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Posted by harry on November 22, 2009, 10:15 am
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> > why the nature of exponential growth is such,
> > that we will not see the problems until a very short
> > time until we run into them
>
> Yeah, that's what Malthus said too. It basically goes like this: the
> human population is growing exponentially (it isn't) and our food
> resources grow geometrically (they don't). Therefore we will be
> subject to massive starvation in the very near future - around the
> middle to late 1800s. At that point there would be more humans than
> all the land in the world could support.
>
> As you are no doubt aware, we did not suffer the starvation event that
> he predicted, although we came close. In the late 1800s our
> agricultural output started outpacing human needs through a series of
> improvements in methods, equipment, fertilizers (a major one) and
> pesticides and insecticides. In the 1960s the introduction of the high-
> yield crops resulted in another massive improvement in food output. As
> a result, we are practically drowning in food, to the point where
> there are more obese people than starving ones, even in Africa and
> other "poster children" for food problems. In fact, the amount of land
> under cultivation in industrialized societies has decreased
> dramatically over time.
>
> The problem with Malthus' claim, or any one like it, is that it
> discounts the creative power of the human mind. More people means more
> minds, and more minds means more invention. But -- and this is key --
> the collective IQ of the planet is a factor of the number of brains
> times the number of connections between them, times the efficiency of
> those communications links. One major output of the inventive process
> are the tools that better communications between us -- like the
> internet channel we are using right now -- the constant multiplier has
> increased by leaps and bounds. A million people's collective inventive
> capability is many times greater today than it was 100 years ago.
>
> As a result, human ingenuity increases more quickly than the human
> population. Perhaps you have noticed the ever increasing rate of
> invention over time? Just over a decade ago we developed the physics
> for GMR, which was productized and in your computer in about a year.
> This rate of improvement has never before been seen in human history,
> and appears to be accelerating. As a result, many futurists have
> written of an era where change is so pervasive and rapid that our
> current predictive tools are simply useless, a time they call "the
> singularity".
>
> Simply put, applying math to problems with humanity like these is like
> trying to come up with a formula for why you like your lover. You
> might be able to do it, but it will confuse the issue more than it
> will help.
>
> Maury
Well, regardless of all the curves, at some point they will cross and
there will be starvation/wars/mass population migration. It's just a
question of which curve(s) you pick.
Also addtional factors keep on creeping in.
Like global warming & sea levels rising (if true)
Also to have/not have global wars.
Pestilence. (AIDS/flu)
Human ingenuity tends to increase population rather than the reverse.
I suppose all this is what the futurists mean by chaos.
Aid to foreign countries is counter-productive unless they control
their populations.
Personally I think the "tipping point" is near. There's nowhere left
to export surplus population. We just have to keep the starving
masses from our own countries or they will destroy us.
The end of the world is nigh. Tee Hee!
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