While reading this essay, I had several questions:
The author starts by stating that resource abundance leads to population growth but then quickly moves to why the human population isn’t growing despite this abundance. Wouldn’t it be worth exploring what “abundance” means for modern humans? Could there be some form of scarcity at play? Comparing humans to bacteria or plants in terms of abundance is quite amusing, and I even welcome this anti-anthropocentric perspective. However, humans have (or may have) unique needs. I’ve always found it puzzling why researchers, when discussing abundance in the context of fertility, focus only on the first two or three levels of Maslow’s hierarchy of needs. If we stick to this framework, shouldn’t we also consider, even if controversial, the fascinating “Universe 25″ experiment by John B. Calhoun? It suggests that abundance (in a closed system) leads to societal collapse. This leaves two questions unresolved for me: What exactly is abundance? And can we confidently say it influences fertility in only one (positive) direction?
I’ve always been baffled by the fact that, despite governments constantly lamenting declining birth rates, there’s a near-universal shortage of childcare facilities. For instance, the statistics on kindergarten enrollment in the U.S. from 1980 to 2021 (https://www.statista.com/statistics/184020/kindergarten-enrollment-in-public-and-private-institutions/) don’t seem to show a clear downward trend in the number of children at first glance.
p.s. I don’t want to dive too deeply into Lacanian abyss, but just as a gentle prompt for reflection: Can there be abundance if you lack a sense of lack?
The author starts by stating that resource abundance leads to population growth but then quickly moves to why the human population isn’t growing despite this abundance.
It’s not accurate to say that the author said that the human population is growing.
He said that the human population is “still growing today, by roughly 80 million people per year.”
He also linked to an essay that talks about this.
He also believes that growth can and will go back up without population control and/or major disaster(s).
The author starts by stating that resource abundance leads to population growth but then quickly moves to why the human population isn’t growing despite this abundance. Wouldn’t it be worth exploring what “abundance” means for modern humans? Could there be some form of scarcity at play?
I’ve always found it puzzling why researchers, when discussing abundance in the context of fertility, focus only on the first two or three levels of Maslow’s hierarchy of needs. If we stick to this framework, shouldn’t we also consider, even if controversial, the fascinating “Universe 25” experiment by John B. Calhoun? It suggests that abundance (in a closed system) leads to societal collapse.
Maybe, but I don’t think we should trust the claimed results of Calhoun’s experiment(s).
His Mouse Utopia experiments have never been replicated by anyone other than himself, and I see no reasons to believe that abundance would lead to collapse, especially if abundance persists and consistently outpaces the population and its growth.
This leaves two questions unresolved for me: What exactly is abundance?
We could say that abundance is a high quantity of resources, relative to a given population.
It’s a fuzzy number, not an exact number.
And can we confidently say it influences fertility in only one (positive) direction?
I argued in sections 5.3 to 5.6 of my Population Dynamics FAQs that abundance always leads to higher fertility.
That would still be the case too, if it weren’t for the widespread existence of effective birth control, as addressed in sections 5.8 to 5.12.
I’ve always been baffled by the fact that, despite governments constantly lamenting declining birth rates, there’s a near-universal shortage of childcare facilities.
Yeah, I think that’s a problem too, but probably not among the main barriers to increasing birth rates, as addressed in section 7 and its subsections of those FAQs.
p.s. I don’t want to dive too deeply into Lacanian abyss, but just as a gentle prompt for reflection: Can there be abundance if you lack a sense of lack?
Hmm, I think so. I think that the concept of abundance and the corresponding patterns in reality are independent of how we define words.
While reading this essay, I had several questions:
The author starts by stating that resource abundance leads to population growth but then quickly moves to why the human population isn’t growing despite this abundance. Wouldn’t it be worth exploring what “abundance” means for modern humans? Could there be some form of scarcity at play? Comparing humans to bacteria or plants in terms of abundance is quite amusing, and I even welcome this anti-anthropocentric perspective. However, humans have (or may have) unique needs. I’ve always found it puzzling why researchers, when discussing abundance in the context of fertility, focus only on the first two or three levels of Maslow’s hierarchy of needs. If we stick to this framework, shouldn’t we also consider, even if controversial, the fascinating “Universe 25″ experiment by John B. Calhoun? It suggests that abundance (in a closed system) leads to societal collapse. This leaves two questions unresolved for me: What exactly is abundance? And can we confidently say it influences fertility in only one (positive) direction?
I’ve always been baffled by the fact that, despite governments constantly lamenting declining birth rates, there’s a near-universal shortage of childcare facilities. For instance, the statistics on kindergarten enrollment in the U.S. from 1980 to 2021 (https://www.statista.com/statistics/184020/kindergarten-enrollment-in-public-and-private-institutions/) don’t seem to show a clear downward trend in the number of children at first glance.
p.s. I don’t want to dive too deeply into Lacanian abyss, but just as a gentle prompt for reflection: Can there be abundance if you lack a sense of lack?
It’s not accurate to say that the author said that the human population is growing. He said that the human population is “still growing today, by roughly 80 million people per year.” He also linked to an essay that talks about this. He also believes that growth can and will go back up without population control and/or major disaster(s).
He wrote a sequel to this essay. Basically, the answer is that birth control has been impeding population growth. That’s why it’s possible that humans currently live with abundant food and amenities, while the population has
Maybe, but I don’t think we should trust the claimed results of Calhoun’s experiment(s). His Mouse Utopia experiments have never been replicated by anyone other than himself, and I see no reasons to believe that abundance would lead to collapse, especially if abundance persists and consistently outpaces the population and its growth.
We could say that abundance is a high quantity of resources, relative to a given population. It’s a fuzzy number, not an exact number.
I argued in sections 5.3 to 5.6 of my Population Dynamics FAQs that abundance always leads to higher fertility. That would still be the case too, if it weren’t for the widespread existence of effective birth control, as addressed in sections 5.8 to 5.12.
Yeah, I think that’s a problem too, but probably not among the main barriers to increasing birth rates, as addressed in section 7 and its subsections of those FAQs.
Hmm, I think so. I think that the concept of abundance and the corresponding patterns in reality are independent of how we define words.