User:Stevenarntson/group spaces/analytical writing/group 1

1. Overview of the problem.
Throughout the process of researching and developing this page, our group focused on defining the issue, discussing it's conflicts, and considering possible solutions. All the while we had to conduct our research through the mindset of five twenty somethings attending college in the United States, the most privileged of the first world countries. We struggled with making our voice fair, and had difficulty finding solutions that would solve the issue; a task that the world and all it's great minds have yet to accomplish. Overpopulation was a very difficult problem to explore and write about, particularly because it is not an easy problem to define. We found that the methods used in the past to control population were morally questionable. This made us reevaluate the topic and explore what could be done on first world grounds. We found that the root of the issue, which is really a lack of resources for everyone, was actually mostly the first world countries' doing. While looking for solutions, we often look towards education of third world countries on birth control and other contraceptives. We found, however, that education needs to first happen at home regarding our horrible consumption habits. We fully acknowledge that the issue of overpopulation, so vast and far reaching a topic as it is, cannot possibly be surmised in this one little page. Absences, mis-communication, and the reality that we are five young adults with classes, graduations, and lives crowding our time, made the vastness of the topic even that much more overwhelming. However, we hope that we have done a sufficient job of compiling some of the most basic, and most important information, in hopes, ultimately, to better educate readers on the issue.

2. History of overpopulation.
History of Over Population

The idea of overpopulation originated with the physiocrats a French led intellectual movement in the 18th century. They argued land determines wealth, since land is finite and is not able to support an endlessly increasing number of people. Their opposing group believed a large population is a form of wealth, making it possible to have larger markets and armies.

From A.D. 1 until the 1900’s our population had a very gradual increase, slowly picking up. Some events in history helped to slow the process down more, but only for a limited period of time. The black plague was a huge help with setting the growth back. The black plague reduced the world's population from about 450 million to about 375 million in the 1400’s. That was a pretty big drop in our population setting it back, but we overcame it and gradually built our numbers back up. Then in the 1800’s four hundred years later we hit the first billion. This about the time Thomas Robert Malthus published six editions of an essay on “The Principle of Population”. He was one of first notable people to recognize our exponential rate and our more linear rate of resources. The industrial revolution also helped living conditions. Almost sixty five percent of the population at this time lived in Asia, about twenty one percent in Europe, and less than one percent in North America. Then in about 1927 one hundred twenty seven years later we hit the two billion marker. The exponential rate of our population really comes into light in this century. This increase in numbers was mainly influence by the help of antibiotics and other health advances being introduced into the public health care, increasing the life expectancy and also the number of children who would live to have children of their own. Thirty three years forward to the 1960’s the population adds another billion to the total making our population three billion. During this time more modern advances in medicine, agriculture, and sanitation had spread to many countries. Fourteen years later. 1974 is the year in which we reached four billion. At this point in time new reproductive technologies such as the condom and birth control helped slow the growth rate, but with such a large number of people already on the earth it was too late for less abrasive measures to slow it down enough to prevent the population explosion from continuing. In 1987 we reached five billion people worldwide. Twelve years later on October 12, 1999 we have added another million. Today North America holds about five percent, Asia sixty one percent, Latin America nine percent, and Africa and Europe hold about twelve percent each. It has been projected that in 2050 we should have around nine billion at this rate.

It took all of human history until 1830 for world population to reach one billion. The second billion was achieved in 100 years, the third billion in 30 years, the fourth billion in 15 years, and the fifth billion in only 12 years. In 2005, world population exceeded 6.5 billion people, growing by nearly 80 million per year. This drastic increase to the world population demonstrates the exponential increase of human life. With human life however, we need resources and with the current trend in population growth it seems as though some groups would believe the earth will soon become unable to support human life. Over 10 years ago John Holdren wrote an article that showed the world exactly what determines our total energy consumption. It says total energy consumption, equals population size times the average per capita energy use. So if E * total energy use, P * population size, and e * energy use per capita, we can say E * P x e. This equation basically states that if we fail to control our per capita consumption we will never solve our ecological problems. Today's "ecological footprint" measure is an elaboration of Holdren's equation. Holdren greatly stressed the importance of consumption awareness. He believed we as a group of people should know the exact amount of resources we were using. In the US, per capita consumption is higher than in developing countries. This equation proves to the US especially that we cannot simply ignore this issue. With regard to oil use, for example, adding one person to the US population is like adding about 15 in China. Other studies have shown that even the average American child uses more than many other countries. In comparison to seemingly “overpopulated” areas of the globe such as Africa a child from the United States uses approximately 30 times more resources than the children of African nations. (www.overpopulation.org)

The world population as of 7:30 last night was 06,840,273,886. By the time you read this article this number will have grown by more than 50,000. Every day there are over 300,000 births and over 14,000 of those births occur every hour. Now some of you may be thinking well hey people are dying too and yes every day there are over 100,000 deaths, but this also means that every single day there are 200,000 new people on this earth. So let’s put this into terms that we all can understand. Everybody know how big Safeco field is right? Well Safeco field can seat 93,242 people. So every day over two entire Safeco fields are filled to max occupancy. Looking at the world populous when from 1988, the year I was born, it seems that in my lifetime the population has grown by over 1 billion people. So as you can see the world population can grow very quickly. The vast number of the World's population increases drastically every single day. No single group is completely at fault and we must take the time to spread awareness of our own population. Everyone thinks that the population crisis is somewhere else. The US media focuses on China and Africa but does not take into consideration the amount of resources that the average American uses.

3. Contemporary Situation.
Over population is a big problem that our planet faces today. According to UTC, the rate of population increase by 1.31% each year. Human population might be growing at a geometric rate. The fact is, population keeps increasing but our planet is not going to expand and grow new land to create space and produce resources for more individuals. United nation assumes the world’s population could grow by another 50% to 9 billion people. Most of the over growth population taking place in less developed regions such as China, Indonesia, India, and many other developing country.

Some nations in Africa are currently unable to feed their citizens and Africa’s population could be double within the next 20 –30 years. As I looked through the internet, news, movie, or prediction by scientist, over population will tighter our land. This is will happen soon because people live in this world need a better place to stay. Cities with overwhelming population are put under great strain to supply housing, health care, education, jobs, and a certain quality of life. The consequence of overwhelming population is that one of these areas must suffer. The greater the population, the more natural resources are burnt up.

There are two things that I really concern about overpopulation which is global warming and garbage. Take a good example of wall-e movie; we would never know what our earth is on the future. People will start to burn garbage if it’s too much and it can reduce the layer of earth atmosphere. A city with overpopulation will lead to roads clattering with cars. According to Miller, G. Tyler, The level of carbon dioxide emission will increase 9% each year. In cities as crowded as Mexico, it will be equivalent to smoking twenty cigarettes a day. Living in an overcrowded city forces us to be part of an unhealthy life, illness, and environmental crisis. The real problem is toxic pollution. America’s major ports have been poisoned for decades. Boston and New York have some of the worst harbors. Water toxicity in the Puget Sound was recently reported to be the worst of any coastal waters in USA. Georgia and Florida also have very high levels of mercury in their ponds, bays and streams. People who like to fishing and eat the fish should be more aware because it can leads to cancer.

That is because the world is overcrowded, therefore people start to ignore and become greedy. Many people may have a life of unemployment and poverty, without access to a good education. As I said on the previous essay, providing family planning, creating awareness will help the to stable world population. The world can turn into overpopulation if the community does not act soon. People must start regulating how many children can have. Let say 2 kids and that’s it, there is no need to have 12 kids running around. It sounds bad to say this, but many people already proved that we are not responsible enough to take care of these ourselves. If we reduced our current population substantially, every person would have more natural resources and more healthful environment

4. Viewpoints.
The primary conflict driving opposing viewpoints in overpopulation exists within whether humanity is truly responsible for correcting the issue of overpopulation or not. Factors such as religious context, economic standpoints, and ethical ramifications all play a role in dividing people on the issue.

Naturally, before a solution to this issue can be reached, the world must come to an agreement concerning the problem itself. However, with people divided on the cause and nature of the issue of overpopulation, solutions are far from humanity's grasp. Bridging the gap between religious standpoints is one of the greatest obstacles. There are two primary conflicts that exist under the umbrella when examining the issue of overpopulation. One deals with the conflict of birth control, and the other deals with the attitude towards procreation itself. One of the most basic conflicts here exists in contraception and birth control itself. It makes sense that overpopulation is greatly effected by birth rates in humanity, and therefor controlling those rates is an important aspect of the issue. The majority of the world's religious sects recognize that family planning is a basic human right and helps promote strong and healthy families. However, many religious organizations still maintain that some methods of birth control interfere with religious values. With the exception of Catholicism, which forbids sex outside of marriage, there are few religions in the united states which expressly forbid the use of birth-control and family planning beyond abstinence. However, the majority of these religions go out of their way to acknowledge that the health and wellness of the family come first, as well as the reality that the decision to pursue birth control is a personal decision. The second aspect of religious conflict within the issue of overpopulation exists in views towards procreation as a fundamental aspect of life. The vast majority of world religions hold that procreation is mankind's duty. Christian scripture cites, repeatedly, that God gave the order to man to "go forth and multiply", referring to children as a reward and blessing to the faithful. Another command given by God is the command to be fruitful in that multiplication. In Genesis 1:28 and Genesis 9:1 God command is to "fill the earth." This implies that not only is mankind meant to reproduce, but also to vastly populate the earth and use it's resources. These principles carry over through many religions, promoting the concept of procreation as a duty and necessity. Catholicism in particular presents sex as sinful, permissible only as a means of reproduction within wedlock. In this way, the idea that mankind's primary objective is to populate the earth, trusting in the nature of the world to control it's flow, religion conflicts with any concept of population control solution.

Another significant obstacle surrounding understanding the issue of overpopulation stems from world economics. Much of this has been and will be discussed in the other sections of this page, but seeing as it is a serious conflict within the issue, it will be briefly detailed here. The World Bank, a massive economic force in the world, has long been effecting the balance of population and the means to support it. Offering loans to developing and underdeveloped countries who do not have the means to pay the interest, the World Bank is a major force in determining how a population will change in said area. Conflict exists in whether this should be permitted to continue when it has such an extreme effect on world economy, and often results in inhumane living conditions. A major conflict existing in the economic issue of overpopulation consists of whether the first world should change their consumption rates, or the third world should work to lower birth rates. Naturally the choice is not quite so black and white, nor will one or the other serve to eradicate the problem. The reason for this will be discussed later, however the conflict in this choice is ever dire. After all, the reality is that first world countries consume massive amounts more than second or third world countries. In fact, if the world's population consumed at the level of high-income countries, the planet could support only around 1.8 billion people, as opposed to the over 6.5 billion that it now houses. Of course, what happens to the world's economy when first world countries cut consumption rates is another factor to consider. One could not surmise that lowering excessive consumption would solve the overpopulation issue in its entirety. On the contrary, the concept of losing the market revolving around first world children alone would effect the entire world's economy.

Finally, humanity has long been divided over the ethics surrounding a solution to overpopulation. Naturally, this conflict stretches far and wide, encompassing viewpoints and opinions that one could not hope to surmise in a single work. The most prominent and basic of these revolve around government involvement, privacy, and basic human rights. Throughout history, the role of the government in population control has been primarily minimal. Commonly, natural occurrences like disease, war, and famine kept population in control, and it was not until the industrial revolution that overpopulation even began to cross humanity's mind. However, as humanity's role on earth became more and more complex, the need to regulate population came into question. More on this can be found in the history section, but the governments involvement in population control, as a rule, has enjoyed minimal success. In nations like communist China, the government's ability to enforce such regulations is far more appreciated than it could ever be in a democratic western nation like the United States. The primary reason being that populations existing in such a state are vehemently opposed to such intrusive government facilitation. Indeed, this goes hand in hand with issues like privacy and human rights. The western world stands firm on the idea that family and procreation are personal matters, and that the government's involvement should be minimal. In addition, to have children and procreate is considered a basic human right allotted to all. Another issue surrounding the ethical ramifications of population control goes back to the strained relationship between first and third world countries. Often, it is difficult to separate the desire to aid in population control from issues like coercion, and resulting eugenics. In other words, often people in third world countries are offered food and aid in return for practicing birth control, resulting in more first world children, and fewer third world. What this can mean for the world population as a whole remains to be seen, but the ethics of the situation speak clearly against such practices, conflicting with possible solutions. In searching for a solution to the issue of overpopulation is is imperative to examine factors such as religious context, economic standpoints, and ethical ramifications before hoping to understand a solution. By doing so, humanity gives itself the greatest possible chances to succeed at such a lofty endeavor.

5. Framework for possible solution.
There are obvious religious objections to population control in all nations. These must first off be respected no matter what the oppositions’ religious views entail. While there may be a way to control a nations population by appealing to their religious beliefs, why not instead appeal to the nations’ religious beliefs regarding the land, their source for resources? This seems a much more effective way for mothers and families to protect the resources they have and understand the effect that a growing population has on these resources. That way, they can manage their own procreation. The people of Ghana believe that they have a spiritual connection with the Earth. Small interest groups have begun to combat the slash and burning of Ghanian forests by individual farmers, because of Western influence. In order for a person to cut down a tree, the person must recite a prayer in the local language to the tree, explaining why they are cutting it down. This has helped in dropping the numbers of burned forests and keeping the Ghanian tradition of stewardship alive.

Anyone should have birth control made available to them. However, this does not give governments the right to mandate forced abortions or simply killing infants and orphans through neglect. The distribution of birth control among over-populated countries would reduce abortion and child neglect in the long run. Birth control should be made available in clinics across the the world to provide a safe alternative. In first world countries, we are brought up to believe that population control is supposedly necessary for keeping the planet inhabitable for everyone, and vital for making sure there is enough food and land to go around. However, those of us living in first world countries fail to see that the Earth could in fact support the current population of 6.7 billion people, and, with a possible future emphasis on supplying actual resources rather than the current consumer’s transient whims, could support several more billion people.

Population control seems the obvious answer for those of us unwilling to sacrifice getting the flyest Nikes, state of the art computer, or the latest in cosmetic surgery. It both assumes that the third world countries in question are responsible for being unable to take care of their children, and are taking up the most room and using the most resources by their sheer numbers. That is simply not true. Consumerism and greed in the first world has kept third world countries from being able to have access to the resources they need to take care of their children. Out of six billion people, the one billion people in developed nations are using up 86% of the Earth's resources, while the other 5.7 billion people are left with just 14%.

The infant mortality rate in third world countries is incredibly high as well. According to the CIA World Fact Book, In Sierra Leone, the infant mortality rate is 156.48 deaths per 1000 live births. If your child had a 16% chance of dying early, and you needed your children to help with farming and finding fresh water, don’t you think you would procreate with a bit more urgency? Again, this brings us back to the real issue, why are the mothers of Sierra Leone giving birth in such conditions that their babies are unable to receive the same chance at life as a baby born in the United States? Why must the mothers rely on having many children in order for them to sustain their family’s meager conditions? The ugly truth of the matter is under the guise of irresponsible, uneducated parenting in the third world countries. The truth is that the resources to make a child’s life in Sierra Leone possible are littering first world garbage dumps. The money spent on making the Xbox, played only a few times until the Wii came out, the money spent on making the Toyota Corolla, replaced six months later, the money spent on making the countless Gucci bags, no longer in style-- all of that could have gone toward ensuring several thousand babies would have a better shot at life in Sierra Leone.

In order for people in first world countries to understand how imbalanced these numbers really are, global and environmental responsibility needs to be emphasized from a very young age in school. That way, people actually have a decent understanding of the affects of their actions as both consumers as well as stewards. The reality that we are members of a whole race of humans might give people more compassion for other of cultures, and would hopefully make them more responsible with resources in the future. While I do think that people should be able to make their own spending choices, I propose that the future of education puts all of their efforts into making the unhappy reality of the state of the world abundantly clear to children and quit protecting them from the truth just so they’ll grow up to be good little consumers. Parents and schools must reclaim children from retailers, it is the only hope for the future.

In addition to blatant consumer denial of our role to play in this issue, comes the role of the World Bank. According to its very own website, the World Bank is made up of two different development institutions owned by 185 member countries—the International Bank for Reconstruction and Development (IBRD) and the International Development Association (IDA). The IBRD focuses on middle income and creditworthy poor countries, while IDA focuses on the poorest countries in the world. This organization provides loans and credits for developing countries. This may sound like a godsend for impoverished nations, but the World Bank is actually responsible for the unforgivable conditions and continued lack of resources in these countries. A prime example is Ghana. There, the people believe that they have a spiritual connection with the Earth. However, this is being destroyed by Ghana’s government’s desperate choice in accepting a loans from the World Bank to export their timber. Now, the forests are being slashed and burned for profit by farmers. This leaves the land nearly unable to sustain life or agriculture, as well as disrespects the relationship Ghana’s people have with the land. In addition, the timber yards of Ghana are very simple from continued intuitive lack of funding from the World Bank, and so they only process 15% of the tree, while almost anywhere else in the world would process 86%.

In order for the World Bank or the International Monetary Fund to actually be an aid for poor nations, there must be reform regarding the the use and nature of credit. these institutions simply dangle a small prize in front of these poor nations governments, leaving just barely enough for the countries’ populations to survive. How do we enforce a more balanced system? I think this can only be done by people once again, being educated as to why the goods bought are so inexpensive, and beginning to become self reliant again on their own countries. This would create jobs for more people, which would create less needs for government loans and credit.

First world countries do not have the right to limit the procreation in third world countries. The answer to the population problem starts on first world grounds. The whole issue is lack of resources for everyone on the planet. If each of the 1 billion people in the first world countries humbled their extravagant lifestyles, then the rest of the world, 5.7 billion people, would not be scraping to get by. The answer to the population problem is to allow each community, including those communities in first world countries, to become stewards of their own individual populations and grounds-- to become self reliant sources of agriculture and resources.

http://www.ciaworldfactbook.com

www.overpopulation.org

http://www.worldnews.com/

www.greenpacks.org

www.grinningplanet.com

6. Group Sources.
No Author Listed. Feb, 16 2009, www.overpopulation.org

KatieManske 08:23, 18 March 2009 (UTC)

Menter, Rebekah. "A Christian View on Population Control". Last Updated July 11, 2008. Accessed March 15 &17, 2009. 

Knight, Kevin. NewAdvent.org. "Theories of Population". Accessed March 14-17, 2009. 

BBC.co.uk. "The Ethical Problems of Mass Birth-Control Methods". © MMIX Accessed March 10-17, 2009. 

Dawn, Stacey. M.Ed, LMHC. "What Do Religions Say About Birth Control and Family Planning?" Updated: Oct 22, 2007. Accessed March 16&17, 2009. 

Overpopulation.org. Karen Gaia; publisher, editor, webspinner.Last updated: Jan 19, 2009. Accessed: Feb & March, 2009. 

Camille's Sources

GRINNINGPLANET.com. Jeantheau, Mark. © 2009. Accessed for citing March 24, 2009. 

GREENPACKS.ORG. ©2008. 

WORLDNEWS.com. © 2009. Word News Network.

ciaworldfactbook.com