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Century's Growth Leaves Earth Noisy
Lester Brown, global watchdog, can cite enough looming
catastrophes to spoil anyone's day: Water tables are falling,
temperatures are rising, rain forests are shrinking.
Gordon Hempton, professional ``sound tracker,'' faces a simpler
problem: It's getting awfully hard these days to find 15 minutes
of peace and quiet.
Each man, in his own way, is talking about the same thing. A lot
more people live on the planet than ever before, and by and large
we're a hungry, needy, noisy bunch. Of all the changes the 20th
century has seen, none is more far-reaching than the explosion of
human population - the one trend to which everybody contributes.
One hundred years ago, 1.6 billion people lived on Earth. This
year, world population will reach 6 billion.
How to keep all those people alive without ravaging the planet is
a question Brown addresses daily as president of the Worldwatch
Institute, an environmental research group based in Washington,
D.C. Yet even he remains awed by humanity's talent for
multiplication.
``There has been more population growth since 1950 than during
the preceding 4 million years,'' Brown says.
While Brown's path to comprehension is paved with Big-Picture
charts and graphs, Gordon Hempton has a more personal way of
measuring how crowded the world has become.
He listens.
From his home in Port Angeles, Wash., Hempton treks to remote
corners of the world with an expensive tape recorder in hand,
seeking to capture nature's quiet symphony.
Trouble is, few places remain where human noise doesn't intrude.
In rural glades of the southeastern United States, Hempton has
tried in vain to escape the low drone of ``monster flutes'' - the
smokestacks of coal-fired electric plants dotting the landscape.
In Wyoming, his quest for quiet has been interrupted by the
rhythmic booming of oil-well pumps. Even in the Southwest's
lonely deserts, he finds no peace.
``If you listen in the middle of the night, the desert landscape
is actually rumbling,'' he says. ``A tremendous amount of sound
is being pumped out from distant cities, highways, power
transmission lines, industry and mining.''
Fifteen years ago, Hempton documented 21 spots in Washington
state where he could reliably capture 15 minutes of natural
sounds uninterrupted by the likes of roaring jets, humming trucks
and barking dogs. Now he finds only three.
He mourns the loss. When we can't escape noise, our senses start
shutting down and life is not as sweet, Hempton believes.
And so, in his own quiet way, he reaches the crux of the
population question: It's not whether 6 billion or 16 billion
people can be crammed onto the planet. It's the quality of life
those people enjoy, whatever their number.
Hempton craves solitude. Others want gasoline for their cars and
electricity for their computers. Millions would settle for a
daily loaf of bread or bowl of rice. Can the globe support us all
in the manner to which we are accustomed?
Some perspective from the charts and graphs:
Population growth accelerated during most of this century. It
took all of human history to reach a world population of 1
billion in 1804. It took 123 years to reach 2 billion in 1927, 33
years to reach 3 billion in 1960, 14 years to reach 4 billion in
1974, and 13 years to reach 5 billion in 1987. Adding the sixth
billion, a milestone that United Nations demographers calculate
will occur in early October, will have taken just 12 years.
The growth rate has started to slow, but world population still
rises by 78 million each year, the U.N. Population Division says.
That's like adding 1.5 million people, or a city the size of
Philadelphia, every week.
All those people consume a lot of resources. In 1900, only a few
thousand barrels of oil were used each day worldwide. Today,
humanity uses 72 million barrels a day, Worldwatch says. Use of
metals has risen from 20 million tons a year to 1.2 billion tons,
the group says.
On average, people have never been healthier or wealthier, but
the gap between rich and poor remains wide. Half of all American
adults are overweight, yet elsewhere more than 13,000 young
children die every day of malnutrition and related illnesses, the
World Health Organization says.
Brown sees ozone depletion, global warming, overfishing and
falling water tables as bills coming due from growth the Earth
cannot sustain. He believes Americans and others living high on
the hog should scale back their consumption to leave enough food
and resources for others.
World grain production hovers just under 2 billion tons a year,
Brown notes. How many mouths that can feed depends on how much is
eaten directly vs. being fed to livestock, an equation that
varies widely by nation.
``With 2 billion tons of grain, you can feed 10 billion
Indians,'' Brown says. ``Or you can feed 5 billion Italians. Or
you can feed 2.5 billion Americans. If we're all eating like
Americans, we need another planet, basically.''
Some don't consider the century's near-quadrupling of population
a problem.
``We should celebrate it,'' says Jerry Taylor, director of
natural resource studies for the Cato Institute, a conservative
think tank in Washington. ``It's a product of improving human
health, improving lifestyles and better nutrition. People are
living longer.''
While others worry that too large a population will exhaust
natural resources, Taylor says human ingenuity is the true
resource - and that will only increase with more people around.
``People aren't just mouths to feed. They're creators of art and
generators of technology,'' he says.
People can also be surprisingly adaptable. Last October, U.N.
demographers reduced their population-growth estimates by about 2
million a year, saying they hadn't anticipated how quickly women
around the world would embrace the notion of having fewer
children.
In the 1950s, the average woman gave birth five times during her
lifetime. Today that global fertility rate is 2.7 births per
woman and falling, the United Nations says.
Fifty years from now, there will be 8.9 billion people on Earth,
according to the United Nations' midlevel, ``most likely''
projection. Virtually all the gain will occur in the poorer
nations.
Will resources be available, or life enjoyable, for that
population, 50 percent greater than today's?
Gordon Hempton answers with a story. He was in the Everglades one
day, working against the odds to make an uninterrupted recording
of an Eastern meadowlark.
``Thirty seconds into the recording,'' he recalls, ``sure enough,
the roar of a jet came in.''
Hempton let the tape roll, and now the recording is one of his
favorites. The sweet song of the lark and coarse thunder of
technology speak to him of nature's grace and humanity's striving
- a duet affirming that even in a cramped and noisy world, there
is music in the air.
10-Year-Old Charged in Rape
DAYTON, Tenn. - A 10-year-old boy has been charged with raping a
5-year-old boy while the two were playing videogames.
Police say the incident happened June 16. The younger boy's
father left the two alone in the apartment for about 30 minutes
to go to the grocery store and returned to find his son being
assaulted, police said.
The older child, who had been staying with the younger boy's
neighbors, confessed and said he learned how to do it by watching
his parents, police said.
A juvenile judge released the 10-year-old to his mother's custody
and scheduled a court hearing for Thursday.
Police say the 10-year-old probably won't be incarcerated but
will be required to receive counseling and may be assigned a
probation officer.
``This is one of the most difficult cases I've ever had to deal
with,'' said Dayton Police Investigator Billy Cranfield.
Harvard Offers Course on Animal Law
CAMBRIDGE, Mass. - Harvard Law School is going to the dogs. For
the first time, the school will offer a course on what some
consider an emerging field: animal rights law.
The elective class next year will discuss fundamental rights -
why humans are entitled to them and why animals have been denied
them - and whether legal rights should be extended beyond people.
``There is this thick legal wall with humans all on one side and
all non-human animals on the other side,'' said attorney Steven
Wise, who will teach the course next spring as an adjunct faculty
member.
While the law currently protects pets from abuse and endangered
species from extinction, animals do not actually have rights - an
age-old position of the legal system.
But over the last 50 years, science has shown that some animals -
chimps in particular - have extraordinary mental capacities
beyond what the ancient Greeks, Romans and Hebrews ever imagined,
said Wise, whose forthcoming book is called ``Rattling the Cage:
Toward Legal Rights for Animals.''
If they have a human-like intelligence, Wise said, shouldn't that
entitle them to human-type rights?
While the concept may sound far-fetched, it wasn't too long ago
that women and blacks were denied rights because they were
considered, to some degree, less than human, he said.
Harvard's new course was initiated by students, who convinced a
faculty committee that it would enrich the curriculum, said Alan
Ray, the school's assistant dean for academic affairs.
``It took a 13th Amendment to the Constitution for us to outlaw
slavery at a time when people were treated as property because of
the color of their skin,'' Ray said. ``There are occasions in the
law for taking a very fundamental look at the treatment of other
living things.''
A similar class has been a popular offering at Hastings College
of the Law at the University of California-San Francisco, said
Leo Martinez, the school's dean.
``I think most people who aren't familiar with the course think
it is knee-jerk and assume it is the province of wild-eyed
radicals,'' he said.
Ten students have signed up for an animal law class at
Northwestern University's law school in Chicago next fall. Wise
has taught the course as well at the John Marshall Law School,
also in Chicago, and at Vermont Law School.
Many feel that more law schools will offer such courses now that
Harvard has jumped into the fray.
``Everybody I know that teaches animal law was absolutely
thrilled to hear that Harvard was going to offer it,'' said
Pamela Frasch, who teaches the class at Northwestern School of
Law of Lewis and Clark College in Portland, Ore.
``It's just reality that if Harvard is going to teach it, that
other schools that might have looked askance at it as a
legitimate area of study might take another look.''
Man Convicted of Giving Girl AIDS
COLUMBUS, Ohio - A man accused of having sex with a 13-year-old
girl and giving her the virus that causes AIDS was convicted of
felonious assault.
The girl, now 14, said that Henry Couturier, 47, did not tell her
he had the virus when they had sex in May 1998. She tested
positive for HIV about three months later.
Defense attorneys argued the girl was a prostitute who could have
contracted the virus from a customer. They also said Couturier
told her he was HIV-positive and that he had used a condom every
time he had sex with her.
Couturier was also convicted Friday on three counts of corruption
of a minor and corruption with drugs. Sentencing is scheduled for
July 28. Couturier faces up to 14 years in prison.
Defense attorney Todd W. Barstow said he will urge Couturier to
appeal.
The girl had been convicted last year of a delinquency count of
soliciting for prostitution and admitted working as a prostitute.
She testified that she didn't know how many men she had sex with
before Couturier.
Ariz. Girl Found Dead in Prayer Room
GILBERT, Ariz. - Investigators say a note written in blood
praying for ``compassion, love and kindness'' was found near the
body of an 8-year-old girl beaten to death with a belt.
Christine Tuong was found dead May 15 on the floor of a prayer
room in her family's home in suburban Phoenix, according to a
police report released Thursday.
A piece of paper on the altar was inscribed in blood. A Buddhist
priest told detectives the inscription was the beginning of a
2,500-year-old mantra usually recited as a chant.
Detectives suspect Christine's parents hit her more than 17
times, leaving injuries that match belt buckles seized from the
family's home, according to the report.
The parents then instructed their other daughters, ages 7 and 9,
to lie to authorities about the death, the report says.
A decision on whether to charge the parents will be made after an
outside expert helps the medical examiner's office review
evidence gathered from the autopsy, said County Attorney Rick
Romley.
The parents told police they do not beat their children and rely
on verbal discipline, the report said.
The girl's father, Tung Tuong, and mother, Minh Tuong, are
Vietnamese refugees who came to the United States in 1980. They
have refused to comment publicly about their daughter's death.
FBI Proposing Spy Hunting Division
NEW YORK - The Federal Bureau of Investigation is proposing to
create a division devoted solely to hunting spies, part of a
government-wide review of counterintelligence, The New York Times
reported today.
The move comes amid suspicions that China stole nuclear secrets
for two decades. American intelligence agencies have increasingly
focused on threats of terrorism, causing counterintelligence
efforts to dwindle, the newspaper said, citing unidentified
government officials.
Previously, the FBI's national security division had added
counterterrorism to its emphasis on combating espionage, and
these efforts seemed to earn a higher priority as the battle
against terrorism became more important in the post-Cold War era,
the officials said.
FBI Director Louis Freeh has proposed splitting the national
security group into two divisions: one focusing on terrorism, and
the other aimed at rooting out spies, the officials said.
Attorney General Janet Reno has approved the request and
forwarded it to the White House, they added.
At risk is both the theft of military secrets and economic
espionage aimed at stealing technology or information to help
foreign goods compete with American products. Foreign governments
and military intelligence services are joined by corporations in
the new forms of espionage, which can occur between scientists
and at academic conferences.
The government's review also includes the Pentagon and the
Central Intelligence Agency and is expected to lead to an
overhaul of all counterintelligence. This represents the first
time the three agencies have collaborated on a systematic
assessment of espionage threats.
Reacting to criticism of its handling of suspected Chinese
espionage at nuclear weapons labs, the government is changing
procedures, including adding special squads of FBI agents at the
labs.
Some lawmakers said the FBI and the Justice Department had failed
to aggressively investigate cases including that of Wen Ho Lee,
the nuclear scientist suspected of helping the Chinese acquire
advanced thermonuclear technology. Lee has denied he spied for
China, and Chinese officials have denied stealing nuclear
secrets.
Sleepwalk Slay Husband Found Guilty
PHOENIX - Scott Falater didn't deny stabbing his wife 44 times,
hiding the knife and bloody clothes, dragging her to their
swimming pool and then holding her head underwater.
But Falater did deny responsibility for her 1997 death because he
claims the entire episode happened while he was sleepwalking.
A jury on Friday rejected his defense and convicted the
43-year-old of first-degree murder.
``I think it was a strange defense,'' said juror Theresa
Beaubien. ``It seems to me that there was too much going on for
it to be sleepwalking.''
Prosecutors have said they will seek the death penalty, although
that decision will be reviewed before a sentencing hearing later
this summer, said Maricopa County Attorney Rick Romley.
``It's not over yet,'' Falater told his mother after kissing her
on the cheek before leaving court. He showed no emotion as the
verdict was read.
Relatives of Yarmila Falater did not attend the trial. Her mother
said before the trial she did not want to be a part of the
proceeding, said prosecutor Juan Martinez.
Two sleep experts cited Falater's family history of sleepwalking,
job stress and lack of sleep as reasons for a violent
sleepwalking episode.
But experts for the prosecution said Falater's actions were too
deliberate for him to have been sleepwalking. They based that
view in part on testimony from neighbor Greg Koons, who watched
over a wall as Falater pulled on gloves, motioned to his dog to
lie down, then dragged his wife's body to the pool.
Jurors agreed that Koons' testimony was key.
``If there had been no eyewitness, we probably would have
acquitted him,'' said John Merrill. ``Greg Koons' testimony was
just too damning.''
The defense painted Falater, a former Motorola engineer, and his
wife of 20 years as a happily married, religious couple. Defense
attorney Mike Kimerer said Falater had no reason to kill his
wife.
But Martinez noted the couple had disputes over Falater's desire
for more children and his wife's waning dedication to the Mormon
faith. She was not wearing her wedding ring when her body was
found.
