When people argue overpopulation is a myth, their arguments typically revolve around the amount of “open” space on earth not yet occupied by humans.
“Ever flown across the country and seen all the vacant land between New York and California?” or “Did you know every single person on Earth could fit into the State of Texas?” they say.
What they fail to mention is it takes a lot more land than one’s body or house stands on to sustain a human life. Just because we can cram a few billion more human bodies here, and few billion more there, doesn’t mean there is enough fertile farmland or clean water to sustain all those people.
According to the Global Footprint Network, if every person on the planet were to enjoy the standard of living of the average European – who consumes about half as much as the average American – the Earth could sustainably support about 2 billion people, at most.
If all 7.5 billion people on Earth were to enjoy the standard of living of the average American, we would need five Earths.
So the question we should be asking is not “how many human beings we can cram onto the planet?” but “what quality of life do we want the average human to enjoy?”
Once we determine that, we can determine the ideal population and how many babies we should be having, on average. There are several factors humanity needs to ponder in determining this number:
1. Fossil Fuel Can’t Be Part of the Equation
Fossil fuel has already caused us to overshoot Earth’s carrying capacity for humans, and we are already on track for a massive human die-off when the oil runs out.
It’s important to start with an understanding that the human population never would’ve gotten this big without fossil fuel.
The “Green” Revolution of the 1960s and 70s – in which scientists learned how to fertilize the globe’s depleted topsoil with petroleum – is credited with saving at least a billion people from starvation. But what it hasn’t gotten enough “credit” for is creating 4 billion more mouths to feed.
Just as the baby boomer generation entered adulthood, scientists launched a modern agricultural revolution, powered by synthetic fertilizers, pesticides and new high-yield varieties of cereal grains.
So instead of a global population of about 3.5 billion in 1968 dropping back down to a pre-WWII level of 2.5 billion, we enabled the population to double to 7 billion by 2012, and are now expected to hit 10 billion by 2050.
This has been the history of agriculture since it began. Agriculture creates a false sense of food security because of temporary surpluses. So people have more babies. But when the soil has been been stripped after a few hundred years, farmers, and kings, move on to new land, pushing aside anyone with smaller weapons who stands in their way.
Today, instead of warring for new farmland, we just go to war for more petroleum to pump minerals back into our depleted soil.
But most scientists agree oil production has already peaked and is now declining. So haven’t we only delayed and worsened the inevitable catastrophe when the oil finally runs out?
2. Quantity vs. Quality
It takes longer for Americans to feel the effects of global overpopulation, as each of us, on average, consumes 32 times more resources than the average Kenyan. But if we’d take the blinders off, we’d see that the vast majority of the human species already lives in abject poverty.
In non-European countries around the world, people are starving, working in factories like slaves, and living in squalor in crowded, filthy slums.
In Europe and America, the middle class is working harder and harder each year to keep a roof over their heads in a safe part of town. Most of us can’t afford real food and live with cancer, diabetes and heart disease because of it.
We can tell everyone to consume less, but how much less do we want to consume? And how much space do we want?
“Middle class living standards in the US peaked some time ago,” says The Platonist in an article titled – What is the Ideal Population of the Earth?
“The average house now contains much less land than it did in the 70s, when the average person could still reasonably expect to have a whole 1/3 acre of their own (this should be the minimum size for suburban lots, to ensure enough space between the houses, visually, and for the children of the place to run in and feel free from built-up areas). But compare this to the 1700s, when every American could have 100 acres for the taking!”
Additionally, the American lifestyle requires a lot more than the land we build fences around.
The average American requires approximately 22 acres of land (and a ton of slave labor) to produce the amount of food and resources he consumes. If all 7.5 billion of us used 22 acres worth of resources, we’d need 163 billion acres of productive land. Unfortunately, there are only 36 billion total on earth.
And of course, the only reason we can have such a luxurious lifestyle from so few acres is because of industrial agriculture. When the oil runs out, industrial agriculture is going to disappear. People are going to have to return to more primitive modes of farming and spend a lot more hours producing their own food (or learn permaculture.)
Unless, of course, we want to return to the ways of hunter-gatherers, who enjoy much more leisure time than agriculturalists and consume far less energy per capita than any type of human being ever. Hunter-gatherer population densities rarely exceeded one person per 10 square miles.
3. How many can we destroy before we destroy ourselves?
Every time we build a new city, suburb or farm for humans, we are shrinking the amount of space for bison, bears, deer, lions, rhinos, elephants, giraffes, zebra, non-human apes, rabbits, squirrels, fish, insects, trees, grasses, bacteria. You may not particularly care about any of those species, but the species at the top of the food chain are utterly dependent on those below.
Because of our interdependence, the extinction of one species can create a domino effect, wiping out dozens of other species.
Earth is now losing species 1000 times faster than before modern humans evolved. According to environmental activist Lierre Keith, we will lose more species in the 65-year period between 1980 and 2045 than we have in the last 65 million years.
Some scientists are calling it the sixth great extinction crisis, akin to the one that wiped out the dinosaurs.
The Solution? Stop Having Kids
Ok, you can have one (or two if you convince your neighbor not to have one) until the population stabilizes:
So, why don’t we see big billboards advocating that we all have one child?
The economy, Stupid. Because corporations, and the global economy, are guaranteed to grow each year so long as population grows. If they aren’t growing, they’re dying, says The Platonist:
“More mouths means more consumers, more consumers means more bottom line, especially for the largest global firms … The gigantic companies like Coca-cola, McD’s, Dow, Bayer, Proctor & Gamble, etc, all depend on having more mouths to buy their products each year for their continued economic growth.”
“To witness firsthand how highly pro-population growth the economics field is, one need only turn to The Economist, where one continually sees editorials on how countries with low projected population growth rates are decried as economic minefields, while places with high population growth are declared to be economic Nirvana, even if, as in Eastern Europe, these places’ spiralling population is leading to a drastic reduction of living conditions and well-being for the average person. Generally, economists aren’t in the business of caring about quality of life per capita.”
So now, we’ve come to a rock and a hard spot – do we allow the economy to suffer or continue to kill the planet that feeds us? I opt for the first.
RELATED: Earth is Overpopulated, And No, We Cannot All Live in the State of Texas
RELATED: Agriculture: “The Worst Mistake in the History of the Human Race”
RELATED: Civilization is Inherently Unsustainable
Comments
86 responses to “‘Ideal Global Population Under 2 Billion,’ Sustainability Experts Say”
If you want to give a Malthusian outlook at least give him credit.
The only vaguely interesting thing you have to say begins to critique Boserup but the thought is unfinished.
If you look at nations with low birth rates you will find that they are all advanced economies with excellent medical facilities. In the TEDx talk the education of women was referred to as being a crucial factor in lowering the birth rate but I suspect that this is a case of correlation not causation (I’m not against women’s education by any means though). My argument simply put is that if the child mortality and morbidity rate is low then people don’t reproduce so much as one of the key reasons that people reproduce is that you want someone to look after you when you are too old to look after yourself. The only problem with this is that it takes an around one and a half centuries for a nation (looking at western behaviours) to learn that the need for a large family has gone. This is exemplified in the population explosion of the 20th century when significant medical advances spread across Asia and Africa concurrently however this is when you see the population pyramids of Europe and North America taking on their roughly rectangular form signifying a roughly stable population that lives for a long time.
If you want to poo-poo and nip in the bud any talk regarding the fact that there actually can be a number of human beings which exceeds the capacity of the planet to allow for a harmonious, free living for all life-forms, then one trots out a word such as Malthusian so they appear intelligent but in fact they show the opposite.
The rest of your argument simply put is useless and leaving it up to chance. The fact is ‘from nothing, comes nothing’ and with that the problem remains.
http://au.figu.org/overpopulation_bomb.html
http://au.figu.org/destruction_environment.html
Both of your comments are irrelevant. Until someone with the fortitude to pull the trigger comes along and removes 90% of the population, by hook or by crook. Humanity is doomed. Most of the macro life on the land masses is doomed.
Or you know…think out of the box and realize that it is capitalism that is the problem, not “hurrr too many people”.
As always the article is ignorant and smoothly glosses over the REAL problem.
UNFAIR distribution of resources…NOT “too many people”.
Capitalism depends on endless population growth.
Excellent article.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hVimVzgtD6w
[…] RELATED: Stop Having Kids, We Already Have Six Billion Too Many […]
I’m sick of people who can’t afford kids haveing them, it only costs the rest of us money, seems only uneducated poor poeple are haveing them. If 4 out of 5 kids are living in poverty stop fucking haveing them , the world cannot sustain more people
Are you sure you’re educated? Its “having”, not “haveing”.
Are you sure you’re educated too Fatin? It’s ‘it’s ‘ not ‘ its ‘
Ahh yes the grammar Nazi appears. Ever hear of typos or auto correct messing things up? Yep because I’m sure you’re freaking perfect. Jackass!
lol
but he is right
If you’re going to criticize poor, uneducated folks, then you should at least exemplify your stance by using proper grammar, spelling, and punctuation.
What an absolute goitre!
I can not believe you have put uneducated people are the ones having children! I work and my husband works full time, We work hard and pay for our children!! You need to get your facts right before shouting your mouth! Not everyone is uneducated as you say! Maybe some have children out of love.
And if you look into the fact of people dying and births, it may even its self out!
And I just want to point out, us uneducated lot can actually spell having the right way (it does not contain a ‘e’) so I guess you popped out a lot of children
We*
We* uneducated lot
Sheesh…
Oh, so a rich bi*ch like you know how to grow your own food eh?
I bet you also know how to sew/make your own clothes, fix the plumbing issue by yourself, build your own home?
Be respectful and thankful.
I would be thankful to have them, rather than to have you born to this world.
You should do your part to stop breeding to save the Earth
Blame the distribution of wealth. Don’t attack poor people, attack poverty. People that have the opportunity to obtain a higher education tend to put their career goals on top of their priority list. Having a family is secondary and only an option to these people once they gain financial stability. They usually have less time for a devoted relationship, which leads to them having less sex. Furthermore, they’re capable of having safer sex because they have luxuries like insurance that pays for birth control. Poor people don’t have access to better education, better paying jobs or better healthcare. All of this contributes to them having more children – even if they can’t afford to because they can’t afford abortions either. Poor people usually have little to no higher education – some never even get a high school diploma. They don’t even get a chance at college because of how our systems are set up. Sure, they can get a Pell grant once they qualify for one, but that will afford them the chance to go to a community college or technical school. What is that good for when most well-paying jobs require 5 years of work experience and a Bachelor’s degree? There are many factors contributing to poor people having more children than they can logically afford, but you seem to be quick to drop the blame squarely on them for factors outside their control.
This!
This!
I blame the people Kevin. They are too stupid to realize condoms are cheap and/or free around the world or they just act like selfish humans, as 5 seconds of pleasure is worthy of fucking everyone else on this planet over. Plus you are a guy. You seem to expect females pony up for the BC, lest it take anything away from YOU. Hypocrite. Someone was too stupid to get a scholarship to college I take it and whines about something irrelevant. No more stupid people breeding. I’ll pay for your sterilization.
It’s actually the rich people having kids who are the problem. One American child takes up the resources of nine Kenyan children.
When you don’t know how to spell “having” perhaps you yourself are one of the uneducated.
Just how do you propose to do that?
I have an idea: let’s tax rich people like you to provide free, easily accessible birth control, and easily accessible, FREE abortion on demand. Especially to poor and working-class women.
Colorado experimented with this scheme for a while with great success until the goddamned Christian fundies messed it up.
So, pony up.
Karen is right. stop having kids, stop fucking around. mistake is mistake. but so many.is not good for education, feeding, and living space. why to keep living suffocated the earth is to small to support more population one example India.
It’s you fucking dumb liberals that exploded the population of the world, and in places where the people are dumber than rocks with your cry about a kid covered with flies commercials. Don’t tell western people to not have kids. The problem is kids from stone age cultures.
I’m not one of your so called fucking liberals but you are a fucking moron. What the fuck does being a liberal have to do with overpopulation. If fucktards with your IQ weren’t allowed to reproduce the population would drop dramatically. It’s not the liberals it’s the duck sticks with jacked up pickups with trump bumper stickers dragging your 5 or 6 cross eyed to Walmart in your spandex that need to change.
People who think the human race is all about petty party politics are part of the problem if not THE problem. Thanks for making the author’s point abundantly clear, dumbass.
Actually, that’s not correct, for the US at least. 19% fertility gap between liberals and conservatives:
http://www.sfgate.com/opinion/article/Republicans-fertile-future-Through-the-past-2488626.php
If you’d read (and understood) the article, you’d realize that the problem IS western people. They might not have the same birthrate as third world countries, but they consume many times more resources. So either change how you live (flies optional), or reduce the birthrate. Or invent a hyperdrive so we can travel to a new planet that can be colonized in the next hundred years, because we’re going to need it.
Because it is liberals who are against abortion, birth-control, and any kind of sex education other than abstinence-only education . . .
Oh wait.
What an ignorant, bigoted person you are. I bet you’re fun at parties.
Those fly-covered kids use 32 times less resources than we rich Americans do. If our population was sized to match our resource use, the U.S. alone would be $18 bn. So, go ahead, call me a fuckin’ dumb liberal who apparently thinks a bit more thoroughly than you do.
We needn’t wait until the oil runs out. The whole point of civilization is ease and security and we breed up; the point not being a higher birthrate but the expectation that your children will live and prosper and that’s a proposition NO-ONE can refuse. Eventually there is no margin for error. A couple bad seasons and the Visigoths are marching on Rome. Just had one, my farm output cut in half. A continent wide failure anywhere now is the end of civilization like on the road with Cormac McCarthy. So keep pumping out pollution, burning coal and sucking out that oil and maybe you can jump in the car and drive out of trouble.
Be Fruitful and Multiply?
Christians and other religions believe they have a special responsibility to have children.
This is the main problem with our exploding population. If this will ever change then Religious Institutions need to be on board to educate their followers.
“Christian ideas about contraception come from church teachings rather than scripture, as the Bible has little to say about the subject. As a result, their teachings on birth control are often based on different Christian interpretations of the meaning of marriage, sex and the family.
Christian acceptance of contraception is relatively new; all churches disapproved of artificial contraception until the start of the 20th century.
In modern times different Christian churches hold different views about the rightness and wrongness of using birth control.
Liberal Protestant churches often teach that it is acceptable to use birth control, as long as it is not used to encourage or permit promiscuous behaviour.
Less liberal churches only approve the use of contraception for people who are married to each other.
Since these churches regard sex outside marriage as morally wrong (or if not wrong, as less than good), they believe that abstaining from sex would be morally better than having sex and using birth control.
More conservative churches suggest that contraception should be limited to married couples who are using it to regulate the size and spacing of their family. They often teach that using contraception to prevent children altogether is not desirable.”
BBC – Contraception
Last updated 2009-08-03
1 of every 3 people live in just two countries, India and China. That is more than quadruple any other country. That is more than any other continent combined.
What religion do most people China and India follow? Not Christianity to any degree of significance! Not even related Abrahamic faiths like Judaism or Islam!
If you care so much about this topic then it might be worth a little research. Of course, it might burst your little bubble of delusion, that Christian attitudes of birth control are the primary problem.
Ummm one of Jesus’ disciples went to India some years after Jesus died. I think you’ll find Christianity has been in India longer than most of the world.
Second line : “Christians and other religions”.
All @Gunther Allen said is true for almost all religions : their aim is to overwhelm the world, and the way they try to reach that goal is by encouraging large families …
In today’s world, that is totally irresponsible !
If we accept the point the article made about Americans using more resources per capita than almost any other people, and assume that America is more or less Christian, then yes, Christian attitudes toward birth control are a HUGE factor in overpopulation and overuse of resources. Even if we don’t have as many kids we still use all the stuff and things.
I grew up in a “conservative” Christian Church. Yes they taught abstinence, but at no point was I taught birth control was bad or that I should ” be fruitful and multiply”. Also, when I look at both my family members and friends the number with large families or small families are pretty much the wether they are liberal or conservative.
http://www.npg.org/wp-content/uploads/2013/07/effects_of_overpopulation_wildlife.pdf
As population grows at a record pace, the threat to wildlife and their natural habitats remains a grave concern.
At NPG, we recognize that the only way to truly protect our wildlife from further damage is to reduce overall
human population levels. Research on this topic reveals the following startling facts. Don’t be fooled by those telling you the overpopulation is a myth!
Birthrates organically reduce as standard of living increases. So, the problem is the people in power that are forcing most of the world to remain in 3rd world conditions and stay ignorant. The problem is psychopaths with bad intent that orchestrate catastrophic conditions, not normal families that have more than one child.
I completely agree with what you are saying, population is one of the biggest problems, but you are missing one big thing, this is not a matter of saying that or not, most of the world population has no access to internet, they work from day to night and they only have sex to get some kind of pleasure in their life and you can`t say to them: ok, you can`t get studies, you have a shitty job, you can even get a decent food, or go to the cinema, so, you quit to the only pleasure you have. This is an economic issue, that need the life of the poor and the most a little better with more access to education and a better quality of life, before you can blame the people without education to get pleasure from sex without any kind of preservative.
And is normal, I mean I am from Mexico, and in here one of the biggest problems is violence, and narco and corruption… ¡right? Noooup, the main trouble here as ben and always has been inequality, and poorness, that lead to all the other problems. We spend a lot of money on weapons, and military, but if we don`t fight against poor generation this will be an eternal waste of money and resources that never has an end.
My point this is a real issue that only is going to be eliminated if WE the people with education and some abilities fight against the economic way of things right now.
And in all fairness, the wealth inequality is not their fault. But it exists. And i mean wealth of knowledge as well as ‘money’. Be that as it is, it needs to stop now. Not 40 years from now but right now. The continuing damage needs an off switched flipped. Either by a massive devastating war, unlikely. Or organized depopulation using pathogens. For humanity to continue, it needs to give itself an enema. As inhuman as that sounds, its really the only logical choice.
Also don’t eat meat. Vegans use a lot less resources than meat eaters, and are healthier as well.
Sorry to pick nits here, but the video shows a brilliant speaker whose microphone didn’t amplify her voice enough. It looked (often) like she held the mic too far from her mouth. It’s also likely the mic settings were set too low for some combination of gain, volume, level, or loudness. Also consider the Malthusian belts in Huxley’s “Brave New World.” If I’m not mistaken, hasn’t Chine imposed a 1-child limit?
And let us be frank here having children is totally selfish. And subjecting others to your children is also selfish, especially for those of us who opted out.
I had a vasectomy when I was 18 and I totally agree. I don’t want to hear your baby cry, and I don’t want to see your kid’s pictures on Facebook, and I definitely am not going to congratulate you on your pregnancy.
Every new human assures the extinction of all life on Earth.
Some of the comments are so interesting to me. When you are old and in need of care, who will take care of you? Someone in a rest home? A brother, or sister? Some in home care? A nurse? Who will that be? Or will you just quietly die alone, quickly, without need of help?Quite possibly, someone’s child will help you. I have adopted children, who belong to a family member who became ill and could not care for them. The choice was foster care, for older kids, or a family member could adopt. Of course, you would not know if I”had” them, or “adopted” them, because I don’t carry a sign around announcing it. So in your eyes, I am selfish. In my eyes, you are judgmental. Many “parents” are not selfish.
“Who will take care of you when you are older?” is a bit of a red flag against your argument that selfishness is not the crux of the matter. Either way, to even expect that your children will do such a thing is wishful thinking at best; visit any elderly person and that fact becomes astonishingly clear.
And those children will grow up to a very harsh existence. What an awful thing to do to someone who didn’t agree to it.
That’s one way of looking at it. Someone who gets ill and dies can’t really ask if you agree to it, but when the police call and ask you if you will take your sister’s kids, well then, that’s a tough one isn’t it? And, though hard at first, I have learned lessons about love, compassion and life that being childless would have not allowed. I do know that before children, I was more self absorbed and selfish, how can you not be, right? Now I have a greater empathy, something that seems to be lacking on this discussion board.
No that is not true. Having children and not teaching them to be responsible citizens who contribute to the world in a positive way is selfish.
But, having children and loving them, and teaching them to become educated and to make a positive difference to the world is the opposite of selfish.
Deciding that you don’t want children because you want life the way you want it without any distractions, that is the definition of selfish.
And by the way, how did you get to be born in the first place?
Mike, that is what I think is so odd. Do people forget that they were children? And someone brought them into the world?
Well, I didn’t have a choice in the matter– if I had had a choice, I would not have chosen to be born.
There is a very dark anti-children sentiment in many of these alt groups lately. I personally think it’s just the joyless nature of childless people. Let them commit genetic suicide. Who cares?
Good article!
You could perhaps look at India and China as the population power houses, having almost a third of the world population. Apart from ignorance, poverty and economics of big multinational companies, the govts also do not support a child ban or 1 child policy (China recently relaxed 1 child policy) because they need hands to work. A good work force is what is keeping these highly populated countries going. It’s a vicious circle where a dramatic decrease in population will implode the country’s economic state, as the population grows older beyong working age.
So I feel the solution has to be driven during early years of education, not just to girls but also to boys. This will have an impact spread over half a century, easing into the culture and hopefully we will be able to save the planet.
[…] Stop Having Kids: We Already Have 6 Billion Too Many […]
This should be a load of nonsense. If Europe and the US just regulated immigration and maintained themselves at a reasonable lifestyle and learned to butt out of other countries’ affairs, all would be ok. But no the West will import the problem and then stir it up in the world through its ham fisted interference!
The basic point is nonsense by the way. We can clearly support the world population as is and there is no possible reason why we should support that population at European standards of living. The basic posit of the article is false.
Western mind is so blind to the root of the cause of over population. That is eating animals. The Western mind can’t see the reincarnation of the lifeforce in every being. The massive raising animals to be foods attract unaccountable lifeforce waiting to be born in this planet then get killed to be placed on the plate.
There is a law and the cycle of eating and to be eaten in the universe. The lifeforce from the killed animals in turn take the human body that is the real root of the over population
Who decides who gits to have kids then? And who WILL take care of you when your older? Other people’s children? Are children the problem? Maybe it is the collapse of the family and the lack of stewardship in our culture? Ps. being a good parent is one of the MOST selfLESS thing a person can do.
The operative word is “good” parent. Most parents are not suited for tbe job, as it requires patience, a degree of emotional stability, and a host of other skills which most people simply don’t possess.
Such people should not have children.
Dear Bear
In what world is working your whole adult life to feed and take care of people who depend on you selfish…
and sitting in shitty bachelor pad, smoking weed, discussing bullshit philosophies, playing video games, watching porn and jerking off isn’t.
you are an idiot.
This!
Because those selfish people you described above are not creating beings that will use up more of the planet’s limited resources–especially true if the beings are born in the United States.
We will never have to many trees, flowers, or wing turbines but we’ll have to many humans. The King ranch in south Texas sits on 825k acres. They have 35k cattle and 200+ horses grazing the land. Should they sell or give up their land for more people to lodge? My has property to but nowhere near as big as the King ranch. We utilize our land like the King Ranch though. I used to date a man from Spain and he mentioned that there are a few countries where the population is waning because not a lot of people are procreating much less adding to the next generation.
Some of y’all mention that Christian communities have been condoned to use contraceptives. Here’s the thing though. Muslim families generate between 5-8 kids. I don’t know what their stance on birth control is but a lot of them are migrating to the west and adding more to the population. That’s not to mention that China and India are the two most populated countries in the world b
It took around 200,000 years for the Earth’s population of modern homo sapiens to reach one-billion, at around 1803 CE. During my 70 years the Earth’s human population has tripled to 7.4-billion people. Those, who don’t see anything significant in this fact, must be living in a state of denial.
The vast majority of the world’s still growing population of 7.4-billion people are likely to reject my and similar comments in favor of blind positivism. Most people have strong vested interests in doing so. It’s become increasingly clear that many people reject evidence that doesn’t support their existing deeply entrenched worldview. For them, maintaining these views is far more important than the trashed future our offspring will likely be inheriting.
Graph of human population from 10,000 BCE – 2000 CE
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_overpopulation#/media/File:Population_curve.svg
David Suzuki speaks about overpopulation
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8x98KFcMJeo
How the world went from 170 million people to 7.3 billion, in one map
http://www.vox.com/2016/1/30/10872878/world-population-map
Bindi Irwin’s original (un-edited) essay regarding overpopulation
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lYbNbJG3-1k
Having Children Brings High Carbon Impact
http://green.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/08/07/having-children-brings-high-carbon-impact/?_r=0
it is selfish to have kids, but the alternative is to be gay or lesbian and live the rest of a depressive life. so if you’re like that just kill yourself in order to give room to people like me who like to have kids, and enjoy their education and their first laughs and so on…
Why is being gay the only alternative to having kids? Why not just use contraception?
This is why I only had one. I thought I was crazy for realizing the planet was this much over populated. Used to say a good 80% of humans need to die as a morbid joke. I was only 5% off the mark cause it’s actually 7.8 billion people, right at 8 billion, and that means it’s nearly 75% that mess to go. I’m glad to see more and more articles talking about this.
it’s a good article, and should serve as a wake-up call to those who weren’t already aware of its implications. if the human population continues along its destructive, greedy path then we are doomed. i’m voting GREEN!
No it’s not. it’s propaganda against the poor.
Very nice post. I just stumbled upon your blog and wished to say that I have really enjoyed surfing around your blog posts. In any case I will be subscribing to your feed and I hope you write again soon!
http://www.alternet.org/environment/why-capitalism-not-population-our-greatest-environmental-threat
http://www.nytimes.com/2013/09/14/opinion/overpopulation-is-not-the-problem.html?_r=0
http://climateandcapitalism.com/2009/05/30/population-control-10-reasons-why-its-the-wrong-answer/
Woefully ignorant article, bordering on propaganda against the poor.
[…] RELATED: Stop Having Kids, We Already Have Six Billion Too Many […]
It is sad that as smart as we may be as humans.The only way population will ever be even moderately put back in check. Will be either war or famine. Neither being a good option. All because of our strong wills and pride.
[…] Jake on Stop Having Kids: We Already Have 6 Billion Too Many […]
[…] RELATED: Stop Having Kids, We Already Have Six Billion Too Many […]
[…] Have fewer kids. Lierre Keith says the number one thing anyone can do to save the planet is not have kids. We wouldn’t be cutting down so many trees, to grow so many crops and to produce so much […]
…ridiculous post … fake propaganda topped by ignorance… can impress imbecile people only …
Life finds a way. Not going to regulate or converse your way out of it. Biochemically, you’re dumbed down and primed up when it comes breeding time anyways.
So life finds a way, but death doesn’t have to even search. Ever present. While we may not possess the social unity,mastery of individual will, or even the > than 10 second attention span required to examine the problem before the consequence of it ends you, you should not worry.
People aren’t listening. Man will get inventive. New tricks can be employed to stretch the system. Numbers will rise and rise. QOL perpetually down across the board (a few patches of clever and cruel well to doers).
At some point the system (Earth and what we share it with) will utterly break beyond any inventiveness man could muster. Massive human die off, along with many other species which is happening NOW. A small pocket of humans might survive. An Earth without an atmosphere may sun cook the whole place like Mars and even the cockroaches and fungal spores on a toads balls croak. Eventually though, it’s a rock, in a favorable distance for life as we know it, surrounded by belts of objects to have collide with it to start a chemical change. If it comes to us totally killing it, that was not a total kill. It was a killing spree and a suicide. The Earth is like the Universe. It’s the arena in which the insanity happened. Can’t kill that. It will be around to support better or worse forms of life beyond us. We are the frail ones here. We might get under the planets skin, but all we ever were and will be is skin deep. Ego might let you think your a demi god of some sort, 60 seconds without air is enough to make you start to open up and accept frailty in your reality vs your own bs. Pride cometh before the fall. Our modern culture is in for a leap off Everest (I have a golden pogo stick and my nike shoes have ultramax 999 shock absorbers I expect to survive and demi-god my way on, if not I will strive to die in the most regal of poses,history will always remember me, the crab people will whisper my legacy in caves)
https://youtu.be/oCdR4E0m7RU
What a bunch of bull shit! Their first argument is that we’ll “run out of fossil fuel”. BS. In 2016, new oil fields were found that will supply global demand for over 2 centuries ALONE. There is currently a GLUT of oil which is why prices are down. Secondly, the US produces enough food to feed the entire world. China produces enough rice to feed the whole world. The problem isn’t the amount of food, its the dictators who refuse to let their people access it. This is a tired and always disproven myth. The global elitists don’t want more people than they can control, that is the ONLY reason why “population control” exists.
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mother earth will hit us with an asteroid, tsunami, earthquake or something similar, wiping out a few billion and even out the balance, so why care
This opinion of someone I don’t know isn’t relevant
Keep the animals we need and get rid of the rest them well have plenty room
There’s loads of places left still uninhabited, why worry about something we can’t change.
Go educate the uneducated if you want but meanwhile nobody cares