Why genocide probably isn't a good idea

We need less people in the world.
The economies of scale that large societies are able to create to grow and advance themselves are offset by the law of diminishing returns that resource depletion creates, and will continue to create at a greater extent into the future. It's clear that our society is the proverbial lazy horse that seems immune to whatever plagues of gadflies we can throw at it. it's too powerful, too big to fail. like an algal bloom.

we are animals. we require the same basic needs, on a survival level, as any other animals. we are subject to the same basic ecological patterns. the difference being that we are able to manipulate our environment. you would think that we might manipulate our environment to ensure that our distant descendants can live comfortably into the future, and who knows, leave earth some day.

but why would we bother doing this? evolution is geared by individual survival and reproduction. the lizard-brained among us will gather as many resources as they can while they survive. whoever dies with the most toys wins, right? lets reproduce and greedily consume while we have the chance, right? like an algal bloom.

those of us capable of feeling a sense of intergenerational empathy might disagree. perhaps its the natural sense of curiosity and wonder that amongst other things defines our species, that hopes that life can continue on indefinitely into the future, and that consciousness can continue to reach new heights and better know the universe we live in.

but for this to happen, it might be ethically permissable to kill a few billion people to bring us back withing our carrying capacity.
it is clear that our technological optimism in extending carrying capacity is growing more and more unfounded as economies collapse and bring ecosystem services down with them.

the inherent dignity of the human individual is diminished as our numbers grow. we become locked into buerocratic systems that systematically take away our need to think and reason. it turns people into safe happy consumption drones. few want to move from the foetal security of this society. any alternative movement will likely be crushed by fear of change and some sense of rose-coloured nostalgia.

so for genocide to work, and be ethically justifiable, three conditions must be satisfied:

1) it must be carried our to bring humans within a realistically sustainable carrying capacity.

2) it must defy all demographic boundaries. all victims must be chosen at absolute randoms; and carrying on from this:

3) the people charged with implementing the technology that kills billions of random people must also be subject to the killing.


my only objection to this genocide is a strangely misanthropic one: I don't think that we are intelligent enough (nor do individuals have the scope of compassion large enough to see the eventual good of such an undertaking) to implement this fairly. also, we would just repopulate.

That's enough drunk midnight blogging for me right now.
have a nice day.