Have we expanded beyond the planets capacity to support us? If so how do we solve this problem? Is an environmental collapse (ice age) necessary to regulate our species?
2006-10-19 06:54:31 · 12 answers · asked by Edit_Cat 2 in Environment
No. The earth could support a lot more people, but there is a caveat to this: not with the standard of living enjoyed by westerners at this stage. Such a standard of living would be possible world wide only with a drastic reduction in raw material wastage, and a quantum increase in processes efficiency. And while those are possibles, there is not much willingness to go that way right now.
2006-10-19 06:59:31 · answer #1 · answered by Vincent G 7 · 2⤊ 2⤋
Short answer: no. A report I read a few weeks ago (someone help me out if you know who wrote it) said we could sustain a population of 60+ billion people. And the environmental stabilization you seek is not necessary, as the world's population should stabilize around 2050 at 10 billion people.
In industrialized nations the population is not increasing because new humans are born, it is increasing because of immigrants. Only in developing countries do you see population increases and when those countries are advanced, the same trend will continue.
2006-10-19 15:32:10 · answer #2 · answered by Anonymous · 2⤊ 1⤋
No. Farmland is a cheap $1400 per acre here in Arkansas. The government pays land owners to take their land out of production. Farmers could grow a lot more food out here if they had to feed more people. As it is they can hardly eke out a living. The myth of overpopulation is a favorite of the liberal doom-and-gloomers. When I was a kid they tried to scare us by saying the earth had passed 4 billion persons, and that there was a population explosion.
2006-10-19 15:53:25 · answer #3 · answered by af490 3 · 0⤊ 1⤋
Short answer is no. When an animal consumes past its means in an area, the animal dies out do to lack of resources (usually food). This is the common state for animals (constantly overproducing with the extras or weaker member starving and dying out).
You could argue that in some places with low resources, Ethiopia for example, that there are too many humans. But we are about the only animal that has not consumed ourselves to starvation based on lack of resources in most areas. There is NO evidence that people anywhere, including western countries, are overconsuming.
EDIT: By the way, "quantum" does not mean a large step, it means a definite, digital, integral (for example) step and is usually denoting something quite tiny.
2006-10-19 14:00:05 · answer #4 · answered by PoohP 4 · 4⤊ 2⤋
Of course not. The only species to feel guilty about being successful are humans. We seem to be a guilt ridden species, at least a large percentage of us. It is pretty rediculous in my opinion.
2006-10-19 16:17:39 · answer #5 · answered by JimZ 7 · 0⤊ 1⤋
no! there are always this many people at this time in TheTorah. and the earth is more than capable of supporting many times more. if we just don't concentrate on technology of killing each other, and concentrate on living with G-D. TheTorah Happening is only 6818 man years in length. and if we screw it up, as we are today. we must come back, and do this all over to the third and fourth visitation. if we get it right once, we enter GanEden with G-D. without all of this terrorism, to plague us for not being true to HIM. shalomcha vshalomech!
2006-10-19 15:38:30 · answer #6 · answered by yehoshooa adam 3 · 1⤊ 2⤋
You should take a road trip across the western US. We have lots of room to house people, grow food and in reallity there are many natural resources available for use. We need to be wise with our resources and despose of our waste responsibly. We could tripe the population of the Earth and still have plenty.
2006-10-19 14:25:11 · answer #7 · answered by Answergirl 5 · 2⤊ 2⤋
I think so, there are soo many people now and our resources are being used faster than they are made. People are also being born faster than they die so the population is going up. So in my opinion there are too many people.
2006-10-19 13:58:33 · answer #8 · answered by Anonymous · 1⤊ 3⤋
yes- every now and then though the population is levelled out though, by some sort of epidemic or something
2006-10-19 15:26:16 · answer #9 · answered by Anonymous · 0⤊ 2⤋
i belive there is. yesterday they counted over 300 million here in the US alone.
2006-10-19 14:01:45 · answer #10 · answered by Anonymous · 1⤊ 4⤋