Overpopulation

I'm writing a big paper on Overpopulation and would like to know if anyone knows any good, informative websites on the subject or has any opinions on the issue. Thanks.

 

The only thing I have on overpopulation is my opinion. People suck for not taking care of this world and the nature around us. All they can do is go have unprotected sex and have babies just to make matters worse. There are enough people starving in this world as is it. When one babie is born it just takes the food away from someone else. TRy searching google for overpopulation ideas. What calss is this paper for? It seems interesting.

 

over populations a myth, take a look at states like wyoming, n. and s. dakota and basically the entire middle of this country its empty.

 

There is no overpopulation problem, nor has there ever been, nor will there ever be. The earth is capable of supporting far more than the current world population; if it wasn't, then there wouldn't be an increasing number of people leading some sociologists to falsely conclude "overpopulation."

Humans are no different than any other animal. When our population reaches its maximum capacity (I doubt that'll ever happen), it'll stay at it's maximum capacity. That's why it's called a maximum.

 

~All -Thankyou for all of your opinions!
~purcolecraze - Yeah, i agree. My mother is actually an international flight attendant and has told me many stories about India, China, and, more recently, Africa and about how overpopulated they are and how people just throw away their childrend, - literally... That's actually what inspired me to write this paper for my big senior research paper. (English class).

~juggla - i aws talking about worldwide population. - Sorry if i was unclear, but i just thought that was a given seeing as most parts of the U.S. obviously have no overpop. problem...

~inagod... - Have i've already done the google search results and all but for my paper i need 20 sources and that's a lot of scanning through sites trying to find decent info so i just thought i'd be lazy and just ask the people of this forum - I was pretty sure that on a hippy site people were bound to have opinions/info about the subject...

~Kandahar - Thanks for your opinion, which i assure you i do appreciate, but your last few sentences :
"Humans are no different than any other animal. When our population reaches its maximum capacity (I doubt that'll ever happen), it'll stay at it's maximum capacity. That's why it's called a maximum."
Are greatly misinformed, just so that oyu know. I'm not trying to argue about this, but am just telling you what the pros say. I've done much research (on both sides of the issue) and it's just not correct. - Humans are indeed just like any other animal and as the four 2000 and up Biology textbooks i've used for sources all state, once any species reaches it's max cap. in a given area, unless the species death rate goes above their birth rate or members leave the area, then competition for food will increase until, if the deatyh/birth rates continue, that species die off... I think the best arguement for their being no overpop. problem is our modern plagues (Aids, Cancer) and smoking... And if there is no overpop. problem then why is there infanticide in many nations?

 

Well I'm almost done with my paper and i really think it's coming along quite nicely... (I know all of you have just been so worried about me and my paper, so now you can go back to eating and sleeping...)

 

I disagree. Maybe the Earth IS capable of supporting more, maybe we have space left to grow, but that would be at the cost of every other living form on earth. There is a finite amount of space; for humans to grow, other species have to shrink. Already we use a great deal of the land for our own purposes, with our monoculture crops, cities, and ranches. Biodiversity will suffer greatly and that leads to unstability in global ecosystems.

Either way though, our population now depends on fossil fuels; before they were being used, our population was steady and hardly grew very much at all for 98% of human history. We've been growing exponentially for the last 200 or so years, but it will level off and then crash. Reason? We depend on a limited nonrenewable resource for our large numbers. When a species comes to take advantage of a new resource, populations spike, but then the resource is used up, and it crashes back down. I say we will crash too (you're right, like any other animal) because our resource base will not last forever (which is the only way you get a leveled off, stable plateau). We will not be able to remain in balance at such high numbers without oil and gas, and whatever the date for the peak/crash (be it within a decade or at best, in 30 years), there is no chance of us maintaining such a huge human population on Earth.

 

if your going to write anything on overpoulation, you need to read the book "Ismael". Actually, that should be required reading for every one any how if you dont think the USA has an overpop problem consider that one american uses up 60 times the resources of a third world resident. 200 species a day is the cost of supporting the current number of people in the world. How much longer do we have until the structure that is nature(what we depend on above all else) collapses? go recycle something today.

 

There is no over-population problem. This is what the elites would have you believe, though. Of course many, like Hans Kissinger and David Rockefeller, have expressed a fondness of eugenics and population control through the release of plagues for years.

 

Ismael is a very good book. My Ismael should be read with it too. It doesn't have too much to do with overpopulation specifically, but I agree that it should be required reading for everyone! (Overpopulation and a pathetic social structure are two seperate problems/issues)

 

To all those who say there is no population problem,
That has to be sarcasm, because the idea that there is plenty of room on the planet surface left to support people is ridiculous. The EXPONENTIAL growth of human population is, forgive the cliché, unprecedented. The world already has a serious resource distribution problem, not to mention diseases that kill and have no cure.
There also have been many disasters in the past 100 years that have killed more than 100,000 people at a time. Perhaps all Mother Natures population control?
Peace

 

It is also fleeting. The exponential growth will not continue forever; it will probably level off around 12-15 billion. The exponential growth is a testament of the wonders of science and technology, which have increased the life expectancy dramatically over the past century. Birth rates are actually LOWER in many parts of the world than they were a century ago; the population explosion comes from an ever-decreasing death rate.

Changes in the birth rate mirror changes in the death rate...but lag behind by about one generation.

Right. A resource DISTRIBUTION problem, not a resource problem. An increasing population won't aggravate that problem, because there are plenty of resources for everyone.

What does that have to do with overpopulation?

Nature is not a conscious entity. Nature does not care what the population of humans, or any other animal, is. Nature is merely a set of biological and geological rules.

 

The truth is, that we're not even close to having an overpopulation problem in North America and South America, and Europe's population is actually shrinking pretty fast.

Asia, obviously has a big problem, but Africa is a true clusterfuck.

 

We ARE overpopulated. Maybe if we all spread out (away from cities), but we'd all have to farm to eat. Even then, most places just can't support such large populations. Again, we depend on oil for food: tractors and other equipment run on it, fertilizers and pesticides are made from it, water is pumped from wells with it, food is moved to market (even across continents and oceans) with it. We are close to the end of the oil age, and the oil age is the only reason we have been able to produce so much food (shipping it to places that can't grow enough, increasing their populations as well as our own). Without oil, we can at best support ~2 billion people...not 12-15.

It all comes down to energy, and we're running out. If we have to go back to depending mainly on solar energy (through photosynthesis in plants) rather than oil energy, we will not be able to support such high populations. It is an inescapable fact. Energy is not "just another resource" it is the base from which everything else proceeds. It is the major determinate.

 

"Been around the world and found that only stupid people are breeding
The cretins cloning and feeding
And I don't even own a TV!"
Harvey Danger

 

A long time ago, I read about a man who advocated that the human race simply die out. I agree with him. What are we afraid of ? We have faith in the Universe, or we do not. Either way, with mans desire to self destruct in one fashion or another, a fast trip to the next scene may be better. A world without the need to reproduce. We just got used to being in human form, that's all. I never felt the urge to reproduce enough to actually do it, and my world is just as rich. Still, I would miss the sight of a Tapir snout, and many other things, but perhaps they are in original form elsewhere, and safe from human greed...and error.

 

One shouldn't assume that no other forms of energy besides oil exist, nor should one assume that forms of energy considered to be expensive and inefficient today will always be expensive and inefficient. Whenever one paradigm ends, a new one quickly takes its place. When oil starts to become rare and expensive, there will be a much bigger demand for research into other forms of energy. You're right that the oil age is reaching its end, but that doesn't mean we'll suddenly be plunged into another Dark Age. Solar power and nuclear fusion will probably be the next two paradigms in energy.

 

Kandahar, you are stubborn.
I just feel it is total ignorance to say there is no population problem.
The resource distribution problem is NOT GOING AWAY ANYTIME SOON.
12-15 Billion people is MORE THAN DOUBLE what we have now. That sounds exponential to me.
Diseases spread faster in more populated areas, consider the plague, SARS, etc...
Nature is not a conscious entity? What do you believe in, God?
Nature can feel that there are 6.5 Billion people on the planet, I think that is obvious.
Peace

 

As you just admitted, it's a resource DISTRIBUTION problem, not a resource SUPPLY problem. There are plenty of resources to go around; an increase in the population will not change that.

We'll also have biotechnology allowing more fertile farmland and healthier foods. We'll have forms of energy that don't rely on fossil fuels. You can't talk about the population explosion without even considering the technology explosion that accompanies it (and makes it possible).

If you're worried about that, there's plenty of sparsely populated land in the world you could move to. But cities also have access to better medical care than rural areas do. This isn't the 1300s.

No, but that's not relevant.

Nature can't feel anything because nature is not an entity with nerve cells. I think that is obvious.

 

haha you gotta be kidding me. wait- you're not? so sad.