[Excido]

I hear overpopulation thrown out in conversation once in awhile, used to explain why there are people starving or in poverty around the world. The claim is that people can not grow or extract enough resources for the human race as a whole to continue growing at this pace. It could be water, food, oil, or any other resource that causes this issue to arise. Some claim we have already passed the limit, and are already well overpopulated. I am curious as to the other INTJ's perspective on this claim. Maybe I will toss in my view later.

Is it possible for humans to overpopulate and why? If you believe we are overpopulated or heading in that direction, what would you suggest be done about it?

 

[quigglehope13]

I am not an INTJ but an INFJ but I can not help but comment.
I think we have passed the limit and everything on earth has a limit to how much they can take from it then when they pass it their population goes down then goes back up and so forth. But being human we tried to go past it so I think that After awhile our population will go down. I think educating women would help a lot because when women are educated they choose to have less children(for the most part).

 

[Peter]

Overpopulation actually really means that we´re using more usable natural resources than the earth produces.

There are 3 possible solutions:

1) Reduce the population
2) Increase the production and number of usable natural resources of the earth
3) Reduce the amount of natural resources the population needs per person.

The first option is not a real solution because it's not practically implementable.

The second solution is possible. There are a lot of resources not used. If we can manage to use them, we can increase the usable natural resources a lot. We are already developing them. Examples are solar energy and wind energy. Also increasing efficiency of existing technologies will help a lot. If you realize that of the potential energy in gasoline, something like 20% is actually used to produce kinetic energy, then there is a lot to gain there.

The third option is not a real solution, but can help to give us more time to develop more strategies and technologies for option 2. Examples here are lights. It used to be normal to use 100 Watts for a light for which we, today, use like 15 Watts. That's a big improvement.


So we´re already doing something about it. In fact, the world has never worked harder than now at doing something about this problem. Few people realize this and most people do it for other reasons, but that's great actually. By having other (multiple different) reasons to choose from everybody has a reason for solving these kinds of problems.

 

[lirulin]

People prefer to say it's the problem, rather than, say, resource allocation, because then you're not blaming anyone, or then you don't have to take responsibility.

 

[NastyCat]

There are 3 possible solutions:
1) Reduce the population

Impose birth limits!

Place a massive tax with additional legal fees for birthing/registration which costs even more as you have more children. I wouldn't be surprised if the Australian government started doing that. Haha.

Yeah, it'll take some time... but it could work.

/Joking.

 

[darlarosa]

Impose birth limits!

Place a massive tax with additional legal fees for birthing/registration which costs even more as you have more children. I wouldn't be surprised if the Australian government started doing that. Haha.

Yeah, it'll take some time... but it could work.

/Joking.

Actually I have had conversations about that before. I think it's a necessary deterrent.

It's simple Scarcity, Finite resources infinite people. People think we can all live in a free society, but thats not true. We need laws a limits to keep the population under control.Individuals who are merely draining resources or harming society are wasting resources. It's cruel but true. The needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few. If people did not have so many damn babies we would not have such a major problem. I also blame medicine for increasing life spans beyond what nature is meant to support.

 

[st0831]

I think overpopulation or lack thereof (in some areas) is not much of a problem compared to resources and willingness to work together. I think most people do things for themselves nowadays and don't give thought to a future.

The spoiling of citizens is also a problem. When wasteful things/practices such as hummers, sports cars, overeating, disposable society, why repair it when you can buy a new one, two cars is not enough, a TV in every room, room full of baby toys, a 50,000 income is "poverty", transportation includes car and car only. You have problems. Society is very inefficient nowadays.

 

[Peter]

Actually I have had conversations about that before. I think it's a necessary deterrent.

It's not. Read my first post (third post in this thread.) It explains why it's not a necessary deterrent.

The needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few.

This is a very socialistic point of view and even though it seems to make sense, nature doesn't work like this.

People will always think of them selves first and then about others. In other words, from the individual's point of view, the needs of the few (the person him/her self) always outweigh the needs of the many. Though people may talk like they don't believe that, if you really analise their behavior, you'll see that they actually apply the logic that their own needs outweigh the needs of the rest.

This is actually the way things work in nature. It's the "survival of the fittest" logic or "natural selection".

So when you want to solve these kinds of problems, you need to take this into account and come up with solutions that use the correct principle. This basically means that if you want people to have less babies, then you need to give them a reason for not having many babies. And that's actually easier than it seems.

Education doesn't work (though helps) because it doesn't change the individual needs. Educated people say that the needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few, but if you have no reason for having just 1 or 2 babies instead of 6, then you will have 6 babies.

What changes people's needs is economic stability. Once a population has economic stability for a long time (multiple generations long) then you see the need for having lots of babies go down a lot. Because in that situation, the believe develops you can give your children the same as or even better than, you have. In that situation, the need for having just a couple of babies is bigger than the need for having lots of babies.