I think biomass is probably more important than sheer number for these comparisons. Although I would also accept ‘proportion of world’s arable land being used to sustain them’ as I suspect the ratios come out pretty similar for obvious reasons.
Sadly it’s not objectively false, it’s merely vague. There’s no equivocation whereby it actually specifies that the unit of measure is the individual animal, rather than, say, kg. It’s just playing on your assumptions (I did assume biomass fwiw, but who cares).
But anyway, the point made by sheer fucking biomass imbalance is surely the thing to focus on here? Now that we know what it means, and are in agreement that the wording should be clearer, the statistic is still egregious, isn’t it? Humans have taken far too much of the world for themselves IMO. Vastly diminishing returns for us, devestatingly larger impact on the environment, the more we push it.
I’m in fact under the impression that the “number must go up” plot was played on us as well. Humans are increasing in quantity ever since the industrial revolution, but instead we should be focusing on the quality of life.
Couldn’t agree with you more. In particular, the way most state pensions are structured imply infinite exponential growth. It’s gonna be a tough drug to wean off of.
We’re below reproduction rate in most parts of the world, and likely will fall below in the rest of the world during this century, so we’re already in the ‘find out’ era :(
I think biomass is probably more important than sheer number for these comparisons. Although I would also accept ‘proportion of world’s arable land being used to sustain them’ as I suspect the ratios come out pretty similar for obvious reasons.
The problem is that the infographic says “of all the mammals on Earth”, which means individuals, not biomass. So the infographic is objectively false.
Intentionally misleading
Sadly it’s not objectively false, it’s merely vague. There’s no equivocation whereby it actually specifies that the unit of measure is the individual animal, rather than, say, kg. It’s just playing on your assumptions (I did assume biomass fwiw, but who cares).
But anyway, the point made by sheer fucking biomass imbalance is surely the thing to focus on here? Now that we know what it means, and are in agreement that the wording should be clearer, the statistic is still egregious, isn’t it? Humans have taken far too much of the world for themselves IMO. Vastly diminishing returns for us, devestatingly larger impact on the environment, the more we push it.
I’m in fact under the impression that the “number must go up” plot was played on us as well. Humans are increasing in quantity ever since the industrial revolution, but instead we should be focusing on the quality of life.
Couldn’t agree with you more. In particular, the way most state pensions are structured imply infinite exponential growth. It’s gonna be a tough drug to wean off of.
We’re below reproduction rate in most parts of the world, and likely will fall below in the rest of the world during this century, so we’re already in the ‘find out’ era :(