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This may be unpopular, but I already feel the earth is well beyond it’s ideal human population capacity. We are straining resources because of our bad policies

This may be unpopular, but I already feel the earth is well beyond it’s ideal human population capacity. We are straining resources because of our bad policies and practices and politics.

Forge36 6y ago
Potentially. I think we'll see another explosion in population IF a cause it's addressed. What those causes may be is not yet fully identified.
- deleted 6y ago
  [deleted]
syshum 6y ago
Yes and no. if you look at the date though the places with the most "abundance" or wealth is where the fertility rate is collapsing. It is largely down to that wealth that people are having less children.
- dougabug 6y ago
  Couldn’t this also be construed as a good thing? One outcome might wealth will be available to take care of the remaining population.
  - syshum 6y ago
    "Good" and "Bad" are down to perspective and is very subjective. Especially when talking about this issue. There is a strong correlation also with educational levels and birth rates. the more educated the person, means both they are more successful monetarily, and they are less likely to have children, or have only a single child which is less than replacement (every child has 2 parents) So is large numbers of uneducated people having children that statically will also be uneducated as well a "good" thing for humanity? I dont know have you watched the movie Idiocracy? Natrually then most people will say "well we just need to educate that generation, get those nations / people educated" , this however does not solve the problem of birth rates because as you educate more and more people, as you bring more and more people to success they will also stop having children. If you reach the utopia where everyone in society has equal levels of education, then it is very likely you will see population crash. Now technology could solve for that, extended life / extended fertility span for women for example would certainly inverse the population issue.
DoofusOfDeath 6y ago
It may be unpopular, but I agree 100%. I don't want people to suffer unnecessarily. But the more people we add to the planet, the more we exacerbate problems with food, water, Co2 emissions, etc. In the end, something will curtail human population growth. I really hope it's voluntary and painless.
- grugagag 6y ago
  Exactly, let it be our educated decision not starvation, senseless wars and poverty. And the more the human population rose it took into other populations, it led to numerous extinctions, etc I hope the trend stays like this. It’s not like there are 1000 people left, there are still billions extra
- gscott 6y ago
  Most of the United States is unpopulated. We can easily double our population and be fine.
  - chillwaves 6y ago
    That's not the bottleneck. At present consumption levels, doubling the population of the United States would be disastrous.
- aahhahahaaa 6y ago
  Following this logic (and ignoring the increase of suffering as a raw product of addition) it's totally possible there'd be less suffering if we stayed in loosely connected hunter-gatherer societies.
  - ivalm 6y ago
    Maybe, but we didnt, so here we are and I don’t see any megafauna to hunt near me. In the future we may wish to think more about our changes.
  - scarmig 6y ago
    Following this logic further, we might be best off if we reduced the population to a single person whose ideal, perfectly happy life is that of a hermit. Philosophers have given this a lot of thought: the "repugnant conclusion" is what to Google for.
ALittleLight 6y ago
What is your estimate on the Earth's ideal human population and what is it based on?
mhh__ 6y ago
Eliminate coal power and the "problem" is nowhere near as bad.
- tim58 6y ago
  The problem is a lot bigger than coal power. One example, agriculture is the leading cause of deforestation and many of our current agricultural practices have questionable long term sustainability. In addition our agricultural processes are introducing new diseases into the human population, including our current pandemic. The problem of sustainably providing nutritious food people want to eat is just one of a dozen that we are not solving at acceptable levels.
miles 6y ago
> I already feel the earth is well beyond it’s ideal human population capacity. You might enjoy Peter Russell's "The Global Brain" for another perspective on human population growth: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B1sr9x263LM https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B1sr9x263LM . > We are straining resources because of our bad policies and practices and politics. It certainly seems that our carrying capacity could be much greater with sounder policies, practices, and politics.
- paulcole 6y ago
  100% agree. If there’s one thing you can count on to come through in a tricky situation, it’s level heads and politicians.
Guy2020 6y ago
In my view, you are echoing propaganda. Nothing says humans have to live in cities and burn massive amounts of fossil fuels. The way we are living may be stressful to the planet, but humans aren't the problem... it's the way we are forced to live that is.
- busterarm 6y ago
  It's almost like we've all been convinced to join some weird, global suicide cult. Except instead of killing ourselves we're throwing our genetic information away. Almost everyone I know who is really well-off/rich is having several kids. Heck, Elon Musk, who is basically spending his life trying to solve these environmental problems as his multiple businesses, has six! Why are their social norms and thoughts on this so different from the rest of us?
  - aahhahahaaa 6y ago
    It's not rocket science, it's because they don't have to raise the kids - I'd be surprised if elon saw his kids for more than a third as much as the middle class sees theirs. Hell he wasn't even at the birth of his latest.
    - busterarm 6y ago
      Right, but the difference is that we don't admit that we're not willing to or can't take on the burden of raising children. Instead it's "oh, I'm doing what's right for the environment." One of these two behaviors is intellectually dishonest. Which one do you think it is? Aside: Most of the parents that I know are extremely involved in their kids lives, even if they pay for help.
  - Guy2020 6y ago
    Most of us are not willing participants in this "cult." We're dragged along by the nose.
  - cyberlurker 6y ago
    He's getting up there in age and there needs to be a Musk on Mars.
thaumaturgy 6y ago
This is the popular view, reinforced by lots of different bits of media and pop culture. It's also wrong. Enough food is already produced right now to feed every person on Earth [1]. Most estimates furthermore put the Earth's carrying capacity at around 2 billion more people than we already have [2]. The problems that people think of when they think of "overpopulation" are the result of insufficient distribution systems, corruption, unconstrained capitalism, faulty human psychology, and poor education. They are problems caused by human beings screwing over their fellow human beings. Some of these problems get easier to solve when you have more people, not fewer, and in any case, nobody's yet figured out how to make things much better in a shrinking economy. [1]: https://www.researchgate.net/publication/241746569_We_Already_Grow_Enough_Food_for_10_Billion_People_and_Still_Can't_End_Hunger https://www.researchgate.net/publication/241746569_We_Alread... [2]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carrying_capacity#Humans https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carrying_capacity#Humans
- imtringued 6y ago
  https://www.overshootday.org/newsroom/past-earth-overshoot-days/ https://www.overshootday.org/newsroom/past-earth-overshoot-d...
aahhahahaaa 6y ago
It's obviously very difficult to predict, but there's also some expert speculation that affluence will spread widely enough to slow the birth rate down to be close to the death rate and we'll reach some sort of equilibrium.
- skissane 6y ago
  I think another factor is traditionalist religious minorities – ultra-Orthodox Jews, the Amish, Latin Mass Catholics, etc – many of these minorities still have big families, and are sustaining those big families generation after generation. (Even though some people who grow up in those kinds of communities defect to mainstream society, something like 80% choose to stay.) Those religious minorities are quite small right now, but if they manage to sustain their current growth into the coming decades, they may end up being a much more substantial component of the population.
risyachka 6y ago
No one is saying we must increase the population. Article points out that it is important to slow it down so decrease is not so rapid, otherwise it will be harsh. It's easy to slow down the birthrate if country wants it. It's much harder to raise it.
tamarind8 6y ago
Over 50% of the worlds resources are consumed by the USA. A lot of it goes to waste e.g. restaurant food, "ugly" fruits etc The problem isn't the quantity of those resources, the problem is in distribution. The world is abundant enough to comfortably support twice as many humans, if human inefficiencies, waste, greed and selfishness are factored out. https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/american-consumption-habits/ https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/american-consumpt...

This may be unpopular, but I already feel the earth is well beyond it’s ideal human population capacity. We are straining resources because of our bad policies and practices and politics.

Forge36 6y ago

Potentially. I think we'll see another explosion in population IF a cause it's addressed. What those causes may be is not yet fully identified.

deleted 6y ago
[deleted]

syshum 6y ago

Yes and no. if you look at the date though the places with the most "abundance" or wealth is where the fertility rate is collapsing. It is largely down to that wealth that people are having less children.

dougabug 6y ago
Couldn’t this also be construed as a good thing? One outcome might wealth will be available to take care of the remaining population.
- syshum 6y ago
  "Good" and "Bad" are down to perspective and is very subjective. Especially when talking about this issue. There is a strong correlation also with educational levels and birth rates. the more educated the person, means both they are more successful monetarily, and they are less likely to have children, or have only a single child which is less than replacement (every child has 2 parents) So is large numbers of uneducated people having children that statically will also be uneducated as well a "good" thing for humanity? I dont know have you watched the movie Idiocracy? Natrually then most people will say "well we just need to educate that generation, get those nations / people educated" , this however does not solve the problem of birth rates because as you educate more and more people, as you bring more and more people to success they will also stop having children. If you reach the utopia where everyone in society has equal levels of education, then it is very likely you will see population crash. Now technology could solve for that, extended life / extended fertility span for women for example would certainly inverse the population issue.

DoofusOfDeath 6y ago

It may be unpopular, but I agree 100%. I don't want people to suffer unnecessarily. But the more people we add to the planet, the more we exacerbate problems with food, water, Co2 emissions, etc. In the end, something will curtail human population growth. I really hope it's voluntary and painless.

grugagag 6y ago
Exactly, let it be our educated decision not starvation, senseless wars and poverty. And the more the human population rose it took into other populations, it led to numerous extinctions, etc I hope the trend stays like this. It’s not like there are 1000 people left, there are still billions extra
gscott 6y ago
Most of the United States is unpopulated. We can easily double our population and be fine.
- chillwaves 6y ago
  That's not the bottleneck. At present consumption levels, doubling the population of the United States would be disastrous.
aahhahahaaa 6y ago
Following this logic (and ignoring the increase of suffering as a raw product of addition) it's totally possible there'd be less suffering if we stayed in loosely connected hunter-gatherer societies.
- ivalm 6y ago
  Maybe, but we didnt, so here we are and I don’t see any megafauna to hunt near me. In the future we may wish to think more about our changes.
- scarmig 6y ago
  Following this logic further, we might be best off if we reduced the population to a single person whose ideal, perfectly happy life is that of a hermit. Philosophers have given this a lot of thought: the "repugnant conclusion" is what to Google for.

ALittleLight 6y ago

What is your estimate on the Earth's ideal human population and what is it based on?

mhh__ 6y ago

Eliminate coal power and the "problem" is nowhere near as bad.

tim58 6y ago
The problem is a lot bigger than coal power. One example, agriculture is the leading cause of deforestation and many of our current agricultural practices have questionable long term sustainability. In addition our agricultural processes are introducing new diseases into the human population, including our current pandemic. The problem of sustainably providing nutritious food people want to eat is just one of a dozen that we are not solving at acceptable levels.

miles 6y ago

> I already feel the earth is well beyond it’s ideal human population capacity. You might enjoy Peter Russell's "The Global Brain" for another perspective on human population growth: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B1sr9x263LM https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B1sr9x263LM . > We are straining resources because of our bad policies and practices and politics. It certainly seems that our carrying capacity could be much greater with sounder policies, practices, and politics.

paulcole 6y ago
100% agree. If there’s one thing you can count on to come through in a tricky situation, it’s level heads and politicians.

Guy2020 6y ago

In my view, you are echoing propaganda. Nothing says humans have to live in cities and burn massive amounts of fossil fuels. The way we are living may be stressful to the planet, but humans aren't the problem... it's the way we are forced to live that is.

busterarm 6y ago
It's almost like we've all been convinced to join some weird, global suicide cult. Except instead of killing ourselves we're throwing our genetic information away. Almost everyone I know who is really well-off/rich is having several kids. Heck, Elon Musk, who is basically spending his life trying to solve these environmental problems as his multiple businesses, has six! Why are their social norms and thoughts on this so different from the rest of us?
- aahhahahaaa 6y ago
  It's not rocket science, it's because they don't have to raise the kids - I'd be surprised if elon saw his kids for more than a third as much as the middle class sees theirs. Hell he wasn't even at the birth of his latest.
  - busterarm 6y ago
    Right, but the difference is that we don't admit that we're not willing to or can't take on the burden of raising children. Instead it's "oh, I'm doing what's right for the environment." One of these two behaviors is intellectually dishonest. Which one do you think it is? Aside: Most of the parents that I know are extremely involved in their kids lives, even if they pay for help.
- Guy2020 6y ago
  Most of us are not willing participants in this "cult." We're dragged along by the nose.
- cyberlurker 6y ago
  He's getting up there in age and there needs to be a Musk on Mars.

thaumaturgy 6y ago

This is the popular view, reinforced by lots of different bits of media and pop culture. It's also wrong. Enough food is already produced right now to feed every person on Earth [1]. Most estimates furthermore put the Earth's carrying capacity at around 2 billion more people than we already have [2]. The problems that people think of when they think of "overpopulation" are the result of insufficient distribution systems, corruption, unconstrained capitalism, faulty human psychology, and poor education. They are problems caused by human beings screwing over their fellow human beings. Some of these problems get easier to solve when you have more people, not fewer, and in any case, nobody's yet figured out how to make things much better in a shrinking economy. [1]: https://www.researchgate.net/publication/241746569_We_Already_Grow_Enough_Food_for_10_Billion_People_and_Still_Can't_End_Hunger https://www.researchgate.net/publication/241746569_We_Alread... [2]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carrying_capacity#Humans https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carrying_capacity#Humans

imtringued 6y ago
https://www.overshootday.org/newsroom/past-earth-overshoot-days/ https://www.overshootday.org/newsroom/past-earth-overshoot-d...

aahhahahaaa 6y ago

It's obviously very difficult to predict, but there's also some expert speculation that affluence will spread widely enough to slow the birth rate down to be close to the death rate and we'll reach some sort of equilibrium.

skissane 6y ago
I think another factor is traditionalist religious minorities – ultra-Orthodox Jews, the Amish, Latin Mass Catholics, etc – many of these minorities still have big families, and are sustaining those big families generation after generation. (Even though some people who grow up in those kinds of communities defect to mainstream society, something like 80% choose to stay.) Those religious minorities are quite small right now, but if they manage to sustain their current growth into the coming decades, they may end up being a much more substantial component of the population.

risyachka 6y ago

No one is saying we must increase the population. Article points out that it is important to slow it down so decrease is not so rapid, otherwise it will be harsh. It's easy to slow down the birthrate if country wants it. It's much harder to raise it.

tamarind8 6y ago

Over 50% of the worlds resources are consumed by the USA. A lot of it goes to waste e.g. restaurant food, "ugly" fruits etc The problem isn't the quantity of those resources, the problem is in distribution. The world is abundant enough to comfortably support twice as many humans, if human inefficiencies, waste, greed and selfishness are factored out. https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/american-consumption-habits/ https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/american-consumpt...