I’ve had my worries about the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS), especially its cozying up to religion. They’ve collaborated with Templeton in funding an accommodationist program, the Dialogue on Science, Ethics, and Religion (DoSer), and have engaged in other religion-coddling activities unseemly for a secular science organization (see, for instance, here, here, here, and here). I’m not sure why that is, unless somehow the AAAS wants to court popularity by making nice with faith.
But when I saw a new “editorial” in the AAAS’s journal Science, I was gobsmacked. The piece, “Pursuit of integral ecology,” is clearly labeled as an “Editorial” (which means its message has the approval of Science), and was written by Monsignor Marcelo Sánches Sorondo, Chancellor of the Pontifical Academies of Science and of Social Science, and Veerabhandran Ramanathan, a climate scientist at UC San Diego and a council member of the Pontifical Academy of Sciences.
The editorial, part of a special Science Issue on “Urban Planet,” is basically a paean to the Pope’s views on environmentalism, and really says nothing more than this: “We like the Pope’s views that pollution, environmental degradation, and so on, impacts people differently, with the poor suffering the brunt of the damage.” Fine, but that’s been said over and over again. There’s nothing remarkable or new in the piece. But there’s also a notable inclusion and a notable omission.
The inclusion (my emphasis):
The Paris agreement was signed by 195 nations to limit global warming to well below a 2°C increase. These global acknowledgements of systemic ecological and social problems have opened a window of opportunity to focus on how problems of poverty, human well-being, and the protection of creation are interlinked. The real innovation is this new synergy between science, policy, and religion.
What the hell is the notion of “creation” doing in a science journal? It’s this kind of wording that got the Los Angeles County Museum of Natural History in trouble for referring to its Nature Lab exhibit (funded by a donor) as helping celebrate “God’s creatures.” On the curators’ insistence, that sign was quickly taken down. Why does Science, then, allow mention of “creation,” a clearly religious concept, in an “editorial”?
And the notable omission: there is not a single word in the Science editorial about population growth as a cause of environmental damage, nor about population control. No surprise, given who wrote it! The Catholic Church has of course refused to connect population growth with environmental damage—perhaps the most important nexus between society and ecology—because the Church wants its warren to breed like rabbits. And no condoms or pills! Instead, the piece simply praises Pope Francis as being prescient:
Indeed, 1 year ago, Pope Francis emphasized, in the encyclical Laudato Si, that complex crises have both social and environmental dimensions. The bond between humans and the natural world means that we live in an “integral ecology,” and as such, an integrated approach to environmental and social justice is required.
Where is the social dimension of birth control?
Others have noticed the AAAS’s reluctance to even discuss birth control. In a piece called “AAAS wields the censor’s hammer on U.S. population issues,” Stuart Hurlbert, emeritus professor of biology at San Diego State, writes a “J’accuse” piece on the AAASs apparent accommodationism:
Over the last four years three different population-focused NGOs have tried to have exhibitor booths at AAAS meetings. All have been turned down. The 2011 battles by Californians for Population Stabilization and Population Institute Canada to have booths at the 2012 AAAS meeting in Vancouver have been recounted elsewhere (1), as has AAAS’s exclusion of substantive discussion of U.S. population growth and policies from its flagship journal, Science.
Most scientists scream bloody murder when others suppress knowledge. But a few are in fact happy to censor when it suits their own ideological predispositions.
The positive consequence of those earlier battles was the formation of a new national NGO, Scientists and Environmentalists for Population Stabilization (SEPS). SEPS now educates people not only on population issues but on the problem of censorship by scientists of other scientists as well.
SEPS applied for a booth at the 2014 AAAS meeting in Chicago and was rejected. So when it applied for one at the 2016 AAAS meeting in Washington, D.C., it listed in its application the 19 scientific societies that since 2012 have warmly welcomed SEPS exhibitor booths at their meetings. No society other than AAAS has ever rejected a booth application from SEPS.
The 2016 application also listed 40 current or former presidents of scientific societies who were endorsing SEPS’ application. These included several distinguished past and present members of my own San Diego scientific community such as: Michael Soulé, former UCSD professor and founding president of the Society for Conservation Biology and the Wildlife Network; Margaret Leinen, director of the Scripps Institute of Oceanography and current president of the American Geophysical Union; John Rieger, former SDSU grad student and founding president of the Society for Ecological Restoration; Peter Jumars, former SIO grad student and past president of the American Society for Limnology and Oceanography; Edith Allen, former SDSU professor and past president of the Soil Ecology Society, and Dennis Murphy, former SDSU grad student and past president of the Society for Conservation Biology.
But no luck. The narrow-mindedness of AAAS staff once again trumped the judgment of large numbers of top scientists both in and out of SEPS, including the meeting organizers of 19 other societies.
Pretexts offered by AAAS for application rejections have been diverse, disingenuous and puzzling.
For the 2016 meeting, AAAS CEO Rush Holt claimed that rejection of SEPS’ application was “based on the mission, focus and actions of your organization.”
So let’s see what is causing all this fear and trembling at AAAS.
SEPS mission statement as given on its website is this: Our mission is to improve understanding within the U.S. scientific, educational and environmental communities of the fact of overpopulation and its social, economic and environmental consequences at both national and global levels. We advocate for U.S. population stabilization followed by its gradual reduction to a sustainable level by humane, non-coercive means.
Hurlbert ends this way:
Such discussions seem destined to never be had in an AAAS exhibition hall.
The problem here is far bigger than rejection by AAAS of booth applications from a few NGOs. The AAAS staff and board of directors seem to have decided, surreptitiously, to exclude substantive discussion of U.S. population issues from all AAAS venues. An independent board of inquiry is needed. This behavior by AAAS has already been discussed by the board of the Council of Scientific Society Presidents. Perhaps they will bite the bullet and take up the task.
For some reason the AAAS, like the Pope and the Pontificating Academy of Partial Sciences, doesn’t want to bring up population control as an important social issue affecting the environment. I get why the Catholics don’t do that, but why a respected scientific organization? How do they benefit from censoring discussion of population growth?
h/t: Anne
Overpopulation is the 3rd rail of environmentalism. Despite the fact that we know how to stop unwanted pregnancies, but have yet to come up with a single solution to stop people from wanting stuff.
I disagree; we already have the solution and it’s pretty simple in principle (though difficult to implement globally in practice): educate and provide equal work opportunities to women, along with easy access to birth control. The statistics from the western industrialized countries is, IIRC, pretty clear on this: when women are giving equal opportunity outside the home, they choose to have kids at a rate below the replacement rate (ranging from 1.3 to 2 or so kids/family).
There is no need for draconian population control measures. This problem fixes itself…if we can overcome sexism.
In discussions with people advocating sometimes extreme measures to fend off climate change I point out that ALL changes people do in their lifestyle are relatively insignificant in the general scheme of things. Cutting 20% of your consumption during you lifetime means little.
However not having children makes a large difference in your ‘footprint’, and the effect of that change increases over time.
That doesn’t go over well, usually.
I’m about ready to join the Voluntary Human Extinction Movement. They don’t want to kill anyone. Just don’t reproduce and let nature take its course.
Since I never had kids, I guess I could consider myself an honorary member. On the other hand, my family name in this country will also be extinct (but that’s not a good enough reason to have children).
DoSer? Wasn’t that the evil Sumerian deity in Ghostbusters?
👻
Many years ago my than currant girl friend and I had a child. I don’t think she had children with anyone else, so between us one child entered the world. I guess you could call that negative population growth,two people, one kid.
I was an active EarthFirst!-er back in those days and one of my T-shirts had the slogan Voluntary Human Extinction Movement on it, but I think in my head I was more of a Negative Population Growth sort of guy.
Any Hey, in my opinion, a pretty optimum number for human population on Earth would be about between 500,000 and 1,000,000, certainly not more if we are serious about protecting and saving the planet and the other species that inhabit it with us.
Of course that would involve the elimination of Capitalism which promotes population expansion for economic reasons, and most religions which promote population increases because it means there are more credulous folk around to worship the non-existent sky-fairies. It would also necessitate the Introduction of Reason and Rational Thought, of which is unlikely.
Elimination of capitalism means elimination of civilization as we know it. There are two possible roads: a totalitarian socialist society doomed to self-extinction, as we saw it in Eastern Europe, or a regression to the pre-capitalist “barefoot & pregnant” lifestyle, where only a sky-high mortality can counteract explosive population growth.
I’d suggest, keep capitalism.
Sigh. I suspect they equate declaring for overpopulation with coming out for eugenics and that sort of thing. Nobody’s advocating for culling the herd – just for reining in the output – but the reaction is there. And [pick your group] reacts with cries of genocide aimed at them.
I was at a party not that long ago of what I thought were like-minded people when something came up that (like so many things) could be attributed to overpopulation. When I said “the elephant in the room is there are too f*ing many people on the planet,” one guy revealed himself as an uber-Catholic, shouting back, “There are NOT too many people on the planet.”
I’m at a total loss.
There’s also conspiracy theorists. And having to convince people in religious power that it’s acceptable and responsible to use family planning other than abstinence. But that requires old religious men to change their teachings about sex, sexuality, and women’s autonomy, then waiting for that to trickle through the flock.
Eeevery sperm is sacred….,
eeevery sperm is great…
Too much of a holy ejaculation!
Perhaps it’s time to audit where the AAAS get their money from? If a monseigneur, no less, gets to write their editorials, I smell a rat with a mitre…
I had a similar thought. At the risk of sounding like Jesse Ventura, I suggest following the money.
I think some people also have a much greater fear – the improvement in healthcare worldwide means there’s going to be a huge shift in population distribution by the end of the century. Africa and Asia will dominate. Also authoritarian Islamic theocracies are managing to stop people leaving the religion at the moment, meaning Islam is growing. They want to maintain the dominance of the white Christians.
I look at the problem from another angle. Currently, population growth is the realm of non-Westerners, mostly non-white and non-Christian (and non-secular, of course, at least not openly). Self-hating leftists who seem to dominate Western culture would rather bite their tongues than tell an African or Asian nation – particularly an Islamic theocracy – that its current population growth is unsustainable and harms the planet. So leftists keep telling Westerners that all we need to do to save the Earth is to abandon our comfortable lifestyle. Meanwhile, non-Westerners are not only increasing in numbers but also try to increase their consumption, for which I do not blame them.
I agree with you. The Philippines government recognizes that over-population is one of its biggest problems and is taking a whole lot of practical steps to reduce the population including free sterilization surgery. At the same time the Catholic Church is opposing the moves, and they even got a visit from the pope telling them to keep breeding.
+ 1
This is phenomenally ignorant. Overpopulation is the most detrimental thing we are doing to our planet. I am surprised all the other plants and animals have not turned on us already.
Gamora’s response is all I have: “I am going to die surrounded by the biggest idiots in the galaxy.”
That’s exactly how I feel.
I’m grateful for these periodic updates on AAAS. I get donation pitches from them on occasion. I will probably direct my meager funds to more worthy organizations.
Amazing. The pomos who claim all they are doing is studying the “nonscientific factors influencing science” might want to pipe up now.
I’ve been concerned about overpopulation ever since I was required to do a presentation on it with classmates in senior biology in high school way back when, and if anything I am more alarmed now. As, after all, we’ve learned more about resource limitations (e.g., due to global warming) than we knew then.
“after all, we’ve learned more about resource limitations (e.g., due to global warming) than we knew then.”
Nitpick – I disagree. “We” knew it perfectly well way back then. It was obvious to anyone with two braincells to rub together that ‘growth’ could not continue indefinitely, nor were resources unlimited. Also that, even then, some areas were acutely overpopulated and that many areas of the environment were under threat.
What the economists do not seem to have learned is how to control a stable or slightly shrinking economy without social disasters occurring. I’ll rephrase that – what the economists don’t seem to have learned is how to control a bloody thing.
cr
I’ll agree with all of that, with the proviso that I’ll claim specifics and you’re talking more generally. And that’s ok.
And yes, we *need people working on how to get to steady state economics*.
It really is amazing that so many people are unable to see that which is right in front of their eyes! Overpopulation is affecting everything and the catholics have the gall to deny it.
Thought you might enjoy a recent article in The Onion : ‘We Must Preserve The Earth’s Dwindling Resources For My Five Children.
‘www.theonion.com/blogpost/we-must-preserve-the-earths-dwindling-resources-fo-11239
Ooh that’s savage and almost too painful to be funny.
It is guilty, though, of exaggeration. It speaks of 15,625 great-great-great-grandchildren, which sounds quite alarming. However, it ignores the fact that those g-g-g-g’s will have had 64 g-g-g-grandparents, so the actual increase is only 244:1. Isn’t that a far more reassuring figure?
cr
It wasn’t always like that. Consider, for example, this editorial from Science back in 1971, entitled Nobody Ever Dies of Overpopulation. The title might sound as if the AAAS today would like it. But the content says otherwise.
Although the word “creation” has developed an alternative secular meaning like the word “soul” (at least Random House would seem to indicate so in both cases), I wouldn’t bet on the Pontifical Academy of Science using it mainly in the latter sense, and the dividing line is less clear.
Everyone knows that soul music isn’t about a dualistic immortal soul in the sense employed by both Thomas Aquinas and the Bhagavad-Gita.
But speaking of creation without a creator is a bit more odd. (Even in Christianity, the left-wing nature-celebrating “creation spirituality” movement was often confused with the creationism of Ham and Dembski et al.)
It’s interesting that the word “creature” does not seem to have the the same religious connotations. Is it perhaps because we pronounce it with two syllables rather than three, thus tending to lose its derivation?
And (apparently) “creature” used to be applied to non-living things, including human-made things. So, yes, the idiomatic sense that has become established carries no “memory” of its etymology.
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Except, of course, to etymologists.
Are there any etymologists of entomology? (People who study how insect names arose?)
Great Post Dr. Coyne! Now if only hundreds of millions more people would post and blog about Over-Population and the environmental degradation it’s causing maybe we could prevent the destruction of our Planet!
I don’t know what people are thinking when they decide they want to bring a new life to this world. The planet is doomed, the political world order as we know it is going to hell, there are new failed states being created every year. You have to be a moron to want to bring a new life to this world.
My neighbors just had a baby… Oh wow born in 2016! What will the world look like by the time he is my age in 2046??
When I was born in the early eighties there were 4.5 billion people, how many more people will there be in 30 years?? 9-10 billion?
It is hard to predict because of the number of variables so the range of predictions is large. There is some level of consensus that world population will peak at approximately 9 billion and then begin decreasing.
Many nations already appear to have birth rates lower than replacement, though often other factors, like immigration, result in maintaining an increasing population. It has been evident for some time now that there is an inverse correlation between standard of living type indicators and average birth rates.
Regarding your main question, a question in return. Have you enjoyed any part of your life? Has any part of your life been worth living in your opinion?
Darrelle — IMHO, these projections of peak population and decline are the demographers’ version of Pie in the Sky — their models simply presume that a richer, better-educated third world will magically do the Transition Shuffle — like Italy [or just a bit slower decline would be better as long as the food and coffee are Italian-grade]– on a glide into a sustainable long-term level.
This is magical, not scientific thinking — I know of no feedback mechanisms — other than Chinese-style compulsion and monitoring or some implantation of territorial nesting — that can regulate population in a species that can [and does] double in less than 20 years, live to 70 or 80, and make decisions in minutes..
If everyone gets too rich to want kids, don’t worry — we then just enter the domain of cycling like lemmings in a neoMalthusian world.
No, that is not accurate. Most such models project actual statistical trends into the future. The correlation between standard of living type indicators and average birth rate is not evident in only 1st world countries.
Could such models be wrong? Sure. How wrong? Anyone who says they know to a high degree of assuredness is fooling themselves. We don’t have the ability to make these kinds of predictions accurately.
A few things do seem like a good bet. Even in the happy case that population peaks at 9-11 billion then declines, we have some serious problems. No matter what predictions one subscribes to we should be making serious efforts to deal with all the problems that we are causing for ourselves and the rest of the planet.
Sorry I don’t get your question. I do think though that the more we are the less enjoyable our lives will become as resources will get scarcer and quality of life will decrease for most people…even in developed nations like Sweden or Canada.
According to Hans Rosling, the global population will taper off to about 11 billion by the end of the century.
I’m not sure how good of news that is.
Was there a time before now when it would have been okay to have children? If so, when?
Does our species deserve to die out, and if so, for whose benefit?
The benefit of all other species. We are not special, other Homo species have gone extinct. Sooner or later we’ll go extinct too.
In my opinion we should have stuck within the 2 billion earth’s carrying capcity limit but we are so stupid we just can’t help ourselves even with modern birth control methods.
I haven’t been a member of the AAAS for a few years and was surprised when I received an email today with a free reading pass for the Urban Planet edition. Will be interested to take a look. Frankly I can’t figure out what is going on. Religion is being weeded out in many places but this pervasive Deepakian gibberish shows up more and more despite the fact that it cannot by its nature add a single thing to the conversation. The Lancet has done something similar. I used to like it for the science but now it seems to focus more on squishy soft science.
American Association for the Advancement of Superstition.
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I’m surprised that there are no prominent members of AAAS reading this WEIT webpage. I’m sure that if there were, they’d submit really good scientific reasons for AAAS wanting to avoid any discussion of the problems and solutions related to overpopulation.
Maybe they think the problem is simply trivial and will resolve itself like some itchy patch of skin?
Learning this disgusting information about AAAS makes me glad that I chose not to renew the subscription after my husband died earlier this year. I’ve already cancelled National Geographic for their current religious bent. More magazine subscriptions may bite the dust if they keep adding
articles about Christian mythical figures as though they’re real.
In re religions such as Catholicism (also, Judaism and Islam) and their vehement promotion of population growth: they seem not to care much about the quality of the lives of the parents and their many children. (I wonder why these children must be physically born. Couldn’t they just remain happily in heaven or paradise without undergoing the earthly travail?)
I received a request for a donation yesterday from Doctors Without Borders that focused on the severe malnutrition of African children and talked about the vast number of children dying. I went to an internet article just now that states the 2011 Global Hunger Index reports that 6 countries (5 in Africa, and North Korea) have higher hunger rates than they had two decades ago. 2 out of 5 children, or 60 million, are stunted (permanently damaged by malnutrition). It is expected that 450 million will be affected by 2025.
I also recently read an article about a couple of gay Israeli males who arranged to have a baby via an Oregon surrogate mother.
The culture requires progeny.
Old people (such as myself) are not dying fast enough. We continue to live longer and use up the resources of the young, so I’m told. But, too many of the children being born are starving to death or living physically and/or mentally stunted lives due to malnutrition.
Warfare and epidemics used to deplete populations periodically. However, as was discussed on this site recently, secularists need to be much more committed and active in the prevention of wars. We also don’t want epidemics that can be controlled via medicines. And, we mustn’t provide the starving with GMO foods.
Any useful suggestions? I think I’ll send a donation to Doctors Without Borders!
Population is a factor in AGW and other less important environment degradation, but it is not a decisive one. We have made our processes more effective than we degrade. Starvation, or more generally the root cause of poverty, is a great example. A century ago 80 % of the global population was poor and starving at times, but today the numbers is 20 % and steadily decreasing. That is why global starvation affects ever less people despite increasing populations.
Nitpick: We do want to use precision agrarian methods like GMOs. C.f. Jerry’s (IIRC) notes on how it would save many, for example the “golden rice” A vitamins, while using ever less resources.
Not using GMOs is a rich nation problem.
I am constantly peeved by how Swedish consumers, now 30 %, can afford to pay over prize for ‘ecological’ produce that use a lot more fossil fuel and twice the areal, so non-ecological. And the much famed “plant diversity” is comparably better inside the areal (less dense produce and no herbicides) but the important border regions where non-produce plants increase over all diversity are equivalent.
The only claim to fame ‘organic’ produce has is that the safe amounts of herbicides and pesticides that the consumer may be subjected to is on average lower. (But never guaranteed, batches have been found that are as high on active compounds, for one reason or other. Breaking protocol to guarantee produce?)
That was the one excuse the local industry put out in media when cornered, “let the consumer decide”. Yes, decide for no good reason to waste the environment unnecessary, and to make an else much criticized non-solidarity stance (since few can afford it; more problematic is that the planet *don’t have* twice the areal needed).
I am also peeved that EU kiss up to ‘organic’ producers, and accept their religious theosophic rooted homeopath ‘fertilizing’ methods Steiner propagated. (Not that they are used in practice, what I know. But the very idea!)
Everybody – read Garrett Hardin. This from 1974:
Lifeboat Ethics: the Case Against Helping the Poor by Garrett Hardin, Psychology Today, September 1974
Check the Garrett Harden website. Read or reread “Tragedy of the Commons.” Lifeboat Ethics created quite a negative stir, but in the meantime the Earth’s population has doubled. Since I graduated from high school the Earth’s population has tripled.
Evolution to the rescue:
“Evolutionary engineer Frances Arnold wins €1m tech prize
US engineer Frances Arnold has won the Millennium Technology Prize for pioneering “directed evolution”.
By driving a sped-up version of natural selection in the lab, the method has created new enzymes for industrial catalysts, household detergents, and even to make rocket fuel from sugar.
The €1m (£0.8m) prize is awarded biennially and Prof Arnold is the first female winner in its 12-year history.
It recognises developments that “change people’s lives for the better”.”
“But instead of breeding animals, the directed evolution process works directly with small stretches of DNA and the proteins they encode.
It is now used in laboratories worldwide and has produced many valuable enzymes, including one used in manufacturing Januvia, a popular drug for type 2 diabetes, which would otherwise be produced using heavy metals.
“They replaced a chemical process with an enzymatic process, thereby completely eliminating toxic metals that were needed… and getting solvent waste reduction of 60%,” said Prof Arnold.
“We’re talking tonnes of material.”
Directed evolution has also produced catalysts that allow industrial chemicals and fuels to be made from renewable sources.
Prof Arnold is a leading proponent of this such “green” chemistry and has co-founded a company, Gevo, that works in this area.
“Isobutanol is not a natural product, but we evolved an enzyme that makes it possible to convert plant sugars to this precursor to jet fuel,” she said. “So this company is producing jet fuel from renewable resources.””
[ http://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-36344155 ]
“How do they benefit from censoring discussion of population growth?”
You have to wonder.
Population demand on resources, land and security of food supply is of a great concern.
We are a greedy and demanding species and quite capable of strangling ourselves.
Are we smart enough to know we are turning blue and the eyes are bulging with blood.
Not if we are stupid enough to follow this lot and not even discuss the possibilities, outcomes, policies, mitigation, etc.
To the AAAS and the CC it must all be part of the Gits plan.
I wonder if the National Academy of Science has ever publicly held forth on such AAAS positions/activities.
‘For the 2016 meeting, AAAS CEO Rush Holt claimed that rejection of SEPS’ application was “based on the mission, focus and actions of your organization.”’
I think it would be nice for former U.S. Representative and Physics & Religion professor Rush Holt to go on record regarding whether he thinks that the Earth has an unlimited carrying capacity.
Professor of “Religion and Physics” LOL think that explains the problem!
The first author’s e-mail is pas@pas.va: The Pontifical Academy of Sciences at the Vatican. Not even a personal address, but a generic one, no doubt filtered and where any sort of genuine inquiry would fall on deaf ears if it isn’t ‘lost’ before that. So I think you can safely say that the Vatican wrote this piece, and got a hanger-on to sign up, too.
They should change the name to the AARS. R = regression, of course. Could do an S (suppression) instead. Yes, I like that: AASS.
I still can’t understand why the Vatican still exists as a state. Italy should reclaim it and make them pay their back taxes.
I think you’ve got to the bottom of things there, John.
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It’s often interesting to see government and other organizations dance around the obvious to avoid the elephant in the room.
A recent article by the CDC discussing the unfortunate increase in AIDS infections among gay black men particularly in the US south went into quite a discussion of discrimination as the cause. Completely missing was the actual cause of bad personal choices and irresponsible behaviors. No-one has ever gotten AIDS from discrimination.
I suppose this is why truly great scientists like Richard Feynman so disparaged organisations like the AAAS and the charlatans who’d wish to be a member?
Stuart Hurlbert is one of ecology’s greats. Respect to him, and to you, Jerry.
Let’s not forget Al Bartlett who has beating the overpopulation drum since 1969. http://www.albartlett.org/presentations/arithmetic_population_energy.html
The religious actually believe we will die out if we don’t breed to the max all the time
Now is NOT the time to increase population and besides prior to the 1960s infant death rates 0-5 were hugely higher world wide. We don’t have the huge infant mortalities thanks to vaccines, greater access to clean water and greater hygiene knowledge. Smaller population and families have been shown to improve the standard of living everywhere, not just in the West – and it’s a critical factor in improving the lot of the poor outside the rich world.
Its wicked. The church maintains a celibate clergy to ensure that they retain exclusive loyalty to the Church and can’t be identified as ordinary people – it’s a power base. Meanwhile they tell everyone to breed as much as possible, they don’t give a stuff about the consequences on this earth because of, well …. End times and teleology. Thanks largely to religion and the discord and poverty encouraged by ideologies POMOCrit and right alike, global population will keep on increasing through most of the 21st century and we will be frying.
The Pope and the Aaa(r)s(e) need to be given the full series of lectures by Prof Robert Wyman, on Global Problems of Population Growth