have made the highest profit of any company in any industry ever in history. From 2003, XOM's profit rose from $22 billion that year to $41 billion in 2007. Their profit has been at the cost of food prices, delivery services, trucking services, shipping services, and reduced the amount of disposable income available to all workers.

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My conclusion is the aristocracy is again trying to make serfs out of us, and dammit, I WON'T TAKE IT ANYMORE!!!

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I don't think it is entirely incoherent, though I see your point. But I would argue that if we spent half as much time thinking about innovation in food production as we do on innovation of, say, video games, we'd have seen a dozen Norman Borlaugs by now.

Populations will continue to grow - and an effort should be made to curb that growth (hint: abstinence-only education is not the way to go on this one) - but why not work on increasing sustainability as well? The Green Revolution succeeded in feeding millions of people that surely would have starved. I see no reason to believe that we can't do that again if we put our minds to it. Sadly, it isn't a priority in the West, which will always eat before our counterparts in S. Asia and Africa.

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Originally posted by Krypton Oil sure as hell is not worth $120. I don't care about China, India, emerging markets, etc. IT IS NOT WORTH $120 A BARREL!!

Wouldn't capitalism dictate that as long as people are willing to pay a price for a commodity, the price will continue to rise. Isn't that the invisible hand at work?

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Originally posted by Krypton Bio-fuels are a disaster of an industry. They make absolutely no long-term solution to the carbon emissions problem. It is a short-term quick fix that will never last without putting extensive pressure on food prices. I think the catalyst of this entire crisis are the oil prices. Not only are the major integrated oil & gas companies making record profits, but they do so at the expense of the consumer. This is not capitalism. It is robbery. Capitalism is an equal exchange between a buyer and seller. Oil sure as hell is not worth $120. I don't care about China, India, emerging markets, etc. IT IS NOT WORTH $120 A BARREL!! I blame the energy cartels of America for the inflation of food and gas prices. Yes, I know the crude oil price has been traded to the level of $120, but I have a very VERY high level of suspicion in the forces behind such a high oil price. My questions are basically... Who is making the largest oil trades? How much are they trading? When are they trading? Is there a oil industry/American government plot to make oil prices rise? I can't tell you yes or no. I have no solid evidence. The only thing I can point is... 1. Since George W. Bush has taken office, gas prices have risen about 100% 2. Companies such as Exxon Mobil (XOM) have made the highest profit of any company in any industry ever in history. From 2003, XOM's profit rose from $22 billion that year to $41 billion in 2007. Their profit has been at the cost of food prices, delivery services, trucking services, shipping services, and reduced the amount of disposable income available to all workers. ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- My conclusion is the aristocracy is again trying to make serfs out of us, and dammit, I WON'T TAKE IT ANYMORE!!!

/obligitory



Was it Canada or States (or both?) that were going to look into why, if these oil companies are making record profits they are still getting government cuts and grants?
Wasn't there an inquiry or something?

___________________
"...End? No, the journey doesn't end here. Death is just another path...one that we all must take.
The grey rain-curtain of this world rolls back, and all change to silver glass...and then you see it...
...white shores...and beyond...the far green country under a swift sunrise."