So, not to go the sky is falling route, but I was reminded of both the economist-philosopher Thomas Malthus and the current doubling rate (54 years!) of the world population the other day. And, I was catapulted back along my personal philosophy timeline to high school debate, circa, say, 1992.
Malthus came to that type of bold conclusion that seems somewhere between rabidly political and indecently direct outside of certain intellectual and academic circles. It’s one of those black-and-white doomsday scenarios that bring conversation to an awkward pause. We could quibble over the wording, but, essentially, he said that our very natures will lead us to procreate ourselves to extinction.
That is maybe why I am accused of oversimplification.
Ok, a little more detail – Malthus looked at the economies of natural instincts and his work is considered something of a precursor to Darwin and Wallace (their theories of natural selection). He observed that in nature, plants and animals produce far more offspring than can actually survive and that humans, too, were capable of overproducing when left unchecked. The natural result of our overproducing (birth rates exceeding replacement rates) would be famine and poverty as our resources were outstripped by consumption.
The doubling rate for the U.S. population is closer to 117 years. We’re producing far few children per capita than much of the rest of the world. In fact, in general, the West is producing far fewer children than developing nations. Those nations – some would argue because of geography – are already suffering serious shocks to economy and health.
Then, too, there are stories like this of the virtual plague that AIDS has become in some of the world’s most densely populated regions.
It is possible that we – as a species – are nearing an apex … that progress will not move infinitely forward. Our way of life is certainly not the world’s way of life and as the gaps between have and have not continue to grow and the population rates drift, with the most developed nations pharmaceutically controlling their reproduction and the less developed nations growing at much faster rates, doesn’t it seem likely that we will reach a point where poverty and hunger become the rule rather than the exception? What then?
It’s possible, I think, that terrorism is just the start.
posted by Leigh Householder
