human population problems

[Robert Robbins]

On Fri, 31 Mar 1995, Jacqueline Soule wrote:

> On Wed, 29 Mar 1995, Matt Buys BOTANIE Tel 8083604 wrote:
>
> > > "everyone has the right to have as many children as they want."
>
> No!  People do not have the RIGHT to have more children than they can
> afford to feed, shelter, and nurture.  No human has the right to
> add to human suffering on this planet.

And on what basis does one determine the presence or absence of these
rights?

God's Will, personal preference, enacted laws, or yet another source?

I'm with Ivie -- science qua science provides no basis for moral opinions.
It offers a methodology for hypothesizing how the world does work, but
none for how it should work.

An understanding of how things do work makes it easier to estimate the
consequences of certain acts and this can be used to inform moral
injunctions:

    scientific observation:  Adding phosphates to water supplies
                             stimulates algal blooms to the detriment of
                             other life forms.

         aesthetic opinion:  It is bad to stimulate algal blooms to the
                             detriment of other life forms.

          moral injunction:  It is bad to add phosphates to water supplies.

When "good" gets based on aesthetics, then morality is a function of the
beholder.  There was a time, recall, when the earth had a reducing
atmosphere and obligate anaerobes thrived in the open.

Then an evil life form came along, invented photosynthesis and polluted
the atmosphere to the point of lethal toxicity, causing the anaerobes to
be squeezed into marginal niches with anaerobic microhabitats.

>From the aesthetic/moral view of the anaerobes, humans might be seen as
the saviors, sent by God to eradicate the noxious photosynths and to
return the earth to its original pristine anaerobic state...



ÿÿ    Re: human population problems                                          R<W