By Christopher M. Riggs Steven W. Mosher says God has not rescinded the first commandment given to our first parents, “be fertile and multiply and fill the earth.” And we’re a long way from filling the earth, he said in an interview from his office in Front Royal, Va. Mosher, an anthropologist and president of the Population Research Institute, said the problem in most countries of the world is not overpopulation but underpopulation. That was the same message he delivered Oct. 31 to the National Press Club in Washington, D.C., in response to the United Nation’s announcement of the birth of the seven billionth person in the world. “We are grateful that Baby Seven Billion will come into this world,” Mosher said. “The attitude of the anti-people types is arrogant and elitist. They say, in effect, to Africans, Asians and Latin Americans: ‘There are just enough of us, but there are way too many of you.’” In the 1960s and 1970s many governments bought into the idea that a population time bomb was set to explode, he said, adding that when facing such situations “governments either tend to do nothing or they tend to overreact.” One result of governmental overreaction is that the world’s population will peak in about 30 years. “We don’t know the exact number, but we do know that the birth rates are falling everywhere. We do know that in half of the countries of the world people are having too few children to maintain their current populations.” Many countries face a demographic crisis as a result, he said. “In Germany, for example, and Italy and Japan, they fill more coffins each year than cradles.” After the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991, Russia was left with a population of about 148 million. Today Russia has about 144 million people. As a result of the decline, the government declared a demographic crisis. “If you lose two-thirds of a million people a year out of a population of 144 million and if you don’t get your birthrate up, you better decide who you want to give your country to,” he said, “because someone else is going to inherit those lands in the future.” To overcome the problem of a shrinking population, Mosher has advised the Russian government to be generous to couples having children by sheltering them from all taxes. He recommends that the United States do the same. Young couples raising children “shouldn’t be paying into Social Security, for example, because they’re raising future taxpayers who will help keep Social Security solvent in the years to come,” he said. A percentage of student loans should also be forgiven for each child a couple brings into the world “because again they are providing for the future in the most fundamental way by providing for future generations.” Mosher, who was the first American social scientist allowed to do research in China in 1979, said China also faces demographic problems as a result of its one-child policy. “This is a great moral catastrophe for the Chinese people. It has cheapened human life in China…but it is also an economic disaster. Has China really made itself better by eliminating 400 million of the most productive enterprising and intelligent people in the world has ever seen? I don’t think so.” There are now labor shortages in China’s coastal provinces, he said, adding that by next year the labor shortage there will be nationwide. The scarcity of food is the common objection by those who say the world is overpopulated, Mosher said, adding that they will point to photos of starving children and say there isn’t enough food to go around. “Their response, in many cases, is not to say well, let’s produce more food or let’s make sure food is distributed those who need it,” he said, “Their response is often to say those children are suffering so much it would have been better if they had never been born.” Mosher said the U.N.’s Food and Agriculture Organization has stated that with current agricultural technology and with the current amount of land under cultivation, the world could produce enough food to feed 12 billion people. The problem is not our ability to produce food, he said, the problem is overcoming the economic challenges to feed the hungry that result from governmental abuses and corruption. “The other side thinks that the number of seats at the banquet table of life is limited. And if more people come along then perhaps they or their friends might be forced to give up their seats to these newcomers. So they try to eliminate the newcomers, they try to eliminate the children who would otherwise come into existence and want a seat at the table,” Mosher said. “I think that our goals should be to set more seats at the banquet table of life rather than to artificially limit the number. I think that the more seats we set at the banquet table of life the better off we will all be at the end of the day.” Mosher believes God has given mankind the capacity to take care of itself as the population of the world grows. “Who would have imagined a century ago that we would be turning sand on the beach into silicon chips and make communications like the one where having now possible?” he said. “If you look at the long stand of human history, I think it’s fairly clear that God designed this world to be a cornucopia, a horn of plenty, for us as we carefully and prudently tap into its resources.” Trust in God, he advises young couples, and don’t put artificial limits on the number of children you might have. “Don’t decide in advance that you’re going to have two children or don’t decide in advance that you’re going to have any given number. Decide that as life goes on, as opportunities arise, and as God places in your heart a desire to co-create with him another spark of the divine that comes into the world to enjoy life in this world with you. And, of course, after making the right choice enjoying eternity in heaven with God as well.”
Posted on: Thu, 05 Dec 2013 02:27:58 +0000
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