Earth, a massive rock with a copious amount of minerals and elements, consist of many natural features that benefit our structure of life. The Earth has limited resources because it is a closed system, meaning it must operate under the standard conditions in which it was given to us and many generations to come. The ecosystem consists of biotic and abiotic interactions that work together to provide us with many natural resources. New resources cannot be created but only withdrawn from the ecosystems that occupy it. Barry Commoner, a biologist and leading ecologist, ruled four major laws of ecology, first that everything is connected to something else in some way. Second, everything must go somewhere. Third, nature knows best. Lastly, …show more content…
Current outputs, which refer to any natural resources taken out of the ecosystem, are outweighing the inputs. This is causing an ecological imbalance. The human population rate steadily increased for a couple hundred years until the industrial revolution in 1850, during which an exponential increase in birth/death ratio is observed. There was an equal amount of births in the two hundred years prior to 1850 and the fifty years leading to the next century (pg.17). Industrialization catalyzed this population growth and established the marketplace within American culture. With demand exponentially increasing, the resulting issue was the supply of irreplaceable natural core resources. Garrett Hardin, an American ecologist, was extraordinarily distressed over the global harm being caused by this rapid population growth and the system in place. Hardin is worried about the rate at which these are destroying the environment. He ties together many argumentative reasons of how the population growth and system imposed are causing great environmental harm, which are causing a tragedy to our commons, and also benchmarks to fix it. Tragedy of the commons is the overall foundation of the input and output system. With population clearly growing at a uncountable rate, the outputs impacting the environment are equally growing. Tragedy is referred specifically to the overuse of an item. The overuse of water now will have drastic
There are many horrendous effects that come from population growth. One of the many major effects include decreasing amounts of available land. Another is the decreasing amount of essential natural resources. A part
“The Wreck of Time,” written by Annie Dillard, illustrates societies battle with population. Dillard emphasizes the disasters that savage our world. According to the author, “ By moderate figures, the dead outnumber us about fourteen to one. The dead will always outnumber the living.” (Dillard 168) The amount of natural or man-made catastrophes do not affect the population as much as we claim. Dillards opinions are supported with facts throughout her essay, but readers are still left to question, why is our world considered to be overpopulated? Perhaps it is time for our society to consider Earth is not overpopulated in terms of people, but in resources. In addition, humans are struggling to grasp that other ecosystems are also being affected. With the introduction of Darwinism (the theory of evolution, by natural selections), humans are programed with the mentality of “survival of the fittest” forcing our humanity to evolve. Although evolution proved to be beneficial, as our immune system and way of life improved, we sacrificed our natural resources along the way. The problem with our society is not the lack of knowledge, but the ignorance and selfishness within our society. Overpopulation, threatened by the lack of resources, intimidates humans to disrupt biodiversity as we know it. (1) Man-made changes jeopardize our biodiversity. (2) As a result, the Earth’s resources are being depleted due to rapid consumption. (3) Even though we lack resources,
Dr. Forsyth implements plenty of evidence as well as proven statistics to back up his outlook on these issues. The growth of human population is happening at an exponential rate, implying that in a short period of time population growth will double. “We find it difficult to comprehend exponential growth, but it may prove to be our fatal blind spot” [3]. When analysing the world’s population over a long period of time, it took roughly 19,000 years for the world’s population to go from 5million people to 500 million people in 1500 A.D. [4] With an estimated population of 7.5 billion people [5], for a period less than 1000 years, population increased more than 1500 times its size than it was in the 1500’s. In addition, on a more minute scale of time, in 1950 the world’s population was roughly 2.5 billion people [6] in merely 50 years the world’s population has tripled. With these statics, it is evident that the world’s population is increasing at an incomprehensive rate. With populations at their peak, overconsumption is another problem this world faces, as Dr. Forsyth affirms “humans consume far more than their fair share of the Earth’s natural productivity.”[7] Due to this over consumption of resources, there is a vast demand for cheap food which results in the clear cutting of large forest to generate room for new plantations of food. When doing so, humans destroy habitats that
No matter how many people do claim overpopulation is not a relevant issue, it very much is because of the simple fact that starvation and pollution are very real and existing issues that are ultimately offset by overpopulation. In an article titled “Overpopulation Is Not the Problem,” author Erle C. Ellis uses the analogy “Like bacteria in a petri dish, our exploding numbers are reaching the limits of a finite planet, with dire consequences,” to argue that overpopulation is not a problem by stating the opposing claim. “We are nothing like bacteria in a petri dish,” Mr. Ellis solemnly asserts, “...these claims demonstrate a profound misunderstanding of the ecology of human systems. The conditions that sustain humanity are not natural and never have been. Since prehistory, human populations have used technologies and engineered ecosystems to sustain
Never in the history of the human species have we been in such a rapidly changing environment. Since the beginning of the industrial revolution, we have been making social, economical, scientific, and environmental changes and advancements at an unprecedented rate. Societal advancements, while much appreciated by the average Joe, have been detrimental to our environment. Every days forests are cut, rivers polluted, and once ecologically important areas are cemented over to compensate for our rapidly growing population. As the status of our natural world becomes more critical by the year it is important that we look at the driving factors and reasons for this destruction of the natural world. While pollutants and globalization are the driving
Garrett Hardin, human ecologist and writer, in the informative analytical essay, “Lifeboat Ethics: The Case Against Helping the Poor” (published 1974), argues that overpopulation is affecting our dwindling resources on Earth and it has to be stopped. Hardin supports his argument by giving statistics about the rise in population in the past decades and by explaining how this impacts the use of our resources; his generous use of parentheticals helps him convey his message eloquently, and his use of anaphora when he says, “Complete justice, complete catastrophe.”( Hardin, 383) keeps the reader absorbed; and his use of dilemmas throughout the whole article keeps the reader curious and wanting to continue reading on. Hardin’s purpose is to persuade
In his essay “The Tragedy of the Commons” author Garrett Hardin presents several points for his argument against the population problem. The population is growing at an exponential rate leading to a decline in the quality of life for mankind. Due to the fact that the population is growing so must the energy available, if mankind is to survive. Hardin’s argument is that if the population continues to grow with the laws that are currently set in place, the quality of life will eventually decline. Hardin states “Freedom in a commons brings ruin to all” (Hardin 23).
Imagine if Earth’s population was so large that all of the world’s resources had to be exhausted to their last limits just to provide food for only half of the population. That is exactly what 17th-century demographer Thomas Malthus envisioned when he predicted how the world’s population would affect the world’s resources. In An Essay on the Principle of Population, published in the late 18th century, Malthus expressed many controversial predictions in which he argued that the increase of resources was arithmetic while the increase in population was exponential; thus, he concluded that the population would greatly outpace the amount of resource growth on Earth. Being that Malthus made his predictions during the industrial revolution (which was when North America and Europe reached stage two of the demographic transition), many critics of his theory claim that Malthus’ calculations were inaccurate because he did not consider technological advances in relation to food production. Also, Malthus’ critics believe that he overestimated population increase (mainly because of the time period he lived in) and (adverb) underestimated the production rate of resources. Though both sides of the debate are plausible, it is evident that Malthus’ views were incorrect because modern-day statistics regarding population and food production do not support his claims. Therefore, because of Malthus’ uncircumspect approach when he predicted population
Answer 1: Tragedy of the commons exposes the ignored truth that supply of resources is limited. Everyone has equal right on common resources and this freedom works if there are limits. Increase in demand by an additional unit will reduce supply by same and at certain stage the demand will overwhelms the supply. This situation occurs when individuals tries to maximize the benefit while neglecting the society. Water is going through same phase due to which it’s being privatized and may be in future it is not -common.
The Industrial Revolution was arguably the largest turning point in the history of the interaction between people and nature. New manufacturing techniques allowed for a rapid increase in the power, capability, and convenience in lifestyle for humans. Unfortunately, immense consequences for the environment also started to result. The changes were particularly significant in North America at this time, since advanced lifestyles had not been around long enough to make an impact on the vast wilderness compared to many of the areas in Europe. In the United States, a sense of limitlessness toward so many resources represented the view of the majority, and overall appreciation for and connection
Since the Industrial Revolution we have practiced deforestation, burned fossil fuels, and as a result we have disrupted stable ecosystems. Advances in medicine and technology have given humans the ability to increase their carrying capacity. While increasing our carrying capacity we have also decreased biodiversity around the world. We have introduced different species in new environments to help ourselves
For as long as the earth has existed, it has gone through remarkable things, and through it all it has been able to be sustained. First, it was the asteroid, now it is humans. Biologists claim we are in the age of the sixth extinction; predominantly caused by humans. In this essay, I will be going over how the destruction of the ecosystem pertains to the sixth extinction caused by industrialization, movement of species, and human population growth.
“The Tragedy of the Commons” written by Garret Hardin explains how the human population is degrading the environment. When Hardin refers to commons he is talking about a resource that is owned by no one and used by a group of people. Some examples of commons include the air we breathe, the water we drink, and the oceans we fish. The tragedy is that people don’t look at the bigger picture; the over use of commons for our own personal benefit leads to the destruction or extinction of these commons. For example if one fisherman wants to fish the oceans as much as possible that’s fine, but now imagine if every fisherman wants to fish the oceans as much as they can, this is one example of a common being destroyed by the human population. The
Hartmann states, " Affluence has more to do with the depletion of natural resources than does population size" because similarly to the issue of food distribution, too few people consume too much of the world 's energy, metals and wood (Hartmann 1995: 23). For this reason, " on a global level, it simply does not make sense to blame environmental degradation on population growth" (Hartmann 1995: 23); consumption patterns illustrate that one group of people are obviously creating the damage, and that group is not the "overpopulated" nations of the Global South. Hartmann explains that the goal of achieving a Western lifestyle, which necessitates environmental exploitation, cannot become a reality for a global population of this size but that the globe does have the ability to support every life on the plant. She is effectively calling into question the notion that a Western existence is inherently desirable and better, forcing people to examine if they cry "overpopulation" as a way of protecting their extravagant and environmentally harmful existences. This connects to the final overpopulation myth, analyzed here, which paints the developing world 's inability to reach Western levels of economic growth on their growing population size.