Poverty, population and principles of least effort.

Abstract

There has always been inequality in all areas of life; men everywhere claim to want to eliminate them while tryping to increase the inequality in their own favor. The fact is that there is a general regular predictable ordering of inequites and it is within this ordering that our existence must be confined. The principle of least effort of G.K. Zipf is little known but is the primary principle that governs individual and collective behavior in many areas. The analysis of language usage populations of metropolitan areas incomes and experimental rate behavior as described by Calhoun reveal a fundamental relationship. It is inevitable that there will always be social stratifications in human populations. The goal of mans efforts in regard to poverty must not be its elimination but acceptance of direction to and adaptation to its existence. If man is to avoid total destruction he must consider himself to be under direct stress. Human discoveries have arisen under stress: scientific and ethical concepts. Behavioral scientists must give their full support to population reduction pollution reduction to containment of potential social explosions to early recognition and deflection of individuals who might bring on the atomic holocaust.