Anecdotally, while driving along Minnesota's segment of I94 in the '90s, one would have to stop and scrape the bugs off the front window and grill. Today, this is no longer a problem.
Same here, but in California's Central Valley.
Where have all the insects gone?
41–50 of 299 posts
Re: Where have all the insects gone?
#42Earlier quoted context omitted.
There are no "Marxist" countries on the planet. I'm not sure there ever were. I think I understand what you're trying to say, but someone could very easily take what you wrote as the suggestion that there are two types of countries: "capitalist" and "non-capitalist (Marxist)". That's... you should actually read Marx, or decide on a less fraught descriptor. For that matter, how much of the ecological devastation in th…
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> Oh yeah, "that wasn't true communism".
"Marxism"? "Communism"? What are we talking about again? Eh, who cares what words mean when you can bludgeon people with them! It's all "non-capitalist", which is a word that means "bad".
Re: Where have all the insects gone?
#43Re: Where have all the insects gone?
#44Earlier quoted context omitted.
Historically, the capitalist countries have been much less-polluted ('cleaner') and more environmentally friendly in general than the communist countries. With respect to 'socialist' countries, the correlations depend on exactly how you define socialism, and which countries you include/exclude.
I think there’s enough contradictory information here to make clear ideological statements like that indefensible. The late USSR was far dirtier than America of the same period, yes, but neither can hold a candle to pre-EPA America or late industrial revolution England. Heck, London had a coal smoke smog in 1952 that killed 10-12K people in a week. Regardless, I find this discussion to be an unwelcome diversion. The…
North Korea and Cuba have been disasters, and I think you're wrong about the USSR being cleaner than pre-EPA USA. China has been a mess throughout its self-professed communist history as well; you may dispute its degree of communism, but it certainly has more nationalized industries (of the sort proposed in parent comments) than the USA or any other 'capitalist' country.
Re: Where have all the insects gone?
#45Earlier quoted context omitted.
Without the full article it's tough to say, but my refute would be about my local environment. There has absolutely been a MASSIVE decline in NATIVE insects (among other things). Instead we have more asian beetles, emerald ash borers, and japanese beetles than you can shake a stick at. So while yes, technically the numbers may remain neutral, I'm not sure we can call it a healthy distribution.
> my refute would be about my local environment Is it an urban environment? Most people's environments isn't a reasonable reference.
That would be spread across a residence outside of the city, one inside city limits, and a cabin in the middle of nowhere.
The only insect I'm aware of that seems to still be in full force that is native are mosquitos. Dragonflies, lightning bugs, lady bugs, moths, butterflies, etc. are sadly all rare sightings.
Re: Where have all the insects gone?
#46Sometimes I get the sense that people hate that we exist, in the numbers that we do, because of our impact on the earth by merely existing. A self-hatred if you will. And before you respond with "if only we did X, it would be fine," consider that the difficulty of convincing/coercing lots of people to do things is also an inherent part of our existence. Also part of our existence is the incentive to cheat to get ahea…
The problem is that we life under a system that demands endless growth on a finite plane. It's pretty clear that the human population has grown beyond the ability of the planet to sustain a progression towards universal industrialization. Humans have nowhere else to live and we're eroding what underpins our ability to survive. We more than tripled the human population in the last 100 years. In my own lifetime, the hu…
I've read studies that show human population peaking around 2100 and slowly lessening until it finds a happy medium. This is due to increased access to birth control in developing nations as well as people simply having less children because automation on the farm replaces the need to have several workers (the kids) around to help with the harvest, etc.
Link to article: https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2019/06/17/worlds-popu...
Re: Where have all the insects gone?
#47Earlier quoted context omitted.
>We can't live like native Americans with iPhones. We probably could in the next 100 years through automation, massive reduction in population, and making things to last instead of making things to be replaced. Building a society whose values aren't based around never-ending growth. We won't, but we could.
There is a good anti-growth counter argument/observation in Homo Deus. Population growth necessitates economic growth otherwise you end up with unemployment which destabilizes society and can lead to war. If you don't have population growth you still need economic growth to provide upward mobility to people at the bottom. Without growth you have a zero-sum game which again can lead to war. Ideally improvements in eff…
>If you don't have population growth you still need economic growth to provide upward mobility to people at the bottom. Without growth you have a zero-sum game which again can lead to war.
OR you reset wealth upon death. You don't necessarily need unlimited growth if you prevent wealth from pooling at the top.
Re: Where have all the insects gone?
#48[flagged]
@babycake I take it that you are making a dig at Western society as a whole or just the U.S.? I think if you took some time and traveled to some of the non-capitalist (Marxist) countries you might see the utter horrifical ecological damage that they are doing and have done to the world. I think if all told you might find that capitalist countries have done a better job with the environment - I am not saying they have…
dramatically off-topic
Re: Where have all the insects gone?
#49Anecdotally, while driving along Minnesota's segment of I94 in the '90s, one would have to stop and scrape the bugs off the front window and grill. Today, this is no longer a problem.
Could that be explained by improved aerodynamics of cars now compared to then? Has that been studied?
Re: Where have all the insects gone?
#50[flagged]
If only the government had nationalised industry, these bugs would be alive?
I mean, probably? If we had elected good officials at least. I'm not defending socialism at all, but if you accept the fact that this kind of thing happens because there's no monetary incentive for the industry to avoid it, then the logical conclusion is that under a system not motivated by profit this would be less likely to happen.
But what I'm sure you are aware of this line of thinking. What is the argument against it?