A little simple arithmetic: The world is home to less than 7 billion people, and the U.S. has a dry land area of about 9 million square kilometers. If everybody in the world lived in the U.S., then the population density would be a startlingly low 778 per square kilometer. That's quite a bit less than Omaha, Nebraska, my mid-sized hometown. In fact, in Kiplinger's 2008 ranking of the 10 best U.S. cities to live in, not one city has a population density that low.
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What about farmland, industry, commercial shopping, and business space? Huge sections of the United States are made up of desert wasteland and jagged mountains. These are hardly suitable living conditions. What about natural resources like water, oil, and iron ore? We could only sustain this kind of population density with a certain level of technological development.
What about environmental concerns? As wacko as the eco-heads might be, if we were to cut down /all/ the forests and clear /all/ the land for cities, it would pose a bit of a problem.
Just advocating the devil a little bit.
> What about farmland, industry, commercial shopping, and business space?
The additional space allowed the exceptionally low population density would certainly be sufficient to accommodate all of these uses expect farming. After all, many cities (over 150 in the world if I'm not mistaken) have higher population densities and still manage to allow for these land-uses.
Farming & eco-mania would have to be addressed using a separate calculation. I suppose the question would look something like this: How much cropland is needed for adequate food (and CO2) production? Outside of the U.S., how such cropland is available?
> As wacko as the eco-heads might be, if we were to cut down /all/ the forests and clear /all/ the land for cities, it would pose a bit of a problem.
Of course, we would never have to resort to such extreme measures. (hopefully.) But at any rate, plenty of trees are observable in such cities as Omaha. Human habitation does not preclude the possibility of healthy vegetation.
As it stands, apparently the forested area of the U.S. (and maybe the world?) is actually GROWING, not shrinking. And a huge portion of the world is covered with thick forests of varying types.
Along those lines, just because we don't see certain animal species as much doesn't mean they don't live out there somewhere. :) Several animals (eg. white owl) have turned out to be far more numerous than once believed. Still others, once thought extinct, have been rediscovered in the earth's remote corners.
Thanks for the stimulation!
Peace. --Jacob
? I suggest you do a bit more research. Population density is entirely different than overpopulation. Overpopulation is a matter of carrying capacity.
We’ve already exceed global carrying capacity. We are now in “overshoot”. Global population is nearing 7 billion. Global carrying capacity is about 2 billion. (This assumes some level of social justice and a moderate, low by US standards, standard of living.) We will get to that lower number the hard way (wars, famine, disease, and their accompanying losses of environmental quality, freedom, and social justice) OR the less hard way (immediately and drastically reducing our population voluntarily). Yes, I mean all of us, yes I mean everywhere.
For examples of what I consider to be valid measures and explorations of overpopulation and carrying capacity, I suggest:
www.paulchefurka.ca
http://home.alltel.net/bsundquist1/
www.theoildrum.com/node/2693
Hello, Anonymous.
Thank you for your comment, and welcome to my blog.
> I suggest you do a bit more research.
I suggest you don't believe everything you read on the Internet. More on that later...
As for whether I'm informed on the subject, the U.S. public education system is huge on overpopulation. (NPI.) I've heard it, and I've heard it again. Yours is not the minority opinion, even if the "informed" don't always take up such a radical stance as yourself. In fact, those who are somehow totally uninformed (unmisinformed?) on overpopulation must be an incredibly small minority.
> Population density is entirely different than overpopulation.
Population density is intrinsically tied to the idea of overpopulation. (As everyone who buys in to the notion would agree.) If the world's resources are finite, then the resources of any portion of the world must be also be finite. If the population of the world is limited by its resources, then the same must apply on a smaller scale. Thus, our model requires us to scale down population as much as we scale down area.
If this simplified model has any merit at all, and we think strictly in terms of immediate quality of life, then the world is capable of comfortably supporting a considerably larger population than it does now.
> Overpopulation is a matter of carrying capacity.
Yes, and almost every scientist agrees that carrying capacity is defined in terms of the limited resources within some area. Population... Area... Population per area... Density!
> We’ve already exceed global carrying capacity.
Then, according to the definition of carrying capacity, our race should be deteriorating-- after all, its impossible for the environment to support us without deterioration. Yet somehow, life expectancy keeps growing. The standard of living keeps improving.
> Global carrying capacity is about 2 billion. (This assumes some level of social justice and a moderate, low by US standards, standard of living.)
The global capacity for a fulfilled life and a descent standard of living is 0. Hobbes was right about at least one thing: human existence is "solitary, poor, nasty, brutish and short." It doesn't matter how many or few of them you pile together. They won't be happy without Jesus, because they will slavishly, helplessly sin against themselves and one another. And sin is destructive.
On the other hand, we might describe carrying capacity in terms of maximum growth. (Traditional definition alert!) Apparently, it's not 2 billion, because we're at almost 7, and we just keep on agrowin'!
> We will get to that lower number the hard way (wars, famine, disease, and their accompanying losses of environmental quality, freedom, and social justice)
Oh, I don't insist that world population won't start decreasing at some point. It's not unlikely. The Bible predicts war, famine and epidemics. They may decrease our population or not. But the world has been full of injustice since Adam, and the freest people have always been in bondage to sin. Such has been the state of the world since long before the 2 billion mark.
> OR the less hard way (immediately and drastically reducing our population voluntarily).
All right, get in line!!! Really, though, who should we start with? It immediately becomes a matter of the strong destroying the weak in an effort to protect their strength.
Or maybe you think "birth control" (i.e. esp. killing the unborn) doesn't hurt anybody. No healthy species in the world agrees with you. Mothers and fathers of every animal species (and humans too) have a hormonal desire to produce offspring. Robbing humans of this is dehumanizing. It's not just about sex. It's about completeness.
Human prevalence is as much a result of nature as anything is. Intelligent animals keep their species at its highest possible rung on the food chain. No animal as of yet has been psychotic enough to systematically & intentionally attempt to forfeit the well-being of its species in favor of other species. I suppose if our species is so dumb, we deserve whatever consequences we will naturally incur.
> For examples of what I consider to be valid measures and explorations of overpopulation and carrying capacity, I suggest...
I was hoping for some meaty intellectual (or at least scientific) sources. The sites you linked to are nothing activist sites. They are not information, they are propaganda. Is this the kind of research you do?
Here's more information than you probably ever knew about your sources:
Paul Chefurka is a photojournalist amd computer (not natural) scientist. (Missing from this list: natural scientist, mathematician.) He apparently became an environmental activist after a 2-year emotional crisis. Works in print: none.
Bruce Sundquist is a trail guide with the Sierra Club-- a group known for its extensive political activism. Works in print: trail guides.
I would have been willing to do some reading on either site if I'd know where to start. Unfortunately, they both just seemed to be disorganized mass of links to their own respective (endless, propagandistic) writings.
Interestingly, the most credible source you linked to was the least relevant, and ironically, the most obscure. "Gail the Actuary" is actually a successful financial mathematician.
She has published a book on malpractice insurance, as well as several articles on peak oil (both in actuarial magazines, not scientific journals). I found the peak oil debate to be quite fascinating (amusing?) if not totally without credibility. The only problem: what does this have to do with overpopulation again?
Well, that's all for my run-on comment. Hope I haven't scared anyone away. Rebuttals are welcome, and I hope to see you back soon!
Peace. --Jacob
>"Or maybe you think "birth control" (i.e. esp. killing the unborn) doesn't hurt anybody. No healthy species in the world agrees with you. Mothers and fathers of every animal species (and humans too) have a hormonal desire to produce offspring. Robbing humans of this is dehumanizing. It's not just about sex. It's about completeness.
>"Human prevalence is as much a result of nature as anything is. Intelligent animals keep their species at its highest possible rung on the food chain. No animal as of yet has been psychotic enough to systematically & intentionally attempt to forfeit the well-being of its species in favor of other species. I suppose if our species is so dumb, we deserve whatever consequences we will naturally incur."
This is simply brilliant. Unfortunately, it seems like careful thinking does, in fact, scare away would-be commentators. Or maybe their just trying to let you have the last word. :D
Maybe he was never really looking for a reply in the first place... Oh, well; I still had some fun anyway. :)
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