Evokit

“Overpopulation is a myth”
according to the Pro-Life Population Research Institute

First lets start by defining what Overpopulation is.

Overpopulation, according to the video, occurs when there are too many people on the earth to feed. In other words, where the amount of food that can be produced limits the population. Food is, of course, only one limiting factor. Other factors include, fresh water, usable land and, for most western societies, energy. 

As the population increases, there is less available for each person. For example, if the land area of the earth 1000 acres and the population is 500 people, then there is 2 acres per person. If the population increases to 1000, then there is 1 acre per person. We can, of course, keep increasing the population until we are packed in like sardines. At that point, someone is going to complain. One partial solution to the problem is to make more usable land. People have been doing this for years by draining river flood plains, creating dykes, dams and ocean protection, and filing in the sea. In Japan, a country with relatively little flat land, the have even created islands out to sea. These are all only temporary solutions though as eventually you will run out of mountains to push into the sea.

The same problem with increasing population happens with food. The more people there are the less food there is per person. We have also tried to get around this problem, by clearing more land for agriculture and by increasing its yield, the amount of food per acre. Eventually, though, a limit is going to be reached, for example where all the usable land on the earth is being used for agriculture and the maximum yield is reached. At this limit the amount of food available per person starts to decrease. If the population continues to increase beyond this point the food available per person could decrease to the point where people starve.

Fresh water, as with land, is also a limiting factor in food production. We just don’t use fresh water to produce food, we drink it, as do animals and many other uses. To get around fresh water limitations we have dammed rivers and streams and more recently turned to desalination, the converting salt water to fresh water. These are also just temporary solutions. Eventually we will reach a limit where the amount of water available per person will decrease. 

So now that we have defined what overpopulation is, let’s investigate the video’s claims that Overpopulation is a myth.

1. The world hasn’t ended as Thomas Malthus and Paul Ehrlich claimed thus Overpopulation must be a myth

Just because their predictions of the end of the world were wrong doesn’t mean overpopulation doesn’t exist. It exist and can be seen by our attempts avoid it that I explained previously.

2. We haven’t run out of food thus Overpopulation must be a myth

Just because we haven’t run out of food doesn’t mean we never will. As i have explained, overpopulation doesn’t end in catastrophe but it causes a reduction of the food available per person. An indicator that there is less food to go around would be increasing food prices, though this can be caused by other factors.

3. The population could fit into Texas thus Overpopulation must be a myth. 

On their website, they back this up by saying

According to the U.N. Population Database, the world’s population in 2010 will be 6,908,688,000. The landmass of Texas is 268,820 sq mi (7,494,271,488,000 sq ft). So, divide 7,494,271,488,000 sq ft by 6,908,688,000 people, and you get 1084.76 sq ft/person. That’s approximately a 33’ x 33’ plot of land for every person on the planet, enough space for a town house.

…. Such an arrangement would leave the entire rest of the world vacant. There’s plenty of space for humanity.

The first problem here is that they haven’t allowed for the land required for farming or taken into account water limitations as well as may other things. To put it simply this is an extremely simplistic analysis of the situation.

4.The world’s population will peak in 30 years thus Overpopulation isn’t a problem.

Regardless of where the population peaks in 30 years or not isn’t important. The important question is will people be happy with the amount of resources, land, food, water, energy etc., that they each have. At the moment the amount of resources that each person in the third world uses is quite small compared to that the developed world. Third world people want to live like people in the developed world, thus the amount of resources they will want and use will increase. As a result of this the issue of over population doesn’t go away when the population peaks.

The reason why the Population Research Institute thinks Overpopulation is a myth is because it is against their Pro-Life stance. What they are really fighting against is human rights abuses committed in population control programs. For example though the use of abortion, abortifacient contraception, and chemical and surgical sterilization. 

Regardless of your Pro-Life stance, Overpopulation is real. The earth’s resources are limited and thus the amount available for each person is limited. If we are happy having less per person, then by all means increase the population.