OFC Meeting 1
OFC Meetings --> here
16 Jan 2018:
FUTURE DEMOGRAPHICS
Jess
Some questions we might try to answer include:
- How mobile will people be in 20 years?
- Which people?
- What will be the effects of such mobility?
- Where will most of them live in 20 years?
- Where will Canadian immigrants come from?
- Where will Canadian emigrants (if any) go?
- How many people can Canada hold?
- What would be the ideal number of Canadians?
- How many people can the Earth hold?
- What would be the ideal number of humans on Earth?
- What will be the number of robots per person?
- What will the age distribution look like in 20 years?
- How old can we get?
- How old do you want to get?
- Will we just upload into Virtual Reality?
Some possible sources of ideas and information on this subject:
- The Limits to Growth (classic 1972 book whose gloomy predictions have been largely borne out)
- The Population Bomb by Paul & Anne Ehrlich in 1968, predicting catastrophes that have not happened.
- The Gapminder World website, which explains why they haven't & probably won't. (See especially the video entitled "DON'T PANIC: The Facts About Population".)
MINUTES of MEETING
The first meeting was difficult. First Jess was unable to get hooked up to the TV to show his prepared computer presentation, then we found that the "private" meeting room at Serious Coffee is actually an echo chamber for the rest of the restaurant, so only the very loud of voice were able to make themselves heard. That venue is clearly unacceptable, so Keith Barnes has reserved the Qualicum Foods boardroom for us, which will require shifting to the second Tuesday of each month. See OFC Venue Options.
COMMENTS on the FUTURE DEMOGRAPHICS discussion:
It was generally agreed that Hans Rosling is a bit of a Pollyanna with his predictions that the "Population Bomb" has been defused by prosperity and drastically reduced infant mortality. Still, there may be room for hope. Jess thinks that Rosling's main purpose is to counter the broad consensus that since we're doomed no matter what we do, there's no point in trying to act more responsibly.
A lively discussion of the consequences of a plague wiping out 90% of humanity reached an impasse over the issue of whether the remaining people would just crank their birth rate back up to 5 or 7 children per woman, or responsibly enjoy the benefits of a more sustainable population.
Added by Philip: To go to the facebook page on population hosted by Don White of Nanaimo -- search on facebook for "7 Billion and You".
That would be at 7 Billion and You, in case you want a direct link.
Next Meeting:
Hendrik Witmans has [been] volunteered to introduce and moderate a discussion of "Philosophy and our Future" for our next meeting. This may be a more academic-sounding topic, but after all, everything else we do is either motivated or informed by Philosophy, so we'd better get that straight first!
The date of the next meeting is Tuesday 13 Feb 2018 in the Qualicum Foods boardroom (up two flights of stairs from the grocery floor) from 2-4 PM.
