3 ms·
I thought this was talked about in high school biology... S-curves for populations that settle. Sometimes a population goes above the carrying capacity and it
by patcon 3y ago
I thought this was talked about in high school biology...
S-curves for populations that settle. Sometimes a population goes above the carrying capacity and it crashed and oscillates until it stabilizes. Humans are in an exponential J-curve that seems to keep going, but it's just because our culture and technology continually raise the carrying capacity on an S-curve.
But if we "break" either culture or tech, then the carrying capacity immediately becomes lower. And then it crashes more and becomes even lower. Etc until society rescues itself from crash in carrying capacity. So the crash is potentially harrrrrd. I recall it being referred to a J-curve crash.
But maybe my high school teacher was just riffing a bit, and this isn't established understanding... When I search, I don't find this talked about online in the ways I recall from 2002 biology class haha :)
- roenxi 3y agoAn aside ... it is not safe to assume that the population stabilises. Chaotic results are possible if growth is fast. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Logistic_map https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Logistic_map
- kylebenzle 3y agoPopulations never "stabilize" for any meaningful amount of time.
- a_t48 3y agoNit: eventually, they will.
- GolfPopper 3y agoThis sounds a lot like something I read not that long ago (it was on acoup, of course[1]) about post-Roman population density, how the carrying capacity of the Roman Empire was high because of the increased efficiency allowed by having a good transportation - classic economic specialization. But once the Empire collapsed, the specializations it enabled couldn't come back, and it took a thousand years or more for former Roman provinces to return to their Imperial population levels. 1.https://acoup.blog/2022/02/11/collections-rome-decline-and-fall-part-iii-things/ https://acoup.blog/2022/02/11/collections-rome-decline-and-f...