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September 14th, 2007
 | 02:54 pm - Apocalyptic Myths: Overpopulation
I grew up in the 1970s with various pronouncements about the horrors of overpopulation, and when I was in college in the 1980s, I heard more of the same, except from one professor of economic anthropology. He talked about urbanization and demographic transitions and how all trends were pointing towards world population growth rates falling, and how he expected world population to stabilize at well below current predictions.
I was hopeful, but also quite dubious. The data of the past 20 years has caused me to agree with him, but from a recent discussion on rpg.net and various posts I've seen on lj over the past year, the myth of dangerous overpopulation is still very much alive. However, at this point I'm calling it a myth. The rate population growth has fallen continuously for the past 40 years. In addition, pretty much every prediction about future world population has been wrong, all of them have been too high. The world population has consistently grown more slowly than predicted and that rate of growth is continuously slowing. Already, the rate of population growth is negative in most of the first world, and the only reason the US population is still growing is immigration.
These days, most of the reliable predictions I've seen indicate that the world population will stop growing between 2050 and 2070. The reasons for this is a combination of economics and urbanization. People who are not desperately poor farmers have many fewer children than those who are, and urban people have fewer children than rural people, in large part because children are (for a wide variety of reasons) more expensive and less economically useful in cities. Half the population of the world already lives in cities, and current predictions indicate that this will rise to at least 80% by 2050.
For reference, here's some data from 1998, and some more recent data
Looking at the data from the first link on Population for World and Major Areas is particularly interesting, since it clearly shows how important the link between economics and population growth is. The predictions for growth between 1998 and 2050 in all areas of the world except Africa are fairly modest, none of the other regions doubles in population, and in fact the largest predicted increase is by a factor of 1.6 (for Latin America). In vivid contrast, Africa is predicted to add more than one billion people in 50 years, increasing in population by a factor of 2.35. In short, more than 1/3 of the total growth in the world's population over the next 50 years will be in Africa.
The reason for this is because sub-Saharan Africa is pretty much the only region of the planet where life has not been getting considerably better for the inhabitants over the last few decades. It's hard to say if life there is getting worse or is merely continuously horrid, but the improvements that are doing so much for the rest of the planet are largely absent there. My own prediction is that the world population will stop growing between 2050 and 2060 at somewhere between 8 and 9 billion, and will then start to decline slowly.
On a darkly amusing note, the popular press and governments of the first world have recently noticed the vast decline in first world birthrates, and the predictable reaction is vile and hopefully pointless nonsense (in the sense that I hope all these efforts to encourage breeding utterly fail) like this article. From my PoV, a falling population is something to celebrate, since it lightens the resource load on the planet and increases potential material abundance. From a transhumanist PoV, it's also exceptionally good news, since I'm betting that significant increases in longevity will be available quite soon, and negative birthrate growth plus increasing longevity is a good combo for long-term stability.
In any case, the next time you hear about the horrors of overpopulation, it's worth remembering that while 8-9 billion people is definitely a lot of people, the end of overpopulation isn't all that far away, and the 1970s and 80s predictions of a continuously growing population and world population exceeding 10 or 12 billion are thankfully wrong and anyone who claims otherwise is working off of old data. It's also worth remembering that the best way to curb overpopulation is to help the third world develop vigorous and sustainable urban economies. The current Chinese investment in African industry may well do more for Africa than either the well meaning work of many western charities or the various vile and deeply corrupt development efforts by the World Bank and IMF. In any case, the population problem is not only soluble, it's actually solving itself and the only question is how fast it can be solved.
Current Mood: ![[mood icon]](http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/mood/opiummmm/foxies/happy.gif) pleased
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Comments:
![[User Picture]](http://l-userpic.livejournal.com/89353729/341215) | | From: | ![[info]](http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif) pyat |
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| Date: | September 14th, 2007 10:53 pm (UTC) |
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What I usually argue that the countries best able to support able to support a large population are usually also the countries were it will never be a problem, barring some huge disaster.
Sadly, in the countries were it will become a problem, it's ultimately self-correcting.
![[User Picture]](http://l-userpic.livejournal.com/41589928/454961) | | From: | alobar |
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| Date: | September 14th, 2007 11:00 pm (UTC) |
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| | Hogwash! | (Link) |
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Most, if not all of the items on this page are directly the result of human overpopulation. In a balanced ecosystem, no one species destrys than it replenishes by being food for other species. When a species over-runs an ecosystem, it is called a PLAGUE. http://www.precaution.org/lib/07/prn_dhn070913.htm
![[User Picture]](http://l-userpic.livejournal.com/3742064/303965) | | From: | heron61 |
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| Date: | September 14th, 2007 11:03 pm (UTC) |
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| | Re: Hogwash! | (Link) |
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I nowhere said it wasn't a problem, I said that it was a problem in the process of correcting itself.
![[User Picture]](http://l-userpic.livejournal.com/7899820/454961) | | From: | alobar |
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| Date: | September 15th, 2007 12:00 pm (UTC) |
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| | Re: Hogwash! | (Link) |
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Too little, too late is not much good.
![[User Picture]](http://l-userpic.livejournal.com/83497946/5195943) | | From: | antayla |
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| Date: | September 15th, 2007 12:15 am (UTC) |
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I think it is crazy that they want to pay women to have babies when there are plenty of folks that would love to emigrate and start sending money back to their families (which would spur growth of industry and education in those areas as well.)
![[User Picture]](http://l-userpic.livejournal.com/46709466/3995538) | | From: | pompe |
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| Date: | September 15th, 2007 04:44 am (UTC) |
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Living in a country where the state indeed do subsidize children and have done for a _long_ time (1937, but it became a generic thing in 1948 applied to all children no matter of the income level of the parents) I don't think the real issue is to pay women to have babies, it is to compensate the families for some of the costs involved so they are less likely to be dissuaded from having children for pure economical reasons. It isn't a way to pay career moms (it isn't enough money to replace a lost second income in a family, for one) but a way to assist people who think "we want to have children, but we cant afford it".
So every child in Sweden gets a monthly payout, which indeed go up with more than two kids.
Current discussion here are more along the line of how the state should force parental leave to be divided. Currently only one month out of the 18 "has" to be taken by the father, but the progressive parties want to force it up to a third or even half. The idea is that if it becomes less likely for the female to handle parental leave and care of sick children discrimination would go down because Dad would be gone just as much.
| | From: | pompe |
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| Date: | September 15th, 2007 04:07 am (UTC) |
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Hmm. But if people start to live significantly longer...
| | From: | heron61 |
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| Date: | September 15th, 2007 06:21 am (UTC) |
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If someone develops a cheap immortality pill, then there would likely be severe problems. However, my bet is gradually lengthening lifespans using methods that are (at least at first) restricted to the first world and the upper class of the third world because of costs and complexity. With many first world nations have birthrates of 1.6 or lower, lengthening lifespans by a few decades won't make much difference, and as lifespans get longer, I'm betting that birthrates will not increase (especially since fertility, at least in women, isn't likely to continue past their late 40s, until treatments become exceptionally advanced.
Of course, all this could be utter nonsense, if hyperintelligent AI or significant intelligence amplification, Drexlerian nanotechnology, or any of the other possible techno-wonders occur within the next 40 years, then all bets are off about what 2050 will look like. I'm personally betting that we will have impressive AI or IA by 2030-2040, and either of these (especially the second, which seems the most likely) is going to have a huge and not very predictable impact.
| | From: | pompe |
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| Date: | September 15th, 2007 06:51 am (UTC) |
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Sure, but if deathrates go down while birthrates stay low you still get a population growth because of inertia. Compare with earlier stages in demographic transition.
| | From: | heron61 |
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| Date: | September 15th, 2007 07:10 am (UTC) |
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True, but I'm betting that birthrates will also continue to decrease in much of the first world. In any case, I don't see much likelihood of longevity causes rises in first world populations until perhaps 2040 or so, and by that point, I'm betting that we will at least have issues regarding sustainable energy production largely solved, which will definitely help offset many of the problems that a gradual (and ultimately temporary) population increase might cause.
Define "sustainable". You could run an civilization the size of ours off the fissionables contained in our rivers (thus making the rivers mildly less radioactive) for geological eras but many people who call for sustantainable energy sources view nuclear power with an extreme suspicion underelated to the numbers involved.
| | From: | heron61 |
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| Date: | September 15th, 2007 05:01 pm (UTC) |
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I'm definitely including fission in the options. If done sensibly (like the exceedingly safe pebble bed reactors), they are as good an option as any other, and easier than most.
If someone develops a cheap immortality pill, then there would likely be severe problems. However, my bet is gradually lengthening lifespans using methods that are (at least at first) restricted to the first world and the upper class of the third world because of costs and complexity. I suspect that you can get a larger net effect on human lifespan by using utterly mundane methods to bring the lifespans in squalid hellholes up to First World levels. As an example of what can be done with relatively poor nations, in 1960 South Korea was very poor and lifespans were about 52 years. Today South Koreans are respectably well off by First World standards and the lifespans are just short of 80 years. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Life_expectancy_world_map.PNGAnd the UN population projections suggest that the greatest potential for an increase in average lifespans is in Africa, which is both slated to double its fraction of humanity by 2100 and which has appalling lifespans at present. The swath of high population, medium lifespan nations in Asia also offer a region that could have great impact on average human lifespan.
I suspect that you can get a larger net effect on human lifespan by using utterly mundane methods to bring the lifespans in squalid hellholes up to First World levels.
This is related to my belief that if you want to get the greatest impact out of encouraging lower pollution power generation, the nations to talk to aren't places like the US or Canada that aren't going to be increasing power usage dramatically but places like India or China that are experiencing a lot of rapid growth.
It's probably not entirely wonderful if China quintuples per capita energy using coal as its primary fuel, at least if the coal is used in the conventional way.
| | From: | heron61 |
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| Date: | September 15th, 2007 05:18 pm (UTC) |
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It's probably not entirely wonderful if China quintuples per capita energy using coal as its primary fuel, at least if the coal is used in the conventional way.
Agreed. I am pleased that there is a growing environmentalist movement in China. As the current first world nations develop increasingly inexpensive alternative to fossil fuels, I'm guessing that a combination of cost and public pressure will speed their adoption in China and India.
| | From: | heron61 |
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| Date: | September 15th, 2007 05:30 pm (UTC) |
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I'm suspicious of significant rises in longevity in Africa until social and political conditions change there, and when that happens, birthrates are certain to plummet there as well. In fact, given that rates of urbanization are also increasing in Africa, I suspect that lowered birthrates will in fact predate significant increases in longevity. Ultimately, one of the major things that's going to eliminate overpopulation (as much, or perhaps more than the fact the middle class people have fewer children than poor people) is that urban people have fewer children than rural ones. Also, these days, South Korea isn't all that poor, at 30th or 34th, they are ahead of almost all of Eastern Europe, and well ahead of most well-off 3rd world nations like China. I'd put them at the lower end of the first world.
Also, these days, South Korea isn't all that poor,
Sure, that's part of my point. In 1960, South Korea was amongst the poorest nations on Earth and now they are not. Botswana pulled off something similar with the added disadvantgaes of being resource dependent and landed locked with a fairly dismal set of neighbors around them. Unfortunatly Botswana is in the process of being depopulated by AIDS. Up to 40% of the adult population has it and that's enough to drop what would otherwise be a 68 year life expectancy down to 40.
People who are big fans of reducing population may want to keep an eye on nations like Botswana and Japan, where the populations are either shrinking or will shrink in very near future.
| | From: | heron61 |
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| Date: | September 15th, 2007 06:54 pm (UTC) |
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People who are big fans of reducing population may want to keep an eye on nations like Botswana and Japan, where the populations are either shrinking or will shrink in very near future.
True, but I expect the effects will be very different between those two nations. Japan's decrease is due to low birthrates and aging population, while in Botswana, it's due to a massive outbreak of lethal illness, and I'm guessing the results will look very different, and likely considerably more positive in Japan.
Then one more reason for having children will largely disappear.
| | From: | pompe |
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| Date: | September 15th, 2007 06:38 am (UTC) |
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I'm not so sure that is necessarily true once we've hit average birth rates of the low one-point figures. In essence I would believe that we're already close to a situation, in the affluent west, where birth rates are fairly close to a low and people no longer have children because it is commanded by clergy, to secure their old age, or because it would be some sort of occupation for a disappearing housewife class.
I always enjoy your optimistic posts on this sort of stuff, heron61. I'm not sure I share your optimism on this particular topic, regardless of the numbers, but I s'pose that's because the overpopulation problem is my own personal apocalyptic scenario.
The problem isn't so much the numbers as the consumption. Some of the places where overpopulation is worst (especially African countries) have a much, much lower level of per-person consumption than America.
![[User Picture]](http://l-userpic.livejournal.com/87843349/3708860) | | From: | rjgrady |
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| Date: | September 18th, 2007 06:04 am (UTC) |
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Yes, I'm a lot more optimistic than I was in the late 80s. I spent a lot of time thinking about nuclear war and overpopulation. Boooring.
Nowadays, I am concentrating on populating the world with my offspring. :) |
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