Poll: Is the world overpopulated?

[Tigers!]

(my first post on the new site)
As others have noted the problem is more apparent than real. We waste so much food, energy etc. that could be used for other purposes. Eat too much (including myself ). Less greed and better use of technology and our brains will be a good start.

 

[Rhea]

I don't know where you're getting those numbers from. Right now, we could fit the entire population of the planet into a city with NYC's densities, and it'd be smaller than Texas. We could also supply them with enough water with just half of the columbia river. With currently technology, we can feed 3333 people for an entire year at western standards with one square kilometer of farmland. Which means we'd need around 2.5 million square kilometers of farmland for the entire population. The current farmland of the US alone is already more than 3.7 million square kilometers; and that's not counting all the land that is not currently farmland that would suddenly be freed up (like cities and all that jazz). That leaves everything outside of the US and then some completely free of any human activity. ( http://www.simplyshrug.com/index.ph...erpopulation-myth&catid=31:general&Itemid=50) ).

Your argument assumes changes in human interaction and government and production and consumption and philosophy that have no evidence to show humans are capable of making these dramatic changes.

It ignores that much of the US farmland (and its water) goes to products that are exported to feed populations that cannot feed themselves. It assumes inventions not yet in evidence.

If humans are not capable of living in your scenario without catastrophic upheaval, then how is it a viable solution? There is no supporting evidence that it is realistic or even possible.

 

[funinspace]

I think the world is overpopulated, as I prefer to not further the transformation of the planet, into a ecological system just for sustaining more billions of human existence.
I am at the tail end of the boomers
I live in an suburban setting
My ideal population is 3 - 4 billion.

If humans became something very different than they are, then we could probably manage well enough at today's population level. W/o new technological solutions in the next 10-20 years, cheap energy will eventually become much less cheap. The ocean's fish populations are already very over taxed. Many large river systems are edging countries further towards war or famine...

 

[Loren Pechtel]

I don't know where you're getting those numbers from. Right now, we could fit the entire population of the planet into a city with NYC's densities, and it'd be smaller than Texas.

Where the people live isn't the limiting factor.

We could also supply them with enough water with just half of the columbia river. With currently technology, we can feed 3333 people for an entire year at western standards with one square kilometer of farmland.

That's a smaller plot than any numbers I have seen. I assume you're talking greenhouses.

Which means we'd need around 2.5 million square kilometers of farmland for the entire population. The current farmland of the US alone is already more than 3.7 million square kilometers; and that's not counting all the land that is not currently farmland that would suddenly be freed up (like cities and all that jazz). That leaves everything outside of the US and then some completely free of any human activity. ( http://www.simplyshrug.com/index.ph...erpopulation-myth&catid=31:general&Itemid=50) ).

Check your zeros. You have a major math error here.

As the above figures show, you wouldn't need to cover the whole surface of the earth, not even remotely near it. And just 'double decker' agriculture? Come on, what is this, the 1990's? Why not a 100 stories tall? Seeing as how we wouldn't need to cover anything near the percentage of the surface with buildings as you're imagining; the rest of your argument kind of falls apart. (And I don't understand why you're not even considering off-world greenhouses or what not, but that's besides the point).

I went with double decker because that's the minimum needed.

As for off world greenhouses:

1) Where are you getting the organics?

2) The issue was what Earth can support.

Unfortunately, I'm having no luck finding useful numbers for those lights so it's time to whip out an envelope: Sunlight at the Earth's surface is just under 1000 w/m^2. I'll be generous and figure you can halve this by lights that selectively emit the best frequencies--500 w/m^2.

That's actually not generous at all; Plantlab LED's managed to allow for greenhouse farming with just 10% of the normal requirements. And that was years ago. The method involves dramatically cuts down on emitted frequencies. Not only does this method decrease energy and resource costs, it also dramatically increases output; outdoors photosynthesis for crops is at best only 9%; by balancing the emitted light, plantlab managed 15% back in 2011; managing a crop yield increase of a factor of three. I don't even know what the efficiency is at these days. Just think about that; they managed a yield three times the normal, on just 10% the resources. Their efforts alone should convince you that we could make do with far less space to feed our current population (or a population hundred times the size), and that's with technological advances 4 years old. Who knows what the future brings?[/QUOTE]

I neglected the efficiency of the lights and the powerplants. The actual numbers are still very bad.

 

[dystopian]

Your argument assumes changes in human interaction and government and production and consumption and philosophy that have no evidence to show humans are capable of making these dramatic changes.

Actually, my argument does none of this. We already have examples of human populations living within the desired (for the purposes of the hypothetical scenario) parameters; so we know it's perfectly possible for humans to exist under those conditions and make the necessary changes required. What we don't have is 100% of the world's population making these changes, but that's hardly the same as what you said.

It ignores that much of the US farmland (and its water) goes to products that are exported to feed populations that cannot feed themselves.

This is actually not really true; plus, it doesn't actually MATTER for the purposes of the argument. If you'll reread my post, you'll find that I was talking about a hypothetical megacity that houses the ENTIRE world's population of 7 billion; fitting into an area less than that of Texas... and that *furthermore* this population would require LESS farmland than the US currently has. In other words, it ignores the fact that the US exports a lot of its food produce on account of the fact it doesn't fucking matter for the hypothetical scenario we're talking about.

It assumes inventions not yet in evidence.

No, it really doesn't. All of it is possible with technology that exists *today*.

If humans are not capable of living in your scenario without catastrophic upheaval, then how is it a viable solution?

Catastrophic? There is no catastrophic upheaval in the hypothetical thought-experiment I provided; everyone is fed in the scenario. Surely that is less catastrophic than them starving to death because we refuse to organize our economy along lines that don't prioritize profit over human life?

There is no supporting evidence that it is realistic or even possible.

Did you not read the link I provided? We're talking about some pretty basic factual calculations here; well within reality; not requiring any substantial new technological developments.

 

[dystopian]

Where the people live isn't the limiting factor.

Actually it very much is an important factor. A widespread chaotic distribution of population as the planet currently exhibits drastically increases resource usage; though of course the whole point of such calculations is to counter the popular perception many people have that overpopulation will soon require us to pave over all the land.

That's a smaller plot than any numbers I have seen. I assume you're talking greenhouses.

Nope; apparently using a strictly vegan diet, we could meet calorie and protein needs with just 300 square meters. Presumably this efficiency could be greatly increased with vertical hydrophonics and the like.

Check your zeros. You have a major math error here.

It's not my math; but I don't think so.

I went with double decker because that's the minimum needed.

It's also ridiculous. If you're going to farm vertically, why on earth would you only grow two stories tall? That makes no sense.

1) Where are you getting the organics?

You'd only need to import those once before you can set up local production. Not a problem assuming the infrastructure has been built.

2) The issue was what Earth can support.

Yes, but nobody said we had to restrict ourselves to purely the Earth in terms of resources. Assuming a ridiculous hypothetical in which the human population kept on growing to 700 billion (or even just 10% of that, which it also won't do); it would surely take long enough for us to actually develop off-world infrastructure needed to help support that population.

I neglected the efficiency of the lights and the powerplants. The actual numbers are still very bad.

3 times the yield that nature provides on only 10% the resources are *not* bad numbers; especially given the fact that's using *prototype* technologies with ample room for efficiency improvement.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

Catastrophic? There is no catastrophic upheaval in the hypothetical thought-experiment I provided; everyone is fed in the scenario. Surely that is less catastrophic than them starving to death because we refuse to organize our economy along lines that don't prioritize profit over human life?

There is no supporting evidence that it is realistic or even possible.

Did you not read the link I provided? We're talking about some pretty basic factual calculations here; well within reality; not requiring any substantial new technological developments.

You're talking a *MAJOR* upheaval and you're neglecting the fact that we have to build all the equipment to do it.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

Actually it very much is an important factor. A widespread chaotic distribution of population as the planet currently exhibits drastically increases resource usage; though of course the whole point of such calculations is to counter the popular perception many people have that overpopulation will soon require us to pave over all the land.

That's a smaller plot than any numbers I have seen. I assume you're talking greenhouses.

Nope; apparently using a strictly vegan diet, we could meet calorie and protein needs with just 300 square meters. Presumably this efficiency could be greatly increased with vertical hydrophonics and the like.

The numbers I have seen have been for a vegan diet, also. Animals take at least 10x the space unless you can feed them only waste materials.

Check your zeros. You have a major math error here.

It's not my math; but I don't think so.

Your numbers work for Earth's current population, it was in reference to 100x the population.

I went with double decker because that's the minimum needed.

It's also ridiculous. If you're going to farm vertically, why on earth would you only grow two stories tall? That makes no sense.

I was talking about farming over the entire planet. (And neglecting the fact that in high latitudes you aren't going to be able to farm by sunlight, period.) It made the energy calculations simpler. How the vertical farming is arranged doesn't change the energy needed and thus is immaterial.

1) Where are you getting the organics?

You'd only need to import those once before you can set up local production. Not a problem assuming the infrastructure has been built.

Fail. You keep shipping organics to Earth in the form of food.

2) The issue was what Earth can support.

Yes, but nobody said we had to restrict ourselves to purely the Earth in terms of resources. Assuming a ridiculous hypothetical in which the human population kept on growing to 700 billion (or even just 10% of that, which it also won't do); it would surely take long enough for us to actually develop off-world infrastructure needed to help support that population.

Yeah, we might be able to support 700 billion people on Earth if all resource production was offworld. (I still have serious doubts about the total energy, though--that's going to do nasty things to the biosphere.)

I neglected the efficiency of the lights and the powerplants. The actual numbers are still very bad.

3 times the yield that nature provides on only 10% the resources are *not* bad numbers; especially given the fact that's using *prototype* technologies with ample room for efficiency improvement.

The best powerplants aren't even 1/3 efficient. This is inherent in the existing technologies and probably can't be improved upon. (All current power generation systems are variations on a steam engine and there are theoretical limits on steam engines.) In fact, nuke (and there's nothing other than nuke in our current tech that could power it) is more like 1/4 efficient--they run them cooler than coal plants for safety reasons.

A quick check of LED efficiencies is no better--for most colors it's around 25%. The best is 40% for red. I assumed 100% efficiency in figuring the heat load of the lights, reality appears to be no more than 10% and probably less than that. Thus heat numbers as high as I came up with.

 

[dystopian]

You're talking a *MAJOR* upheaval and you're neglecting the fact that we have to build all the equipment to do it.

No, not exactly. Sure, you can read it that way if you're imagining I'm advocating (ignoring for a second that this is just a thought experiment) we start building megacity one right now, force everyone to live there, and expect to do this in just a few years or something. Of course, we'd actually have plenty of time for a gradual shift to this alternate version of Earth; it's not as if there's some requirement that we go from 0 to 100 straight away.

 

[Zeluvia]

anyone else find it ironic the poster that took the handle dystopian is arguing for a more populated future?

 

[dystopian]

The numbers I have seen have been for a vegan diet, also. Animals take at least 10x the space unless you can feed them only waste materials.

The numbers you've seen are for a highly diversified vegan diet. A primarily potato based vegan diet would suffice at 300 square meters. Getting a more diversified diet would take 700 square meters, and getting the kind of diversified diet Europeans and Americans are accustomed to (vegan or otherwise), which yes would include animals, would indeed take far more.

Your numbers work for Earth's current population, it was in reference to 100x the population.

I already addressed that concern though; please re-read my post more carefully.

I was talking about farming over the entire planet.

Which wouldn't be necessary.

(And neglecting the fact that in high latitudes you aren't going to be able to farm by sunlight, period.)

So what? We're talking vertical farming... there's absolutely no sane reason to rely on natural sunlight for vertical farming whatsoever... especially given I just told you were can achieve at least 3 times the yield with LED lighting. So why even bring up sunlight at high latitudes at all?

It made the energy calculations simpler. How the vertical farming is arranged doesn't change the energy needed and thus is immaterial.

Nonsense; concentrating things into a single building allows you to save considerably on required energy when compared to spreading it out over multiple buildings. This again, ignoring the fact that modern LED based farming is already far more energy efficient than you originally gave it credit for.

Fail. You keep shipping organics to Earth in the form of food.

Do you imagine that it would somehow be a 1:1 ratio? One wonders how we ever manage to more volume of food than the base we started with. I trust you understand organic material *grows*, right?

The best powerplants aren't even 1/3 efficient.

Sorry, what? Water turbines are 90% energy efficient. Cogeneration plants manage 80%. Combined cycle Gas turbine plants manage up to 60%. Coal plants manage up to 40% (Still more than one third). Wind turbines manage up to 45%.

This is inherent in the existing technologies and probably can't be improved upon.

Except... they already have been. As I just pointed out. If you seriously think our most efficient power plants are only reach 33% energy efficiency, you're seriously out of touch.

(All current power generation systems are variations on a steam engine and there are theoretical limits on steam engines.)

Nonsense. The photovoltaic effect; for one; is not a bloody variation on the steam engine.

In fact, nuke (and there's nothing other than nuke in our current tech that could power it) is more like 1/4 efficient--they run them cooler than coal plants for safety reasons.

So first you grossly underestimate the energy efficiency of many of our modern power plants... next, you DRAMATICALLY overestimate the energy efficiency of nuclear power plants. In actual reality, nuclear power plants have an energy efficiency of LESS than ONE percent; that one percent is the amount of nuclear energy that gets converted into heated water; as for the efficiency of electricity generated over THAT 1%, I've seen figures ranging from the low thirties to as high as 91%.

A quick check of LED efficiencies is no better--for most colors it's around 25%. The best is 40% for red. I assumed 100% efficiency in figuring the heat load of the lights, reality appears to be no more than 10% and probably less than that. Thus heat numbers as high as I came up with.

Plantlab's growth process only involves blue and red leds. Other colors are eliminated. I don't know how recent the figures you've found are: Today's LEDS are at least 3 times as efficient as the most efficient ones from just 2005. Modern LED's can achieve a 100 lumens per watt.

 

[Rhea]

This is actually not really true; plus, it doesn't actually MATTER for the purposes of the argument. If you'll reread my post, you'll find that I was talking about a hypothetical megacity that houses the ENTIRE world's population of 7 billion; fitting into an area less than that of Texas...

And you are claiming no change in governance or social upheaval to make them all move there?
Sounds like a HORRIBLE existence. If that is required, then, yah, we are way overpopulated. I hate your idea of housing with the burning passion of a thousand suns.

(note, in my answer above: location = rural)

and that *furthermore* this population would require LESS farmland than the US currently has. In other words, it ignores the fact that the US exports a lot of its food produce on account of the fact it doesn't fucking matter for the hypothetical scenario we're talking about.

It assumes inventions not yet in evidence.

No, it really doesn't. All of it is possible with technology that exists *today*.

I don't think you've shown that. Indeed, you said,

Yes, but nobody said we had to restrict ourselves to purely the Earth in terms of resources. Assuming a ridiculous hypothetical in which the human population kept on growing to 700 billion (or even just 10% of that, which it also won't do); it would surely take long enough for us to actually develop off-world infrastructure needed to help support that population.

If humans are not capable of living in your scenario without catastrophic upheaval, then how is it a viable solution?

Catastrophic? There is no catastrophic upheaval in the hypothetical thought-experiment I provided;

Oh yeah there is. When you come to my town and tell us we have to move to a megacity of 7B people.

everyone is fed in the scenario. Surely that is less catastrophic than them starving to death because we refuse to organize our economy along lines that don't prioritize profit over human life?

I don't think it is. Really. You're proposing something pretty catastrophic.

 

[DBT]

This is a ridiculous question. Overpopulated implies an ideal population; ideal population implies an end to which population is a means.

''Overpopulated'' does not imply an ideal population. 'Over' implies a figure that is over and above that of an ideal population.

The option of ''not overpopulated'' may also include a voters idea of an ideal population figure, because if the world is not overpopulated, there is no problem. The point of the poll was to see how many voters believe that there is a problem, or that there is no problem with both our current and projected population figures.

But then you run into the problem of who is doing the projecting, and how accurate or realistic are they.

If a person is confused enough to think that the population will double and re-double in the next century - and many are - then they will say 'yes' if the question is about projected population, but perhaps 'no' if the question is about current population, or even plausible projections that contradict their implausible ones.

That's right, but this poll is only intended for the purpose of estimating the ratio, for and against. In the end it usually comes down to one or the other position.

For the purpose of the poll, it doesn't matter who is actually right.

 

[Unbeatable]

This is a ridiculous question. Overpopulated implies an ideal population; ideal population implies an end to which population is a means.

''Overpopulated'' does not imply an ideal population. 'Over' implies a figure that is over and above that of an ideal population.

Right, the "overpopulated" implies that the concept of "ideal population" is meaningful. We are in agreement. My wording was simply unclear.

 

[DBT]

This is a ridiculous question. Overpopulated implies an ideal population; ideal population implies an end to which population is a means.

''Overpopulated'' does not imply an ideal population. 'Over' implies a figure that is over and above that of an ideal population.

Right, the "overpopulated" implies that the concept of "ideal population" is meaningful. We are in agreement. My wording was simply unclear.

I can see what you meant now. Nothing like a bit of hindsight.

 

[dystopian]

And you are claiming no change in governance or social upheaval to make them all move there?

Like I explained to Loren, the single world city thing is just a thought experiment to show the world isn't really overpopulated. Naturally it's not a serious suggestion to put everyone into a single city like that (although taking steps to decrease how spread out our urban sprawl is would surely be a good thing)

Sounds like a HORRIBLE existence.

Yes, I'm sure the people in NYC have an utterly dismal existence living at those densities!

If that is required, then, yah, we are way overpopulated.

The whole point of the exercise is to show that we're *not* overpopulated. It isn't that we're REQUIRED to fit everyone comfortably in a city that big; it's that we could and that the size of said city is actually much smaller than it would be if we in fact WERE overpopulated.

I don't think you've shown that. Indeed, you said,

Yes, but nobody said we had to restrict ourselves to purely the Earth in terms of resources. Assuming a ridiculous hypothetical in which the human population kept on growing to 700 billion (or even just 10% of that, which it also won't do); it would surely take long enough for us to actually develop off-world infrastructure needed to help support that population.

First of all; we ALREADY have the technology to develop off-world food production facilities, so... huh? Secondly, I was obviously speaking specifically about the technologies required to house and feed our *current* world population into a single city.

Oh yeah there is. When you come to my town and tell us we have to move to a megacity of 7B people.

That's not catastrophic; that's your town being a bunch of dramaqueens who refuse to stop living above their means. Go ask someone who moved from the french countryside to paris if the move was 'catastrophic' for them... because that's pretty much the same thing that would be asked of you; that megacity would have the same sort of urban density as a NYC or a Paris. Bet you nobody who'se made that move thought of it as 'catastrophic'.

 

[DBT]

I doubt that a single world city could ever work in practical terms. The sheer scale of infrastructure to transport food from vast areas of farmland and factories, include vast mountains of waste products, commuting, recreation and so on... it would be a nightmare. Not at all practical.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

Do you imagine that it would somehow be a 1:1 ratio? One wonders how we ever manage to more volume of food than the base we started with. I trust you understand organic material *grows*, right?

Where's your Nobel prize? If you could actually blow modern physics to bits and prove it you certainly would have one.

You get more food than you start with because the plants convert CO², H₂O and N₂ (although most plants require bacteria to fix it into the soil first) into most of the body of the food and add a bit of other elements pulled from the soil to complete the job.

Now, Oxygen is readily available from any rocky body (say, the moon.) Hydrogen is only readily available in the outer solar system. Carbon and Nitrogen aren't so easy to come by. You're going to have to keep supplying your farm with all of these.

The best powerplants aren't even 1/3 efficient.

Sorry, what? Water turbines are 90% energy efficient. Cogeneration plants manage 80%. Combined cycle Gas turbine plants manage up to 60%. Coal plants manage up to 40% (Still more than one third). Wind turbines manage up to 45%.

I was discounting the stuff that isn't viable in this case.

Sure, water turbines do well--but there's not that much hydro power available. Note, also, that there would be *NONE* available under the conditions needed--if you leave the water in the environment we turn into a Venus.

Cogeneration is a matter of combining it with a heat-using task, only viable if you have a suitable task. And note that it doesn't cut the total heat production, it just makes other use of it.

Gas turbines--until the gas runs out. It would do so very quickly at that level of use.

Coal--likewise.

Wind--until you run out of wind. There's nowhere near enough of it.

This is inherent in the existing technologies and probably can't be improved upon.

Except... they already have been. As I just pointed out. If you seriously think our most efficient power plants are only reach 33% energy efficiency, you're seriously out of touch.

I didn't say the most efficient. I was limiting myself to what could actually be used on this scale.

(All current power generation systems are variations on a steam engine and there are theoretical limits on steam engines.)

Nonsense. The photovoltaic effect; for one; is not a bloody variation on the steam engine.

No solar in this world--it's all being used to grow food.

In fact, nuke (and there's nothing other than nuke in our current tech that could power it) is more like 1/4 efficient--they run them cooler than coal plants for safety reasons.

So first you grossly underestimate the energy efficiency of many of our modern power plants... next, you DRAMATICALLY overestimate the energy efficiency of nuclear power plants. In actual reality, nuclear power plants have an energy efficiency of LESS than ONE percent; that one percent is the amount of nuclear energy that gets converted into heated water; as for the efficiency of electricity generated over THAT 1%, I've seen figures ranging from the low thirties to as high as 91%.

I'm talking about efficiency of heat produced to watts on the wire. I'm not talking about unused fissionables.

A quick check of LED efficiencies is no better--for most colors it's around 25%. The best is 40% for red. I assumed 100% efficiency in figuring the heat load of the lights, reality appears to be no more than 10% and probably less than that. Thus heat numbers as high as I came up with.

Plantlab's growth process only involves blue and red leds. Other colors are eliminated. I don't know how recent the figures you've found are: Today's LEDS are at least 3 times as efficient as the most efficient ones from just 2005. Modern LED's can achieve a 100 lumens per watt.

Blue & red will give an efficiency in the 30s, thus an overall efficiency a bit below 10%.

 

[Rhea]

The whole point of the exercise is to show that we're *not* overpopulated. It isn't that we're REQUIRED to fit everyone comfortably in a city that big; it's that we could and that the size of said city is actually much smaller than it would be if we in fact WERE overpopulated.

And the whole point of the answer is to point out to you that the definition of "overpopulation" means monumentally more than whether we can create enough food paste tubes to prevent starvation. You fail to notice this point.

What is life? Why not just put people into life support incubators and let them interface via computer simulation? Then you could probably support 100x as many because the nutrition needs of a still and stunted body are less than those of outdoor activities.


What is life. An existence worth living. And your scenario does not produce one, therefore, it describes a higher population than can be supported for "life". Overpopulation happens long before we are living in towers with a pass to visit the local outdoor square mile once a year.

 

[Rhea]

Oh yeah there is. When you come to my town and tell us we have to move to a megacity of 7B people.

That's not catastrophic; that's your town being a bunch of dramaqueens who refuse to stop living above their means. Go ask someone who moved from the french countryside to paris if the move was 'catastrophic' for them... because that's pretty much the same thing that would be asked of you; that megacity would have the same sort of urban density as a NYC or a Paris. Bet you nobody who'se made that move thought of it as 'catastrophic'.

You think a voluntary move of a single person to the current sized city is the same as forced migration of all people to megacities with respect to how much of a catastrophic change it would be for society? "rollseyes"?


I think you misunderstand what a catastrophic social upheaval it would be to need clustered megacity existence for all people.