But yeah, sure he's making a slightly more complicated argument, but it's still making an implicit assumption that the upsides of population growth will scale indefinitely, and I just don't buy it. It's at best an open question. But on a fundamental level, there has to be some limit. That's simply due to physics.
A simplistic counter argument might suggest that given enough technological advancement, humanity would expand beyond the finite limits of the Earth. However, it is also probable that technologies which are inconceivable to us today will become available in the future. How this will change our understanding of the Earth's perceived "ecological limits" is unknown.
As we project out into the future, we are dealing with things which are known to be unknown-unknowns.
The more damning indictment of the Club of Rome's agenda and philosophy is the dark history of Eugenics. Paul Ehrlich wrote in favor of forced sterilization:
>The Ehrlichs float the idea of adding "temporary sterilants" to the water supply or staple foods. However, they reject the idea as unpractical due to "criminal inadequacy of biomedical research in this area."
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Population_Bomb#:~:text=Th...
A better question which illustrates the underlying philosophical issues might ask: What is the greatest good? An unspoiled vision of nature as idealized by contemporary elites? Or productivity gains which ease the human condition and lift the masses out of poverty?
From my perspective this is the underlying issue with the environmental movement as conceived by the Club of Rome, the World Economic forum and other globalist organizations.
Then he goes on a rant about malthus and the subsequent explosion in population without mentioning the very important fact that it would've been impossible without the invention of synthetic fertiliser. Instead he says Malthus missed the fairly obvious fact that livestock and plant populations would increase with human populations. But again, this is imprecise at best.