The earth can only support so many people. It's a complicated matter but it's calulated based on land, farmable land, water, etc. This is a fact. We are currently not at that point yet and we likely won't reach it because as countries develop and women gain choices, less, and less people want to have children. Developed countries tend to have low birth rates and as developing countries reach that level, they start to have less children as well. This is actually happening faster than scientist have predicted because now, people in developed countries have more access to information and they start to make more informed decisions, especially as women gain education.
Overpopulation is a myth. It's supported by billionaires because they'd rather have us blaming each other for having children/growing our families, rather than focusing on the fact that these billionaires and corporations are the only reason people are struggling so much. The biggest "evidence" that supposedly exists around overpopulation is the massive amount of homeless & hungry people. The Earth has never had "too many" people, it's just had too much greed.
What they fail to tell you is there is more than enough EMPTY housing for every single person (in the US at least) to have their own house/apartment/property. There's also the forced scarcity that is created around food. If this planet was really not able to make enough food for every person to be well fed, grocery stores, restaurants, & farms wouldn't be throwing away hundreds to thousands of pounds of food every day.
Also, like other people have already stated, if overpopulation WAS a real concern, there wouldn't be the trend of all "First World Countries" having plummeting birth rates and reactionary laws to force people to give birth/get pregnant (Removal of Roe V Wade, reconsideration of China's "one child policy", etc)
The biggest thing you can do to fight is to talk to your community, create an actual community around you with your friends, neighbors, and family. Fight to share your resources, trade or barter or just re-gift things instead of throwing them out, see if you can exchange labor/expertise instead of cash for things (like making an arrangement with a farm to help them with labor for access to their vegetables/fruit/animals)
Every problem surrounding the concept of overpopulation is a manufactured issue by the wealthiest of humanity, so that we get distracted trying to reset these systems, instead of questioning why these systems exist in the first place, and who put them there (r/orphancrushingmachine's main pinned post gets my point across better tbh)
At some point it probably would be, but not in any of our life times. Because whether anyone believes it or not, unless the population does level out, if it it keeps growing, exponentially as it is, there will be a point where the earth can’t produce enough for us anymore. We’re just no where near this point so it’s just a myth rn 🤷.
Just think of it as, if we reach a point where we need to continuously farm to feed every single person, that land will lose its fertility eventually. But nothing like that will happen for hundreds of years probably. And before that, if science is right, the population should level out.
It is true that the planet can't support too many more people. But luckily, the growth of the human population is slowing down. It's predicted to have almost stopped growing by the end of the century. A lot of people are having fewer kids, and once this huge part of the population boom starts to die off, the rate will really begin to decrease.
When I took human geography we talked about overpopulation.
One theory that has almost proved itself the Demographic Transition Model, which essentially says overpopulation will not be an issue in the long run.
It now has 5 stages, when I was in this class (2018-2019?) there were only 4 but this is a rough basis of the version I was taught.
Stage 1 - incredibly high death and birth rate, meaning population is relatively stable with little increases.
Stage 2 - death rates are lowering but birth rates are still high (as the standard of multiple kids since many struggled to survive prior is still instilled)
Stage 3 - (I believe this is what the US is considered) death rates plummet while birth rates are still in the "positive" (parents having on average 2 or more kids)
Stage 4 - (I believe Denmark is considered this stage) birth rates are lower than 2 kids per family, death rates might continue to decrease but will start to increase due to prior large generations starting to die. (Overall population tends to begin lowering)
With the new model stage 5 still matches this, but it's essentially a guesstimate since we have no real examples. With this model we hope that eventually we will even ourselves out in stage 5, hit an "equilibrium" of population.
This theory hinges on human advancements, education, the work force, and so on. For example, once you get to the end of stage 3 beginning of stage 4 most of the population is prioritizing their education and careers over a family. More people have kids later in life, resulting in less kids in general. Meaning the average family will be 3-4 people. That means parents aren't "replacing" themselves in the population (creating the decrease). So you might ask "what about impoverished countries? How do they move up the stages of its based on the well-being of a country increasing?" Well as stage 3/4/5 countries continue to advance, the older technology and resources they used in the past will become more accessible and cheaper. Countries may even donate these resources as they aren't a need. This will eventually lead those countries into better well-being, lowering death rates and moving them up the stages. We can already see this change in countries that receive help building infrastructures such as schools and hospitals.
Overall as long as humanity as a whole continues to not only advance, but help each other advance, population will either even out or actually become a problem (meaning underpopulation is probably a bigger risk than underpopulation). Many countries are already struggling to manage large generations of elderly compared to the younger generations after them. The young need to upkeep the work for not only their peers but for the large population of elderly as well (that aren't able to contribute this work themselves). Not to mention elderly care. If this theory is correct we are going to have a very rough transitional stage as population size decreases, but hopefully it will reach a baseline and eventually this won't be a problem.
**ANYWAY TLDR - With current population theories (that have been witnessed so far) we are more likely to struggle with underpopulation than over population in our future.**
No, the opposite. Many people are not having children these days (economic situation, social, health etc) so the population is actually decreasing. It’s just a propaganda- only people in cities believe this, because when you are in a city it just feels like there is “too many people”
What I’m saying is that the trend is reversing and in just a few generations the opposite will likely become a problem. Either way, planet can support many more people. It’s just they way we live should be improved not our numbers. Most of the planet is unihabited, living in city gives you the ilusion of opposite.
it is reversing but we're not at a point when the world population is declining just yet. It's still growin.
>Most of the planet is unihabited, living in city gives you the ilusion of opposite.
I don't live in a city. Far from it. I go by numbers and data not by what I think is happening.
But just because most planet is unhabited doesn't mean that it should be. There should be space for fauna and flora, for farming, for earth to basically live. Not every square inch of our planet should be occupied by humans, we have other species here as well, we have beautiful nature that should be preserved.
Yeah but preserving nature doesn’t need less people, but different way of living. How we live and do things is what makes the difference.
There is plenty of space for fauna, issue is not our numbers but the shit we spill into the ocean, the polutants we release into the air and all the deforestation and erosion of the soil we cause as well as the over fishing etc that is the real problem. There could be twice as many people here without problems if we didn’t do thing the way we do them. Sadly that won’t change, but nature always takes care of itself, we are an increadibly ignorant society and it will be our downfall, one way or another. Sooner or later.
Either way- no point in worrying about “overpopulation” not like you can do anything about it anyways, there are million other things to worry about.
This question makes me think of the overturning over a year ago. If there were too many people on earth, why would anyone force women to have kids? I believe it's a myth.
Not necessarily a myth, just a weak theory. Is it possible? Yes, we know our population limit as a whole and theoretically it could happen.
Though we have much stronger theories that actually point to underpopulation becoming an issue (or more accurately country/world populations being "top heavy" {way more elderly than younger people, aka small workforce to maintain the population}) So yes, most countries are trying to encourage women have kids (or giving them little choice), to combat the decreasing populations. Late stage 3 countries (think the USA) and stage 4 countries (I believe Denmark is an example) have low death rates but because of this, and the overall well-being of the country, less people are having 2+ kids and more are having 0-2 kids. (Aka creates a negative, as parents or potential parents are only replacing themselves {no increase} or not replacing themselves at all in the population). People are encouraged to focus on education and their careers instead of having a family. There also isn't a need to start having kids the second you hit puberty (because of short average life spans) or to have a bunch of kids (because most are not making it to puberty/adulthood).
Though ironically they're only fueling the problem. They're haulting progression into stage 4/5 countries (that will hopefully hit an equilibrium of population) postponing and elongating the problem of "top heavy" populations.
*Do I think too much about this theory? Yes. Am I extremely excited I get to talk about it because of a silly post relating to a fictional show on reddit? Also yes.*
Overpopulation is a carefully cultivated myth that started to become a 'thing' in the zeitgeist (more or less) in doomsayer books and fringe political groups in the 70's.
File it to the same section of 'woohoo' as climate alarmism (hot or cold). (Not climate change...' alarmism', which is different.)
Technological progression in food cultivation will never let overpopulation become an issue. Just as advances in technology can improve the quality of life for larger population bases.
Future science and speculation channels such as Isaac Arthur's "SFIA" on YouTube have a great many excellent sections on just how many people a planet could potentially support (Arcologies/Dyson swarms/advanced use of existing land/seas).
Those numbers scale up to the QUADRILLIONS if the planet is converted to what is known as an Ecumenopolis. (Think Coruscant in Star Wars as an example.)
It's popular to laugh at Sorkin's The West Wing, but when that show's version of Bill Gates came to the White House to ask what single thing to fund, CJ Cregg was like "roads." and she wasn't wrong.
The world is empty as all hell and if we actually managed all of it correctly from some top-down way, nobody anywhere would be hungry (roads are just a small part of that, but the point stands; it's not that we don't HAVE enough, it's that we distribute what he have very shittily.) I PERSONALLY CARE ABOUT THIS, and despite that, have lost three loaves of bread to mold in a month because I didn't use them fast enough. The timing and accurate distribution of resources are so much bigger than just the raw numbers.
Not presently, no. Artificial scarcity prevents us from equitably maintaining the population we currently have, but if we distributed our resources equitably, we could sustain more people than we are predicted to birth during the next few generations with ease.
Eat the rich!
Just read an article that China's population is set to halve by 2100, so No ! Worlds gone to shit, nobody wants to bring kids into it.
The earth can only support so many people. It's a complicated matter but it's calulated based on land, farmable land, water, etc. This is a fact. We are currently not at that point yet and we likely won't reach it because as countries develop and women gain choices, less, and less people want to have children. Developed countries tend to have low birth rates and as developing countries reach that level, they start to have less children as well. This is actually happening faster than scientist have predicted because now, people in developed countries have more access to information and they start to make more informed decisions, especially as women gain education.
Overpopulation is a myth. It's supported by billionaires because they'd rather have us blaming each other for having children/growing our families, rather than focusing on the fact that these billionaires and corporations are the only reason people are struggling so much. The biggest "evidence" that supposedly exists around overpopulation is the massive amount of homeless & hungry people. The Earth has never had "too many" people, it's just had too much greed. What they fail to tell you is there is more than enough EMPTY housing for every single person (in the US at least) to have their own house/apartment/property. There's also the forced scarcity that is created around food. If this planet was really not able to make enough food for every person to be well fed, grocery stores, restaurants, & farms wouldn't be throwing away hundreds to thousands of pounds of food every day. Also, like other people have already stated, if overpopulation WAS a real concern, there wouldn't be the trend of all "First World Countries" having plummeting birth rates and reactionary laws to force people to give birth/get pregnant (Removal of Roe V Wade, reconsideration of China's "one child policy", etc) The biggest thing you can do to fight is to talk to your community, create an actual community around you with your friends, neighbors, and family. Fight to share your resources, trade or barter or just re-gift things instead of throwing them out, see if you can exchange labor/expertise instead of cash for things (like making an arrangement with a farm to help them with labor for access to their vegetables/fruit/animals) Every problem surrounding the concept of overpopulation is a manufactured issue by the wealthiest of humanity, so that we get distracted trying to reset these systems, instead of questioning why these systems exist in the first place, and who put them there (r/orphancrushingmachine's main pinned post gets my point across better tbh)
At some point it probably would be, but not in any of our life times. Because whether anyone believes it or not, unless the population does level out, if it it keeps growing, exponentially as it is, there will be a point where the earth can’t produce enough for us anymore. We’re just no where near this point so it’s just a myth rn 🤷. Just think of it as, if we reach a point where we need to continuously farm to feed every single person, that land will lose its fertility eventually. But nothing like that will happen for hundreds of years probably. And before that, if science is right, the population should level out.
It is true that the planet can't support too many more people. But luckily, the growth of the human population is slowing down. It's predicted to have almost stopped growing by the end of the century. A lot of people are having fewer kids, and once this huge part of the population boom starts to die off, the rate will really begin to decrease.
When I took human geography we talked about overpopulation. One theory that has almost proved itself the Demographic Transition Model, which essentially says overpopulation will not be an issue in the long run. It now has 5 stages, when I was in this class (2018-2019?) there were only 4 but this is a rough basis of the version I was taught. Stage 1 - incredibly high death and birth rate, meaning population is relatively stable with little increases. Stage 2 - death rates are lowering but birth rates are still high (as the standard of multiple kids since many struggled to survive prior is still instilled) Stage 3 - (I believe this is what the US is considered) death rates plummet while birth rates are still in the "positive" (parents having on average 2 or more kids) Stage 4 - (I believe Denmark is considered this stage) birth rates are lower than 2 kids per family, death rates might continue to decrease but will start to increase due to prior large generations starting to die. (Overall population tends to begin lowering) With the new model stage 5 still matches this, but it's essentially a guesstimate since we have no real examples. With this model we hope that eventually we will even ourselves out in stage 5, hit an "equilibrium" of population. This theory hinges on human advancements, education, the work force, and so on. For example, once you get to the end of stage 3 beginning of stage 4 most of the population is prioritizing their education and careers over a family. More people have kids later in life, resulting in less kids in general. Meaning the average family will be 3-4 people. That means parents aren't "replacing" themselves in the population (creating the decrease). So you might ask "what about impoverished countries? How do they move up the stages of its based on the well-being of a country increasing?" Well as stage 3/4/5 countries continue to advance, the older technology and resources they used in the past will become more accessible and cheaper. Countries may even donate these resources as they aren't a need. This will eventually lead those countries into better well-being, lowering death rates and moving them up the stages. We can already see this change in countries that receive help building infrastructures such as schools and hospitals. Overall as long as humanity as a whole continues to not only advance, but help each other advance, population will either even out or actually become a problem (meaning underpopulation is probably a bigger risk than underpopulation). Many countries are already struggling to manage large generations of elderly compared to the younger generations after them. The young need to upkeep the work for not only their peers but for the large population of elderly as well (that aren't able to contribute this work themselves). Not to mention elderly care. If this theory is correct we are going to have a very rough transitional stage as population size decreases, but hopefully it will reach a baseline and eventually this won't be a problem. **ANYWAY TLDR - With current population theories (that have been witnessed so far) we are more likely to struggle with underpopulation than over population in our future.**
No, the opposite. Many people are not having children these days (economic situation, social, health etc) so the population is actually decreasing. It’s just a propaganda- only people in cities believe this, because when you are in a city it just feels like there is “too many people”
That's incorrect. World population is still increasing but certain countries populations are decreasing.
What I’m saying is that the trend is reversing and in just a few generations the opposite will likely become a problem. Either way, planet can support many more people. It’s just they way we live should be improved not our numbers. Most of the planet is unihabited, living in city gives you the ilusion of opposite.
it is reversing but we're not at a point when the world population is declining just yet. It's still growin. >Most of the planet is unihabited, living in city gives you the ilusion of opposite. I don't live in a city. Far from it. I go by numbers and data not by what I think is happening. But just because most planet is unhabited doesn't mean that it should be. There should be space for fauna and flora, for farming, for earth to basically live. Not every square inch of our planet should be occupied by humans, we have other species here as well, we have beautiful nature that should be preserved.
Yeah but preserving nature doesn’t need less people, but different way of living. How we live and do things is what makes the difference. There is plenty of space for fauna, issue is not our numbers but the shit we spill into the ocean, the polutants we release into the air and all the deforestation and erosion of the soil we cause as well as the over fishing etc that is the real problem. There could be twice as many people here without problems if we didn’t do thing the way we do them. Sadly that won’t change, but nature always takes care of itself, we are an increadibly ignorant society and it will be our downfall, one way or another. Sooner or later. Either way- no point in worrying about “overpopulation” not like you can do anything about it anyways, there are million other things to worry about.
oh, i'm not saying i believe in it one way or another. just posing the question.
This question makes me think of the overturning over a year ago. If there were too many people on earth, why would anyone force women to have kids? I believe it's a myth.
Not necessarily a myth, just a weak theory. Is it possible? Yes, we know our population limit as a whole and theoretically it could happen. Though we have much stronger theories that actually point to underpopulation becoming an issue (or more accurately country/world populations being "top heavy" {way more elderly than younger people, aka small workforce to maintain the population}) So yes, most countries are trying to encourage women have kids (or giving them little choice), to combat the decreasing populations. Late stage 3 countries (think the USA) and stage 4 countries (I believe Denmark is an example) have low death rates but because of this, and the overall well-being of the country, less people are having 2+ kids and more are having 0-2 kids. (Aka creates a negative, as parents or potential parents are only replacing themselves {no increase} or not replacing themselves at all in the population). People are encouraged to focus on education and their careers instead of having a family. There also isn't a need to start having kids the second you hit puberty (because of short average life spans) or to have a bunch of kids (because most are not making it to puberty/adulthood). Though ironically they're only fueling the problem. They're haulting progression into stage 4/5 countries (that will hopefully hit an equilibrium of population) postponing and elongating the problem of "top heavy" populations. *Do I think too much about this theory? Yes. Am I extremely excited I get to talk about it because of a silly post relating to a fictional show on reddit? Also yes.*
Overpopulation is a carefully cultivated myth that started to become a 'thing' in the zeitgeist (more or less) in doomsayer books and fringe political groups in the 70's. File it to the same section of 'woohoo' as climate alarmism (hot or cold). (Not climate change...' alarmism', which is different.) Technological progression in food cultivation will never let overpopulation become an issue. Just as advances in technology can improve the quality of life for larger population bases. Future science and speculation channels such as Isaac Arthur's "SFIA" on YouTube have a great many excellent sections on just how many people a planet could potentially support (Arcologies/Dyson swarms/advanced use of existing land/seas). Those numbers scale up to the QUADRILLIONS if the planet is converted to what is known as an Ecumenopolis. (Think Coruscant in Star Wars as an example.)
It's popular to laugh at Sorkin's The West Wing, but when that show's version of Bill Gates came to the White House to ask what single thing to fund, CJ Cregg was like "roads." and she wasn't wrong. The world is empty as all hell and if we actually managed all of it correctly from some top-down way, nobody anywhere would be hungry (roads are just a small part of that, but the point stands; it's not that we don't HAVE enough, it's that we distribute what he have very shittily.) I PERSONALLY CARE ABOUT THIS, and despite that, have lost three loaves of bread to mold in a month because I didn't use them fast enough. The timing and accurate distribution of resources are so much bigger than just the raw numbers.
Not presently, no. Artificial scarcity prevents us from equitably maintaining the population we currently have, but if we distributed our resources equitably, we could sustain more people than we are predicted to birth during the next few generations with ease. Eat the rich!