Population Crisis

The world population of 7.2 billion in mid-2013 is projected to increase by almost one billion people within the next twelve years. It is projected to reach 8.1 billion in 2025, and to further increase to 9.6 billion in 2050 and 10.9 billion by 2100. This assumes a decline of fertility for countries where large families are still prevalent as well as a slight increase of fertility in several countries with fewer than two children per woman on average.

Population Growth is an issue that exists in today’s world that needs to be confronted before it becomes out of hand. The population itself has reached overwhelming numbers making it a problem that could turn to be dangerous. The amount of humans that the earth can support or the carrying capacity is slowly rising but at a much slower rate than the population growth rate. The increasing growth rate has its negative effects environmentally, agriculturally, socially, and economically and also has its positive effects nationally, and economically. The government is brainstorming and trying to come up with ways to decrease

The human population rate has changed throughout the ages. By looking at the table we were given the human population has increased heaps from 2000 years ago. If we look at our ancestors they lived with a small existence but this has changed as we have developed and there is more agriculture in this world. Population grew very slowly in the 1000 A.D. also decreased after the Black Death causing large numbers of people wiped out. Then in the 1800 A.D. the industrial revolution came, soon living standards were raised and there was food shortage with the population. In 1927 medicine was introduced this meant that there was increased life expectancy, so the human population grew more. There was more advantages from agriculture, medicine and sanitation

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.

There are more than seven billion people on Earth now, and about one in eight of us don’t have enough food to eat. So, with a projected nine billion people by the year 2050, how many people can the Earth support while maintaining a healthy population? Population changes are due to the relationship between births and deaths. If the number of births equals the number of deaths then the world’s population will remain the same, but if births exceed deaths, population growth will occur. Early in history, population was slowly growing because of high death rates related to wars, famines, and poor medical services. With advances in

In 1960 worldwide population growth reached an all time peak of 2.0. At this point demographers brought up the issue of carrying capacity.

As the human race continues to grow older the population starts to grow. Population growth is a change in the size of a population over time, depending on the balance of births and deaths over a period of time. For the world, population grows when the amount of births exceeds the amount of deaths. As shown in figure 1, the world’s population grew very slowly until about 1750 that is when the population growth started to increase rapidly. Figure 2 shows the growth of the global population from 1950 onwards, it also shows the projected population growth up to 2050. The global population is estimated to rise to approximately 9 billion people by 2050.

The United States already had an overpopulation problem. Now that the population is growing even more we have more cities and states being overpopulated. According to Support U.S. Population Stabilization (SUSPS), if our population trend continues, we will be able to add enough population to create another New York City, Los Angeles, Chicago, Philadelphia, Baltimore, San Francisco, Indianapolis, San Jose, Memphis, Washington D.C., Jacksonville, Milwaukee, Boston, Columbus, New Orleans, Cleveland, Denver, Seattle, and El Paso - plus the next 75 largest cities in the U.S. - by 2020. According to Federation for American Immigration Reform (FAIR), low-ranking countries have high population growth and high ranking countries have lower population

The article by Dennis Dimick brings up some very good points about the increasing population. He states that with our current population of 7 billion people, we currently do not have enough food to eat. With the population increasing day-by-day, we will face more shortage in the future. He also brings up the issue of natural resources. We are currently using so much natural resources that we will run out very soon. The use of natural resources tend to increase with increase in social standing (wealth).

Exponential Growth is shaped in a J-form, this type of growth curve occurs when supplies and materials to a specific population are abundant. Since usually environments are not idealized and resources are limited, exponential growth curve doesn’t occur as much as a logistic growth curve. Logistic growth is a type of growth curve,in a S-form, that occurs more often in an environment. Since each environment has a carrying capacity,which is the number of individuals from a population an environment can hold,the logistic growth is the most logical way to represent a population size over time. An example of a population size that could be represented by an exponential growth curve are mice. Since mice reproduce many offspring at the time of reproduction the population size will exponentially grow, however since mice also have a high predation rate the exponential curve starts rapidly decreasing over a period of time. An example of a population size that could be represented by a logistic growth curve are lions. Usually when lions reproduce only a few offspring are created. However, once an environment reaches its carrying capacity, the population size decreases as the environment can’t sustain the entire population and the “fittest” survive.

Thomas Malthus believed that the human population exhibits exponential growth, which is when the increase is proportional to the amount already present. With exponential growth the rate of increase becomes more rapid in proportion to the increasing total size. An example of exponential

growth rate in the United States is approximately 2.2%. This means by 2050 the population could reach 438 million people (“World Bank Group”) Many citizens do not see any danger of the population rise in the United States. Unawareness might be the biggest factor in why they believe this; however, overpopulation can destroy the environment, including food and water sources, while also raising unemployment rates and the risk of disease.

In the article Overpopulation Is Still the Problem, Alon Tal (2013) claims that overpopulation remains the number one problem facing the world today and discusses various problems and possible solutions. Tal unveils the falsely assuring news stories refuting overpopulation as a problem. He particularly dissects Ellis Erle’s assertions, in the New York Times, concerning China’s seemingly magical works of technology. Erle comes to the conclusion that China’s amazing technology has and will always be able to keep them out of any problems regarding overpopulation. Of course Tal is able to rhythmically rebut Erle’s claims by explaining that, “Anyone with a teaspoon of historic sensibilities about the country 's environmental history might want to mention its long litany of famines which occurred precisely because carrying capacities were consistently outstripped by a growing population”. Tal then goes on to explain other problems linked directly to overpopulation in China like the food crisis from 1958-1961 which led to the starvation of over 20 million people. He also discusses the Chinese one-child policy describing it as “tough medicine” although the application of the policy was flawed he depicts how it has prevented the next round of famines. Tal ties the China population problems into the rest of the article which is mainly about how quickly the world is growing and what we need to do about it. He presents distressing facts like 1 in 8 people in the world suffer from

Throughout human history scholars have been publishing works that discuss the correlation and effects of exponential growth and carrying capacity on a population species. Exponential growth is described as “the increase of a population (or of anything) by a fixed percentage each year” (Withgott, Laposata, and Murck 2016), whereas carrying capacity is “the maximum population size that a given environment can sustain” (Withgott, Laposata, and Murck 2016). Three notable authors to contribute to the topic of exponential growth and carrying capacity are Thomas Malthus, Paul Ehrlich, and Mathis Wackernagel. Of the three authors, Reverend Thomas Malthus undoubtedly had the most controversial solution to the problem of population growth. Malthus urged

One of the problems facing our world is population. It began about ten thousand years ago when the humans settled and began farming. The farming provides more food for the people thus making the population grow. Now we are about 6 billion in population and in a few years we will be around 10 to 11 billion. Therefore, our population will