How Many People Can Our Planet Support?

expat girl wrote:

cactus flower wrote:Personally I think we should all be rationed to a maximum of 2 per family. The planet just can't take any more.

Maybe, but replacement rate is 2.1, and infertility rates are rising. We need to even out fertility rates across the globe perhaps, but I wouldn't suggest a reduction here; we're below replacement rates as it is.

Shall we start a "how many people can the globe support" thread?

cactus flower wrote:

expat girl wrote:

cactus flower wrote:Personally I think we should all be rationed to a maximum of 2 per family. The planet just can't take any more.

Maybe, but replacement rate is 2.1, and infertility rates are rising. We need to even out fertility rates across the globe perhaps, but I wouldn't suggest a reduction here; we're below replacement rates as it is.

Shall we start a "how many people can the globe support" thread?

Depends on how they live, and what you consider 'support', plus a variety of technological questions...

It depends on a lot - that is the point of this thread. The answer is unfortunately we don't know the answer to this very important question. It appears that the answer is probably a lot less than there are at present.

The point at which we start to deplete the wild fish population is a bench mark that could be adopted.

Any others you can think of?

cactus flower wrote:It depends on a lot - that is the point of this thread. The answer is unfortunately we don't know the answer to this very important question. It appears that the answer is probably a lot less than there are at present.

The point at which we start to deplete the wild fish population is a bench mark that could be adopted.

Any others you can think of?

I thought we were well past that point, I have to admit.

Are we going to experience a catastrophic rebalancing of population? Through a major major pandemic or famine, or something along those lines?

Food production (including fish) and clean water must be the bottom line. At the moment food production, preservation and distribution is far too dependent on oil. There must be an equation (not that we know it) or a sliding scale - impact per person/total number/quality of life - that would give us a range of numbers.

johnfás wrote:Are we going to experience a catastrophic rebalancing of population? Through a major major pandemic or famine, or something along those lines?

Unless we get a move on famine seems probable.

cactus flower wrote:Food production (including fish) and clean water must be the bottom line. At the moment food production, preservation and distribution is far too dependent on oil. There must be an equation (not that we know it) or a sliding scale - impact per person/total number/quality of life - that would give us a range of numbers.

For example, we know that pre-mechanised agriculture could support about 8 million people in Ireland.

ibis wrote:

cactus flower wrote:Food production (including fish) and clean water must be the bottom line. At the moment food production, preservation and distribution is far too dependent on oil. There must be an equation (not that we know it) or a sliding scale - impact per person/total number/quality of life - that would give us a range of numbers.

For example, we know that pre-mechanised agriculture could support about 8 million people in Ireland.

But was that population sustainable? There were potatoes planted up the mountain slopes in places where potatoes were not happy. A population based on a monoculture single species crop was as we know extremely vulnerable.

It depends on what sort of people you are talking about. Celebrities, for example, consume vast amounts of the world's resources through private planes, multiple homes and generally lavish lifestyles. On the other extreme, lower income citizens of LDCs consume only marginal quantities of the world's resources.

If it was a world of poor people then we could get on with 12-13 billion people at least. If we were a world of US citizens, we could only support about 2 billion people.

Ard-Taoiseach wrote:It depends on what sort of people you are talking about. Celebrities, for example, consume vast amounts of the world's resources through private planes, multiple homes and generally lavish lifestyles. On the other extreme, lower income citizens of LDCs consume only marginal quantities of the world's resources.

If it was a world of poor people then we could get on with 12-13 billion people at least. If we were a world of US citizens, we could only support about 2 billion people.

If I may refine the original question - it is how many people can the planet support sustainably. There are some aspects of life where the rich cannot consume much more than the poor - water is an example and to a slightly lesser extent food.

cactus flower wrote:

Ard-Taoiseach wrote:It depends on what sort of people you are talking about. Celebrities, for example, consume vast amounts of the world's resources through private planes, multiple homes and generally lavish lifestyles. On the other extreme, lower income citizens of LDCs consume only marginal quantities of the world's resources.

If it was a world of poor people then we could get on with 12-13 billion people at least. If we were a world of US citizens, we could only support about 2 billion people.

If I may refine the original question - it is how many people can the planet support sustainably. There are some aspects of life where the rich cannot consume much more than the poor - water is an example and to a slightly lesser extent food.

Good stuff. Water is a prime example, humans on a biological level require a base-load of water every single day in order to survive, grow and maximise their potential.

However, the excesses and the trivial trinkets of western culture are only sustainable if enjoyed by a very small section of each nation's population.

The planet may be able to support a lot more vegetarians than meat eaters.

cactus flower wrote:The planet may be able to support a lot more vegetarians than meat eaters.

What would be the point?

This is not a philosophy thread, Ibis.

That is a great point Ard-Taoiseach about usage. I have concluded that 20 average people use the same resourses as 1 big fat slug. What we need is a standardised unit of measurement. Seeing that 20 is a score we could call this new unit of guzzelment a GORE. So the Earth at the moment would be carrying 350 million GORE units. A GORE unit would of course be the short for Global Organic Reproducing Entity

Most of the World's population boom is fuelled by developing countries.

How long will it be before people decide that famine is an inevitable and natural occurence in coutries which have had unsustainable population booms?

When things threaten to get tight in the west, will we stop helping the poor and starving in the rest of the world on the basis that saving lives is counter-productive?

My prediction is that respect for human life, escpecially the citizens of other countries, will plummet over the course of this century.

cactus flower wrote:The planet may be able to support a lot more vegetarians than meat eaters.

Plants have feelings too, you know. At least we do the poor bashte the decency of killing it before we tuck in.

cactus flower wrote:The planet may be able to support a lot more vegetarians than meat eaters.

Possibly true, but it is always wise to diversify... monocultures are frightening. Google wheat rust UG99 and get back to me on that one. There's a good example also in what Phytophthora infestans (potato blight) managed to do to our good selves 150 years ago. I'm in favour of a good mix of both crops and livestock meself.... how are we going to plough, spray and harvest all the arable and veg during an energy crisis?? There's also the rising cost of fertilizer... a ready supply of manure can substitute, but for that, we need to be farming livestock too

I think a question we will have to ask soon is how many super-rich people the world can support. Resources are going to have to be shared out better.

Zhou_Enlai wrote:I think a question we will have to ask soon is how many super-rich people the world can support. Resources are going to have to be shared out better.

If we look at the response to the Hurricane Katrina, we can see how ready the US government was to abandon people and neighbourhoods. There is likely to be massive displacement of populations through sea level rise that will also impact on food supply. Salt water affecting rise growing areas is a big worry.
We need to use less in the developed states and have a coordinated effort to deal with resource and distribution issues globally.

I am not worried about the sea level rising. Ice on melting contracts in volumn and the water level stays the same. Only ice on a landmass would add volumn on melting. After the record cold temps this winter I would not hold my breath.

Greenland

Would it not be wonderfull if the ice melted on Greenland. As noted elsewhere the Norse lived fat off the land for 500 years. It would be the new Kansas. Enough food for everyone and solar panels on every roof. Buy a few acres up there now when it is cheap. I can see it now, a new utopia with a state of the art new capital city in the interior. Needless to say I have the name for this outpost of the future. Goreville.