World (Over)Population

[Reaper]

Just been reading about the world population, and according to the U.S. Census, this is the estimated current world population: http://www.census.gov/ipc/www/popclockworld.html

 

About 6,705,153,833 human beings now inhabit the Earth as of today. The above link also gives figures for how much the population has changed since last year.

 

Of course, it's been well known that nowadays the population growth rate has been decreasing for the past 40 years, as shown on the graphs provided: http://www.census.gov/ipc/www/idb/worldpopinfo.html

 

 

 

 

 

 

But even with those scenarios, the population is still going to increase to at least 9 billion by 2050. Even worse, there doesn't seem to be an indication that it will actually decrease anytime soon, if you notice that it still keeps going up afterwards:

 

 

 

The reason I post this topic here in this subsection is because the world population is very much tied to the environment, it's effects, and the availability of resources. I think now we all can agree that the world is very much overpopulated as of today, but if these projections are correct, it is going to get a lot bigger. What are your thoughts on this? How do you think we can deal with this rather large problem looming ahead?

[Rev Blair]

What are your thoughts on this? How do you think we can deal with this rather large problem looming ahead?

 

I think we're...what's the word I'm looking for? Oh yeah, boned.

 

We're already seeing collapsing fish stocks and a loss of arable land. Climate change is just beginning to have an effect. We're short of water, short of food, and running out of natural resources.

 

The thing is that over-population is at the very root of these things. Just try having a reasonable discussion about that with the political classes though...they'll either accuse you of wanting to institute eugenics, or say they will be accused of the same. The other choice is being compared to the Chinese government.

 

Action to reduce population is politically untenable.

 

The thing is that anybody with even a slight grasp of animal populations knows how this ends up. Overpopulation is followed by a population crash. Either something eats you, you run out of resources and starve, or you get sick and die.

 

I've seen the cycle with gophers and coyotes, and it ain't pretty.

 

We've disrupted much of the natural cycle with technology, and we actually have the technology to prevent an uncontrolled crash, but we lack the will to do anything about it politically.

 

So I think it will end with resource wars, starvation, and plagues. We could avoid that, but we won't.

[Mr Skeptic]

We also have the technology to allow our population to continue expanding, to a point. Soon, we will have the technology to allow our population to expand into space, which would allow the largest expansion of population mankind has ever known. However, at our current population, if the poor people started becoming more prosperous and demanding about as many resources as the people in richer countries enjoy, we would run out of energy and some materials.

[D H]

Soon, we will have the technology to allow our population to expand into space, which would allow the largest expansion of population mankind has ever known.

By "soon", I assume you mean "during the next century or so". Granting that "soon" means soon for the sake of argument, I posit that the ability to expand into space will still not relieve human population pressure for a long, long time.

 

Right now we can send a one or two dozen people into space per year on a temporary basis. Suppose we developed overnight the ability to send one or two hundred thousand people into space per year on a permanent basis. That huge number is tiny compared to the 80 million people we add to the population every year.

[Mr Skeptic]

By "soon", I assume you mean "during the next century or so".

 

Well, I was thinking that I would live to see the start of it. I'm young after all. It depends on how much money we want to spend on it. If we have a "pissing match" re space colonization with China or India like we did with Russia and the moon, it could happen much quicker than most people would expect.

 

Granting that "soon" means soon for the sake of argument, I posit that the ability to expand into space will still not relieve human population pressure for a long, long time.

 

Right now we can send a one or two dozen people into space per year on a temporary basis. Suppose we developed overnight the ability to send one or two hundred thousand people into space per year on a permanent basis. That huge number is tiny compared to the 80 million people we add to the population every year.

 

Actually, I don't think space habitation will ever solve the population problem. Transporting people into space could remain prohibitively expensive, and people might reproduce faster than we can expand. It would allow population to expand to unimaginable numbers but not solve the problem.

[jryan]

If only we had the technology to reduce the worlds population......

[Sisyphus]

If only we had the technology to reduce the worlds population......

 

You mean like bombs?

[bascule]

I think now we all can agree that the world is very much overpopulated as of today

 

I don't believe the world is overpopulated... yet

[doG]

I don't believe the world is overpopulated... yet

 

I think we'd all be better off with about a third of what we have now. We're not doing a good job at feeding what we have now or keeping them busy with productive lives.

[SkepticLance]

Projections of future population depend on who is doing the projection. I have seen a United Nations report that says the most likely maximum is about 9 billion plus or minus a number of millions, after which there will be a slow decline in numbers. That report is somewhere on their population web site at http://www.un.org/popin However, I don't have the time right now to search it out.

 

As to what we can do to get population down a bit quicker. That is easy. Any number of studies have shown that women in third world countries simply do not want to give birth to heaps of rug rats. If they could control their own fertility, they would. All that is needed to massively reduce population growth is to see that all women have access to effective birth control.

 

This is something that the west could do easily, with our massive resources. However, idiots take charge. Talking of idiots, Bush junior has refused to permit aid to third world countries that is meant for birth control. Doh!!

[iNow]

We need more clean and desalinating water technology... Or, less people.

[Reaper]

We need more clean and desalinating water technology... Or, less people.

 

 

Do you mind elaborating on this?

[pantheon]

is the an answer to the ever increasing population ? famine ,disease and warfare contribute to de population by environmental , political instability and agricultural demise . Do we adopt a rational approach to procrastination ie have less children . Im sure the would be less rational and responsible people re-producing . But the people who adopt the attitudes that i want a big family without due consideration to the future welfare would certainly not be the people in the rational group . If we look at the female biology we could find that it is a chemical clock beconning on the necessity to have there chemical , emotional needs satisfied . Science can go some way to explaning this through biological time . To counter balance the argument it is the advancement in science and medicine thats contributed to people living longer of the survey displayed would it be far better to look at social groups who or what group reproduces most and why . If the world cant sustain the population does famine , disease and warfare become the result . I just think personally that the is a balance to be struck in social grouping do we find that the is a balance or is the a ever increasing number of irresponsible people re-producing , without the statistical approach can we solve the riddle . If however we adopt the inevitable approach ie who cares we then enter the irrational group , so what can we do the environmental issue is the great debate now and certainly for the future , will overpopulation bring about our demise ? sustainable development seems to be the buzz word and the is a great deal of spin added to it , but look if we develop in a sustainable

way we still increase the population that rather implies that is the at current growth rates in population a way that we can develop in a sustainable fashion and who decides this anyway . Im afraid you may like what im going to say yes the is a problem of over population and i have to be completely honest it has to fall to the irrational group of people who cannot provide for there spouses and therefore cannot develop in a sustainable fashion but hey we all have the right to a loving caring family regardless.The environment is more akin to world governments providing a cleaner and safer environment and that has to filter down to everyone . Kind regards Pantheon

Just been reading about the world population, and according to the U.S. Census, this is the estimated current world population: http://www.census.gov/ipc/www/popclockworld.html

 

About 6,705,153,833 human beings now inhabit the Earth as of today. The above link also gives figures for how much the population has changed since last year.

 

Of course, it's been well known that nowadays the population growth rate has been decreasing for the past 40 years, as shown on the graphs provided: http://www.census.gov/ipc/www/idb/worldpopinfo.html

 

 

 

 

 

 

But even with those scenarios, the population is still going to increase to at least 9 billion by 2050. Even worse, there doesn't seem to be an indication that it will actually decrease anytime soon, if you notice that it still keeps going up afterwards:

 

 

 

The reason I post this topic here in this subsection is because the world population is very much tied to the environment, it's effects, and the availability of resources. I think now we all can agree that the world is very much overpopulated as of today, but if these projections are correct, it is going to get a lot bigger. What are your thoughts on this? How do you think we can deal with this rather large problem looming ahead?

[iNow]

Do you mind elaborating on this?

 

You think things will be bad when oil runs out? Just wait until fresh water is in short supply. Wars will be fought to stave off dehydration and death of crops. Oil will seem like a silly childhood concern.

 

We don't have enough fresh water to support the population as it stands.

The population either needs to decrease or more fresh water needs to become available.

For more fresh water to become available, we need more desalination (also, toxin removing) technology.

[SkepticLance]

To pantheon

 

Overpopulation is not a matter of personal choice. As a general rule, population growth becomes zero or negative in advanced western nations, except where there are large groups of recent immigrants from third world countries. In Japan, there are desperate government efforts to get their women to have babies since the population is dropping while their elderly are increasing in number - meaning too small a tax base to support pensions.

 

The problems are in third world nations, and are a result of lack of access to birth control. Having sex is a given. It is too powerful an instinct to reject. However, with birth control, it need not result in babies. If third world women all had access to birth control, the number of babies would drop very dramatically.

 

To iNow

 

You are pushing the problem of limited fresh water resources. This is not a new problem. It is as old as mankind. I always remember the ancient Persians, during the bronze age, who built hundreds of kilometers of underground canals to carry water from mountains to the dry plains for agriculture. The effort was equivalent to a multibillion dollar scheme today. I doubt that our current water shortages are any worse on the proper relative scale than has always been the case for a large proportion of our species.

 

That said, it is still a major problem. There are many possible palliative measures, ranging from cutting edge desalination technology, to dams and canals, to giant rainwater ponds to store water etc. I think the problem will not go away, but that we have the means to prevent it becoming worse.

[foodchain]

Overpopulation has many negative consequences. I mean for every person alive to be rather basic on the issue requires then a certain overhead to be met just to survive at least in regards to the environment. In this case for the most part lots of the worlds population does use say hydrocarbons or fossil fuels really. I mean to subtract out that part of modern infrastructure would just about extinguish such from existence. This requirement not only persists in time it becomes to require more and more. So eventually I think on large enough of a scale you could say its decline would not only become a limiting agent to growth in various ways it would be deadly really.

 

To add to this the environmental impact will continue to soar along with more and more of us. Enough to cause extinction and even change to the earth overall geologically such with the atmosphere and oceans. So our behavior as it would is directly impacting pretty much all the spheres on the earth it can, and this will only continue to grow. Adding to this you have the reality that this impact is not positive in a conservative equilibrium type sense. Now this might not even be possible as to make fully efficient or to make human action 100% “green”. The flipside of this is that any real application of ecological understanding is hardly practiced at all, so our actions currently could be say close to 100% anti-green really.

 

I mean to make so important for modern survival as we understand it a limited and damaging resource such as oil has a great chance of producing negative results I think on the earth. I would think global instability over the issue could lead to dire consequences, this coupled with the reality of its environmental impact now and to come should make getting away from oil a prime concern, more so if we do couple that with an ever growing human populous.

 

I would speculate though that continued production of such a lifestyle to the bloody end of oil for what its worth my be the only way to kick such habits though.

[iNow]

Lance,

 

Sorry mate, but you can doubt all you want. There has never ever in all eternity been a scale such as that we are forced to consider today.

 

Population grows exponentially. You are correct that the limited availability of water resources is not a new problem, but you are mistaken to suggest that today's issue is no worse than at times previously in human history.

 

That said, you are quite correct that we do have the means to prevent it from becoming worse. This would be a two step solution. One, technology to increase the availability of fresh water en masse. Two, to hinder further unconstrained population growth.

[Reaper]

You think things will be bad when oil runs out?

 

If we don't do anything about that, then yes, things could get real bad real fast.

 

Just wait until fresh water is in short supply. Wars will be fought to stave off dehydration and death of crops. Oil will seem like a silly childhood concern.

 

Not really.

 

We don't have enough fresh water to support the population as it stands.

The population either needs to decrease or more fresh water needs to become available.

For more fresh water to become available, we need more desalination (also, toxin removing) technology.

 

And this is where I'm asking you to elaborate. Unless we use nukes, how the hell are we going to actually decrease the population? Or rather, how the hell are we going to actually increase the availability of fresh water cheaply?

 

 

 

I have to say, that statement did make me laugh out loud.

 

I don't believe the world is overpopulated... yet

 

You can thank the Green Revolution for that. Unless GM foods become quite widespread, and are grown on hydroponic farms (that, or force everyone to live in a gigantic megacity with a population density similar to what you see in Mumbai India. Or arcologies... etc.) , I don't think we can possibly sustain the food requirements necessary for our rather large population.

[SkepticLance]

To iNow

 

On an absolute scale you are correct. At no time in the world's history has there been such a need for more megatonnes of fresh water to be delivered to where it aint.

 

However, if you read my earlier post, I used the phrase 'relative scale'. Relative to population, the water shortage is no worse than it has been lots of times in the past. In fact, I suspect it is less severe on that relative scale, since a smaller proportion of the world's population die of hunger due to drought than any time I have ever read about. 40 to 80 years ago, in India and surrounding nations, it was very common for hunger during times of drought to kill millions - sometimes up to 10 million at a time. That no longer happens.

 

Today hunger still kills, but basically for reasons of political or economic mismanagement or corruption.

 

We have the beginnings of the technology. There is no total water shortage on this planet. There is ample salt and freshwater for human needs no matter how far you project it into the future. The problem is that the fresh water is not distributed as we would like it to be.

 

Take Australia for example. The driest populated continent. Two thirds of Australia suffers drought. But the rest has ample water. The top one third is monsoonal, which gives it massive rainfall for part of the year and dry for the rest. However, the aquifers are filled each wet season, so that they can be tapped and never run out. The two thirds of Australia that suffer drought could be irrigated if fresh water from the monsoonal one third gets piped there.

 

This would be a mammoth undertaking, with hundreds or thousands of kilometres of large diameter water pipe, and enormous pumping stations. However, it is not impossible, and one day may well be done. After all, if the liquid is oil, it gets done!

 

We will have the technology, and there is no reason, apart from human corruption and stupidity, why the supply of freshwater cannot be increased such that the problem (on a relative scale) never gets worse, and should get better.

[Reaper]

You are pushing the problem of limited fresh water resources. This is not a new problem. It is as old as mankind. I always remember the ancient Persians, during the bronze age, who built hundreds of kilometers of underground canals to carry water from mountains to the dry plains for agriculture. The effort was equivalent to a multibillion dollar scheme today. I doubt that our current water shortages are any worse on the proper relative scale than has always been the case for a large proportion of our species.

 

Yes, but back then the total amount of fresh water that was available could easily meet their needs, given that the population was much lower back then. Now, we are looking at running out of fresh water, period.

 

That said, it is still a major problem. There are many possible palliative measures, ranging from cutting edge desalination technology, to dams and canals, to giant rainwater ponds to store water etc. I think the problem will not go away, but that we have the means to prevent it becoming worse.

 

 

You guys keep saying desalination, but I have yet to see how we can produce, oh, some tens of trillions or even quadrillions of gallons of fresh water that will be necessary and cheaply.

 

Which, by the way, more than half of all fresh water supplies currently available to us are used directly for irrigation, something for you to contemplate...

Edited June 24, 2008 by Reaper

[iNow]

And this is where I'm asking you to elaborate. Unless we use nukes, how the hell are we going to actually decrease the population? Or rather, how the hell are we going to actually increase the availability of fresh water cheaply?

 

You tard. I'm not actually arguing in favor of killing people. I'm using that as leverage for my comments that it's well past time for us to get smarter about this whole thing.

 

 

It's called "Vapor compression distillation." I first heard of it here:

 

Interview - Dean Kamen | The Colbert Report | Comedy Central

[doG]

A related news piece:

 

Worldwide Water Shortage On Horizon

 

A crisis is looming over water shortages worldwide. By 2025 more than half the nations in the world will face freshwater stress or shortages and by 2050 as much as 75 percent of the world's population could face freshwater scarcity. So say Mike Hightower and Suzanne Pierce' date=' water experts at Sandia National Laboratories, in an article they wrote that appeared in a recent issue of Nature...

 

Freshwater withdrawals already exceed precipitation in many parts of the U.S., with the worst shortfalls often in areas with the fastest population, particularly in the southwest. But, this is also very much a global problem...

 

More at Terra Daily...

[Reaper]

You tard. I'm not actually arguing in favor of killing people. I'm using that as leverage for my comments that it's well past time for us to get smarter about this whole thing.

 

 

I see that we are all doomed then .

 

 

It's called "Vapor compression distillation." I first heard of it here:

 

 

 

---Ahem: http://www.rpi.edu/dept/chem-eng/Biotech-Environ/Environmental/desal/vaporcomp.html

 

Vapor-compression distillation, also known as compression distillation, is a process which uses its own steam after it has been compressed as its primary heat source. In this process, it is necessary to provide a mechanical energy source, specifically a mechanical compressor.

 

http://www.coastal.ca.gov/desalrpt/dchap1.html

 

 

 

=======================================

 

Sorry to burst your bubble, but I'm still waiting....

 

 

I'm not trying to be deliberately difficult, but solving this problem is going to take a great deal more then just a passing "it will be solved somehow". Cause I'm going to be part of the generation that has to go out and actually help resolve the issue....

 

This is something that the west could do easily, with our massive resources. However, idiots take charge. Talking of idiots, Bush junior has refused to permit aid to third world countries that is meant for birth control. Doh!!

 

Yup, I hear you. Us Americans are the ones who are taking the full brunt of this stupidity. But the question then also becomes, what do you do to get rid of the idiots in charge .

Edited June 24, 2008 by Reaper

[iNow]

\Sorry to burst your bubble, but I'm still waiting....

 

 

I'm not trying to be deliberately difficult, but solving this problem is going to take a great deal more then just a passing "it will be solved somehow".

That's all well and good, but I proposed one possible solution, and you supplemented my point by offering numerous others.

 

This is not going to happen... why exactly?

 

 

Neither one of us is saying, "it will just be solved somehow." We know precisely what it will take. What's the next step?

[Mr Skeptic]

Well, to desalinate water requires plenty of energy -- just what we will be hurting for already when we switch from or run out of fossil fuels.