It all depends on how you define 'better'. Whether or not each generation can be deemed to be better off than the last can only be determined in how they live and what they achieve, at a personal level and also on a social level. Some will go on to greatness whilst the majority don't, some will become leaders whilst the majority remain followers. It has always been that way and always will be, but the gap between the 'haves' and the 'have nots' is becoming wider, the rich are getting richer at the expense of the poor who are are getting poorer. It took over 200,000 years of human history for the world population to reach 1 billion and only 200 years more to reach 7 billion. By the end of this century it is estimated that it will reach 18 billion and 51 billion by the year 2200. Based on a stable and constant growth rate, it will pass 1 trillion by the year 2500. The planet cannot support that number of people - it's struggling with the number we have now. Jeff
Actually Jeff, my biggest criticism is his comment about arsonists, even though I agree with some of what he says, and some you say. Our Mr Dutton is not known for the wisdom of everything he says, that's for sure. RFS or CFA, unsure which, recently issued a statement that somewhat less than 3% of fires in a given year are started by arsonists. I read 'arsonists' only as those who make deliberate attempts to start fires. I tend to think the writer's choice of words is a bit out of whack and he may refer to our lack of effort to protect forests from fire and hence wrongly refers to those responsible as arsonists. It's generally agreed that by far the majority in this fire event were started by lightning. Understandable when the fuel available has almost never been so dry. It became explosive and don't we know it in this shire. Up until Tuesday of last week, our shire had lost over 500 home and more went last week. Why? sadly, in too many cases homes were where they should not be built. Our shire covers a large area, has only 30,000 people and 17,000 of those are in one town; Batemans Bay. The majority is dense native bushland with extremely limited access. If my interpretations of his use of 'arsonists' is correct, it's another case of not getting his English right. That's something far too common in reporting, and in our speech in general. We are losing the ability to use the Queen's English as we should. This will become a greater issue over time. I say it has the propensity to create another language, speeded up by our real youngsters getting 'hip' with computers and being far more aware of most things than many of us oldies who will never want to master such things anyway, and we'll never be as well educated. The young of today could not imagine many of us older ones who were out of school at 13 and working for a living at 14yo. I side with you on climate change. Something is happening. There is too much solid evidence to disagree and for many reasons, Murdoch has much to answer for. There's no point in saying one person should never own such a swathe of media. We have a choice to not believe all the comments printed. He is known to have dabbled in international elections, generally to promote his own interests. It's all a rather big subject, that's for sure. Noel
Being a saw-miller, he does have a vested interest in forests and I can understand his frustration when preventable fires occur and impact on his business. However, he is being rather hypocritical in stating: 'I believe we now have a new breed of people in this country that NEED TO BLAME somebody for every natural event that occurs and they have infiltrated our communities with their ideology!' when he himself is blaming arsonists for lighting some of the recent devastating fires even though there is no evidence to corroborate it and also pointing the finger of blame at minority groups for influencing decisions. Ultimately it is the people in power who make the final decisions on anything and they are generally made for self interest only and not to satisfy the requests of the so called minority groups. Graeme needs to man up, take it on the chin, stop living in the past and come to grips with the fact that the country has entered a new phase of weather events created by a changing climate. Jeff
Following the fires which are now extinguished, the following rain hit the upper parts of the Tuross River rather heavily. As can be seen it peaked at around 9.3 metres so our lake is well flooded at present. It has also opened a nice deep channel through the sand so we will again have good tides going in and out. Noel
