Tunnel/Farmer in the Sky

[Bill Leary]

Folks:

A couple of weeks ago there was a thread, under a subject line about "The
Moon is a Harsh Mistress," discussing using space travel (ships in Farmer in
the Sky) and teleportation (Ramsbotham gates in Tunnel in the Sky) for
population control. I said at the time that I hadn't read either book in a
while. Now I've read them both again.

In Tunnel in the Sky, they were absolutely using the gates for population
control. At least the Asians were, though the comments by the announcer at
the gates where one such instance is taking place clearly doesn't think much
of it. The people being forced to emigrate are forced from one gate (where
they were stage) to another gate where they're being sent to a new planet.

In Farmer in the Sky, the ships were almost as clearly not being used for
population control. There's talk that some people might be thinking that
way, but guy doing the talking says it won't work and enough people would
never leave earth voluntarily even if they ships were available and Ganymede
(or other colonies) could accept them. And that's not the purpose of
setting up colonies anyway. He says that the colonial commission is setting
up colonies because they expect war on earth, due to population pressure, in
40 to 70 years and hope the colonies will survive.

Let the debate continue... or not. The two stories have different premises
both in technology and social aspects.

- Bill
________________
We'd forgive most things if we knew the facts.
- Graham Greene

[Chris Zakes]

I agree that while population pressure might be one of the reasons,
emigration--either voluntary, like in "Farmer" or forced like at the
beginning of "Tunnel"--isn't going to solve it. At least it won't
solve it unless the entire world manages to stabilize or reduce its
population growth at the same time, and how likely is that?

Even with a mandatory one-child policy since 1979, is China's
population shrinking?

-Chris Zakes
Texas
--

Be careful what you wish for, it may have a very long job description.

-Puck Curtis

[Bill Leary]

"Chris Zakes" wrote in message
news:dgc4i8hnej7q35dqb...@4ax.com...

> On Sun, 17 Feb 2013 21:16:26 -0500, an orbital mind-control laser
> caused "Bill Leary" <Bill_...@msn.com> to write:
>> A couple of weeks ago there was a thread, under a subject line about "The
>> Moon is a Harsh Mistress," discussing using space travel (ships in Farmer
>> in
>> the Sky) and teleportation (Ramsbotham gates in Tunnel in the Sky) for
>> population control. I said at the time that I hadn't read either book in
>> a
>> while. Now I've read them both again.

>> ((..omitted..))

>>Let the debate continue... or not. The two stories have different
>>premises
>>both in technology and social aspects.
>

> I agree that while population pressure might be one of the reasons,
> emigration--either voluntary, like in "Farmer" or forced like at the
> beginning of "Tunnel"--isn't going to solve it. At least it won't
> solve it unless the entire world manages to stabilize or reduce its
> population growth at the same time, and how likely is that?
>
> Even with a mandatory one-child policy since 1979, is China's
> population shrinking?

Apparently not, but it turns out the policy wasn't really meant to reduce
overall population but rather to curb the increase in urban population, thus
reducing overcrowding and the strain on social services in those areas.

A year or so back I saw something in the press along the lines that they
were considering allowing second children. This caused me to look into the
policy. It turns out that it targets a specific demographic and thus only
applies to about 35% of the population.

- Bill

[Michael Black]

Or look at "Red Planet", simply because I reread it last week. Things
seem to be in good shape, until they reveal that they have to move about
550 people to the other pole for winter. That's a minor number, though
one reason the Company (just like when the pacific northwest was fur
company territory) didn't want to move the colonists was so they could use
the housing at the other pole for newcomers, in effect doubling the
population.

It doesnt' really go into immigration much, other than that they are
starting to set up machines to make the atmosphere breathable by people
from earth, which implies more will come. Counter to that, they have
issues with the landlords (the Martians) who don't seem that thrilled and
then want everyone to leave.

Here Heinlein is talking about a very static number of people, and not
much about that increasing. He never even specifies how the colonists got
there (was it one of those slow transports, like the people on Ganymede
had to live with until the faster ship came along?), so he really
completely ignores the issue. Maybe because the book isn't about that,
maybe for some other reason.

> Even with a mandatory one-child policy since 1979, is China's
> population shrinking?

On the other hand, there was some "newsmagazine" type show here in Canada
some time back that did a piece on the place of Chinese men, and
apaprently things aren't going well for them, since when only one child is
allowed per couple, they still see males as more important, which leaves a
whole generation of men with comparatively few women to pursue.

That's one way of halting population growth.

Michael

[Chris Zakes]

On Mon, 18 Feb 2013 15:38:20 -0500, an orbital mind-control laser
caused Michael Black <et...@ncf.ca> to write:

>On Mon, 18 Feb 2013, Chris Zakes wrote:

(snip)

>> Even with a mandatory one-child policy since 1979, is China's
>> population shrinking?
>
>On the other hand, there was some "newsmagazine" type show here in Canada
>some time back that did a piece on the place of Chinese men, and
>apaprently things aren't going well for them, since when only one child is
>allowed per couple, they still see males as more important, which leaves a
>whole generation of men with comparatively few women to pursue.
>
>That's one way of halting population growth.
>
> Michael

I've got a friend who's adopted several children from Russia.
According to him, in Russia girl children are preferred over boys. So
perhaps at some point in the future we'll see a new Russian-Chinese
alliance.

[Yisroel Markov]

On Mon, 18 Feb 2013 07:57:23 -0600, Chris Zakes <dont...@gmail.com>
said:

No, it's only aging, and the sex ratio is tilting male. OTOH, Japan's
population has been declining for the past six years without any such
policies.
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2013-01-01/japan-s-population-falls-by-record-in-2012-as-births-decrease.html
--
Yisroel "Godwrestler Warriorson" Markov - Boston, MA Member
www.reason.com -- for a sober analysis of the world DNRC
--------------------------------------------------------------------
"Judge, and be prepared to be judged" -- Ayn Rand

[Chris Zakes]

Further evidence that the best way to control population is to have a
reasonably affluent populace and easy access to contraceptives?

-Chris Zakes
Texas
--

From the point of view of an arrow, chain mail can be thought of as a series of
loosely connected holes.

-Terry Pratchett, "Lords and Ladies"

[jgharston]

Michael Black wrote:
> ...which leaves a whole generation of men [in China]

> with comparatively few women to pursue.

It's not /comparatively/ fewer women, it's 30 meeeellion fewer women.

JGH

[Yisroel Markov]

On Wed, 27 Feb 2013 17:32:17 -0600, Chris Zakes <dont...@gmail.com>

said:

>On Wed, 27 Feb 2013 12:36:18 -0500, an orbital mind-control laser
>caused Yisroel Markov <ey.m...@MUNGiname.com> to write:
>
>>On Mon, 18 Feb 2013 07:57:23 -0600, Chris Zakes <dont...@gmail.com>
>>said:

[snip]

>>>Even with a mandatory one-child policy since 1979, is China's
>>>population shrinking?
>>
>>No, it's only aging, and the sex ratio is tilting male. OTOH, Japan's
>>population has been declining for the past six years without any such
>>policies.
>>http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2013-01-01/japan-s-population-falls-by-record-in-2012-as-births-decrease.html
>
>Further evidence that the best way to control population is to have a
>reasonably affluent populace and easy access to contraceptives?

*And* an empowered female population. But that's a chicken/egg
phenomenon :-)