Random Thoughts

[Angrboda]

In the “Summary for Policymakers” of its 2014 Fifth Assessment Report, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change stated that, globally, economic and population growth continue to be “the most important drivers” of increases in CO2 emissions from fossil-fuel combustion.

According to the World Health Organization, an estimated 222 million women in developing countries do not want to have children now, but lack the means to ensure that they do not conceive. Providing them with access to contraception would help them plan their lives as they wish, weaken demand for abortion, reduce maternal deaths, give children a better start in life, and contribute to slowing population growth and greenhouse gas emissions, thus benefiting us all.

Who could oppose such an obvious win-win proposition? The only naysayers, we may suspect, are those in the grip of a religious ideology that they seek to impose on others, no matter what the consequences for women, children, and the rest of the world, now and for centuries to come.

~ Peter Singer. Ethics in the Real World: 82 Brief Essays on Things That Matter.

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A study of 28 European countries found that depression cost them €118 billion in 2004, or 1 percent of their combined GDP. The cost of treating depression accounted for only 9 percent of this huge sum. A much larger share was lost productivity.

~ Peter Singer. Ethics in the Real World: 82 Brief Essays on Things That Matter.