Essential Reading on Population March 28, 2009
Posted by Graham in : Human Ecology, Population, Renewable Energy , trackbackThe Real Perils of Human Population Growth by David and Marcia Pimentel
The present world population of 6.7 billion is projected by the United Nations to increase to 9 billion and may rise to as many as 11 billion by 2050. Even if a worldwide policy of two children per couple (instead of the current 2.8 children) were agreed on tomorrow, the world population will continue to expand for about seventy years before stabilizing at about 13 billion people.
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I always laugh when I see these population predictions because they assume that the resources that allow for 6.7 billion today will be able to support 11 or 13 billion tomorrow.
The only reason the planet can support 6.7 billion people is because we have had cheap and abundant fossil fuels. Without this energy source, we wouldn’t be able to feed ourselves. And does anyone of a serious nature believe that we are going to continue to have the continually expanding energy from fossil fuels going forward?
The planet can not support 13 billion people. Hell, the planet can not sustainable support 6.7 billion people.
2050 will, I suspect, see a drastically reduced global population. Starvation, thirst, resource wars, climate change, increasing natural weather disasters …
The biggest obstacle we face in changing attitudes toward overpopulation is economists. Since the field of economics was branded “the dismal science” after Malthus’ theory, economists have been adamant that they would never again consider the subject of overpopulation and continue to insist that man is ingenious enough to overcome any obstacle to further growth. This is why world leaders continue to ignore population growth in the face of mounting challenges like peak oil, global warming and a whole host of other environmental and resource issues. They believe we’ll always find technological solutions that allow more growth.
But because they are blind to population growth, there’s one obstacle they haven’t considered: the finiteness of space available on earth. The very act of using space more efficiently creates a problem for which there is no solution: it inevitably begins to drive down per capita consumption and, consequently, per capita employment, leading to rising unemployment and poverty.
If you‘re interested in learning more about this important new economic theory, then I invite you to visit either of my web sites at OpenWindowPublishingCo.com or PeteMurphy.wordpress.com where you can read the preface, join in the blog discussion and, of course, buy the book if you like.
Please forgive the somewhat spammish nature of the previous paragraph, but I don’t know how else to inject this new theory into the debate about overpopulation without drawing attention to the book that explains the theory.
Pete Murphy Author, “Five Short Blasts”
Surely it’s not just a reaction to Malthus- it is in fact explicit economic policy to encourage population growth- economic “growth” depends on it.
Hi Graham. I don’t think it’s as simple as that now the growth model of Mr Brown and the like is based on growth in a number of areas. Population growth feeds into overall growth but already in some economic models it’s recognized as potentially having a negative impact as population can outstrip economic growth leading to more having less. I tried to read a little economic theory last year but to be honest (apologies to Pete Murphy) I think you have to have something wrong with you to really get into it. There are so many obvious holes and assumptions in most of the common models that I’m amazed anyone takes it seriously outside of academia.
Dode, I agree with you! I too find much of economics to be mind-numbing, dealing more with philosophy than real economics. My book is written in plain language, targeted at average folks and rooted in what I believe is bullet-proof logic. I have mailed a copy to Graham for his review.