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A reduction in human numbers is inevitable
The current array of global crises is more intractable than we realise, says David Cox
First, a climate crisis, then an energy crisis, now a food crisis. No wonder we've forgotten the poverty crisis that was declared the mother of all crises by the G8 only a year ago.
Yet, our success in tackling these predicaments doesn't seem to match the urgency we accord them. People don't stop travelling or even change their light-bulbs. Meanwhile, the steps we do manage to take turn out to conflict. Biofuels hijack farmland; enhancing agricultural output requires more oil; even scrapping food packaging increases waste by reducing the contents' longevity.
Maybe the problem is that we're looking at things in the wrong way. Perhaps these supposedly separate crises should really be considered facets of one straightforward, if intractable, phenomenon.
The populations of animal species expand with available food and habitat. When the supply of these things contracts, their populations fall. Technology has enabled humans to expand their global footprint massively, and their population has surged accordingly. However, this process couldn't go on for ever.
Actually, some of the technological advances that sustain the 6.6 billion of us here at present are now proving ecologically counter-productive. So, it should hardly surprise us that a population still expected to increase by a further three billion is overshooting the earth's carrying capacity.
A reduction in human numbers is therefore to be expected. Because we're aware of our circumstances and consider ourselves omnipotent, unlike other species, we imagine we can somehow circumvent this. However, technology cannot foster unlimited population expansion. Sooner or later, the bubble must burst.
Equally, we're incapable of enhancing group prospects by changing our behaviour. Ants might manage this, but humans are individually, rather than collectively, motivated. Our urges to consume and reproduce are therefore destined to flourish unrestrained.
The planet isn't threatened and our species will survive. However, billions will die. Get over it. ·
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@Sharon Causey: "There is a high probability that the world will soon experience an avian flu epidemic of staggering consequences. And while official mortality estimates have been kept artificially low, a not unreasonable number would be between 300M to over 1B. As shocking as that sounds, the vast majority of fatalities would be in Asia."..................................
So that's OK then!
Izzi, Buckminster Fuller died in 1983, we know a lot more now than an 88-year-old man back then, although I would have argued with him then on all three points; the energy crisis was only visible to those who looked, there was widespread outbreaks of famine in the eighties and the environmental crisis has been known about by some of us since the sixties.
So what are you trying to say with this irrelevant quote?
The planet is quite clearly stressed by the sheer numbers of humans; too successful for our own good, we are, nonetheless, still part of the ecosystem and will suffer the consequences of uncontrolled reproduction just as locusts do when the food supply runs out.
"There is no energy crisis food crisis or environmental crisis. There is a crisis of ignorance."
R. Buckminster Fuller
There is a high probability that the world will soon experience an avian flu epidemic of staggering consequences. And while official mortality estimates have been kept artificially low, a not unreasonable number would be between 300M to over 1B. As shocking as that sounds, the vast majority of fatalities would be in Asia. Mortality would be significantly higher in the developed world than it should be, because of a shortage of respirators, currently barely enough to support a typical flu season. But it would still be significantly less, as a proportion of population. Even with that, worldwide population would recover quickly, and there will be an extended period of economic prosperity. This is what happened in Europe after the plagues of the 14th and 17th Centuries. The permanent effect of lowering the world's population would not be caused by this pandemic, however. It is occurring naturally, right now, in the strong decrease in the rate of growth. If the trend continued, the world's population would probably peak about now, then strongly trend downward to a stable population of around 5 billion or less. But with the avian flu, it will *seem* like the drop in population from 7 billion to 5 or so billion will happen overnight.
There are more people than the planet has resources for: hence the various crises and loss of habitat and species. But we can do something about it. The birth rate is falling where family planning is available. If the international community could fund universal contraception and abortion availability, we could reach a stable, sustainable global population. We just need to overcome religious and conservative opposition to female empowerment. Details of sustainable population sizes are provided on optimuumpopulation.org
I must disagree with Mr.Cox, Bloodaxe and DurangoKid about their prognosis for humankind.
Mr. Cox thinks he is addressing an audience of people who do not understand the importance of 'managing' our global resources AND using our brains to improve our living conditions. When the first humans discovered they could use weapons to protect themselves from lions and tigers and bears and secure a protein rich meal in the process, they did not stop to consider whether or not their impact would lead to the exploration of other worlds. When Charles Dickens was alive, the 'world' was abysmal. (World population-less than 1 billion).
China and India have 1/3 of the worlds population now and their presence on the planet has been the concern of people in Western nations, because they use more resources.
However they are using some of the most incredible technological advances of our time, including automobiles fueled by air,(dismissed by western industry for 50 years), irrigation and water projects that will provide agricultural self-sufficiency and a different approach towards improving the lives of their citizens.
The underdog is always the optimist.
Arguably, humans started on the collision course with finite resources at the start of the industrial revolution. At that time the population was about 1 billion. If we double that to 2 billion, to be generous, we probably have a rough idea of how many humans the earth might support without oil. Already we're 4.5 billion past the oil-free carrying capacity for the earth let alone the projected 3.5 billion or so more. Every place where oil has allowed us to overreach, we will retreat. One could make the same argument with coal, irrigated agriculture, the working of metals, etc. If oil depletion reaches about 2.5% per year we might expect the exported supply to diminish at roughly 5%. This means that every 14 years there will be half as much oil available for purchase from exporting regions. In other words, take any 14 year period and that will represent all the oil that humans will ever have remaining at the end of that period. So, now we know in rough numbers the what and when and of course the why. A problem without a solution is called a constraint. Better get used to it.
There's another aspect to human overcrowding that hasn't been mentioned here. All species get aggressive when there are too many of them crammed into the cage.