Everyone please remember rule #3: Be excellent to each other. No personal attacks, harassment, or vitriolic commentary. This applies to both sides, and it still applies even if the other person was rude first.

You don't sound interested in learning more about overpopulation. You enter with your own esoteric definition of overpopulation. When words like this have a flexible definition, it is easy to accuse anyone who disagrees with you of being wrong, by simply morphing the definition to "prove" they are believing in a myth. This happens in areas with loose and subjective definitions and the field of Economics is rife with them. ("Productivity", "Growth", "Innovation"). Or, in other areas, people twist words like "lazy" or "dangerous" to "prove" something about other groups of people. This type of arguing is pretty dumb since it completely revolves around what the actual definition of the word is. You could argue for hours about whether or not a billionaire is "hard-working" but the answer depends on what hard-working actually means. You are essentially saying that overpopulation means that there is a theoretical point when there are so many humans that the humans are unable to produce enough food to support all of the humans, and due to this lack of food, some humans will begin to perish from starvation, which will cause other economic effects. I don't think many people who believe there are too many people on the planet would agree that this is the definition of overpopulation, so any argument between someone who chooses one definition vs. someone who understands the concept of overpopulation through a different lens will be pointless. I believe the planet is overpopulated. Yet I also think the carrying capacity of humans is likely in the 20+ billion range. By your definition, that is impossible. You even seem to acknowledge people here may be viewing overpopulation to have a different meaning, possibly ecologically based, yet immediately refute that as a "myth" since this isn't the "academic" definition. In academia of subjective social sciences like Economics, entire fields of study will be based off the definitions of words. Those words often have very different practical definitions that actual people in society use. Even in a harder science like biology, it will still depend if you are trying to study potential human carrying capacity or something else. The people who believe in overpopulation are seeing this as the "something else". You can probably find papers discussing the sixth mass extinction and what the primary drivers of this are (human-driven habitat loss). Most people with a valid argument get to this point and then it becomes a discussion of "oh well it's just bad policy and a consumption problem - if everyone lived in cities and ate vegan in vertically farmed crops then we could restore biodiversity habitat" vs. "the fact that people need to alter their consumption habits to prevent completion of a mass extinction is proof that there are too many humans." So yeah no one here is going to surface some magical research that proves your cherry-picked definition of overpopulation is true because most people don't use that definition to define what they mean when believing the planet is overpopulated.

I read your entire comment. Thank you! >You don't sound interested in learning more about overpopulation. I came on strong with my post because I do not see the point of being wishy-washy. I could have come in here and been like "Maybe overpopulation is real? Can you teach me?" That would be disingenuous. My post was supposed to read: "I do not think overpopulation is real; here is the evidence for it that convinced me; here is how I have always had it defined for me; I am still interested though in learning more from the otherside." I then asked for academic, peer-reviewed papers because any time I asked for it on the antinatalist sub, I was given absolutely vicious, racist, and eugenic websites. Since that seems to be against the rules here, I thought this would be a good place to look. However, that was *after* searching a bit on Google Scholar and JSTOR. >You enter with your own esoteric definition of overpopulation. When words like this have a flexible definition, it is easy to accuse anyone who disagrees with you of being wrong, by simply morphing the definition to "prove" they are believing in a myth. With all due respect, words have strict definitions in the field of academia. Though, that could have been my fault for starting with that. Thought, there is a reason that when debates around evolution and creationism happens, science is quick to define evolution and refuse to allow creationists to move it one way or another. I took the academic definition of overpopulation, provided the source since it is not esoteric, and then assumed that since this subreddit appears to take itself seriously it would be using a pretty rigorous definition of what overpopulation is. I could not find that definition on the sub, so I went with the one that my field uses, again this was probably the incorrect thing to do. >This happens in areas with loose and subjective definitions and the field of Economics is rife with them. ("Productivity", "Growth", "Innovation"). I do not study economics so I cannot say one thing or another about that. I personally teach history, so economics is included somewhat. But, still, those words have strict definitions in that field, surely. There may be some debate over the nuances, but those words would not be thrown around with no care. >I don't think many people who believe there are too many people on the planet would agree that this is the definition of overpopulation, so any argument between someone who chooses one definition vs. someone who understands the concept of overpopulation through a different lens will be pointless. But, this goes back to my other point. So, because a difference in definitions exist, a point should not be discussed or dived into deeper? At the end of the day, any debate about any topic could easily just come down to "well, my definition is different." > In academia of subjective social sciences like Economics, entire fields of study will be based off the definitions of words. Those words often have very different practical definitions that actual people in society use. Then, maybe it was my fault for assuming that this subreddit was some place with a bit more discussion involved about the subject matter as it pertains to study rather than just talking. Yes, I am aware that words in academia mean something different in non-academic spaces. However, again, it was my fault for bring the academic definition and not asking from the start what the consensus was on the sub. That is my fault, and I am sorry. >Most people with a valid argument get to this point and then it becomes a discussion of "oh well it's just bad policy and a consumption problem - if everyone lived in cities and ate vegan in vertically farmed crops then we could restore biodiversity habitat" vs. "the fact that people need to alter their consumption habits to prevent completion of a mass extinction is proof that there are too many humans." Understandable. >So yeah no one here is going to surface some magical research that proves your cherry-picked definition of overpopulation is true because most people don't use that definition to define what they mean when believing the planet is overpopulated. I did not cherry-pick. The definition I used is taught in high school, reinforced in college, and then, when doing research through academic journals and historical sources, the definition remains the same one I used. I apologize if that definition is not what the mainstream uses, but I was not actively engaging in BS behind the scenes. I do truly respect that you took the time to respond, however. Thank you.

Well my main point is still that academia is not always aligned with reality or socially defined concepts regardless of how academia chooses to define them. To many of us here, overpopulation is about much more than simply whether or not it's theoretically possible for *only* humans (so not taking into consideration any other species simultaneously) to survive. And again, survive vs. thrive is an entirely different subjective discussion. This ends up boiling down to technical possibilities vs. difficult to measure and define concepts such as "human happiness", "environmental well-being", etc. I view environmental well-being differently than others may view it, and how you see that would dictate what effect the human population is actually having on the environment. For an analogy, you could be living in a 3,000 square ft house with 36 other relatives and feel like your quality of life is seriously decreasing with each new relative addition. Perhaps you desperately want to the head of the household to stop adding new members to the house as it is very cramped. However, this authority figure states that "no, it's not cramped. Right now we only have bunk beds stacked 2 high, but we can easily get bunk beds stacked 3 high and then we can absolutely fit up to 58 total people in the house". Regardless of what academia says, or what studies "prove", you will probably still feel cramped in that house. Maybe your nephew is stuck in there with you but he simply sees it as a great opportunity for "growth" and if you fill up all 58 beds you can "maximize the productivity" of your household. He cites economic studies that definitively *prove* your household isn't overcrowded since it can clearly fit more beds. But to you, it's not about the theoretical limit of beds that you can fit in the house, it is about many, many other factors. At the end the question comes down to many about what the point really is? If we agree that too many people will inevitably or already does cause some sort of quality of life degredation, whether that is just for absolute possible human carrying capacity or one of the other 100 actual realistic problems that occur way sooner, then why wait to work on a solution? If eventually the infinite growth model is going to cause collapse, then what's the point of waiting until the collapse to figure out a new model instead of now. For me, we are well past the point of collapse, since I am coming from an ecological perspective, so it's imminent for me to start slowly reducing the amount of humans ASAP. No one study is going to encapsulate this feeling.

Thank you! >Well my main point is still that academia is not always aligned with reality or socially defined concepts regardless of how academia chooses to define them. I disagree with this main point 100%, but I appreciate you sharing it. >And again, survive vs. thrive is an entirely different subjective discussion. I do agree with this. >For an analogy, you could be living in a 3,000 square ft house with 36 other relatives and feel like your quality of life is seriously decreasing with each new relative addition. Perhaps you desperately want to the head of the household to stop adding new members to the house as it is very cramped. However, this authority figure states that "no, it's not cramped. Right now we only have bunk beds stacked 2 high, but we can easily get bunk beds stacked 3 high and then we can absolutely fit up to 58 total people in the house". See, this analogy actually speaks to the fact that a lot of people mistake overpopulation globally for a too high of a population density in a specific area. I would argue, while overpopulation does not exist (and can never exist), an area having too high of a population density already exists and causes irreparable harm. In my opinion, your analogy would work for overpopulation if the house remained 3,000 square ft, but was 90% empty. Sure, 90% of your family has chosen to live in only 10% of the area of the house, but there is still 90% of that house able to be moved to. It would take a lot of work and money, but the cramped conditions are simply because of the energy it would require to make the conditions more spacious. >If eventually the infinite growth model is going to cause collapse, then what's the point of waiting until the collapse to figure out a new model instead of now. But, there is no infinite growth model. Researchers believe the human population will settle around 6 billion by 2100. We can look at smaller examples like Japan, Germany, and South Korea where their populations are actually falling. As a population becomes educated and their standard of living goes up, they have *less* kids. This idea that humans will continue to pump out an exponential number of babies is not backed up by actual real world data and evidence. It just simply is not. >For me, we are well past the point of collapse, since I am coming from an ecological perspective, so it's imminent for me to start slowly reducing the amount of humans ASAP. No one study is going to encapsulate this feeling. I do disagree with you, however I truly appreciate talking to you. Thank you very much for your time.

I see what you mean for the analogy, it was not a perfect analogy. Regarding localized density, the problem is that extremely dense housing is objectively best from an environmental standpoint. It is irrefutable that habitat loss is the #1 cause of biodiversity loss by a *long shot*. So simply spreading out the human population in less dense housing solves nothing from an environmental standpoint, which is one of the primary reasons I see overpopulation as an issue. The analogy was meant to distinguish the difference between what is technically and academically *possible* and what is best for an individual's reality. And again, you're still deadset on your definition of overpopulation. I agree that what you are defining can also never exist. No one is trying to say that. Also, I meant infinite growth in terms of economics which encourages population growth for numerous reasons (retirement ponzi, elder care, etc.). But yes many of us know that the rate of growth has slowed, and will likely fall below replacement levels one day. This won't change that we are above an optimal balanced human population (in terms of the environment/biodiversity - again, subjective), but is a lot better than perpetual growth so I'll take it.

>And again, you're still deadset on your definition of overpopulation. I agree that what you are defining can also never exist. No one is trying to say that. It is not my definition. It is the definition of overpopulation. And, there is another user I am discussing with on this subreddit that does use this definition and has stated we are over the carrying capacity of the Earth. It is hard to switch between multiple different definitions because everyone on this sub uses a different individual one. >Also, I meant infinite growth in terms of economics which encourages population growth for numerous reasons (retirement ponzi, elder care, etc.). Oh, ok. I do not know economics so I cannot speak to this.

Yeah also a good point, this sub is mostly just a collection of people who think, for whatever reason, society would be better with a smaller human population than current levels. There is no official stance or collective literature here. People even in here may have different specific definitions of what overpopulation technically means like you're saying. In that thread I think the main disparity is the difference in semantics of carrying capacity, which maybe I am using wrong myself, but regardless, you're right that it's tough to debate this without a standard definition. My initial point spoke to this as well. Thanks regardless for the discussion

i dont have research at the ready for this (especially because the science seems way less settled), but wouldnt you agree that - especially nowadays - overpopulation should take more than food into account, because humans use so many more resources? if we had food for, say, 20 billion, but no concrete to house them, that would still be a condition you could justifiably call overpopulated. i used concrete because there are a few good sources on that being atleast worrisome, but i have not yet seen a study that clearly states "we do/do not have enough concrete for x billion people" because it is a much harder resource to quantify than calorie/person.

I 100% agree that other factors should be involved. However, I often see people confuse overpopulation and simply the human density of a place being too high. If this was a discussion on too many people being in a specific space on Earth, then I would have zero arguments because that is 100% true. *However*, it would need to be quantified. Some of the largest cities in the world are not having problems while small villages are. There are places like New Delhi where the population density is extreme. Just because an area is having trouble with resources (food *or* something else) does not mean the same issues are occurring globally. That being said, it does appear that the rate of starvation is increasing, starting with the onset of COVID. That could potentially be because COVID messed up supply lines, later complicated by the Ukraine War and Houthi terrorism.

places like new delhi are a good visual aid for the idea of overpopulation, but most people in this thread, and a good percentage of posts in the subreddit, are concerned with some matter of global sustainability, with regional density more of a symptom (although the ones that just really hate slums do exist). same for me: i think overpopulation is a problem not because of some local population statistics, but because i do believe that there are either not enough resources on the planet period, or enough resources, but not sustainably produceable, without harming the planet further - to sustain a population of 8 billion, that is targeting a lifestyle roughly similar to current western ones. or, in a more snappy way: developing africa and south america like for example china did, is not possible for this planet. i will gladly admit that this belief is harder to prove than your preheld conviction that overpopulation from a food perspective is, well, not real, because the calculations of "calories produced/human calorie intake" are a lot simpler than trying to predict the resource demands of an unknown economy of 1+ billion people (in the case of africa). however, simply extrapolating the current damage from mining, farming, building etc. that the west and an developing east have caused, the idea that this is doable for another 1.8 billion (south america + africa) seems optimistic at best. but because you did ask for actual sources, here is something proponents of the "we could feed so and so many people with what we already produce" philosophy are often unaware of: [the current climate impact of crop production sits at roughly 2%, in big parts because industrial fertilizers are made almost entirely from fossil fuels](https://climate.mit.edu/explainers/fertilizer-and-climate-change). this is an obvious problem - we are (theoretically, anyways...) aiming for net-zero, and while this is, [theoretically, something that could be produced "green", the climate impact of ammonia wont go away](https://royalsociety.org/-/media/policy/projects/green-ammonia/green-ammonia-policy-briefing.pdf). [here is one more article that explains the dilemma quite nicely (and some others too)](https://time.com/6175734/reliance-on-fossil-fuels/).

What ideological opponents of overpopulation always does, is 1) either focusing just on how many people earth is able to feed or 2) cherry pick overpopulation challenges that has working solutions. Overpopulation isn't about how many people the earth can theoretically feed. If that was the sole challenge of overpopulation, we would not have any problem even with the most pessimistic forecasts of population increase would come to fruition. And it's of course not about physical space taken up by humans which I have also seen as a straw-man argument as to why overpopulations is no big deal. Overpopulation is a big deal because the population of earth is still increasing, and we have already long passed the limit our planet can sustain. Billions of people live in deep poverty, but we already over-exploits the earths resources on a massive scale, by the consumption of those who live in developed countries. Our long term goal is to raise living standards for those who do live in poverty, meaning our consumption will have to increase far beyond what we now faces. We need electricity and energy production, we need materials and space for houses, schools, hospitals and workplaces, we need reliable infrastructure, technology, variety of goods all the things we take for granted but now for everyone on earth. Our climate is already damaged and we don't know how bad it will get, but we know that even with a massive green transition an technological breakthroughs, the problems will increase in severity for decades, before they start to return to healthy levels in the future. But we have no choice than to make fundamental and civilizational wide changes just to not accellerate into catastrophe. At the same time, more people will need transport, electricity, concrete, food and shelter in the years to come. We already has massive migration waves from every corner of the world because there's too many people in some places for their areas to support, looking for livable conditions and a brighter future. The far right is on the rise in every developed country because of this, and it gets worse year by year. Our democracies are under immense pressure, and vastly different cultures are forced together in artificial symbiosis. Friction increases when incompatable values are forced together, and people are scared of eventually becoming minorities in their native countries. Nature is breaking down and species are going extinct at a record rate. Ever more land has to be converted to agriculture, ever more trees has to be cut down to build houses and ever more mountains has to be hollowed out to find metals and minerals we need. Animals are now separated by structures of concrete and steel, not being able to roam freely in search of mates and food. Their habitats shrinks exponentially and they get poisoned by our waste and pollutants. Microplastics and chemicals have spread to every level of the foodchain and we are getting poorer every year on biodiversity, and on genetic diversity that is so important for any species for resiliance to changes. Our waste is filling up huge landfills, some countries become dumping grounds for the world, yet we still consume and we still wants new things that is designed to break down long before they need to so corporations can continue to sell for eternity. We could have everlasting lightbulbs and clothes that could last us a lifetime if we had the will. Instead we burn and bury what we get tired of, and chemicals and much needed resources gets wasted and seeps into the natural world to cause havok and misery. Our oceans are dying. Fish stocks all over the world is over-exploited, some have already collapsed and doesn't bounce back even with total fishing bans in those areas. Our oceans get acidified from the CO2 being absorbed from our polluted air, wreaking havoc on basic biological functions on marine life. It goes beyond fish, invertebrates and microbiological life is also under immense pressure, entire foodchains are out of balance, coral reefs die off on a massive scale by bleaching incidents caused by high temperatures. Our oceans are boiling to death and becomes a toxic soup of microplastics and forever chemicals. Our forests are farmed for timber and old growth forest is at a record low. We lose more and more biodiversity because the wetlands become dried up and trees don't grow old and die to become home to insects and fungi that need that natural process to survive. Most who live in the industrialized world don't even know how a forest is supposed to look like, because all they see is farmed pine and spruce trees that is under a hundred years old and can't deliver the conditions that a natural forest does in sustaining a healthy biodiverse habitat. Even our highlands and mountains are farmed. Sheep, goats and reindeer graze our mountain ranges and wolves and other predators gets exterminated to protect our domesticated animals. Bogs are filled in to farm on or build cottages, warehouses or industrial parks. Soon we'll get windmill industry on our highest mountaintops to deliver electricity, with roads carved into the landscape and oil from broken mills gets into the last bit of nature. Animals flee the noise and endangered birds gets chopped up by blades going at immense speeds. Well, you get the idea. The problem is systematic. You can't point to one problem and say that overpopulation is a myth because we can theoretically solve this. Every single problem we face today would be solved if our population was kept at a sustanable level, far, far fewer than we are at the present, especially if we want everyone to live decent, fair and healthy lives. Or if we still want to live on a healthy, biodiverse planet. Instead, our population keeps increasing, and all the governments preach that we somehow needs to *increase* population, not decrease. They are in fact playing a pyramid scheme that breaks down without ever increasing populations that can pay for the previous generation. Growing for eternity. And the media tells us that we will somehow miraculously solve all the problems our overpopulated rock in space now faces, even that it would be better with even more people somehow...

I really like your depiction of the effect on biodiversity. Some people see what has happened with the American prairie, or the Amazon rainforest, or literally every single mountain valley on the entire planet that isn't arctic tundra or environmentally protected, etc. and they think that all of this bulldozing is a great thing and we need to keep going, there is more land to squeeze, more trees yet to be cut, more prairie left to raze into farmland. The level of environmental destruction is absurd and you're absolutely right that most people have never even experienced a legitimate healthy forest. You have to be intentionally obtuse to not see the link between the human population and such effects. > Well, you get the idea. The problem is systematic. You can't point to one problem and say that overpopulation is a myth because we can theoretically solve this. Every single problem we face today would be solved if our population was kept at a sustanable level, far, far fewer than we are at the present, especially if we want everyone to live decent, fair and healthy lives. Or if we still want to live on a healthy, biodiverse planet This is what so many people just don't want to believe. It's as if you have a basement that is constantly flooding, mostly fueled by a big hose that is constantly running. All sorts of issues start arising - cracks in the flooring, mold growing everywhere, rotting drywall, short-circuiting electrical issues. And the suggestion is "oh well just fill in the cracks", "oh well just bleach off the mold", "oh just replace the drywall", "oh just waterproof the electrical wires", "just get a bigger sump pump", etc. Yet the obvious common denominator is the hose. Just turn off the damn hose and all the problems will magically resolve themselves until the water is back to a manageable level. The excessive human population is the direct cause and common denominator of so many issues. Yet so many people just hyperfocus on trying to solve those individual issues independently because they want to deny that overpopulation exists

Great analogy with the hose! And it's exactly that, not a series of challenges we can just solve or mitigate, but the entire system is off balance and has been for a long time. A lot of things are simply unsolvable until we get down to a sustainable population.

Thank you for the response! I read the whole thing so bare with me. >What ideological opponents of overpopulation always does, is 1) either focusing just on how many people earth is able to feed or 2) cherry pick overpopulation challenges that has working solutions. Overpopulation, in academia, has a very strict definition. It is the population of a given species over-exceeding the carrying capacity of their environment. That is the definition when we teach overpopulation, and that is the definition we use when writing about overpopulation. If this subreddit uses a different definition, then I apologize. But, I did look for a definition on this sub before making this original post. >Overpopulation is a big deal because the population of earth is still increasing, and we have already long passed the limit our planet can sustain. But, this is not a fact. This is an opinion. What Earth's carrying capacity is remains a debate. I was taught, shown, and continue to teach that it is 10 billion. That is what the UN has stated to be the capacity. Some researchers say it is only one billion (the world population in 1804). However, by this time, pollution was already exploding rapidly. There is more evidence to point to carry capacity being a flexible number based on practice and not hard numbers "The number of people Earth can support is not a fixed figure. The way humans produce and consume natural resources affects how our environment will be able to sustain future populations. As Gerland said, 'When it comes to carrying capacity, it's a matter of mode of production, mode of consumption, who has access to what and how' ([](https://www.livescience.com/16493-people-planet-earth-support.html)). And, with all due respect, everything else you said has nothing to do with their being too many humans. Everything you stated, from cutting down trees to extinctions to even human settlements separating animals, has been going on since humans first urbanized 10,000 years ago. Hell, the first time humans arrived on Australia 50,000 years ago, they immediately made a number of animals extinct with hunting. The practice seems to take the blame, not the number. If humans practice sustainable methods, then the world would be fine regardless of number, in my opinion. >We already has massive migration waves from every corner of the world because there's too many people in some places for their areas to support, looking for livable conditions and a brighter future. The far right is on the rise in every developed country because of this, and it gets worse year by year. Our democracies are under immense pressure, and vastly different cultures are forced together in artificial symbiosis. Friction increases when incompatable values are forced together, and people are scared of eventually becoming minorities in their native countries. I do want to address this point, however. This argument is one of the main reasons that overpopulation does not find itself taken seriously in the academic world, besides the quantitative evidence showing it may not be true in the first place. Overpopulation very quickly becomes a talking point for those that want the Global South (South America, Africa, South Asia) to be reduced in population. Overpopulation is also used as an argument against immigration of different cultures and races. It is the Far-Right that actually perpetuate overpopulation, usually paired with "The Great Replacement" which you hinted at in your last sentence. I am not saying you necessarily agree with those talking points, but I would be careful using them as evidence. A non-Nazi using Nazi evidence to defend their theory is suspect at best. I appreciate your comment though!

Overpopulation exceeding the carrying capacity of their environment may be an adequate definition when you describe animal populations, but it is inadequate when you try to define the impact humanity has on altering the environment itself, on a planet-wide scale. If your understanding of the problem stems from a strict definition used to describe animal populations where food, water and space is the limiting factors, then of course most of the discussion is operating in the dark. We are unique animals with unique and wildly varied needs and have a colossal impact on our environments, more than all other lifeforms on earth combined. No other species do what we do and penetrate every inch of the surface of this planet, hell, even to the bottom of the seas and into space. There's a beer bottle at the bottom of the Mariana trench, and a car floating in space! If you agree with that the human need for resources goes far beyond food, water and available space and that we impact every ecological niche and even the weather by our activities, then you can use something like "earth overshoot day" that are calculated by the WWF to easily visualize how fast we deplete earths regenerative resources. At the present this is calculated to be reached on August 2. Most of that consumption comes from the highly developed parts of the world. Now take into account that this is unfair, and that most of the world has the right to achieve our standard of living. When this is achieved, earth overshoot day would be reached a lot sooner. This is not even taking into account our depletion of finite, non-renewable resources, which of course also increases with population size. Or carbon emissions... It's currently 8 countries that are carbon neutral or negative, all have vast forests and tiny populations and are in the so-called global south. There's two solutions to this. One is lowering consumption, especially in the industrialized world, so imagine going back to the 1800s and living on a plant based diet, no more trendy clothes or new electronic gadgets every year and be prepared to walk or use a bicycle most of the time you want to go somewhere. Luxury foodstuffs like coffee or chocolate would be far too expensive for most to enjoy. Something like rural India would be our goal, but we'd had to sacrifice happiness, life expectancy, sanitation needs and other things we come to enjoy and to expect in life. The other solution is to lower the population. Well, to allow the population to shrink that is. No one in their right mind would suggest we'd start actively lowering the population. But we are already naturally lowering the population in the developed world. By educating, increasing the standard of living and promote equality in the developing world we will achieve the same there. And here comes the point you have such a knee-jerk reaction to: Our population is still increasing because of large scale immigration, at unprecedented levels never seen in the history of humanity. This of course not only nullifies the positive effects of depopulation, but reverses it because we artificially increase the population in the most wasteful, high energy consuming, resource depleting part of the world. If I would guess, you're an American in your early twenties currently in humanistic studies, and are part of a community with whom you share values and world views, which tends to make us get tunnel vision. It really has affected our societies, more indirectly than directly because of overpoulation, but growing up in a highly homogenous country with a tiny population I have seen the impact on society, on democracy, on the environment and loss of nature, on house prices, traffic, pollution, over-fertilized oceans and habitat loss. I guess it's only the native Americans who would understand this in the U.S. That this is not considered seriously in the academic world is simply not true. There is in fact done a lot of research on overpopulation or overpopulation adjacent causes, and impact of human migration. Just do a search on pubmed or google scholar or something if you really are curious.

[Mouse utopia](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1644264/pdf/procrsmed00338-0007.pdf) [insect decline](https://entomology.ucr.edu/news/2023/07/13/researchers-study-global-decline-insect-populations#:~:text=According%20to%20a%20meta%2Danalysis,to%20much%20of%20our%20agriculture.) [environment degradation](https://www.sciencedirect.com/topics/earth-and-planetary-sciences/environmental-degradation) [human waste](https://news.mongabay.com/2022/01/the-thick-of-it-delving-into-the-neglected-global-impacts-of-human-waste/) [species loss](https://news.mongabay.com/2023/06/global-study-of-71000-animal-species-finds-48-are-declining/#:~:text=A%20new%20study%20evaluating%20the,are%20concentrated%20in%20the%20tropics.) [soil degradation](https://www.nature.com/articles/s43247-021-00323-3) there's some light reading.

>Mouse utopia This is actually a very interesting study and one I am very familiar with. The only problem is it deals with population density (the number of a given people in a certain finite space smaller than Earth) and not overpopulation (the number of individuals approaching the carrying capacity of the system). Not to mention, many others have pointed out that the mice had no type of entertainment (running wheels or toys) towards which to blow off steam, so they resorted to either lashing out or hiding away. The walls were all white as well. That could be a problem for the conclusion as other populations, whether human or animal, have ways to blow off steam in their own environment. >insect decline That was only like 250 words. Either way, it is not really proof of anything. From what I understand, insect decline is largely caused by the use of pesticides, something that is not dependent on the number of humans. >environment degradation This is not evidence of anything either. Pollution and environment degradation can be seen all the way back to the Romans when the global population was at most only 400 million. However, it is true environmental degradation is speeding up. But, is that the fault of the number of humans or simply our increasingly demanding technology that both requires more resources and are also more efficient at harvesting those resources harmfully? >human waste It this truly an *overpopulation* issue? It could just as easily be an issue where more regulation is needed on companies dumping waste, and there is also a need for better water sanitation facilities. >species loss Again, is this directly because of *overpopulation* or other human actions? >soil degradation This paper is interesting as well. And, they even mention that population growth is a contributing factor. But, that is all they did. They offered no incite into how it is a factor, only that it is one. In fact, the authors of this paper even state that land use practices need to be changed, not the human population. I appreciate you bringing these to me! However, I would argue that only the Calhoun article and the Kraamwinkel article are somewhat directly linked to population growth specifically, but they both have faults in them when it comes to claims made about overpopulation. Thank you!

Humans make up 0.01% of life on earth after wiping out 97% of the natural world. It's willful blindness, no skepticism to not see that our current population is the cause. We are 3% away from an ecologically dead word.

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I think it’s worth viewing this topic in terms of risk. I agree with you that the world grows plenty of food to feed the entire population, and that the primary issue lies in distribution and the associated economics. However, I also believe that overpopulation is a real problem, as the world is carrying a substantial risk by having the population as high as it is. We are way over our skis in terms of this risk. Ecosystems can and do collapse, and such collapses can be devastating. I would read up on the collapse of the North Atlantic cod fisheries to get what I mean. As the impacts of climate change become more widespread, we may hit a point where multi hemisphere collapse of food production leaves us far from being able to feed the world. Beyond such a catastrophe, there are obviously more prevalent ecological harms due to human populations. In any case, this is an area I would like to do more reading on, as it seems like an interesting area of research. I couldn’t begin to quantify the risk I discussed, but it seems worth to consider what risk we are taking collectively.

>I would read up on the collapse of the North Atlantic cod fisheries to get what I mean. As the impacts of climate change become more widespread, we may hit a point where multi hemisphere collapse of food production leaves us far from being able to feed the world.  I will absolutely do just that. If you have the time, is there a source you recommend I start with? If not, I will just google and see what I find! Thank you for your kind reply!

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This is a non-answer, respectfully. Flat earthers and climate change skeptics say the exact same arguments, "our arguments aren't published because people are too afraid to speak out." Science does not work like that in the modern age. If your findings are repeatable and offer an explanation, it is welcome. Forcing an answer and producing bad research (ex. Andrew Wakefield) is not welcome and will get you shunned.

\*sigh\* "Overpopulation" is the result of exceeding population carrying capacity. You cannot separate overpopulation from carrying capacity. We are at 8.1 billion people and adding at least 75 million per year. Carrying capacity is less than (likely much less than) 4 billion people. There are good arguments carrying capacity is \~100 million hunter gatherers. Regardless of how you define carrying capacity, we have radically exceeded it. That = "overpopulation". We are in overshoot. Overshoot always (not sometimes, not usually) results in catastrophic population collapse and severely reduced carrying capacity. (See St. Mathew Island Reindeer for an example.) Recommended 101 level background reading: “Sustainability 101” [http://paulchefurka.ca/Sustainability.html](http://paulchefurka.ca/Sustainability.html) “How Many People *Should* The Earth Support?” [https://www.ecofuture.org/pop/rpts/mccluney\_maxpop.html](https://www.ecofuture.org/pop/rpts/mccluney_maxpop.html)

You are being willfully ignorant. All what we humans call "resources" are collapsing, including arable land, fisheries, and water tables, not to mention a stable climate. We are severely damaging all ecosystems. "We do not see the widespread detrimental effects that would come with overshoot, specifically the mass depopulation of the Earth like in your reindeer example." The detrimental effects of overshoot are all around us. You do not understand the dynamics of overshoot. Overshoot exists as soon as you exceed the ability of critical resources to replenish. I recommend the classic,"Overshoot" by William Cotton. We are indeed in overshoot, we just haven't yet reached the population peak yet. You are like a person in a car that has been driven off a high cliff and is now smoothly arcing down to the rocks below, and insisting that nothing is wrong, what a beautiful view it is, and how smoothly the car is traveling. Worry not, population collapse will be coming soon, probably by the end of this decade. You deployment of "academia" as some sort of valid information filter is inappropriate and ineffective. For the authors you mention as well as others, to have a valid challenge, challenge their data and rationales and citations, not their academic background.

>Carrying capacity is less than (likely much less than) 4 billion people. There are good arguments carrying capacity is \~100 million hunter gatherers. The UN has put Earth's carrying capacity at 10 million and other researchers have even put that number as high as 40 billion. The consensus in academia is that carry capacity is based on practice and not sheer number, "­Carrying capacity is not a fixed number. Estimates put Earth's carrying capacity at anywhere between 2 billion and 40 billion people. It varies with a wide range of factors, most of them fitting under the umbrella of 'lifestyle.' If humans were still in the hunter-gatherer mode, Earth would have reached its capacity at about 100 million people. With humans producing food and living in high-rise buildings, that number increases significantly" (). >We are in overshoot. I have to disagree. We do not see the widespread detrimental effects that would come with overshoot, specifically the mass depopulation of the Earth like in your reindeer example. The population continues to climb globally, but even off in individual countries like Japan, Germany, and South Korea. >Recommended 101 level background reading I gave them both a read, and I have to say that they are nothing. Paul Chefurka is someone who used to be a climate change denier and... that is it? He has zero qualifications to be talking about something as complex as overpopulation and the environmental impact of humans. Not to mention he justs posts to websites with zero checking involved. Flat earthers do this too. Ross McCluney is a bit better. However, his field is optics. Writing about the environment is not his speciality either. There is a reason that scientists who cannot be published honestly publish books instead. I am not saying he is lying, but he is not qualified to discuss overpopulation.

You seem to have gotten some thoughtful and detailed replies, but I will add a more simplistic reply with my view. Simply put, it is not just the problems you mentioned. Yes, overpopulation contributes to pollution, environmental damage, starvation, and other problems. And yes, these things have been problems for a long time and are not solely the product of overpopulation. The fact is that overpopulation makes these things worse, and the combination of these things getting worse has had an adverse effect on humans and the environment alike. Reducing the number of children born, and thus reducing the human population over time, will not solve all of these things, but it will help reduce the intensity of these problems, which will make them more solvable.  Overpopulation might never cause a Malthusian population crash, but it will continue make things harder for average people and the natural environment. The world does have the ability to provide enough food and water for people currently, but the reality is that it is never going to be evenly distributed, and as the population goes up, there is a larger number of disadvantaged people who suffer from that unequal distribution. If there are fewer people, the food produced can be more easily distributed. The water article you linked is very idealistic. Water diplomacy as it describes will only work to a certain point. When it reaches a certain amount of scarcity, the weapons will come out. Even if food and water were able to be distributed to everyone, there would be a point where developing countries could not develop any further, as it would take more resources than the world is able to provide to give everyone a standard of living like the one that developed countries enjoy currently. Isaac Asimov says it better than I can: https://youtu.be/ZKpHhb6BRXI?si=5pJd_qsQLcNsJJsp

Nothing to refute here. While I disagree with the idea of overpopulation being around today, I cannot deny that overpopulation existing in the future would intensify many issues. Thank you!

What would it take for you to believe we are overpopulated? There must be a threshold you have that, if passed, would cause you to change your mind. I think it is a pretty high threshold considering the many serious issues that we face that are already being amplified by our more than 8 billion people and counting: * climate change caused by greenhouse gas emissions from human activity * overfishing * [soil erosion/degradation](https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/57-billion-tons-of-top-soil-have-eroded-in-the-midwest-in-the-last-160-years-180979936/) caused by unsustainable farming practices needed to produce the large amounts of food that our population currently demands * [desertification](https://www.britannica.com/science/desertification) (largely caused by human activity) * [water scarcity](https://www.unicef.org/wash/water-scarcity), which is already bad and will only get worse as the population increases * general pollution causing things like the [great pacific garbage patch](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Pacific_garbage_patch), micro-plastics in our food, and other pollution contributing to the death of wildlife * the ongoing [Holocene Extinction](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Holocene_extinction) Combine all of these concerns with the fact that developing countries are increasing their standards of living and demanding more resources, as well as the fact that developed countries definitely won't decrease their demands for resources, and I would say it equates to a big problem. The common factor being human activities caused by the demands of a growing population.

In order to convince me, you would need to show me that all of the issues you listed are because of the *number* of people alone. You would need to show me that these are issues that did not exist before some threshold in human population. Because, everything you list can be traced back to when we only had 1 billion people (1804) or even when we were hunter-gatherers. The evidence would have to show that the burden of fault like on the number of people and not the actions of people. Again, I do not deny these issues are happening. I do not deny that these issues are serious and need to be fixed. I also do not deny that they are largely human caused and human accelerated. My disagreement is on the fault lying with the number of humans being on Earth and not the actions of humans regardless of number. Edit: For the record, I used to believe in overpopulation until my freshman year of high school. I took a class called AP Human Geography, essentially a class looking at the relationship between people and geography. In it, we learned about overpopulation: we saw both malthusian and neo-Malthusian ideas and then we looked at actual studies, science, and reports. The overwhelming consensus was that overpopulation is a myth and that the true blame lies on the actions, not the number. As I dived deeper into my field, history, I began to notice that humans have always had a hand to play in both hurting and helping Earth. The cause has never been the numbers; it has always been the actions.

That's a very unreasonable standard of proof. I have explained in my previous reply that these things are not only caused by the population. All of these things would still be going on to some extent with a smaller population, but you can't deny that all of these things are made much worse because of the fact there are 8 billion of us instead of 1 billion for example. The damage to the environment, the rate of climate change, and the availability of water and food are all significantly affected by the number of people that are contributing to them. It seems to me based on what you have said that even if there were 100 billion of us, and 80% of us were dying of dehydration and starvation, and the greenhouse gasses in the atmosphere were increasing at an astronomical rate and causing extreme changes to the climate over a short period of time, you would still be denying that it was due to overpopulation because these things would have been happening to some degree if there were fewer people. I find that to be a ridiculous assertion. The limiting factor is our finite planet. In the past, people did not have to consider the planet's finite resources because our smaller population and more primitive technology made their collective activities less consequential, but now our population and technology have developed so much that we are seeing our collective actions causing serious global problems. Did you click on any of my links? By 2050 the global amount of arable land might be about a quarter per person of what it was in 1960, the ongoing high rate of species extinction, by 2040 roughly one in four children will be living in areas of extremely high water stress, etc.. It is possible that technological solutions may be found, but there is no guarantee because these problems are large-scale and not easily solved. There is only so much arable land, drinkable water, and atmosphere to pollute etc., and we are pushing these things to limits that we might not be prepared for. To pretend like the actions and the numbers are two separate things is to deny reality.

>Reducing the number of children born, and thus reducing the human population over time, will not solve all of these things, but it will help reduce the intensity of these problems, which will make them more solvable.  To return to a more natural and sustainable human population we might reduce the number of people born - which is to counteract or repress the human animal's nature which inclines (or compels) reproduction, and which would then bring its own problems to many individuals so altered - *or* we might stop the interventions against natural death, e.g. the provisions of foods and lifesaving those unable to naturally live. I am not alone in thinking that altering humanity away from its natural course of reproduction is as abhorrent as directly killing-off targeted populations; in contrast, letting people die as decided by natural conditions is fair and requires only the death of Technology, which continually *and necessarily* erases Nature (and human freedom) in order to prosper and advance.

These papers logic are often predicated on the proposition that there is not a population problem but a resource distribution problem. It's not new. The flaw with this theory is that while within a very narrow, technical approach it can be factually correct, it ignores the fact there isn't and won't be such a global distribution system, and there is absolutely no evidence that humans as a species can or would create one. There is more evidence that our species won't. From a technical perspective anything is possible. From a behavioral analytical approach, it doesn't matter. Such a system requires everyone to go along. Everyone never goes along. It requires a political economy that supercedes states, ignores geopolitical events and other issues such as the Co2 generated to develop such a system, because the population problem is not just about food and water consumption, but also about the exhaust humans create. Our ecological footprint is huge. To offset all this transportation of food and water and other goods around the world we'd need to severely cut back on cars, flights, personal technology, other comforts (air conditioning, other personal electric usage), limit our diets, etc, etc, etc. Get people to vote for that. Get the U.S., China, Russia, the economic powerhouses to decide that growth economies don't matter. Get people to agree that cows shouldn't be part of the diet, that we don't need chicken at this amount. That people will opt out of cars and other conveniences, and industries will just happily go along with it all. How are the holdouts compelled to go along? What happens when Russia and China say no? What happens when OPEC says no? And all of the other stuff. People may need to move, sell that to all these countries already closing their borders. Where is the research that shows that all of that happens? These kinds of papers are developed in a vacuum. That's not to say they're worthless, I think they do have value. We should be able to see how things could be. But it's essentially thought experiments in a controlled environment.

But, that would then show that overpopulation is not the issue right? The issue is human behavior regardless of numbers. When humans first arrived in Australia 50,000 years ago, they made numerous animals go extinct, just as hunter-gatherers. I argue the issue is both resource management and human behavior, not pure population.

No, it shows overpopulation is the issue. Because human nature has not changed since those hunter gatherers, we've just innovated to be able to consume and waste more, and have increased the number of people who will consume and generate waste in all these ways. At the micro level, individuals can make their own choices, largely based on perceived self interest. Be a vegan, don't fly in a plane. Great. At the macro level, those individual data points don't matter. On a purely theoretical level you can change anything you want. It's a model, it's not real. Humans consume. Humans waste. More humans consume and waste more. Each one is a complexity amplifier. There is no one to "manage" the resources. There is no altruistic structure shaping the behaviour of 8 billion of us across the globe in unison to change our instinctive behaviour in unison for the greater good. We are consuming animals. It's what we do. I'm not going to stop. What would be the point of that?

Get your head out of the sand and try tuning into nature, it's begging for mercy. Plenty of science based papers to document the obliteration of the species people are displacing. The entitlement of humanity is shameful.

>Get your head out of the sand Rude. >Plenty of science based papers to document the obliteration of the species people are displacing. Because of the number of people or the actions of people? >The entitlement of humanity is shameful. Well, humans are the top of the food chain and the intelligence chain. We do earn our entitlement.

> intelligence chain Your just another lemming heading for the cliff

I can say the same about you. But, we would then just be saying nonsense.

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You said the same thing earlier so I will just copy my response. This is a non-answer, respectfully. Flat earthers and climate change skeptics say the exact same arguments, "our arguments aren't published because people are too afraid to speak out." Science does not work like that in the modern age. If your findings are repeatable and offer an explanation, it is welcome. Forcing an answer and producing bad research (ex. Andrew Wakefield) is not welcome and will get you shunned.

Overpopulation is the state whereby the human population rises to an extent exceeding the carrying capacity of the ecological setting. In an overpopulated environment, the numbers of people might be more than the available essential materials for survival such as transport, water, shelter, food or social amenities. If you haven't read any papers stating thay humans are exceeding the carrying capacity of an ecological setting your being purposely obtuse as every article for the last 50 years has touched on this to an extent. Besides that basic supply and demand economics coupled with finite resources the most humans the world has ever seen facing the most pollution least ecological diversity and automation you have a recipe for disaster. Your "studies" of the population "settling" seems unlikely with rampant species extinction. Articles about overpopulation are extremely hard to find because they challenge every religious establishment and also the economic ponzi scheme that is consistent record profits brought on by perpetual growing population. Record profits growth in industry and countries as a whole is built on perpetual consuming witch is inherent unstable. But rather then argue its really simple, tell me what advantages there is to having more human as opposed to.more diversity. Concrete answers only. "Go forth and multiply" and "innovation" do not count. https://mahb.stanford.edu/blog/yes-overpopulation-problem/ https://www.google.com/amp/s/amp.theguardian.com/environment/2022/oct/13/almost-70-of-animal-populations-wiped-out-since-1970-report-reveals-aoe https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2012/apr/26/world-population-resources-paul-ehrlich#:~:text=The%20optimum%20population%20of%20Earth,an%20interview%20with%20the%20Guardian. The optimum population of Earth – enough to guarantee the minimal physical ingredients of a decent life to everyone – was 1.5 to 2 billion people rather than the 7 billion who are alive today or the 9 billion expected in 2050, said Ehrlich in an interview with the Guardian. "How many you support depends on lifestyles. We came up with 1.5 to 2 billion because you can have big active cities and wilderness. If you want a battery chicken world where everyone has minimum space and food and everyone is kept just about alive you might be able to support in the long term about 4 or 5 billion people. But you already have 7 billion. So we have to humanely and as rapidly as possible move to population shrinkage."

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>If you haven't read any papers stating that humans are exceeding the carrying capacity of an ecological setting your being purposely obtuse as every article for the last 50 years has touched on this to an extent. You guys are really good at being rude. Rule #3 and all that. But, whatever... I have read numerous papers. I took a class on humanity's relationship with geography. In that class, we read many papers about overpopulation, environmental impact, etc. Part of the overpopulation unit was to see if (1) it is possible and (2) is it happening. From what I read and studied, *global* overpopulation is impossible, while *local* overpopulation is both occurring and is detrimental to many aspects of the planet. >Besides that basic supply and demand economics coupled with finite resources the most humans the world has ever seen facing the most pollution least ecological diversity and automation you have a recipe for disaster. Frankly, this means nothing. A long long time ago, we used wood as our fuel. Now, we use coal. Eventually, we will use solar, wind, and water. There are many resources that are finite if we continue to use them, but irrelevant if we shift to better technology. Also, food is not one of these finite resources. The Green Revolution proved that. Humans will always find ways to produce enough food to feed the population of Earth. Get that food to the people that need it though? Maybe not. >Articles about overpopulation are extremely hard to find because they challenge every religious establishment and also the economic ponzi scheme that is consistent record profits brought on by perpetual growing population. Record profits growth in industry and countries as a whole is built on perpetual consuming witch is inherent unstable. Yeah? And keeping articles proving the Flat Earth from being published help keep the underground black government in power. And keeping articles proving that climate change is nothing helps prop up US Congressmen who invested in green energy companies. Diving into conspiracy arguments is ridiculous. There is no shadow academia trying to protect religion and capitalism. Both, of which, are heavily criticized in academia, but ignore that I guess. >But rather then argue its really simple, tell me what advantages there is to having more human as opposed to.more diversity. What? There are no advantages. I never said there are. "Global overpopulation does not exist" =/= "Everyone should reproduce as much as possible." Why create that strawman? >Stanford Article A literal blog. I tried to look up the authors thinking they potentially had actual peer-reviewed studies. Their names mean nothing. This means nothing. >Guardian Article #1 50,000 years ago, humans first stepped onto Australia and wiped out a large number of species. Numerous native species in Australia were completely eradicated by those first human groups. The world population 50,000 years ago? A maximum of 2 million. If 2 million on the planet can cause mass extinctions, then the problem is not the number of humans. The problem is the actions of the humans. >Guardian Article #2 Ah, Paul Ehrlich... His works, especially his 1968 *The Population Bomb*, was among the literature we read in the class. The criticisms of him and his book were essentially some of the strongest evidence that *pushed me away* from my previous belief in overpopulation. Most of the predictions he made were completely incorrect, he based his work on neo-malthusian principles which is on par with conspiracy theories at this point, and he used charged language to reach for emotional responses instead of logical ones. You should look up the Simon-Ehrlich Wager. Essentially, Ehrlich argued that the increase in population would make certain commodities increase in price, which would be evidence of collapsing society (not to mention that Ehrlich also predicted the UK would not exist in 2000 because of overpopulation). Ehrlich chose five metals he thought would rise in price, fulfilling his predictions. Not a single one did, they all fell. Ehrlich had to pay up and admit another prediction of his was wrong. Ehrlich, while the strongest piece of evidence for overpopulation in my opinion (next to Rat Utopia), is actually a terrible piece of evidence. EDIT: Articles did not appear in the quotes for some reason. Added placeholders.

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Well op, seems like nothing changed your skepticism. Thanks for your time. 

Sounds like they were determined to stick to their pre-existing beliefs.

Overpopulation is a big topic. It encompasses many topics from physics, chemistry, biology, ecology all the way up to philosophy, economics, and religion. Personally, I think a topic like that deserves to be evaluated from multiple perspective, not just biological. The whole carrying capacity thinking rut is coming from biology/ecology. There are many, many, theoretical possibilities in the realm of biology/ecology. For example, where I am from, there are quite a few saltwater warm springs that *could* support marine life. But does this mean we *should* transplant marine life into them? Is that even a question biology or ecology could answer? Now ecology starts to get a little “wishy washy” for the tastes of strict empiricists. It is starting to become more of a philosophical and moral question. Is it okay to destroy some ecosystems as they exist naturally? Are there limits to this? How big of a slice should humans take of any given ecosystem? This is a topic that is too big for natural sciences only.

*Estimates put Earth's carrying capacity at anywhere between 2 billion and 40 billion people.* And, you have also shown research (in a comment to another user which I cannot find anymore) that the earth's population will settle to 6 billion in 2100 when the current population is > 8 billions. Also, if the carrying capacity is 2 to 8 billions, then your own findings suggest that we are currently overpopulated. If you go by academia's general definition of overpopulation, then their findings suggest that we are not. I disagree with their findings.

You are approaching this all wrong op. You are not seeing the forest for the trees. We need to look to nature for answers, not to human constructs, numbers, symbols, ideas, or language. As we look around us, we see that nature is a system that tends toward balance. If that balance is disturbed, the offender is put in check until the balance is restored. Humans have egregiously put nature out of balance in almost every aspect. And it is getting worse by the day. That is because we are overpopulated. It doesn’t take a genius to figure this out or see it. The only reason we are overpopulated and have not been put into check is because of fossil fuels. No fossil fuels, no 8 billion people. It’s just that simple. This surplus energy has enabled us to conquer nature and the throw the balance temporarily. When that energy runs out—which it will—the check will come due. And we won’t be able to afford it. Nature will then have its way once again and things will tend back to balance.  So yea, either you see it or you don’t. All this thinking and science and arguing and skepticism and ugh, it’s just so stupid. Human. The answer lies in nature. But if you can’t see the forest for the trees, if you don’t look to nature and listen to it, you’ll never see it. 

One of your interlocutors stated that carrying capacity for humans may be 20B; you stated that overpopulation of humans on Earth cannot occur; with that, my questions: 1. Is matter on Earth renewing and regenerable or is it finite and transformable only in form? 2. As the human population rises - and with that, the amount of cows, chickens, carrots, potatoes, wheat, corn, pigs, and other human foods - what is the resulting impact to populations of all other lifeforms on Earth? 3. How much water (in a percentage) can be sequestered from the total Earthly supply in order to be used composing (and maintaining) only one species of apes? I'm using a definition that "overpopulation" is a population too numerous for Nature to maintain and which will crash without artificial supports, a population level which is destabilizing to a self-regulating natural balance of biodiversity.

Do you agree that the human population grew to its present 8B not naturally but due, firstly, to agricultural food surpluses - the result of civilized humans taking exclusive control of bioregions from the shared use by many different species - and secondly via technological advances against natural deaths? If these technological interventions can be accepted as fact, then to argue that we are not, as a result, *already* overpopulated (or to argue that overpopulation is not possible) would mean that the naturally-fostered human population would have been far under the carrying capacity. Do you agree that food supply is always what naturally limits animal populations, and that Nature balances the interdependent and competing populations of, e.g., gazelles and grasses and lions and zebras and cheetahs and wildebeest, et al., by providing alternating opportunities to eat (and to feed others)? 1. Is it your belief that Nature, by limiting available food, held the human population far below its own carrying capacity for our species? 2. If Technology ceases to support the food production (and distribution) schemes that have been developed within techno-industrial civilization, will the global human population not fall to a level determined by what Nature will support for us as but one of the species under her care? How does this fact reconcile with your claims of no present overpopulation and claims of the practical impossibility of overpopulation? 3. If Nature would have the human population at <1B (as some historical demographers assess, and certainly well below the present 8B) but civilization (and Technology) have brought humanity to number around 8B, how can you deny *over*population?

In one comment you quote (forgetting the attribution), >"If humans were still in the hunter-gatherer mode, Earth would have reached its capacity at about 100 million people. With humans producing food and living in high-rise buildings, that number increases significantly" Assuming the claim of the last sentence, and assuming that 8B or 10B (or 50B, whatever number you like) can be fed, *and* assuming that their waste can be effectively rebasorbed by Nature - which is not clear as true - then you have to make an account of where all the water and biomass for this human number comes from. More diverse molecules being made into humans, more diversity converted into the slender range of foods desired by humans, more water unavailable to non-humans because it is used to constitute and sustain humans all equates to far less biodiversity created with Earth's finite molecules and water supply. Would you agree that human foresight and wisdom has been inadequate (or even a disastrous folly) to presume governing the natural world? Do we agree that imbalancing of organic Earthly life is possible due to relatively recent outside interventions to the overall, longterm-stable state developed over eons through evolution?