Comment by DanBC | Hacker News Reader

Comment by DanBC | Hacker News Reader

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> What upcoming food shortage? Food production is largely a solved problem. We know how to sustainably produce large amounts of food from a given amount of arable land, and we have plenty of arable land to feed not just the current global population, but the projected maximum global population. It's true! We already have the ability to feed the largest population we'll ever have. True, Africa currently has food shortages, but as soon as Africa stops relying on peasant farming, that problem goes away. We can argue about when (or if) Africa is going to finally have their own Green Revolution[0], but...upcoming shortages? Do you know something the rest of us don't? :)

(I had a strong personal reaction to your tone; I find your tone really unpleasant. I recognise this is my problem. Sorry.)

You're right that there is enough food for everyone to be fed and live a productive life.[1] But there are still extensive problems sharing that food out.

Just one example: almost half of children under 5 in Nepal are stunted because of chronic malnutrition.[2]

Developing countries spend too much money importing food.[3]

There are problems now that are hard to overcome in future - climate change, desertification, salination, rates of HIV / AIDS in the farming population, migration, etc. Here's a set of photos showing some problems. (http://www.irinnews.org/photo/Slideshow/43/Too-Poor-to-Farm)

But there are interesting methods that show some promise - such as 'empowering women'.[4]

I don't think we are conquering global inequality. I think it's getting worse. And the environment might not recover eventually; it might go into runaway heating and boil off the atmosphere. Or it might recover eventually, after having killed off all human life.

[1] (http://www.wfp.org/hunger/faqs)

[2] (http://www.irinnews.org/Photo/Details/201112300839360722/A-y...)

[3] (http://www.irinnews.org/In-depth/77872/72/A-global-food-cris...)

[4] (http://www.irinnews.org/Report/95038/FOOD-Reduce-hunger-nurt...)

"I don't think we are conquering global inequality. I think it's getting worse."

I'm sure you think that, but the numbers are clear, and not really under any dispute. Global inequality has been falling steadily and rapidly since 1980; it's the biggest reduction in absolute poverty the world has ever seen. You can interpret those numbers however you like, but those are the numbers.

"And the environment might not recover eventually; it might go into runaway heating and boil off the atmosphere."

Not according to the IPCC and the "scientific consensus". :)

Some believe that equality means that the gap between the rich and poor is lessened, and if that was your frame of mind, then it does seem like global inequality has risen.

However, absolute poverty is decreasing just as you said, and i think that ought to be the real measure. Who cares if the richest of the rich is 100million times better off than the poorest, if the poorest is better off already?

This stuff is actually not as hard as you seem to be making it. We don't need all these "some believe" or "seem like" qualifirs.

First, what do we mean by "global inequality"? Well, let's break that down. We're talking about a metric measuring income dispersion, which is, yes, a measure of the gap between rich and poor. A common metric is the Gini Coefficient[1]. And instead of looking at the coefficient of a single country, if we look at the entire population, we get a metric of global inequality. Not hard, right?

Second, what have metrics of global inequality been doing since 1980? Why, they've been falling[2]!

So, yes, the "gap between the rich and poor [has] lessened". I have no idea why you or anyone else might think that it seems otherwise. Find an op-ed or column about the global economy from anytime in the past decade, and you've got a good chance of it either talking about how real incomes in the West (ie, the global 1%) are stagnating, or how real wages in China (ie, the global 99%) are booming. There's really no way this could happen and not result in a significant reduction in the gap between the rich and poor. And indeed, that's exactly what's resulted. (And to tie it back to a perennial HN favourite, the mechanism by which this has happened - an unprecedented reduction in global inequality and a massive reduction in absolute poverty - is exemplified by Apple and Foxconn.)

(You're also right that we could have a reduction in absolute poverty even as global inequality increased. But that's now what is happening.)

[1]: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gini_coefficient

[2]: I'm resisting supplying citations because a quick Google search will turn up, literally, pages of results. Still, if you want one image, this one[3] isn't bad.

[3]: http://media.economist.com/sites/default/files/cf_images/200...

And the environment might not recover eventually; it might go into runaway heating and boil off the atmosphere.

Runaway heating strikes me as highly unlikely. As temperature increases, blackbody radiation increases. Since solar input is very roughly constant, eventually a new equilibrium will be found where energy lost to space once again equals energy received from the sun.

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