So What’s Wrong with More People?

ENS102D

March 3, 20006

Three ethics by Garrett Hardin• The Lifeboat Ethic. (1974 - AAAS Presentation)Envision a lifeboat with space for 50…..

"So long as nations multiply at different rates, survival requires that we adopt the ethic of the lifeboat.  A lifeboat can hold only so many people.  There are more than two billion wretched people in the world - ten times as many as in the United States.  It is literally beyond our ability to save them all … Both international granaries and lax immigration policies must be rejected if we are to save something for our grandchildren."

Link to Hardin’s essays - http://www.garretthardinsociety.org/

Three ethics by Garrett Hardin

• The Tragedy of the Commons (Science, December 13,

1968 )

http://www.garretthardinsociety.org/articles/art_tragedy_of_the_commons.html

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Three ethics by Garrett Hardin

• Freedom is an illusion (Extension of The Tragedy of the Commons

by Garrett Hardin, 1998 )

“Individualism is cherished because it produces freedom, but the gift is conditional: The more the population exceeds the carrying capacity of the environment, the more freedoms must be given up. As cities grow, the freedom to park is restricted by the number of parking meters or fee-charging garages. Traffic is rigidly controlled. On the global scale, nations are abandoning not only the freedom of the seas, but the freedom of the atmosphere, which acts as a common sink for aerial garbage. Yet to come are many other restrictions as the world's population continues to grow. “

http://www.garretthardinsociety.org/articles/art_extension_tragedy_commons.html

The Problem - 1798

• http://desip.igc.org/populationmaps.html• Food is necessary for human existence. • Human population, if not checked, tends to grow faster than the power in

the earth to produce subsistence. • The effects of these two unequal powers must be kept equal. • Misery is the mechanism that balances human requirements and available

resources. • Nature's requirement that the imbalance between demand and supply be

resolved forms the "strongest obstacle in the way of any very great improvement of society," and thus makes "the perfectibility of man and society" a theoretical and practical impossibility.

• The Principle of Population, i.e., the inevitability of misery due to the power of population to overwhelm resources, provides the mainspring behind the advance of human civilization by creating incentives for progress.

The Problem - 1968

• The Population Bomb - Paul Ehrlich

"The battle to feed all of humanity is over. In the 1970s and 1980s hundreds of millions of people will starve to death in spite of any crash programs embarked upon now. At this late date nothing can prevent a substantial increase in the world death rate..."

How is human population growing?

• exponential

growth

How is human population growing?

• MN

growth

0

1000000

2000000

3000000

4000000

5000000

6000000

7000000

8000000

9000000

1830 1880 1930 1980 2030 2080

Minnesota Population

Year

Minnesota Population Growth

Data: U.S. Bureau of Census 1850 - 1990

How is human population growing?

• Japan stabilizing 1.3• SAfrica - Aids

declining• Afganistan (7)• Nigeria >5• France 1.5• China 1.6 but still

growing.

• Sweden 1.72

What did you find?

How is human population growing?

• unequalgrowth

What are the factors that affect human population growth?

• TFR• Life Exp• Technology• Education• Health care• Age• culture• personal

• historical

How is human population growing?

• Total fertility rates

How is human population growing?

• Total fertility rates

How is human population growing?• Population Profile

How is human population growing?

• Mortality (CDR)

So what happened? Was the bomb a dud?

• Two Transitions:

1. The Demographic Transition

2. The Epidemiologic Transition

The Demographic Transition

• Explanations?

The Epidemiologic Transition

• Explanations?

What will be the trends of the future?

For Next Week

• Read Chapter 6• Presentations in Lab• Friday - another online

exam becomes available