Overpopulation. Resources running out. What do we do about these things?

[Mr.Wizard]

If anyone has ever read the "Bio of a Space Tyrant" series by Piers Anthony he has some interesting ideas on how to deal with some major issues (that plagued the world both at the time of writing and still to this day).

Some of the more interesting ideas include:

Decriminalizing and nationalizing the drug trade so that all profits from drug sales goes to the government.
Lacing water supplies with temporary sterility drugs and then licensing births to match the death rate.
Health care to a limit. Once people have used up their allocated health care they are cut off, meaning they would either have to pay their own way or die, saving the governement and thus the taxpayers from having to support them.

I think some of his ideas are awesome and some would never work, but a great series.

 

[Enkidu88]

Well eventually the lack of resources will drive one of the superpowers to start a war, and then eventually nukes will be thrown around. Boom, end of problem. Billions would probably die from the blasts/radiation sickness.

Then we get to start from scratch, maybe we'll get it right the next time around! =P

 

[Duck Sandwich]

Well, if Judicator Aldaris has taught me anything, it's that when faced with the problem of having too many people....

Spoiler: Solution

YOU MUST CONSTRUCT ADDITIONAL PYLONS.

 

[universaltraveller]

Send in the clowns.

Agreed...

Or, I'm thinking a Logans Run style termination age.

Concerning the 'One Child Policy' in China, as I understand it, it hasn't really worked. Some cities allow for more than one child, also there's the fac that some people choose to kill their child if they a have a girl.

But yeah, fun, so I still say termination age... maybe 40?

 

[DSK-]

Live under the sea?
Space colonies?
uhm.. One child per family?
*shrug* we'll think of something, otherwise we just let nature take its course and let the population stabalise itself again once we cant sustain our numbers anymore

It's cheaper to go in to space than go to the bottom of the ocean :/

 

[Nexus4]

Build cities on/in the ocean! Or underground for that matter! Towns in caves would be awesome.

 

[Phoenix14]

Well consider this...25% of the earth is solid land humans only live on about 11% of this granted the other 14% is mostly desert and frozen wasteland I believe if population meats it's absolute limits a excess of people will probably try to make Siberia more habitable or something.

 

[universaltraveller]

SPACE

Seriously, I want to see someone land on Mars in my life time

Screw just landing on Mars in your/our lifetime. I wanna see Mars terraformed to the point that it looks like the grand canyon and you don't have to wear a full suit to walk around comfortably outside. It's about as likely to happen as Silver Surfer flying by and putting us on Galactus's lunch menu but still. I want to see Mars terraformed and a full, civilian Lunar colony up and running before I die.

As for food and stuff...why not just take up indoor gardening? Potatoes are supposed to be easy as hell to grow for example.

Have you not seen Total Recall, or read any Philip K. Dick? It will only end badly, though we may have some reality-bending funtimes...

As for growing indoor potatoes, I approve, we can have chips/fries, and lots of potato clocks...

'because I'm a potatoe'

 

[RoBi3.0]

1) Better family planning education for under developed nations.

2) Teaching people in developed nations that it is completely okay not to eat meat everyday.

3) Colonize Space as soon as possible.

Number 1 will reduce the strain on our resources

Number 2 will allow us to us to use our resource more effectively. It takes something like 4 pounds of grain (don't quote me)to produce 1 pound of meat. If the amount of meat consumed by humans was reduced it would greatly increase the amount of other food we could produce therefore feed more people.

number 3 is for the simple fact that there is a maximum amount of people that can be sustained be the earth. It is very unlikely that even with the best population controls and food production that we will never reach that number. Colonizing space is the only way to guarantee the lasting survival of the human race. I suppose that you could factor a 4th step which would be hope that there is a god and that he will save us before we run out of time, but that is a long wait for a train that don't come.

 

[Caligulove]

Out to space with us! We're born as natural explorers, curious of our surroundings, wanderers that have always sought to discover new places and stretch our knowledge of their borders and what occupies them, if anything. We love the Earth, though we, as a species, have clearly outgrown this planet, and should unite ourselves in the common goal of bringing humanity out into the cosmos. We possess both the ability to destroy nearly every human life on this planet as well as the ability to put men onto other worlds.

Both possibilities are open to us, I just hope that we choose the latter.

 

[Raregolddragon]

War is my best in my opinion.

Its like a sport but there is a real winner and no fucking refs.

I also like the idea of a new plague it will kill off the unwashed more then the clean. Because lord knows we need to up there standers.

 

[Radoh]

Terra Form something and move a huge chunk of the populace there. Like the Population of China or India sized chunk.

 

[Azaraxzealot]

as a kid once said in Grand Theft Auto 4...

"Involuntary Euthanization for the weak and the elderly"

in all seriousness, though, we don't have many options unless we're going to suddenly take the "brave new world" approach and just have a population that's drugged and indoctrinated to be happy and then just exile everyone else.

 

[TheYellowCellPhone]

Make jaywalking and speeding legal.

It may not be effective enough, but it could work.

 

[Reincarnatedwolfgod]

mass genocide, war, starvation, disease will eventually fix problem

all you need is a gate accident that destroy the earth moon and the problem will be solved

1) Better family planning education for under developed nations.

2) Teaching people in developed nations that it is completely okay not to eat meat everyday.

3) Colonize Space as soon as possible.

Number 1 will reduce the strain on our resources

Number 2 will allow us to us to use our resource more effectively. It takes something like 4 pounds of grain (don't quote me)to produce 1 pound of meat. If the amount of meat consumed by humans was reduced it would greatly increase the amount of other food we could produce therefore feed more people.

number 3 is for the simple fact that there is a maximum amount of people that can be sustained be the earth. It is very unlikely that even with the best population controls and food production that we will never reach that number. Colonizing space is the only way to guarantee the lasting survival of the human race. I suppose that you could factor a 4th step which would be hope that there is a god and that he will save us before we run out of time, but that is a long wait for a train that don't come.

my options

1: it will just postpone the problem

2: my faith in humanity says all human are greedy and want every thing there for doing this is impossible.

3: that not happening any time soon; world war 3 will happen first.
(4: not going to happen)

 

[Wintermoot]

we could start building things like these

and simply mine asteroids that happen to pass by.

 

[Antari]

Meh, I give it another 100 years at best before we end up with a major world war to cull the population a bit.

 

[tofulove]

the solution is very ez. kill 75% of the population. do it again if the problem happen again down the line. you also get the added benefit of a Renaissance like period fallowing said mass population loss.