Our Habitable Capacity III
If in the latter half of the 21st century, the world’s population significantly exceeds its habitable capacity, what happens to the “excess” people?
Plan A
Currently the world is pursuing a plan with two possible components:
Climate Crisis: Mainly through technology, the world needs to reduce the emissions of greenhouse gases so the accumulated gases will sufficiently dissipate to avoid uncontrollable climate change in the latter half of the 21st century.
Population: Is not part of the plan because it is associated with racism.
Many scientists believe Plan A is failing and may completely fail.
The Climate Crisis under Plan A
The three largest national contributors to greenhouse gases are not meeting needed targets:
China’s main focus of world domination has been delayed by having focused on COVID-19.
In the U.S., instead of Al Gore, we got Bush 2’s multiple disasters. Obama’s slight progress was more than reversed by Trump.
India is consumed with meeting the growing aspirations of its large population which continues to increase.
After the Great Recession and the acute COVID-19 effects, the increasing population is chasing too few goods and services, resulting in worldwide inflation. China and India, representing a third of the world’s population, have failed to condemn Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and may be helping Russia behind the scenes.
Population under Plan A
According the a recent U.N. report, world population is projected to be 9 billion in 2040 and possibly exceeding 10 billion as of 2060.
The declining rate of population growth, due to aging and other natural causes, is also being influenced by the following:
The Gates Foundation, some NGOs, and some countries are promoting women’s education and the voluntary use of contraceptives. Counter to this is China’s reversal of its “one child” policy to now “at most three children.” The U.N. projects China’s population to decline from the current 1.44 billion to 1 billion around 2100.
Given China’s World domination goals, how likely is this to happen? Can we expect China to start enforcing “at least two children per family" in Han Chinese families?
Considering the above, by 2040, one ninth of the population will be produced by additional people in just 18 years. The greenhouse gases generated by these additional people will likely be less than one ninth but still significant.
Even though the rate of growth of the world’s population is decreasing, each subsequent year’s rate is being applied to a larger population. Thus, based on U.N. data, over 60 million people per year will be added through the year 2040 along with all the greenhouse gases they generate.
Assuming 60 million additional people per year and a decline of the Earth’s habitable capacity at 50 million per year, after these two cross the population will be exceeding habitable capacity by at least 110 million a year or over 1.1 billion in 10 years.
Plan A’s Apocalyptic Consequences
If we do not change course to a Plan B, what are the likely effects on the biosphere?
The Arctic Ocean will be free of ice in the late summer. Most of the Greenland ice cap will melt and a small portion of the Antarctica ice cap as well, raising the ocean level at least a foot. All the calamities we are now experiencing will increase in intensity and frequency.
Turning to the impact on people, if we don’t change our course, let’s use the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse (with the last one taken from an alternate list):
Death: Many people will simply die when population exceeds habitable capacity, due to the changes in the biosphere mentioned above. More will die as a result of the following three horsemen. All this death could make the U.N. forecast of population irrelevant after 2070.
Famine: The world is already experiencing unprecedented famine. The Russian war in Ukraine will make things worse in the short term. Long term, we should expect massive crop failures due to heat.
War: We have had Russian war crimes in Chechnya, Georgia, Syria and Ukraine. Also, recent wars in Rwanda, Bosnia, Ethiopia and Yemen. Will there be future wars over resources such as water? Much habitat has been destroyed in these listed wars, and its replacement will produce more greenhouse gases.
Plague: As plagues go, COVID-19 and its variants was mild. Going back in time, polio in children in the ’50s and ’60s was worse and Spanish Flu was devastating to those under 25 starting in 1918. In the Middle Ages, the Black Plague killed over half the population in Europe. What happens if something like a highly infectious Ebola emerges which takes two years to develop a vaccine? There can also be plagues of plants like the Irish potato famine beginning in 1845 and the die-off of chestnut trees in the U.S. in the mid 20th century. What happens if something similar happens to corn, wheat, soy beans, or rice? We also have present and future plagues affecting domestic animals, such as chickens being infected with bird flu.
In addition, immigration pressures from hot regions to cooler will likely become much higher than present, with the political torment that will result.
Plan B
Here is a partial alternative:
Climate Crisis
We obviously need continued pressure to do what is possible to reduce greenhouse gases as in Plan A.
Beyond this, we need to plan for a biosphere with a declining habitable capacity for humans. For example:
We need to plan for a one-foot rise in sea level by year X where X is revised as new data is analyzed. This means no rebuilding of structures destroyed by hurricanes in this new “ocean flood plain.”
Massive research is needed for heat and drought resistant sources of food.
Population
We here have some hope, leverage to improve humanity’s fate with greater impact than Climate Crisis efforts. The simple solution is a worldwide adoption of:
Please at most 2 children per family to reduce the suffering and death of future generations.
As explained in a previous article, our population could peak at roughly 1 billion lower, and decades earlier, than is currently forecast.
If humanity has the intelligence to create the James Webb Telescope, do we have the intelligence to save ourselves?
