# Manila today. A prediction of the future for the world ? (overpopulation) **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [October 16, 2010, 12:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/manila-today-a-prediction-of-the-future-for-the-world-overpopulation/557305 "2010-10-16T00:01:22Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 9\ **Page:** 4
**Author:** ![Susanann](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/7ab992/32.png) [@Susanann](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Susanann)\ **Post date:** [October 19, 2010, 2:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/manila-today-a-prediction-of-the-future-for-the-world-overpopulation/557305/61 "2010-10-19T14:05:52Z")
> [@Susanann](#): > > If you, or anyone else, thinks that after we increased our population by 50% from 200 million people to over 300 million people, and that we now have more farms, more forests, and more fields, then you are totally nonsensical, illogical, and have no understanding of the effects of the destruction that adding 100 million more people have done. > . > [@Baboonanza](#): > > All the things you cite are much more to do with how people have changed their lifestyles in the last 50 years than the absolute increase in population. Of course, you are just trying to be funny, but you are overdoing it. Nobody could seriously say that America has not lost most of its forests, fields, farms, wild lands, wildlife, and its natural beauty over the past 50, 100, 200 years. You know darn well that the vast prairies and buffalo herds of the Great Plains are completely destroyed. Grizzly bears are now extinct east of the Mississippi and replaced with traffic jams. It is well known how empty and how much natural lands were in California just 160 years ago, a state that now is overflowing with 40 million wall-to-wall people, their cars, their crime, and their pollution. California was a lovely beautiful uncrowded place back in 1850. If we dont stop overpopulating now, our grandchilden will never be able to get away from crowds of people. ---
**Author:** ![Wendell\_Wagner](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/8491ac/32.png) [@Wendell\_Wagner](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wendell_Wagner)\ **Post date:** [October 19, 2010, 2:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/manila-today-a-prediction-of-the-future-for-the-world-overpopulation/557305/62 "2010-10-19T14:32:14Z")
Baboonanza, I believe that the United States is on balance an exporter of wood, not an importer of it. However, I can’t find the statistics on this question. Can anyone tell us the numbers on this? Yes, Susanann, we can and do say that in the past 100 years there has been very little change in the total amount of forests in the U.S. Much forest near cities has been cut down, but a lot of former farm land has been reforested. Also, some native animal species have begun increasing in numbers, even near cities, and are now actually become once again somewhat of a nuisance. ---
**Author:** ![sleestak](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/919ad9/32.png) [@sleestak](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/sleestak)\ **Post date:** [October 19, 2010, 2:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/manila-today-a-prediction-of-the-future-for-the-world-overpopulation/557305/63 "2010-10-19T14:51:27Z")
> [@Susanann](#): > > Of course, you are just trying to be funny, but you are overdoing it. > > Nobody could seriously say that America has not lost most of its forests, fields, farms, wild lands, wildlife, and its natural beauty over the past 50, 100, 200 years. > > You know darn well that the vast prairies and buffalo herds of the Great Plains are completely destroyed. Grizzly bears are now extinct east of the Mississippi and replaced with traffic jams. > > It is well known how empty and how much natural lands were in California just 160 years ago, a state that now is overflowing with 40 million wall-to-wall people, their cars, their crime, and their pollution. > > California was a lovely beautiful uncrowded place back in 1850. > > If we dont stop overpopulating now, our grandchilden will never be able to get away from crowds of people. Are you going to provide any cites for your assertions? Or should we just believe you because, well, just because? Also, have you ever heard of Julian Simon? Slee ---
**Author:** ![sqweels](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/f19dbf/32.png) [@sqweels](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/sqweels)\ **Post date:** [October 19, 2010, 3:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/manila-today-a-prediction-of-the-future-for-the-world-overpopulation/557305/64 "2010-10-19T15:31:36Z")
Overpopulation is where there is an excess ratio of people to resources (fresh water being a critical one), not just high density. Overpopulation can exist side-by-side with under-population because it can in some degree be compartmentalized by economic class. And the way I see it, there are not so much barriers to people moving into the higher economic classes but bottlenecks. Only so many people can move on up in a given period of time, but if you dump too many people into the lower classes you clog up the works and it becomes more difficult for any of them to get ahead. And so while family planning is key, promoting it more heavily runs into opposition not only from conservatives fighting the War on Sex, but from, uh, people on the left who think it’s some insidious plot to wipe out minority groups. ---
**Author:** ![nachtmusick](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/ac91a4/32.png) [@nachtmusick](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/nachtmusick)\ **Post date:** [October 24, 2010, 10:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/manila-today-a-prediction-of-the-future-for-the-world-overpopulation/557305/65 "2010-10-24T10:01:10Z")
> [@Wendell\_Wagner](#): > > Yes, Susanann, we can and do say that in the past 100 years there has been very little change in the total amount of forests in the U.S. Much forest near cities has been cut down, but a lot of former farm land has been reforested. Also, some native animal species have begun increasing in numbers, even near cities, and are now actually become once again somewhat of a nuisance. What you term “forest” is just stems. Let us get our terms straight. There is a lot of woodlot in the U.S.; there is very little forest left. The native animals you refer to are coyotes, skunks, raccoons, rats, pigeons, mice, etc. For every wildlife species that finds it can thrive in the urban landscape, there are dozens that are pushed out. The plant species, not being too light on their feet, just expire. ---
**Author:** ![godix](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/278dde/32.png) [@godix](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/godix)\ **Post date:** [October 25, 2010, 4:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/manila-today-a-prediction-of-the-future-for-the-world-overpopulation/557305/66 "2010-10-25T04:25:20Z")
> [@Susanann](#): > > Over population ALWAYS causes more crime, more laws, poverty, unemployment, pollution, disease, big intrusive government, and less personal freedoms. > > The United States is committing suicide in its rush to overpopulate itself via record immigration. The overpopulating/destroying of the United States is a deliberate, intentional, but preventable act. [The highest immigration rate to the US was in 1907](http://www.census.gov/statab/hist/HS-08.pdf) [The US growth rate is near record lows.](http://www.google.com/publicdata?ds=wb-wdi&met=sp_pop_grow&idim=country:USA&dl=en&hl=en&q=us+population+growth) [Pollution is declining](http://epa.gov/airtrends/2010/report/airpollution.pdf) [Crime rate is down](http://www.disastercenter.com/crime/uscrime.htm) The other things you claim have little to do with overpopulation. For example, I suspect the housing bubble bursting has a lot more to do with unemployment than how many people per square mile there are. Google is your friend. The next time you want to scare us all with facts, please take a moment to actually make sure the facts are exactly opposite what you claim. ---
**Author:** ![godix](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/278dde/32.png) [@godix](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/godix)\ **Post date:** [October 25, 2010, 4:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/manila-today-a-prediction-of-the-future-for-the-world-overpopulation/557305/67 "2010-10-25T04:46:52Z")
By the way, some basic math for you. World Population: [~6.7 billion](http://www.google.com/publicdata?ds=wb-wdi&met=sp_pop_totl&tdim=true&dl=en&hl=en&q=world+population) Population density for Tokyo: [5655 per square km](http://www.japaneselifestyle.com.au/tokyo/tokyo_population.htm) Land needed if the entire population lived in conditions like Tokyo - 1,184,307 sq km Land area of Australia - [7,617,930 km](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Australia) In other words, the entire human race could live like Tokyo residents, by all reports not a bad place to live, and take up one seventh of the smallest continent. Wouldn’t even have to touch the deserts or anything, we could all live reasonably near the beach. Which would leave Asia, Europe, Africa, North America, South America, Antarctica, the entirety of the oceans, and the remaining 6/7 of Australia to supply what mankind needs. Somehow I doubt six and 6/7 continents to exploit couldn’t provide for the people in the remaining 1/7. Mankind has many issues. Overpopulation ain’t one of them. ---
**Author:** ![ataraxy22](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ataraxy22/32/307_2.png) [@ataraxy22](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ataraxy22)\ **Post date:** [October 27, 2010, 2:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/manila-today-a-prediction-of-the-future-for-the-world-overpopulation/557305/68 "2010-10-27T02:09:09Z")
> [@godix](#): > > Overpopulation ain’t one of them. LOL. :D:D:eek: ---
**Author:** ![Markxxx](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/5daacb/32.png) [@Markxxx](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Markxxx)\ **Post date:** [October 27, 2010, 3:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/manila-today-a-prediction-of-the-future-for-the-world-overpopulation/557305/69 "2010-10-27T03:56:56Z")
> [@Susanann](#): > > If you, or anyone else, thinks that after we increased our population by 50% from 200 million people to over 300 million people, and that we now have more farms, more forests, and more fields, then you are totally nonsensical, illogical, and have no understanding of the effects of the destruction that adding 100 million more people have done. Not the case, if you look at census figures almost ALL the population growth is coming form immigration. And birthrates are down for everyone BUT immigrants. I’m talking legal ones here. And where are the immigrants going? California and Texas and NYC. And they are almost all going into dense built up cities. So there is no need to tear more things down. In the past immigrants spread out, this isn’t happening today. The immigrants are sticking to inner cities. I live in Chicago and there are still a lot of unbuilt areas, forests and farms between Chicago and Aurora the second largest city. The growth is coming from immigration not birth rate. And as long as the immigrants stick to the central inner cities, which they are doing, there will be no problems. Look at Chicago it was almost a million people larger in 1950 than today [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/manila-today-a-prediction-of-the-future-for-the-world-overpopulation/557305.md?page=3)