Guest essay by Eric Worrall
h/t Nick Shaw – US Author Kim Stanley Robinson wants half the Earth to be depopulated, by somehow inducing rural people to move into cities.
Empty half the Earth of its humans. It’s the only way to save the planet
Kim Stanley Robinson
There are now twice as many people as 50 years ago. But, as EO Wilson has argued, they can all survive – in cities
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Right now we are not succeeding. The Global Footprint Network estimates that we use up our annual supply of renewable resources by August every year, after which we are cutting into non-renewable supplies – in effect stealing from future generations. Eating the seed corn, they used to call it. At the same time we’re pumping carbon dioxide into the atmosphere at a rate that is changing the climate in dangerous ways and will certainly damage agriculture.
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The tendency of people to move to cities, either out of desire or perceived necessity, creates a great opportunity. If we managed urbanisation properly, we could nearly remove ourselves from a considerable percentage of the the planet’s surface. That would be good for many of the threatened species we share this planet with, which in turn would be good for us, because we are completely enmeshed in Earth’s web of life.
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So emptying half the Earth of its humans wouldn’t have to be imposed: it’s happening anyway. It would be more a matter of managing how we made the move, and what kind of arrangement we left behind. One important factor here would be to avoid extremes and absolutes of definition and practice, and any sense of idealistic purity. We are mongrel creatures on a mongrel planet, and we have to be flexible to survive. So these emptied landscapes should not be called wilderness. Wilderness is a good idea in certain contexts, but these emptied lands would be working landscapes, commons perhaps, where pasturage and agriculture might still have a place. All those people in cities still need to eat, and food production requires land. Even if we start growing food in vats, the feedstocks for those vats will come from the land. These mostly depopulated landscapes would be given over to new kinds of agriculture and pasturage, kinds that include habitat corridors where our fellow creatures can get around without being stopped by fences or killed by trains.
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Meanwhile, cities will always rely on landscapes much vaster than their own footprints. Agriculture will have to be made carbon neutral; indeed, it will be important to create some carbon-negative flows, drawing carbon out of the atmosphere and fixing it into the land, either permanently or temporarily; we can’t afford to be too picky about that now, because we will be safest if we can get the CO2 level in the atmosphere back down to 350 parts per million. All these working landscapes should exist alongside that so-called empty land (though really it’s only almost empty – empty of people – most of the time). Those areas will be working for us in their own way, as part of the health-giving context of any sustainable civilisation. And all the land has to be surrounded by oceans that, similarly, are left partly unfished
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Read more: https://www.theguardian.com/cities/2018/mar/20/save-the-planet-half-earth-kim-stanley-robinson
A few thoughts.
One of the main reasons farming is far from carbon neutral is producing nitrate fertiliser is very energy intensive. It takes a tremendous amount of energy to break nitrogen gas molecules apart, and convert the shattered gas molecules into biologically available forms of nitrogen like ammonia and nitric acid. To give a sense of the scale of energy required, natural nitrate is largely produced inside lightning bolts. But there is nowhere near enough natural nitrate produced this way to feed the world.
Finding a viable artificial method to produce nitrate fertiliser was one of the great innovations which made modern agriculture possible. Reducing the land available for agriculture would require even more intensive nitrate fertilisation and enhancement of whatever land was left.
I appreciate Robinson’s desire for non-violence, but I doubt a purposeful policy of rural depopulation would remain peaceful for long. In Guatemala and Africa, creation of carbon credit forest projects has allegedly resulted in native people being forcefully removed from their homes.
Even if the violence was avoided, I don’t think natural demographic trends will achieve anything like the result Robinson seems to want. In the near future I suspect the social pressures which created the need for cities will diminish. Better transport and communications technology is making it easier to live outside cities. Growing numbers of people no longer have to commute to work; my office is wherever I open my laptop. There will always be people who love the bustle of high density city life, but plenty of city people yearn for a quieter life, with more affordable housing and with neighbours who aren’t always in their face. Modern technology and social change is making this choice increasingly available.
I like some of Kim Stanley Robinson’s work, the Red Mars / Green Mars / Blue Mars trilogy is an excellent read. I want to believe Robinson’s intentions are good. But sometimes the road to hell is paved with good intentions.
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As if they even cared about the environment; No governments joining hands via the UN to halt the destruction of rain forests in Borneo, Papua New Guinea, and Brazil.
Why does anyone believe they actually care? It is just a ruse to achieve an agenda.
Interesting.
Gathering everybody in the US and Europe up into cities, saves the Amazon rainforest how?
The movement of people to the cities has slowed tremendously in recent years.
It used to be that technology demanded that people cluster together.
Newer technologies have removed that requirement.
Human advancement is the reality pinheads like Kim Stanley Robinson refuse to accept.
There was another science fiction writer, a committed Leftist like Robinson, and a name that he should recognize – Dr. Isaac Asimov. A city boy, who rarely ventured outside of New York City.
He, too, wrote of the “ultimate urbanization of mankind.” Except that, despite his own background, he realized he was writing about a dystopian culture, carrying the seeds of its own destruction. See The Caves of Steel, The Naked Sun, or the fate of Trantor in the Foundation series.
Cities have been, at least for the last few millennia, essential to civilization – but when allowed to become too dominant, they become cancers to that civilization.
Asimov visited Eastern Europe during Soviet times – his wife turned to him and said “We’re in Mordor”. From an essay in one of his books of short stories, he thought the One Ring represented technology.
Oh, yes, reliably Leftist, of the Malthusian/Luddite sect.
His science popularization books were, in the main, quite good though. Dang it, I wish the wife hadn’t rushed me out of the used bookstore several years ago, before I could buy the copy of his book on the coming ice age – I’d probably still be mining it for wonderful quotes.
Which is ultimately a stupid assertion, regarding the One Ring. Tolkein literally prefaced his trilogy with the statement (paraphrasing): if you try to shoehorn allegory into my story, just throw my book away please. Tolkein had his own motives, and to him– and only him– elements of his universe meant something specific. He knew he was making a fantasy, and only a fantasy, for others to read. Hence why he placed the intellectual wall at allegory.
Another liberal fraud. No science degree or training. He wants everyone else to live in cities. He’s living in “Village Homes” in Davis – 225 homes and 20 apartments on 70 acres – not atypical for California suburbs but certainly not city density. http://www.villagehomesdavis.org/
And a brief search indicates he did numerous talks and books signings from Maine to NY to Phoenix to San Diego to Santa Cruz. I suspect a bit more searching will turn up many more. I’m wondering how he traveled to each of these distant locations? Surely not burning up jet fuel and destroying our world.
His idea for the lowly masses would be akin to the megalopolis seen in such things as Judge Dredd, whilst the “enlightened” such as himself will live in palatial estates with high walls and armed guards.
Just like Bill Nye, the unscientific actor guy who studied mechanical engineering.
Where do these nutters come from?
Aftermath of a Mongolian Gang Bang.
I have no idea what that means but I laughed anyway.
Let’s see – 71% of the earth’s surface is water, leaving 29% of the surface that is not water. Of that, some is occupied by people (about 0.03%), arable (crop and pasture, about 10%) and the rest of it is neither occupied nor usable (about 90%). So, moving people from the 10% to the 0.03% is a solution to something? Huh? How can people not see the bigger picture? Oh, and by the way, there is nothing humans can do to change the climate at all. Period. And we are not changing it. The vast majority of the surface being water, it dominates climate. And it is virtually ALL subject to the sun, shaded only by clouds at times.
And soylent green (the green wafers made from “plankton”) would be the food source, of course. Oh, the possibilities are endless.
Science fiction writer proclaims himself as having a plan for a “sustainable” future. Lives in a world of his own imagination, convinced that his own in vacuo musing has value in the real world, and is worth our time in reading it. Sorry, not worth bothering to compose a response.
Where would the cities get their food? The fact is they wouldn’t, and the idea that you can grow food without feeding it is left wing loon craziness. If cut civilization off form the energy it takes to produce, transport and store food, which is what they’re trying to do, then the result will be genocide and the end of the human race as we know it.
‘It’s the only way to save the planet’
Wut? From what?
This big ol’ dirt ball will keep flying around the sun NO MATTER WHAT WE DO.
Well remember he’s a science fiction writer. ‘Nuff said.
Obviously not “hard science” fiction.
I’ve got an idea for KSR. How about a future that includes the next ice age? Fertile ground, as I’ve yet to find an apocalyptic novel that doesn’t start with inundated cities.
He should move to Mars. Which makes as much sense as his idea of depopulating the countryside.
You know what, all greenies should move to Mars where they can begin anew and mold the planet the what they want.
Why waste a perfectly good planet on these nut cases.
Give them Ceres.
Naw, Ceres is covered in hydrazine or something like it. Send them to Titan. It has a permanent methane atmosphere that they can use for fuel to keep themselves warm. That infers that they’ll introduce O2 into the mix to make methane flammable, but what the heck – it’ll warm up that big moon in a heartbeat!
Reminds me of the ending of “Beneath the Planet of the Apes” from the original series of movies.
Tom in Florida, suggesting the green fanatics all move to Mars and transform it doesn’t make sense! They would have to use– gasp– CO2!!!!!!!!!!!!
I only have one thought. I’m not listening to some guy that obviously has a half empty head
Makes a change from wanting to frogmarch everyone off to the countryside to wallow around in paddy fields and dig ditches I suppose. They’re certainly a restless, schizophrenic bunch these lefties with their Utopian visions. Can’t seem to make up their minds about anything, a lot like their bizarre weather prognostications..
Science fiction writers are often very bright, and creative thinkers. Unfortunately, they are seldom also practical thinkers — for every 100 wild ideas, one has a chance of being pragmatic and useful
I have read SciFi since 1960 (including every SciFi book in the main LA County Public library at the time, so caught up on all the books I had missed earlier), so am well-versed in the field.
SciFi writers have intentionally started religions (Hubbard) and accidentally started religions (Robert A. Heinlein).
Some have been highly trained practicing scientists and some have been drug-addled hippies.
Some write what will be known in 100 years as literature, some write pulp-fiction.
Having “science” in one’s occupation title (“Science Fiction Writer”) does not make anyone an expert on science and certainly doesn’t bless their opinions with any cache of value for society.
Robinson has missed nearly everything with this idea.
Dr Goebbels would have loved Kim’s ideas.
Anybody can see that, except Guardianistas.
Kim Stanley Robinson
Who?
Kim Jong Robinson, the next North Korean dictator 🙂
A number of former camp guards slipped into the U.S. after the war.
Left the big city for country life 15 years ago. People can keep their cities, hate even going near them now. I wont be forced back either.
“Left the big city for
countrylife”You really didn’t need the qualifier.
I grew in LA, I now live in a city of 50,000.
Not going back.
I spent 30 years living in Chicago. Nothing could persuade me to move back there now.
Where do I sign up to whore for agenda 21? Really good work if you can get it
I always get a kick out of these idiot control freaks who think they can solve a “problem” with some simple “solution” which would only create real problem.
FARMS have lots of GUNS. Me mates grew up target practicing. Can split a greenie pea at 300 m.
And that is the kind of people that are currently deterring, and will eventually win a civil was if liberty is directly attacked. These are the people I want as my neighbors.
Ditto. Plenty of deer in my county alone. No one would go hungry.
This guy has some serious lack of knowledge when it comes to economic geography if he thinks everyone can move out of rural areas and go live in cities with everyone else. What are we going to do, bus and fly all the workers out to the mines, farms, forests, etc every day?
“I like some of Kim Stanley Robinson’s work, the Red Mars / Green Mars / Blue Mars trilogy is an excellent read.”
I too enjoyed reading this trilogy, but if I remember correctly, this trilogy had a very anti-capitalist, pro-socialist bias with the character representing capitalism being murdered and the rest of the characters accepting this murder as necessary. Given that story arc, his current ideas do not surprise me.
Agenda 21 to the core.