World Population Growth

[bubaloo]

didnt read the replies, but imo - this all comes down to the food chain; for some reason humans are considered to be at the top. this is not true, bacteria naturally is (or was) before antibiotics/penecillin etc were invented. population control was handled by nature (think plagues/diseases etc) and everything was in the balance.

[DrewDevil]

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I have a basic theory that is probably not popular, and is also easily misunderstood, so I rarely discuss it. In a nutshell, I think the world population (of humans) is too high and population growth should be stopped.

I view the world as having evolved more or less according to Darwin (I do not have traditional biblical creationist beliefs.) For almost all of history, life on Earth has evolved in a "natural" way. By that I mean according to the "laws" of evolution that presided up until [censored] sapiens came along.

Then at some point during the growth of [censored] sapiens population, things reached some "critical mass", and the intelligence of our species threw everything out of balance. Things that were true before were no longer true now.

We arrived at the state we are in now, where technology and the combined skills and knowledge of the world's civilizations have created a situation in which evolution no longer operates "correctly" (as it did). The weak often survive to pass their genes on. More food is produced than naturally would have been available on earth, so that huge populations can be sustained. The vast majority of the world's population live off the intelligence and production of others (to wit, "stupid" and unhealthy people can easily survive and reproduce). Medicine has advanced to the point where "traditional" evolution no longer works right.

In a sense, we are "devolving", yet our population continues to grow.

The unpopularity of some of these points is immediately apparent - one might jump to the conclusion that I'm implying medicine is bad. Can you imagine - not trying to cure cancer in our loved ones? Not trying to take every effort for our frail newborn to survive? I cannot imagine those things either, and would not want to.

However, things cannot continue forever. The growth cannot be sustained on this planet, and I imagine everyone agrees with that (except maybe for some right wing fundamentalist types). There are millions of people living in hunger and suffering and poverty, and yet our population continues to grow. I think we have the obligation as the most highly evolved and intelligent species ever to inhabit the planet, to control our situation and our destiny.

For example, trying to feed the hungry is a worthy short term goal, but at what cost? So that they will all survive to seed an exponentially growing population of even more hungry, poor and suffering people? Personally, I think the better longer term solution might be to put some of those resources into things like teaching birth control and making it available and educating cultures that it's the right thing to do. This might seem like a cold approach, but I think it's more compassionate in the long term.

Our population growth will stop, it's just a question of how it happens and how much suffering occurs along the way.

Of course there are other obvious issues, such as China's approach to birth control.

Comments or disagreements?

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You are completely wrong.

The entire population of earth could fit into Texas at a density far less than the current density in New York City. We have plenty of room.

Starvation is caused by governments, not food scarcity. There has never been a famine in a nation with a free press. You could look it up.

Food production mirrors population, it doesn't outstrip it. We have enough food to feed everyone on earth, we just can't get it to them because of repressive regimes.

Also, this is another one of those "crises" that always make me wonder what the suggested solution is. You think we'd be better off with a worldwide sterilization campaign? Or should people have to register with you before having kids?

[Rick Nebiolo]

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I have a basic theory that is probably not popular, and is also easily misunderstood, so I rarely discuss it. In a nutshell, I think the world population (of humans) is too high and population growth should be stopped.

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Almost a year ago I started this thread with quite a different viewpoint.

Some of the links won't work but hopefully John Feeney's are still up.

~ Rick

[turnipmonster]

you would really really like daniel quinn's books. I recommend "Ishamel" followed by "Story of B".

[jeffnc]

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You are completely wrong.

The entire population of earth could fit into Texas at a density far less than the current density in New York City. We have plenty of room.

Starvation is caused by governments, not food scarcity. There has never been a famine in a nation with a free press. You could look it up.

Food production mirrors population, it doesn't outstrip it. We have enough food to feed everyone on earth, we just can't get it to them because of repressive regimes.

Also, this is another one of those "crises" that always make me wonder what the suggested solution is. You think we'd be better off with a worldwide sterilization campaign? Or should people have to register with you before having kids?

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It's always a hoot to hear "you're wrong" followed by examples of non sequiturs and poor reading comprehension :-)

[steggy]

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The entire population of earth could fit into Texas at a density far less than the current density in New York City. We have plenty of room.

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Source? That's amazing if true.

[scotchnrocks]

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The entire population of earth could fit into Texas at a density far less than the current density in New York City. We have plenty of room.

[/ QUOTE ] Source? That's amazing if true.

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From wiki, the earth's population is about 6.6 billion, NYC's population density is 66,941 people/mi^2, and Texas is 268,601 mi^2. This works out to a pop. density of 24,572 people/mi^2, almost a third of the density of NYC.

[DosXX]

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LOL at the the thought humans can trump "traditional evolution." As long as we are carbon-based life forms with hereditary material, we have evolution. Its like as long as we have mass, we are subject to gravity.

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Well you can LOL at me all you want but my field is directly related to this. If you think that designer evolution will never out pace regular evolution then you are simply ignorant. We are creating chimeras as we speak.

http://news.nationalgeographic.com/n..._chimeras.html

and that's just the simple stuff.

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Perhaps you don't mean evolution, but natural selection. I don't think we are changing either, but will concede if you try to argue that humans are not under natural selection, you are on much sturdier ground.

Evolution is simply the changing of gene/gene frequencies over time, I do not think we can escape evolution. Perhaps you may convince me we can escape natural selection, but I doubt it. Natural selection acts on so much more than just people dying off in nature, so much more.

[Rococo]

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The entire population of earth could fit into Texas at a density far less than the current density in New York City. We have plenty of room.

[/ QUOTE ] Source? That's amazing if true.

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From wiki, the earth's population is about 6.6 billion, NYC's population density is 66,941 people/mi^2, and Texas is 268,601 mi^2. This works out to a pop. density of 24,572 people/mi^2, almost a third of the density of NYC.


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And I have no doubt that the Texas desert could support such a population density. This statistic is nothing more than a curiousity.

[bobman0330]

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The entire population of earth could fit into Texas at a density far less than the current density in New York City. We have plenty of room.

[/ QUOTE ] Source? That's amazing if true.

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From wiki, the earth's population is about 6.6 billion, NYC's population density is 66,941 people/mi^2, and Texas is 268,601 mi^2. This works out to a pop. density of 24,572 people/mi^2, almost a third of the density of NYC.


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And I have no doubt that the Texas desert could support such a population density. This statistic is nothing more than a curiousity.

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I don't think he's actually suggesting that everyone in the world move to Texas...