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Comment by matte_black | Hacker News Reader

Such events are necessary to keep human population under a manageable number. Throughout human history there have been outbreaks that claimed many lives and stunted population growth for some time. We will likely see such an event in our time.

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Humans prior to modern times haven't ever exceeded the carrying capacity of our environment and haven't had a die out that substantially reduced our population in modern times.

Your thesis other than being fictional also is an emotional appeal to the concept that what is natural is desirable which is wholly unsound both on its face and because any die out sufficient to be effective is entirely likely to not only take civization with it but also reduce our ability to take effective measures to manage our environment as our technology dies with our civilaztion.

The way forward to a managable population size is through raising everyone up to a relaively modern level and the way forward to that population living sustainably is via education.

Edit: Your philosophy that its ok for the more developed nations to wreck the environment leading to mass death presumably among those you regard as your inferiors while relax and have a latte safe behind our metaphorical walls is pure insanity.

Humans prior to modern times haven't ever exceeded the carrying capacity of our environment

Can you provide a citation for this? My understanding is that humanity have spent most of its history near the carrying capacity of the environment -- world population was very stable, and the major increases in population happened due to humans figuring out new ways to increase the carrying capacity (e.g through farming), or lucking out into them (e.g. through lactose tolerance genes). At least, could you specify what excatly you mean by "modern times"?

I don't know what your cutoff for "substantial" reduction but the Black Death killed over 20% of all humans.

Agree that "natural" is too often used as synonymous with "good" when our lives are far superior to what "natural" humans would experience.

Original poster "Such events are necessary to keep human population under a manageable number. Throughout human history there have been outbreaks that claimed many lives and stunted population growth for some time"

The black death was a singular public health crisis precipitated by sanitation not an example of the world population periodically resetting to a manageable level.

I am not unaware of the black death I just don't think it represents an example of what poster is arguing for.

Education is not the savior. There is a physical limit to resources here on this Earth. There is only so much food we can make, only so many jobs we can create.

The only way to manage population is to control breeding. That is not a scaleable solution.

Well... not directly. But in societies with more education, the birth rate is lower. Some countries have already dipped below a self-sustaining birth rate.

Yeah there is indeed a physical limit to human population.

And that physical limit is much closer to 100 billion people, than it is to 1 billion.

Population growth is already on the downward trend, and we are expected to reach population growth neutrality by 2040.

Do you have some sources on the max amount of people on Earth? Just curious.

> Education is not the savior.

Unless you can educate the world that the Earth has limited carrying capacity and that GDP and population growth aren't necessarily the be-all and end-all.

Malthus called, he wants you to read up on the 20th century.

Mass death < managed population and immigration control.

Managed population? Such as one child per couple policies? Immigration control? Such as closed borders and deportation of illegals?

How exactly would deportations help with overpopulation? That seems to be irrelevant - leading to changes in distribution, not numbers.

Easy, when you deport to a warzone and/or desert.

I don't know. I didn't suggest immigration control. I assume the parent meant they would deport people to regions where survival is much less guaranteed.

You prefer mass death?

> Such events are necessary to keep human population under a manageable number.

Is there any evidence for this assertion?

It's really more of a philosophical position, isn't it? That isn't to say it's correct, but what would "evidence" even mean in this context?

Philosophical positions that you can't defend are mental masterbation without a payoff at the end. They aren't worth the time required to post them on this site.

Ok, but what about philosophical positions that CAN be defended? For example, your statement is a philosophical position in itself, no? A position, I assume, you believe to be "defensible?"

The answer to 2+2 has an infinite number of wrong answers. Finding the correct way to answer the question gives us a tool in our tool box that we can use to add any 2 numbers.

Through defensible positions even if we ultimately believe the conclusion is wrong we learn new ways to reason about life and the world around us. New tools to inform our interaction with the world or at least new thought processes to communicate with our fellow humans.

The bald statement that 2+2 = 17 or even that 2+2=4 is worth nothing if you can't explain why you think its correct.

Well evidence would be something like "over time these countries have had reduced quality of life over the past decade, because of population growth".

But it seems like the opposite is true. Quality of life is still massively improving basically everywhere.

We are not running out of resources.

Which part, that the events are necessary or that we have to keep human population to a level that the planet can currently support?

It's not a given that such events are necessary because human population growth has already slowed down and will continue doing so as more of the world becomes developed. Furthermore, technological advancement can increase the number of people the planet can support. So, while there is definitely some population strain, it's far from certain that human overpopulation will result in catastrophe without events like this.

The former. At our current consumption levels/technology, we are obviously above our planet's current carrying capacity.

This is not controversial. We are living on borrowed time - our civilization currently relies on the consumption of non-renewable resources, and the non-sustainable consumption of renewable resources.

Even if this is sustainable for 10, 20, or 100 years, it is not sustainable for longer time horizons.

It's worth pointing out that for developed economies like the US, UK, and Japan, the amount of per capita energy usage is the lowest it has been in decades:

https://d33wubrfki0l68.cloudfront.net/0784d9d63336606d4ca025...

This may be at least in part due to the shifting of energy-intensive industries to countries like China, but it does show that countries can continue to grow their GDP (per capita) while dropping their energy usage per capita, which bodes well for the future.

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