Global population likely to hit 11 bn +
September 18, 2014 7:38 PM Subscribe
New global population predictions published in Science today says that world population stabilisation is unlikely this century, with an 80% probability that world population, now 7.2 billion, will increase to between 9.6 and 12.3 billion in 2100, greatly exceeding previous consensus figures that settled around 9 billion, and is expected to keep growing next century. More in the Guardian.
The article is not technically published yet (it's online ahead of print), which means that it's behind, like, double-secret-paywall, but the Methods supplement is online for free.
Note that their main accounting is based on current trends in fertility, mobility, and mortality. I suspect that global climate change and the effects it will have on arable and livable land will impact those trends in ways that we aren't able to accurately project right now, but this work is still interesting.
posted by kagredon at 7:48 PM on September 18, 2014
Note that their main accounting is based on current trends in fertility, mobility, and mortality. I suspect that global climate change and the effects it will have on arable and livable land will impact those trends in ways that we aren't able to accurately project right now, but this work is still interesting.
posted by kagredon at 7:48 PM on September 18, 2014
So, buy land?
posted by Going To Maine at 7:49 PM on September 18, 2014 [4 favorites]
posted by Going To Maine at 7:49 PM on September 18, 2014 [4 favorites]
Also, the ratio of working age people to older people is likely to decline substantially in all countries, even those that currently have young populations.
Oh, great.
posted by BungaDunga at 7:56 PM on September 18, 2014 [2 favorites]
Oh, great.
posted by BungaDunga at 7:56 PM on September 18, 2014 [2 favorites]
I'm sure that the socks companies are behind this. Everyone wears socks. Sometimes even with sandals.
posted by oceanjesse at 8:06 PM on September 18, 2014 [9 favorites]
posted by oceanjesse at 8:06 PM on September 18, 2014 [9 favorites]
Stop breeding and start adopting, you idiots.
posted by Decani at 8:12 PM on September 18, 2014 [16 favorites]
posted by Decani at 8:12 PM on September 18, 2014 [16 favorites]
People do like to fuck.
posted by birdherder at 8:12 PM on September 18, 2014 [3 favorites]
posted by birdherder at 8:12 PM on September 18, 2014 [3 favorites]
.
posted by lalochezia at 8:13 PM on September 18, 2014 [6 favorites]
posted by lalochezia at 8:13 PM on September 18, 2014 [6 favorites]
People do like to fuck.
Yes, but "fuck" hasn't been necessarily causally linked to "create new human life" for well over a century.
posted by DGStieber at 8:15 PM on September 18, 2014 [10 favorites]
Yes, but "fuck" hasn't been necessarily causally linked to "create new human life" for well over a century.
posted by DGStieber at 8:15 PM on September 18, 2014 [10 favorites]
Send women to college. Women with careers make money, not babies.
posted by Camofrog at 8:15 PM on September 18, 2014 [33 favorites]
posted by Camofrog at 8:15 PM on September 18, 2014 [33 favorites]
People do like to fuck.
Stop breeding and start adopting, you idiots.
Give more women access to birth control and they can fuck all they please.
Stop breeding and start adopting, you idiots.
Give more women access to birth control and they can fuck all they please.
The cause of the stalled fertility rate is two-fold, said Raftery: a failure to meet the need for contraception and a continued preference for large families. “The unmet need for contraception - at 25% of women - has not changed in for 20 years,” he said.posted by BungaDunga at 8:16 PM on September 18, 2014 [28 favorites]
So, buy land?
Plastic.
Women with careers make money, not babies.
That is an odd and inexact formulation.
posted by Dip Flash at 8:18 PM on September 18, 2014 [3 favorites]
Plastic.
Women with careers make money, not babies.
That is an odd and inexact formulation.
posted by Dip Flash at 8:18 PM on September 18, 2014 [3 favorites]
Mostly in Africa. Perhaps the Pope can help and allow the use of oral contraceptives.
posted by Brian B. at 8:19 PM on September 18, 2014 [2 favorites]
posted by Brian B. at 8:19 PM on September 18, 2014 [2 favorites]
It's just amazing how closely population stability and just about every quality of life index tracks the emancipation and empowerment of women. Almost makes you think it has something to do with it or something.
posted by George_Spiggott at 8:20 PM on September 18, 2014 [58 favorites]
posted by George_Spiggott at 8:20 PM on September 18, 2014 [58 favorites]
I really believe birth control options are the greatest social/technological achievement we've had in the last couple of centuries - and all you have to do is provide them.
Women (and at the moment, that's who the responsibility is lumped with) WANT to be able to have only as many children as they can provide for. Children they can feed, school, provide good healthcare for.
We don't need advertising to have less children, we just need accessibility to birth control options.
Unfortunately, it just feels like there is a systemic effort across several countries, to reduce birth control options, and to stigmatise choosing to use them. Religion, xenophobia, conservative values, and a good old fashioned backlash against womens rights - why?
We're so close to that tipping point!
Fingers crossed for the 20% chance. We need it.
I still believe we have the potential for a decreasing, and sustainable population, and future - it feels like there is so much fear-mongering these days, and that that is what is driving some of these attitudes. Why bother being sustainable when we're all screwed?
We're not. At economy levels, and at population growth, it would only take a couple of changes to have things less stupid.
It's still possible.
posted by Elysum at 8:21 PM on September 18, 2014 [18 favorites]
Women (and at the moment, that's who the responsibility is lumped with) WANT to be able to have only as many children as they can provide for. Children they can feed, school, provide good healthcare for.
We don't need advertising to have less children, we just need accessibility to birth control options.
Unfortunately, it just feels like there is a systemic effort across several countries, to reduce birth control options, and to stigmatise choosing to use them. Religion, xenophobia, conservative values, and a good old fashioned backlash against womens rights - why?
We're so close to that tipping point!
Fingers crossed for the 20% chance. We need it.
I still believe we have the potential for a decreasing, and sustainable population, and future - it feels like there is so much fear-mongering these days, and that that is what is driving some of these attitudes. Why bother being sustainable when we're all screwed?
We're not. At economy levels, and at population growth, it would only take a couple of changes to have things less stupid.
It's still possible.
posted by Elysum at 8:21 PM on September 18, 2014 [18 favorites]
People do like to fuck.
It's called the biological imperative. It's what has kept life going for a billion years. It's a fundamental part of being human, and to mock or deny it is inhumane.
Anyway, more than birth control, we need to improve infant mortality - radically improve it to developed-world standards - so families do not feel compelled to "hedge" by having more kids.
posted by Nevin at 8:34 PM on September 18, 2014 [4 favorites]
It's called the biological imperative. It's what has kept life going for a billion years. It's a fundamental part of being human, and to mock or deny it is inhumane.
Anyway, more than birth control, we need to improve infant mortality - radically improve it to developed-world standards - so families do not feel compelled to "hedge" by having more kids.
posted by Nevin at 8:34 PM on September 18, 2014 [4 favorites]
.
posted by Golden Eternity at 8:35 PM on September 18, 2014
posted by Golden Eternity at 8:35 PM on September 18, 2014
Anyway, more than birth control, we need to improve infant mortality - radically improve it to developed-world standards - so families do not feel compelled to "hedge" by having more kids.
There have been significant strides made in infant mortality in the last two decades. Meanwhile, per the Grauniad article, “The unmet need for contraception - at 25% of women - has not changed in for 20 years”.
posted by kagredon at 8:44 PM on September 18, 2014 [3 favorites]
There have been significant strides made in infant mortality in the last two decades. Meanwhile, per the Grauniad article, “The unmet need for contraception - at 25% of women - has not changed in for 20 years”.
posted by kagredon at 8:44 PM on September 18, 2014 [3 favorites]
I look forward to being dead before this gets terrible.
posted by poffin boffin at 8:48 PM on September 18, 2014 [21 favorites]
posted by poffin boffin at 8:48 PM on September 18, 2014 [21 favorites]
It's called the biological imperative. It's what has kept life going for a billion years.
Sex may be a biological imperative, having children isn't. The main reason for the population increase is the restrictions on contraception that countries like the US place on foreign aid, and a lack of education.
You want the population to go down? Get the goddamn US government to remove restrictions on family planning, and increase the budget. Otherwise just yelling at the brown people is a crock of shit.
posted by happyroach at 8:55 PM on September 18, 2014 [9 favorites]
Sex may be a biological imperative, having children isn't. The main reason for the population increase is the restrictions on contraception that countries like the US place on foreign aid, and a lack of education.
You want the population to go down? Get the goddamn US government to remove restrictions on family planning, and increase the budget. Otherwise just yelling at the brown people is a crock of shit.
posted by happyroach at 8:55 PM on September 18, 2014 [9 favorites]
Hell is other people.
posted by valkane at 8:59 PM on September 18, 2014 [5 favorites]
posted by valkane at 8:59 PM on September 18, 2014 [5 favorites]
It's called the biological imperative. It's what has kept life going for a billion years. It's a fundamental part of being human, and to mock or deny it is inhumane.
What a crock of shit. I've never understood this bizarre, cultish idea that anything to do with procreation is somehow sacred.
Yeah, the biological imperative is what's kept life going for a billion years, but for all the joy it has brought, it has also brought every single bit of suffering ever experienced.
Saying that it's inhumane to "mock or deny" our biological imperative is to actually deny what makes humans unique on this planet: the ability to look out, to think about things other than the self, and to try to improve things in spite of our limitations and constraints.
posted by Ickster at 9:03 PM on September 18, 2014 [40 favorites]
What a crock of shit. I've never understood this bizarre, cultish idea that anything to do with procreation is somehow sacred.
Yeah, the biological imperative is what's kept life going for a billion years, but for all the joy it has brought, it has also brought every single bit of suffering ever experienced.
Saying that it's inhumane to "mock or deny" our biological imperative is to actually deny what makes humans unique on this planet: the ability to look out, to think about things other than the self, and to try to improve things in spite of our limitations and constraints.
posted by Ickster at 9:03 PM on September 18, 2014 [40 favorites]
It's just amazing how closely population stability and just about every quality of life index tracks the emancipation and empowerment of women. Almost makes you think it has something to do with it or something.This is resoundingly true, but whereas I'm sure you meant to imply "we have the solution" I can't help but worry about the additional implication, "we have another problem". Let z="emancipation and empowerment of women", plug in a strong negative covariance between z and w, then solve for Δz...
posted by roystgnr at 9:04 PM on September 18, 2014 [1 favorite]
There's an 80% probability that many people will still be rehashing Malthusian doctrine at the turn of the next century, despite it's fallacies.
posted by CincyBlues at 9:05 PM on September 18, 2014 [4 favorites]
posted by CincyBlues at 9:05 PM on September 18, 2014 [4 favorites]
We are approaching the limits to growth at a frightful speed, and without any brakes.
posted by Schadenfreude at 9:09 PM on September 18, 2014 [4 favorites]
posted by Schadenfreude at 9:09 PM on September 18, 2014 [4 favorites]
This is great!! I like people!!
posted by pompomtom at 9:14 PM on September 18, 2014 [11 favorites]
posted by pompomtom at 9:14 PM on September 18, 2014 [11 favorites]
Finish up RISUG, apply to every male at 12 or whatever. Reversals free upon request after reaching the age of majority.
posted by save alive nothing that breatheth at 9:26 PM on September 18, 2014 [3 favorites]
posted by save alive nothing that breatheth at 9:26 PM on September 18, 2014 [3 favorites]
On the bright side, we'll have enough for a billion football teams, which would let us run brackets 20 levels deep.
posted by michaelh at 9:39 PM on September 18, 2014 [6 favorites]
posted by michaelh at 9:39 PM on September 18, 2014 [6 favorites]
> Stop breeding and start adopting, you idiots.
Good luck with that advice. Education and birth control are the actual answers you're looking for.
posted by stp123 at 9:39 PM on September 18, 2014 [5 favorites]
Good luck with that advice. Education and birth control are the actual answers you're looking for.
posted by stp123 at 9:39 PM on September 18, 2014 [5 favorites]
I can't help but worry about the additional implication, "we have another problem". Let z="emancipation and empowerment of women", plug in a strong negative covariance between z and w, then solve for Δz...
what
posted by kagredon at 9:50 PM on September 18, 2014 [7 favorites]
what
posted by kagredon at 9:50 PM on September 18, 2014 [7 favorites]
Yeah, the biological imperative is what's kept life going for a billion years, but for all the joy it has brought, it has also brought every single bit of suffering ever experienced.
I dunno... this sounds like a pretty bizarre, cultish take on humanity.
posted by 2N2222 at 9:55 PM on September 18, 2014 [8 favorites]
I dunno... this sounds like a pretty bizarre, cultish take on humanity.
posted by 2N2222 at 9:55 PM on September 18, 2014 [8 favorites]
Right now our world civilization is headed for some kind of massive disaster if we do nothing to stop it, and this will probably happen in closer to 50 years, not 86. I've no idea what the form of it will be, but currently we're just running everything too hard - there's too much CO2, too many people, too much wealth concentration, too much reliance on fossil fuels, too much degradation of arable land, too much water used, too much reliance on natural ecosystems for food and fuel... And on and on. Eventually that's going to catch up with us in the form of shortages and social upheaval as billions of people experience an irreversible slide in their standard of living.
But it doesn't have to happen. We're only at seven billion people now, and the climate and ecosystem of the Earth has huge inertia. We can still fix this (or at least make our future problems much smaller in scale) if we do the right things today.
posted by Kevin Street at 9:56 PM on September 18, 2014 [10 favorites]
But it doesn't have to happen. We're only at seven billion people now, and the climate and ecosystem of the Earth has huge inertia. We can still fix this (or at least make our future problems much smaller in scale) if we do the right things today.
posted by Kevin Street at 9:56 PM on September 18, 2014 [10 favorites]
A couple things that are worth keeping in mind :
1) If life gets better in Africa, people there will have fewer children. This has happened basically everywhere life has gotten better. And make no mistake, life is getting better in Africa.
2) Third-world people consume a fraction of the resources us first-worlders do. So, even if the African population reaches 4 billion, they still may consume fewer resources than 400 million Americans.
posted by evil otto at 10:11 PM on September 18, 2014 [1 favorite]
1) If life gets better in Africa, people there will have fewer children. This has happened basically everywhere life has gotten better. And make no mistake, life is getting better in Africa.
2) Third-world people consume a fraction of the resources us first-worlders do. So, even if the African population reaches 4 billion, they still may consume fewer resources than 400 million Americans.
posted by evil otto at 10:11 PM on September 18, 2014 [1 favorite]
There's an 80% probability that many people will still be rehashing Malthusian doctrine at the turn of the next century, despite it's fallacies.
As far as I can tell, the only reason that Malthusian predictions haven't come to pass is that technology keeps bailing us out by doubling food supplies to keep up with the population-- first artificial nitrogen, then industrial agriculture, then green revolution "double wheat" and pesticides. I'm sure many people here believe that human ingenuity can rescue us yet again, likely in the form of genetic manipulation of cultivated varieties, and they may be absolutely correct, but when we look at the cost of these innovations, we see each an every one has been a supremely sharp double edged sword, pitting humanitarian issues against ecological diversity, adding layer after layer of abstraction to our food supply.
Malthus might be proven wrong, but in so doing we will almost surely create a world virtually unrecognizable to the people of today.
posted by Perko at 10:34 PM on September 18, 2014 [11 favorites]
As far as I can tell, the only reason that Malthusian predictions haven't come to pass is that technology keeps bailing us out by doubling food supplies to keep up with the population-- first artificial nitrogen, then industrial agriculture, then green revolution "double wheat" and pesticides. I'm sure many people here believe that human ingenuity can rescue us yet again, likely in the form of genetic manipulation of cultivated varieties, and they may be absolutely correct, but when we look at the cost of these innovations, we see each an every one has been a supremely sharp double edged sword, pitting humanitarian issues against ecological diversity, adding layer after layer of abstraction to our food supply.
Malthus might be proven wrong, but in so doing we will almost surely create a world virtually unrecognizable to the people of today.
posted by Perko at 10:34 PM on September 18, 2014 [11 favorites]
I can't help but worry about the additional implication, "we have another problem". Let z="emancipation and empowerment of women", plug in a strong negative covariance between z and w, then solve for Δz...
what
Yeah, I'm puzzled by this too. What precisely is this pseudomath supposedly suggesting?
posted by AdamCSnider at 10:49 PM on September 18, 2014 [1 favorite]
what
Yeah, I'm puzzled by this too. What precisely is this pseudomath supposedly suggesting?
posted by AdamCSnider at 10:49 PM on September 18, 2014 [1 favorite]
Goodbye elephants, great apes, zebras, giraffes, other African mega-fauna, lemurs. At least we'll always have the Great Pacific Garbage Patch.
posted by Auden at 11:05 PM on September 18, 2014 [5 favorites]
posted by Auden at 11:05 PM on September 18, 2014 [5 favorites]
Auden: "Goodbye elephants, great apes, zebras, giraffes, African mega-fauna, lemurs. At least we'll always have the Great Pacific Garbage Patch."
And the four others. Humans, as a group, are stupid.
posted by InsertNiftyNameHere at 11:06 PM on September 18, 2014 [1 favorite]
And the four others. Humans, as a group, are stupid.
posted by InsertNiftyNameHere at 11:06 PM on September 18, 2014 [1 favorite]
Yeah, I'm puzzled by this too. What precisely is this pseudomath supposedly suggesting?
Well, he links to the Price equation, in which z is a given heritable trait and w is the overall fitness of the species. Which kind of makes it sound like the "another problem" is that the human species will somehow become diminished by the greater emancipation of women, but I'm hoping I am badly misinterpreting him.
posted by kagredon at 11:32 PM on September 18, 2014
Well, he links to the Price equation, in which z is a given heritable trait and w is the overall fitness of the species. Which kind of makes it sound like the "another problem" is that the human species will somehow become diminished by the greater emancipation of women, but I'm hoping I am badly misinterpreting him.
posted by kagredon at 11:32 PM on September 18, 2014
Finish up RISUG, apply to every male at 12 or whatever. Reversals free upon request after reaching the age of majority.
And the great thing about making it mandatory? If there's any ethnic, cultural or political group you don't like, you can always refuse to perform reversals. Is there any ethnic group you prefer to see go extinct citizen?
posted by happyroach at 11:39 PM on September 18, 2014 [4 favorites]
And the great thing about making it mandatory? If there's any ethnic, cultural or political group you don't like, you can always refuse to perform reversals. Is there any ethnic group you prefer to see go extinct citizen?
posted by happyroach at 11:39 PM on September 18, 2014 [4 favorites]
All of them, Katie happyroach. All of them.
posted by cytherea at 12:15 AM on September 19, 2014 [1 favorite]
posted by cytherea at 12:15 AM on September 19, 2014 [1 favorite]
Time for a Global One-Child Policy?
Or should we stop trying to find cures and treatments for various life-threatening diseases? We could just let people die more often.
posted by mary8nne at 12:26 AM on September 19, 2014 [1 favorite]
Or should we stop trying to find cures and treatments for various life-threatening diseases? We could just let people die more often.
posted by mary8nne at 12:26 AM on September 19, 2014 [1 favorite]
1) If life gets better in Africa, people there will have fewer children. This has happened basically everywhere life has gotten better. And make no mistake, life is getting better in Africa.
2) Third-world people consume a fraction of the resources us first-worlders do. So, even if the African population reaches 4 billion, they still may consume fewer resources than 400 million Americans.
Aren't these contradictory? Won't consuming more resources go hand in hand with life "getting better"?
Anyway, yes, the answer is universal access to family planning. The real tragedy of our age isn't all the problems we're going to face - it's that they were so easily avoidable.
posted by heathkit at 12:38 AM on September 19, 2014 [7 favorites]
2) Third-world people consume a fraction of the resources us first-worlders do. So, even if the African population reaches 4 billion, they still may consume fewer resources than 400 million Americans.
Aren't these contradictory? Won't consuming more resources go hand in hand with life "getting better"?
Anyway, yes, the answer is universal access to family planning. The real tragedy of our age isn't all the problems we're going to face - it's that they were so easily avoidable.
posted by heathkit at 12:38 AM on September 19, 2014 [7 favorites]
Also, the greatest shortcoming of the human race is our inability to understand the exponential function.
posted by heathkit at 12:41 AM on September 19, 2014 [5 favorites]
posted by heathkit at 12:41 AM on September 19, 2014 [5 favorites]
1) If life gets better in Africa, people there will have fewer children. This has happened basically everywhere life has gotten better. And make no mistake, life is getting better in Africa.
This is not, in fact, guaranteed. You can read some interesting research about grips on Africa where infant mortality has gone way down but large families are still the preference. You can't break something add all encompassing add population growth down to a single, or even a few, causes. It is multicausal.
posted by smoke at 12:53 AM on September 19, 2014 [3 favorites]
This is not, in fact, guaranteed. You can read some interesting research about grips on Africa where infant mortality has gone way down but large families are still the preference.
Infant mortality is not the only metric of "life getting better", though, as tell second link in the OP addresses:
The preference for large families is linked to lack of female education which limits women’s life choices, said Raftery. In Nigeria, 28% of girls still do not complete primary education.
[...]
In separate work, published on Monday, Wolfgang Lutz, director of the Vienna Institute of Demography, highlighted education as crucial in not only reducing birth rates but also enabling people to prosper even while populations are growing fast. In Ghana, for example, women without education have an average of 5.7 children, while women with secondary education have 3.2 and women with tertiary education only 1.5. But he said: “It is not primarily the number of people that’s important in population policy, it’s what they are capable of, their level of education, and their health.”
Which is to say: there may be unique cultural factors that contribute to variations in birth rate, but there's a demonstrable difference that coincides with access to education and opportunity for women, which have a greater effect at present than nebulous "cultural" factors.
posted by kagredon at 1:19 AM on September 19, 2014 [4 favorites]
Infant mortality is not the only metric of "life getting better", though, as tell second link in the OP addresses:
The preference for large families is linked to lack of female education which limits women’s life choices, said Raftery. In Nigeria, 28% of girls still do not complete primary education.
[...]
In separate work, published on Monday, Wolfgang Lutz, director of the Vienna Institute of Demography, highlighted education as crucial in not only reducing birth rates but also enabling people to prosper even while populations are growing fast. In Ghana, for example, women without education have an average of 5.7 children, while women with secondary education have 3.2 and women with tertiary education only 1.5. But he said: “It is not primarily the number of people that’s important in population policy, it’s what they are capable of, their level of education, and their health.”
Which is to say: there may be unique cultural factors that contribute to variations in birth rate, but there's a demonstrable difference that coincides with access to education and opportunity for women, which have a greater effect at present than nebulous "cultural" factors.
posted by kagredon at 1:19 AM on September 19, 2014 [4 favorites]
On the bright side, we'll have enough for a billion football teams, which would let us run brackets 20 levels deep.
If football played an actual full season, say 160+ games like baseball, we'd be able to employ a lot more aspiring athletes than the current schedule allows.*
*the healthcare costs associated with this might be another issue
posted by hippybear at 1:24 AM on September 19, 2014
If football played an actual full season, say 160+ games like baseball, we'd be able to employ a lot more aspiring athletes than the current schedule allows.*
*the healthcare costs associated with this might be another issue
posted by hippybear at 1:24 AM on September 19, 2014
No one has any real incentive to stop this because of the economic system currently favored all over the world-- it's a pyramid scheme that depends on an ever-increasing number of people at the bottom to prop up those at the top.
If we stop the unchecked growth, the global economy shits the bed and we're fucked. If we don't, the Earth shits the bed and we're fucked. The next revolution that bails us out needs to be economic instead of agricultural. Or an inexhaustible supply of non-polluting energy collected with inexhaustible materials. I know which one sounds more plausible to me.
posted by Mayor Curley at 2:21 AM on September 19, 2014 [14 favorites]
If we stop the unchecked growth, the global economy shits the bed and we're fucked. If we don't, the Earth shits the bed and we're fucked. The next revolution that bails us out needs to be economic instead of agricultural. Or an inexhaustible supply of non-polluting energy collected with inexhaustible materials. I know which one sounds more plausible to me.
posted by Mayor Curley at 2:21 AM on September 19, 2014 [14 favorites]
This is a terrifying article. Look at the very first sentence you see:
Nigeria – the country’s population is expected to soar from 200m today to 900m by 2100
Nigeria's population cannot possibly grow to over four times its current size.
The resources and infrastructure are simply not there - indeed, they barely support the current population and seem to be getting worse rather than better. The fact that your average Nigerian uses only a fraction of the world's resources that an American does is irrelevant if Nigeria itself cannot produce or import enough of those resources to keep their citizens alive. And even though a great deal it is stolen before it reaches the people, much of Nigeria's economy depends on oil revenues, which will certainly be exhausted within a generation or at most two.
Take that together with the article, and you reach a grim conclusion - there will be hundreds of millions of excess deaths in Nigeria by 2100 - which translates to a huge, unprecedented number of deaths on a global scale - unless we desperately soon start investing hugely in birth control for the world.
As usual, the reason we don't do this is because of a comparatively tiny group of American psychopaths. I will edit out most of my emotional responses to that fact, but I do hope they eventually pay for their crimes.
posted by lupus_yonderboy at 2:31 AM on September 19, 2014 [13 favorites]
Nigeria – the country’s population is expected to soar from 200m today to 900m by 2100
Nigeria's population cannot possibly grow to over four times its current size.
The resources and infrastructure are simply not there - indeed, they barely support the current population and seem to be getting worse rather than better. The fact that your average Nigerian uses only a fraction of the world's resources that an American does is irrelevant if Nigeria itself cannot produce or import enough of those resources to keep their citizens alive. And even though a great deal it is stolen before it reaches the people, much of Nigeria's economy depends on oil revenues, which will certainly be exhausted within a generation or at most two.
Take that together with the article, and you reach a grim conclusion - there will be hundreds of millions of excess deaths in Nigeria by 2100 - which translates to a huge, unprecedented number of deaths on a global scale - unless we desperately soon start investing hugely in birth control for the world.
As usual, the reason we don't do this is because of a comparatively tiny group of American psychopaths. I will edit out most of my emotional responses to that fact, but I do hope they eventually pay for their crimes.
posted by lupus_yonderboy at 2:31 AM on September 19, 2014 [13 favorites]
Nothing bums me out harder than thinking about the future 100 years of life on earth. Nothing.
And it should be the most uplifting thing.
posted by dogwalker at 3:19 AM on September 19, 2014 [14 favorites]
And it should be the most uplifting thing.
posted by dogwalker at 3:19 AM on September 19, 2014 [14 favorites]
Well, he links to the Price equation, in which z is a given heritable trait and w is the overall fitness of the species. Which kind of makes it sound like the "another problem" is that the human species will somehow become diminished by the greater emancipation of women, but I'm hoping I am badly misinterpreting him.
That kind of notion (whether it's what roystgnr meant or not) reminds me of this 1912 article by eugenicist and revered American libertarian Albert Jay Nock, in which he warns of a terrible impending "race suicide" that would arise from the working class having fewer children:
After these, we find the Education Act of 1899 forbidding the employment of children under twelve in any way to interfere with full attendance at school. We find a Factory Act in 1891, again raising the age of child-employment, and restricting the employment of women after child-birth. And the whole birth rate of England responded with a brisk decline.Continuing on to argue against enacting child labor laws in the U.S.:
But what we have done, in the social and economic view, is to penalize parentage by destroying the economic value of the child. We have contributed no economic assistance to the upkeep of those families, in lieu of the productive power that we have paralyzed. We have handicapped the parent in his competition with the childless; and the law of supply and demand attends to the rest. The family of seven or eight is supplanted by that of two or three, the strange law of primogeniture governing inherited disabilities comes in, and our population is physically, mentally, and morally impaired.I hadn't noticed the first time I read this that in passing he suggests that to "compensate" parents for outlawing child labor we might enact a baby bonus. I wonder what modern libertarians would think of that...
posted by XMLicious at 3:27 AM on September 19, 2014 [4 favorites]
The neglect the effects of the inevitable 3rd world war that is shaping up nicely to break out within the next two decades. You need not worry about human overpopulation.
posted by Renoroc at 4:07 AM on September 19, 2014
posted by Renoroc at 4:07 AM on September 19, 2014
I'm doing my part by eating my fries with mayo.
posted by oceanjesse at 4:11 AM on September 19, 2014 [3 favorites]
posted by oceanjesse at 4:11 AM on September 19, 2014 [3 favorites]
If you want to control demographics, it looks like fairly simple polices will do this:
If you want to reduce the numbers of an ethnic group, educate women, provide free healthcare and pensions, and encourage feminist civil society groups.
Eventually the world will be dominated by sexist patriarchal societies with no welfare state, poor educational opportunities for women and restricted birth control options. The future is Texas, in other words.
posted by alasdair at 5:12 AM on September 19, 2014
- birth control availability (fewer babies born if women don't want them)
- female education and employment (makes women not want them)
- a welfare state, especially pensions (makes women not need them)
If you want to reduce the numbers of an ethnic group, educate women, provide free healthcare and pensions, and encourage feminist civil society groups.
Eventually the world will be dominated by sexist patriarchal societies with no welfare state, poor educational opportunities for women and restricted birth control options. The future is Texas, in other words.
posted by alasdair at 5:12 AM on September 19, 2014
The next revolution that bails us out needs to be economic instead of agricultural. Or an inexhaustible supply of non-polluting energy collected with inexhaustible materials. I know which one sounds more plausible to me.
I'm with you on free energy being our only hope.
posted by Dip Flash at 5:13 AM on September 19, 2014
I'm with you on free energy being our only hope.
posted by Dip Flash at 5:13 AM on September 19, 2014
Put me in the very unlikely camp.
1. Of the 224 or so countries in the world, fully 116 (basically half) are at or below replacement fertility. This includes China, the USA, and Brazil.
2. Within the next 20 years, another 40 countries are going to drop below replacement fertility. This group includes India, Mexico, and South Africa.
3. Total fertility is declining in every single country in the world
4. The only regions with high (above 5) fertility are equatorial Africa (which, with the exception of Nigeria - don't have very large populations in the first place (think Burkina Faso, or Mali) and Afghanistan.
From the looks of things, and from the demographers with whom I've spoken, the assumption is that population will steadily increase until about 2050 - top out about 9 billion, and then commence an extended period of decline.
posted by The Giant Squid at 5:14 AM on September 19, 2014 [6 favorites]
1. Of the 224 or so countries in the world, fully 116 (basically half) are at or below replacement fertility. This includes China, the USA, and Brazil.
2. Within the next 20 years, another 40 countries are going to drop below replacement fertility. This group includes India, Mexico, and South Africa.
3. Total fertility is declining in every single country in the world
4. The only regions with high (above 5) fertility are equatorial Africa (which, with the exception of Nigeria - don't have very large populations in the first place (think Burkina Faso, or Mali) and Afghanistan.
From the looks of things, and from the demographers with whom I've spoken, the assumption is that population will steadily increase until about 2050 - top out about 9 billion, and then commence an extended period of decline.
posted by The Giant Squid at 5:14 AM on September 19, 2014 [6 favorites]
The future is Texas, in other words.
I am tempted to title my (nonexistent) dystopian magnum opus Texasomalia.
posted by Dip Flash at 5:16 AM on September 19, 2014 [1 favorite]
I am tempted to title my (nonexistent) dystopian magnum opus Texasomalia.
posted by Dip Flash at 5:16 AM on September 19, 2014 [1 favorite]
Well, he links to the Price equation, in which z is a given heritable trait and w is the overall fitness of the species.
The suggestion seems to be that "emancipation of women" is somehow genetically determined, and that by the Price equation natural selection will lead to less of it. It does seem plausible that the poverty and misery caused by rapid population growth might sometimes work against efforts to empower women.
posted by sfenders at 5:24 AM on September 19, 2014 [1 favorite]
The suggestion seems to be that "emancipation of women" is somehow genetically determined, and that by the Price equation natural selection will lead to less of it. It does seem plausible that the poverty and misery caused by rapid population growth might sometimes work against efforts to empower women.
posted by sfenders at 5:24 AM on September 19, 2014 [1 favorite]
Within the next 20 years, another 40 countries are going to drop below replacement fertility.
Are you basing that on the old UN "vague and subjective" estimates? I was glad to see someone finally tried to do a better job.
posted by sfenders at 5:25 AM on September 19, 2014
Are you basing that on the old UN "vague and subjective" estimates? I was glad to see someone finally tried to do a better job.
posted by sfenders at 5:25 AM on September 19, 2014
Malthus might be proven wrong, but in so doing we will almost surely create a world virtually unrecognizable to the people of today.
A genie gives you a choice: 100 years in the past or 100 years in the future. Which do you choose?
posted by mikewebkist at 5:29 AM on September 19, 2014
A genie gives you a choice: 100 years in the past or 100 years in the future. Which do you choose?
posted by mikewebkist at 5:29 AM on September 19, 2014
A genie gives you a choice: 100 years in the past or 100 years in the future. Which do you choose?
Is this supposed to be a slam dunk? At the very least, I know what horrors await me 100 years in the past.
posted by Steely-eyed Missile Man at 5:33 AM on September 19, 2014 [8 favorites]
Is this supposed to be a slam dunk? At the very least, I know what horrors await me 100 years in the past.
posted by Steely-eyed Missile Man at 5:33 AM on September 19, 2014 [8 favorites]
Before all the doom and gloom sets in, it's worth knowing that a century ago people were saying exactly the same thing about world population. The earth will be unable to sustain it. There will be mass starvations. Etc. Then some dude figured out how to manufacture ammonia.
posted by deathpanels at 5:43 AM on September 19, 2014
posted by deathpanels at 5:43 AM on September 19, 2014
@sfenders
Take a country like Peru (TFR of 2.22)
1970 - 6.31
1980 - 5.01
1990 - 3.83
2000 - 2.93
2010 - 2.50
2012 - 2.45
2014 - 2.22 (2014 CIA Estimate)
My demographer friends said there's 3-4 dozen countries that fit the exact same profile (see: Venezuela, Colombia, Ecuador, Brazil, Bangladesh, India, South Africa, Botswana), they've all got roughly identical curves of decline, they're all at or slightly above replacement TFR, and there's no reason to expect there to be some major spike in fertility in all places at the same time.
posted by The Giant Squid at 5:43 AM on September 19, 2014
Take a country like Peru (TFR of 2.22)
1970 - 6.31
1980 - 5.01
1990 - 3.83
2000 - 2.93
2010 - 2.50
2012 - 2.45
2014 - 2.22 (2014 CIA Estimate)
My demographer friends said there's 3-4 dozen countries that fit the exact same profile (see: Venezuela, Colombia, Ecuador, Brazil, Bangladesh, India, South Africa, Botswana), they've all got roughly identical curves of decline, they're all at or slightly above replacement TFR, and there's no reason to expect there to be some major spike in fertility in all places at the same time.
posted by The Giant Squid at 5:43 AM on September 19, 2014
I'd love to see an infographic that showed predicted populations over time. I grew up believing that there would be 10 billion people in 2010, so news that we've got another 90 years is great!
posted by rebent at 5:50 AM on September 19, 2014 [1 favorite]
posted by rebent at 5:50 AM on September 19, 2014 [1 favorite]
That was the essential method for the optimistic forecasts: Take a few countries that show a declining trend in fertility, and assume the same thing will happen everywhere. Also assume that the trend will continue to replacement rate or below. Interesting that you include India. Reported TFR in that extremely populous country had stopped its declining trend for a couple of years when I looked at this around 2008, but it's now declining again in recent years. So that's some relatively good news for them. Also there's good news for the USA.
But I'll be surprised if these researchers aren't correct that all this is outweighed by taking a more realistic estimate than the old UN projections.
posted by sfenders at 6:03 AM on September 19, 2014 [1 favorite]
But I'll be surprised if these researchers aren't correct that all this is outweighed by taking a more realistic estimate than the old UN projections.
posted by sfenders at 6:03 AM on September 19, 2014 [1 favorite]
Yikes; you think it's safe to go to sleep, and the next thing you know you're a eugenicist spouting pseudomath...
Price's equation is also called "Price's theorem"; this isn't a theory some racist politician came up with, this isn't an empirical report from some eugenicist pseudoscientist, it's the same sort of math as "multiplying two odd numbers gives you an odd number".
Δz = 1/w cov(w_i,z_i) + 1/w E(w_i Δz_i)
Look at any characteristic z that, along with the reproduction rate w, might vary between subpopulations i. (Note: there are no races or genes in this equation. Influences on Δz_i can be anything that causes z_i in those subpopulations to vary or hold steady over time, and the division into subpopulations can be any partition you choose; it's true for all of them.)
The change in the average value of z over time, Δz, comes from two parts:
The second part is a weighted expectation (E()) of the change in individual subpopulations, Δz_i. (loose translation: when a subgroup's value for z tends to increase or decrease from generation to generation, to a lesser extent so does z as a whole)
The first part is a weighted covariance between z and w. (loose translation: if subgroups with more z tend to grow more than subgroups with less z, then z tends to increase; if subgroups with more z tend to grow less than subgroups with less z, then z tends to decrease)
As George Spiggott alluded to, there are feminist choices you can make for z (quantifiable choices like "number of years women are educated on average" or "percentage of women allowed to vote", not just pseudomath) and measurable choices for sets i (like nationality or female educational attainment) for which cov(w_i,z_i) is a significant negative number.
When one of our goals is to reduce population growth w then that covariance is a fantastic thing; empowering women is possibly the kindest handle on the problem one could hope for. Causation is much more tentative than correlation, but it looks like you really can just let girls go to school long enough to see more options for their lives, and most of them will decide that having huge families isn't the best option.
But when one of our goals is to empower women, then that covariance is frightening. It means that we're fighting an uphill battle, and we have to constantly tread water just to keep from drowning. Even if you can get through to every culture in the world, make Δz_i positive everywhere, that doesn't even guarantee that Δz will break even, because there's a big negative term fighting that. It doesn't matter that patriarchy isn't a genetic trait, all that matters to the math is that patriarchal subcultures typically get away with transmitting it to their kids and that the more regressive a patriarchy is the more kids it's likely to have.
posted by roystgnr at 6:12 AM on September 19, 2014 [6 favorites]
Price's equation is also called "Price's theorem"; this isn't a theory some racist politician came up with, this isn't an empirical report from some eugenicist pseudoscientist, it's the same sort of math as "multiplying two odd numbers gives you an odd number".
Δz = 1/w cov(w_i,z_i) + 1/w E(w_i Δz_i)
Look at any characteristic z that, along with the reproduction rate w, might vary between subpopulations i. (Note: there are no races or genes in this equation. Influences on Δz_i can be anything that causes z_i in those subpopulations to vary or hold steady over time, and the division into subpopulations can be any partition you choose; it's true for all of them.)
The change in the average value of z over time, Δz, comes from two parts:
The second part is a weighted expectation (E()) of the change in individual subpopulations, Δz_i. (loose translation: when a subgroup's value for z tends to increase or decrease from generation to generation, to a lesser extent so does z as a whole)
The first part is a weighted covariance between z and w. (loose translation: if subgroups with more z tend to grow more than subgroups with less z, then z tends to increase; if subgroups with more z tend to grow less than subgroups with less z, then z tends to decrease)
As George Spiggott alluded to, there are feminist choices you can make for z (quantifiable choices like "number of years women are educated on average" or "percentage of women allowed to vote", not just pseudomath) and measurable choices for sets i (like nationality or female educational attainment) for which cov(w_i,z_i) is a significant negative number.
When one of our goals is to reduce population growth w then that covariance is a fantastic thing; empowering women is possibly the kindest handle on the problem one could hope for. Causation is much more tentative than correlation, but it looks like you really can just let girls go to school long enough to see more options for their lives, and most of them will decide that having huge families isn't the best option.
But when one of our goals is to empower women, then that covariance is frightening. It means that we're fighting an uphill battle, and we have to constantly tread water just to keep from drowning. Even if you can get through to every culture in the world, make Δz_i positive everywhere, that doesn't even guarantee that Δz will break even, because there's a big negative term fighting that. It doesn't matter that patriarchy isn't a genetic trait, all that matters to the math is that patriarchal subcultures typically get away with transmitting it to their kids and that the more regressive a patriarchy is the more kids it's likely to have.
posted by roystgnr at 6:12 AM on September 19, 2014 [6 favorites]
I look forward to being dead before this gets terrible.
Sure, you'll be dead and I'll be dead, but I have to think about the welfare of my six kids, 36 grandkids, and 216 great-grandkids. This population growth holds real potential to make things difficult for them.
posted by Pater Aletheias at 6:26 AM on September 19, 2014 [3 favorites]
Sure, you'll be dead and I'll be dead, but I have to think about the welfare of my six kids, 36 grandkids, and 216 great-grandkids. This population growth holds real potential to make things difficult for them.
posted by Pater Aletheias at 6:26 AM on September 19, 2014 [3 favorites]
"Asia will probably remain the most populous continent, although its population is likely to peak around the middle of the century and then decline. The main reason for the increase in the projection of the world population is an increase in the projected population of Africa. The continent’s current population of about one billion is projected to rise to between 3.1 and 5.7 billion with probability 95% by the end of the century, with a median projection of 4.2 billion. While this is large, it does not imply unprecedented population density: it would make Africa’s population density roughly equal to that of China today."
posted by cashman at 6:27 AM on September 19, 2014 [1 favorite]
posted by cashman at 6:27 AM on September 19, 2014 [1 favorite]
Aren't these contradictory? Won't consuming more resources go hand in hand with life "getting better"?
No, they're just unintuitive. There's lots of data showing that human populations under more survival stress (less food, environmental catastrophe, disease, etc.) reproduce at much higher rates. The better off, less stressed populations reproduce at lower rates. The key to controlling population growth is making sure everyone has plenty of food and is healthy and educated about reproductive issues. Basically the opposite of everything we've been doing in the US lately.
posted by saulgoodman at 6:29 AM on September 19, 2014 [2 favorites]
No, they're just unintuitive. There's lots of data showing that human populations under more survival stress (less food, environmental catastrophe, disease, etc.) reproduce at much higher rates. The better off, less stressed populations reproduce at lower rates. The key to controlling population growth is making sure everyone has plenty of food and is healthy and educated about reproductive issues. Basically the opposite of everything we've been doing in the US lately.
posted by saulgoodman at 6:29 AM on September 19, 2014 [2 favorites]
A genie gives you a choice: 100 years in the past or 100 years in the future. Which do you choose?
Is this supposed to be a slam dunk? At the very least, I know what horrors await me 100 years in the past.
No...not a slam dunk -- a question about perspective which you answered reasonably: "the devil I know." But reasonable people can disagree -- even if they agree on population projections and climate science.
posted by mikewebkist at 6:31 AM on September 19, 2014
Is this supposed to be a slam dunk? At the very least, I know what horrors await me 100 years in the past.
No...not a slam dunk -- a question about perspective which you answered reasonably: "the devil I know." But reasonable people can disagree -- even if they agree on population projections and climate science.
posted by mikewebkist at 6:31 AM on September 19, 2014
Major Curley: No one has any real incentive to stop this because of the economic system currently favored all over the world-- it's a pyramid scheme that depends on an ever-increasing number of people at the bottom to prop up those at the top.
This. And we're not even allowed to talk about economic reforms, whether it's zero or no-growth economies, or sharing of resources, because anything else is Socialism. I see a disturbing trend to demonize environmental concerns as "fascism" because they have been successfully used to block some kinds of development.
obMirowski:
posted by sneebler at 6:42 AM on September 19, 2014 [3 favorites]
This. And we're not even allowed to talk about economic reforms, whether it's zero or no-growth economies, or sharing of resources, because anything else is Socialism. I see a disturbing trend to demonize environmental concerns as "fascism" because they have been successfully used to block some kinds of development.
obMirowski:
The Left has traditionally thought science was on its side. Yet ‘nature’ and ‘the economy’ have never been clearly separated in the history of political economy. Because economists have understood themselves as scientists studying a natural phenomenon called ‘the economy’, ecological meltdown throws conventional habits of thought into confusion: ‘economic growth’ is, after all, a reassuring biological metaphor that diverts attention from what it actually describes: the rate at which humans convert land once occupied by ecosystems into coal-pits and industrial technomass.Just to say that not all our problems go back to Malthus.
posted by sneebler at 6:42 AM on September 19, 2014 [3 favorites]
Crush people together and they tend to get sick. My assumption has always been for a catastrophic pandemic in my lifetime.
posted by IndigoJones at 7:03 AM on September 19, 2014 [1 favorite]
posted by IndigoJones at 7:03 AM on September 19, 2014 [1 favorite]
I think I understand roystgnr's point here. To put it glibly, when you survey humanity as a whole, the degree to which groups subjugate women by forcing them to have lots of unwanted children correlates strongly with a high birth rate. I think this makes a kind of intuitive sense, and if we have measurable empirical data to support it, then as roystgnr points out, the conclusion follows that we have to be constantly fighting the oppression of women, everywhere it exists, forever, just to avoid catastrophe.
Population control happens one way or another. I think non-terrible people agree that population control by women having control of their fertility, bodies and lives is preferable to population control by the four horsemen of the apocalypse, which is pretty much the only alternative.
In a world where the dominant constraint on population growth is women's control of their bodies, the propensity of a society to deny women that choice will have a positive fitness, in the technical sense. Well, at least as long as patriarchal values can be passed on to the next generation. I guess what this means is that to have a decent future, it is not enough to simply "emancipate women" like this is some kind of irreversible process, or even a transition into another metastable state, but rather that we will have to fight the patriarchy forever, as it pops up in the human body politic like a metastatic cancer.
If humanity truly has an original sin, it was blaming Eve.
posted by [expletive deleted] at 7:41 AM on September 19, 2014 [14 favorites]
Population control happens one way or another. I think non-terrible people agree that population control by women having control of their fertility, bodies and lives is preferable to population control by the four horsemen of the apocalypse, which is pretty much the only alternative.
In a world where the dominant constraint on population growth is women's control of their bodies, the propensity of a society to deny women that choice will have a positive fitness, in the technical sense. Well, at least as long as patriarchal values can be passed on to the next generation. I guess what this means is that to have a decent future, it is not enough to simply "emancipate women" like this is some kind of irreversible process, or even a transition into another metastable state, but rather that we will have to fight the patriarchy forever, as it pops up in the human body politic like a metastatic cancer.
If humanity truly has an original sin, it was blaming Eve.
posted by [expletive deleted] at 7:41 AM on September 19, 2014 [14 favorites]
this will help for some folks
posted by Reasonably Everything Happens at 7:45 AM on September 19, 2014
posted by Reasonably Everything Happens at 7:45 AM on September 19, 2014
Sex may be a biological imperative, having children isn't.
The desire to have kids is most certainly (for some people) a raging, uncontrollable biological imperative. Leaving aside biology, kids in most of the world are also regarded as one's old-age security program. And help on the farm. So the best way to reduce the world's population is to improve standards of living.
As I've said in many, many other threads, population growth in the poorest countries is not really going to affect the global environment all that much. All of the damage that has been done so far has been done by a minority of the world's population - the richest 20% or so.
The biggest problem is a global population of 11B is quality of life for those people.
posted by Nevin at 7:57 AM on September 19, 2014 [2 favorites]
The desire to have kids is most certainly (for some people) a raging, uncontrollable biological imperative. Leaving aside biology, kids in most of the world are also regarded as one's old-age security program. And help on the farm. So the best way to reduce the world's population is to improve standards of living.
As I've said in many, many other threads, population growth in the poorest countries is not really going to affect the global environment all that much. All of the damage that has been done so far has been done by a minority of the world's population - the richest 20% or so.
The biggest problem is a global population of 11B is quality of life for those people.
posted by Nevin at 7:57 AM on September 19, 2014 [2 favorites]
Which kind of makes it sound like the "another problem" is that the human species will somehow become diminished by the greater emancipation of women, but I'm hoping I am badly misinterpreting him.
Well yeah, once the cannibalistic armies of the totalitarian theocratic gynocracy are in place things will get a little rough for the huMAN species but it'll sort itself out i'm sure.
posted by poffin boffin at 8:52 AM on September 19, 2014
Well yeah, once the cannibalistic armies of the totalitarian theocratic gynocracy are in place things will get a little rough for the huMAN species but it'll sort itself out i'm sure.
posted by poffin boffin at 8:52 AM on September 19, 2014
Thanks for coming back and clarifying, roystngr, sorry for the misunderstanding.
posted by kagredon at 9:10 AM on September 19, 2014 [1 favorite]
posted by kagredon at 9:10 AM on September 19, 2014 [1 favorite]
Metafilter: next thing you know you're a eugenicist spouting pseudomath
posted by jfuller at 9:21 AM on September 19, 2014 [1 favorite]
posted by jfuller at 9:21 AM on September 19, 2014 [1 favorite]
I see someone else has already mentioned Hans Rosling, but he has a video here, Don't Panic, where he forecasts population growth. Disclaimer: I haven't watched it all myself but friends who have say it paints a slightly less gloomy picture (at least of the actual numbers, if not the problems it will cause).
posted by kumonoi at 9:25 AM on September 19, 2014
posted by kumonoi at 9:25 AM on September 19, 2014
If humanity truly has an original sin, it was blaming Eve.
QFMFT. If I actually went to atheist conventions -- Russell's Teapot forbid -- I would wear that on a goddamn t-shirt.
posted by George_Spiggott at 9:49 AM on September 19, 2014 [2 favorites]
QFMFT. If I actually went to atheist conventions -- Russell's Teapot forbid -- I would wear that on a goddamn t-shirt.
posted by George_Spiggott at 9:49 AM on September 19, 2014 [2 favorites]
HUMAN POPULATION NUMBERS AS A FUNCTION OF FOOD SUPPLY
by Russell Hopfenberg and David Pimentel
posted by Golden Eternity at 9:49 AM on September 19, 2014
by Russell Hopfenberg and David Pimentel
Abstract:It seems to me when you consider limited resources that are being consumed at an exponentially increasing rate ( water aquifers, fossil fuels, etc. ), the mass extinctions we are witnessing which may indicate more severe ecological damage, global warming, and that quality of life and energy consumption is generally increasing globally, it doesn't make a lot of sense to have a population of 11B humans. Maybe technology will be able to address the resource problems and population will come down eventually before the shit hits the fan in a few centuries or whatever.
Human population growth has typically been seen as the primary causative factor of other ecologically destructive phenomena. Current human disease epidemics are explored as a function of population size. That human population growth is itself a phenomenon with clearly identifiable ecological/biological causes has been overlooked. Here, human population growth is discussed as being subject to the same dynamic processes as the population growth of other species. Contrary to the widely held belief that food production must be increased to feed the growing population, experimental and correlational data indicate that human population growth varies as a function of food availability. By increasing food production for humans, at the expense of other species, the biologically determined effect has been, and continues to be, an increase in the human population. Understanding the relationship between food increases and population increases is proposed as a necessary first step in addressing this global problem. Resistance to this perspective is briefly discussed in terms of cultural bias in science.
posted by Golden Eternity at 9:49 AM on September 19, 2014
I think I understand roystgnr's point here.That seemed like an excellent restatement, yes. I apologize for my original terseness and ambiguity; I was working late last night, and didn't think I had time for more than a quick link and brief comment.
posted by roystgnr at 10:07 AM on September 19, 2014
A genie gives you a choice: 100 years in the past or 100 years in the future. Which do you choose?
Let's see...
1914 - PROS?:
-Global Population 1.8 billion
-Ozone Hole: practically nonexistant
2014 - PROS?:
-We stare at tiny handheld screens instead of the world around us. Why is this a pro? because it makes it easier to overlook the fact that we lose between 35-100 other species EVERY DAY.
-Ke$ha
Ke$ha makes it close, especially with that whole WW1 thing, but I gotta go with 100 years in the past. At least back then we were mostly killing each other instead of the planet.
posted by Perko at 10:08 AM on September 19, 2014
Let's see...
1914 - PROS?:
-Global Population 1.8 billion
-Ozone Hole: practically nonexistant
2014 - PROS?:
-We stare at tiny handheld screens instead of the world around us. Why is this a pro? because it makes it easier to overlook the fact that we lose between 35-100 other species EVERY DAY.
-Ke$ha
Ke$ha makes it close, especially with that whole WW1 thing, but I gotta go with 100 years in the past. At least back then we were mostly killing each other instead of the planet.
posted by Perko at 10:08 AM on September 19, 2014
Well, Golden Eternity, the parts of the world with the fastest growing populations aren't responsible for the bulk of the increases in resource consumption, so the relationship between population growth and resource use isn't as direct as people expect intuitively. The populations that are contributing most to increased natural resource consumption aren't the populations that are growing fastest, but the ones that are growing more slowly, have stabilized, or are in decline, so we need to tackle the consumption problem as a distinct matter from the population growth one. The biggest factor in environmental degradation within a human population is the kind of technological infrastructure the population depends on for its economic activity (cite).
posted by saulgoodman at 10:17 AM on September 19, 2014
posted by saulgoodman at 10:17 AM on September 19, 2014
All it takes is about 1/2 a child difference, on average, for the world to get to 15 billion vs. 9 billion by 2100. 1/2 a child isn't much, the differerence between 2.0 and 2.5. Even if all the developed countries had below replacement, a few big countries could bring the global average up by that extra half a child.
posted by stbalbach at 10:22 AM on September 19, 2014
posted by stbalbach at 10:22 AM on September 19, 2014
"Developing nations as a group now have 80% of the world’s people and contribute 97% of population growth."
These are the poor countries where the population is growing. They account for 97% of the overall growth in human population, but do not contribute as much to increasing rates of resource depletion as the richer populations who are stable or declining.
In the United States and other richer countries, the populations have been growing more slowly, stabilizing, or declining, while over the same period we've continued to increase our use of resources at a faster rate than in those poorer countries where population is increasing more rapidly.
The ten richest countries are responsible for five times as much resource consumption as the rest of the world combined.
The most pressing environmental problem is not population growth, it's the specific technologies that the richer countries use and depend on for their economic well being.
posted by saulgoodman at 10:33 AM on September 19, 2014 [3 favorites]
These are the poor countries where the population is growing. They account for 97% of the overall growth in human population, but do not contribute as much to increasing rates of resource depletion as the richer populations who are stable or declining.
In the United States and other richer countries, the populations have been growing more slowly, stabilizing, or declining, while over the same period we've continued to increase our use of resources at a faster rate than in those poorer countries where population is increasing more rapidly.
The ten richest countries are responsible for five times as much resource consumption as the rest of the world combined.
The most pressing environmental problem is not population growth, it's the specific technologies that the richer countries use and depend on for their economic well being.
posted by saulgoodman at 10:33 AM on September 19, 2014 [3 favorites]
Maybe technology will be able to address the resource problems and population will come down eventually before the shit hits the fan in a few centuries or whatever.
It's made out of people!
(I've always thought that it was kind of unfair that people fixed on one silly-sounding line in what is actually a quite thoughtful movie with a sharp vision of what the end result of unchecked environmental pillaging and class stratification would look like. The horror isn't really that Soylent Green is people; the horror is that Soylent Green was made to cover up that even plankton is going extinct and the rich are literally going to start cannibalizing the poor, rather than just figuratively. Oh well.)
posted by kagredon at 10:52 AM on September 19, 2014 [11 favorites]
It's made out of people!
(I've always thought that it was kind of unfair that people fixed on one silly-sounding line in what is actually a quite thoughtful movie with a sharp vision of what the end result of unchecked environmental pillaging and class stratification would look like. The horror isn't really that Soylent Green is people; the horror is that Soylent Green was made to cover up that even plankton is going extinct and the rich are literally going to start cannibalizing the poor, rather than just figuratively. Oh well.)
posted by kagredon at 10:52 AM on September 19, 2014 [11 favorites]
Well-formulated, Kagredon. The notion to me that technology will always be able to bail us out is to me the height of civilizational hubris, and WAY more fallacy-ridden than Malthusian thought; it's essentially a modern day Myth of Icarus wrought on a global scale. Even if technology could always bail us out, we end up with levels of abstraction that any objective observer would find unacceptable. Who are we to think that our designs can improve upon or otherwise augment nature without a host of side-effects? We might not be eating people any time soon, but we'll be eating their genes before you know it.
posted by Perko at 11:08 AM on September 19, 2014 [2 favorites]
posted by Perko at 11:08 AM on September 19, 2014 [2 favorites]
> it's the specific technologies that the richer countries use and depend on for their economic well being.
So getting population growth in all countries to level off the only obvious humane way, by making all countries into richer countries, may have some unintended side effects?
Related, for folks who like to say the US is turning into a third world country, how close can it come to actually turning into a third world country before our own population starts to shoot up third-world-style?
posted by jfuller at 11:34 AM on September 19, 2014
So getting population growth in all countries to level off the only obvious humane way, by making all countries into richer countries, may have some unintended side effects?
Related, for folks who like to say the US is turning into a third world country, how close can it come to actually turning into a third world country before our own population starts to shoot up third-world-style?
posted by jfuller at 11:34 AM on September 19, 2014
Saulgoodman, although resource consumption is much higher in developed areas with low population growth, resource consumption *growth* is much higher in the developing areas with high population growth. Resource consumption may eventually level off along with population, but it seems to me this will happen at a level that is much higher than would be prudent. It is interesting that consumption in Africa is insignificant in most of the food and energy forecasts I'm looking at. If Africa develops economically, perhaps it could add to them significantly. Thirty years ago I doubt anyone would have predicted the amount of growth and wealth accumulation in China.
World Coal Production 2010-2040
Facts on Animal Farming and the Environment
posted by Golden Eternity at 11:41 AM on September 19, 2014 [1 favorite]
World Coal Production 2010-2040
China alone contributed 88 percent of the growth in world coal consumption from 2001 to 2009, which led to a significant increase in coal's share of world total energy consumption, from 24 percent in 2001 to 29 percent in 2009.World Meat Production 1961-2012
Since 1995, however, per capita meat consumption has increased by 15 percent overall—but consumption in developing countries increased by 25 percent during this time, while in industrial countries it increased by just 2 percent.7 The rise in consumption was not universal among developing countries; per capita meat consumption in Niger and many other low-income countries remains low.8Farming Claims Almost Half Earth's Land, New Maps Show (2005)
Facts on Animal Farming and the Environment
posted by Golden Eternity at 11:41 AM on September 19, 2014 [1 favorite]
"Developing nations as a group now have 80% of the world’s people and contribute 97% of population growth."
Well, we've been talking about development as a solution to these problems since early in the 20th C. Instead, the industrialized North has been practicing colonial capitalism, so that while poor countries continue to be stripped of resources for corporate profit little progress is being made towards democratization and stable government. I don't know if it's cynical to think that instability contributes to the problem because it makes resource extraction easier for multinational corporations, but I'm sure it's not out of the question.
As poor countries become relatively poorer due to increasing population, structural incapacities, and environmental degradation it's all too easy to say, "Man, if they'd only use birth control they'd be a lot better off."
Meanwhile, the Canadian government - traditionally a supporter of international development - is cutting development funding:
posted by sneebler at 11:41 AM on September 19, 2014 [1 favorite]
Well, we've been talking about development as a solution to these problems since early in the 20th C. Instead, the industrialized North has been practicing colonial capitalism, so that while poor countries continue to be stripped of resources for corporate profit little progress is being made towards democratization and stable government. I don't know if it's cynical to think that instability contributes to the problem because it makes resource extraction easier for multinational corporations, but I'm sure it's not out of the question.
As poor countries become relatively poorer due to increasing population, structural incapacities, and environmental degradation it's all too easy to say, "Man, if they'd only use birth control they'd be a lot better off."
Meanwhile, the Canadian government - traditionally a supporter of international development - is cutting development funding:
At the end of the 2012-2013 fiscal year, CIDA [the Canadian International Development Agency] had lapsed approximately $800 million in spending. Traditionally, departments who lapse funds approved by Parliament are considered blunderers. But this was no blunder. It was clearly done by design, at the top.(Harper Plays Clever With Foreign Aid)
The agency effectively took the money away from the world's unfortunate and handed it back to Finance Minister Jim Flaherty, who is busily working toward the government's promise to reduce Canada's annual budget deficit to zero by election time. After that open budget cut of 7.5 percent, the government sneaked behind the curtains and chopped the agency's disbursements by another 20 percent.
posted by sneebler at 11:41 AM on September 19, 2014 [1 favorite]
No one has any real incentive to stop this because of the economic system currently favored all over the world-- it's a pyramid scheme that depends on an ever-increasing number of people at the bottom to prop up those at the top.
Not to worry. Soon robots will form the bottom 2/3 of the pyramid (and give the top 1/3 safety from pitchforks, torches, and guillotines), and without a guaranteed basic income, the now redundant masses will simply die off. Problem solved.
posted by Thoughtcrime at 11:51 AM on September 19, 2014 [2 favorites]
Not to worry. Soon robots will form the bottom 2/3 of the pyramid (and give the top 1/3 safety from pitchforks, torches, and guillotines), and without a guaranteed basic income, the now redundant masses will simply die off. Problem solved.
posted by Thoughtcrime at 11:51 AM on September 19, 2014 [2 favorites]
This is an amazingly pessimistic thread. The only documented improvments in the last 100 years are Ke$ha and iPhones and the sole reason for birth control seems to be prevention of cannibalism.
posted by mikewebkist at 12:33 PM on September 19, 2014 [2 favorites]
posted by mikewebkist at 12:33 PM on September 19, 2014 [2 favorites]
A genie gives you a choice: 100 years in the past or 100 years in the future. Which do you choose?
My initial thought was "Go away genie, you can't fool me. Right now is the best time to be alive, it's the apogee of human progress and prosperity accurate to within a hundred years." Although it may be only a local maximum. A thousand years in the future might be more tempting.
But now I'm reconsidering. 100 years in the past, although it may be a slightly inconvenient date due to the war, I could get rich on the stock market, invent the transistor 20 years early, meet the Wright brothers, and maybe live to have a decent shot at preventing the second World War. So that might be fun. Either way, Ke$ha does not factor into it.
posted by sfenders at 1:23 PM on September 19, 2014
My initial thought was "Go away genie, you can't fool me. Right now is the best time to be alive, it's the apogee of human progress and prosperity accurate to within a hundred years." Although it may be only a local maximum. A thousand years in the future might be more tempting.
But now I'm reconsidering. 100 years in the past, although it may be a slightly inconvenient date due to the war, I could get rich on the stock market, invent the transistor 20 years early, meet the Wright brothers, and maybe live to have a decent shot at preventing the second World War. So that might be fun. Either way, Ke$ha does not factor into it.
posted by sfenders at 1:23 PM on September 19, 2014
This is an amazingly pessimistic thread.
Huh. I thought it was amazingly optimistic compared to some of the global warming threads from a while back. It was odd to me that no one would consider population as a significant factor in global warming, but many would generally just concede that it was already game over. And in a thread about population global warming rarely comes up, even though in global warming threads the apocalypse is already a certainty. I think there is psychological resistance to thinking about population scientifically - for very good reasons.
The bigger problem than human's inability to understand the exponential function or whatever is our inability to consider our long term future. We only seem to care about what is going to happen in our personal lives or soon after unless we talking about science fiction. Modern humans have been on the planet for what 50k years? Yet with the level of population growth over the last few hundred years coupled with the industrial revolution we may be about to use up vast majority of planetary resources necessary for our survival in just a few centuries. That doesn't seem to be very smart, even if there is some reason to speculate that technology will be able to overcome resource limitations.
posted by Golden Eternity at 1:27 PM on September 19, 2014 [4 favorites]
Huh. I thought it was amazingly optimistic compared to some of the global warming threads from a while back. It was odd to me that no one would consider population as a significant factor in global warming, but many would generally just concede that it was already game over. And in a thread about population global warming rarely comes up, even though in global warming threads the apocalypse is already a certainty. I think there is psychological resistance to thinking about population scientifically - for very good reasons.
The bigger problem than human's inability to understand the exponential function or whatever is our inability to consider our long term future. We only seem to care about what is going to happen in our personal lives or soon after unless we talking about science fiction. Modern humans have been on the planet for what 50k years? Yet with the level of population growth over the last few hundred years coupled with the industrial revolution we may be about to use up vast majority of planetary resources necessary for our survival in just a few centuries. That doesn't seem to be very smart, even if there is some reason to speculate that technology will be able to overcome resource limitations.
posted by Golden Eternity at 1:27 PM on September 19, 2014 [4 favorites]
A genie gives you a choice: 100 years in the past or 100 years in the future. Which do you choose?
Do I get to be a white upper class male?
posted by Golden Eternity at 1:28 PM on September 19, 2014 [7 favorites]
Do I get to be a white upper class male?
posted by Golden Eternity at 1:28 PM on September 19, 2014 [7 favorites]
...even if there is some reason to speculate that technology will be able to overcome resource limitations.
And just to prove we're not all pessimists, people can refer back to Bartlett's Arithmetic, Population and Energy talk:
And just to prove we're not all pessimists, people can refer back to Bartlett's Arithmetic, Population and Energy talk:
We must educate people to see the need to examine carefully the allegations of the technological optimists who assure us that science and technology will always be able to solve all of our problems of population growth, food, energy, and resources.posted by sneebler at 2:26 PM on September 19, 2014
Chief amongst these optimists was the late Dr Julian Simon, formerly professor of economics and business administration at the University of Illinois, and later at the University of Maryland. With regard to copper, Simon has written that we will never run out of copper because “copper can be made from other metals.” The letters to the editor jumped all over him, told him about chemistry. He just brushed it off: “Don’t worry,” he said, “if it’s ever important, we can make copper out of other metals.”
This is an amazingly pessimistic thread. The only documented improvments in the last 100 years are Ke$ha and iPhones and the sole reason for birth control seems to be prevention of cannibalism.
Is this pessimism at work, or the heuristic that for every problem we purport to solve, we often end up creating a host of new ones thanks to negative feedback loops?
I'd welcome a list of technological improvements that have been made for the benefit of all or even most of our increasingly growing global population, without any tangible side effects. Feel free to start with the invention of the light bulb, which robs us of 3 hours of sleep a night, bless its heart.
Progress is a myth like any other. It's just because it's the central myth of society, that so few think of it that way. May 10 billion people prove me wrong before there's 20.
posted by Perko at 2:48 PM on September 19, 2014 [1 favorite]
Is this pessimism at work, or the heuristic that for every problem we purport to solve, we often end up creating a host of new ones thanks to negative feedback loops?
I'd welcome a list of technological improvements that have been made for the benefit of all or even most of our increasingly growing global population, without any tangible side effects. Feel free to start with the invention of the light bulb, which robs us of 3 hours of sleep a night, bless its heart.
Progress is a myth like any other. It's just because it's the central myth of society, that so few think of it that way. May 10 billion people prove me wrong before there's 20.
posted by Perko at 2:48 PM on September 19, 2014 [1 favorite]
The one thing I retained from high school biology is that when an organism faces an inhospitable environment, it can only Move, Adapt, or Die. When we start bumping against the carrying capacity of the planet, we'll either die off, move to space, or invent alternatives to natural systems (which could be used to live in space, anyway).
posted by heathkit at 4:07 PM on September 19, 2014
posted by heathkit at 4:07 PM on September 19, 2014
Maybe. If we could slow things down though, which granted we can not, it would give us more time in case "alternatives to natural systems" don't work out too well. It just seems that, if "we" had a choice, a population of 1B or maybe less would probably be safer for the species as a whole.
posted by Golden Eternity at 4:43 PM on September 19, 2014
posted by Golden Eternity at 4:43 PM on September 19, 2014
It's not hopeless by any means. There are technologies and social policies existing right now that can tackle these problems. Maybe there's no one perfect solution, but there's more than enough out there to make a solid beginning, and we can figure out the rest as we go along.
The real problem is that we need to start working together on a global scale to change the future that's coming into something more desirable. We do this on the level of individuals and families all the time (by buying insurance, putting kids through school, going on diets, getting better jobs, and so on), but somehow this simple process of working to control our own destiny becomes much harder when more people are involved. We need to work on applying reason to large scale group dynamics instead of just falling back on self or national interest.
posted by Kevin Street at 6:11 PM on September 19, 2014 [2 favorites]
The real problem is that we need to start working together on a global scale to change the future that's coming into something more desirable. We do this on the level of individuals and families all the time (by buying insurance, putting kids through school, going on diets, getting better jobs, and so on), but somehow this simple process of working to control our own destiny becomes much harder when more people are involved. We need to work on applying reason to large scale group dynamics instead of just falling back on self or national interest.
posted by Kevin Street at 6:11 PM on September 19, 2014 [2 favorites]
We need to work on applying reason to large scale group dynamics instead of just falling back on self or national interest.
Good luck with that, when something as basic as the UN Convention Of The Rights Of The Child has been signed on to by every member of the United Nations...
... except the United States of America and Somalia.
There is no interest in global cooperation. There isn't now, and there likely won't be in any foreseeable future. It's a nice dream, but it won't happen. If the US isn't going to join that convention or the International Criminal Court, there is no reason for the rest of the planet to join in on anything that has actual meaning.
posted by hippybear at 7:19 PM on September 19, 2014
Good luck with that, when something as basic as the UN Convention Of The Rights Of The Child has been signed on to by every member of the United Nations...
... except the United States of America and Somalia.
There is no interest in global cooperation. There isn't now, and there likely won't be in any foreseeable future. It's a nice dream, but it won't happen. If the US isn't going to join that convention or the International Criminal Court, there is no reason for the rest of the planet to join in on anything that has actual meaning.
posted by hippybear at 7:19 PM on September 19, 2014
and you think that traffic is bad NOW....
posted by a humble nudibranch at 1:45 AM on September 20, 2014
posted by a humble nudibranch at 1:45 AM on September 20, 2014
Noam Chomsky: The End of History?
The era of civilization coincides closely with the geological epoch of the Holocene, beginning over 11,000 years ago. The previous Pleistocene epoch lasted 2.5 million years. Scientists now suggest that a new epoch began about 250 years ago, the Anthropocene, the period when human activity has had a dramatic impact on the physical world. The rate of change of geological epochs is hard to ignore.Over Half of Earth’s Wildlife Has Been Killed in the Past 40 Years
One index of human impact is the extinction of species, now estimated to be at about the same rate as it was 65 million years ago when an asteroid hit the Earth. That is the presumed cause for the ending of the age of the dinosaurs, which opened the way for small mammals to proliferate, and ultimately modern humans. Today, it is humans who are the asteroid, condemning much of life to extinction.
Animals living in freshwater environments have been hit hardest — declining 76 percent. Marine and terrestrial populations fell 39 percent. The biggest declines occurred in South America and the Asia-Pacific region.posted by Golden Eternity at 8:08 PM on September 30, 2014 [1 favorite]
"What I thought was striking about the report was they did excellent and groundbreaking research to document the population trends of thousands of species," Kieran Suckling, executive director for the Center for Biological Diversity (CBD), told VICE News. "The results were very frightening."
Industrial and agricultural practices that pollute the atmosphere and oceans, as well as growing demands on freshwater supplies are unsustainable, says WWF, and could trigger catastrophic changes to ecosystems and the climate.
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...Right?
=(
posted by curious nu at 7:45 PM on September 18, 2014 [6 favorites]