Drunk Elephants kill six people

I wonder if they had to put "Killed by drunken elephants" on the death certificates. Can't be a nice way to go I'd imagine. Unfortunately four children are among the victims of this terrible incident.

Wait...this isn't a joke?

Veh> BBC aren't known for joking on their news, with the exception of on April fools day...

But it is kinda hard to believe for us here in the west...

Very true. Huge jungle and forest ranges have been reduced to islands in a sea of people. Overpopulation of humans will continue to put enormous presure on wild ecosystems.


What will the world be like in fifty years?

"overpopulation is a threat to mankind
they always depended on the same food
some may call it controlled resources
just another phrase for extinction" - Funker Vogt - The Last

And yet more then 50% of the earths useable wilderness is still unpopulated and unaltered.


People completely overinflate "overpopulation". The fact of the matter is it that the earth could easily easily support 40 billion people having an acre of space EACH, and yet having more then half of the earths surface (not including the oceans and antarctica) free.

We aren't overpopulated, we are overpopulated in a few small areas because we have horrible land management skills as a species.

I disagree, last time I checked there were limited resources on the earth.

What would you have us do? Cut down the rest of the 'useable' rainforest. Then, farm cows on the 'fertile' soil, no wait rainforest soil has few nutrients, so the farm only last's five years, let's just cut down more rainforest. Then, when the rain season hits, we'll wonder why there's so many deaths from mudslides.

How else do you think you can buy a pound of beef for practically nothing? We may have wilderness now, but what about tomorrow? It's not that we cannot use the land we have now, it is the way it is used that will ruin the land.

In Australia, mismanagement of the farm lands has caused deserts to grow; in South America, rainforest is cleared at the rate of 30 million ACRES a year; and in the US, rich topsoil the size of Connecticut is lost to erosion every year and in over the last two hundred years, the us topsoil has gone from 21 inches average to less than 6 inches average.

The alternative is simple, stop most cattle grazing and instead grow food crops. A pound of beef will require around 390 gallons of water and 16 pounds of wheat. A pound of wheat will require only 25 gallons of water and will produce a pound of wheat. Spinach grown on an acre of land will produce up to 26 times as much protein as beef will.

In Hawaii we have limited resources, there are vast fields of pineapples and sugar cane, but very few cow pastures. heck, we even have untouched jungles and lush vegitation. We aren't going around saying, "we have so much jungle, let's clearcut it and grow grass instead." It's about using what land we have already damaged and preserving what is still untouched.

In reality, it will actually be our children that will wonder how could we let ourselves ruin the world.

I did a report on world nutrition last year, by the way

Well I disagree with you, we are no were near over populated, and as far as limited resources, about the trees, there are more trees now, than a 100 years ago, there's been plenty of studies on it, when I find a page to one I'll post the link. And I like Beef, no way I'd give it up for more green stuff. Cows Rock:grinthumb .... In my opinion the earth is fine, we have plenty of resources, for the most part, lots of space left, there is no global warming(because there isnt), and the ozone layer is fine....

I believe that global warming is still a natural cycle that will continue for as long as the earth is around.


I agree that the earth is 'fine' ... however my point is what will be in store for the future.


We will never be wiped out, but it is our responsibility, our moral duty as sentient beings to preserve what God has given us.

And the last time I checked, that's impossible, because nothing can be truly created or destroyed. Once we stockpile all the food in lcoked underground chambers because we're selfish and paranoid of a nuclear war, that's when there will be limited resources And, the same thing will happen when we mummify our dead, as we pack them with preservatives, and we won't allow the nutrients stored in their body to return to the earth for some bizarre reason. We will never truly "run out" of resources on earth, but rather we will convert it all to unusable products. Then our strain of infestation will move to another planet because of humanity's incredible, selfish, all-powerful need to live. :dead:

I'm not a vegetarian because I don't appreciate the killing of animals, and it's cruel or anything, and eating cows will someday do anything to our environment, but rather it's because you're eating dead meat, most of the animals are caged in spaces barely larger than them, and it's terribly bad for you. Next time, when you're eating a McDonalds cheeseburger, think of the dead cow who was stuck in a cage for it's whole life, the cow who's *** you're eating. You are what you eat

And cows do discharge a lot of methane, which is terrible for the ozone layer, but I'll only be on this planet another 90 some years so it won't affect me, and I don't care!

Amazing how a conversation about drunk elephants can turn into something like this...

It just does, SNGX.

I heard once that a vet went out to a farm where he had to have a look at a poorly cow. Anyway he forgot his torch (it was night time) and all he had was a lighter... He popped on his gloves, lit the lighter so he could see what he was doing, inserted his hand in the cows backside, and the cow farted ... He and the farmer ended up in hospital with major burns, and the barn was barely standing after..... KABOOOM...:blackeye:

A true story story apparently...

(Sorry - going off the subject a bit )

Yes, I'm aware of the law of conservation of mass and energy.

You can't grow plants without fertile soil. Forests are cut down to grow grass which feeds the cows, when the plants are eaten, some of the topsoil is removed via wind or water, after a few years of this the topsoil is gone, which means that no grass grows there, so they throw down fertilizer, which also washes away, until they pave it over and turn it into a parking lot. This can be seen in the Gulf of Mexico, where fungal blooms decimate fisheries along the Mississippi river delta. When's the last time anyone drank from a river?

This loss of topsoil and pollution via animal droppings and fertillizer will continue to harm people and the general environment. erosion is an ongoing process, but it is the unnatural acceleration of this process that causes so much disruption. The resources are there ... we are simply messing them up, and that's what makes them limited.

Methane (CH4) is a "greenhouse gas". Other examples include water (H2O), carbon dioxide (CO2), ozone (O3), nitrous oxide (N2O), and chlorofluorocarbons (CFC's). These gasses all absorb some of the infrared radiation from the sun. Which is the same energy that warms the surface of the earth everyday.

This Earth is Precious

Be warned - this is long - But well worth a read if you have the time. I've read it many a time - It's on a poster on the back of my toilet door .

In 1854, the "Great White Chief" in Washington made an offer for a large area of Indian land and promised a 'reservation' for the Indian people of the North West of the USA. Chief Seattle of the Suquamish was said to have made this reply.