It makes no sense to second-guess what “mother nature” intended for us; there’s nothing “unnatural” about our current population. And whether we are over-populated is debatable. Some say we’re just very inefficient.
Uh huh?
So can you name even one single thing that “we” did to avoid overpopulation that had any measurable effect whatsoever on world population?
Just one?
The fact is that the “Population Bomb” was typical Leftist alarmism. Wild extrapolation and overt faith in simplistic models that were great at predicting the past but proved utterly useless at predicting the future.
The “population problem” never existed, as economists like Simon were saying loudly at the time. Yet despite all of Simon;s predictions coming true and all of Ehrlich’s predictions being proved laughably wrong, the Left still accepts there is a problem, in defiance of all the science.
Well, no. It’s more of a case of hitting a tyrannosaur and having a mole pop up, then hitting the mole and having a mosquito pop up, and hitting the mosquito and having a louse pop up.
Second hand smoke just isn’t comparable to infectious diseases. Infectious diseases killed 3 people out of 4 before they had a chance to reproduce. Second hand smoke kills, at worst, around one person in 100 million before they reach middle age.
The same sorts of disparities are true of all the other examples you use. The problems that pop up aren’t even within the same order of magnitude as the problem that you claim they have replaced. It really is a case of replacing a rampaging tyrannosaur with an angry mole.
Of course. I was just following the metaphor of the title of this thread. I don’t believe nature has a will, or other common memes like “our purpose is to reproduce”.
I didn’t mean to imply that I believed it was a one-to-one exchange. This may surprise some people, but I am actually not a stupid person.
But it’s kind of hard for me to worry about what we are doing “against” mother nature when we are both blocking and enabling her grim scathe.
The problem is that it’s not even a one-to many exchange. There was no exchange. Nothing anybody did to avert the looming population catastrophe made any difference whatsoever to it occurring. yet there is no catastrophe and there never will be.
There is simply no justification of any kind for you claiming that the catastrophe was averted because it was widely warned of. There never was going to be any catastrophe. It was all just leftist Chicken Little hysteria.
Weren’t there programs pushing birth control throughout the third world? What about China’s one-child policy?
I do know a lot of the history of this issue and there is a nitpick here, sure, I have seen people from the left use Malthus but also people from the right; overall, the most fact based leftists or rightists do dismiss Malthus.
I can report that both the left and the right have a beef with forceful population control, but for different reasons; I remember elements of the right supporting population control in many parts of Latin America in the 60’s and 70’s; there were many on the left that complained that the right was doing so for other reasons rather than just population control or to help families, the point (not that I agree with it) then was that in essence population control was offered as solution to limit poverty or the birth of future guerrilla fighters, offering free (yep, even in places were the conservative church rules) contraception was easier than actually educating and increasing the standards of living of the population.
In fact I am not advocating eugenics. The title of my post hints at my feelings. As it happens after reading a bit about dysgenics and modern eugenics advocates, I think, in as balanced way as I can, that eugenics has a flawed assumption; viz that we (humans) know how best to breed to optimize genetic quality/humanity. The evidence suggests to me that we do not. A good example is that of autism. It appears that if two ‘intelligent’ people have children, they are more likely to have autistic kids than those of lower IQs. Ignoring the obvious debate about autism and its values, if we are to presume we apply eugenics to improve intelligence, then autism is not a desired outcome.
So I am anti-eugenics for that reason (among others).
Straw man. I never said populations would rise indefinitely, just that they are rising. The point being that the human population has exploded and we don’t understand the consequences. Whether or not you believe in the role of humans in climate change, you have to admit this is uncharted territory for our planet. A planet that bumbled along for millenia with around one twentieth of the number of humans it currently supports.
Admittedly though, I suppose your interest in this question does hinge upon your belief in the negative consequences of overpopulation.
For over 20 years now I have mentioned this opinion whenever this conversation comes up.
Assuming there are no huge troubles…a civilization threatening event and society carries on…
in 500 years, governments will be BEGGING women to have children. There will be ‘bribes’ galore (tax breaks, subsidies etc). People will be concerned with the problems of the oncoming ‘population implosion’.
Think about it. Every woman would need to have a little more than 2 kids to keep population stable (there will some deaths of kids, sterile women etc.) This means that if each woman has just 2 kids, population will decline.
Think of the younger women you know today. Yes, they will have kids…but ONE will be a popular number. Ask a random young woman today if she will have 3 kids and she’ll look at you like you are insane.
If you think md2000 and I are deluded…maybe…but think again. Maybe we are…but, as md2000 has said…kids are * no longer an economic asset and are a huge economic liability to the parents * as they were in the past (for first world economies anyway). This was not true in the past where kids were a benefit economically to most. Now they are not. That is a huge ‘sea change’ that has not been seen before. As md2000 said, you have to REALLY want kids to have them. Now, biology will make many want kids…but most likely one, maybe two…maybe.
Assuming civilization cooks along…500 years from now people will be screaming about population decline.
You’re right. Humans can never stop meddling. It’s in our nature, and arguably, one of the main reasons we have become the dominant species of this planet.
My question was largely philosophical, as (as far as I can see) the alternatives to the status quo are; abandon all human life preservation, or actively select specific humans to prevail (eugenics). Neither are options likely to be considered in the near future. None-the-less, whether or not there is a practical solution, the initial question can still be considered.
I love the mole analogy. Perfectly sums up my feelings.
As a scientist I am often unnerved by the use of statistics to push frontiers of research. We are all chasing the next “most prevalent” disease like it is an oversight that must be addressed. The current one is Alzheimer’s, which is of course a disease of the elderly. As we get better at curing one disease (hitting the mole in your analogy) others rear their ugly heads.
Where I disagree with you is that because we will just die anyway, it will be ok (at least that’s what I thought you meant). While death is certain, if we all live longer, then we ‘consume’ for longer, and our impact on our environment increases.
For the record I am not an environmentalist per se, just that I think it suits us to ignore environmental issues until such times as it is impossible to do so. I prefer to consider these things anyway.
Interesting point, worth thinking about. My gut instinct is that your caveats are perhaps the crux of my question.
You assume that in the intervening 500 years (or however long it takes) our planet continues to be able to support us in the way it does now. Is it not possible that in the future, while the population is in its growth phase (in your model) we undermine this assumption? I’m no environmental expert, but it seems that there is a reasonable weight of opinion to suggest a large human population will have or has already had negative consequences that we don’t quite know the gravity of yet.
Of course I don’t believe in the population bomb, as it was proven by history to be wrong, but as a pragmatist I have to admit to ignorance over the effect of an unprecedentedly large human population on our planet. No one knows for sure, which, it seems to me is a reasonable position to take. But unlike when the population bomb was written, we have some evidence that our world is changing rapidly, and that humans may have had some bearing on this. I’m not saying I think human-induced climate change is real, but it is an issue that deserves consideration, and perhaps if is later shown to be true, then the OP has more relevance.
I agree with your aging population point, and in fact see this as being intrinsically linked to our current population issues. Demographic transition shows that as birth rate declines in developed countries, so the age of the population increases. But in essence this is my point. Nature would not have allowed all these old people to survive. It just so happens that the present issue with an aging population is economic.
Very possible, hence the caveat 
However, I tend to be somewhat more optimistic about the ‘near’ future (500 years?) than most. There is energy that MIGHT be able to be had out there after fossil fuels. Nuclear, of course but hopefully fusion. I know, I know fusion energy is about 10-20 years away and always will be 
but hopefully one day we will get it going. There are possible others ones as well which may or may not take.
I can’t help but thinking that at least one will take off (beside nuclear) and we will have energy…and if we have energy we should be ok from civilization collapse.
I think 500 years from now society will still be cooking along. It will most likely look very different and people may be a bit better or worse off…but still around.
In 500 years, babies will be decanted, not born.