On population control

Dedicated to Willy McBride:
Every society throughout history seems to have found a way to do it. In the 20th century, they seemed to have reaped the harvest of the 19th, having to do away with more than had ever needed to be done away with before. Hence the world wars, Korea, Vietnam, El Salvador, Stalinist Russia, the Khmer Rouge, etc. (For the record, I could go on. I stop there out of good taste.) They seem to assume that since there's even more people on earth now, despite the carnage of the last century, that there will be still greater wars to come in this century. Possibly, perhaps. I fear it. But much more likely, our fate has already been sealed by our thoughtless abuse of our oh-so-fragile planet. I guess, in practice, that means that there has to be still more intense wars that will go on until homo sapiens sapiens has managed to wipe itself from the face of the Earth. It's a shame--our stay here has been oh so very short, and we've done so many good things. And yet our only lasting legacy, at this rate, is going to be our ability to make ourselves unable to survive here. Oy!