These days, I hear so often people panicking about overpopulation. Among the lectures I attend professors in up to three courses (ECON 221, ECON 211, and EOSC 114) freak out as to how fast world population is growing and how soon we will run short of resources to upkeep us all.
My Econ 211 professor told me last month that our population reached 7 billion now. "That means we've got another China within the past few decades".
So my question is: Why do we have overpopulation ? And furthermore, will that really bring us all to doom ?
Here's my logic: in most economically developed countries, the trend nowadays is to have few children, if not none, per married couple. Many couples actually decide not to even have children, and many others just want one or two children. In my case, most couples around me in the three places I've lived in (Seoul South Korea, Vancouver, BC, Canada, and Geneva, Switzerland) want at most two children. The reasons can extend from personal preferrence to economic issues.
It takes two children per couple to keep a population growth rate of 0.
Of course, you will tell me that such is not the case in developing countries, and that birth rates are far greater in the Third World. And this is where I also think is the problem.
So here's another follow-up question: Why do these people keep giving births ?
Even in developed countries, having two children presents to be an incredible economic burden. So for these people, if they have several children, I'm just lost for words. What are they thinking ?
In effect, I'm just arguing the Malthusian trap here.
If every person in a less developed country were 1. Engaged to one person of the opposite sex only 2, had two or less children per couple then the people will benefit from not only a huge uplifting of economic burden, but will also contribute to slowing down the rate of population growth. Furthermore, even the countries' GDP might increase, since there will be far less people to treat for Malaria and other deadly diseases.
Here's one more thing to consider. If less developed countries are the ones contributing to overpopulation (although I am aware that India plays a huge part too - I'm leaving China out because they have that one-child policy going now), then the problem of overpopulation is also an issue that will be concentrated in the less-developed countries, right ? In a globalization-perspective, the stable population in developed countries will barely suffer since they will just import the resources from less developed countries and just maintain their own resources to a consistent level.
Does this mean doom will be unleashed only in less developped countries, the (partial) cause of the issue ?
Please enlighten me
Edit: Here's something else I don't understand. Clearly the developed countries have things to learn from, like the culture of being engaged to only one person. This culture has been adapted by other cultures even though this used to be contrary to their original customs (e.g. Japan), because it is a useful aspect of western culture. Why are the developed countries so stubborn and do not adopt these customs themselves ? We always hear about promoting education to these people, but where is the result ?
I know that my grand parents had 11 kids so that if one kid failed to be good at life, they could fall back on another. Turns out their first kid, my mother was the most successful.
Edit: Not kidding though, thats really why they had 11 kids. My grandpa participated in the Vietnam War under the CIA to sabotage the NVA/vietcong cross borders. He had two originally in Laos, but when the opportunity was given to travel to the US, he had as many kids as he could so he could potentially be rich.
To put this into perspective, its too general to answer since theres so many factors but then it comes to the question of morals... And thats not a very desirable discussion on the forums. :/
Read the national geographic that came out yesterday instead of speculating stuff. There is a huge article (it's front page too) explaining why the problem is poverty and the way we consume, not over population.
Here's the thing. A lot of couples in third world countries live on farms, or have a lot of work needed to be able to survive. More children = more workers. That and the death rate of infants is much higher in third world countries. The reason we have population growth isn't neccessarly more kids being born, it's people living longer and in better condition.
when a large amount of the male population was away from home/loved ones. less chance to have kids. Also things like the plague would come around every few hundred years and wipe out a fair amount of the population in certain areas.
There is no overpopulation. There's plenty of room for everyone. Plus as countries become industrialized the birth rate drops. Eventually population will slowly cap out. The best way to ensure this is to start modernizing.
On February 08 2011 17:00 Disregard wrote: To put this into perspective, its too general to answer since theres so many factors but then it comes to the question of morals... And thats not a very desirable discussion on the forums. :/
I understand, but it might not have been so desirable for professors in lectures either. I don't understand why you try to discard this post from the 'General' section of the forum. Life isn't always pleasures.
I think the main problem is not so much the number of people that are on Earth but the fact that people are using up so much energy and resources to a point where sooner or later, we (and certainly our grandkids and so on) will not be able to live like we are now.
On February 08 2011 17:01 MrRicewife wrote: Read the national geographic that came out yesterday instead of speculating stuff. There is a huge article (it's front page too) explaining why the problem is poverty and the way we consume, not over population.
Do you have a link? Unfortunately not everyone can subscribe.
I find it hard to believe that the number of people isn't a problem though. Of course if everyone lived like wild animals and died at 15 we wouldn't be overpopulated, but since we try to improve our lives we put massive stress on the environment. There is only a certain extent to which we can be "green" while also enjoying modern comforts. Hopefully we will get better at that anyway.
It seems as though a lot of lower class people here in the US have a lot of kids for some reason. My mom works at a free clinic, and some 19 year old keeps coming in for a check-up, and he has a girlfriend and with 4 kids :/ 3 of them are his. I have no idea how you end up with 4 kids at the age of 19 but at least he works to support them. My brother also has 5 kids and i think he is 26 or something.
In countries without old-age pensions or superannuation it's very common for couples to have many children so that when they're old and can't look after themselves then they have more people to look after them than those that only have a few. In effect it's because of a poor economy and/or lack of monetary planning that causes people to have more children. I guess it wouldn't be as much of a problem if people were properly educated about finances, but a poor economy somewhat prevents that too. So I guess its all just a part of the cycle of poverty.
Let's put it this way, if you were super poor and had nothing to pass your time with (ie TV, internet, etc...) after work, what do you do? Sex.
No seriously. There was a study that found that birth rates of developing nations went down when TVs were introduced 'cause they had other stuff to do than just sex. If I come across it I'll link it.
On February 08 2011 17:01 MrRicewife wrote: Read the national geographic that came out yesterday instead of speculating stuff. There is a huge article (it's front page too) explaining why the problem is poverty and the way we consume, not over population.
I assume this is the article to which you were referring. If not, I have to tell you, the problems they talk about are numerous, which include overpopulation, are all very foreboding to the casual reader like myself, and none of it is being talked about outside of pieces like these. It highlights just how ignorant most of the world is to these problems.
You are asking the wrong question. The question is why people get less children.
If you ask woman in countries with high birth rates why they get so many children they have no answer. If you ask them how many children would be ideal they have no answer. It is as if they don't realize sex and getting pregnant are related. They have sex and children just keep happening, despite options for birth control being available.
There's also this nice story about someone in Africa learning the woman of a village how to put a condom on a banana. So that person comes back a year later and they all have children. So she asked why they didn't use a condom. They said they did. They had all put a condom on a banana, but apparently that hadn't worked.
Then it's just a question of the exponential function. In the most primitive tribes war used to be the no.1 cause of death. Not famine. Hunter gatherers had no problem with food at all. They also didn't have to work. They would just hang around doing nothing and it would only take them a little time to get food. These tribes killed each other in wars. Why no one can explain. They don't even know themselves. There's no reason to fight over property or land, as they don't have that. Apparently the reason is just to get revenge.
So when we get into the agricultural revolution you suddenly get huge famines. One period you would have a lot of food and population would explode. There would also be no wars. Then they would have a bad harvest or a war and they would die at huge numbers. When almost everyone has to produce food and you get just as many children as you can feed, when a war breaks down and no food at all can be produced, you get extreme famines.
As for overpopulation, if we had way way less people we would all be a lot richer. The earth is limited. Why do we need even 1 billion people? Would we really be worse off with only 20 million world wide? What would be the problem of that?
If you think about what the ideal population would be I think it would be a lot less than what we have now. We can only hope we can limit climate change, increase food production, avoid major wars and somehow hope that the fashion of getting less children, which does really seem to be just a fad, somehow catches in those parts of the world.
I heard this story before about overpopulation and how it's supposed to be a problem. So I did some research into it. According to my research the reason why there seems to be a problem is how humans function.
Example take a twelve room house imagine that it represents the earth. put one person in it they have free reign of the entire thing. Then add another person say a woman that's his wife. Still plenty of room. They have a daughter, she wants a place where she can have privacy there's only 11 rooms where the husband can go. Add another two people call them a different couple well they can't share as they are different people. So we divided the house in half six rooms a piece but one family has one room where the husband can't go.
Basically if there's was no countries nor anyone wanting more that want they need overpopulation would not be a thought in our minds.
1st world countries are definitely more to blame than 3rd world. They may have larger families but it's because of the reasons already stated; labor force/lack of education, etc. We don't have any excuse for what we do, we know better and do it anyways.
A good example of why we're screwed: Remember those awesome Sun Chips bags that were 100% Biodegradable? Ever wonder why you don't see those anymore? Oh, that's right. They pulled all but one kind because they got to many customer complaints about the new "green" bags were 'too loud.' I'll admit they were definitely louder and made a distinct sound but come on 'MERICA. Come on.
As an asian, I know why we have many children. It's difficult to keep many children alive, but in the farmlands, children start working at an early age. The point is, the more children you can support, the better off you are when you're older. You have a lot of helping hands and support after you're too old to work.
It doesn't take much to grow up children if you give them the bare minimum. China is like that, where most of the population are in poverty.
There's other issues like unprotected sex and prostitution.
As for overpopulation, if we had way way less people we would all be a lot richer. The earth is limited. Why do we need even 1 billion people? Would we really be worse off with only 20 million world wide? What would be the problem of that?
With less than 2 billion people we won't have enough workers/specialists to produce the goods we need at the rate we need.
To have economic growth you need population growth, in non industrial countries. The children are a resource, and it is only when they stop becoming a huge resource, then they will stop having a lot of children. Also no\expensive birth control, makes a lot of babies.
Mostly through subsidised existence in the third world - countries can have higher populations than would naturally exist due to UN food aid programs.Of course with the desertfication of Africa due to farming wood for fuel and goat herding more people is not a good proposition for Africa.
are you asking why people aren't having less children?
there are too many reasons for this. it's like basically asking for one reason why rome fell. people, at least men, like to have sex. people in third world countries don't have condoms or birth control, so once they have sex, chances are they are going to get knocked up alot sooner than say some urban american socialite who sleeps with dozens of men a month.
why do people have children? well because if you live in a third world country, some of your children are probably going to die off from starvation of disease or something like that, so if you have more, the more chances that some will survive.
THE biggest change in birthing rates was because of feminization and invention of birth control. you can just google any graph and see the drop in birth rates around that time.
well still if you are asking why people in undeveloped countries aren't progressively thinking on how to limit their birth rate, it's because they don't give a shit and honestly they are right to not give a shit. i highly doubt it's a economic burden for them too. the more children you have, especially boys, they can work on the farm or whatever and take care of you when you get old. there are too many reasons for them to have kids.
if you really want people to stop having as many kids, the only way is to modernize their country. the more first-world their country is the less kids they will have.
This is a very complex issue overall, and the whole category of "overpopulation" is a subjective term that I'm not convinced applies here. However, to tackle the issue of high population growth in lower income countries a very very simple way of thinking about it is from the very very simplified economic thought - Children in high income countries are very expensive and provide very little labor. Children in third world countries provide extensive labor for (comparatively) very little cost. Being stuck in a cycle of poverty means that there is an incentive to have more children thereby greatly increasing the population.
Unfortunately, it gets a lot more complicated from there, and there are countless factors you can add in, but its a good stepping stone I suppose. I'm curious to see the opinions of those with more knowledge of a more specific trend of growth though - its clearly very interesting.
On February 08 2011 17:05 don_kyuhote wrote: I think the main problem is not so much the number of people that are on Earth but the fact that people are using up so much energy and resources to a point where sooner or later, we (and certainly our grandkids and so on) will not be able to live like we are now.
This is the correct issue.
Overpopulation is not our world defining issue, over consumption and waste will be what makes or breaks our stay on Earth. We have far more than enough room for many times the population we have now, just not the means to sustain ourselves with our currently resource and energy usage.
I live in a country where almost half of the country lives in 1 state (18 millon people out of 40 million) we have 23 states. Argentina is the 8th largest country in the world and we have that little amount of people. Overpopulation my ass, we have a very bad population distribution. In reality, we are underpopulated and we have a problem with population density. The world has this problem as well. Its not the amount of people that live in a certain place its where these people live. And yeah as many people said Poor means more children cause there is less contraception and a bigger need for a big or numerous family.
On February 08 2011 16:56 spkim1 wrote: So my question is: Why do we have overpopulation ? And furthermore, will that really bring us all to doom ?
You'll find out the answer to the first question when you hit puberty, and the answer to the second question about 30 years after that.
More seriously, I think there is a problem in your analysis in comparing the cost to support a child in the industrialised world and the non-industrialised world. Also, most cultures in the world have social mechanisms to encourage procreation. While these mechanisms don't benefit the individual, they are obviously necessary for biological reasons.
Wikipedia actually has a lot of information on this. Basically the maximum sustainable population of Earth varies widely based on the methods you use for calculation. Are people going to be consuming as much as they are now (ecological footprint) or are they consuming less?
We should be focusing on consuming less but maintaining or improving our lifestyle. This means efficiency -- we get more out of the stuff we use and/or can recycle it when we no longer require it. If efficiency improves at a rate higher than we are populating the planet (consuming resources) we effective have no real ceiling for a population max. By the time we take up all the land mass on the planet, we'll likely have technology suitable for colonizing the moon and Mars, it's just a matter of making the way we do things better, faster than we are growing.
The population of the earth is going to peak in 30 years, then start declining. Then everyone would start freaking out.
Problems about poverty and world hunger is another issue, not due to "overpopulation".
Why would population magically start to decline in 30 years?
That vid just says "it's not true lol, just a myth guys" without providing any evidence whatsoever.
The video does not state sources no, but it is on the right track. Many modernised countries are either at the replacement level or in population decline, some dangerously so such as Japan which is at 1.3 children per couple. You can imagine what would happen to society in a country over a 50-100 year period at such a low growth rate, certainly social collapse is on the cards with giant swathes of your countryside abandoned, mass aged demographics with no social security from a vibrant working force taxes to get by.
How to fix the overpopulation problem has been known for a long time. There are basically two approaches. One is the one child policy China is enforcing.
The other is fix the socioeconomic problems that people face. This means fixing the third world poverty. Its well known that changing economic policy to fix poverty will reduce birth rates just like you see in industrialized countries. If women have opportunities, birth rates will go down. Its that simple
Population does not follow an exponential function. It follows a logistic function. If resources do begin to be more limited, evolution dictates that population will plateau. We are far from hitting that point as of now.
The population of the earth is going to peak in 30 years, then start declining. Then everyone would start freaking out.
Problems about poverty and world hunger is another issue, not due to "overpopulation".
Why would population magically start to decline in 30 years?
That vid just says "it's not true lol, just a myth guys" without providing any evidence whatsoever.
There are sources for everything.
Here's one of them:
According to the U.N. Population Database, the world's population in 2010 will be 6,908,688,000. The landmass of Texas is 268,820 sq mi (7,494,271,488,000 sq ft).
So, divide 7,494,271,488,000 sq ft by 6,908,688,000 people, and you get 1084.76 sq ft/person. That's approximately a 33' x 33' plot of land for every person on the planet, enough space for a town house.
As for why the population will decline in 30 years:
According to the U.N. Population Database, using the historically accurate low variant projection, the Earth's population will only add another billion people or so over the next thirty years, peaking around 8.02 billion people in the year 2040, and then it will begin to decline. Check their online database.
Hans Rosling has done quite a few talks for TED.com which largely relate to the developing world and overpopulation. He is actually one of my favourite people to listen to. Good talk on overpopulation.
Asking what stops population growth is, imo, the best way to figure out why it grows in the first place. You find that in general as a population becomes better educated, afforded better healthcare and in general become wealthier, they stop reproducing as much.
There is NO reason to have 20 kids. Imagine how overpopulated the world will be in a few decades if everyone has this many kids. It used to be people had larger families to make up for high mortality rate, but with today's medicine, I really do not believe that it is necessary for any more than two kids.... We're eventually gonna get to a point where the Earth cannot support the amount of people we're pumping out. I mean, look at the vegetables now... there's nowhere near the amount of nutrition in them that there used to be, because we have to use less land to grow more...
Basically, it says that the population is expected to stabilize at roughly 9 billion in 2050 lasting through the next 250 years at which point it will begin to decline. I haven't read the entire report since its over 200 pages long but all the reasoning is in there.
The population of the earth is going to peak in 30 years, then start declining. Then everyone would start freaking out.
Problems about poverty and world hunger is another issue, not due to "overpopulation".
Why would population magically start to decline in 30 years?
That vid just says "it's not true lol, just a myth guys" without providing any evidence whatsoever.
There are sources for everything.
Here's one of them:
According to the U.N. Population Database, the world's population in 2010 will be 6,908,688,000. The landmass of Texas is 268,820 sq mi (7,494,271,488,000 sq ft).
So, divide 7,494,271,488,000 sq ft by 6,908,688,000 people, and you get 1084.76 sq ft/person. That's approximately a 33' x 33' plot of land for every person on the planet, enough space for a town house.
As for why the population will decline in 30 years:
According to the U.N. Population Database, using the historically accurate low variant projection, the Earth's population will only add another billion people or so over the next thirty years, peaking around 8.02 billion people in the year 2040, and then it will begin to decline. Check their online database.
Ah, k thanks, I should have went to youtube and checked for more info lol.
Well that's interesting if it proves to hold true, I've wondered about this every now and then, hoping population wouldn't go ridiculously out of control.
The main reason in third world countries/less developed countries is that IMO based on what my parents experience was:
Rural setting/farming. More kids = more to feed but more hands working. As Mao Zedong put it, when asked how china would support that many people he replied "Every person has two hands" or something along those lines. It works well within a less developed nation's constraints but once technology comes into play, the cost to raise a child, essentially feeding them, clothing them, caring for them until they get their first job at I'll say age 15, is a long ways from having a 5 year old that helps water the plants in the farm or an 8 year old that'll take the farm animals to a grazing area.
Overpopulation is primarily tied to land rights. More children-> more laborers to work on farms; hence a preference for more children, preferably male.
China: China is currently having issues with a heavily aging population like a lot of first/second world countries. As China has advanced it's economy, birth rates have significantly decreased naturally- although the one child policy had a huge effect on birth rate as well. This is happening to the point where the Chinese government is relaxing the one child policy. The time when China's population began decreasing, was directly after land right's issues and other issues with the primary sector (mainly food availiablity, solved by the Household Responsibilities Act).
In the past food was a limiting factor for population growth, however the growth is punctured when people no longer find it in their economic interest to have more children. Because they are generally focusing more on their existing children and paying a lot of money to educate and ensure their health. The parents will also more likely be working in an office, where quality generally supersedes quality. (see this link for more info: http://www.teamliquid.net/forum/viewmessage.php?topic_id=174515¤tpage=12#230)
India: India is land locked, a lot of the land is owned by land barons, and because mechanical capital is expensive relative to human capital, laborers are preferred. India has huge amounts of arable land, so hypothetically if it were to get it's economy to focus on food, it could feed most of the world. India has a lot of outstanding issues in it's financial system, government and its secondary sector- however given time these issues will most likely cease given a chance.
Resources and food are different, food is renewable (while the climate is intact), to say the least. However a lot of goods such as housing materials are not. Because of my reasons above, I don't think overpopulation is a threat to natural resources. Overconsumption and waste would be the main issue for resources.
A lot of other changes would help; in America for example:
"Capitalist" intellectual property laws to free certain innovative technologies in America would stimulate technologies to reduce the resources require to provide goods, this would effectively reduce the amount of resources required per capita. And the trade of these products would help the world (other countries would import these technology and goods and use less resources themselves) as well America (through the exports) with it's travails in economic recovery.
But this is one example of many, if it becomes dire, it's very likely such laws would be forcibly rewritten. This is all opinion by the way, not fact ~tell me what you think ♪
"It takes two children per couple to keep a population growth rate of 0."
Really? Replacement fertility is 1.41 children per female.
2 people having 2 children is most often times 4, which can stay that way for 40 or more years and certainly leads to population growth.
What is the problem with Over Population? The Earth has a set "carrying capacity". That is determined by so many factors its impossible to quantify. How efficiently we farm, how sustainable our farming and water usage is, how fairly food and resources are distributed... but regardless of what is numerically, it is certainly exists.
We consume energy to sustain our society. Food. Petroleum. Coal. Water. Almost all of the energy originates with the sun. The question is, are we using up more than the biosphere is currently capturing and making available- and thus depleting the reserves? (aka... peak oil, soil erosion [less arable land], over fishing of the sea) ... or are we sustainable with the environment?
When we reach the actual "carrying capacity" of the planet... there will be a temporary overshot of population- that lives off the stored up energy and basically waits for the inevitable shrinkage. The real question is if we are already in the overshot zone, and how much the shrinkage will be when it comes.
The real danger, is the vast number of people, coupled with inevitable shrinkage, that may be multiplied many times by our cultures damaging of the Biosphere and resulting reduction in the carrying capacity. This, simply, means a lot of people could die in a short time from things like starvation, water wars, and famine.
Of course, we could just assume everything is fine and the earth can probably sustain 100 billion people and why worry.
On February 08 2011 17:38 Neivler wrote: To have economic growth you need population growth, in non industrial countries. The children are a resource, and it is only when they stop becoming a huge resource, then they will stop having a lot of children. Also no\expensive birth control, makes a lot of babies.
Kinda picking nits here but you can industrialise a country (provivded it's non-industrialised) to increase it's growth rate. Yes children are a huge reasource in that country so that is why people have so many children in those countries.
There was a theory (for lack of a better word more like a truth or an application of logic) made by some reverend in I think the 1800s who stated that (not exactly) ''A population will continue to grow until everyone is on the cusp of being able to breed'' basically if anyone has reasources allowing them to have extra children they will do so + Show Spoiler +
(this is economics it makes generalizitions like that because it is correct about 99% of the time and it's simpler to teach students it gets more complicated later)
So everone will have the exact amount of reasources to have just enough children to continue the status quo. This kinda got completely screwed over with the advent of birth control but it remains relevent in 3rd world countries. And for those who talk about running out of reasources, well not really, as demand increases there is an increase in the incentive to more efficiently use our reasources, like as petrol is going up in price fuel efficient cars are getting more popular, and ultimatly it will be better to switch to a renewable source, say hydrogen. Governments don't have to do anything about population it will take care of itself ultimately. That principle is something that few Governments take into account all they have to do is care for those that cannot care for themselves (welfare) and keep people honest (in economic terms like stopping fraud/ false advertising). As population rises then the free market will find ways to better allocate reasources as population gets higher and higher and people have less and less then the reverends theory gets screwed because of the advent of the condom, so population never gets to a horribly high level. And people will get access to that tech because a high population means cheap labout which means industrialisation which means better living standards which means condoms. EDIT: typo EDIT: btw the replacement rate is 2.1 children per female
On February 08 2011 18:27 cursor wrote: "It takes two children per couple to keep a population growth rate of 0."
Really? Replacement fertility is 1.41 children per female.
2 people having 2 children is most often times 4, which can stay that way for 40 or more years and certainly leads to population growth.
Wait, What, can you go over this one one more time please ? If an adult couple of two people make two children, and these children each set out as adults to pair up with another adult each and to make two other children, the initial two people die of old age, leaving four adults and four children, of whom two adults come from another set of two people who died of old age, giving an average of two adults and two children per family, which is the same as the initial position.
Summarizing the result, an adult couple with two children will keep cycling with the same number of population.
Let me make this even plainer: Two people meet, they make two people, and they die. How many people are left ? Two people. And if these two people make two more people and die, then ...... ?
Where on earth did you get that math of 1.41 children per female ? It's absolutely illogical.
On February 08 2011 18:33 Ethic wrote: Population only increases by multiples if each couple has 3 or more children. Most couples only have 1 or 2 children in this century...
Yes, and nonetheless population growth is known to be exponential at present, according to reliable statistics and data. What is your point in paraphrasing a part of what I said in the OP ?
Edit: What do you mean by "most couples" ? Are you taking a sample that leaves out most of the African continent, South Asia, and South America ?
Yes, it was exaggerated, but after looking around for a while i found it to be closer to the truth than i thought. For every sensible couple that decides on 0-2 children there are a lot more couples that have more children, either from accidents, because they want the child support money or because they don't believe in using protection.
The situation is far worse in less developed countries, especially since for example the US still has a lot of free, habitable land while in those third world countries the habitable land is too small and there isn't enough agriculturally useable land to feed the population.
It's time to build a moon station or off-world/space habitats and farms.
On February 08 2011 18:33 Ethic wrote: Population only increases by multiples if each couple has 3 or more children. Most couples only have 1 or 2 children in this century...
Yes, and nonetheless population growth is known to be exponential at present, according to reliable statistics and data. What is your point in paraphrasing a part of what I said in the OP ?
Edit: What do you mean by "most couples" ? Are you taking a sample that leaves out most of the African continent, South Asia, and South America ?
its because people dont just die right after they have 2 kids.
for example, my wifes grandma and grandpa had 2 kids, who each went and had 2 kids. There are now 2+2+4= 8 people. They are all still alive and counted as people. Basically, there is a piling up effect, because people usually have kids when they are 20-30 but live for 70+ years. Hence, the amount of time between people being created is much sorter than the amount of time that people live.
By the time people die, they are usually around the Great Grandparent age... and soon after, if another 2 come... you're already growing again. 2+4+8= 14. (this is assuming the original 2 have already died)
On February 08 2011 18:08 Kickboxer wrote: Just wait for World War III and things will even out in a couple of years ^___^
Half the world will be uninhabitable due to nuclear radiation , would not be a pleasant future , sadly i do see a major war on the horizon within the next 5-10 years.
I think it has a lot to do with the dramatically increased life expectancy of the average person over the past century. The world's population seems to be growing at an alarming rate because the overwhelming majority of people aren't dying fast enough (no major wars, health care too good, etc).
On February 08 2011 18:08 Kickboxer wrote: Just wait for World War III and things will even out in a couple of years ^___^
Half the world will be uninhabitable due to nuclear radiation , would not be a pleasant future , sadly i do see a major war on the horizon within the next 5-10 years.
Relax we're in Australia China and America will screw each other over and no-one gives a fuck about Australia because we have nothing any body wants in the middle of a war. EDIT: except vast reserves of iron ore, bauxite and uranium...shit.
On February 08 2011 17:35 Lokian wrote: As an asian, I know why we have many children. It's difficult to keep many children alive, but in the farmlands, children start working at an early age. The point is, the more children you can support, the better off you are when you're older. You have a lot of helping hands and support after you're too old to work.
Exactly. People don't want to die alone. Especially in countries without nursing homes.
For many third world countries, its more beneficial to have more kids. The more kids you have, the more kids you can have to do work for you. That was how it was hundreds of years ago and it is the same for countries not as developed as first world countries. Also, overpopulation is the result of lower mortality rates in infants as compared to the past. Not as many babies die in their first year. Also, people are living longer due to medicine and new technology.
On February 08 2011 18:02 teh_longinator wrote: I mean, look at the vegetables now... there's nowhere near the amount of nutrition in them that there used to be
India: India is land locked, a lot of the land is owned by land barons, and because mechanical capital is expensive relative to human capital, laborers are preferred.
Exponential population growth is the result of a lot of things, like lack of birth control, stigma on things like abortions, people living 70-100 years off medications, improved health practices, less deaths during child birth, and most of all, no huge repercussions on having a child.
People are even having children in the US just to gain citizenship :/
I would be all for a proposition that made it so that only 2 children in the US recieve free education and governmental benefits, and that any over 2 will be either taxed or will have to be 100% funded by the parents.
But that's too "intrusive on human rights herpity derpity". Get so mad when I see people with 5+ kids and they are supported on welfare and shit.
On February 08 2011 18:33 Ethic wrote: Population only increases by multiples if each couple has 3 or more children. Most couples only have 1 or 2 children in this century...
Yes, and nonetheless population growth is known to be exponential at present, according to reliable statistics and data. What is your point in paraphrasing a part of what I said in the OP ?
Edit: What do you mean by "most couples" ? Are you taking a sample that leaves out most of the African continent, South Asia, and South America ?
its because people dont just die right after they have 2 kids.
for example, my wifes grandma and grandpa had 2 kids, who each went and had 2 kids. There are now 2+2+4= 8 people. They are all still alive and counted as people. Basically, there is a piling up effect, because people usually have kids when they are 20-30 but live for 70+ years. Hence, the amount of time between people being created is much sorter than the amount of time that people live.
By the time people die, they are usually around the Great Grandparent age... and soon after, if another 2 come... you're already growing again. 2+4+8= 14. (this is assuming the original 2 have already died)
Ahem, not quite. What you are describing is a short term effect of longevity, which is easily and fastly superceded by the exponential decrease of population if the fertility rate stays at 1.4 for a couple of generations. Longterm replacement fertility is necessarily higher than 2 (given that gender cannot be handpicked and people cannot be ordered to interbreed)..
Children provide income for the family. Most children start to work way earlier then we do. They provide for their parents when they are to old to work. All the family stays in the village or town.
So families with smaller number of children are poorer then those with many.
+social status from having many children.
So on a family scale it is benificial to have many children. On a bigger scale it is dissastrous.
The population crises has been postponed time and time again by technological advances in agriculture. I think it will catch up to us and there will be famine, riots and political instabillity.
More crops are needed for biofeul. Climatechange. Draughts floods storms Erosion More strained food logisticsn Political tesion due to overpop landclaims waterclaims
I see no upside to further growth. Other factors in play will boost the negative effects of overpopulation
drop from 7 bil to 3 billion and focusing on better conditions and education for the 3 would be better for humanity and the world as a whole, but it won't happen :/
Developing countries have higher death rates and worse medical care than developed countries and that is why they have more than two children per family. Also it was already stated that in a mainly agricultural society it is always good to have one more worker on the fields.
If the natural resources start running short it will be felt everywhere. Wars have already been started entirely because of the need for resources (like USA's war on Iraq).
On February 08 2011 20:27 despite wrote: Developing countries have higher death rates and worse medical care than developed countries and that is why they have more than two children per family.
What I think you mean to say is that developing countries come from an era with a high deathrate among children to an era with a low deathrate among children. This in turn cause the same number of sexual intercourses over a full life to result in more children than it did before. Again it is this change that has lead to the invention of contraceptives in developed countries.
As for the causes of this change, the most dominant two would probably be something like; Sanitation and pure drinking water. Population growth is nothing unheard of. It is a natural response to a changed way of living.
It is not entirely unlike one of our ancestors picking up a stick and using it for the first time to defend against predators. That also drastically changed the human population(If that ancestor can be called human).
India: India is land locked, a lot of the land is owned by land barons, and because mechanical capital is expensive relative to human capital, laborers are preferred.
Have you ever looked at a map?
Land locked was the wrong word. What I should have said was land rights are locked.
Is over population really a concern? The U.S. and all of western Europe all have essentially a 0 growth rate whereas 50 years ago they had a very high growth rate. As a country becomes more developed the people just stop having lots of children for some reason.
Even countries such as Brazil, China, Indonesia, and India have seen dramatically lower population growth rates than 50 years ago. I feel like in another 50 years we will see the peak population of the planet, but it's leveling off.
There are many factors for population growth, some of these factors affects a group of people more than others, for example: Instinct of survival: When people are afraid of their survival instincs kick in and the answer is to have more kids in an attempt to preserve the species, who are the people having a lot of children in developed countries?, at least in Latin America it's always the poor people, being poor is not a good condition, it brings sickness and a lot of stress, people feel under pressure to survive, even when it's against logic having more kids when you are in such a situation it just happends. A more equal society tends to reduce this from happening, Cuba the only second world country in Latin America is the one with the lowest birth rate (please, I beg you do not quote Fox News into it's a protest against the communist regime).
Religion: Certain religions like derivated forms of Islam or protestants, in their traditions signal that couples need to have a lot of kids for the good of their nations. One of my neighbors had 6 kids 'because of his religion', he says it demands 12 kids but because it's too much he decided to at least achieve half of what it demands. Population grow in India is atributed heavily to this.
Grow in global GDP: People now can have kids while having means to sustain them, child mortality have been reduced by a lot, when there is abundance grows. This is tied to inequality of course... having the means to sustain the kids and to properly sustain them are two different things, in more equal societies grow should be closer to 0%.
In ancient Rome, Ceasar Auguste demanded the ruling class to have more kids because their grow was low in comparison to the gallics, some people say it is because their living conditions were much better than the later, sort of like what is happening in Europe today, the instinct to preserve the species isn't there because there is no danger of that happening any time soon...
On February 08 2011 20:27 Fa1nT wrote: drop from 7 bil to 3 billion and focusing on better conditions and education for the 3 would be better for humanity and the world as a whole, but it won't happen :/
And who would decide who could live? And what would happen with parents getting too many children?
There is no easy way turning back and reducing population, there is either the option to expand to other planets, for which the technology already exists, though it would cost about as much as the US is in debt, probably more, including some lost lives... or have a big war which kills half the population.
I'm still in favour of expanding, yes, it's risky for people, it's expensive, but hell... it would solve so many problems.... oh, and it's definatly cool :p
On February 08 2011 18:02 teh_longinator wrote: I mean, look at the vegetables now... there's nowhere near the amount of nutrition in them that there used to be, because we have to use less land to grow more...
Rhode Island, 50, 1545 sq mi, 4002 sq km. 1545 (sq mi) = 43,072,128,000 sq feet Latest official current world population estimate, for mid-year 2010, is estimated at 6,852,472,823 43,072,128,000 / 6,852,472,823 = 6.28563281 sqr(6.28563281) = 2.50711643
Conclusion: If you give everyone in the world their own 2.5ft x 2.5ft box, you can fit them all in the small state of Rhode Island. If you think the world is over populated... then move.
So, divide 7,494,271,488,000 sq ft by 6,908,688,000 people, and you get 1084.76 sq ft/person. That's approximately a 33' x 33' plot of land for every person on the planet, enough space for a town house.
The area seems low, but not as low as I thought. 33' x 33' ~= 100m^2 ~= 85kg rice ~= half years food for one person That is using Belgium's cereal yield, Zimbabwe would only make 3kg with the same area.
But that's too "intrusive on human rights herpity derpity". Get so mad when I see people with 5+ kids and they are supported on welfare and shit.
Do you get mad at old people and the disabled as well because they are on welfare and shit? You can blame poor people for overpopulating the world but its the rich people that are using a disproportionate amount of resources. A family with a good income is going to leave a far far bigger carbon footprint than 5 homeless guys.
Hey don't worry we have a thousand years to colonize another planet (Tau Ceti or Mars since they found frozen water there) according to Stephen Hawking but first the 1% of the wealthiest population on Earth will live in luxurious condos on the moon away from most of humanity lol :D
Relax guys , with the fed printing all that funny money that will push the price of food beyond most people soon.Thats what caused the Egyptians to go over the edge.$10 for an average loaf coming within a year to the US.
Relax we're in Australia China and America will screw each other over and no-one gives a fuck about Australia because we have nothing any body wants in the middle of a war. EDIT: except vast reserves of iron ore, bauxite and uranium...shit.
Also Oil , natural gas and GOLD. Govt needs to start investing more in missile technology and scrap those useless collins class submarines. Also i would buy some nukes off the US .Most would disagree with me there , still i don't think you can underestimate the threat from China.
Like i said before what will happen , China is building a massive stockpile of resources , the mining industry here is in a bubble with manufacturing , services and construction all shrinking over the past 6 months (source : forexfactory.com ).Suddenly China will stop buying resources , the value of those mineral companies will collapse and China will buy them all up for cheap.
On February 08 2011 20:27 Fa1nT wrote: drop from 7 bil to 3 billion and focusing on better conditions and education for the 3 would be better for humanity and the world as a whole, but it won't happen :/
And just how would you get rid off 4 billion people? Send them out to space? Nuke a couple of continents?
Are you asking why there is overpopulation especially among poorer countries?
There are two main reasons that come to my mind and they're clearly stated in most articles about this subject.
1. Those in poor countries cannot afford to actually go do things. No electronics or internet to keep them entertained, so guess what happens in the 2-5 hours they're up while there is no light in their country, but they're not tired yet? They fuck. Very simple it is how the pass the time. Not read my candle light, not watch the TV, they don't have those luxuries. They fuck.
2. Lack of intelligence. Even if they had a book they usually can't read well. They can't get a decent job to afford a TV because of their lacking. Just how it goes.
On February 08 2011 17:03 darmousseh wrote: There is no overpopulation. There's plenty of room for everyone. Plus as countries become industrialized the birth rate drops. Eventually population will slowly cap out. The best way to ensure this is to start modernizing.
some documentary on the BBC said that if we were to all consume at the rate of the standard American, the world can only support ~4billion people, Europeans something about 6 or a more eastern lifestyle the number is much higher.
overpopulation is a relative term based on how you want to live your life. if we all want to be Americanised the world is already 50% beyond the sustainable cap
Yes there's overpopulation, OP. Because people just don't understand the exponential function. But the world's not getting fucked because of that - it's us in the wealthy countries that consume the vast majority of the world's resources. Pointing the finger at the abundance of poor people is a cop-out.
But yes, once the oil starts to dry out there's going to be a huge spike in food prices, and starvation around the world is going to be something scary.
On February 08 2011 22:10 DanceSC wrote: Rhode Island, 50, 1545 sq mi, 4002 sq km. 1545 (sq mi) = 43,072,128,000 sq feet Latest official current world population estimate, for mid-year 2010, is estimated at 6,852,472,823 43,072,128,000 / 6,852,472,823 = 6.28563281 sqr(6.28563281) = 2.50711643
Conclusion: If you give everyone in the world their own 2.5ft x 2.5ft box, you can fit them all in the small state of Rhode Island. If you think the world is over populated... then move.
Earth = 148940000 km2 land (29.2 %) out of 510072000 km2 148940000 km2 = 1,603,176,817,464,746.2 ft2 1,603,176,817,464,746.2 / 43,072,128,000 = 37,220.7479 ft2 land per person
Now assuming that only half of the land is inhabitable you still have 18 610.374 ft2 per person
WAIT!! I DID THAT WRONG *update* world / rhode island = how much larger your 2.5 x 2.5 box can be* 1,603,176,817,464,746.2 / 43,072,128,000 = 37,220.7479 sqr(37 220.7479) = 192.926794 192.926794 * 2.50711643 = 483.689935
Conclusion: There is enough room for everyone to have their own 483.5ft x 483.5ft plot of land
On February 08 2011 22:10 DanceSC wrote: Rhode Island, 50, 1545 sq mi, 4002 sq km. 1545 (sq mi) = 43,072,128,000 sq feet Latest official current world population estimate, for mid-year 2010, is estimated at 6,852,472,823 43,072,128,000 / 6,852,472,823 = 6.28563281 sqr(6.28563281) = 2.50711643
Conclusion: If you give everyone in the world their own 2.5ft x 2.5ft box, you can fit them all in the small state of Rhode Island. If you think the world is over populated... then move.
Earth = 148940000 km2 land (29.2 %) out of 510072000 km2 148940000 km2 = 1,603,176,817,464,746.2 ft2 1,603,176,817,464,746.2 / 43,072,128,000 = 37,220.7479 ft2 land per person
Now assuming that only half of the land is inhabitable you still have 18 610.374 ft2 per person
WAIT!! I DID THAT WRONG *update* world / rhode island = how much larger your 2.5 x 2.5 box can be* 1,603,176,817,464,746.2 / 43,072,128,000 = 37,220.7479 sqr(37 220.7479) = 192.926794 192.926794 * 2.50711643 = 483.689935
Conclusion: There is enough room for everyone to have their own 483.5ft x 483.5ft plot of land
more then 70% of the Earth consists out of water, and on top of that you have mountains, deserts or barren landscapes which are fairly inhabitable.
Edit: bad reading comphrehension. Still the problem is not how to fit the population on the Earth, it is if the amount that people consume can keep up
On February 08 2011 22:10 DanceSC wrote: Rhode Island, 50, 1545 sq mi, 4002 sq km. 1545 (sq mi) = 43,072,128,000 sq feet Latest official current world population estimate, for mid-year 2010, is estimated at 6,852,472,823 43,072,128,000 / 6,852,472,823 = 6.28563281 sqr(6.28563281) = 2.50711643
Conclusion: If you give everyone in the world their own 2.5ft x 2.5ft box, you can fit them all in the small state of Rhode Island. If you think the world is over populated... then move.
Yeah I am sure your precious Rhode Island supports itself with food , water , electricity and recycles 100% so that you don't stack up grabage.
Also here we have a problem with a certain ethnic group which is the only group going fast in numbers and all i can say is atleast 90% of them are unemployed.They start having children at 13 for the child support and recently it was discovered that some of them sell their children in Greece.
Double also Europe DOES have a problem with over population.Thats why all the borders are starting to have more and more strick control(and because of another big problem that is a result of the overpopulation but lets not get into that).France even sent back to us this ethnic group because even they couldn't handle them.Soon it's going to be FFA ..everyone trying to push the masses of unducated somewhere else untill we can't push anymore.
And I'd say we are already overpopulated.Even if you can fit people in 2.5ft x 2.5ft boxes the polution that goes along with supporting humanity will overwhelm us.
That is given everyone their own 2.5 x 2.5 space, you CAN fit the entire population of the world in Rhode island. and Rhode island is 1 / 37,220.7479 th's of the Earths land. if you take the 6.25 (2.5 * 2.5) area^2 and multiplied that by 37,000, you would get about 231,250 ft2 per person...
The topic was *WORLD OVERPOPULATION* not *EUROPE OVERPOPULATION* if you have a problem then like i said... "move"
(you didn't address what ethnic group btw) Im sure with 37,220.7479 ft2 space per 2.5ft x 2.5 box everyone has, they have plenty of room for your "food , water , electricity and recycles 100% so that you don't stack up grabage (*sp garbage*)"
1. Population Growth is not a problem long-term. Population growth world wide is slowing, and we may have the problem of underpopulation by 2200
2. Overpopulation is also not Much of a problem... because a lot of the resources that we use are based on people (at the very least based on technology that more people come up with.)
3. Underdevelopment IS a problem, and it ties into the other two... in underdeveloped countries, more children are good for the family (both culturally and economically) and the population isn't able to contribute as much.
i really don't have time to read the entire thread, but i want to chime in. population growth can be easily explained by FAVORABLE CONDITIONS that promote growth. one of my teachers showed me a graph of the worlds population since the beginning of recorded history, then plotted technological inventions along the graph. the worlds population spiked whenever there was an advance in technology/medicine, and the worlds population went down whenever there was a disaster/whenever a finite natural resource was in low supply. i don't want to be alarmist or anything, but oil is a finite resource, and according to the graph, the worlds population SKY-ROCKETED around the time oil was found/used/cultivated/w/e, but what happens when it runs out? so many things rely on oil, as far as my own personal research on the subject is concerned, there is no viable replacement. get ready for the worlds population to go down a little bit :3
If you want to learn about population growth simply google "The demographic transition." In theory the extreme population growth we currently see will stabilize as fertility rates in developing countries drop to match the already falling mortality rates. Its happened to the developed world and is theorized to be currently happening the less developed countries.
On February 09 2011 00:17 Krikkitone wrote: 1. Population Growth is not a problem long-term. Population growth world wide is slowing, and we may have the problem of underpopulation by 2200
What are you basing that on? We gained over a billion people in the last decade.
2. Overpopulation is also not Much of a problem... because a lot of the resources that we use are based on people (at the very least based on technology that more people come up with.)
Not a problem for us here in the States who are fortunate enough to have a high standard of living already. Technology needs to *drastically* improve if we're going to maintain such ridiculous levels of population growth.
On February 08 2011 23:37 lowercase wrote: Yes there's overpopulation, OP. Because people just don't understand the exponential function. But the world's not getting fucked because of that - it's us in the wealthy countries that consume the vast majority of the world's resources. Pointing the finger at the abundance of poor people is a cop-out.
But yes, once the oil starts to dry out there's going to be a huge spike in food prices, and starvation around the world is going to be something scary.
You got it backwards. There is fear of overpopulation because some people who barely managed to figure out the exponential function think they now have a clue about the dynamics of population growth and technological progress. If "the world as we know it" should ever come to an end due to humanity, it will surely not be due to the fact that there were just too many people, but because a significant minority of those people did something terribly wrong.
It will work itself out. A population will increase until it reaches/surpasses the carrying capacity of its environment then that population will decline and eventually stabilize.
The OP is full of ignorance. Japan has had negative population growth for years (this is not a good thing) because the birth rate there is <2/couple. The population growth in the world is not in the US or developed nations, but rather poverty stricken areas in Indonesia, India, China, sub-Saharan Africa, and South/Latin America.
Also, be aware that population growth in the world is not a Malthusian trap. There is PLENTY of food to feed everyone, and if people would only open their eyes to science and GM food, more than enough to feed 15, maybe 20 billion.
The problem isn't enough food. It's that the food isn't where it needs to be.
It's cute how people are arguing about land being the focal point of this issue and others trying to debunk it with the world being able to fit in land mass the size of Texas. It's a shame that logic and common sense need not apply in these threads.
The core issue of overpopulation is the arithmetic rate in which we grow food and gather resources as compared to the geometric rate in which our population grows and consumes. It's a problem of commodities not land. The specifics of this aren't limited to food, it is a HUGE misconception that we are suffering from a food shortage. In fact, we produce more food than we could eat (assuming that everyone had access to the food), the problem is that we don't have the means to deliver and secure the food to the people that need it. The real issues that lie ahead for us with overpopulation are: fresh water and fossil fuels. I can't wait until everyone has to grab a ticket and wait in line just to get a bottle of water.
War and Disease used to be the way that the population was kept in check. As Diplomacy and Medicine has made great advances in the last 100 years, we've seen huge spikes in population and overcrowding in many areas. While in the last decade the developed world has seen, for the most part, a normalization of population growth, the undeveloped world has gone unchecked. A more specific sub-category of the problem of overpopulation (as hinted at before) is population density. As population grows, it becomes more susceptible to new forms of diseases and viruses. And, given that we now live in an industrial age, you have to worry about quality of living, air, and environment.
Land plays a very small role in this equation, even more so when the people doing the math include areas of the world that aren't livable for their "we can all live in Texas" or "everyone can fit shoulder to shoulder in Rhode Island" math.
There is only one answer to this problem: education and women's rights. It is a proven fact that when women are educated, have access to higher forms of education, and means to provide for themselves, that birth rates drop, marriages occur at later ages, and family sizes are smaller. Even if overpopulation isn't an issue, even if population growth is peachy, there is no argument anyone can make against education and universal rights being given more attention on the world stage.
There is only one answer to this problem: education and women's rights. It is a proven fact that when women are educated, have access to higher forms of education, and means to provide for themselves, that birth rates drop, marriages occur at later ages, and family sizes are smaller. Even if overpopulation isn't an issue, even if population growth is peachy, there is no argument anyone can make against education and universal rights being given more attention on the world stage.
It's hilarious and ironic that a person with the handle "Babyfactory" would post this, but you're absolutely correct. This is the right answer to "solving" population growth.
There is only one answer to this problem: education and women's rights. It is a proven fact that when women are educated, have access to higher forms of education, and means to provide for themselves, that birth rates drop, marriages occur at later ages, and family sizes are smaller. Even if overpopulation isn't an issue, even if population growth is peachy, there is no argument anyone can make against education and universal rights being given more attention on the world stage.
It's hilarious and ironic that a person with the handle "Babyfactory" would post this, but you're absolutely correct. This is the right answer to "solving" population growth.
It's a huge sticking point I have with politics for the simple fact that politicians won't address this issue due to it being "political suicide". I've only heard two political figures even begin to address this issue to a suitable degree and they are: Bill Clinton and Henry Kissinger.
Bill Clinton has given speeches about promoting both education and women's rights with the overtone being to address the issue of overpopulation. It's a shame that we think we need more airport security and tougher regulations on wall street instead of high standards of education and a society that is actual equal. If I can find them, I will post.
edit:
It tickles your fancy even more, I'm conservative and strongly disliked Bill Clinton's presidency. However, I have to say, I love everything he's done before and after it.
There is only one answer to this problem: education and women's rights. It is a proven fact that when women are educated, have access to higher forms of education, and means to provide for themselves, that birth rates drop, marriages occur at later ages, and family sizes are smaller. Even if overpopulation isn't an issue, even if population growth is peachy, there is no argument anyone can make against education and universal rights being given more attention on the world stage.
It's hilarious and ironic that a person with the handle "Babyfactory" would post this, but you're absolutely correct. This is the right answer to "solving" population growth.
It's a huge sticking point I have with politics for the simple fact that politicians won't address this issue due to it being "political suicide". I've only heard two political figures even begin to address this issue to a suitable degree and they are: Bill Clinton and Henry Kissinger.
Bill Clinton has given speeches about promoting both education and women's rights with the overtone being to address the issue of overpopulation. It's a shame that we think we need more airport security and tougher regulations on wall street instead of high standards of education and a society that is actual equal. If I can find them, I will post.
edit:
It tickles your fancy even more, I'm conservative and strongly disliked Bill Clinton's presidency. However, I have to say, I love everything he's done before and after it.
Joe Biden as well. Everyone only really knows him as "that guy who says a lot of dumb stuff on TV", but he's done fantastic things for women's rights over the course of his political career.
Education, (for both men and women), and women's equality is huge in preventing large birth rates. Consensual sex simply isn't a reality for women in all parts of the world. Combine this with a lack of understanding/access to contraceptives, and poor/uneducated women end up having a lot of children they can't support.
I once saw a documentary mentioning that in a lot of developing countries the methods of birth control aren't as popular as in Europe, the USA, etc. It's caused by lack of education and a lot of times religious conventions, prohibiting the use of condoms, the pill etc. And for the pill of course, it needs to be available and not too expensive (the actual commentary was about the spread of AIDS in africa and largely due of the non-use of condoms, which as you know don't only serve prevention, but also protection issues). And maybe (but that's just my theory), in a mostly patriarchic society it's the man who decides when to engage in intercourse ( ). Plus, he is rarely the one who has the "burden" of carrying the child and nourishing it, so he will not care too much about prevention if the woman can't somehow force him to. Furthermore, where there's no working legal system, an impregnated woman will never get the begetter to pay for the child if he decides to leave the woman. I think the lack of law and the lack of social development towards an equal (man-woman) society is playing a huge role here.
On February 09 2011 00:17 Krikkitone wrote: 1. Population Growth is not a problem long-term. Population growth world wide is slowing, and we may have the problem of underpopulation by 2200
What are you basing that on? We gained over a billion people in the last decade.
Yes, and next decade we will grow at a smaller % and probably between 2050 and 2100 we will start losing hundreds of millions each decade.
2. Overpopulation is also not Much of a problem... because a lot of the resources that we use are based on people (at the very least based on technology that more people come up with.)
Not a problem for us here in the States who are fortunate enough to have a high standard of living already. Technology needs to *drastically* improve if we're going to maintain such ridiculous levels of population growth.
The developed world is losing population (naturally, immigration make up the difference) Technology mostly needs to Change.
As population stabilizes+declines worldwide, technology will continually improve living standards. (by 2200 any society that has been stable for the past 200 years will almost certainly have their people economically living much better than the US/other developed countries now)
Here is a video regarding overpopulation that EVERYBODY SHOULD WATCH! Its only an hour, watch the interview. It will change your views on all this overpopulation buzz.
In labour economies having more children increases household income.
In knowledge economies having more children decreases household income (in the short- and medium-term).
Children in knowledge economies are extremely expensive but earn more in the long-term, so people have less of them. In labour economies the cost per child is more than outweighed by the child's relatively quick return of labour and income to the household, so it's in the family's interest to have as many as possible.
The population of the earth is going to peak in 30 years, then start declining. Then everyone would start freaking out.
Problems about poverty and world hunger is another issue, not due to "overpopulation".
Why would population magically start to decline in 30 years?
That vid just says "it's not true lol, just a myth guys" without providing any evidence whatsoever.
This is a constant in every demographic studies I have seen, by 2050 the population will stop growing. Then some demograph think it will decline, other say it will stay at the same level (around 9-10 billions ?).
Don't ask me the math or "why" cauze I don't know, I'm not a demograph and only remember the conclusion of those works I read back then.
i really do not think overpopulation will ever happen. There will always be people that have a butt-load of kids and those who do not have any. I am not sure how to explain it but i can promise there will not be an "overpopulation" of humans on earth.
The population of the earth is going to peak in 30 years, then start declining. Then everyone would start freaking out.
Problems about poverty and world hunger is another issue, not due to "overpopulation".
Why would population magically start to decline in 30 years?
That vid just says "it's not true lol, just a myth guys" without providing any evidence whatsoever.
This is a constant in every demographic studies I have seen, by 2050 the population will stop growing. Then some demograph think it will decline, other say it will stay at the same level (around 9-10 billions ?).
Don't ask me the math or "why" cauze I don't know, I'm not a demograph and only remember the conclusion of those works I read back then.
Demographs are simply extrapolating the developments of the last decades into the future. The (relative) population growth steadily declined in that time, especially in correlation with economic development.
There are only a few countries in the world nowadays with the insane population growth rates most countries had 50-100 years ago.
Why have there been insane population growth rates at that time? The reproduction strategies of the past were still practiced while mortality rates dropped drastically in the modern age, simple as that.
More modern reproduction strategies seem to solve that problem, and we as individuals are lucky that that is the case, because the average quality of life would decrease if economic growth could not keep up with population growth (as is the case in many developing countries, see e.g. egypt)
Hi, I have an A-Level in geography so ill try to explain population grwoth to you . In the extremely undeveoped world, (e.g. Ethiopia, Somalia, Zimbabwe ect) people give birth to lots of children due to lack of contraception and lack of entertainment. However, the death rates are so high in these countries, the population stays the same because the birth rates are roughly the same as the death rates. These countries are at stage one on the demographic transition model.
In countries that are just starting to become developed, the healthcare system starts to improve and the death rate plummets, this causes the population to spiral much like india over the past 50 years (since WW2, the Indian popuation has increased from 300 million to 1.1 billion and shows no sign of stopping). This is stage 2 on the dtm.
In countries that are nearing full development, people start being educated on the dangers of unprotected sex and the economic disadvantage you put yourself at by having children. The death rate starts to fall however the overall popuation is still increasing due to the ever falling death rate. These type of countries include places like South Africa, Eastern Europe and Argentina. This is stage 3 on the dtm.
In countries that are just recently fully developed, the popuation stays the same due to equal birth and death rates. Woman still want to have children and Men still want to get married. Places like this include South Korea, Japan, Australia. This is stage 4 on the dtm.
In countries that have been develpoed a while, woman realise the implications of having children and would rather work on their career before making a family. The health care is nearing the best it can be and death rates are extremely low resulting in an aging popuation and eventually a fall in the population. Places like this include Germany, UK, US, France ect. This is stage 5 on the dtm.
Also, it has been calculated that in a fully developed country, the average fertillity of a woman throughout the country needs to be at 2.04 to sustain the population. Any lower than that, the population decreases, any higher than that, the population increases. The fertillity rate in Spain is 1.1, in Germany is 1.3, in UK is 1.8 and in France is 1.7. Also about China. The sex ratio in china is extremely male. This means that along with the one child policy, the popuation of China may half over the next 50-100 years.
i really do not think overpopulation will ever happen. There will always be people that have a butt-load of kids and those who do not have any. I am not sure how to explain it but i can promise there will not be an "overpopulation" of humans on earth.
The age of cheap oil and industrialized food production are the main source of overpopulation. Without the use of cheap oil, food production would drop by 90%, to medieval levels. Population growth is limited by a single decisive factor: how much food you can harvest per acre of farmland.
If enough food is available, humans will reproduce. If not, they won't.
Another factor is medical advancement, but that's not nearly as important as food.
because a lot of people have more than 2 kids (my family has 5)
And furthermore, will that really bring us all to doom ?
The Earth is like us, once it became to be, it was dying in the sense that every day its closer to its doom. The Earth of course has a longer life span than a human, so now the question is when will we sap it of all our resources? I think the real question here is how long will we be able to sustain ourselves (resource-wise), and when will the rest of the world implement a child limit like China to prevent further overpopulation?
Why do these people keep giving births ?
Some people like big families. My father had a lot of money, so he could afford it. Once he lost his job, it became a huge financial burden. The Mexican family next door to me has 7 kids, and they are poor and they live happily just having each other.
Does this mean doom will be unleashed only in less developped countries, the (partial) cause of the issue ?
I have no idea, so I will leave that for others to answer
On February 09 2011 02:26 Cain0 wrote: Hi, I have an A-Level in geography so ill try to explain population grwoth to you . In the extremely undeveoped world, (e.g. Ethiopia, Somalia, Zimbabwe ect) people give birth to lots of children due to lack of contraception and lack of entertainment. However, the death rates are so high in these countries, the population stays the same because the birth rates are roughly the same as the death rates. These countries are at stage one on the demographic transition model.
In countries that are just starting to become developed, the healthcare system starts to improve and the death rate plummets, this causes the population to spiral much like india over the past 50 years (since WW2, the Indian popuation has increased from 300 million to 1.1 billion and shows no sign of stopping). This is stage 2 on the dtm.
In countries that are nearing full development, people start being educated on the dangers of unprotected sex and the economic disadvantage you put yourself at by having children. The death rate starts to fall however the overall popuation is still increasing due to the ever falling death rate. These type of countries include places like South Africa, Eastern Europe and Argentina. This is stage 3 on the dtm.
In countries that are just recently fully developed, the popuation stays the same due to equal birth and death rates. Woman still want to have children and Men still want to get married. Places like this include South Korea, Japan, Australia. This is stage 4 on the dtm.
In countries that have been develpoed a while, woman realise the implications of having children and would rather work on their career before making a family. The health care is nearing the best it can be and death rates are extremely low resulting in an aging popuation and eventually a fall in the population. Places like this include Germany, UK, US, France ect. This is stage 5 on the dtm.
Also, it has been calculated that in a fully developed country, the average fertillity of a woman throughout the country needs to be at 2.04 to sustain the population. Any lower than that, the population decreases, any higher than that, the population increases. The fertillity rate in Spain is 1.1, in Germany is 1.3, in UK is 1.8 and in France is 1.7. Also about China. The sex ratio in china is extremely male. This means that along with the one child policy, the popuation of China may half over the next 50-100 years
i really do not think overpopulation will ever happen. There will always be people that have a butt-load of kids and those who do not have any. I am not sure how to explain it but i can promise there will not be an "overpopulation" of humans on earth.
What?
He is from the US so he has his excuses. Just .. leave him alone.
On February 08 2011 18:51 Morfildur wrote: Have you ever seen the movie "Idiocracy"?
Yes, it was exaggerated, but after looking around for a while i found it to be closer to the truth than i thought. For every sensible couple that decides on 0-2 children there are a lot more couples that have more children, either from accidents, because they want the child support money or because they don't believe in using protection.
The situation is far worse in less developed countries, especially since for example the US still has a lot of free, habitable land while in those third world countries the habitable land is too small and there isn't enough agriculturally useable land to feed the population.
It's time to build a moon station or off-world/space habitats and farms.
I find that this bolded phrase a little irritating as the only reason they are sensible is if there really is an imminent overpopulation crisis. And the reasons may be true for some. However, what about the simple reason of wanting a couple more children? Having come from a larger family, I can say there is a significantly different family dynamic when you have +3 children that I think single child and even two children families miss.
The whole overpopulation crisis is a wonderful scare tactic to justify all sorts of wonderful programs including sterilizing people with 'inferior' genetic material. The problem is it's hard to predict the efficiencies that can be created in food production. It's a crisis that can be continually pushed back, that will eventually happen. Since Malthuse, we've pushed back this so-called crisis a full century. So how imminent was the crisis in the first place?
As others have said, an agriculture society (particularly one with poor medical care) requires many children both because for labour and because of infant mortality. The huge increase in population occured in the industrial era when living conditions improved and people continued to have the same amount of children. However, when children became an economic burden, people had less children and later. The same thing would probably happen in India and Africa. While infant mortality and agriculture child labour remain, the birth rate will be large. When living conditions improve, the population will probably increase dramatically, but if children become an economic burden, the birth rate will drop.
The biggest problem with a lot of these prediction methods is that it assumes that the current trends will continue or even compound ad infinitum. That could be the case, but there could also be additional factors that would interrupt and change our predictions.
In the space of one hundred and seventy-six years the Lower Mississippi has shortened itself two hundred and forty-two miles. That is an average of a trifle over one mile and a third per year. Therefore, any calm person, who is not blind or idiotic, can see that in the Old Oolitic Silurian Period, just a million years ago next November, the Lower Mississippi River was upwards of one million three hundred thousand miles long, and stuck out over the Gulf of Mexico like a fishing-rod. And by the same token any person can see that seven hundred and forty-two years from now the Lower Mississippi will be only a mile and three-quarters long, and Cairo and New Orleans will have joined their streets together, and be plodding comfortably along under a single mayor and a mutual board of aldermen. There is something fascinating about science. One gets such wholesale returns of conjecture out of such a trifling investment of fact.
Oh and the birth rate required to maintain 0 growth I believe is 2.1. The 0.1 is necessary to account for women unable to give children (or who don't want to.)
im almost certain china does not have that 1 child thing going still. it created a problem with gender ratio. instead of a nearly 50% ratio of boys to girls its like high 50s for boys.
On February 09 2011 04:40 beat farm wrote: im almost certain china does not have that 1 child thing going still. it created a problem with gender ratio. instead of a nearly 50% ratio of boys to girls its like high 50s for boys.
It's still in effect, although only in large cities. In addition children of the one child policy, once they get married, are allowed to have two (but only if they marry another child of the policy).
Actually, according to the Wikipedia, raw IQ scores historically were increasing by 3 every decade. I used word historically, because I do not want to claim that trend continues.
This pretty much insures there will be no idiocracy.
That means that compared to newborns, on average, we are below average intelligence. It also opens a whole new front on discussion how much smarter you are then your parents.
A thing to note, that gains are concentrated in lower half of intelligence range. That means that upper bound of intelligence moved insignificantly. Also recent data shows stagnation. However, I think that increasing world complexity (using phone/pc/gaming/sc2^^ are highly abstract concepts) will force population to more or less keep intelligence levels up.
Also this bring another question, does MAC rethinking (making shit simple to use) dumb down the population?
I find it appalling that the only real part of this concern has been glossed over by so many people.
The issue is not that we will get 40 billion people, and then go extinct because nobody has enough food. That is not the problem. The absolute worst case is that some people die and the population goes back down. There is no way for this to even be a problem, so quit talking about it.
The issue is not about personal space. It's not like you just divide the land evenly and say, look, this is lots of space. It has nothing to do with space. I'm sure we can all fit comfortably in antarctica, though I heard the weather is unpleasant...
The issue is about quality of life. Overpopulation is not linked to some mystical doomsday event, it is linked to poverty and disease and human suffering. Specifically local overpopulation, in areas that cannot support the resource drain. Waving your hands around, posting a shitty link about how the population is going to stabilize is fucking retarded. No shit.... what you should be concerned about is that "stabilize" can mean a lot of suffering. We certainly ought to have the foresight to avoid it. Overpopulation is a real problem that causes real suffering and deserves real solutions.
On February 09 2011 05:32 ToxNub wrote: I find it appalling that the only real part of this concern has been glossed over by so many people.
The issue is not that we will get 40 billion people, and then go extinct because nobody has enough food. That is not the problem. The absolute worst case is that some people die and the population goes back down. There is no way for this to even be a problem, so quit talking about it.
The issue is not about personal space. It's not like you just divide the land evenly and say, look, this is lots of space. It has nothing to do with space. I'm sure we can all fit comfortably in antarctica, though I heard the weather is unpleasant...
The issue is about quality of life. Overpopulation is not linked to some mystical doomsday event, it is linked to poverty and disease and human suffering. Specifically local overpopulation, in areas that cannot support the resource drain. Waving your hands around, posting a shitty link about how the population is going to stabilize is fucking retarded. No shit.... what you should be concerned about is that "stabilize" can mean a lot of suffering. We certainly ought to have the foresight to avoid it. Overpopulation is a real problem that causes real suffering and deserves real solutions.
which also have a very simple solution seeing how every single nation follows the exact same four step pattern, so we know what needs to be done to solve it. Hence why nobody gives a crap, people love figuring out a solution but they very rarely care enough to make it happen.
On February 08 2011 16:56 spkim1 wrote: These days, I hear so often people panicking about overpopulation. Among the lectures I attend professors in up to three courses (ECON 221, ECON 211, and EOSC 114) freak out as to how fast world population is growing and how soon we will run short of resources to upkeep us all.
My Econ 211 professor told me last month that our population reached 7 billion now. "That means we've got another China within the past few decades".
So my question is: Why do we have overpopulation ? And furthermore, will that really bring us all to doom ?
Here's my logic: in most economically developed countries, the trend nowadays is to have few children, if not none, per married couple. Many couples actually decide not to even have children, and many others just want one or two children. In my case, most couples around me in the three places I've lived in (Seoul South Korea, Vancouver, BC, Canada, and Geneva, Switzerland) want at most two children. The reasons can extend from personal preferrence to economic issues.
It takes two children per couple to keep a population growth rate of 0.
Of course, you will tell me that such is not the case in developing countries, and that birth rates are far greater in the Third World. And this is where I also think is the problem.
So here's another follow-up question: Why do these people keep giving births ?
Even in developed countries, having two children presents to be an incredible economic burden. So for these people, if they have several children, I'm just lost for words. What are they thinking ?
In effect, I'm just arguing the Malthusian trap here.
If every person in a less developed country were 1. Engaged to one person of the opposite sex only 2, had two or less children per couple then the people will benefit from not only a huge uplifting of economic burden, but will also contribute to slowing down the rate of population growth. Furthermore, even the countries' GDP might increase, since there will be far less people to treat for Malaria and other deadly diseases.
Here's one more thing to consider. If less developed countries are the ones contributing to overpopulation (although I am aware that India plays a huge part too - I'm leaving China out because they have that one-child policy going now), then the problem of overpopulation is also an issue that will be concentrated in the less-developed countries, right ? In a globalization-perspective, the stable population in developed countries will barely suffer since they will just import the resources from less developed countries and just maintain their own resources to a consistent level.
Does this mean doom will be unleashed only in less developped countries, the (partial) cause of the issue ?
Please enlighten me
Edit: Here's something else I don't understand. Clearly the developed countries have things to learn from, like the culture of being engaged to only one person. This culture has been adapted by other cultures even though this used to be contrary to their original customs (e.g. Japan), because it is a useful aspect of western culture. Why are the developed countries so stubborn and do not adopt these customs themselves ? We always hear about promoting education to these people, but where is the result ?
THe whole post made me laugh. When are the "developed" countries going to realize that in a global perspective, the problems of humanity even if they happen in north sudan, should be their primary concern? Srsly.- It's extremely wrong not to help someone just because of "we do not have enough resources." The World has been producing unbelievable amounts of wealth, the problem here is actually sharing them.
Did you know that more than half of the world's wealth is owned only by 257 people? Thats a fucking distribution disaster.
On February 08 2011 16:56 spkim1 wrote: These days, I hear so often people panicking about overpopulation. Among the lectures I attend professors in up to three courses (ECON 221, ECON 211, and EOSC 114) freak out as to how fast world population is growing and how soon we will run short of resources to upkeep us all.
My Econ 211 professor told me last month that our population reached 7 billion now. "That means we've got another China within the past few decades".
So my question is: Why do we have overpopulation ? And furthermore, will that really bring us all to doom ?
Here's my logic: in most economically developed countries, the trend nowadays is to have few children, if not none, per married couple. Many couples actually decide not to even have children, and many others just want one or two children. In my case, most couples around me in the three places I've lived in (Seoul South Korea, Vancouver, BC, Canada, and Geneva, Switzerland) want at most two children. The reasons can extend from personal preferrence to economic issues.
It takes two children per couple to keep a population growth rate of 0.
Of course, you will tell me that such is not the case in developing countries, and that birth rates are far greater in the Third World. And this is where I also think is the problem.
So here's another follow-up question: Why do these people keep giving births ?
Even in developed countries, having two children presents to be an incredible economic burden. So for these people, if they have several children, I'm just lost for words. What are they thinking ?
In effect, I'm just arguing the Malthusian trap here.
If every person in a less developed country were 1. Engaged to one person of the opposite sex only 2, had two or less children per couple then the people will benefit from not only a huge uplifting of economic burden, but will also contribute to slowing down the rate of population growth. Furthermore, even the countries' GDP might increase, since there will be far less people to treat for Malaria and other deadly diseases.
Here's one more thing to consider. If less developed countries are the ones contributing to overpopulation (although I am aware that India plays a huge part too - I'm leaving China out because they have that one-child policy going now), then the problem of overpopulation is also an issue that will be concentrated in the less-developed countries, right ? In a globalization-perspective, the stable population in developed countries will barely suffer since they will just import the resources from less developed countries and just maintain their own resources to a consistent level.
Does this mean doom will be unleashed only in less developped countries, the (partial) cause of the issue ?
Please enlighten me
Edit: Here's something else I don't understand. Clearly the developed countries have things to learn from, like the culture of being engaged to only one person. This culture has been adapted by other cultures even though this used to be contrary to their original customs (e.g. Japan), because it is a useful aspect of western culture. Why are the developed countries so stubborn and do not adopt these customs themselves ? We always hear about promoting education to these people, but where is the result ?
THe whole post made me laugh. When are the "developed" countries going to realize that in a global perspective, the problems of humanity even if they happen in north sudan, should be their primary concern? Srsly.- It's extremely wrong not to help someone just because of "we do not have enough resources." The World has been producing unbelievable amounts of wealth, the problem here is actually sharing them.
Did you know that more than half of the world's wealth is owned only by 257 people? Thats a fucking distribution disaster.
Fuck capitalism.
Oh hello there socialist. See, the world has scarce resources and the allocation has to be dealt with in the most effective manner. Since we are divided mainly by countries (then the EU is on a lesser extent), the governments provide the resources they can afford to purchase mainly in their own country, as that increases the consumer satisfaction of the population of their own country, ending up in votes coming in.
Then on an individual level, the same sort of principle applies where people have an instinct to survive resulting in natural greed to a certain extent. Some people may be 'charitable' but they dont spend the majority of their income on others not related to them at all, do they? Therefore when countries and individuals develop on a financial level, the majority of their funds are in their possesion.
Then as there was slow amounts of development when a country is in a developing country their population increases resulting in population growth. We shouldn't be scared of population growth because with that comes economical growth as the whole country of the increasing population gets more developed.
Is our purpose to sustain an exorbitant way of life and the economy in general, or to reproduce?
Furthermore, what (national) economy did ever benefit from having a decreased amount of raw manpower at its disposal?
To continue in that line, one of the real issues with overpopulation in the developed world rather is the massive amount of elderly people compared to the size of the labour force, i.e. not enough children. How do you intend to solve that issue?
Finally, to answer your question: yes, doom will be unleashed upon us. Once again. As it has been so many times before, sooner or later, on whatever scale. It would be foolish to asume our society so perfect this will never happen.
In any case, to get back to where we started, it seems brutal to take away something that can be considered at least a human right if not human nature. In case disaster does strike, it's good we'll all still be in the mood of doing it (without protection).
i really do not think overpopulation will ever happen. There will always be people that have a butt-load of kids and those who do not have any. I am not sure how to explain it but i can promise there will not be an "overpopulation" of humans on earth.
Overpopulation already happened. The current number of people on earth can't live at the current standard of living indefinitely. Not only is oil running out, but so is wood and a number of other natural materials that get get harvested and used faster then they can be reproduced.
On February 08 2011 17:01 MrRicewife wrote: Read the national geographic that came out yesterday instead of speculating stuff. There is a huge article (it's front page too) explaining why the problem is poverty and the way we consume, not over population.
Do you have a link? Unfortunately not everyone can subscribe.
I find it hard to believe that the number of people isn't a problem though. Of course if everyone lived like wild animals and died at 15 we wouldn't be overpopulated, but since we try to improve our lives we put massive stress on the environment. There is only a certain extent to which we can be "green" while also enjoying modern comforts. Hopefully we will get better at that anyway.
I looked up the article and read it. Here's the link.
I don't see how "the problem is poverty and the way we consume" from that article, the poverty could just as easily be caused by overpopulation itself. The two are generally inter-correlated. The article does make a point to mention that the author believes reducing poverty will help, but only in that reducing poverty will aid in reducing overpopulation. Overpopulation is still the problem at hand. It also mentions that in some destitute villages in India, child bearing is a method of gaining social standing. The opposite should be true, if only those people were educated.
This type of discussion makes me furious over those who are opposed to abortion. I commend those who get abortions for not adding to the problem. So many people see child bearing as something that just happens, without really thinking about it they just do it as many times as they want. Most educated people are only bearing replacement numbers, which is great. I'm not necessarily against government imposed restrictions on the amount of children a couple can have (2, obviously). But with proper education that doesn't have to happen, as shown by the fact that it is already less than or equal to that in America and Europe.
On February 09 2011 07:45 Meta wrote: I don't see how "the problem is poverty and the way we consume" from that article, the poverty could just as easily be caused by overpopulation itself. The two are generally inter-correlated. The article does make a point to mention that the author believes reducing poverty will help, but only in that reducing poverty will aid in reducing overpopulation. Overpopulation is still the problem at hand. It also mentions that in some destitute villages in India, child bearing is a method of gaining social standing. The opposite should be true, if only those people were educated.
This type of discussion makes me furious over those who are opposed to abortion. I commend those who get abortions for not adding to the problem. So many people see child bearing as something that just happens, without really thinking about it they just do it as many times as they want. Most educated people are only bearing replacement numbers, which is great. I'm not necessarily against government imposed restrictions on the amount of children a couple can have (2, obviously). But with proper education that doesn't have to happen, as shown by the fact that it is already less than or equal to that in America and Europe.
Something I have hard time finding numbers on (in the western world) is if people are getting 2 children as expected. Or many people are skipping/leaving it too late and thus other families get the children to spare to make up for the figures.
Many European countries are in population decline only combated by immigration and the fact that many immigration families have more children than the country norm after they have emigrated. Advising abortion in a country that is getting a population even more elderly each year and that has a too low birth rate isn't good. Give birth and give it up for adoption instead.
A solution to the population problem in Europe would be to change who takes care of children. Say we manage to lower the average first child back below 18 years of age. Then the couple's parents take care of the child since they are at an age when their careers are often stable and no longer in school. This way the impact of having a child is smaller on the ones having them (at worst retaking a year at school), while ensuring more stable family environments. It doesn't seem likely to happen though.
Something interesting that might occur is that the western world gets so low populations that countries with population explosions get enough clout to force immigration. Say a country like Russia continues its population decline while its neighbours increase, how would they hold the border? Same case as the USA/Mexico deal.
Growth of population is directly linked to the levels of poverty in a country, that is true, but there is a more obvious link - healthcare and the quality of healthcare available.
Looking at Western countries, for which we have far greater levels of data, we can look at the birth rates over the past few hundred years. We find that there were a lot of babies being born to families, but at the same time, relatively few of them were surviving to adulthood, or even their first few years. There were so many complications which meant the chances of the child dying at an early stage in their life was very high - poor natal care, rampant disease, poor cleanliness and medical knowledge etc. If you had a child, it seemed it was more likely to die than to live. But people needed children to carry on the family business, or to help with earning power, so how do you combat this? Have a ton of babies. People were having a lot of babies because they were trying to beat the odds.
Carry this into the modern age. The last time a generation really had a lot of children was probably about the 50s-60s - the post-war generation. Here was a time when lots of people were having children, just like their parents, their grandparents, all those generations before them. But a lot of these children were surviving into adulthood, leaving a lot of people with families of 6,7,8 children. I'm sure everyone here knows a family like this. What changed? Healthcare. There was a better knowledge of disease, and a lot of new ways of preventing and treating it. Women suddenly weren't dying of simple factors relating to childbirth, babies were getting better care as soon as they were born, while mothers were told that maybe that last pint of ale isn't so good for the child, and please put out that cigar. We now expect children to survive - death in childbirth is a much rarer thing. As people get to access better healthcare, they are more likely to have children which survive. This means people start to have fewer children - we don't tend to pay attention to moralising crusades which tell us that it's better for the world if we only have one or two children. We pay attention to our wallets. It's a lot cheaper to have one or two children than it is to have 6 - imagine trying to hold down a job and care for them, or the healthcare bills, or sending them to college.
Of course, this level of healthcare really is only prevalent in the developed West. We have great healthcare (unless you listen to FOX, in which case Obama is ruining it and Britain has death squads....). In 'third world' countries, the level of healthcare is much lower, and access to that healthcare is limited by a number of factors - lack of money, lack of resources, warfare etc. So people are still following the 'beat the odds' system - have a ton of kids and hope enough of them survive to take care of you. But healthcare is not non-existent in these countries. There is a number of basic things that can be done to increase the chances of both the child and the mother surviving childbirth - boiling water, simple hygeine etc. Which means that more of these children are surviving. Millions of children which would have otherwise died from disease, poor sanitation, lack of knowledge, are surviving. These children are mouths to feed, are taking up space, are inflating the population. As basic knowledge of hygeine and healthcare spreads around the world, the population is rising because these children are living where they would have otherwise died. As the levels of healthcare rise across the world, and access to that healthcare becomes easier, more children can survive the arduous task of being born.
Likely as the population continues to rise and people start to realise their children are more likely to live (and that they will have to feed those children) the population growth will slow, then stabilise. The same thing that happened to us will happen in 'third world' countries. Eventually one or two children will be the norm across the world, not just in the West.
So there you have it. It's not a lack of knowledge about sex, or pregnancy, or a conspiracy to take over our countries. Medical science is to blame. If we could all just stop knowing how to keep our children and child-bearing mothers alive, we would be fine!
On February 08 2011 17:01 MrRicewife wrote: Read the national geographic that came out yesterday instead of speculating stuff. There is a huge article (it's front page too) explaining why the problem is poverty and the way we consume, not over population.
Do you have a link? Unfortunately not everyone can subscribe.
I find it hard to believe that the number of people isn't a problem though. Of course if everyone lived like wild animals and died at 15 we wouldn't be overpopulated, but since we try to improve our lives we put massive stress on the environment. There is only a certain extent to which we can be "green" while also enjoying modern comforts. Hopefully we will get better at that anyway.
I looked up the article and read it. Here's the link.
I don't see how "the problem is poverty and the way we consume" from that article, the poverty could just as easily be caused by overpopulation itself. The two are generally inter-correlated. The article does make a point to mention that the author believes reducing poverty will help, but only in that reducing poverty will aid in reducing overpopulation. Overpopulation is still the problem at hand. It also mentions that in some destitute villages in India, child bearing is a method of gaining social standing. The opposite should be true, if only those people were educated.
This type of discussion makes me furious over those who are opposed to abortion. I commend those who get abortions for not adding to the problem. So many people see child bearing as something that just happens, without really thinking about it they just do it as many times as they want. Most educated people are only bearing replacement numbers, which is great. I'm not necessarily against government imposed restrictions on the amount of children a couple can have (2, obviously). But with proper education that doesn't have to happen, as shown by the fact that it is already less than or equal to that in America and Europe.
So are you also furious over those who are opposed to capital punishment, are you also furious over those who are opposed to death camps?
Or more specifically are you opposed to those parents who beat their own children to death? Because that is (generally) why people who oppose abortion oppose it, because they see it as murder.
If you don't oppose killing people as a method of solving the population problem, then the problem is VERY easy to solve, start up death camps for internal population control & weaponize our smallpox for external population control. ................. sorry for the diversion, but that had to be answered
Basically if society has costs from an additional person, the parents should bear that cost. They already do in many cases, and that is shown in the fact that fertility is declining in DevelopING countries as well as developed ones.
i heard a lot of people yell for education here. this might be helping fighting overpopulation. it also leads to (for me) one of the saddest facts of life: the more stupid people are, the more children they have. this applies especially for more developed countries. people who go to college often have 1 maybe 0 kids, while a lot unemployed people have a lot of children. and are (in Germany at least) rewarded with more money.
and this will continue to be so, because people with more responsibilities in their jobs tend to not have the time or will to deal with a grand family at home.
stupid people carry on their gens, smart people die out, thus totally contradicting evolution. the share of smart people will decrease more and more. sure there will be some geniuses, but the number will get lower and lower. i think about it every now and then. and it makes me sad. mankind gets (more) dumb...
Actually 3rd world countries don't actually contribute to overpopulation, more affirmed countries contribute to overpopulation.
Even if people in say Ivory Coast were giving birth to 5 children the mortality rate is much higher so its basically 0.
While in established countries even people giving birth to 2 children is creating more people, because mortality is lower(better living conditions, better health care, etc...)
Plus the way mortality is measured is year by year, or 10 years at most. The right way to measure mortality is on a 100 years period. Did in 100 years more people die or more people were born?
So to me its more the failed system of calculating mortality, rather then anything else. As long as the myth exists that 3rd world countries are contributing to the overpopulation things are never going to change.
I'd what is more worrying is the way we consume things and the way we don't recycle.
Lets take mmother nature for example. Grass grows, deer eats grass, deer shits making grass grow again, bear eats deer, deer bones left, wolf's eats most of the leftovers and most of the bones, birds and other small animals clean up the rest. All these carnivorous shit, shit is used as food by various insects(fly's, beetles, etc...) the leftovers are degraded by bacteria and that is it. The cycle repeats itself and nothing goes to waste.
While we humans eat, throw, burn as garbage. make object, use, throw as garbage, burn or bury as garbage.
There were some numbers that only 0.2% in the whole world stuff that is recycled. So that leaves 99.8% stuff that would take thousands of years to degrade on itself.
On February 09 2011 13:48 thehitman wrote: Actually 3rd world countries don't actually contribute to overpopulation, more affirmed countries contribute to overpopulation. .
Incorrect.
Any country where women have less than 2 children on average over their life will decline in population, no matter how good medical care is.. it can't get mortality to Less than 0%.
And most population growth in the 20th century was in developing countries, and most of the population growth in the 21st century will be in developing countries.
On February 09 2011 13:48 thehitman wrote: Actually 3rd world countries don't actually contribute to overpopulation, more affirmed countries contribute to overpopulation.
Even if people in say Ivory Coast were giving birth to 5 children the mortality rate is much higher so its basically 0.
While in established countries even people giving birth to 2 children is creating more people, because mortality is lower(better living conditions, better health care, etc...)
So to me its more the failed system of calculating mortality, rather then anything else. As long as the myth exists that 3rd world countries are contributing to the overpopulation things are never going to change.
You....uh........didn't quite read my post, did you?
As Krikkitone says, developing countries will show the biggest population increase over the next century, as they possess adequate medical resources to keep the kids alive but haven't quite gotten rid of the older mentality of 'I'll be having a crap-ton of kids to make sure some of them survive long enough to care for my old age'.
On February 09 2011 08:34 Bibdy wrote: Overpopulation or not, the world's only getting dumber because smart people are choosing to have less kids, while dumb people continue to have more.
Also, I see a lot of this 'it'll peak at 9 billion, and then drop. Do the math' kind of responses in this thread.
Care to jot down the math and/or reasoning for those of us without the time and raw numbers at our disposal?
Myself and jstar posted links to articles and videos that support the 9 billion figure on pages 1 and 2. The numbers come from estimates from the UN and other organizations who have a lot more expertise in this area than anyone on this board.
If you don't want to spend the time to watch/read the links though, here's the short answer: Population growth in first world economies is traditionally very low or negative. Over the past 50 years, this trend has become apparent in emerging nations as well. In short, richer nations = more access to education and healthcare = few children = lower population growth.
The current forecasts estimate that population growth will cease somewhere around 2050 at around 9 billion. At that point, it is expected to begin to decrease.
It's interesting that a lot of the posters in this thread are basically using Malthus' arguments which are HORRIBLY inaccurate as he failed to predict the effects of technological advancement on both population growth and food production.
Edit: I thought about this for a second and decided to add another thought. Instead of worrying about overpopulation, people should be more concerned about the effects of negative population growth on a global scale. All estimates say this WILL happen within our lifetimes. Many of the decisions we make in society are based on the assumption that population will grow. A persistent decrease in population introduces a number of problems without easy solutions. We're already seeing these issues to some degree as countries struggle to support a growing number of aging citizens with fewer younger workers. Currently, these numbers are offset by immigration...what is the solution when the problem is no longer a regional one?
The population of the earth is going to peak in 30 years, then start declining. Then everyone would start freaking out.
Problems about poverty and world hunger is another issue, not due to "overpopulation".
Why would population magically start to decline in 30 years?
That vid just says "it's not true lol, just a myth guys" without providing any evidence whatsoever.
There are sources for everything.
Here's one of them:
According to the U.N. Population Database, the world's population in 2010 will be 6,908,688,000. The landmass of Texas is 268,820 sq mi (7,494,271,488,000 sq ft).
So, divide 7,494,271,488,000 sq ft by 6,908,688,000 people, and you get 1084.76 sq ft/person. That's approximately a 33' x 33' plot of land for every person on the planet, enough space for a town house.
As for why the population will decline in 30 years:
According to the U.N. Population Database, using the historically accurate low variant projection, the Earth's population will only add another billion people or so over the next thirty years, peaking around 8.02 billion people in the year 2040, and then it will begin to decline. Check their online database.
I think you miss the point. The problem does not stem from the availability of living space, there is clearly plenty of that. The problems occur when you attempt to provide people with a certain standard of living. Higher standards require far more resources, a thing that our planet has a finite supply of. For example only certain areas are fertile enough to grow crops, almost all nations hit peak oil in the 80s since then production has been tailing off in the major oil exporting nations, and fresh water is becoming more of a priority especially for areas such as California or any desert environment.
It is finite resources not a lack of living space that has everyone worried about such unchecked population growth.
I think too many people here watched Idiocracy and took it seriously. The idea that 'smart genes' die out and 'stupid genes' continue is absolutely inane. Intelligence is not a simple issue and many of the people that are sometimes called 'stupid' are actually quite intelligent in certain specific ways but are not educated. This all assumes that intelligence is primarily genetic, but that is not clear at all. Clearly some people are just freakishly smart and really capable at certain tasks without much effort or training. I think the inclination to resort to biological determinism to explain this is premature, but is certainly a narrative that is appealing to those who want to see themselves as naturally superior rather than, perhaps, somewhat lucky. For centuries in Europe only a very small number of people were considered 'intelligent' or 'educated' while the vast majority were peasant farmers of some sort. Some of those peasants had descendants who became wealthy, powerful nobles or highly educated men, yet it is likely that they themselves were as ignorant and uneducated as one could be with the only schooling be a limited exposure to some Church based indoctrination.
At any rate, the issue of disparate birth rates in different areas of the world is very closely correlated with the education level of women. Educated women are likely more career oriented so they have a specific set of goals outside of child rearing that might be deterred if they were to get pregnant. They are also taught from an early age about birth control and contraception, which may seem like a silly thing to note, but it's nevertheless very easy for capable and clever people to believe really insane things if the circumstances are right. If you are really concerned with population levels, the best way to address them would probably be to help alleviate the poverty, ignorance and unequal nature of gender relations in a lot of these high birth rate areas of the world, but how exactly to do that is somewhat unclear and most more 'liberal' attempts to do that have ended up in political and cultural disaster.
Population is a double edged sword here in India. As pointed out , poverty and illiteracy contributed a lot to the the same, but the spread of education and awareness has helped checked this trend now.
Better lifestyle and more opportunities are available in urban towns which is encouraging people from villages to migrate there rapidly. This is causing an enormous strain on the standing infra in major cities like Mumbai/Delhi etc (Like the NYC /Londons of West). But the heartening fact to note is the growth rate of pop has been declining..
Humans are the scum of the earth, seriously. What kind of race desecrates the ecosystem that has given so much to them. There's no species on the planet in all of history that has made the earth as despicable as it is. Human's are so fuckin narcissistic, we're already thinking about finding other planets to live on because the earth is being fucked and desecrated by us humans. Sorry for the rant. And no I am not saying I'm not one of these humans.
On February 09 2011 08:34 Bibdy wrote: Overpopulation or not, the world's only getting dumber because smart people are choosing to have less kids, while dumb people continue to have more.
Also, I see a lot of this 'it'll peak at 9 billion, and then drop. Do the math' kind of responses in this thread.
Care to jot down the math and/or reasoning for those of us without the time and raw numbers at our disposal?
Myself and jstar posted links to articles and videos that support the 9 billion figure on pages 1 and 2. The numbers come from estimates from the UN and other organizations who have a lot more expertise in this area than anyone on this board.
If you don't want to spend the time to watch/read the links though, here's the short answer: Population growth in first world economies is traditionally very low or negative. Over the past 50 years, this trend has become apparent in emerging nations as well. In short, richer nations = more access to education and healthcare = few children = lower population growth.
The current forecasts estimate that population growth will cease somewhere around 2050 at around 9 billion. At that point, it is expected to begin to decrease.
It's interesting that a lot of the posters in this thread are basically using Malthus' arguments which are HORRIBLY inaccurate as he failed to predict the effects of technological advancement on both population growth and food production.
Edit: I thought about this for a second and decided to add another thought. Instead of worrying about overpopulation, people should be more concerned about the effects of negative population growth on a global scale. All estimates say this WILL happen within our lifetimes. Many of the decisions we make in society are based on the assumption that population will grow. A persistent decrease in population introduces a number of problems without easy solutions. We're already seeing these issues to some degree as countries struggle to support a growing number of aging citizens with fewer younger workers. Currently, these numbers are offset by immigration...what is the solution when the problem is no longer a regional one?
Well as social security begins to decline people will start having to take care of their parents/rely on their kids. So they start going back to the earlier model... Kids as your retirement plan. I agree it will be problematic, but I expect population long term to fluctuate/stabilize. Especially because people that think it is a good idea to have more kids can transmit that idea onto their children.
If the population starts declining, people will react and just pump out more kids. I'm not sure how or why people would think that will ever become a problem. The species isn't as functionally retarded as the Dodo to cause its own extinction through a slow bleed like that. We're much better at causing our own extinction through other kinds of slow bleeds (environment, war etc.).
On February 10 2011 09:59 Bibdy wrote: If the population starts declining, people will react and just pump out more kids. I'm not sure how or why people would think that will ever become a problem. The species isn't as functionally retarded as the Dodo to cause its own extinction through a slow bleed like that. We're much better at causing our own extinction through other kinds of slow bleeds (environment, war etc.).
um... usually the population increases dramatically because of wars... example: baby boomers. and environment... i guess natural disasters and such, but im pretty sure more people die of old age then a natural disaster.
People in endemic poverty tend to have more children because more of those children will likely die of hunger and disease. Because of Western kindness, they are given medication and food enough to prevent the majority of "natural deaths". Because of Western stupidity, they are not taught how to create the infrastructure to break free from the prison of Western kindness and take control of their own fates.
On February 10 2011 09:59 Bibdy wrote: If the population starts declining, people will react and just pump out more kids. I'm not sure how or why people would think that will ever become a problem. The species isn't as functionally retarded as the Dodo to cause its own extinction through a slow bleed like that. We're much better at causing our own extinction through other kinds of slow bleeds (environment, war etc.).
um... usually the population increases dramatically because of wars... example: baby boomers. and environment... i guess natural disasters and such, but im pretty sure more people die of old age then a natural disaster.
Population increases dramatically because of a dire need for population. War is just one of them. There was a big population spurt right after the Black Death, too. If first world nations notice that their populations are declining too far, for whatever reason, then people will just have more kids. Governments will start ad campaigns and incentives for people having more kids and the problem will essentially fix itself. A slow declining population due to low birth rates is literally the last thing on the list that's going to kill us off.
On February 10 2011 09:59 Bibdy wrote: If the population starts declining, people will react and just pump out more kids. I'm not sure how or why people would think that will ever become a problem. The species isn't as functionally retarded as the Dodo to cause its own extinction through a slow bleed like that. We're much better at causing our own extinction through other kinds of slow bleeds (environment, war etc.).
Not necessarily, People don't think on the basis of "the species" birth rates don't go down because the population is high, they go down for other reasons. I doubt we as a species would ever go extinct because of people just not having kids, but negative population causes a lot of potential problems (too many old people:young people), that we will probably run into.
On February 10 2011 09:59 Bibdy wrote: If the population starts declining, people will react and just pump out more kids. I'm not sure how or why people would think that will ever become a problem. The species isn't as functionally retarded as the Dodo to cause its own extinction through a slow bleed like that. We're much better at causing our own extinction through other kinds of slow bleeds (environment, war etc.).
Not necessarily, People don't think on the basis of "the species" birth rates don't go down because the population is high, they go down for other reasons. I doubt we as a species would ever go extinct because of people just not having kids, but negative population causes a lot of potential problems (too many old people:young people), that we will probably run into.
First thing I can think of is Logan's Run. Too many old people is always a problem. They're always a burden (in the economic sense). It just depends on how big of a burden the society is willing to accept.
Don't worry there will be a nuclear war in our lifetime. Way too many people are getting their hands on this technology all it takes is one to lose it and they all start flying. I had a dream that the rich all over the world had these underground facilities where they could basically live forever and emerge to a new Garden of Eden after they wiped us all out. And they had a meeting and did it. Or maybe it was playing too much Fallout.
I think it's not possible for an advanced race to be doomed by overpopulation. There's tons of space out there in...space for our race to live in. We can colonize planets, moons, we can even put up space stations in orbit not just in our orbit but in other planets' orbits.
So have no fear, sooner or later we'll be colonizing space.
EPT
). Plus, he is rarely the one who has the "burden" of carrying the child and nourishing it, so he will not care too much about prevention if the woman can't somehow force him to. Furthermore, where there's no working legal system, an impregnated woman will never get the begetter to pay for the child if he decides to leave the woman. I think the lack of law and the lack of social development towards an equal (man-woman) society is playing a huge role here.
