A fair world=? Or?

[SoNR]

WHat would a fair world be to you? Is the world of today fair? Isn't the world situation something like the apartheid in South-Africa? Many suffer, many die, many do not get any rights, even though they have the right to...The world trade organization has messed up the world, because the 3rd world countries have nothing to say in it, and they have to pay huge sums every year to it, not being able to support their own population w/ their needs...
What realistic measures could help the world to become a better place? I call myself lucky, because I'm a citizen of one of the wealthiest countries in the world, and if I someday become handicapped I have many basic rights, and if I don't ghet those rights I could then get the attention of the massmedia, and I'd probably get my rights fulfilled... The western world has enough resources and wealth, and should share it with the poor countries of the world, to share oppurtunities with those who weren't as fortunate with where they were born... We are all of the same species and we all need things like love and security and shelter and food...
I will say more on this matter later...

 

[welsh]

Good question SoNR. I added a poll. Hope you don't mind.

 

[SkynetV4]

Don't think the topic is worthless for the lack of replies SoNR. This one will need a lot of thinking and personally I can't reply with a good solution right now.

 

[Pipboy2000]

God did make a perfect world, his fault was giving humans free-will. If only everyone showed him respect for his accomplishments. Err.... I should say "her" accomplishments, refer to "Dogma"

 

[MorGan]

There is no chanse of worl being fair to everybody... Ever.. You hippie...

 

[alec]

A fair world for everyone, huh? It's an interesting topic. I took some lectures on it while I was still a student. Professor Vermeersch gave them. I don't even remember half of what he said during those lectures, but he did refer to something called the "Scylla-Charybdis-principle": If that part of the worldpopulation that lives in welfare becomes bigger, the ecosystem will be more and more endangered. If the ecosystem gets more secured, than more people will live in total misery.

The thing is: there's way too many people on this small planet. Earth just cannot support the more than 6 billion people that live on it today in an equal way, with the same wealth and stuff. Actually: if everyone on this planet would like to be as rich and prosperous as we in the West are nowadays, the worldpopulation would have to be restricted to approx. 1 billion humans.

In short: all of the resources on this planet are limited in one way or another. The rest is struggle for survival: the one that gets his hands on most of the resources, is just the smarter/stronger one. Yeah, life's a bitch...

 

[NgInE]

i think it's an outrage, that so many people live in hunger, while we have enough recouses to feed 12 bilioun (yes, 12) mouths!!! but because of the current economical system, so many people simple die, because a bunch of greedy bastards, who drive in cars bigger then their ego's, simple won't compromise! now you tell me if this is a fair world.

 

[Sander]

I disagree, Blade Runner. Even thought the current version of the world is not fair, that does not mean it cannot be. There may not be enough fossil fuels to go around, bu hydrogen power is coming up, which is very abundant. And the third world countries in Africa could theoretically live off the constant solar power they could get there. The world isn't fair, but it can be. Theoretically....

 

[Maverick]

The world simply can't be fair to everyone. If everyone was happy, it'd be a Utopia of sorts, and that's impossible. There's no real way to rationalize it, but it's the truth.

 

[Sander]

Tell me, then, why is it not possible? Why would a Utopia be impossible(besides people being malcontent, let's ignore that). It's possible for everyone to live the same (good) lives. Then it is a fair world, when everyone can live their life under the same conditions as everyone else.

 

[alec]

we have enough recouses to feed 12 bilioun (yes, 12) mouths!!!

That is a whole load of Brahmin crap, my friend. Whoever told you that is way too optimistic. Good crops need some sort of irrigation system, so you'd need heaps of drinking water and drinking water is very rare on this planet. Making salt water into drinkable water = expensive, you need energy, electricity, fuels... Really, guys, no kidding: this little ball we live on can NOT support so many people. You say it can feed 12 billion mouths? Well then: why can't we properly feed 6 billion mouths (only half of it!) nowadays? Because it is NOT possible.

There may not be enough fossil fuels to go around, but hydrogen power is coming up, which is very abundant.

Water is the prime concern here, people. Drinking water and food. And yeah, I know: hydrogen power will make water as a by-product, but that won't do it either. And solar power is great but the manufacturing process of light-sensitive materials is highly polluting. Wanna make 6, no make that 12 billion solar panels the size of a small playground to deliver us the energy we need?

Thing is: if the whole goddamn world wants our wealth and healthcare and dental plans and dvd's and drugs and make up, the world is doomed. If we agree to give every single soul on this planet the same wealth and blablabla, we in the West will have to give up lots and lots and lots of riches. We'd become dissatisfied and poor and probably very unhappy ('cause we're used to this). Every soul on this planet would basically have to become poor although some people, who were really poor before, might actually become just a tiny little bit richer. They'd have something to eat on a daily basis instead of on a weekly basis, and hey, maybe they'd be wearing pants for a change. But all of us rich bastards would have to stop buying pc-games and candy and weed and some port to go with diner. You get the idea.

 

[Sander]

You say it can feed 12 billion mouths? Well then: why can't we properly feed 6 billion mouths (only half of it!) nowadays? Because it is NOT possible.

No, because we're all a bunch of egoistic over-consumers.

Blade Runner, you are way too fixated on what is possible NOW rather than what will be possible later on. Now, from what I know, hydrogen power can solve a lot of problems on it's own, so could nuclear power, and the usage of water power, like they have in Norway. The main problem is not the presence of resources, but the distribution and usage of it.

 

[alec]

Blade Runner, you are way too fixated on what is possible NOW rather than what will be possible later on. Now, from what I know, hydrogen power can solve a lot of problems on it's own, so could nuclear power, and the usage of water power, like they have in Norway. The main problem is not the presence of resources, but the distribution and usage of it.

Hehe, that's funny coming from you, Sander. For someone who doubts science as much as you do, you seem to have a greater trust in it than I have, and I'm all science, you know that. But believing that science will one day solve all of our problems (the really big ones, like poverty and hunger and thurst and pollution) is not the right way to go. It's actually pretty naive, imo. "Hey, I don't believe Sagan and Hawkings and Einstein and what-d'ye-call'em, but science will make this world into a fair world one day." Hmpf! "Hey, there's a hole in the ozone layer, you say? Bwah, don't worry, science will fill it up in about, hm, 5 years or so, trust me." Yeah, sure. We have to see about that.

 

[Sander]

First of all, that is NOT what I said. Second of all, I NEVER SAID THAT I DON'T BELIEVE EINSTEIN AND HAWKINGS AND WHATNOT. I merely said that they are not necessarily right. *sigh*

 

[alec]

First of all, that is NOT what I said. Second of all, I NEVER SAID THAT I DON'T BELIEVE EINSTEIN AND HAWKINGS AND WHATNOT. I merely said that they are not necessarily right. *sigh*

Nit picker

You know I'm right. I'm saying this world is doomed. You can already see the signs of the impending apocalyps: wars for oil, holy wars, poverty, strange diseases, climat changes, crazy Dutch people who annoy the shit out of me... When will it stop, when will it stop...

I for one don't believe in a system that would give everyone on Earth an equal share of the world's riches.

 

[Brother None]

You know I'm right. I'm saying this world is doomed. You can already see the signs of the impending apocalyps: wars for oil, holy wars, poverty, strange diseases, climat changes, crazy Dutch people who annoy the shit out of me...

Change that to "the current status of the world is doomed" and I'll agree.

It's a bit of typical arrogance that you see in humans at all time to think the center of humanity/their faith (especially with Christians)/etc. is completely and utterly dependant on this moment and this place. Screw that. "The world" will survive anything us nutjobs do, and in all likelyhood our current countries will collapse before we get a chance to destroy ourselves.

I mean, seriously, we'd survive nuclear war too, in all probability. We might not be looking too pretty afterwards, but we'll live...

Humanity may lay claims to the capability to wipe itself out at this moment in time, but I put question-marks on how capable we are of that feat right now. We'll probably be wiped out at some point, yeah, but it'll prolly be by something bigger than us. Like the sun.

 

[Ozrat]

I voted for the "it was a perfect world until we came along" option. Just not the God part.

Seriously, nature does have its balance. What are we humans doing? Fucking it up the ass. As long as our population and food production rates keep going up, we're only going to crash even harder when our actions catch up with us. Just look at the massive imbalance that exists between different populations in the world. Personally, I can't wait for the end of Western Civilization. Until then, I'll just keep on riding its coattails because there's nothing else I can do at the moment.

 

[welsh]

I have to lean more towards Kharn on this one. Chances are we won't wipe ourselves out and that we will get past this mess.

I also think we could feed 12 billion people, and that a lot of the issues of today- oil, religious conflict, etc, has been seen before in one capacity or another and we still managed to keep ourselves humming along. In fact, I would say things are much better today than 20 years ago when Reagan was heating up the Cold War again.

Why are some folks rich and some folks poor? Politics and money. For the rest of the world to have the quality of life in the West would, today, cost the West too much and probably wouldn't work. The reason is that many governments in countries around the world have a class system built around political power. Unless we are to go in and change the systems, as if that were even possible or an answer, then maybe. But we can't and don't want too.

The world is composed of a bunch of self-interested rational actors that would fuck each other in a heart beat if necessary. It's getting better, and wealth is spreading. But we aren't nearly there yet. So yes, the status quo is inherently unfair, and it really sucks to be poor.

ANd no this is not a hippy question but identifies both your optimism and cynicism.

 

[KurganFr]

Would this be an appropriate moment to mention Gordon of Gecko's "Greed is good"?

All communities of a certain size have a leader, someone with ambition to be more than simply a member of the community, because it's part of human nature and also for convenience's sake when interacting with other communities.
People who want to make the world fairer will never be political leaders because their opponents are ruthless self-interested *b-word*s who will resort to almost any method, however immoral, to fulfill their ambition. The *b-word*s will also appeal more to the greedy component in the vast majority of voters (in a democracy) by promising to improve their situation.
In any case, even if only a few countries/communities have greedy opportunists as leaders, it prevents the world from being completely fair. It's human nature, we have to live with it. Unfortunately.

 

[SoNR]

People in the third world should get less children, because the larger the population gets the harder it is to sustain it... There will always be done unjustice... Humans have wills of their own and so some people will suppress others to get what they want...The western world couldn't have been that rich today if it hadn't bee nfor the third world countries... I still think that the western world should help the third world countries to come out of some of their misery... I lived in Cambodia for 15months and I've seen the misery of a corrupted government... With power comes a great responsibility, and some people just can't handle it and uses it to reach their own ends... It is very hard to prevent this, unfortunately...