Does it bother you at all that we are overpopulating the Earth?

[Farseer Lolotea]

And to the people saying there's plenty of space left for us to live, that's like dropping a cake and saying it's fine to eat because it's not totally covered in grit.

Pretty much. Whenever someone argues that the entire population of the world could fit into Texas, or something of the sort, quality of life never seems to factor into it at all.

So yeah, overpopulation is an issue. And people like this guy aren't helping.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lgXJbJeRxHo

...what the hell did I just watch?

 

[Con Carne]

I think Ebenezer Scrooge had the right idea. "decrease the surplus population"

 

[Pandabearparade]

We have an enormous amount of arable land that we haven't tapped yet, 'overpopulation' would only be a problem if for some reason no one realized that more people require more farmland for food.

 

[zerobudgetgamer]

oh also if you know anything about the demographic transition theorys you would know that as countries develop life expectincies increase, number of children needed by parents thus goes down as they know they will live and population declines this is already happening in Canada and Europe, our population is declining and thus their are a slew of problems that will occur as people live longer but their are less people working to take care of them and thus we need to increase imigration to compensate and............. its a complictaed problem but dont worry we are not overpopulating and the population will start to decline eventually.

Perhaps, but when? And by how drastically? The current global population is around 7 Billion. When I was in Middle/High School it was around 6 Billion. If you're saying that decades down the line, when we're all shriveled up and/or six feet under that the population will go from ~8 billion to ~7.7 Billion in the course of yet another decade, then that's neither soon enough nor enough people.

And to both the people crying "Space Travel" and "Eugenics," who the hell do you think is gonna get on those Space "Arks" to the new "Eden?" First will be anyone who can pay the $1 Billion ticket. Then will be people of vast political and cultural power/fame. Then, finally, if we're lucky, there will undoubtedly be tests held to select only the most physically and mentally capable of the race. And then you'd better damn well hope there'd be a "Rat Hole" entrance for everyone else.

To put it into some form of perspective, it's not going to be like WALL-E and everyone and their grandma leaves the planet on some extended vacation while all the happy little robots clean our mess for us, and more like Cowboy Bebop, where all the "good" people leave the planet and go colonize the rest of the galaxy, while those of us left here get to shuffle through the Himalayas-sized mountains of garbage left behind.

 

[elz_bellez]

Yes, it concerns me that we are overpopulating the earth, however, there are so many children in the world who need homes. I find it hard to justify having children myself while i know there are children suffering. What is more I know our existence has a detrimental effect on the planet itself.

Like Ashilba27 I hope that we can come to a place where people and the earth can survive in harmonic way. But i'm just a bit of a hippie.

 

[Hafnium]

Yes, but overpopulation is just advancing the ill effects of our clever, yet stupid, race.
I don't have high expectations for human-kind, but I hope for the best.

Personally I won't be having kids (though that's not due to overpopulation, I can't stand the bastards), and I'd urge couples to get 2 at the most, to hopefully stabilize population.

Edit: To the poster above.
Not cool man, reported.

 

[Troublesome Lagomorph]

Some countries are losing in population and others are gaining. After that, I figure its gonna flip.

And if you people are so worried, why NOT SUPPORT GENOCIDE? ISN'T IT HELPING THE PLANET?

 

[JaymesFogarty]

The Earth is perfectly capable to support a MUCH bigger population than now. That said, I personally think reproduction should be a privelege, not a right. You need a license to drive a car, but not to CREATE AND CARE FOR A SENTIENT BEING. That just doesn't sit right with me. Abortion shouldn't be legal; it should be compulsory. Unless you pass a test just as rigorious as the ones prospective adoptive parents have to pass.

That's one idea that I simultaneously agree, and disagree with. I definitely agree that there should be some kind of criteria put to people wanting to having children; not trusting someone with something as simple as a car without a license, but allowing procreation willy nilly just doesn't make sense to me. A test would seem a appropriate for prospective parents. But the real question is exactly how you would define what it takes to be a good parent. Even in the best intentions, so many things in life are subjective; how could you provide a fair parental role model for others to emulate and try to adopt characteristics from? Essentially, what is a good parent?

 

[icame]

At the moment the planet is more than capable of supporting everyone living on it, especially with advances in crop technology, the problem is that were just not distributing resources evenly.

If we want to look REALLY far ahead I'd personally prefer that every country who has the capacity to to accelerate their space programs, so that we can find a way of expanding beyond earth. As far off as it seems now the sooner we accept that it's what it's going to have to came to eventually (that or we do resort to a global one child policy to control population) then the sooner we will get there.

I think people need to realize we will never get off of earth, unless we can somehow make another planet habitable (such as mars), because there is no way in hell we will ever be able to get to another preexisting habitable planet. I think there was a story on here that some french scientists discovered a planet that is habitable, but 1. It was around 25 lightyears away 2. i think it had like 6 times earths gravity.

There is no way we could live in that level of gravity, and there is no way were going to create a way to move faster then light. Hell, if it is even possible to move faster then light, I would be surprised. The limit of a particle's movement, no matter what, is the speed of light (As far as I know), meaning that if we could somehow find a way, it would still take 25 years to get there.

 

[Christian Lerche]

Well, it'll resolve itself so to speak, child production rates are falling as we speak as far i've learned. But that might be irrelevant since people gets to live longer.

 

[wammnebu]

so do the noble thing and step aside

 

[The_Yeti]

Overpopulation concerns are a long way off, especially in modern countries where the birth rate is slowly declining. There's still a lot of room left on Earth.

Can we really trust Real Holographic Simulated Evil Lincoln on this matter...?

jk

OT: It wouldn't bother me at all, no interest in kids, quite frankly i'm immensely annoyed by the majority of morons around me so I wouldn't mind a good ol' less then painful deadly plague.

 

[AlexWinter]

The Earth is perfectly capable to support a MUCH bigger population than now. That said, I personally think reproduction should be a privelege, not a right. You need a license to drive a car, but not to CREATE AND CARE FOR A SENTIENT BEING. That just doesn't sit right with me. Abortion shouldn't be legal; it should be compulsory. Unless you pass a test just as rigorious as the ones prospective adoptive parents have to pass.

You make a good case. Until you get people that just stop using condoms and viruses spread like mother fuckers.

 

[Candidus]

The people who turn around and say "we can have as many people on the earth as we like" are more or less right, we probably could have fifteen billion people on the planet; but at what cost to the environment and to other species?

There are some people who say it'd be a great tragedy if that ten billionth couple couldn't squirt out five brats because of 'draconian conservation legislature'. I think that ten billionth couple should stick a sock in their mouths. And her vagina.

 

[Lady Nilstria]

I think most people aspire to have kids at some point in our life, but as innocent an aspiration it may be, its having a detrimental impact on the Earth and our living standards. Whether we like it or not, we are having more babies then dying, all the while trying to find ways to live longer, to have more kids...who is feeding all those children? I suppose our generation doesn't need to care that much because it isn't effecting us, but what about our grandchildren? We as the human race have destroyed quite a bit of what keeps us living, so I'm led to wonder at which point we will get so desperate to live that even the remainder of that is destroyed as well.

Anywho, how do you think we could go about resolving this issue and if your government initiated a single child policy tomorrow for example, would it bother you at all?

You are wrong. Demographically, humanity is dying faster than it is being replaced. In order to keep the population equal, not even bothering about expanding, but just equal, a couple has to have 2.13 children to replace them, known as Replacement Fertility, (2.13 because of child deaths). Any less than 2.13 decreases the population long term, any more increases it. 44% of the world is below Replacement Fertility. Birthrates have declined 50% since 1979.

The effects of this won't be immediately seen, but it will probably be seen first in Europe and Russian, since their birth rate is only 1.3 and 1.17 respectively. No European country reaches 2.1. Most developing nations are fine, and the USA is okay due to immigration.

Fewer people means fewer workers, less people to grow food and maintain what is already present. Global population of 2010 is 6.8 billion, with the working population* being about 63% of that, (4.2 billion). I don't know if you have ever farmed, but one person has much trouble maintaining the 1.8 acre global average, particularly if you have no machinery, which the majority of the world really doesn't. This number doesn't include people who don't go into food production. If you take that into account, the numbers look even worse, considering only 2% of the US population, (darn it's hard getting global numbers), works in the actual farm production industry, (not counting livestock because these numbers are bloody hard to find from a reputable source). Any fewer people and we won't have to worry about less food so much as not enough people to produce food in the first place. As said, we have plenty of land, just not enough people who will actually work it.

Maybe what we need is a shift of career choices. Fewer and fewer people are going into agricultural and agronomy. As another person said, it's not so much the production as the distribution. This is the problem Ethiopia has.

Given soil capability, the following is true. Ethiopia can feed all of Africa. The Ukraine can feed all of Europe, (why the Germans took all of their dirt). China can feed all of Russia and the Orient; India can practically do this too. The USA can feed all of North America. Argentina can feed all of South America and Australia. The capability is there. We are woefully inefficient, however.

Have you heard of how many schools in Europe are closing because there are no children? In Hungary, only 1 in 200 schools are still open. Teachers wonder why their wages are cut and schools close. No children. One-child policies, forced sterilization (Peru), divorce, cohabitation, abortions, all of this leads to a birthrate far below Replacement Fertility.

*Working age being defined as 15-64 years.

For the record, if the USA enforced a one-child-policy, that may be the one thing that would make me leave. Regulation helps nothing. The tighter the grip the government has, the worse things get. That is a historical fact.

I heard about this one conversation a man had with a woman on the radio. They were talking about farmer's subsidies and income. The woman called in and said, "We don't need more farmers subsidies." This after the man explained how difficult it was to make any profit farming. "How are you going to get your food if there are no farmers?" The man asked. Smugly, the woman replied. "I'll go down to HEB like everyone else."

It's that kind of ignorance and stupidity that has led to this problem. No one knows what goes into food anymore we've become so estranged from it and instead depend on the government like turkeys staring at the raining sky.

 

[Vault Citizen]

Abortion shouldn't be legal; it should be compulsory. Unless you pass a test just as rigorious as the ones prospective adoptive parents have to pass.

Thats just messed up. The parenting license thing is bad enough on its own, as so many things to do with parenting are subjective.

1) You are regulating someone's body
2) You are forcing them to undergo an operation which could have an affect on their longterm mental and physical well being.

Apart from in the extreme cases no one is truly able to set what a criteria would be and no one truly has a right to enforce it, especially since everyone makes a mistake as a parent and every parent will tell you they aren't ready at first.

 

[NinjaDeathSlap]

At the moment the planet is more than capable of supporting everyone living on it, especially with advances in crop technology, the problem is that were just not distributing resources evenly.

If we want to look REALLY far ahead I'd personally prefer that every country who has the capacity to to accelerate their space programs, so that we can find a way of expanding beyond earth. As far off as it seems now the sooner we accept that it's what it's going to have to came to eventually (that or we do resort to a global one child policy to control population) then the sooner we will get there.

I think people need to realize we will never get off of earth, unless we can somehow make another planet habitable (such as mars), because there is no way in hell we will ever be able to get to another preexisting habitable planet. I think there was a story on here that some french scientists discovered a planet that is habitable, but 1. It was around 25 lightyears away 2. i think it had like 6 times earths gravity.

There is no way we could live in that level of gravity, and there is no way were going to create a way to move faster then light. Hell, if it is even possible to move faster then light, I would be surprised. The limit of a particle's movement, no matter what, is the speed of light (As far as I know), meaning that if we could somehow find a way, it would still take 25 years to get there.

I think making closer planets habitable would be our best bet. I think I'm right in saying that Stephen Hawking, as well as other leading scientists, are exploring the avenue of perhaps building giant 'greenhouse cities' on Mars, that will be closed off from outside conditions and have their temperature and air supply internally regulated. It seems like a long shot, but if we can advance our space faring technology to the point where transit between Earth and Mars can become routine, then it is theoretically possible.

The only other alternative is to wait until we suffocate ourselves on Earth under the weight of our own overpopulation, war, starvation, diseases of affluence and jealous hogging of resources. What would you have us do, give up?

 

[pulse2]

Snip

I agree that this is apparent for those developing or developed countries, but we can't deny that elsewhere it is growing, most if not all scienfic global population stats point to that.

It doesn't have to be us doing the populating, we live in developed countries, so while we technically are more stable to support more children, education, resources and the money to afford things to prevent it are frequent here, we want more sex and less chance of having babies. In impoverished countries (and there are more impoverished places than rich) that isn't quite the case.

Snip

Snip

Snip

I think we need to abandon the idea of moving to other planets, even if that were possible to do now, as people have said, only the rich and successful as well as useful people would be taken there, everyone else would be left here to rot (depending on the state of the Earth at that time, lol). Of course there are so many flaws with the move to space that we have no idea where to begin, creating atmospheres? Seas? Adapting to gravities? The distance and time to get there? Creating something large enough to reach these planets and deliver an abundance of people? Whether or not there are species similar to our own out there (the last thing we want is a repeat of the colonisation of America ¬_¬) and god knows what else.

I think it's more realistic to figure out how to adapt to our own planet before jetsetting off to planet V6.