Dr Paul Collins. Author of 11 books. He is a well-known broadcaster and Catholic theologian with a Masters degree in theology from Harvard University and a Doctorate in history from the Australian National University. His latest book is Judgment Day: The struggle for life on earth. In it he provides sobering predictions about the future but he is absolutely convinced that the crisis can only be dealt with through a new way of thinking.

Dr Collins was on a panel discussing Climate Change & Population: The Intimate Connection. Kelvin Thomson MP and Larissa Waters (Senator elect) were also on the panel chaired by Professor Ian Lowe.

Dr Collins said: We have never been in the whole history of our race with a population completely out of control. This is an entirely NEW situation. For an historian to say something is new means it is very big. We are fast approaching a situation that is catastrophic (if not already reached).

The Optimum Population Trust in the UK has come up with the concept of ‘carrying capacity’ for countries. Most countries are already living well beyond their carrying capacity.

Table p 84: Australia population 22m; carrying capacity 18 m
UK pop 60m cc 23m
Israel pop 6m cc 1m
China pop 1.3 billion (1300 million) cc 168 m
India pop 1 billion(1000m) cc 103 m
Egypt pop 67m cc 6m
Bangladesh pop 135m cc 6m
Nigeria pop 111 m cc 10m
Pakistan pop 138m cc 26m

The situation is impossible. Human numbers are now so far beyond sustainablility as to render the concept of sustainability irrelevant.

The great religious traditions have had little to say about over population. Generally all of them have been officially characterised by a pro-reproduction stance especially when it applies to their own members. ‘Officially’ because there is and always was a real difference between what church or religious officials taught and what ordinary believers actually did. For instance in Australia Catholic fertility has remained almost in lock-step with national fertility since the late 19th century and is now slightly below that of the rest of the population.

The question of population impacts directly on the future of the natural world and its myriad species. Linked to climate change it is the most important issue facing humankind. It is not just about a so-called personalist ehtis. If anything it is about a universalist ethic a morality focusing on how humankind relates not just to itself but to the whole world around it.

For those concerned about population pressures the questions are not primarily about individual reproductive or social justice rights. The reality we confront now is that a billion people are under-nourished or starving. We cannot feed the people on earth now let alone those who will be born in the future. And the more of us there are the greater the effects of climate change and environmental destruction are going to be. There are clearly profound broad-scale ehtical issues here.

6.8 billion people and rising is already completely unsustainable. We’re now way beyond the earth’s physical carrying capacity and are already facing acute food shortages. Those advocating technological fixes some of which may or may not be successful turn a blind eye to the loss of biodiversity water shortages land degradation and increasing salinity..

Humanity has never been in this kind of situation before. This means we have to rethink some of our moral presuppositions. At the core of the population problem is a conflict of rights: the right of individuals to reproduce and the right of other species and whole ecosystems to continue to exist.

Aquinas said the world and its species are icons of God. Everything that exists shows something of the image of God and to lose any of it is to lose something of our contact with God. To reduce the natural world to a kind of human feed-lot is to destroy the possiblity of experiencing transcendence and to drive out whole aspects of the divine presence.

Is it possible to develop a genuine Christian response to the question of population?

And here Dr Collins turns to the 4 cardinal virtues: Prudence fortitude temperance and justice.

P57. What is prudence? Aquinas follows Aristotle in his interpretation of prudence as ‘practical wisdom’. Prudence is reasoned regulation of conduct reasoning well about the whole business of living well. It is an acquired virtue; it requires an alertness and shrewdness of mind. Prudence demands that we always act cautiously and make sure that all our actions are appropriate to the demands of natural law which is geared to protecting out planet. Aquinas says that prudence is cognitive rather than instinctive in the sense that it requires ‘memory reasoning understanding willingness to confront the evidence and practical in that it needs ‘foresight circumspection and caution.’ To live a good moral life you not only have to know the moral law but you also have to be able to apply that knowledge in complex ethical situations. He also sees prudence as a kind of foresight. Prudence considers issues that are ahead of us in the distance in so far as they are a help or hindrance to what we decide at the present moment. A prudent man looks to the future. He is sharp-sighted and foresees uncertainties. Prudence is to know the future from the present and the past.

All of this has clear resonance in the context of a world threatened by climate change and with a population far exceeding the earth’s carrying capacity.

If prudence is the primary element of moral judgment then it is clearly acting sinfully to do nothing or just try to put a bandaid on a global crisis. This is a moral issue and we don’t have time to mince words. We need to apply moral pressure in regard to climate change and population.

Dr Collins goes on to talk about the other cardinal virtues of fortitude temperance and justice.

He believes we will need fortitude to confront and persevere on these issues.

We will all need to develop temperance involving self-control self-sacrifice and genuine asceticism – that is a willingness to make sacrifices for the greater good. We need as a species. To reduce our use of resources to lower our standards of living and to think of those coming after us.

Finally justice which Aquinas defines as ‘a habit according to which each person constantly and continuously bestows on others what is due to them.’ Justice is essentially social and communal. If there is one thing we owe to our children and grandchildren and people in the future it is a liveable world a place of beauty and diversity in which other species flourish. This is percisely what is threatened.

We tend to think of sin in far too narrow and personalised a context. We see it as what individuals do. This allows whole communities to collude in utterly reprehensible behaviour: doing next to nothing to change our addictions to burning coal for power and not curbing our use of fossil fuels. Inertia is not an excuse. To do nothing involves us all in sinful situations.

All Germans who lived between 1932 and 1945 were caught up in Nazism. Nowadays we are all caught up in climate change. Perhaps it is not as obviously sinful as Nazism but in the long term it will be far more destructive. In these circumstances it is the role of the virtuous person to make a stand to speak out. That is why fortitude is a cardinal virtue. The problem is that once you are aware of an issue like climate change or environmental destruction or global overpopulation you become bound to act. Sinful collusions begins when you do nothing.

The world is adding the equivalent of one China’s worth of people every ten years one Mexico’s worth every year one New York City’s worth every month one Australia’s worth in 3.5 months.

Australia’s current population growth rate is very high. Indonesia 1.16 Iran 1.35 Bangladesh 1.67 Russia -0.51 Australia 2.1. This is the highest growth rate in 40 years. 64% of this is accounted for by net overseas migration. Natural increase (excess of births over deaths) accounted for 36%

To decide to have a child is not a purely subjective act by an individual couple or woman. It involves broader social and environmental issues:
Q. Can this child be nurtured cared for and fed?
Can the family and the community support it?
What demands will meeting the child’s needs place on the local environment? Can these be met?
Is there evidence that the particular area where the child is to be born is already over-populated?
Is this leading to environmental destruction?

Public debate about these issues is divisive because deeply held philosophical and religious convictions underlie all approaches to the question of population. Given that the debate is about the control of fertility it touches everyone.

The other powerful speaker on population was Kelvin Thomson MP with a clear [url=http://www.kelvinthomson.com.au/Editor/assets/pop_debate/091111%20population%20reform%20paper.pdf]14 point plan for population reform[/url] addressing population in both Australia and globally. Crucially he argues that every country in the world must take responsibility for stabilising its own population so that births = deaths in each country. Every country including Australia should be asked to do no more and no less than this. This is a much more equitable task that dealing with the difference between developed and developing countries on climate change.