The Story of B (Ishmael 2) - Page 89

This is demonstration number one. Into a nice roomy cage we introduce two young, healthy mice. The cage has a built-in feeder that enables us to make food available to the mice in any quantity we like. After installing the two mice, we shove in two kilos of food. This is obviously much more than two mice need, but that will do no harm and you’ll soon see the point of it. Next day, we take out the feeder, discard the uneaten food, and replace it with another two kilos. We do this every day. Soon the two mice become four, the four become eight, the eight become sixteen, the sixteen become thirty-two. This population growth confirms the fact that these mice have plenty of food. We continue to put in two kilos of food every day and, as time goes on, more and more of it is eaten; this isn’t a surprise, because there are more and more mice eating it. Eventually there comes a day when all of it is eaten. No matter. We continue to put two kilos of food in the cage every day, and every day the two kilos of food are eaten. Now guess what happens to that population, which has been growing so busily from day one of the demonstration. It stops growing. It levels off. Again, this is no surprise at all. As we continue to supply two kilos of food a day, we count the mice daily for a year and see that the population fluctuates between two hundred eighty and three hundred twenty, with an average of three hundred. Two kilos of food every day will maintain about three hundred mice. That’s demonstration one.

Demonstration two begins much the same way. Cage. Two mice. This time, however, we follow a different procedure. Instead of putting in the same amount of food every day, we start with one amount and increase it daily. However much the pair of mice eat the first day, we put in fifty percent more the second day. However much they eat the second day, we put in fifty percent more the third day. Before long there are four mice. No matter, we follow our procedure. Whatever they eat in a day, we put in fifty percent more the next. Before long there are eight mice, sixteen mice, thirty-two mice. No matter, whatever they eat in one day, we put in fifty percent more the next. Sixty-four mice, a hundred twenty-eight, two hundred fifty, five hundred, a thousand. Whatever the mice eat in one day, we put in fifty percent more the next, carefully extending the sides of the cage as needed to avoid stressful overcrowding. Two thousand, four thousand, eight thousand, sixteen thousand, thirty-two thousand, sixty-four thousand. At this point, someone runs in and yells, “Stop! Stop! This is a population explosion!”

Golly! I guess you’re right! What shall we do?

I have a suggestion. Let’s start by answering this question: How much did the sixty-four thousand mice eat yesterday? Answer: five hundred kilos of food. Okay. Well, ordinarily, we’d put seventy-five hundred kilos of food into the cage tomorrow, but let’s abandon that procedure now. Our new procedure will be based on this theory: Yesterday five hundred kilos was enough for them, so why shouldn’t five hundred kilos be enough for them today?

So today we put just five hundred kilos of food into the cage, same as yesterday.

Now watch closely. There are no food riots. Why should there be? The mice have just as much to eat today as they did yesterday.

Now watch closely again. No mice are starving. Why would there be?

Now it’s tomorrow, and again we put just five hundred kilos of food into the cage.

Again, watch closely. There are still no food riots. Still no mice starving.

We do it again on day three. Again, no food riots, no mice starving.

But aren’t new mice being born? Of course—and old mice are dying.

Day four, day five, day six. I’m waiting for the food riots, but there are no food riots. I’m waiting for the famine, but there is no famine.

There are sixty-four thousand mice, and five hundred kilos of food will feed sixty-four thousand mice. Why should there be riots? Why should there be famine?

Oh—and I almost forgot to mention it—the population explosion stopped overnight. What else could it do? Population growth has to be supported by increased food availability. Always. Without exception. Less food—decline. More food—growth. Same food—stability. That’s what we’ve got here: Stability.

Demonstration three. This demonstration is identical to demonstration two right up to the end. Sixty-four thousand mice, five hundred kilos of food, stability. Then the head of the department charges in and says, “Who needs sixty-four thousand mice? These mice are eating us out of house and home. What’s special about sixty-four thousand mice anyhow? Why not eight thousand? Why not four thousand?”

Oh my, what a crisis. Quick—check the Yellow Pages, see if anyone makes condoms for mice! What, no condoms for mice!?! Well, look under Family Planning! What, no family planning for rodents!?!

No, you know this would not be the reaction. You know this because you understand the B in the ABCs of ecology. We don’t need birth control. All we need is food control.

Someone says, here’s what we do. Yesterday five hundred kilos of food went into the cage. Today we’ll reduce that by a kilo. Oh no, another objects. A kilo is too much. Let’s reduce it by a quarter of a kilo. So that’s what they do. Four hundred ninety-nine and three quarters kilos of food go into the cage. Tension in the lab as everyone waits for food riots and famine—but of course there are no food riots and no famine. Among sixty-four thousand mice, a quarter of a kilo of food is like a flake of dandruff apiece.

Tomorrow four hundred ninety-nine and a half kilos of food go into the cage. Still no food riots and no famine.

This procedure is followed for a thousand days—and not once is there a food riot or a famine. After a thousand days only two hundred fifty kilos of food are going into the cage—and guess what? There are no longer sixty-four thousand mice in the cage. There are only thirtytwo thousand. Not a miracle—just a demonstration of the laws of ecology. A decline in food availability has been answered by a decline in population. As always. Semper et ubique. Nothing to do with riots. Nothing to do with famine. Just the normal response of a feeder population to the availability of food.

Objections

I’ve been surprised by how challenging people find these ideas. They feel menaced by them. They get angry. They feel I’m attacking the foundation of their lives. They feel I’m calling into question the blessedness of the greatest blessing of civilized life. They somehow feel I’m questioning the sacredness of human life itself.

I’d like to deal with some of the objections people make to these ideas. I do this not to discourage you from expressing objections of your own but because I can express these objections as rudely as I like to myself without making anyone nervous.

I’ll deal with the most general objection first, which is that humans are not mice. This is of course absolutely true, especially at the individual level. Each of us as an individual is capable of making reproductive choices that mice absolutely cannot make. Nonetheless—and this is the point that ecology makes and that I’ve made here today—our behavior as a biological population is indistinguishable from the behavior of any other biological population. In defense of that statement, I offer the evidence of ten thousand years of obedience to this fundamental law of ecology: An increase in food availability for a species means growth for that species.

I’ve been told that it doesn’t have to be this way. I’ve been told that it’s possible for us to increase food production and simultaneously reduce our population. This is basically the position taken by birth-control advocates. This is basically the position taken by well-intentioned organizations that undertake to improve indigenous agricultural techniques in Third World countries. They want to give technologically undeveloped peoples the means of increasing their population with one hand and birth-control aids with the other hand—even though we know full well that these birth-control aids don’t even work for us! They’re certain that we can go on increasing food production while ending population growth through birth control. This represents a denial of the B in the ABCs of ecology.

History—and not just thirty years of history but ten thousand years of history—offers no support whatever for the idea that we can simultaneously increase food production and end population growth. On the contrary, history resoundingly confirms what ecology teaches: If you make more food available, there will be more people to consume it.

Obviously the matter is different at the individual level. Old Macdonald on his farm can increase food production and simultaneously hold his family’s growth to zero, but this clearly isn’t the end of the story. What’s he going to do with that increase he produced on his farm? Is he going to soak it in gasoline and burn it? If so, then he hasn’t actually produced an increase at all. Is he going to sell it? Presumably that is what he’s going to do with it, and if he does sell it, then that increase enters the annual agricultural increase that serves to support our global population growth.

I’m often told that even if we stop increasing food production, our population will continue to grow. This represents a denial of both the A and the B of the ABCs of ecology. The A in the ABCs of ecology is this: We are food. We are food because we are what we eat—and what we eat is food. To put it plainly, each and every one of us is made from food.

When people tell me that our population will continue to add new millions even if we stop increasing food production, then I have to ask what these additional millions of people will be made of, since no additional food is being produced for them. I have to say, “Please

bring me some of these people, because if they’re not made of food, I want to know what they are made of. Is it moonbeams or rainbow dust or starlight or angel’s breath or what?”

Tags: Daniel Quinn Ishmael Classics
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