Watch this video first: http://www.npr.org/2011/10/31/141816460/visualizing-how-a-population-grows-to-7-billion


Okay, so after this video, something in me clicked. At first it was just at the mere fact that we increased from 300 million to 7 billion in 208 years. Then I started trying to fathom over the thought of over populating. I mean, we already have SOME problems from overpopulating. We have birth laws in China. We have a bunch of homeless and starving people, though some of homeless is from choice and a lot of the rest is just from being born into such a poor situation. Even though anyone can have an uprising with varying work, not every person either makes the effort or realizes it's possible. That's all beside my point, anyway. What are we going to do as the population continues to increase?

I mean, I guess one of the first thoughts would be to cut into more and more rural land to place more residences per sq. mile, but eventually you'll just get closer to farms and prevent farm expansion and would that really be worth it? Would having more places to accommodation more people really be worth the famine(since you'd obviously have more mouths to feed). Then the next step could be compacting cities even more to place more homes, but that isn't really convenient. That and energy usage would increase in those areas. However, nuclear energy is getting larger and larger and IS the way to go as it's more efficient and more green, but people are afraid to fully commit to it from the possible accidents that have happened in the past to get a lot of publicity.

Really, though, my main point is that the Earth's area IS finite. There's only SO MUCH that it can hold. What will we do then? When there's no more places to hold people? Birth laws? Obviously, that'd probably go before all the mentioned above, but the first thing and the thing I was thinking of during that video was getting out of this planet. I mean, right? This one starts to overflow or get close/be able to observe it happening soon, so one would think that we would need to simply leave it and find a new one. Not everyone, but you know.

This has seriously motivated and pumped me up so much that it's unexpected. It seriously makes me want to devote my entire life to getting our asses out of the milky-way or just to another planet and dying by either a natural death on the trip to wherever this place may be in, say, 60 years or of some scientific problem that assists in helping others continue on from my place. Anyway, I just had to get all my thoughts typed out while I had them. Feel free to discuss.

Carrying capacity

I'd assume we'll keep expanding until we shoot for the stars. Until then, I can only imagine that the problem countries, i.e. China, India, the US, et al. would have to create/continue some childbirth laws. Tragic, but overpopulation is a serious concern.

I think there are plenty of people out there who shouldn't even be having a single child at the present...

This will never happen.

Eventually, if places like China and India overflow, then immigration will be much more common than it already is. Not saying it's a bad thing, but some people would just rather live in their own country. :shrug: Then I mean you could start eventually applying age req's for having children and that would work wonders in first-world countries like the US and others. But the point is being that neither of these are permanent solutions when the Earth is most undoubtedly FINITE. There WILL be an end and our progression in science NEEDS to be prepared for that.

I took a class that went over all of this. What I learned? :shrug: I don't remember Nah, really, we are overpopulating and running out of natural resources and something about http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demographic_transition

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vZVOU5bfHrM

Man, that's an awful pessimistic way to think. Come on, really. Just because as far as our current discoveries stand, it's impossible, doesn't NEARLY mean that it's impossible in the future. Will I get us there? Who knows. But thinking "I probably won't, no reason to try." isn't the way to get there and who's to say it'll stop me from devoting my life to it?

Somehow, I envision this thread devolving dangerously close to a few restricted topics...

That said, I've thought about it many times, and other than blasting our asses off of this rock like you said in your OP, (which with today's technology is near impossible) it'd take massive shifts in in social, economic, and religious views, all at once, to change out current growth. That's my thought on it at least, and I dare not elaborate.

Yeah, with todays tech it's definitely impossible. BUT THAT'S THE POINT. To advance the technology PAST this point. ^.^

The Milky Way has a diameter of 100,000 LY. We are 25,000 LY from the center. So even if we were able to travel the speed of light, it would take us 75,000 years to get out of the galaxy.

Exactly. Traveling faster than the speed of light is the goal.

If only.....

Who's to say that we won't find such a discovery that it leads to exponentially increasing in the speed that we can travel, eventually far exceeding the speed of light? What if we discover how to perform the Instant Transmission Technique and never have to worry about anything but training to sense energy from further distance and passing on the skill? That's the thing. We just CAN'T predict it exactly. There WILL be some sort of law-breaking discovery found at some point as there have been a few and whether that's in the next century or millennium, we just don't know. =D

Is that math correct? And when it says that everyone on earth could live in Texas, that would be just houses side to side, with no grocery stores, or anyone having any sort of property (in terms of yards, farms etc)?

Seems like the math is alright. I just posted a response to one of the commenter's shoddy math. Apparently there's enough land area (I'm presuming he assumed mountains were flat, and that his numbers were correct) to give everyone on the planet a plot of land the size of 2.76 football fields. That's also assuming my math was right :whistling:

Now, that doesn't address the real issue, which is distribution of wealth. Starvation isn't the result of overpopulation in general. It's the result of overpopulation in third world countries. I mean, has anyone watched Epic Meal Time? That's a wonderful demonstration of distribution of wealth.

We'll run out of fossil fuels before we run out of land.

I'ma gonna have me fourteen little chitlens!

It's very noble of you to provide aid to cannibalistic cultures.

Sorry, I don't adhere to the Gospel of Flesh.

One of the biggest problems the world faces, and one that is largely overlooked, is that three of the worlds biggest populations (China, India and Pakistan), have a massive shortage of clean, drinkable water. All these three countries are in close proximity to each other, all suffer already from poverty and overcrowding, all have problems with industrial pollution, and are all nuclear armed.

Sure, water might not seem like a pressing issue right now, but given 20 or so years there is definitely the chance for conflict over basic resources. Oil might be the thing in the media at the moment, but you can't drink, farm, or raise livestock with oil.

energy, homelessness, hunger, mass extinction, deforestation, fossil fuels, giant garbage masses in the ocean... and so on. are not problems, they are effects. the problem is the "cause" to the effects. and even if you exand beyond our solar system the effects will follow you as long as the cause remains.

Malthusian thinking has been proven incorrect too many times already.

Humans can adapt, invent, and improve through tech when the need becomes apparent. Don't underestimate our ability to give nature the middle finger.

Human tasty om nom nom. :drool:

Yep. But we better get our butts in gear, since we're going to need energy to lift that finger.

What are we gonna do? Probably enforce strict birth laws. Not unlike China. Maybe stricter, depending on how bad overpopulation gets over the next few decades.


You don't know that. Our current model of physics says we can't travel faster than light, but there's no reason to believe it's entirely correct. Five hundred years ago, people probably thought going in outer space was impossible. We all know how that turned out. It's possible we could be traveling at speeds faster than or equal to that of light within our lifetimes. That said, it's also highly unlikely. But the possibility remains.