First….Identify the Problem

FYI……. This was written before the coronavirus outbreak.

I always told my kids. The first step in solving a problem is to accurately identify the problem. If you come up with a dozen brilliant solutions to a problem, but it’s not the real problem, you get nowhere.

Spoiler alert……. What follows is not going to make you happy. You may disagree, because you don’t like it. But it is the truth.

The planet is getting warmer………deal with it. The right says it’s a temporary anomaly……… I’ll believe that and I’ll buy you a beer…….a nice cold one……. when it cools back down.

All Gore tells us that it’s Global Warming caused by CO2. As much as I dislike the guy, I have to give him half credit here. His book “An Inconvenient Truth” is halfway right. The planet is getting warming……but the problem is not CO2.

If you look at an historical graph of global temperature, you can see that the curve is fairly flat until about 1950, give or take. From there on we have inexorably warmed up. Something changed in 1950……but what? Either there was a sudden change in some critical determinant of global temperature or we crossed a threshold.

I believe that we crossed a threshold. Al Gore says it was the CO2 level. I say that CO2 is just another symptom of the real problem.

The real problem is overpopulation. In 1950 the world population was 2.5 billion…….. today it is almost 8 billion. Let that sink in. In my lifetime the population of the planet has TRIPLED. Just look at the traffic on the interstate and you can see this for yourself. Yes, we eat more meat. Yes, we drive more cars. Yes, we produce more CO2 and methane. But, the root problem is not greenhouse gasses. The root problem is overpopulation. I used to worry that we would someday reach a population level that the planet could not feed. I now realize that we have already passed a population level at which the waste that we produce has overwhelmed the Earth’s ability to absorb it. We have poisoned the Earth……..with CO2, methane, fluorocarbons, plastics, antibiotics, pesticides, etc….and we crossed that threshold around 1950. Being environmentally sensitive is a good thing. But, do you really believe that putting a solar panel on your roof is going to solve the problem of a world population that triples every 50 years?

We need to stop wasting our time worrying about graphs that superimpose global temperature and CO2 levels and start worrying about graphs that superimpose global temperature and population.

The solution is fairly straightforward. We need to get back to a global population of about 2 billion. Unfortunately, we are not going to do it. We will spend enormous resources on projects that will grow the population rather than decrease it.

Oddly enough, the ecosystem of our planet is an amazing equilibrium and it will adjust……..it will ultimately fix global warming…….without our help. The Earth will fix global warming by itself……..not because of; but rather, in spite of, our best efforts……..in spite of the best efforts of science and technology.

Enter, overcrowding, antibiotic resitant “super bugs”, deadly viruses, and the dearth of new antibiotics…….the so called “post antibiotic era”. We are headed for a devastating worldwide pandemic. Every 5 or 10 years we have a near miss. And…… unfortunately…..this is not just inevitable………it is necessary ……..for the survival of the Earth…….and, ironically, for the survival of our species.

To put it another way, without a catastrophic pandemic, or something very much like one, the planet Earth and mankind are doomed.

This is nothing new, the black plague, and the Spanish Flue killed significant percentages of the population, in some areas up to 50%. The coming pandemic will need to be worse than that to solve the problem.

Read “The Stand” by Stephen King or “Rainbow 6” by Tom Clancy for a preview.

So for the secular humanist, you have one of two futures to look forward to on this planet:

Global Warming with all of its consequences including mass extinction, food and water shortages, mass migration, wars over resources, coastal flooding, drought in the northern plains, etc.

Or

Global pandemic…….. sort of a catastrophic biologic “reset”.

And that is the best that science and secular humanism have to offer. We will try hard to delay these bad outcomes……but with the global population exploding…….16 billion humans by 2050…… realistically, the consequences of global warming will likely accelerate rather that slow down.

But

The Bible offers a third possibility……a divine “reset”. The Bible teaches that this Earth will come to a catastrophic end and that each of us will move on to one of two “new worlds”……one pleasant…….the other…….not so much.

Of all of the available options………the pleasant world after the “divine reset” of the Bible………… paradise………. is by far the most appealing to me.

Then I saw “a new heaven and a new earth,” for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away, and there was no longer any sea.  I saw the Holy City, the new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride beautifully dressed for her husband. And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, “Look! God’s dwelling place is now among the people, and he will dwell with them. They will be his people, and God himself will be with them and be their God.  ‘He will wipe every tear from their eyes.There will be no more death’ or mourning or crying or pain, for the old order of things has passed away.”

He who was seated on the throne said, “I am making everything new!” 

John, NIV