The myth of overpopulation

[Nimos]

Frankly, I am flabbergasted that there are even people saying with a straight face that there might be no problem.

It is so darned obvious that there is.

Edited to add: since there is apparently a need to spell it out, here are some reasons why we must indeed attempt to reverse the current trends.

1. Human demographic problems are, by their very nature, politically difficult to handle and take literal generations to even attempt to address.

2. Human multiplication is, and has always been, geometric. Our ability to handle the resulting challenges most definitely does not grow geometrically, and even if it did, that would hardly be a free pass for neglecting those challenges.

3. Humans have been rather demanding of each other and of the environment, in several different ways - politically, economically, socially, and even by a purely cultural perspective. We have actually reached the time in history where there is actual hatred between competing narratives, and a stream of hope for destructive confrontation to "solve" those tensions feeding that hatred. Those are formidable, very tiring, very wasteful and demoralizing challenges that will not go away any time soon, and only become more difficult to address as population numbers rise.

4. The planet itself is very much a finite resource, and talk about going to other planets is ultimately a pipe dream. It is not like the resources for significant migration are even conceivable, nor would that be an actual solution for the demographic pressures in any case.

5. As significant numbers of various overlooked minorities grow, it becomes that much harder to even understand the actual challenges ahead of us, let alone solve them. And the actual measures used become that much more gross and destructive even when correctly chosen and implemented, as well.

6. One of the most dire aspects of the current trends is massive cultural and economic estrangement. Wealth distribution has become so loopsided that there is actual willingness to doubt the very existence of the empoverished masses. That is a very dangerous, very unstable situation.

7. While our cultures have become more ambitious and more specialized, there is always the need to sustain the weight of that ambition, both economically, socially and in the educational aspect. Every achievement needs a multitude of effort to support it. As populations grown without properly addressing the flaws and injustices in those support structures, those flaws become grimmer and more destructive.

8. In order to cope with the various forms of loss of quality of life, we have been increasingly more accepting of chemical dependence and other forms of alienation. That amounts to effectively giving up our own ability to accept reality and deal with each other. Both a result and an aggravator of the other problems caused by overpopulation.

I think you should watch the presentation I linked. Its not just some random dude sharing random ideas. He is a professor, which is not something you become by just taking an exam

 

[Cooky]

Serious social reform, with an emphasis on family planning, the phasing out of the nuclear family, and decisive focus on education and wealth redistribution.

Has that been proven effective anywhere ever?

 

[Stanyon]

Serious social reform, with an emphasis on family planning, the phasing out of the nuclear family, and decisive focus on education and wealth redistribution.

Not trying to be contrary but I am interested and it raises more than a few questions, here's a few:

What type of social reforms do you think would be effective?
China already has Family planning, it was one child per family then it was relaxed in 2013 so they can now have two
Would there be consequences or penalties for having more than a specified number of children and what would happen to them?
Would there be forced abortions?
What would be the reasoning to phase out nuclear families and how do you think that would help?
Wealth redistribution, how would that be implemented?

and if it fails?

 

[David T]

Problem solved:

Singapore Wants to Build Massive Floating Suburbs | Hakai Magazine

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0029801818319875?via=ihub

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0959652619306900?via=ihub

Now with scientists from all over the world working on this, it might not be long before it becomes a reality.

What I think would be interesting, would be to see floating suburbs interconnected by underwater high speed trains.

Another interesting idea for building on under floaring suburbs:
View attachment 28815
The new frontier for ultra-wealthy tourists? Underwater hotels and restaurants

The sea may truly become the new frontier, where possibilities seem endless.

Narrcisism knows no bounds .

 

[oldbadger]

Problem solved:

Now with scientists from all over the world working on this, it might not be long before it becomes a reality.

What I think would be interesting, would be to see floating suburbs interconnected by underwater high speed trains.

Another interesting idea for building on under floaring suburbs:

The sea may truly become the new frontier, where possibilities seem endless.

The population of the World has doubled in 50 years.

1 million species are threatened with extinction (A UN report)

And there are still folks around in total denial about Global Warming and the extreme hazards that we face.

And the unreasonable wealth of the ultra-rich needs to be flowing towards the unreasonably ultra-poor.

 

[Cooky]

View attachment 28822
Narrcisism knows no bounds .

Yeess... The pessimism is strong in you.

 

[David T]

Yeess... The pessimism is strong in you.

View attachment 28824

I think harkonnen is a better analogy since dune is an environmental story.

 

[Twilight Hue]

Problem solved:

Singapore Wants to Build Massive Floating Suburbs | Hakai Magazine

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0029801818319875?via=ihub

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0959652619306900?via=ihub

Now with scientists from all over the world working on this, it might not be long before it becomes a reality.

What I think would be interesting, would be to see floating suburbs interconnected by underwater high speed trains.

Another interesting idea for building on under floaring suburbs:
View attachment 28815
The new frontier for ultra-wealthy tourists? Underwater hotels and restaurants

The sea may truly become the new frontier, where possibilities seem endless.

Wow. Bioshock in real life.

 

[Brickjectivity]

Apparently metallic glass is just as cheap to make as plastic now.

https://www.google.com/amp/s/phys.org/news/2011-05-strong-tough-cheap-metallic-glass.amp

I wonder if that is strong and light enough to create a vacuum chamber that is lighter than air? Wouldn't that change transportation?

Here is a resource with numbers. This particular glass has a compressive strength of 2400 MPa
Bulk metallic glasses and their composites : composition optimization, thermal stability, and microstructural tunability

If I feel like it later maybe I'll attempt to roughly calculate whether it would work. Its probably not strong enough and light enough. It would be so cool though.


Here's a wikipedia article about it: Vacuum airship - Wikipedia

 

[Twilight Hue]

Not trying to be contrary but I am interested and it raises more than a few questions, here's a few:

What type of social reforms do you think would be effective?
China already has Family planning, it was one child per family then it was relaxed in 2013 so they can now have two
Would there be consequences or penalties for having more than a specified number of children and what would happen to them?
Would there be forced abortions?
What would be the reasoning to phase out nuclear families and how do you think that would help?
Wealth redistribution, how would that be implemented?

and if it fails?

Solution? Easy enough. Just stop trying to cheat nature.

Remove all seat belt and helmet laws.

Bring trans fat back into Foods. That's why food was so gosh darn tasty in the first place back in the day.

Bring back asbestos lined brakes, they really were reliable.

Give smokers their freedom back.

Screw catalytic converters and def fluids. Let the diesel burn black.

Allow people to drink alcohol in their cars again like in the early 70s.

That people naturally decide their own fate in life instead of trying to control it for them.


Anything else we could do in the sixties and seventies that we can't do now.

 

[Nimos]

Problem solved:

Singapore Wants to Build Massive Floating Suburbs | Hakai Magazine

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0029801818319875?via=ihub

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0959652619306900?via=ihub

Now with scientists from all over the world working on this, it might not be long before it becomes a reality.

What I think would be interesting, would be to see floating suburbs interconnected by underwater high speed trains.

Another interesting idea for building on under floaring suburbs:
View attachment 28815
The new frontier for ultra-wealthy tourists? Underwater hotels and restaurants

The sea may truly become the new frontier, where possibilities seem endless.

You probably already heard about the Venus project, but if you haven't it does have some interesting ideas, that you might find informative to what you are talking about.

 

[Thief]

saw a report on the population in Japan

seems there are people living in the buildings so far up
their feet have never touched the earth

literally

 

[Thief]

the earth can support 9billion people
fresh water and basic elements become scarce after that

anyone remember?....Soylent Green

 

[Erebus]

I felt a calling to enter this thread.
Weird, eh.

What constitutes over-population?
I see 2 competing meanings.....
1) Can't feed or house all the people we have.
2) We have so many people that our environment is degraded, eg,
seas being emptied of life, the anthropocene extinction, housing
becoming very expensive because of crowding, draining of ancient
aquifers for short term needs.

#1 doesn't apply.
But #2 is a clear & present thingie.

Just wanted to ask for clarification on something here. When you say point 1) doesn't apply, do you mean it doesn't apply currently or that it will never apply?

 

[Revoltingest]

Just wanted to ask for clarification on something here. When you say point 1) doesn't apply, do you mean it doesn't apply currently or that it will never apply?

Currently.
We could pack in many billions more, & still feed them.
But ugh....what a nasty mess that would be.

 

[Erebus]

Currently.
We could pack in many billions more, & still feed them.
But ugh....what a nasty mess that would be.

Ahh I'm with you.

I largely agree, though I would suggest "many billions" is perhaps optimistic. While homelessness and starvation are certainly current issues, they've always been issues. I'm hesitant to blame it on overpopulation when poor resource management and distribution is a more likely cause.

In the future though ... yeah, mass starvation is a very real threat if we're talking about indefinite population growth.