Honor Pledge : Adam Pierce

Chapter one “Population” explains how population changed through the years and what caused the population explosion. One of the reasons was a reduction of death rate after World War II due to being able to stop some diseases. Also, people in less developed countries believe in having more children, often due to religion or tradition. More children provide more wealth. The chapter is explaining how population growth affects development. When the growth is to rapid it causes that most of the population in a country is nonproductive, therefore more resources are needed to maintain a country. On the other hand, if the growth is too low, also more funds are needed to support older part of population. There is no good answer to how fast population

Thesis: The topic of human population growth is an important issue due to its impacts upon people in developing countries, economics, religion, food production, and the environment; without any limitations, population growth can lead to negative consequences, such as famine and environmental destruction, or even positive outcomes, such as potential economic growth.

Population can be slowed by its numbers because as the population grows, limiting factors become more present. You start as a small population with good resources plenty of food, not very much competition for food and ect. Then your population growth grows and after so many generations you come into limiting factors that your population growth has become too large and the competition for food is higher, also less food to go around as we need to feed the total population and resources being used up with the increased numbers. This causes the growth rate to slow because the environment isn’t ideal causing more deaths. Then the stability of carrying capacity is thrown off with death rate possibly exceeding birth rates causing population to be slowed because of all these chain reactions occurring.

Human population growth is becoming a huge issue in our world today. The population is increasing rapidly. The reason that it is becoming a concern is because it has affected the economic, environmental, and social aspects of our world. In the film Frontline: Heat, we can see how there might not be a future for our planet unless we are able to reduce the emissions and make our world a safe place. Not only for the present but also for future generations so that they are able to live long and healthy lives.

Overpopulation can damage or even destroy the environment. The need for resources will grow with the population, but natural resources will not be produced at a fast enough pace. Man may try to produce the resources they need themselves but will there be enough space? According to Young the average person needs a minimum of 100 square feet to feel comfortable in a living space (“How Much Space Do You Really Need?”). Using the estimated population size of 2050, human living space will take up 43.8 billion square feet. Assuming most of these people live in apartment buildings so there is room for farming. Farms will need to switch out crops every year to slow down the process of soil degradation.

Within the early history of the human race, the earth was titanic and appeared boundless. Its resources seemed limitless. Then as the humans traveled away from home, the world got smaller and most of the world was recorded onto maps. Soon, the numbers of people were growing and the world and its natural resources looked as if it was shrinking. The overpopulation of an creature is dangerous to any environment, but with humans its deadly for the whole world.

(n.d.). So many things go into human population growth such as deaths, births, and migration; for, all three play a factor when calculating the growth. The more people that live in the area, can affect more on the environment then anything. “For the last 50 years, world population multiplied more rapidly than ever before, and more rapidly than it is projected to grow in the future.” Jordan, J. (n.d.). Human population growth affects things that go un noticed such as in the workforce, environment, and our

Economically there are two approaches to the debate on how much the human population can grow. One debate is the natural science approach which is adopted by biologists, chemists and physicists. The natural science approach stands by the fundamental idea that earths capacity to supply is fixed and human population is constrained by physical limits and of scarce natural resources. They state that human biological requirements don’t change. For example; everyone on the planet today needs 2000-2500 calories per day to be healthy, this is the same amount of calories our ancestors would have needed 1000 years ago, however, the earth is now vastly more populated than 1000 years ago, consequentially, there will come a time when there

Next, there are several causes of overpopulation. Significant improvement in quality of life and basic health services has resulted in decline in death rate on one hand, and increase in the birth rate on the other. Continuous migration of people from underdeveloped areas to developed areas has triggered an unnatural growth in population in developed areas, thus, putting immense pressure on available resources. Our failure in understanding the problems caused by overpopulation in urban areas is reflected in unplanned growth of newer towns and cities. More importantly, a look at the projected population growth is even more horrendous, which in itself stresses on the fact that we are not learning from our mistakes.

“But as the density of the population increases, certain resources such as food and space become scarce, predation and disease increase, and waste begins to accumulate. These negative conditions generate a feedback effect: Increasing population density produces conditions that slow down population growth. An equilibrium situation results, in which the population

Before now, our population was already concerned about limited resources and paranoia about the future. Amongst coming to a population of 7 billion came the term overpopulation. The term basically speaks for itself; we might be over populated. But is overpopulation a problem; if so, what can we do about it? Along with talking about the issue, to presenting possible solutions which may even take us back, the solution might be easier than we thought. As informed by Nicholas Kristof a New York Times writer, “In 1999, the United Nations’ best projection was that the world wouldn’t pass seven billion until 2013, but we reached it two years early. Likewise, in 1999, the U.N. estimated that the world population in 2050 would be 8.9 billion, but now it projects 9.3 billion Overpopulation can be defined as the comparison of our population and the number of resources used.” Here, I will be overpopulation, including statistics, and the effects taken on the economy. Our birth rates climb and we our population gets bigger and bigger, giving us our biggest issue, overpopulation. Many believe that expanding our areas and cities are the answer to any overcrowding issues. The more we expand the more natural resources we use. We are rapidly losing our natural resources, for not just ourselves but for the others we care about around us. A solution to overpopulation could be birth control, and I do agree that birth control could even help us in more ways than just overpopulation.

No Population can have an ongoing exponential growth without having a limit that rules over the population’s size. This limit is called the carrying capacity. Carrying capacity is the number of people, animals and crops that a region can support without environmental degradation. The way things are now, the human population is going to break through its carrying capacity very soon. Exceeding the carrying capacity means that the number of humans roaming the earth is greater than the number of humans the food supply can hold. Therefore, the only way to avoid a future battle for food is by reducing the birth rate of newborns in families across the globe.

There are many issues today that pose a threat to our way of life. Overpopulation is a serious problem that will eventually have an extremely negative effect on our countries, and our planet. The problems that arise due to overpopulation could even prove to a fatal epidemic that will eventually wipeout the entire human race. Oftentimes this issue is overlooked due to lack of knowledge and understanding of the subject; or, simply because most of us are so blessed that we are not affected first hand by the problems it is causing this very second. Overpopulation, in my belief, is an enormously serious global issue that should be identified, analyzed, and controlled immediately.

Probably the greatest ecological problem of our time is the rapid growth of the human population. During most of the time humans have lived on Earth, its population has grown fairly steadily and slowly. For example, between the years 10 000 and 500 a. the global population passed from 5 million to 100 million. By the year 13000 of our era it reached 500 million, and by the beginning of the nineteenth century it had doubled to 1000 million. Since then there has been a real explosion of the human population, reaching more than 5000 million in 1987.

First, if human population growth is not controlled we will soon run out of resources. The larger the population, the more demand for resources which leads to the issue of the earth not replenishing quick enough to keep up with the demand. In addition, humans require fossil fuels for energy; the requirement for fossil fuels is high often leaving society to question if there will be enough for future generations. For an example, in 1971 the electricity consumption was at the lowest with 1,199.79 verses the latest update in 2014 with 3,128.4. Although there is proof that human population is taking a toll on resources, people believe it is a positive thing because it allows mankind to invent new ways to produce more resources. According to Acton, it opens opportunities for human knowledge to allow us to produce more finished products out of less raw materials leaving natural resources to become more available. Even though humans are finding new ways to save natural resources, to some extent they will always be used and will eventually run out.