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227 comments on DrumBeat: August 14, 2006

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GliderGuider on August 14, 2006 - 6:38pm Permalink | Subthread | Parent | Comments top
The problem is that humanity is already in overshoot.  Even if not another baby were to be born for the next 25 years, the outcome would be pretty much the same.  The time to have stopped growing both our population and our consumption was probably 100 years ago.

For an ecologist's perspective on why this is so, and why we are well and truly in the box, read William Catton's 1982 book "Overshoot".  It powerfully reoriented my thinking on this crisis.

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IFeelFree on August 14, 2006 - 7:21pm Permalink | Subthread | Parent | Comments top
Books have published for decades predicting imminent global disaster due to overpopulation. (According to the 1972 "Limits to Growth" we should already be witnessing the collapse of civilization.) What makes this time different is that there is increasing evidence that we are coming up against some hard limits with regard to natural resources. Obviously, population cannot continue growing forever. It's better not to be overly doom-and-gloom, but we need to take intelligent measures to limit population growth and reduce our usage of natural resources, so that we can at least reduce the suffering.
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oldhippie on August 14, 2006 - 7:46pm Permalink | Subthread | Parent | Comments top
Ummm, er, maybe in 1972 they were right?
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jjhman on August 14, 2006 - 10:28pm Permalink | Subthread | Parent | Comments top
I get really tired of people who obviously haven't read LIMITS TO GROWTH" making up quotes from it.
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GreyZone on August 15, 2006 - 12:38am Permalink | Subthread | Parent | Comments top
The politest response I can give you is that if you don't know what Limits to Growth actually said, then stop making up falsehoods and passing them off as your wisdom. If you read Limits to Growth and then the 30 year update to the same, you'd realize that we are almost dead on target for the Club of Rome's predictions.

P.S. The Limits to Growth gave modern society a lifespan of about 100 years starting from its own publication, so we're talking about a collapse near 2070, not one that was supposed to have happened already.

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227 comments on DrumBeat: August 14, 2006

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