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There is no overpopulation and no realistic prospect of it. It is a myth, a mistaken belief arising as a consequence of the fundamental Malthusian misunderstand

There is no overpopulation and no realistic prospect of it. It is a myth, a mistaken belief arising as a consequence of the fundamental Malthusian misunderstanding of human action and economics - that what is now is what will be in the future, the false prediction of stasis rather than technological progress and change, the constant creation of new resources and more efficient use of old ones. There is inhumanity and kleptocracy and poverty in plenty in this world, and much could be done about it, but those issues are not a function of the number of people involved. They are a function of societal organization, of disuse of resources, and individual willingness to let evil be done. All of that takes place in the midst of plentiful resources, were they actually being used. Demographic Consequences of Defeating Aging: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3192186/ http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3192186/ Too many people? No, too many Malthusians: http://www.spiked-online.com/newsite/article/7723 http://www.spiked-online.com/newsite/article/7723 Superlongevity Without Overpopulation: https://books.google.com/books?id=EakLzDV-xJ0C&pg=PA169&lpg=PA169&dq=Superlongevity+Without+Overpopulation&source=bl&ots=wZY27U15KZ&sig=TwxKFF5Idv9BfD9mKSivmGnJ1EA&hl=en&sa=X&ei=_ctYVbG9Hs77oQSs9YPwBg&ved=0CCwQ6AEwAg#v=onepage&q=Superlongevity%20Without%20Overpopulation&f=false https://books.google.com/books?id=EakLzDV-xJ0C&pg=PA169&lpg=... The Eternal Return of Overpopulation: http://reason.com/archives/2010/10/19/the-eternal-return-of-overpopu http://reason.com/archives/2010/10/19/the-eternal-return-of-...

falcolas 11y ago
> There is no overpopulation and no realistic prospect of it. If everyone stopped dying, there's a very real prospect of this occurring. Unchecked, it results in the population equivalent of compound interest: when combined with our current population growth rate of 1.1%, we end up with a projected population in 100 years to over 46 billion. Even Japan, with their currently negative growth rate of -.14%, would experience sudden and staggering (for them) population growth rate of upwards of .6%. To address the Malthusian argument: could we alter our behaviors to reduce the birth rate to mitigate the population growth caused by "slaying the dragon"? Definitely. Could we potentially find a way to support humanity's exponentially growing energy and dietary needs sustainably? For a little while (there are hard limits[1] to how much more energy we can create while limited to the Earth). Could we convince everyone to cope with an even higher population density? That one's harder. The real problem is that most of these hurdles aren't technological. They're sociological - a place where we have historically advanced much more slowly; the eradication of death worldwide couldn't tolerate slowness. China's current condition is a great example of how hard it is to impose checks on population growth. All that said, there's an even more fundamental question: could we find a way to prevent an asteroid from hitting earth and wiping out all benefits of "slaying the dragon"? Unless something major changes, no, we could not. In my opinion, this is more important than creating any form of superlongevity. It's the difference between the continuation of humanity and our extinction. The Earth has a ticking clock, and we don't know the position of the hands. What will we do with the time we have? [1] http://physics.ucsd.edu/do-the-math/2011/07/galactic-scale-energy/ http://physics.ucsd.edu/do-the-math/2011/07/galactic-scale-e...

falcolas 11y ago

> There is no overpopulation and no realistic prospect of it. If everyone stopped dying, there's a very real prospect of this occurring. Unchecked, it results in the population equivalent of compound interest: when combined with our current population growth rate of 1.1%, we end up with a projected population in 100 years to over 46 billion. Even Japan, with their currently negative growth rate of -.14%, would experience sudden and staggering (for them) population growth rate of upwards of .6%. To address the Malthusian argument: could we alter our behaviors to reduce the birth rate to mitigate the population growth caused by "slaying the dragon"? Definitely. Could we potentially find a way to support humanity's exponentially growing energy and dietary needs sustainably? For a little while (there are hard limits[1] to how much more energy we can create while limited to the Earth). Could we convince everyone to cope with an even higher population density? That one's harder. The real problem is that most of these hurdles aren't technological. They're sociological - a place where we have historically advanced much more slowly; the eradication of death worldwide couldn't tolerate slowness. China's current condition is a great example of how hard it is to impose checks on population growth. All that said, there's an even more fundamental question: could we find a way to prevent an asteroid from hitting earth and wiping out all benefits of "slaying the dragon"? Unless something major changes, no, we could not. In my opinion, this is more important than creating any form of superlongevity. It's the difference between the continuation of humanity and our extinction. The Earth has a ticking clock, and we don't know the position of the hands. What will we do with the time we have? [1] http://physics.ucsd.edu/do-the-math/2011/07/galactic-scale-energy/ http://physics.ucsd.edu/do-the-math/2011/07/galactic-scale-e...