Canada and the World
Current Events with a Canadian Perspective
Last update
19 November 2010
Our Overpopulated Planet
One of the most influential science advisors to
the U.S. government says the human
population now exceeds the planet’s carrying capacity
Dr. Nina Fedoroff is the science and technology advisor to the U.S. Secretary of
State, Hilary Clinton. In March 2009, she told the BBC program One Planet “that humans
had exceeded the Earth’s limits of sustainability.
“We have six-
“We’re going to need a lot of inventiveness about how we use water and grow crops,” she told the BBC.
Population Growth
The World Factbook, which is published by the CIA says “The planet’s population continues to explode: from 1 billion in 1820, to 2 billion in 1930, 3 billion in 1960, 4 billion in 1974, 5 billion in 1988, and 6 billion in 2000.”
According to the U.S. Census Bureau, the current world population is 6.9 billion. This is growing by a net 218,030 people per day, giving a projected world population of nine billion by 2040.
The five countries with the biggest population are:
China -
India -
United States – 306 million
Indonesia – 230 million
Brazil – 191 million
Population Reduction a Vital Issue
Dr. Fedoroff says it’s essential that the world come to grips with the overabundance of people and start working to reduce the numbers; a message that doesn’t seem to have been heard in the Vatican.
As CNN reported (March 2009) as the pontiff arrived in Cameroon for his first visit
to Africa, “Pope Benedict XVI refused Wednesday to soften the Vatican’s ban on condom
use…
“Pope Benedict has always made it clear he intends to uphold the traditional Catholic teaching on artificial contraception.”
This is a view strongly opposed by population control experts and scientists such as Dr. Fedoroff. They make the argument that if we don’t reduce the number of people on the planet we’ll start to suffocate on pollution and our food supplies will be decimated by global warming.
Choking on our own Waste
Peak oil expert Richard Heinberg has posed what appears to be a ridiculous question: “Are human smarter than yeast?”
When yeast is put into grape juice it starts chowing down on the sugar. In the process, yeast produces carbon dioxide and alcohol. And, while the grape juice is being turned into wine, the yeast are busy reproducing. But, that alcohol is poisonous to yeast, as it is to humans if taken in large enough quantities.
Eventually, the yeast produces so much alcohol that there is a total collapse of its population.
So, as Richard Heinburg asks, are humans going to catch on to the overpopulation problem before it’s too late?
Image credits
Anders Sandberg
James Cridland
Sources
“Earth Population now ‘Exceeds Limits.’ ” Steven Duke, BBC, March 31, 2009.
CIA World Factbook
“Ignore the Bluster of Demographic Winter Alarmists: Population Research Institute. Cagle Syndication Service, January 18, 2010.
“Pope Visits Africa, Reaffirms Ban on Condoms.” CNN, March 18,2009.
© Canada and the World, October 2010
All rights reserved
“If we don't halt population growth with justice and compassion, it will be done
for us by nature, brutally and without pity -
Nobel
Laureate
Dr. Henry W. Kendall
“Daily, real-
Cagle Syndication Service