What is the future of humanity?

[caldrail]

Apparently farming insects is somewhat easier and less destructive than simply exploiting existing populations.

 

[Naomasa298]

Many people already eat insects.

And there's relatively little difference between insects and smaller crustaceans.

Cows are insects, right?

 

[sparky]

" A modest proposal " from Jonathan Swift

A Modest Proposal - Wikipedia
it suggested an elegant solution to relieve the poverty and ease the overpopulation of Ireland
parents could sell their children for the feasting of well to do Englishman
it would avoid a lot of famine agony and for the children it would end being close to the same
in fact better as they would be fattened up , something made necessary by their wretched diet
the goodly and Godly Englishmen would thus help the Irish more than they have so far

 

[fascinating]

There are plenty of primitive peoples (no insult intended) today who eat insects. The Australian aboriginies are past masters of this sort of thing. It's called survival.


Absurd? it's becoming common enough to see such things mooted in science magazines.

By primitive peoples you probably mean hunter-gatherers. We can much more easily grow food, since we invented agriculture about 10,000 years ago, putting us in an entirely different position to the hunter-gatherers.

You said that it will be "eat insects or starve". Please point to me, or summarise, a relevant magazine article which actually says that and gives its reasoning/evidence for that assertion.

 

[caldrail]

Scientists disagree with you. Land cannot produce more than a certain level of food, oceanic farms are possible but have issues concerned with ecology and access in tidal waters, and increasing populations mean more land devoted to urban development. As much as you're optimistic, that's a rather ill-informed idea, and if you doubt it, please consult whichever science magazine you prefer. Sooner or later the issues will be described along with calls for changes in human feeding habits and concepts to fill the bellies of those who aren't going to be rich enough to afford the food they want according to common lifestyle expectation we take for granted. At the end of the day, I'm not the one issuing warnings - it's people better qualified than me who are writing these articles.

 

[Dan Howard]

The global population is going to peak at around 9 billion in the middle of this century. We are producing enough food right now to easily feed that many people. We have no problem with food production. We have problems with wastage, inefficient distribution systems, and market manipulation.

 

[caldrail]

Oh I see. There's no problem, so there won't be one. Well that's fine for now. But if your paradise gets knocked at some point, don't come crying to me.

 

[Dan Howard]

There are lots of problems but food production isn't one of them.

 

[fascinating]

Scientists disagree with you. Land cannot produce more than a certain level of food, oceanic farms are possible but have issues concerned with ecology and access in tidal waters, and increasing populations mean more land devoted to urban development. As much as you're optimistic, that's a rather ill-informed idea, and if you doubt it, please consult whichever science magazine you prefer. Sooner or later the issues will be described along with calls for changes in human feeding habits and concepts to fill the bellies of those who aren't going to be rich enough to afford the food they want according to common lifestyle expectation we take for granted. At the end of the day, I'm not the one issuing warnings - it's people better qualified than me who are writing these articles.

What nonesense. I read science magazines but none has said we will need to "eat insects or starve". If you have read magazines which say that, you should be able to point out one such magazine and the article where it was said. Clearly, you know of no such magazine and yet you still spout out this garbage.

 

[caldrail]

Garbage? You should listen to some of the news reports we get on these themes in Britain. it doesn't matter. If you want to believe it's garbage, that's up to you. Sooner or later you'll stumble across one.