[lbo-talk] Narmada Dam (was Arundhati Roy etc.)

[Miles Jackson]

James Heartfield wrote:
> Miles asks an excellent question:
> 
> "But why is it good and necessary for the earth to have more than 4
> million people on it?  Sure, from the perspective of people in
> industrial societies, we think larger human populations are better, but
> that moral/ethical standard is a product of social life in an industrial
> society.  Societies with large populations are not "better" than
> societies with small populations, unless you arbitrarily use the
> standards of industrial societies to decide what's better."
> 
> Why is it necessary for the earth to have more than four million people on 
> it? Itis not necessary, but it is marvellous. People are marvellous, and the 
> more of them, the better. Just think of it this way, would the world be any 
> worse off if Miles, or Andie, or Sean or Patrick or Yoshie, or Wojtek oe me 
> were not on it? Probably not. But I am glad that every one of them is, and 
> all the other six billion, too. Is the world better off for having 
> Michaelangelo or Chin Peng, De Chirico or Ibn Battuta, Martin Heidegger or 
> Heraclitus, Ambrose Bierce or Jacques Verges, Brunel or Brunolesschi?

This is a pretty goofy argument!  I noticed that you didn't mention 
Hitler, Charles Manson, Pol Pot, or Guatemalan death squads in your 
list.  You can just as easily argue that more people means more 
opportunities for war, murder, rape, and other vicious atrocities.  In 
any case, the idea "the more people, the better" is a culturally 
specific belief that is not shared by people everywhere (e.g., consider 
China's attempt at population control).  Thus you're making my point for 
me: you're treating a culturally specific standard--"the more people, 
the better"--as a universal standard by which to judge other societies. 

  To be blunt, this seems like crass ethnocentrism to me.


> 
> There is nothing arbitrary about using the standards of industrial society, 
> when those standards put a greater value on human life than the standards of 
> hunter-gatherer society. That is why industrial society is superior to 
> hunter-gatherer society. More than that, that is why it is possible to see 
> the limitations of industrial society: it does not put enough value on human 
> life. 

But why is putting a value on human life the paramount standard by which 
to judge societies?  (Serious question.)  Once again, you're 
nonreflectively assuming that the values you've learned in your own 
society are universal standards.

Miles