Nature, Scarcity and Misery

Ron Patterson

Arthur, thanks for the kind words yesterday, but I cannot quite agree with your assessment of when and where the population will stabilize:

You wrote: “Where will population stabilize? It will stabilize at a sustainable level. It will stabilize when we look at a lot of trees, and say, we must have 50 trees of various ages growing for each one we cut down in a year. … ”  (And on in that vein.)

I don’t think Arthur, that we will ever look at nature and say anything like: “The population is at as high as the environment can support, so we must stop here.”

Voltaire said: “History teaches us that history teaches us nothing”. Well, history teaches me that human beings just do not operate in that mode. I am a Malthusian. I believe that humans have always lived to their very limit of their existence and they always will. Occasionally, there are times of plenty and this allows us to increase our numbers dramatically. In some places, these times of plenty even allow us the leisure to increase our wisdom and affluence to the point where we can even control our numbers. But the latter only happens to a small number and in such few places as to have little effect on the overall picture.

The population of the world will stabilize at the point where our limited resources will feed no more. The stabilization will not come from rational human beings deciding whether or not to continue having babies. Here is the important point:

If any segment of the population decides their numbers are high enough, and stops increasing their population, they will simply be replaced, in due time, by those who do not.

Nature, and only nature, will be the ultimate arbitrator in deciding when enough is enough. We are destined to return to our natural state of starvation and misery.

I think I will end with two quotes: the first is from Richard Dawkins’ River Out of Eden.

ìThe total amount of suffering per year in the natural world is beyond all decent contemplation. During the minute it takes me to compose this sentence, thousands of animals are being eaten alive; others are running for their lives, whimpering with fear; and others are being slowly devoured from within by rasping parasites; thousands of all kinds are dying of starvation, thirst and disease. It must be so. If there is ever a time of plenty, this very fact will automatically lead to an increase in population until the natural state of starvation and misery is restored.”

And, finally from Jared Diamond writing in Discover Magazine, December 1988

“It’s now clear that preindustrial societies have been exterminating species, destroying habitats, and undermining their own existence for thousands of years. Man has never lived in harmony with nature. Our ancestors were no less rapacious than we are – just less powerful.”

Thanks to EnergyResources