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Ecosystems have carrying capacities. There is only so much water and arable land. There are only so many resources in the mines/oil wells waiting to be extracte

Ecosystems have carrying capacities. There is only so much water and arable land. There are only so many resources in the mines/oil wells waiting to be extracted. Technology (like GMOs) can help you make incrementally more efficient use of those resources, but not as fast as unbounded exponential population growth. At some point, the average standard of living has to come crashing down. The biologically necessary quantity of food and water is not available for everyone. Even with unlimited labor to supply factories, there are no more raw materials to make gadgets and medicine out of. A country in that situation has basically one reasonable course of action: kill the neighbors and take their resources. China is arguably being a good world citizen by trying not to put itself in that position. You may find this statist interference with a natural process distasteful, but consider the alternative: only the fittest get to survive.

nickbauman 11y ago
Arguably 1/2 of the molecules in our bodies come from the artificial nitrogen extraction process developed during WWI. Without that, Earth's human population would have been limited to half of what it is now back in the 20th century. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_the_Haber_process https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_the_Haber_process
- Retric 11y ago
  The earth could probably support 100+ billion people at reasonable comfort levels with slightly better technology as long as we give up the idea of life outside of zoo's. That said, past experience has demonstrated the Human population can easily grow at 5% per year. At that rate it's doubling every 15 years. Trying to double the universes food supply every 15 years is just not possible indefinitely. PS: 2^n is crazy. It takes less time than you might think before the mass of humanity is growing faster than a sphere expanding at the speed of light could support.
  - TTPrograms 11y ago
    Uh, the current growth rate is around 1% per year, and it's decreasing as countries enter the first world. That's a doubling every 70 years. See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Population_growth https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Population_growth We've got a lot of efficiency left in terms of agriculture as well, so there isn't much reason to think reaching the carrying capacity of the planet is a particularly pressing issue. The amount of food that we already grow that we don't eat roughly 1/3 already, and the vast majority of land doesn't contribute to agriculture.
    - Retric 11y ago
      I don't disagree with what your saying. The counter argument goes something like this. Let's double every 1,000 years for the next 1,000,000 years that sounds easy. Let's see that's only 7billion * 2^1,000 or err ~7 * 10 ^ 310 people. Hmm, there are only ~10^83 atoms in the observable universe. I guess they must be really tiny people. So, yea it's not a problem in right now and probably not for a long time yet. But, as soon as you start doubling something has to give.
      - lotharbot 11y ago
        population doesn't keep doubling over and over again. It follows a logistic curve (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Logistic_function https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Logistic_function ). Human population probably reached the midpoint of the curve around 1980 (http://www.growth-dynamics.com/articles/Kurzweil_files/image004.gif http://www.growth-dynamics.com/articles/Kurzweil_files/image... ) and is expected to become fairly level between 9 and 13 billion (http://esa.un.org/unpd/wpp/Graphs/ http://esa.un.org/unpd/wpp/Graphs/ select Population -> Total Population -> WORLD)
        superuser2 11y ago
        Yes, it follows a logistic curve because it hits carrying capacity. The top of that curve is not a pleasant place.
        11y ago
- mikeyouse 11y ago
  If you haven't read it, I'd highly recommend the book, "The Alchemy of Air" about the invention of Haber-Bosch.. It was unbelievable what they went through to fix nitrogen, they literally invented new fields of study in materials science and chemistry. The perils of a Jewish inventor creating a new method for making explosives under the Third Reich is a side story in the book but another fascinating historical anecdote.
  - TeMPOraL 11y ago
    HN is becoming the single source responsible for most of my total book spending... Anyway, just purchased it. Thanks for the recommendation!
  - rz2k 11y ago
    And also Zyklon which would become Zyklon B when the warning eye irritant was removed to make it a better weapon for murdering people. There was a RadioLab[1] episode that talked about how it was eventually used on some of his own relatives. [1] http://www.radiolab.org/story/180132-how-do-you-solve-problem-fritz-haber/ http://www.radiolab.org/story/180132-how-do-you-solve-proble...
  - afarrell 11y ago
    > under the Third Reich I think you mean under the Kaiser, not the Third Reich. Hitler was made Chancellor on January 30th, 1933. Fritz Haber died on January 29, 1934 in Switzerland. Carl Bosch was not Jewish. Here is a quick intro to Fritz Haber: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tdEE5uvFhOM https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tdEE5uvFhOM
    - mikeyouse 11y ago
      I do indeed. Thanks for the correction.

nickbauman 11y ago

Arguably 1/2 of the molecules in our bodies come from the artificial nitrogen extraction process developed during WWI. Without that, Earth's human population would have been limited to half of what it is now back in the 20th century. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_the_Haber_process https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_the_Haber_process

Retric 11y ago
The earth could probably support 100+ billion people at reasonable comfort levels with slightly better technology as long as we give up the idea of life outside of zoo's. That said, past experience has demonstrated the Human population can easily grow at 5% per year. At that rate it's doubling every 15 years. Trying to double the universes food supply every 15 years is just not possible indefinitely. PS: 2^n is crazy. It takes less time than you might think before the mass of humanity is growing faster than a sphere expanding at the speed of light could support.
- TTPrograms 11y ago
  Uh, the current growth rate is around 1% per year, and it's decreasing as countries enter the first world. That's a doubling every 70 years. See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Population_growth https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Population_growth We've got a lot of efficiency left in terms of agriculture as well, so there isn't much reason to think reaching the carrying capacity of the planet is a particularly pressing issue. The amount of food that we already grow that we don't eat roughly 1/3 already, and the vast majority of land doesn't contribute to agriculture.
  - Retric 11y ago
    I don't disagree with what your saying. The counter argument goes something like this. Let's double every 1,000 years for the next 1,000,000 years that sounds easy. Let's see that's only 7billion * 2^1,000 or err ~7 * 10 ^ 310 people. Hmm, there are only ~10^83 atoms in the observable universe. I guess they must be really tiny people. So, yea it's not a problem in right now and probably not for a long time yet. But, as soon as you start doubling something has to give.
    - lotharbot 11y ago
      population doesn't keep doubling over and over again. It follows a logistic curve (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Logistic_function https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Logistic_function ). Human population probably reached the midpoint of the curve around 1980 (http://www.growth-dynamics.com/articles/Kurzweil_files/image004.gif http://www.growth-dynamics.com/articles/Kurzweil_files/image... ) and is expected to become fairly level between 9 and 13 billion (http://esa.un.org/unpd/wpp/Graphs/ http://esa.un.org/unpd/wpp/Graphs/ select Population -> Total Population -> WORLD)
      - superuser2 11y ago
        Yes, it follows a logistic curve because it hits carrying capacity. The top of that curve is not a pleasant place.
        11y ago
mikeyouse 11y ago
If you haven't read it, I'd highly recommend the book, "The Alchemy of Air" about the invention of Haber-Bosch.. It was unbelievable what they went through to fix nitrogen, they literally invented new fields of study in materials science and chemistry. The perils of a Jewish inventor creating a new method for making explosives under the Third Reich is a side story in the book but another fascinating historical anecdote.
- TeMPOraL 11y ago
  HN is becoming the single source responsible for most of my total book spending... Anyway, just purchased it. Thanks for the recommendation!
- rz2k 11y ago
  And also Zyklon which would become Zyklon B when the warning eye irritant was removed to make it a better weapon for murdering people. There was a RadioLab[1] episode that talked about how it was eventually used on some of his own relatives. [1] http://www.radiolab.org/story/180132-how-do-you-solve-problem-fritz-haber/ http://www.radiolab.org/story/180132-how-do-you-solve-proble...
- afarrell 11y ago
  > under the Third Reich I think you mean under the Kaiser, not the Third Reich. Hitler was made Chancellor on January 30th, 1933. Fritz Haber died on January 29, 1934 in Switzerland. Carl Bosch was not Jewish. Here is a quick intro to Fritz Haber: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tdEE5uvFhOM https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tdEE5uvFhOM
  - mikeyouse 11y ago
    I do indeed. Thanks for the correction.