Reply #31: True. I've read in various places that the estimated carrying capacity

[lutherj]

of the earth for the human species is about 2 billion. So the question is: how to we get there? Obviously, it's unlikely there will be any political solution. Nature will supply the answer.

One idea that occurs to me is a kind of universal opt out. We start to convert existing towns into ecovillages, and offer to anyone who wants to the opportunity to live there, working to create the village, grow food, make the basic necessities. In doing so they get to opt out of mortgages and debt, plus they get guaranteed health care and retirement, and a simpler lifestyle. It would be a new kind of homesteading. However they must also agree to sterilization. Everyone else gets to make do in the shrinking economy.

Try running for president on that platform.