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Debunking the Myth of Overpopulation
Anne Roback Morse and Steven W. Mosher
October 1, 2013
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We are contacted all the time by people asking for how they can refute the arguments that the world is overpopulated, so we have decided to create a short primer called “How to Debunk the Myth of Overpopulation in Three Easy Steps.”
Before we start, however, let’s define terms. Overpopulation describes a situation where the number of people exhausts the resources in a closed environment such that it can no longer support that population.
Let’s imagine that our PRI offices suddenly became a closed environment, with nothing allowed in our out. Obviously, our staff would exhaust the available resources very quickly: The water cooler would be drained dry, the refrigerator would be emptied out, and the oxygen would be all used up.
Obviously, our office has too many people for its natural resources, but we haven’t started trying to eliminate our co-workers to ensure our own survival. We haven’t launched a sterilization campaign against younger colleagues or encouraged older ones to jump out of the windows. Why not?
Well, of course, we are constrained by Catholic moral teaching. But aside from that, we know that the office is not a closed environment. Neither are most instances cited by overpopulation zealots, such as crowded cities or poor countries. None of these are closed environments.
Other instances of phony overpopulation occur when humans create artificially closed environments. If someone locked you in a room, most people wouldn’t blame your resulting demise on “the overpopulation of the room” but on the cruel person who locked you in. Similarly, if government policies prevent food from being transported to where it is needed, or distributed to those who are hungry, “overpopulation” is not to blame. It’s the policy, stupid.
Moreover, overpopulation is defined as a problem created by the numbers of people, not their behaviors. If every person demanded his or her own continent or island, the world would seem “overpopulated” very quickly.
Let’s keep these things in mind as we consider the argument that the earth, as a closed environment, is overpopulated. Is Spaceship Earth (as they like to call it), running out of resources? Let’s evaluate:
Food
“There isn’t enough!” Since the time of Thomas Malthus in the early 1800s, doomsayers have gloomily predicted that mankind would outbreed its food supply, resulting in catastrophic famines. Yet the world currently produces enough food to feed 10 billion people, and there are only 7 billion of us. That is, with 7 billion human minds at work, we produce enough food for 10 billion human bodies.[1] Imagine how much food we can produce with 10 billion minds!
“But there are still hungry people in the world!” Yes, hunger remains a problem in some parts of the world, but it is not caused by the number of people. Commenting on the recent Somali famine, Oxfam, an international humanitarian organization, stated, “Famines are not natural phenomena, they are catastrophic political failures.”
https://www.pop.org/debunking-the-myth-of-overpopulation/
Anne Roback Morse and Steven W. Mosher
October 1, 2013
Share on Twitter
Share on Facebook
We are contacted all the time by people asking for how they can refute the arguments that the world is overpopulated, so we have decided to create a short primer called “How to Debunk the Myth of Overpopulation in Three Easy Steps.”
Before we start, however, let’s define terms. Overpopulation describes a situation where the number of people exhausts the resources in a closed environment such that it can no longer support that population.
Let’s imagine that our PRI offices suddenly became a closed environment, with nothing allowed in our out. Obviously, our staff would exhaust the available resources very quickly: The water cooler would be drained dry, the refrigerator would be emptied out, and the oxygen would be all used up.
Obviously, our office has too many people for its natural resources, but we haven’t started trying to eliminate our co-workers to ensure our own survival. We haven’t launched a sterilization campaign against younger colleagues or encouraged older ones to jump out of the windows. Why not?
Well, of course, we are constrained by Catholic moral teaching. But aside from that, we know that the office is not a closed environment. Neither are most instances cited by overpopulation zealots, such as crowded cities or poor countries. None of these are closed environments.
Other instances of phony overpopulation occur when humans create artificially closed environments. If someone locked you in a room, most people wouldn’t blame your resulting demise on “the overpopulation of the room” but on the cruel person who locked you in. Similarly, if government policies prevent food from being transported to where it is needed, or distributed to those who are hungry, “overpopulation” is not to blame. It’s the policy, stupid.
Moreover, overpopulation is defined as a problem created by the numbers of people, not their behaviors. If every person demanded his or her own continent or island, the world would seem “overpopulated” very quickly.
Let’s keep these things in mind as we consider the argument that the earth, as a closed environment, is overpopulated. Is Spaceship Earth (as they like to call it), running out of resources? Let’s evaluate:
Food
“There isn’t enough!” Since the time of Thomas Malthus in the early 1800s, doomsayers have gloomily predicted that mankind would outbreed its food supply, resulting in catastrophic famines. Yet the world currently produces enough food to feed 10 billion people, and there are only 7 billion of us. That is, with 7 billion human minds at work, we produce enough food for 10 billion human bodies.[1] Imagine how much food we can produce with 10 billion minds!
“But there are still hungry people in the world!” Yes, hunger remains a problem in some parts of the world, but it is not caused by the number of people. Commenting on the recent Somali famine, Oxfam, an international humanitarian organization, stated, “Famines are not natural phenomena, they are catastrophic political failures.”
https://www.pop.org/debunking-the-myth-of-overpopulation/
kjen
So. You are unable to accept the fact that 'Spaceship Earth' DOES HAVE a Carrying Capacity.
