I didn't need a hint; I needed you to clarify your position. I know what population growth is.
But you are proferring a limited resource - presumably Earth.
I think our efforts towards spacefaring are on-track to have colonies before we run out of room here. So, I don't really see that as the pinnacle of human dilemmae.
That is the problem, very few people do or give it any thought at all.
People are living in poverty and starving and dying of disease (and always have been), and we're nowhere near Earth's capacity yet. They'e not dying because Earth is running out of resources - if that were true it would man they had the resources but now don't. They're dying because we don't have the infrastructure to get clean water and food to them.
I don't doubt your knowedge of mathematics, but when was the last time you gave serious consideration to the exponential function as it applies to life on earth?
In spite of all the death and disease and accidents, the human population is still growing at 1% per year, which means a doubling time of 70 years. This is not an abstraction, this is hard mathemathics.
As long as there is an exponential population growth, there will be an exponential increase in overcrowding and depletion of non-renewable resources.
To say, there is plenty time to do something about it is overly optimistic, IMO.
At the "current rate" of use recoverable oil will run out in about 40 years, and when we switch to coal the currently estimate of a few hundred years of recoverable coal will also decrease and be used at a much greater rate than at the "current rate", and increasing exponentially.
It is an inescapable problem and the irony is that everything we gconsider as good will make the problem worse, everything we consider bad will relieve the problem. That's the dilemma.
The human dilemma lies in the fact that at some point population growth
must be reduced to zero growth.
Has anyone given serious thought to this? I can guarantee that few people have looked at this mathematical problem. One needs look only at the statements made by politicians. They have no clue!!!!
So we have a choice, we voluntarily reduce population growth (good luck with that) or nature will create condtions which will will reduce population growth, and that will not be a pleasant method.
But instead of trying to voluntarily reduce population growth, we are making increased efforts to keep people alive longer, thereby accercebating the problem.
So, it appears that we are not interested in keeping population growth down, which means we're letting nature choose. Of course this is already evident in man-assisted global warming and climate change.
As Bartlett demonstrated, at which point will we know that there is a
serious problem with our use of natural non-renewable resources and the state of over population??
My guess is, that this will happen much too late.
The the earth will become a toxic hell, instead of that beautiful blue green ball that's floating around the sun.
Lately, have you seen any people needing to wear masks to filter the air we breathe? Go to Japan or China.
And this is about "air". When the oceans become so polluted that they can no longer support food sources or the food sources have become inedible from toxic chemicals, will we become vegetarians or hunt down every living animal. When entire swath's of the earth become uninhabitable what do you think will happen? Great migrations of billions of humans and animals will cause havoc with our "standard" way of ife.
This is the human dilemma we are faced with, if we continue on this path to self destruction. As to the concept of off-world colonies, how many people will you be able to export? The current net population growth today was 191,000 a minute ago, and counting.
http://www.worldometers.info/
Imagine having to transport 200,000 people and provide off-world shelter and food,
each day? Do you really think this provides a solution?
The problem is global, not local. There is a difference.!