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Comment by spodek | Hacker News Reader

Trees don't solve our other environmental problems of plastic, carcinogens, extinctions, etc.

Yes, plant trees as a partial solution. Consider it a starting point, nowhere near an endpoint.

We can dance around it all we like, partial solutions like planting trees don't address that the environment reacts to our population and behavior.

Ultimately we must lower our birth rate and produce less or we will override partial solutions. Projections about or population leveling off would change when assumptions change, like the world being cleaner from planting all these trees. Unless we change our cultural values, goals, and behavior away from growth and externalizing costs.

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I do agree, and I do agree about over population is a problem.

But question, who must lower their birth rate? And how do you implement such a plan? How do you punish people that makes sense? That's a super tricky problem and can't just be waved around. China attempted this... and there's a term that comes to mind on how that turned out... cluster fuck. I mean, I'm not going to vote for any law that says if you have a child outside your allowed quota, then the child is "disposed" or taken away. Thus, how do you enforce it? Tax the piss out of someone? Just to make them poorer and then those kids have a piss poor life even worse than normal?

The population level off isn't tied to the climate being cleaned. It's based on the concept that if countries go from developing to first world status, they adopt 1st world birthing rates of 2 kids or less. Do I buy that argument? Eh? Maybe, to an extent. But knowing human nature. There's going to be a country or two that will propaganda to have more kids to out beat the rest of the world. Humans have a habit trying to gain an advantage over other people. If there's one to be had, they'll have it.

They will adopt 1st world birthing rates and 1st world consumption rates.

> Projections about or population leveling off would change when assumptions change, like the world being cleaner from planting all these trees.

You have it backwards. People in clean, wealthy countries tend to have fewer kids than even the 2.1 required to maintain stable numbers. It's people in developing places, where the environment is often dirty and unhealthy, who have the most children.

Planting trees will not lead to overpopulation.

People in the US also produce ~5x more emissions per capita than people in poor countries so not sure how that math works out in our favor.

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