I would like to make a point that I think a lot of people overlook. Yes, we can sustain this number and it’s only an issue now because of capitalism. But even under a much more efficient system like communism, while the overall burden on the environment would be significantly reduced, I think caution should be taken saying we would have no problem with a significant increase to population.
My reason is simply that every extra farm, pasture, living space, recreational space, work space etc, takes away from a natural environment for other plants and animals. Of course there are also ways to design cities, towns, etc, to be more friendly to the local wildlife and fauna but even then it’s still putting more stress on the area.
I’m not saying we need to start reducing the number of humans or that the population needs to immediately stop increasing. Just wanted to make a point that I feel gets overlooked.
I also want to add a counter argument to the commonly made point of "we could fit all of humanity in [insert land mass that seems to be not all that large in comparison to the size of earth]. While there merit in this point there’s also a point to make that most of the time that calculation is made of how much space a human need in order to live. But what a human needs to live vs what they need to be happy and content are different. Humans need excess space. Not just in the direct living quarters but to go out and do outside stuff. Walk around, explore, exercise, work, etc etc. Sure the direct housing could fit in that space but what about everything else we go do? And those spaces outside the direct quarters are, again, taking away from the natural habitats, even if designed with those things in mind it’s till a lot of space where humans will be frequenting often, which is still a disruption of nature to a degree. Again, not arguing that the world can’t handle our current number but just that it’s not a black and while issue regarding increasing that population significantly.
this is what i was trying to say in my original comment, that feeding one human isn’t about how much calories you can pull out of so many square meters of soil but of the soil biology, and the hydrology, the topsoil and the surrounding trophic systems that support the diversity of organisms necessary to balance land to be suitably arable, but also regenerative in it’s ecological capacity
the critical failure of supporting humans at any scale is not recognizing the importance of other living communities and their value, mutualness and biotic agency on earth. settler-colonialism has enough lessons for us to remind ourselves that reducing ecology to a numbers game is a fallacy.
They never suggested we reduce the population, we can sustain what we already have easily with a rational planned economy, however we couldn’t have a significant increase, say 20 billion or something. Also, we probably won’t exceed 10 billion by much anyway since people have fewer children when their material conditions improve.
Also, we probably won’t exceed 10 billion by much anyway since people have fewer children when their material conditions improve.
Gonna have to disagree here. I know this is a generally accepted fact. Yet, ask around - people will say they are hesitant to have children because they “can’t afford them”. In socialist economy, many of the expenses and risks we’re currently having (i.e. education) will be relieved. Suddenly you have the incentive to have children
That is a good point. Could that be helped by a return to a more community based way of raising children? If people can feel the benefit of taking care of children without them all being biological to them we might have the pros of larger families without the cons of resource use.
I have always liked the idea of communal child rearing from a rational perspective, but even in the early USSR at a time when the revolutionary enthusiasm was at its strongest that was seen as kind of a radical proposal. A lot of people, even many who are otherwise solid communists and devoted to the socialist project will have a visceral resistance to the idea of replacing the traditional family with a fully communal model.
You need to think about how such a transition would be achieved and how to convince people to adopt it. I’m not saying it can’t be done or that it shouldn’t be done, but that it’s something that probably only a very stable communist society can achieve where the people have a great degree of trust in the communal way of doing things are are prepared to make a radical break with the traditional concept of the family.
Historically this was seen as an ultra-left idea and eventually fell out of favor entirely in all socialist states. It would have been too destabilizing politically as trying to make it happen would have provoked much resistance at a time when the situation was precarious enough already. Sometimes revolutionary enthusiasm gets ahead of what is possible given current conditions, and that is counterproductive and dangerous.
I would like to make a point that I think a lot of people overlook. Yes, we can sustain this number and it’s only an issue now because of capitalism. But even under a much more efficient system like communism, while the overall burden on the environment would be significantly reduced, I think caution should be taken saying we would have no problem with a significant increase to population.
My reason is simply that every extra farm, pasture, living space, recreational space, work space etc, takes away from a natural environment for other plants and animals. Of course there are also ways to design cities, towns, etc, to be more friendly to the local wildlife and fauna but even then it’s still putting more stress on the area.
I’m not saying we need to start reducing the number of humans or that the population needs to immediately stop increasing. Just wanted to make a point that I feel gets overlooked.
I also want to add a counter argument to the commonly made point of "we could fit all of humanity in [insert land mass that seems to be not all that large in comparison to the size of earth]. While there merit in this point there’s also a point to make that most of the time that calculation is made of how much space a human need in order to live. But what a human needs to live vs what they need to be happy and content are different. Humans need excess space. Not just in the direct living quarters but to go out and do outside stuff. Walk around, explore, exercise, work, etc etc. Sure the direct housing could fit in that space but what about everything else we go do? And those spaces outside the direct quarters are, again, taking away from the natural habitats, even if designed with those things in mind it’s till a lot of space where humans will be frequenting often, which is still a disruption of nature to a degree. Again, not arguing that the world can’t handle our current number but just that it’s not a black and while issue regarding increasing that population significantly.
this is what i was trying to say in my original comment, that feeding one human isn’t about how much calories you can pull out of so many square meters of soil but of the soil biology, and the hydrology, the topsoil and the surrounding trophic systems that support the diversity of organisms necessary to balance land to be suitably arable, but also regenerative in it’s ecological capacity
the critical failure of supporting humans at any scale is not recognizing the importance of other living communities and their value, mutualness and biotic agency on earth. settler-colonialism has enough lessons for us to remind ourselves that reducing ecology to a numbers game is a fallacy.
So what’s the solution then? Reducing the population? Show me a nation that would agree to that
They never suggested we reduce the population, we can sustain what we already have easily with a rational planned economy, however we couldn’t have a significant increase, say 20 billion or something. Also, we probably won’t exceed 10 billion by much anyway since people have fewer children when their material conditions improve.
Gonna have to disagree here. I know this is a generally accepted fact. Yet, ask around - people will say they are hesitant to have children because they “can’t afford them”. In socialist economy, many of the expenses and risks we’re currently having (i.e. education) will be relieved. Suddenly you have the incentive to have children
That is a good point. Could that be helped by a return to a more community based way of raising children? If people can feel the benefit of taking care of children without them all being biological to them we might have the pros of larger families without the cons of resource use.
I have always liked the idea of communal child rearing from a rational perspective, but even in the early USSR at a time when the revolutionary enthusiasm was at its strongest that was seen as kind of a radical proposal. A lot of people, even many who are otherwise solid communists and devoted to the socialist project will have a visceral resistance to the idea of replacing the traditional family with a fully communal model.
You need to think about how such a transition would be achieved and how to convince people to adopt it. I’m not saying it can’t be done or that it shouldn’t be done, but that it’s something that probably only a very stable communist society can achieve where the people have a great degree of trust in the communal way of doing things are are prepared to make a radical break with the traditional concept of the family.
Historically this was seen as an ultra-left idea and eventually fell out of favor entirely in all socialist states. It would have been too destabilizing politically as trying to make it happen would have provoked much resistance at a time when the situation was precarious enough already. Sometimes revolutionary enthusiasm gets ahead of what is possible given current conditions, and that is counterproductive and dangerous.