Western Civilization is unsustainable/Earth is screwed.

Technology will get you a little way. No more than 10,000,000,000 people before their is serious dislocation.

 

A little way.. Did you know, that since the dawn of man up until recently, more than 90% of the population had to work in argiculture to feed themselves and the rest of the 10%, and yet they had famines? Did you know that today it's probably some ridiculously low number, like perhaps 1-3%, which work in argiculture, and that they produce soo much food so that we not only can feed the entire population, but also so that we can buy food at ridiculously low prices, export it, send it as aid, give historically decent food to our pets, to throw away perhaps a third of it, and to eat so much as to get unhealthily fat?

technology gets ut all the way, and a bit more.

 

Two percent of US workers are involved in agriculture, and we're the breadbasket of the world, waste food like crazy, and are fat as hell!

 

oooh, don't you go get more babies now, you can't feed them!

says the people who probably applaud china's one child policy (which I do too of course, but only because it hurts them)

 

The fundamental problem is the still primitive human mind. We think we are modern and advanced and civil with all our technology, but our behaviour is still very primitive (evolutionary behaviour) Nature is primitive, survival is primitive (overpopulation reduced in the most primitive way, by wars and starvation)
Overpopulation will not be solved in a civil way (never did), the people who want to reduce overpopulation in a civil way face opposition (and emotions, because the subject births reduction has to do with the fundamental thing survival)
There is only one way to stop this entire (evolutionary) process (human nature), by breaking with our primitive things, our psyche, psychology, emotions, feelings, group behaviour, and so on, which is nearly impossible (because it's invisible for most people)
How do we make billions of people aware in a few years? We only have our Avatar Pandora system, the internet (mass communication), which did not work good enough for the last thirteen years, because how many people understand what is really going on? (us primitive (most of us) Homo sapiens in our primitive ecosystem) Hardly anyone.
If you look at history over the past five thousand years, you notice one fundamental thing, that as soon as armies could be formed that showed overpopulation.
All history is caused by the same fundamental thing, populations. As you said, people need space to survive (on this planet there is enough space, if we could sustain the worlds population)
The reason why we are heading for space is survival, the only way is up (birds are the proof of how poweful survival of a species was - if you can't run fast enough, you still can go up in the air - and now we try to go into space, but we are not in time to safe the lives of billions to escape to another planet.
The evolutionary process is again faster, there is only one option left to stop this process, don't move. Because movements in populations show you those populations (organized groups) are heading for trouble (banding together is very primitive, very hard to stop that, survival, humans, animals, fish all do the same, they band together when there is danger, when danger is deception via the media the result is the same), you can see the growth of movements (political parties, protests, large events or revolts) We already see movements all over the world appear. How can a few thousand aware educate a few billion unaware, and show then what primitive this ecosystem and our behaviour is?
If humanity can succeed in this goal, this world would never see wars and destruction ever. Because every time the same movements start to appear people would notice those repeats (nobody in the masses in for example Egypt could see, or in the Ukraine can't see their own evolutionary behaviours, because survival, emotion is the strongest thing there is)
You can make an unsustainable society stable with the right knowledge (guess what, that knowledge is blocked by the media and politics, and as soon as you try to fight via politics or revolts you start to organize, or the state will cause tyranny (even invisible, by bureaucracy and sick tricks) to make society unstable, which means a society in motion.
A society that does the same collectively (in motion) is becoming one mass organization. A society that is aware this is happening can stop that process. No changes one after the other, no process means you keep the current situation (how unstable) At least no war is possible, because they couldn't reach an absolute majority with the same mindset. That is why rulers have more than one way to hammer a society to one, by using psywar, symbolism, pride, mixed emotions, chaos, big events, economy, tyranny, mind control and of cource FUD (fear, uncertainty and doubt) Most is psyche and emotion directed, so very powerful.
Society needs a reset, not an awakening, tyranny can cause invisible awakening, another major problem, a reset which is more powerful than politics and media combined. Back to that free and clear mind before the year 1900 when there was no mass media and mass politics, not the influence as today, with dramatic results.

 

What is the exact "carrying capacity" for buffalo? A hard number if you please.

But to answer your question in the most simplistic of terms...buffalo don't know how to farm.

 

That's malicious. I like it. But it doesn't hurt the Chinese too much. There are a billion of them and they don't necessarily have the resources to feed them all/take care of them.

 

And of course, it will mean that each new generation since the law was passed will basically be halved, and that means the yellow danger will take care of it self. A country with only old people and with a self-inflicted demographic collapse isn't a threat to anyone.

 

Total number of Chinese is not important anyway, what is important is their quality of life and level of development per capita. Maybe they will be less of a "threat" but I dont think it is hurting them.

 

Important for what purpose?

A shrinking population wilö hurt the chinese in all fields, and ultimately make them poorer.

 

Jobs, jobs, jobs, jobs... What people in big cities will do? Nothing sustainable is ever possible to them. They are trapped to death, working for profit of someone else. There is no way back, too many of us on Earth and everyone needs a job. This is a trap. Forget sustainability.

 

Important for the good of their people. I dont think it will make them poorer at all, quite the opposite, it is better for a developing country to have shrinking population than playing catch up with growing population.

 

Carrying capacity is important. Otherwise, we would not be able to assess whether or not technologies will allow for far larger human populations.

Given that, we will have to identify these technologies, to what rate they will increase carrying capacity to meet a growing global middle class, and show how they can be implemented easily in only a few years.

 

Population trends are changing more favorably. There will still be a population bulge yet to come, but the trend is for people to have fewer children as they become more prosperous. The 2.5 kids per couple in the US is down to less than 2 last I heard.

 

Yes indeed. It will let them have their infrastructure and institutions catch up with the population. But what I'm saying is that if they continue like that, they'll have the same demographic problems as the west. 2.1 is the optimal birth rate.

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The problem with overpopulation isn't really with the US or the west though. We could go on having more children over here, that's no problem at all. It's africa and asia that needs to calm down.

 

Unless that population ages. China can't afford to have the same percentage of it's population in retirement that Japan does. There are not enough depends in the world to handle that.

 

And what evidence do you have for that 10 billion theory?

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Please tell me how carrying capacity is calculated.

 

What if the assessment says that technology will not allow for a larger human population? What would be the next step in your mind?

 

We will have to cut down on resource use and localize.

 

The carrying capacity is believed to be 9 to 10 billion, which we will hit in our lifetimes. The thing is if everybody lived like middle class Americans the carrying capacity could only be about 2 billion. We consume far to much, and there is really no arguing that. The planet will be a much different place 100 years from now because of it

 

For the record I do think Earth, or at the very least Western Society has passed the point of no return. The system can only last so long and once the well is dry, its dry. The good news for us is that the well won't be dry for a few generations at least, so at least we can live in (somewhat) peace. Our great grandchildern will never forgive us tho. Who knows, maybe humanity will return to a simple way of life, instead of having to wake up at the crack of dawn to go work for some corporation so they can pay their heating bill, doing something they don't want to, wasting their life away in the process.

 

There's a finite amount of habitable land on the planet but a great deal of desert-be it tundra, the Antarctic or the Sahara. Deserts are growing in size, and land available for farming can't magically expand or bear more crops than the seasons allow. Add massive population growth to that and eventually there comes a tipping point where food production and distribution cannot keep up with demand.

 

It'll happen. When fossil fuels have been used up there will be no plastics or a myriad other things we take for granted, and which are based on petroleum. When the oil runs out, and it will, I can forsee a time when cities and vast, sprawling suburbs will no longer be necessary, and when smaller communities will return to an agrarian lifestyle. Who wouldn't prefer to ride a horse to work?
http://www.imeche.org/knowledge/themes/energy/energy-supply/fossil-energy/when-will-oil-run-out

 

And what's that carrying capacity determined by? Partly technology, and technology continues to change, thus, so will the carrying capacity.

I don't even know for how many years people have been saying the end nigh, and been wrong all the time. Technology and more effective methods are the key to everything. more people is a good thing.

Why do you people totally ignore technology? Did you know that modern agriculture can produce more food per acre than medieval agriculture? Do you know why?

That's assuming humans are complete (*)(*)(*)(*)ing retards. When oil starts to run out, the price will rise, which'll make it profitable to dig for oil where it'd previously been too expensive. And also, it'll give much incentive to people to come up with alternatives to oil and oil-based products. You really think society will just go on being 100% dependent on oil until the day it totally runs out, after which everything will collapse? Gee, you must really think human are retards.

 

I do think humans are retards, yes-especially when there are short-term profits to be made as with the fossil fuel industry. What real interest do they have in cutting their own throats by investing in long-term alternatives while profitable oil is still gushing out of the ground? Major investment must be made now, not in 40 years' time.
As to your other point; people take up space and use land which could otherwise be used for farming. All the technology in the world won't make more land available for either farming or living on.