Are we overpopulating?

[Stilev]

its actully quite sad the way i think this overpopulation thing well end.

 

 

 

there will be which the earth cannot handle this many humans and is either ganna be something by mother nature i.e. global warming or mass starvation or something man made i.e. the first nuclear war.

 

 

 

this disaster will either end the human race, or put us pretty close to it. if you think the holocaust, and sudan thing was bad, this will be thosands of times worse. i'd be will to say that only a handful (100,000 maybe) would survive this at all. and we can expect this within the next 50-100 years

[Giordano]

Saying a natural disaster or a major disease break-out would be a good thing is just ironic. How would YOU like it if a huge tsunami kill you?

 

 

 

Currently I don't think we're over-populating, but need to conserve the resources. Quit the oil and set up nuclear power plants in isolated places (northern Canada, Sahara, Siberra). Sure it'll cost a lot in the short-run, but in the long-run it would save everything.

 

Another thing I would like to see is the end of war and a unified species. The killing of our own race is plain stupidity...once we unify we can explore the universe, find habitable planets and moons and expand the human race.

[Rebdragon]

A topic I feel useful for this topic is Malthusian versus Boserupian theories on population; do people agree with:

 

 

 

Malthus: Population will grow until certain checking factors (such as war, disease, famine, drought) reduce it.

 

 

 

(more info here http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_Malthus)

 

 

 

Or Boserup: That humanity will overcome overcrowding by the invention of new techniques and technologies that increase food production/cure disease etc.

 

 

 

(more info here http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ester_Boserup)

 

 

 

Personally I belong to the Boserupian school of thought - I believe the ability of human kind is so powerful that there is very little we cant overcome - a myriad of disease that were thought to be incurable (such as smallpox etc) have been cured/prevented and I think its only a matter of time until a similar cure is found for AIDS, cancer and similar.

 

Definitely with Malthus on this one. Unless laws were passed to reduce child birth worldwide :-k .

 

 

 

Don't remember where I heard this (or if it's even right >_<), or if I've said it on Tip... but I remember hearing that if Nigeria continues reproducing at it's current rate, it'll have a population size larger than the current world population by 2100...

[Viktorkrum77]

but I remember hearing that if Nigeria continues reproducing at it's current rate, it'll have a population size larger than the current world population by 2100...

 

 

 

How would they all fit? :-s

 

 

 

BTW are you sure you don't mean Niger?

[angryjoe]

 

Don't remember where I heard this (or if it's even right >_<), or if I've said it on Tip... but I remember hearing that if Nigeria continues reproducing at it's current rate, it'll have a population size larger than the current world population by 2100...

I would think that the person that you heared that off was only taking into account the birth rate.

 

Niger/Nigeria (whichever it was) also have very high death rates so therefore doesn't have that much of a natural increase although it is probably higher that pretty much all MEDCs.

 

So they are still in stage one of the demographic transition model so although they have a very fast growing population, I reckon that figure is somewhat exagurated.

 

 

 

EDIT: Looking at this I think it will of been Nigeria.

[Viktorkrum77]

Angryjoe, it's Niger based on birth Rate.

[angryjoe]

Ya I know but looking at the populations it would take a fair while for them to catch Nigeria up since nigeria has over 100000000 more people they would take a fair while to catch up.

 

 

 

And at the bottom of the birth rate list page there are loads of links to death rates, rate of increase etc.

 

 

 

Natural increase of Niger is about 30 per 1000 and Nigeria is about 23 per 1000 but since Nigeria has so many more people Niger wouldn't catch it up for years.

 

 

 

Birth rate

 

Death rate

 

Popn growth rate (%)

[attackyomom]

hrm well i gotta agree with malthus because really what else other epidemics keeps control of population.

 

 

 

I advise you read up on demographic transition it is a interesting theory

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demographic_transition

[darkforaster]

It's inevitable realy. At some point we really are going to overrun the earth's resources. From 6 billion to 9 billion thoguh... it's just.... wow. Breeding like rabbits I suppose.

 

 

 

The cause of overpopulation are the curable diseases. Without them being cured, many more would die. However, if they were never cured then the human fate might alter to the bad side as well.

 

 

 

Thank goodness for viruses, which are much harder to stop.

 

 

 

The solution? Start training drugs on humans instead of animals, the human death rate would increase due to the failure of drugs, but the rest can still live on. Plus maybe some animals would get territorial against us. The mass bear attack or something. :-k

[Harrington]

Nah, everything is just fine... we're just overreacting...see?

 

 

 

Maybe I should become an Evangilist... global warming doesn't exist nor does overpopulation. Yay, I can just climb back into my safe little bubble of bliss now ;)

 

 

 

 

 

 

[warri0r45]

Nah, everything is just fine... we're just overreacting...see?

 

 

 

Maybe I should become an Evangilist... global warming doesn't exist nor does overpopulation. Yay, I can just climb back into my safe little bubble of bliss now ;)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

It's important to remember that overcrowding and overpopulation are different things. Overpopulation, in the biological sense, is when a population gets to a point where food sources are not sufficient and predation is at a level where the population begins to deminish. Populations usually settle after an up-down population fluctuation i.e. reach an equilibrium.

 

 

 

That first picture's pretty funny, though. Where is that?

[cryztalwing]

No. Earth can hold for more poeple that there is. The only real problem with this issue is, that people don't like each other..

[Harrington]

 

 

 

That first picture's pretty funny, though. Where is that?

 

 

 

 

 

It's some tourist place in Japan, I can't for the life of me remember what it's called though. The punchline however is that it's advertised as "Get away from the crowds and relax at our resort" lol.

[warri0r45]

 

 

 

That first picture's pretty funny, though. Where is that?

 

 

 

 

 

It's some tourist place in Japan, I can't for the life of me remember what it's called though. The punchline however is that it's advertised as "Get away from the crowds and relax at our resort" lol.

 

 

 

Haha, a bit tounge in cheek perhaps, but still suiting for a place like Japan. :)

[spikerkid]

*takes out shotgun*

 

 

 

Not anymore :lol:

[chimera302]

do you guys realize that everyone who has ever lived in history could fit in the state of massachusets..which is a very very small state. diseases can change and mutate faster than we can cure them, TB is starting to mutate into a form that is resiliant to penisillen...meaning that possibly soon tuberculosis, one of the biggest killers in history, will once again be incurable. look at past history flu viruses, every few decades theres a big outbreak. the 1918 spanish flue wiped out nearly a third of the population at the time. the black plague in europe in the medieval times also wiped out MASSIVE amounts of people. there will always be diseases to control the population. all it takes is one person getting to close to a bird in asia while that person has normal flu, the two flu strains mix and presto...a super flu that has the potential to kill 75% (i think) of the people that contract the disease.

 

 

 

think about this. hitler did his best to kill as many jews as he could, he killed people nearly 24 hours a day for 4 years..about. he succeded in killing around 2-3million people. the spanish flu was around for around 6 months (flu season) it killed somewhere around 60 million people.

 

 

 

diseases are incredibly resiliant, there is NOTHING we can do to stop them, for every cure there will be a new disease around the corner waiting to wipe of loads of people. High population and density is a heaven for infectious diseases, all it takes is 1 outbreak and we will be reduced greatly.

 

 

 

long story short....theres no way were goin to overpopulate that much, we WILL get it eventually

[Guthix_Girl]

This is an age-old question seen time and time again. As you may know, the human population is the one of a select few of artificially uncontrolled populations (minus the "small" murder rate when compared to the world's population). The population is expected to reach 9 billion by 2050. If you take away Europe's falling population, you are left with staggering population growth in all continents, and countries such as China and India take the lead. And the US is not far behind either, and neither is Africa. And so this leads me to my first question, are we overpopulating? Are we going to run ourselves out of resources?

 

 

 

 

 

 

well if countries in africa and especially india dont reduce their birth rate to 2 children per woman, then the population will nearly double to 11 or 12 billion people. Not 9 billion. Unless people in overpopulated countries finally achieve that "magic" number down to 2 children per woman we will have a MUCH LARGER population than 9 billion. And if we dont cut down on resource use then yes we will most likely run out of natural resources by 2050. At this rate, we will need 3 planets worth of resources to suffice the needs of the now developing countries in the world.

[Viktorkrum77]

well if countries in africa and especially india dont reduce their birth rate to 2 children per woman, then the population will nearly double to 11 or 12 billion people. Not 9 billion. Unless people in overpopulated countries finally achieve that "magic" number down to 2 children per woman we will have a MUCH LARGER population than 9 billion. And if we dont cut down on resource use then yes we will most likely run out of natural resources by 2050. At this rate, we will need 3 planets worth of resources to suffice the needs of the now developing countries in the world.

 

However, you do have to remember that the countries with the highest birth rates often have the highest death rates too. The problem is countries with low death rates and high birth rates, China and India are good examples.

[Guthix_Girl]

well if countries in africa and especially india dont reduce their birth rate to 2 children per woman, then the population will nearly double to 11 or 12 billion people. Not 9 billion. Unless people in overpopulated countries finally achieve that "magic" number down to 2 children per woman we will have a MUCH LARGER population than 9 billion. And if we dont cut down on resource use then yes we will most likely run out of natural resources by 2050. At this rate, we will need 3 planets worth of resources to suffice the needs of the now developing countries in the world.

 

However, you do have to remember that the countries with the highest birth rates often have the highest death rates too. The problem is countries with low death rates and high birth rates, China and India are good examples.

 

 

 

That is also true like in countries such as mali where they have a very high infant mortality rate. But the birth rate is still significantly higher. China isnt as bad though because they are starting to control the number of children per woman.