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{{Short description|Proposed condition wherein human numbers exceed the carrying capacity of the environment}}
{{Distinguish|Population growth}}
{{Use dmy dates|date=December 2023}}
<!-- Deleted image removed: [[File:Global population size and annual growth rate.png|thumb|upright=1|Global population size and annual growth rate: estimates, 1950-2022, and medium scenario with 95 per cent prediction intervals, 2022-2050. ]] -->
<!--Please consider adding new content to a relevant section of the article body, not the lead. The lead section should summarise each section of the article. See [[WP:LEAD]] for guidance.-->'''Human overpopulation''' (or '''human [[population overshoot]]''') is the idea that human [[population]]s may become too large to be [[sustainability|sustained]] by their environment or resources in the long term. The topic is usually discussed in the context of [[world population]], though it may concern individual nations, regions, and cities.
<!--Background and Key concepts-->Since 1804, the global living human population has [[World population milestones|increased from 1 billion to 8 billion]] due to [[Modern medicine|medical advancements]] and improved [[agricultural productivity]]. Annual world population growth peaked at 2.1% in 1968 and has since dropped to 1.1%.<ref name="OWOD2019"/> According to the most recent [[Projections of population growth|United Nations' projections]], the global human population is expected to reach 9.7 billion in 2050 and would peak at around 10.4 billion people in the 2080s, before decreasing, noting that [[fertility rates]] are falling worldwide.{{r |n="UN Projections-2022" |r={{cite report|title= World Population Prospects 2022: Summary of Results |publisher= United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs, Population Division |id = UN DESA/POP/2022/TR/NO.3 |date=2022| url = }}|pages=14-30}} Other models agree that the population will stabilize before or after 2100.<ref name="Roser-2013" /><ref name="Vollset-2020"/><ref name="Science"/> Conversely, some researchers analyzing [[Civil registration|national birth registries]] data from 2022 and 2023—which cover half the world's population—argue that the 2022 UN projections overestimated fertility rates by 10 to 20% and were already outdated by 2024. They suggest that the global fertility rate may have already fallen below the [[sub-replacement fertility]] level for the first time in human history and that the global population will peak at approximately 9.5 billion by 2061.<ref>{{cite news|last1=Ip|first1=Greg|last2=Adamy|first2=Janet|date=13 May 2024|title=Suddenly There Aren't Enough Babies. The Whole World Is Alarmed.|work=The Wall Street Journal|publisher=News Corp|url=https://www.wsj.com/world/birthrates-global-decline-cause-ddaf8be2|access-date=13 May 2024}}</ref> The 2024 UN projections report estimated that world population would peak at 10.29 billion in 2084 and decline to 10.18 billion by 2100, which was 6% lower than the UN had estimated in 2014.<ref>{{cite news|last=Shan|first=Lee Ying|date=11 July 2024|title=Global population to peak within this century as birth rates fall, United Nations report says|publisher=CNBC|url=https://www.cnbc.com/2024/07/12/world-population-to-peak-within-this-century-says-the-united-nations.html|access-date=12 July 2024}}</ref><ref>{{cite news|last=Dougherty|first=Danny|date=11 July 2024|title=Earth's Population Should Peak Before the End of the Century|work=The Wall Street Journal|publisher=News Corp|url=https://www.wsj.com/world/its-official-earths-population-should-peak-before-the-end-of-the-century-81bbd498|access-date=12 July 2024}}</ref><ref>{{cite report|title=World Population Prospects 2024: Summary of Results|date=11 July 2024|publisher=United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs, Population Division|url=https://population.un.org/wpp/Publications/Files/WPP2024_Key-Messages.pdf|access-date=12 July 2024}}</ref>
<!--History of concept-->Early discussions of [[overpopulation]] in English were spurred by the work of [[Thomas Robert Malthus|Thomas Malthus]]. Discussions of [[overpopulation]] follow a similar line of inquiry as [[malthusianism|Malthusianism and its ''Malthusian catastrophe'']],<ref name="Scientific American">{{cite web|title=Human Overpopulation: Still an Issue of Concern?|url=https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/human-overpopulation-still-an-issue-of-concern/|access-date=13 March 2021|website=Scientific American|language=en}}</ref><ref name="10.1080/01436597.2014.926110">{{Cite journal|last1=Fletcher|first1=Robert|last2=Breitling|first2=Jan|last3=Puleo|first3=Valerie|date=9 August 2014|title=Barbarian hordes: the overpopulation scapegoat in international development discourse|url=https://doi.org/10.1080/01436597.2014.926110|journal=Third World Quarterly|volume=35|issue=7|pages=1195–1215|doi=10.1080/01436597.2014.926110|issn=0143-6597|s2cid=144569008|url-access=subscription}}</ref> a hypothetical event where population exceeds agricultural capacity, causing [[famine]] or [[war]] over resources, resulting in [[poverty]] and [[environmental collapse]]s. More recent discussion of overpopulation was popularized by [[Paul R. Ehrlich|Paul Ehrlich]] in his 1968 book ''[[The Population Bomb]]'' and subsequent writings.<ref name="Ceballos2017" /><ref>{{Cite journal |last1=Ehrlich |first1=Paul |last2=Ehrlich |first2=Anne |date=2013 |title=Can a collapse of global civilization be avoided? |journal=Proceedings of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences |volume=280 |issue=1754 |pages=20122845 |doi=10.1098/rspb.2012.2845|pmid=23303549 |pmc=3574335 |s2cid=2822298 }}</ref> Ehrlich described overpopulation as a function of [[Overconsumption (economics)|overconsumption]],<ref>{{cite web|author1=Paul Ehrlich|author2=Anne H. Ehrlich|date=4 August 2008|title=Too Many People, Too Much Consumption|url=https://e360.yale.edu/features/too_many_people_too_much_consumption|access-date=9 January 2021|website=Yale Environment 360|publisher=Yale School of the Environment}}</ref> arguing that overpopulation should be defined by a population being unable to sustain itself without depleting [[non-renewable resource]]s.<ref name="Ehrlich-1990">{{cite book|last1=Ehrlich|first1=Paul R. Ehrlich & Anne H.|url=https://archive.org/details/populationexplos00ehrl/page/39|title=The population explosion|date=1990|publisher=Hutchinson|isbn=978-0091745516|___location=London|pages=[https://archive.org/details/populationexplos00ehrl/page/39 39–40]|quote=When is an area overpopulated? When its population cannot be maintained without rapidly depleting nonrenewable resources [39] (or converting renewable resources into nonrenewable ones) and without decreasing the capacity of the environment to support the population. In short, if the long-term carrying capacity of an area is clearly being degraded by its current human occupants, that area is overpopulated.|access-date=20 July 2014}}</ref><ref>{{citation|last1=Ehrlich|first1=Paul R|title=One with Nineveh: Politics, Consumption, and the Human Future|date=2004|pages=76–180, 256|publisher=Island Press/Shearwater Books|last2=Ehrlich|first2=Anne H|author-link1=Paul R. Ehrlich|author-link2=Paul R. Ehrlich}}</ref><ref>{{citation|last1=Ehrlich|first1=Paul R|title=Healing the Planet: Strategies for Resolving the Environmental Crisis|date=1991|pages=6–8, 12, 75, 96, 241|publisher=Addison-Wesley Books|last2=Ehrlich|first2=Anne H|author-link1=Paul R. Ehrlich|author-link2=Paul R. Ehrlich}}</ref>
<!--Debate-->The belief that global population levels will become too large to sustain is a point of contentious debate. Those who believe global human overpopulation to be a valid concern, argue that increased levels of [[resource consumption]] and pollution exceed the environment's [[carrying capacity]], leading to population [[Overshoot (population)|overshoot]].<ref name="Crist2022" /> The population overshoot hypothesis is often discussed in relation to other population concerns such as [[population momentum]], [[biodiversity loss]],<ref>{{Cite journal |last1=Brashares |first1=Justin |last2=Arcese |first2=Peter |last3=Sam |first3=Moses |date=2001 |title=Human demography and reserve size predict wildlife extinction in West Africa |journal=Proceedings of the Royal Society of London. Series B: Biological Sciences |volume=268 |issue=1484 |pages=2473–2478 |doi=10.1098/rspb.2001.1815|pmid=11747566 |pmc=1088902 }}</ref><ref>{{cite journal |last1=Cafaro |first1=Philip |last2=Hansson |first2=Pernilla |last3=Götmark |first3=Frank |title=Overpopulation is a major cause of biodiversity loss and smaller human populations are necessary to preserve what is left |journal=[[Biological Conservation (journal)|Biological Conservation]] |date=2022 |volume=272 |article-number=109646 |doi=10.1016/j.biocon.2022.109646}}</ref> [[Hunger|hunger and malnutrition]],<ref>{{Cite journal |last1=Daily |first1=Gretchen |last2=Ehrlich |first2=Anne |last3=Ehrlich |first3=Paul |date=1994 |title=Optimum human population size |journal=Population and Environment |volume=15 |issue=6 |pages=469–475|doi=10.1007/BF02211719 |s2cid=153761569 }}</ref> [[resource depletion]], and the overall [[human impact on the environment]].<ref name="Dasgupta2019">{{Cite book |last=Dasgupta |first=Partha |title=Time and the Generations: Population Ethics for a Diminishing Planet |publisher=Columbia University Press |year=2019}}</ref>
Critics of the belief note that human population growth is decreasing and the population will likely peak, and possibly even begin to decrease, before the end of the century.{{r|UN Projections-2022|p=27}} They argue the concerns surrounding population growth are overstated, noting that quickly declining birth rates and technological innovation make it possible to sustain projected population sizes. Other critics claim that overpopulation concerns ignore more pressing issues, like poverty or [[Overconsumption (economics)|overconsumption]], are motivated by racism, or place an undue burden on the [[Global North and Global South|Global South]], where most population growth happens.<ref name="Rao-1994"/><ref name="Monbiot-2021"/>
== Overview ==
<!--Proposed impacts and proposed mitigation-->Modern proponents of the concept have suggested that overpopulation, population growth and overconsumption are interdependent<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Bradshaw |first1=Corey J. A. |last2=Ehrlich |first2=Paul R. |last3=Beattie |first3=Andrew |last4=Ceballos |first4=Gerardo |last5=Crist |first5=Eileen |last6=Diamond |first6=Joan |last7=Dirzo |first7=Rodolfo |last8=Ehrlich |first8=Anne H. |last9=Harte |first9=John |last10=Harte |first10=Mary Ellen |last11=Pyke |first11=Graham |last12=Raven |first12=Peter H. |last13=Ripple |first13=William J. |last14=Saltré |first14=Frédérik |last15=Turnbull |first15=Christine |last16=Wackernagel |first16=Mathis |last17=Blumstein |first17=Daniel T. |date=2021 |title=Response: Commentary: Underestimating the Challenges of Avoiding a Ghastly Future |journal=Frontiers in Conservation Science |volume=2 |issue= |pages= |doi=10.3389/fcosc.2021.700869 |doi-access=free|quote=On the contrary, we devoted an entire section to the interacting and inter-dependent components of overpopulation and overconsumption, which are, for instance, also central tenets of the recent Economics of Biodiversity review (Dasgupta, 2021). Therein, the dynamic socio-ecological model shows that mutual causation drives modern socio-ecological systems. Just as it is incorrect to insist that a large global population is the sole underlying cause of biodiversity loss, so too is it naïve and incorrect to claim that high consumption alone is the cause, and so forth.}}</ref><ref name="Dasgupta">{{cite web |url=https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/957629/Dasgupta_Review_-_Headline_Messages.pdf |title=The Economics of Biodiversity: The Dasgupta Review Headline Messages |last=Dasgupta |first=Partha |author-link= Partha Dasgupta |date=2021 |website= |publisher=UK government| page=3|access-date=15 December 2021 |quote=Growing human populations have significant implications for our demands on Nature, including for future patterns of global consumption.}}</ref><ref>{{cite news |last=Carrington |first=Damian |date=2 February 2021 |title=Economics of biodiversity review: what are the recommendations? |url=https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2021/feb/02/economics-of-biodiversity-review-what-are-the-recommendations |work= [[The Guardian]]|___location= |access-date=15 December 2021}}</ref> and collectively are the primary drivers of human-caused environmental problems such as [[climate change]]<ref>{{Cite journal |last1=O’Neill |first1=Brian C. |last2=Jiang |first2=Leiwen |last3=Gerland |first3=Patrick |date=10 February 2015 |title=Plausible reductions in future population growth and implications for the environment |journal=Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences |language=en |volume=112 |issue=6 |pages=E506 |doi=10.1073/pnas.1421989112 |issn=0027-8424 |pmc=4330723 |pmid=25617373|bibcode=2015PNAS..112E.506O |doi-access=free }}</ref><ref>{{Cite journal |last1=O'Neill |first1=Brian C. |last2=Dalton |first2=Michael |last3=Fuchs |first3=Regina |last4=Jiang |first4=Leiwen |last5=Pachauri |first5=Shonali |last6=Zigova |first6=Katarina |date=12 October 2010 |title=Global demographic trends and future carbon emissions |journal=Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences |language=en |volume=107 |issue=41 |pages=17521–17526 |doi=10.1073/pnas.1004581107 |issn=0027-8424 |pmc=2955139 |pmid=20937861|bibcode=2010PNAS..10717521O |doi-access=free }}</ref> and [[biodiversity loss]].<ref name="Cafaro2022" /><ref>{{Cite book |last=Beebee |first=Trevor J. C. |url=http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/9781108985260 |title=Impacts of Human Population on Wildlife |date=9 June 2022 |publisher=Cambridge University Press |doi=10.1017/9781108985260 |isbn=978-1-108-98526-0|s2cid=249562874 }}</ref><ref>{{cite journal |last1= Ceballos|first1=Gerardo|last2=Ehrlich|first2=Paul R.|date=2023 |title=Mutilation of the tree of life via mass extinction of animal genera|url= |journal=[[Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America]]|volume=120 |issue=39 |pages=e2306987120|doi=10.1073/pnas.2306987120|doi-access=free |pmid=37722053 |pmc=10523489 |bibcode=2023PNAS..12006987C |access-date=}}</ref> Many scientists have expressed concern about population growth, and argue that creating sustainable societies will require decreasing the current global population.<ref name="Ripple2017" /><ref name="Ripple-2019" /><ref name="Crist2022" /><ref>{{Cite journal |last1=Crist |first1=Eileen |last2=Kopnina |first2=Helen |last3=Cafaro |first3=Philip |last4=Gray |first4=Joe |last5=Ripple |first5=William J. |last6=Safina |first6=Carl |last7=Davis |first7=John |last8=DellaSala |first8=Dominick A. |last9=Noss |first9=Reed F. |last10=Washington |first10=Haydn |last11=Rolston |first11=Holmes |last12=Taylor |first12=Bron |last13=Orlikowska |first13=Ewa H. |last14=Heister |first14=Anja |last15=Lynn |first15=William S. |date=2021 |title=Protecting Half the Planet and Transforming Human Systems Are Complementary Goals |journal=Frontiers in Conservation Science |volume=2 |doi=10.3389/fcosc.2021.761292 |issn=2673-611X |quote=Population growth can end and numbers can be gradually lowered within a human-rights framework. Lowering human numbers is achievable by expanding and protecting human rights, especially for children and women . . . A smaller human population will facilitate the conservation of a biodiverse planet while also supporting a higher quality of life for people by lowering pollution levels, preempting resource conflicts, ameliorating overcrowding in urban centers, and empowering girls and women|doi-access=free }}</ref> Advocates have suggested implementation of [[Human population planning|population planning strategies]] to reach a proposed [[sustainable population]].
<!--This paragraph summarises "Criticism" section. Please do not add caveats to it as it reflects section below.-->Overpopulation hypotheses are controversial, with many [[Demography|demographers]] and environmentalists disputing the core premise that the world cannot sustain the current trajectory of human population.{{refn|name=Demographics-Environmentalists|<ref name="Piper-2019" /><ref name="Rao-1994" /><ref name="The Wire" /><ref name="Coole-2018">{{Cite book |last=Coole |first=Diana |title=Should we control world population? |date=8 August 2018 |publisher=John Wiley & Sons |isbn=978-1-5095-2344-3 |oclc=1162049054}}</ref>}} Additionally, many [[Economics|economists]] and historians have noted that sustained [[shortage]]s and [[famine]]s have historically been caused by war, [[price controls]], political instability, and repressive political regimes (often employing [[Planned economy|central planning]]) rather than overpopulation.{{refn|name=Economists–Historians1|<ref>{{cite book|last=Nove|first=Alec|author-link=Alexander Nove|year=1992|orig-year=1969|title=An Economic History of the USSR, 1917–1991|place=New York|publisher=[[Penguin Books]]|edition=3rd|isbn=978-0140157741}}</ref><ref>{{cite book|last1=Schuettinger|first1=Robert|last2=Butler|first2=Eamonn|author-link2=Eamonn Butler|year=1979|title=Forty Centuries of Wage and Price Controls: How Not to Fight Inflation|place=Washington, DC|publisher=[[The Heritage Foundation]]|isbn=978-0891950257}}</ref><ref>{{cite book|last=Sen|first=Amartya|author-link=Amartya Sen|year=1982|orig-year=1981|title=Poverty and Famines: An Essay on Entitlement and Deprivation|place=[[Oxford]], [[England]]|publisher=[[Oxford University Press]]|edition=Reprint|isbn=978-0198284635|url=https://archive.org/details/povertyfamineses0000sena|url-access=registration}}</ref><ref>{{cite book|last=Rockoff|first=Hugh|year=2004|orig-year=1984|title=Drastic Measures: A History of Wage and Price Controls in the United States|place=[[Cambridge]], England|publisher=[[Cambridge University Press]]|edition=Paperback|isbn=978-0521522038}}</ref><ref>{{cite book|last=Becker|first=Jasper|author-link=Jasper Becker|year=1998|orig-year=1997|title=Hungry Ghosts: Mao's Secret Famine|title-link=Hungry Ghosts: Mao's Secret Famine|place=New York|publisher=[[Henry Holt and Company]]|edition=2nd|isbn=978-0805056686}}</ref><ref>{{cite book|last1=Courtois|first1=Stéphane|author-link1=Stéphane Courtois|last2=Werth|first2=Nicolas|author-link2=Nicolas Werth|last3=Panné|first3=Jean-Louis|last4=Paczkowski|first4=Andrzej|author-link4=Andrzej Paczkowski|last5=Bartošek|first5=Karel|last6=Margolin|first6=Jean-Louis|author-link6=Jean-Louis Margolin|translator-last1=Murphy|translator-first1=Jonathan|translator-last2=Kramer|translator-first2=Mark|year=1999|orig-year=1997|title=The Black Book of Communism: Crimes, Terror, Repression|title-link=The Black Book of Communism|place=[[Cambridge, Massachusetts|Cambridge, MA]]|publisher=[[Harvard University Press]]|isbn=978-0674076082}}</ref><ref>{{cite book|last=Sen|first=Amartya|year=2001|orig-year=1999|title=Development As Freedom|place=Oxford, England|publisher=Oxford University Press|edition=2nd|isbn=978-0192893307|url-access=registration|url=https://archive.org/details/developmentasfre00sena}}</ref><ref>{{cite book|last1=Davies|first1=R. W.|author-link1=R. W. Davies|last2=Wheatcroft|first2=Stephen G.|author-link2=Stephen G. Wheatcroft|year=2004|title=The Years of Hunger: Soviet Agriculture, 1931–1933|place=[[Basingstoke]], England|publisher=[[Palgrave Macmillan]]|isbn=978-0230238558}}</ref><ref>{{cite book|last=Dikötter|first=Frank|author-link=Frank Dikötter|year=2017|orig-year=2010|title=Mao's Great Famine: The History of China's Most Devastating Catastrophe, 1958–1962|title-link=Mao's Great Famine|place=[[London]], England|publisher=[[Bloomsbury Publishing|Bloomsbury]]|isbn=978-1408886366}}</ref><ref>{{cite journal|last1=Hasell|first1=Joe|last2=Roser|first2=Max|author-link2=Max Roser|date=7 December 2017|title=Famines|journal=[[Our World in Data]]|publisher=Global Change Data Lab|url=https://ourworldindata.org/famines|access-date=4 April 2023}}</ref>}} They also note that population growth has [[History of technology|historically]] led to greater [[Technological change|technological development]] and [[History of science|the advancement of scientific knowledge]]. This has enabled the [[engineering]] of [[substitute good]]s and technology that better conserve and more efficiently use natural resources, increase agricultural output with less land and water, and address human impacts on the environment. These advancements result from increasing numbers of scientists, engineers, and inventors [[Planck's principle|across generations]], alongside [[Paradigm shift|increasing and continuous revision of scientific thinking]].{{refn|name=Economists–Historians2|<ref>{{cite book|last1=Kuznets|first1=Simon|author-link1=Simon Kuznets|last2=Quandt|first2=Richard E.|author-link2=Richard E. Quandt|last3=Friedman|first3=Milton|author-link3=Milton Friedman|year=1960|title=Demographic and Economic Change in Developed Countries|chapter=Population Change and Aggregate Output|place=[[Princeton, New Jersey|Princeton, NJ]]|publisher=[[Princeton University Press]]|edition=Reprint|pages=324–351|isbn=978-0870143021|chapter-url=https://www.nber.org/system/files/chapters/c2392/c2392.pdf}}</ref><ref>{{cite book|last=Kuhn|first=Thomas|author-link=Thomas Kuhn|year=2012|orig-year=1962|title=The Structure of Scientific Revolutions|title-link=The Structure of Scientific Revolutions|place=[[Chicago]], [[Illinois|IL]]|publisher=[[University of Chicago Press]]|edition=4th|isbn=978-0226458120}}</ref><ref>{{cite book|last=Simon|first=Julian L.|author-link=Julian Simon|year=2019|orig-year=1977|title=The Economics of Population Growth|place=Princeton, NJ|publisher=Princeton University Press|edition=Reprint|isbn=978-0691656298}}</ref><ref name="Simon 1981">{{cite book|last=Simon|first=Julian L.|year=1981|title=The Ultimate Resource|place=Princeton, NJ|publisher=Princeton University Press|isbn=069109389X|url=https://archive.org/details/ultimateresource00juli/|url-access=registration}}</ref><ref>{{cite journal|last=Kremer|first=Michael|author-link=Michael Kremer|year=1993|title=Population Growth and Technological Change: One Million B.C. to 1990|journal=[[The Quarterly Journal of Economics]]|place=[[Cambridge, Massachusetts|Cambridge, MA]]|publisher=[[MIT Press]]|volume=108|issue=3|pages=681–716|jstor=2118405|s2cid=139085606|doi=10.2307/2118405}}</ref><ref name="Simon 1996">{{cite book|last1=Simon|first1=Julian L.|year=1996|title=The Ultimate Resource 2|place=Princeton, NJ|publisher=Princeton University Press|isbn=0691042691|url=https://archive.org/details/ultimateresource00simo|url-access=registration}}</ref><ref>{{cite journal|last1=Ausubel|first1=Jesse H.|author-link1=Jesse H. Ausubel|last2=Wernick|first2=Iddo K.|last3=Waggoner|first3=Paul E.|title=Peak Farmland and the Prospect for Land Sparing|journal=[[Population and Development Review]]|volume=38|issue=s1|year=2013|pages=221–242|doi=10.1111/j.1728-4457.2013.00561.x|doi-access=free}}</ref><ref>{{cite web|last=Ritchie|first=Hannah|author-link=Hannah Ritchie|date=22 August 2017|title=Yields vs. Land Use: How the Green Revolution enabled us to feed a growing population|website=Our World in Data|publisher=Global Change Data Lab|url=https://ourworldindata.org/yields-vs-land-use-how-has-the-world-produced-enough-food-for-a-growing-population|access-date=9 March 2023}}</ref><ref>{{cite journal|last1=Ritchie|first1=Hannah|last2=Roser|first2=Max|year=2019|title=Land Use|journal=[[Our World in Data]]|publisher=Global Change Data Lab|url=https://ourworldindata.org/land-use|access-date=4 April 2023}}</ref><ref>{{cite journal|last1=Azoulay|first1=Pierre|last2=Fons-Rosen|first2=Christian|last3=Graff Zivin|first3=Joshua S.|year=2019|title=Does Science Advance One Funeral at a Time?|journal=[[American Economic Review]]|publisher=[[American Economic Association]]|volume=109|issue=8|pages=2889–2920|doi=10.1257/aer.20161574|pmid=31656315|pmc=6814193}}</ref>}} Instead, [[The Two Cultures|social scientists argue that disputes between themselves and biologists]] about human overpopulation are over the [[Scientism|appropriateness of definitions being used]] (and often devolve into social scientists and biologists simply [[talking past each other]]).{{refn|name=Economists–Historians3|<ref name="Simon 1981" /><ref name="Simon 1996" /><ref name="Nature 12-1-2015">{{Cite journal|last=Scudellari|first=Megan|date=1 December 2015|title=The science myths that will not die|journal=Nature|language=en|volume=528|issue=7582|pages=322–325|doi=10.1038/528322a|pmid=26672537|bibcode=2015Natur.528..322S|s2cid=1414926|issn=1476-4687|doi-access=free}}</ref>}}
Annual world population growth peaked at 2.1% in 1968, has since dropped to 1.1%, and could drop even further to 0.1% by 2100.<ref name="OWOD2019">{{Cite journal|url=https://ourworldindata.org/world-population-growth-past-future|title=Two centuries of rapid global population growth will come to an end|last=Roser|first=Max|date=18 June 2019|journal=Our World in Data}}</ref> Based on this, the [[United Nations]] projects the world population, which is 7.8 billion {{as of|2020|lc=y}}, to level out around 2100 at 10.9 billion<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://population.un.org/wpp/Graphs/Probabilistic/POP/TOT/900|title=World Population Prospects 2019|date=2019|website=United Nations, Dept of Economic and Social Affairs}}</ref><ref name=":8b">{{Cite web|url=https://population.un.org/wpp/Download/Standard/Population/|title=World Population Prospects 2019, Population Data, File: Total Population Both Sexes, Medium Variant tab|date=2019|website=United Nations Population Division}}</ref><ref name=":1b">{{Cite web|url=https://population.un.org/wpp/Download/Standard/Fertility/|title=World Population Prospects 2019, Dept of Economic and Social Affairs, File: Total Fertility|date=2019|website=United Nations Population Division}}</ref> with other models proposing similar stabilization before or after 2100.<ref name="Roser-2013" /><ref name="Vollset-2020">{{Cite journal|last1=Vollset|first1=Stein Emil|last2=Goren|first2=Emily|last3=Yuan|first3=Chun-Wei|last4=Cao|first4=Jackie|last5=Smith|first5=Amanda E.|last6=Hsiao|first6=Thomas|last7=Bisignano|first7=Catherine|last8=Azhar|first8=Gulrez S.|last9=Castro|first9=Emma|last10=Chalek|first10=Julian|last11=Dolgert|first11=Andrew J.|date=17 October 2020|title=Fertility, mortality, migration, and population scenarios for 195 countries and territories from 2017 to 2100: a forecasting analysis for the Global Burden of Disease Study|journal=The Lancet|language=English|volume=396|issue=10258|pages=1285–1306|doi=10.1016/S0140-6736(20)30677-2|issn=0140-6736|pmc=7561721|pmid=32679112|doi-access=free}}</ref><ref name="Science">{{Cite journal|last1=Gerland|first1=P.|last2=Raftery|first2=A. E.|last3=Ev Ikova|first3=H.|last4=Li|first4=N.|last5=Gu|first5=D.|last6=Spoorenberg|first6=T.|last7=Alkema|first7=L.|last8=Fosdick|first8=B. K.|last9=Chunn|first9=J.|last10=Lalic|first10=N.|last11=Bay|first11=G.|date=14 September 2014|title=World population stabilization unlikely this century|journal=Science|publisher=AAAS|volume=346|issue=6206|pages=234–7|doi=10.1126/science.1257469|issn=1095-9203|pmc=4230924|pmid=25301627|last12=Buettner|first12=T.|last13=Heilig|first13=G. K.|last14=Wilmoth|first14=J.|bibcode=2014Sci...346..234G}}</ref> Some experts believe that a combination of factors (including technological and social change) would allow global resources to meet this increased demand, avoiding global overpopulation.<ref name="Our World in Data-2" /><ref name="Deutsche Welle" /> Additionally, some critics dismiss the idea of human overpopulation as a [[Scientific myth|science myth]] connected to attempts to blame environmental issues on overpopulation, oversimplify complex social or economic systems, or place blame on developing countries and poor populations—[[Decolonization|reinscribing colonial]] or racist assumptions and leading to discriminatory policy.<ref name="Nature 12-1-2015" /><ref name="10.1080/01436597.2014.926110" /><ref>{{cite web|date=7 December 2009|title=The spectre of "overpopulation"|url=https://www.tni.org/en/article/the-spectre-of-overpopulation|access-date=13 March 2021|website=Transnational Institute|language=en}}</ref><ref name="Piper-2019">{{cite web|last=Piper|first=Kelsey|date=20 August 2019|title=We've worried about overpopulation for centuries. And we've always been wrong.|url=https://www.vox.com/future-perfect/2019/8/20/20802413/overpopulation-demographic-transition-population-explained|access-date=30 July 2021|website=Vox|language=en}}</ref> These critics often suggest [[Overconsumption (economics)|overconsumption]] should be treated as an issue separate from [[population growth]].<ref name="Kaneda-2014" /><ref name="Pearce-2010">{{cite web|last=Pearce|first=Fred|date=8 March 2010|title=The Overpopulation Myth|url=https://www.prospectmagazine.co.uk/magazine/the-overpopulation-myth|website=[[Prospect Magazine]]}}</ref>
==History of world population==
{{main|World population milestones|Population growth}}
[[File:Population_density_map_of_the_world.svg|thumb|upright=1.2|Map of population density by country, per square kilometer (See ''[[List of countries and dependencies by population density]].'')]]
[[File:Total Fertility Rate Map by Country.svg|thumb|upright=1.2|Map of countries and territories by [[Total fertility rate|fertility rate]]. (See ''[[List of countries and territories by fertility rate]].'')]]
[[File:Population-growth-rate-2023-OWID.png|thumb|upright=1.2|[[List of countries by population growth rate|Human population growth rate in percent]] (2023, [[Our World in Data]])<ref name="i857">{{cite journal | last1=Ritchie | first1=Hannah | last2=Rodés-Guirao | first2=Lucas | last3=Mathieu | first3=Edouard | last4=Gerber | first4=Marcel | last5=Ortiz-Ospina | first5=Esteban | last6=Hasell | first6=Joe | last7=Roser | first7=Max | title=Population Growth | journal=Our World in Data | date=11 July 2023 | url=https://ourworldindata.org/population-growth | access-date=26 January 2025 | page=}}</ref>]]
[[World population]] has been rising continuously since the end of the [[Black Death]], around the year 1350.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.abc.net.au/science/articles/2008/01/29/2149185.htm |title=Black death 'discriminated' between victims |website=[[Australian Broadcasting Corporation]] |access-date=3 November 2008 |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20161220120404/http://www.abc.net.au/science/articles/2008/01/29/2149185.htm |archive-date=20 December 2016 |date=29 January 2008 }}</ref> The fastest doubling of the world population happened between 1950 and 1986: a doubling from 2.5 to 5 billion people in 37 years,<ref>{{Cite journal|last1=Roser|first1=Max|last2=Ritchie|first2=Hannah|last3=Ortiz-Ospina|first3=Esteban|date=9 May 2013|title=World Population Growth|url=https://ourworldindata.org/world-population-growth|journal=Our World in Data}}</ref> mainly due to [[History of medicine#Modern medicine|medical advancements]] and increases in [[agricultural productivity]].<ref>Pimentel, David. "Overpopulation and sustainability." Petroleum Review 59 (2006): 34–36.</ref><ref>Hayami, Yujiro, and Vernon W. Ruttan. "Population growth and agricultural productivity." Technological Prospects and Population Trends. Routledge, 2020. 11–69.</ref> Due to its impact on the human ability to grow food, the [[Haber process]] enabled the global population to increase from 1.6 billion in 1900 to 7.7 billion by November 2018 and, according to the [[United Nations]], eight billion as of November 2022.<ref name="Smil 1999">{{cite journal|last1=Smil|first1=Vaclav|year=1999|title=Detonator of the population explosion|url=http://www.vaclavsmil.com/wp-content/uploads/docs/smil-article-1999-nature7.pdf|journal=Nature|volume=400|issue=6743|page=415|bibcode=1999Natur.400..415S|doi=10.1038/22672|s2cid=4301828}}</ref><ref>United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs, Population Division (2022). ''World Population Prospects 2022: Summary of Results''. UN DESA/POP/2022/TR/NO. 3, p. 1</ref> Some researchers have analyzed this growth in population like other animal populations, human populations predictably grow and shrink according to their available food supply as per the [[Lotka–Volterra equations]], including [[agronomist]] and insect ecologist [[David Pimentel (scientist)|David Pimentel]],<ref name="Hopfenberg and Pimentel">Hopfenberg, Russell and Pimentel, David, "[http://www.bioinfo.rpi.edu/bystrc/pub/pimentel.pdf Human Population Numbers as a Function of Food Supply]", ''Environment, Development and Sustainability'', vol. 3, no. 1, March 2001, pp. 1–15</ref> behavioral scientist Russell Hopfenberg,<ref>{{cite web|title=Human Carrying Capacity is Determined by Food Availability|url=http://www.populationmedia.org/wp-content/uploads/2010/03/Human-Carrying-Capacity-is-Determined-by-Food-Availability.pdf|work=Russel Hopfenberg, [[Duke University]]|publisher=Population media center|access-date=15 September 2020|archive-date=21 September 2020|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200921005240/http://www.populationmedia.org/wp-content/uploads/2010/03/Human-Carrying-Capacity-is-Determined-by-Food-Availability.pdf|url-status=dead}}</ref><ref>{{cite web|url=https://populationinstitutecanada.ca/wp-content/uploads/2020/08/Hopfenberg-A-Summary-of-Human-Population-Dynamics-2020.pdf|title=A Summary of Human Population Dynamics|last=Hopfenberg|first=Russel|publisher=Population institute of Canada}}</ref> and anthropologist [[Virginia Abernethy]].<ref>Abernathy, Virginia, ''Population Politics'' {{ISBN|0-7658-0603-7}}</ref>
{| class="wikitable"
|+ World population history<ref>{{cite web|url=https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/population-since-1800?country=~OWID_WRL|title=World Population Growth|publisher=Our World in Data|year=2013|author=Max Roser|author2=Hannah Ritchie|author3=Esteban Ortiz-Ospina|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20211122212559/https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/population-since-1800|archive-date=22 November 2021}}</ref><ref>{{cite web|url=https://population.un.org/wpp/Graphs/1_Demographic%20Profiles/World.pdf|title=World Population Prospects 2019, Volume II: Demographic Profiles|publisher=United Nations, Department of Economic and Social Affairs, Population Division|year=2019|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210713134040/https://population.un.org/wpp/Graphs/1_Demographic%20Profiles/World.pdf|archive-date=13 July 2021}}</ref><ref>{{cite web|url=https://data.worldbank.org/indicator/SP.POP.TOTL|title=Population, total|publisher=World Bank Open Data|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220103053016/https://data.worldbank.org/indicator/SP.POP.TOTL|archive-date=3 January 2022}}</ref>
|-
! Year
! 1806 !! 1850 !! 1900 !! 1940 !! 1950 !! 1960 !! 1970 !! 1980 !! 1990 !! 2000 !! 2010 !! 2020
|-
! Billions
| 1.01 || 1.28 || 1.65 || 2.33 || 2.53 || 3.03 || 3.68 || 4.43 || 5.28 || 6.11 || 6.92 || 7.76
|}
World population has experienced several periods of growth since the dawn of [[civilization]] in the [[Holocene]] period, around 10,000 BCE. The rise of civilization roughly coincided with the retreat of [[glacial ice]] following the end of the [[Last Glacial Period]].<ref>{{cite web|url=http://muller.lbl.gov/pages/iceagebook/history_of_climate.html|title=A Brief Introduction to the History of Climate|publisher=Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratories|access-date=22 May 2013}}</ref> The advent of farming enabled population growth in many regions of the world, including Europe, the Americas, and China, continuing through the 1600s, though occasionally interrupted by plagues or other crises.<ref>{{cite web |url=http://science.nationalgeographic.com/science/health-and-human-body/human-diseases/plague-article.html |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20071128194106/http://science.nationalgeographic.com/science/health-and-human-body/human-diseases/plague-article.html |url-status=dead |archive-date=28 November 2007 |title=Plague, Plague Information, Black Death Facts, News, Photos |work=National Geographic |access-date=3 November 2008}}</ref><ref>"''[https://books.google.com/books?id=GyE8Qt-kS1kC&pg=PA46 Epidemics and pandemics: their impacts on human history]''". J. N. Hays (2005). p.46. {{ISBN|1-85109-658-2}}</ref> For example, the Black Death is thought to have reduced the world's population, then at an estimated 450 million in 1350, to between 350 and 375 million by 1400.<ref>{{cite web |url=https://www.census.gov/ipc/www/worldhis.html |title=Historical Estimates of World Population |publisher=Census.gov |access-date=3 November 2008 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20131013110506/http://www.census.gov/ipc/www/worldhis.html |archive-date=13 October 2013 }}</ref>
After the start of the [[Industrial Revolution]], during the 18th century, the rate of population growth began to increase. By the end of the century, the world's population was estimated at just under 1 billion.<ref name="censushistorical">{{cite web|title=International Programs|url=https://www.census.gov/ipc/www/worldhis.html|website=census.gov|url-status=dead|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20131013110506/http://www.census.gov/ipc/www/worldhis.html|archive-date=13 October 2013}}</ref> At the turn of the 20th century, the world's population was roughly 1.6 billion.<ref name="censushistorical" /> By 1940, this figure had increased to 2.3 billion.<ref>{{cite web|title=modelling exponential growth|url=http://www.esrl.noaa.gov/gmd/infodata/lesson_plans/Modeling%20Exponential%20Growth.pdf|website=esrl.noaa.gov}}</ref> Even more dramatic growth beginning in 1950 (above 1.8% per year) coincided with greatly increased food production as a result of the industrialization of agriculture brought about by the [[Green Revolution]].<ref name="The limits of a Green Revolution">"[http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/in_depth/6496585.stm The limits of a Green Revolution?]". BBC News. 29 March 2007.</ref> The rate of human population growth peaked in 1964, at about 2.1% per year.<ref>{{cite web|title=United Nations, United Nations, Department of Economic and Social Affairs, Population Division (2011): World Population Prospects: The 2010 Revision|url=http://esa.un.org/unpd/wpp/Analytical-Figures/htm/fig_6.htm|url-status=bot: unknown|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110512065842/http://esa.un.org/unpd/wpp/Analytical-Figures/htm/fig_6.htm|archive-date=12 May 2011|access-date=25 September 2012}}</ref> Recent additions of a billion humans happened very quickly: 33 years to reach three billion in 1960, 14 years for four billion in 1974, 13 years for five billion in 1987, 12 years for six billion in 1999, 11 years for seven billion in 2010, and 12 years for 8 billion toward the end of 2022.<ref>{{cite book|last=Benatar|first=David|date=2008|title=Better Never to Have Been: The Harm of Coming into Existence|url=https://archive.org/details/betternevertohav0000bena/page/167|publisher=[[Oxford University Press]]|page=[https://archive.org/details/betternevertohav0000bena/page/167 167]|isbn=978-0199549269|author-link=David Benatar}}</ref><ref>{{cite report |url=https://www.un.org/development/desa/pd/sites/www.un.org.development.desa.pd/files/wpp2022_summary_of_results.pdf |title=World Population Prospects 2022: Summary of Results |date=2022 |publisher=United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs, Population Division |page= |id=UN DESA/POP/2022/TR/NO.3}}</ref>
== Future projections ==
{{Main|Projections of population growth}}
[[File:World Population Prospects.svg|thumb|upright=1.2|World population projections (2022). Note that half a child more or less per woman would cause a difference of about 8 billion people by the end of the century (blue dotted lines).]]
[[File:Population by broad age group projected to 2100, OWID.svg|thumb|upright=1.2|Projected world [[population ageing]] up to 2100.<ref name="q917">{{cite web | title=Population by age group | website=Our World in Data | url=https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/population-by-age-group | access-date=26 January 2025}}</ref>]]
Population projections are attempts to show how the [[human population]] might change in the future.<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.census.gov/programs-surveys/popproj.html|title=Population Projections|website=United States Census Bureau}}</ref> These projections help to [[Forecasting|forecast]] the population's impact on this planet and humanity's future well-being.<ref>{{Cite web|last=Kaneda|first=Toshiko|date=June 2014|title=Understanding Population Projections: Assumptions Behind the Numbers|url=https://assets.prb.org/pdf14/understanding-population-projections.pdf|website=Population Reference Bureau}}</ref> Models of population growth take trends in [[Human development (economics)|human development]], and apply projections into the future<ref name=":311">{{Cite journal|last=Roser|first=Max|date=9 May 2013|title=Future Population Growth|url=https://ourworldindata.org/future-population-growth|journal=Our World in Data}}</ref> to understand how they will affect [[Total fertility rate|fertility]] and [[Mortality rate|mortality]], and thus [[population growth]].<ref name=":311" />
The most recent report from the [[United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs|United Nations Population Division]] issued in 2022 (see chart) projects that global population will peak around the year 2086 at about 10.4 billion, and then start a slow decline (the median line on the chart). As with earlier projections, this version assumes that the global average [[fertility rate]] will continue to fall, but even further from 2.5 births per woman during the 2015–2020 period to 1.8 by the year 2100.<ref name="United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs, Population Division-2022">{{cite report|title= World Population Prospects 2022: Summary of Results |publisher= United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs, Population Division |id = UN DESA/POP/2022/TR/NO.3 |date=2022 |page = 28| url = https://www.un.org/development/desa/pd/sites/www.un.org.development.desa.pd/files/wpp2022_summary_of_results.pdf}}</ref>
However, other estimates predict additional downward pressure on fertility (such as more education and family planning) which could result in peak population during the 2060–2070 period rather than later.<ref name="Roser-2013" /><ref name="Vollset-2020" />
According to the UN, of the predicted growth in world population between 2020 and 2050, all of that change will come from [[Least developed countries|less developed countries]], and more than half will come from just 8 African countries.<ref name="United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs, Population Division-2022" /> It is predicted that the population of sub-Saharan Africa will double by 2050.<ref>{{Cite web |last=Nations |first=United |title=Population |url=https://www.un.org/en/global-issues/population |access-date=8 May 2023 |website=United Nations |language=en}}</ref> The Pew Research Center predicts that 50% of births in the year 2100 will be in Africa.<ref>{{Cite web |title=World population growth is expected to nearly stop by 2100 |url=https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2019/06/17/worlds-population-is-projected-to-nearly-stop-growing-by-the-end-of-the-century/ |access-date=8 May 2023 |website=Pew Research Center |language=en-US}}</ref> As an example of uneven prospects, the UN projects that [[Nigeria]] will gain about 340 million people, about the present population of the US, to become the 3rd most populous country, and [[China]] will lose almost half of its population.<ref name="United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs, Population Division-2022" />
Some scholars have argued that a form of "cultural selection" may be occurring due to significant differences in fertility rates between cultures, and it can therefore be expected that fertility rates and rates of population growth may rise again in the future.<ref>{{cite journal|last1=Kolk|first1=M.|last2= Cownden |first2=D.|last3=Enquist|first3=M. |title=Correlations in fertility across generations: can low fertility persist?|journal=Proceedings of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences|date=29 January 2014|volume=281|issue=1779|page = 20132561 |doi=10.1098/rspb.2013.2561|pmid= 24478294 |pmc=3924067}}</ref><ref>{{cite journal|last1=Burger|first1=Oskar|last2= DeLong|first2=John P.|title= What if fertility decline is not permanent? The need for an evolutionarily informed approach to understanding low fertility|journal= Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences|date=28 March 2016|volume=371|issue=1692|page = 20150157|doi= 10.1098/rstb.2015.0157 |pmid= 27022084|pmc= 4822437}}</ref><ref>{{cite news |title= Population paradox: Europe's time bomb |url= https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/europe/population-paradox-europes-time-bomb-888030.html |access-date=31 March 2019 |work=The Independent |date=9 August 2008}}</ref> An example is certain religious groups that have a higher birth rate that is not accounted for by differences in income. In his book ''Shall the Religious Inherit the Earth?'', [[Eric Kaufmann]] argues that demographic trends point to religious fundamentalists greatly increasing as a share of the population over the next century.<ref>{{Cite web|title=Shall the religious inherit the earth?|url=https://www.mercatornet.com/articles/view/shall_the_religious_inherit_the_earth/|date=April 6, 2010|website=Mercator Net|access-date=February 27, 2020|archive-date=June 23, 2019|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190623040350/https://www.mercatornet.com/articles/view/shall_the_religious_inherit_the_earth/|url-status=dead}}</ref><ref>{{Cite journal|last=McClendon|first=David|date=Autumn 2013|title=Shall the Religious Inherit the Earth? Demography and Politics in the Twenty-First Century, by ERIC KAUFMANN|url=https://academic.oup.com/socrel/article-abstract/74/3/417/1640161|journal=Sociology of Religion|volume=74|issue=3|pages=417–9|doi=10.1093/socrel/srt026|url-access=subscription}}</ref> From the perspective of [[evolutionary psychology]], it is expected that selection pressure should occur for whatever psychological or cultural traits maximize fertility.<ref>{{cite journal | last1 = Clarke | first1 = Alice L. | last2 = Low | first2 = Bobbi S. | year = 2001 | title = Testing evolutionary hypotheses with demographic data |journal = Population and Development Review | volume = 27 | issue = 4| pages = 633–660 | doi=10.1111/j.1728-4457.2001.00633.x| url = https://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/74296/1/j.1728-4457.2001.00633.x.pdf | hdl = 2027.42/74296| hdl-access = free }}</ref><ref>{{cite journal |last1=Daly |first1= Martin |last2=Wilson |first2=Margo I |title=Human evolutionary psychology and animal behaviour |journal= Animal Behaviour |url= http://courses.washington.edu/evpsych/Daly%26Wilson-HEP-AB1999.pdf |publisher= Department of Psychology, McMaster University |access-date=14 November 2018 |date=26 June 1998|volume= 57 |issue= 3 |pages= 509–519 |doi= 10.1006/anbe.1998.1027 |pmid= 10196040 |s2cid= 4007382 }}</ref><ref name=bbc_sure>[https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-19923200 Can we be sure the world's population will stop rising?], BBC News, 13 October 2012</ref>
==History of overpopulation hypotheses==
{{See also|Malthusianism}}
Concerns about population size or density have a long history: [[Tertullian]], a resident of the city of [[Carthage]] in the second century [[Common Era|CE]], criticized population at the time: "Our numbers are burdensome to the world, which can hardly support us... In very deed, pestilence, and famine, and wars, and earthquakes have to be regarded as a remedy for nations, as the means of pruning the luxuriance of the human race."<ref>{{cite web|title=Population explosion is over|url=https://www.thejakartapost.com/academia/2020/02/29/population-explosion-is-over.html|access-date=22 October 2021|website=The Jakarta Post|language=en}}</ref> Despite those concerns, scholars have not found historic [[societal collapse|societies that have collapsed]] because of overpopulation or overconsumption.<ref>{{cite journal|author=Joseph A. Tainter|title=Archaeology of Overshoot and Collapse|doi=10.1146/annurev.anthro.35.081705.123136|journal=Annual Review of Anthropology|pages=59–74|volume=35|date=2006}}</ref>
[[File:Malthus 1826 vol 1 page 435 top Table England Population Growth 1780-1810.jpg|thumb|Table of population growth in England 1780–1810 in ''[[An Essay on the Principle of Population]]'' (1826) by [[Thomas Malthus]], which would go on to be an influential text on [[Malthusianism]]]]
By the early 19th century, intellectuals such as [[Thomas Malthus]] predicted that humankind would outgrow its available resources because a finite amount of land would be incapable of supporting a population with limitless potential for increase.<ref>{{cite book|title=An Essay on the Principle of Population|chapter-url=https://archive.org/details/in.ernet.dli.2015.228746|date=1798|publisher=J. Johnson|___location=London|chapter=VII, paragraph 10, lines 8–10|quote=The power of population is so superior to the power in the earth to produce subsistence for man, that premature death must in some shape or other visit the human race}}</ref> During the 19th century, Malthus' work, particularly ''[[An Essay on the Principle of Population]],'' was often interpreted in a way that blamed the poor alone for their condition and helping them was said to worsen conditions in the long run.<ref name="Claeys">Gregory Claeys: The "Survival of the Fittest" and the Origins of Social Darwinism, in Journal of the History of Ideas, Vol. 61, No. 2, 2002, p. 223–240</ref> This resulted, for example, in the [[English poor laws]] of 1834<ref name="Claeys" /> and a hesitating response to the [[Great Famine (Ireland)|Irish Great Famine]] of 1845–52.<ref>Cormac Ó Gráda: Famine. A Short History, Princeton University Press 2009, {{ISBN|978-0-691-12237-3}} (pp. 20, 203–206)</ref>
The first [[World Population Conference]] was held in 1927 in Geneva, organized by the [[League of Nations]] and [[Margaret Sanger]].<ref>{{Cite journal|last=Carr-Saunders|first=A. M.|date=1927|title=The Population Conference at Geneva|url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/2223628|journal=The Economic Journal|volume=37|issue=148|pages=670–672|doi=10.2307/2223628|jstor=2223628|issn=0013-0133|url-access=subscription}}</ref><ref>{{Cite journal|last=C. -S.|first=A. M.|date=1 October 1927|title=The World Population Conference|journal=Nature|language=en|volume=120|issue=3022|pages=465–466|doi=10.1038/120465a0|bibcode=1927Natur.120..465C|s2cid=4138206|issn=1476-4687|pmc=1567312}}</ref><ref>{{Cite journal|last=Connelly|first=Matthew|date=November 2006|title=To inherit the Earth. Imagining world population, from the yellow peril to the population bomb|url=https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/journal-of-global-history/article/abs/to-inherit-the-earth-imagining-world-population-from-the-yellow-peril-to-the-population-bomb/8493BC475B75BE069796C3094B5A6838|journal=Journal of Global History|language=en|volume=1|issue=3|pages=299–319|doi=10.1017/S1740022806003019|s2cid=154909241 |issn=1740-0236|url-access=subscription}}</ref>
[[Paul R. Ehrlich]]'s book ''[[The Population Bomb]]'' became a bestseller upon its release in 1968 and created renewed interest in overpopulation. The book predicted population growth would lead to [[famine]], [[societal collapse]], and other social, environmental and economic strife in the coming decades, and advocated for policies to curb it.<ref name="Ehrlich-1990" /><ref name="Piper-2019" /><ref name="archive.is-2020-2" /> The [[Club of Rome]] published the influential report ''[[The Limits to Growth]]'' in 1972, which used computer modeling to similarly argue that continued population growth trends would lead to global system collapse.<ref name="Webb">{{cite web|last=Webb|first=Richard|title=The population debate: Are there too many people on the planet?|url=https://www.newscientist.com/article/mg24833080-800-the-population-debate-are-there-too-many-people-on-the-planet/|url-status=live|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20201111125807/https://www.newscientist.com/article/mg24833080-800-the-population-debate-are-there-too-many-people-on-the-planet/|archive-date=11 November 2020|access-date=21 October 2021|website=New Scientist|language=en-US}} [https://pages.stolaf.edu/2017-bies-228/wp-content/uploads/sites/1061/2021/01/The-Population-Debate-New-Scientist-11.2020.pdf Alt URL] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20211021103950/https://pages.stolaf.edu/2017-bies-228/wp-content/uploads/sites/1061/2021/01/The-Population-Debate-New-Scientist-11.2020.pdf |date=21 October 2021 }}</ref> The idea of overpopulation was also a topic of some works of English-language [[science fiction]] and [[dystopian fiction]] during the latter part of the 1960s.<ref name="archive.is-2020-2">{{cite news|date=8 January 2020|title=The Unrealized Horrors of Population Explosion – The New York Times|url=https://www.nytimes.com/2015/06/01/us/the-unrealized-horrors-of-population-explosion.html|archive-url=https://archive.today/20200108123334/https://www.nytimes.com/2015/06/01/us/the-unrealized-horrors-of-population-explosion.html|url-status=dead|archive-date=8 January 2020|access-date=5 August 2021|website=archive.is}}</ref> The [[United Nations]] held the first of three [[World Population Conferences]] in 1974.<ref>{{cite web|title=United Nations Population Division {{!}} Department of Economic and Social Affairs|url=https://www.un.org/en/development/desa/population/events/conference/index.asp|access-date=11 February 2022|website=www.un.org|language=EN}}</ref> [[Human population planning|Human population]] and [[family planning]] policies were adopted by some nations in the late 20th century in an effort to curb population growth, including in [[Family planning policies of China|China]] and [[Family planning in India|India]].<ref name="Roser-2013" /> [[Albert Allen Bartlett]] gave more than 1,742 lectures on the threat of exponential population growth starting in 1969.<ref name="Nature 12-1-2015" />
[[File:Paul Ehrlich USD Alcalá 1972.jpg|thumb|American biologist [[Paul R. Ehrlich]] generated renewed interest in the topic of overpopulation with ''[[The Population Bomb]]'' (1968).]]
However, many predictions of overpopulation during the 20th century did not materialize.<ref name="archive.is-2020-2" /><ref name="Piper-2019" /> In ''[[The Population Bomb]]'', Ehrlich stated, "In the 1970s hundreds of millions of people will starve to death in spite of any crash programs embarked upon now,"<ref name="leaders">{{Cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=oHYD-XUiSBEC&pg=PA318|title=Leaders from the 1960s: A Biographical Sourcebook of American Activism|publisher=Greenwood Press, 1994|year=1994|isbn=9780313274145|page=318}}</ref> with later editions changing to "in the 1980s".<ref name="Scientific American" /> Despite admitting some of his earlier predictions did not come to pass, Ehrlich continues to advocate that overpopulation is a major issue.<ref name="archive.is-2020-2" />
As the [[environmental movement|profile]] of [[environmental issues]] facing humanity increased during the end of the 20th and the early 21st centuries, some have looked to population growth as a root cause. In the 2000s, [[E. O. Wilson]] and Ron Nielsen discussed overpopulation as a threat to the quality of human life.<ref name="wilson">Wilson, E.O. (2002). ''The Future of Life''. pp. xxiii, 39, 43, 76. Vintage {{ISBN|0-679-76811-4}}</ref><ref name="Nielsen" />{{rp|37–39}}{{Primary source inline|date=July 2022}} In 2011, [[Pentti Linkola]] argued that human overpopulation represents a threat to Earth's [[biosphere]].<ref>Pentti Linkola, "Can Life Prevail?", Arktos Media, 2nd Revised ed. 2011. pp. 120–121. {{ISBN|1907166637}}</ref>{{Primary source inline|date=July 2022}} A 2015 survey from [[Pew Research Center]] reports that 82% of scientists associated with the [[American Association for the Advancement of Science]] were concerned about population growth.<ref name="Pew2015">{{cite news |last=Gao |first=George |date=8 June 2015 |title=Scientists more worried than public about world's growing population |url=https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2015/06/08/scientists-more-worried-than-public-about-worlds-growing-population/ |work=[[Pew Research Center]] |___location= |access-date=6 October 2021}}</ref> In 2017, more than one-third of [[List of Nobel laureates|50 Nobel prize-winning scientists]] surveyed by the ''[[Times Higher Education]]'' at the [[Lindau Nobel Laureate Meetings]] said that human overpopulation and [[environmental degradation]] are the two greatest threats facing mankind.<ref name="Moody2017">{{cite news |last= Moody|first=Oliver|date=31 August 2017 |title=Overpopulation is the biggest threat to mankind, Nobel laureates say|url=https://www.thetimes.com/uk/science/article/overpopulation-is-the-biggest-threat-to-mankind-nobel-laureates-say-zxdnv2bcv|work=[[The Times]]|access-date= 2 September 2017}}</ref> In November that same year, the [[World Scientists' Warning to Humanity|''World Scientists' Warning to Humanity: A Second Notice'']], signed by 15,364 scientists from 184 countries, indicated that rapid human population growth is "a primary driver behind many ecological and even societal threats."<ref name="Ripple2017">{{cite journal|vauthors=Ripple WJ, Wolf C, Newsome TM, Galetti M, Alamgir M, Crist E, Mahmoud MI, Laurance WF|title=World Scientists' Warning to Humanity: A Second Notice|journal=[[BioScience]]|date=13 November 2017|volume=67|issue=12|pages=1026–1028|doi=10.1093/biosci/bix125|url=http://scientistswarning.forestry.oregonstate.edu/sites/sw/files/Warning_article_with_supp_11-13-17.pdf|doi-access=free|access-date=12 July 2018|archive-date=15 December 2019|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20191215010626/https://scientistswarning.forestry.oregonstate.edu/sites/sw/files/Warning_article_with_supp_11-13-17.pdf|url-status=dead}}</ref> Ehlrich and other scientists at a conference in the Vatican on [[Holocene extinction|contemporary species extinction]] linked the issue to population growth in 2017, and advocated for [[Human population planning|human population control]], which attracted controversy from the [[Catholic Church|Catholic church]].<ref>{{cite news|last=McKie|first=Robin|date=25 January 2017|title=Biologists think 50% of species will be facing extinction by the end of the century|work=The Observer|url=https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2017/feb/25/half-all-species-extinct-end-century-vatican-conference}}</ref> In 2019, a warning on [[climate change]] signed by 11,000 scientists from 153 nations said that human population growth adds 80 million humans annually, and "the world population must be stabilized—and, ideally, gradually reduced—within a framework that ensures social integrity" to reduce the impact of "population growth on GHG emissions and biodiversity loss."<ref name="Ripple-2019">{{cite journal |last1= Ripple |first1=William J.|last2=Wolf|first2=Christopher |last3= Newsome |first3=Thomas M |last4=Barnard |first4= Phoebe |last5= Moomaw |first5=William R |date=5 November 2019 |title=World Scientists' Warning of a Climate Emergency |url=https://academic.oup.com/bioscience/advance-article/doi/10.1093/biosci/biz088/5610806 |journal=[[BioScience]] |doi=10.1093/biosci/biz088 |access-date=8 November 2019|author-link1=William J. Ripple|hdl=1808/30278 |hdl-access=free }}</ref><ref>{{cite news |last= Carrington |first=Damian |date=5 November 2019 |title=Climate crisis: 11,000 scientists warn of 'untold suffering'|url=https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2019/nov/05/climate-crisis-11000-scientists-warn-of-untold-suffering |work=[[The Guardian]] |access-date=8 November 2019}}</ref>
In 2020, a quote from [[David Attenborough]] about how humans have "overrun the planet" was shared widely online and became his most popular comment on the internet.<ref name="www.newstatesman.com-2020" />
==Key concepts==
===Overconsumption===
{{See also|Planetary boundaries|Overconsumption}}
The [[World Wide Fund for Nature]]<ref>{{cite news |last=Morales |first=Alex |date=24 October 2006 |title=Canada |publisher=Bloomberg |url=https://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601082&sid=asybYkLBp_tk |access-date=30 November 2011}}</ref><ref>{{cite web |title=WWF – Living Planet Report 2006 |url=http://www.panda.org/news_facts/publications/living_planet_report/lp_2006/index.cfm |access-date=30 November 2011 |publisher=Panda.org}}</ref> (WWF) and [[Global Footprint Network]] have argued that the annual [[biocapacity]] of Earth has exceeded, as measured using the [[ecological footprint]]. In 2006, WWF's ''[[Living Planet Report]]'' stated that in order for all humans to live with the current consumption patterns of Europeans, we would be spending three times more than what the planet can renew.<ref>{{cite web |title=WWF Living planet report |url=http://www.panda.org/news_facts/publications/living_planet_report/index.cfm |access-date=30 November 2011 |publisher=Panda.org}}</ref> According to these calculations, humanity as a whole was using by 2006 40% more than what Earth can regenerate.<ref>{{cite web |title=Data and Methodology |url=https://www.footprintnetwork.org/resources/data/ |access-date=6 March 2020 |website=footprintnetwork.org}}</ref> Another study by the WWF in 2014 found that it would take the equivalent of 1.5 Earths of bio-capacity to meet humanity's current levels of consumption.<ref>{{cite news |last=Carrington |first=Damian |date=30 September 2014 |title=Earth has lost half of its wildlife in the past 40 years, says WWF |work=[[The Guardian]] |url=https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2014/sep/29/earth-lost-50-wildlife-in-40-years-wwf |access-date=3 January 2017}}</ref> However, [[Roger Martin (diplomat)|Roger Martin]] of [[Population Matters]] states the view: "the poor want to get rich, and I want them to get rich," with a later addition, "of course we have to change consumption habits,... but we've also got to stabilize our numbers".<ref>{{cite news |last1=Martin |first1=Roger |year=2010 |title=Stopping at two children is better for the planet |url=http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/programmes/hardtalk/9281866.stm |work=BBC HARDtalk}} Interviewed by Carrie Gracie</ref> By 2023, the Global Footprint Network estimated that humanity's ecological footprint had increased to 1.71 Earths, indicating that human demand for ecological resources and services exceeded what Earth can regenerate in that year by 71%.<ref>{{cite web |title=Footprint in world 2023 |url=https://www.footprintnetwork.org/what-ecological-footprints-measure/footprint-in-world-2023/ |website=Global Footprint Network |access-date=2025-05-09}}</ref> This level of overconsumption underscores the significant environmental pressures associated with population growth and resource use. Additionally, [[Earth Overshoot Day]] in 2023 fell on August 2, marking the date when humanity's resource consumption for the year surpassed Earth's capacity to regenerate those resources. <ref>{{cite magazine |title=In Just 7 Months, the World Used an Entire Year's Worth of Planetary Resources |url=https://time.com/6300968/earth-overshoot-day-global-resources/ |magazine=Time |access-date=2025-05-09}}</ref>
Critics have questioned the simplifications and statistical methods used in calculating ecological footprints. Therefore, [[Global Footprint Network]] and its partner organizations have engaged with national governments and international agencies to test the results—reviews have been produced by France, Germany, the European Commission, Switzerland, Luxembourg, Japan and the [[United Arab Emirates]].<ref>{{cite web |title=Publications – Global Footprint Network |url=http://www.footprintnetwork.org/en/index.php/GFN/page/publications/ |access-date=17 September 2017}}</ref> Some point out that a more refined method of assessing Ecological Footprint is to designate [[Sustainability|sustainable versus non-sustainable]] categories of consumption.<ref>{{cite journal |author=Jeroen C.J.M. van den Bergh |author2=Harmen Verbruggen |year=1999 |title=Spatial sustainability, trade and indicators: an evaluation of the 'ecological footprint' |url=http://www.tinbergen.nl/discussionpapers/98105.pdf |url-status=dead |journal=Ecological Economics |volume=29 |issue=1 |pages=61–72 |doi=10.1016/S0921-8009(99)00032-4 |bibcode=1999EcoEc..29...61V |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20071009210421/http://www.tinbergen.nl/discussionpapers/98105.pdf |archive-date=9 October 2007}}</ref><ref>{{cite web |title=Planning and Markets: Peter Gordon and Harry W. Richardson |url=http://www-pam.usc.edu/volume1/v1i1a2print.html |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20100627044350/http://www-pam.usc.edu/volume1/v1i1a2print.html |archive-date=27 June 2010 |access-date=30 November 2011 |publisher=Pam.usc.edu}}</ref>
===Carrying capacity===
{{Main|Sustainable population}}
Attempts have been made to estimate the world's [[carrying capacity]] for humans; the maximum population the world can host.<ref>Cohen, J.E. (1995). ''How many people can the earth support?'' W.W. Norton & Company, New York, NY, USA.</ref> A 2004 meta-analysis of 69 such studies from 1694 until 2001 found the average predicted maximum number of people the Earth would ever have was 7.7 billion people, with lower and upper meta-bounds at 0.65 and 98 billion people, respectively. They conclude: "recent predictions of stabilized world population levels for 2050 exceed several of our meta-estimates of a world population limit".<ref name="Van Den BerghRietveld2004">{{cite journal |last1=Van Den Bergh |first1=Jeroen C. J. M. |last2=Rietveld |first2=Piet |year=2004 |title=Reconsidering the Limits to World Population: Meta-analysis and Meta-prediction |journal=BioScience |volume=54 |issue=3 |page=195 |doi=10.1641/0006-3568(2004)054[0195:RTLTWP]2.0.CO;2 |issn=0006-3568 |doi-access=free}}</ref>
A 2012 United Nations report summarized 65 different estimated maximum [[sustainable population]] sizes and the most common estimate was 8 billion.<ref>[https://na.unep.net/geas/archive/pdfs/geas_jun_12_carrying_capacity.pdf One Planet, How Many People? A Review of Earth's Carrying Capacity] United Nations, June 2012</ref> Advocates of reduced population often put forward much lower numbers. [[Paul R. Ehrlich]] stated in 2018 that the optimum population is between 1.5 and 2 billion.<ref>{{Cite news |last=Carrington |first=Damian |date=22 March 2018 |title=Paul Ehrlich: 'Collapse of civilisation is a near certainty within decades' |work=[[The Guardian]] |url=https://www.theguardian.com/cities/2018/mar/22/collapse-civilisation-near-certain-decades-population-bomb-paul-ehrlich |access-date=8 August 2020}}</ref> In 2022 Ehrlich and other contributors to the "Scientists' warning on population", including Eileen Crist, [[William J. Ripple]], [[William E. Rees]] and Christopher Wolf, stated that environmental analysts put the sustainable level of human population at between 2 and 4 billion people.<ref name="Crist2022"/> Geographer Chris Tucker estimates that 3 billion is a sustainable number.<ref>{{Cite book |url=https://www.kirkusreviews.com/book-reviews/christopher-tucker/planet-of-3-billion/ |title=A PLANET OF 3 BILLION {{!}} Kirkus Reviews |language=en}}</ref>
==Proposed impacts==
===Poverty and infant and child mortality ===
{{Main|Demographic transition|Income and fertility}}
Although proponents of human overpopulation have expressed concern that growing population will lead to an increase in global [[poverty]] and [[infant mortality]], both indicators have declined over the last 200 years of population growth.<ref name="Our World in Data-2">{{cite web|title=Does population growth lead to hunger and famine?|url=https://ourworldindata.org/population-growth-and-famines|access-date=24 September 2018|website=Our World in Data}}</ref><ref name="Our World in Data">{{cite web|title=The short history of global living conditions and why it matters that we know it|url=https://ourworldindata.org/a-history-of-global-living-conditions-in-5-charts|access-date=24 September 2018|website=Our World in Data}}</ref>
=== Environmental impacts ===
{{Main|Human impact on the environment}}
{{See also|Environmental impact of agriculture}}
A number of scientists have argued that [[human impact on the environment|human impacts on the environment]] and accompanying increase in [[resource consumption]] threatens the world's [[ecosystem]]s and the survival of human civilization.<ref>{{cite web | url=http://www.footprintnetwork.org/gfn_sub.php?content=overshoot | title=Ecological Debt Day | access-date=18 February 2013 | url-status=dead | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20081217234021/http://www.footprintnetwork.org/gfn_sub.php?content=overshoot | archive-date=17 December 2008 }}
</ref><ref>{{cite web | url=http://www.nature.com/news/specials/planetaryboundaries/index.html#feature | title=Planetary Boundaries: Specials | work=Nature | date=23 September 2009 | access-date=18 February 2013 | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130212015050/http://www.nature.com/news/specials/planetaryboundaries/index.html#feature | archive-date=12 February 2013 | url-status=live }}</ref><ref>{{cite journal |last1=Bologna|first1=M. |last2=Aquino|first2=G. |date=2020 |title=Deforestation and world population sustainability: a quantitative analysis |url= |journal=[[Scientific Reports]] |volume= 10|issue=7631 |page=7631 |doi=10.1038/s41598-020-63657-6|pmid=32376879 |pmc=7203172|arxiv=2006.12202 |bibcode=2020NatSR..10.7631B|quote=Calculations show that, maintaining the actual rate of population growth and resource consumption, in particular forest consumption, we have a few decades left before an irreversible collapse of our civilisation.}}</ref><ref name="Bradshaw2021"/><ref>{{cite journal |last1=Tal |first1=Alon |title=The Environmental Impacts of Overpopulation |journal=[[Encyclopedia (journal)|Encyclopedia]] |date=2025 |volume=5 |issue=2 |pages=45 |doi=10.3390/encyclopedia5020045 |doi-access=free}}</ref> The [[InterAcademy Panel Statement on Population Growth]], which was ratified by 58 member [[national academy|national academies]] in 1994, states that "unprecedented" population growth aggravates many environmental problems, including rising levels of [[atmospheric carbon dioxide]], [[global warming]], and pollution.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.interacademies.net/?id=3547 |title=IAP (login required) |publisher=InterAcademies.net |access-date=18 February 2013 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20100210203604/http://www.interacademies.net/?id=3547 |archive-date=10 February 2010 }}</ref> Indeed, some analysts claim that overpopulation's most serious impact is its effect on the environment.<ref name=Timeenvir>{{cite news|url=http://www.time.com/time/specials/packages/article/0,28804,2097720_2097782_2097814,00.html|title=Overpopulation's Real Victim Will Be the Environment|magazine=Time|date=26 October 2011|access-date=18 February 2013|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130218180534/http://www.time.com/time/specials/packages/article/0,28804,2097720_2097782_2097814,00.html|archive-date=18 February 2013|url-status=dead}}</ref> Some scientists suggest that the overall [[human impact on the environment]] during the [[Great Acceleration]], particularly due to human population size and growth, [[economic growth]], overconsumption, [[pollution]], and proliferation of technology, has pushed the planet into a new geological [[Epoch (geology)|epoch]] known as the [[Anthropocene]].<ref>{{Cite news|last=Subramanian|first=Meera|url=https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-019-01641-5|title=Anthropocene now: influential panel votes to recognize Earth's new epoch|year=2019|work=[[Nature (journal)|Nature]] News|access-date=1 March 2020|quote="Twenty-nine members of the AWG supported the Anthropocene designation and voted in favour of starting the new epoch in the mid-twentieth century, when a rapidly rising human population accelerated the pace of industrial production, the use of agricultural chemicals and other human activities."}}</ref><ref>{{cite journal |last1=Syvitski|first1= Jaia |last2=Waters |first2=Colin N.|last3=Day|first3= John |display-authors=etal. |date=2020|title=Extraordinary human energy consumption and resultant geological impacts beginning around 1950 CE initiated the proposed Anthropocene Epoch|journal=Communications Earth & Environment|volume=1 |issue= 32|page= 32 |doi=10.1038/s43247-020-00029-y|bibcode= 2020ComEE...1...32S |s2cid= 222415797 |quote="Human population has exceeded historical natural limits, with 1) the development of new energy sources, 2) technological developments in aid of productivity, education and health, and 3) an unchallenged position on top of food webs. Humans remain Earth’s only species to employ technology so as to change the sources, uses, and distribution of energy forms, including the release of geologically trapped energy (i.e. coal, petroleum, uranium). In total, humans have altered nature at the planetary scale, given modern levels of human-contributed aerosols and gases, the global distribution of radionuclides, organic pollutants and mercury, and ecosystem disturbances of terrestrial and marine environments. Approximately 17,000 monitored populations of 4005 vertebrate species have suffered a 60% decline between 1970 and 2014, and ~1 million species face extinction, many within decades. Humans' extensive 'technosphere', now reaches ~30 Tt, including waste products from non-renewable resources."|doi-access=free|hdl=10810/51932|hdl-access=free}}</ref>
{{Pie chart
| caption = '''[[Biomass (ecology)|Biomass]] of [[mammal]]s on Earth'''<ref>{{cite news |last= Carrington|first=Damian |date=21 May 2018 |title=Humans just 0.01% of all life but have destroyed 83% of wild mammals – study|url=https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2018/may/21/human-race-just-001-of-all-life-but-has-destroyed-over-80-of-wild-mammals-study|work=The Guardian |access-date=13 July 2019}}</ref><ref>{{cite journal |doi=10.1126/science.aau1397 |pmid=30213888 |title=Space for nature |journal=Science |volume=361 |issue=6407 |page=1051 |year=2018 |last1=Baillie |first1=Jonathan |last2=Zhang |first2=Ya-Ping |bibcode=2018Sci...361.1051B |doi-access=free }}</ref>
| label1 = [[Livestock]], mostly [[cattle]] and [[pig]]s
| value1 = 60 | color1 = blue
| label2 = [[Human]]s
| value2 = 36 | color2 = red
| label3 = [[Wildlife|Wild animals]]
| value3 = 4 | color3 = green
}}
Some studies and commentary link population growth with [[climate change]].{{refn|<ref name="Ripple-2019" /><ref>[[John T. Houghton]] (2004)."''[https://books.google.com/books?id=jE9mwoLXdwYC&pg=PA326 Global warming: the complete briefing] {{webarchive |url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160503035714/https://books.google.com/books?id=jE9mwoLXdwYC&pg=PA326&dq&hl=en |date=3 May 2016 }}''". [[Cambridge University Press]]. p.326. {{ISBN|0-521-52874-7}}</ref><ref>{{cite news|date=5 December 2009|title=Once taboo, population enters climate debate|url=https://www.independent.co.uk/climate-change/news/once-taboo-population-enters-climate-debate-5510946.html|access-date=3 August 2021|website=The Independent|language=en}}</ref><ref name="Agencies-2006">{{cite web|last=Agencies|date=6 January 2006|title=Population control 'vital' to curbing climate change|url=http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2006/jan/06/climatechange.climatechangeenvironment|access-date=24 August 2021|website=The Guardian|language=en}}</ref><ref name="WolfRipple2021">{{cite journal |last1=Wolf |first1=C. |last2=Ripple |first2=W.J. |last3=Crist |first3=E. |date=2021 |title=Human population, social justice, and climate policy |journal=Sustainability Science |volume=16 |issue=5 |pages=1753–1756 |url=https://scientistswarning.forestry.oregonstate.edu/sites/sw/files/Wolf2021.pdf |doi=10.1007/s11625-021-00951-w |bibcode=2021SuSc...16.1753W |s2cid=233404010 |access-date=26 October 2021 |archive-date=26 October 2021 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20211026131650/https://scientistswarning.forestry.oregonstate.edu/sites/sw/files/Wolf2021.pdf |url-status=dead }}</ref><ref>{{cite news |last=Laubichler|first=Manfred |date=3 November 2022 |title=8 billion humans: How population growth and climate change are connected as the 'Anthropocene engine' transforms the planet|url=https://theconversation.com/8-billion-humans-how-population-growth-and-climate-change-are-connected-as-the-anthropocene-engine-transforms-the-planet-193075|work=[[The Conversation (website)|The Conversation]]|___location= |access-date=6 November 2022}}</ref>}} Critics have stated that population growth alone may have less influence on climate change than other factors, such as [[List of countries by carbon dioxide emissions per capita|greenhouse gas emissions per capita]].<ref name="Stone-2017">{{cite web|last=Stone|first=Lyman|date=12 December 2017|title=Why you shouldn't obsess about "overpopulation"|url=https://www.vox.com/the-big-idea/2017/12/12/16766872/overpopulation-exaggerated-concern-climate-change-world-population|access-date=10 September 2021|website=Vox|language=en}}</ref><ref name="Webb" /> The global consumption of [[meat]] is projected to rise by as much as 76% by 2050 as the global population increases, with this projected to have further [[Environmental impact of meat production|environmental impacts]] such as [[biodiversity loss]] and increased [[greenhouse gas]] emissions.<ref name="Best2014">{{cite book |last= Best|first=Steven|date=2014 |title=The Politics of Total Liberation: Revolution for the 21st Century|publisher=[[Palgrave Macmillan]]|page=160 |isbn=978-1137471116|doi=10.1057/9781137440723|author-link=Steven Best|quote=By 2050 the human population will top 9 billion, and world meat consumption will likely double.}}</ref><ref>{{cite news |last= Devlin|first=Hannah |date=19 July 2018 |title=Rising global meat consumption 'will devastate environment'|url=https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2018/jul/19/rising-global-meat-consumption-will-devastate-environment|work=The Guardian |access-date=28 September 2019}}</ref><ref>{{cite journal |last1=Godfray|first1=H. Charles J.|last2=Aveyard|first2=Paul|display-authors=etal.|date=2018 |title=Meat consumption, health, and the environment|url= https://ora.ox.ac.uk/objects/uuid:cc174e1d-0e3e-43ce-9d3b-ad7e204d0845|journal=Science |volume=361 |issue=6399 |pages= |doi=10.1126/science.aam5324|pmid=30026199 |bibcode=2018Sci...361M5324G |s2cid=49895246 |doi-access=free}}</ref> A July 2017 study published in ''[[Environmental Research Letters]]'' argued that the most significant way individuals could mitigate their own [[carbon footprint]] is to have fewer children, followed by living without a vehicle, forgoing air travel, and adopting a [[plant-based diet]].<ref>{{cite news|last=Perkins|first=Sid|date=11 July 2017|title=The best way to reduce your carbon footprint is one the government isn't telling you about|url=https://www.science.org/content/article/best-way-reduce-your-carbon-footprint-one-government-isn-t-telling-you-about|work=[[Science (journal)|Science]]|access-date=9 December 2017|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20171201030527/http://www.sciencemag.org/news/2017/07/best-way-reduce-your-carbon-footprint-one-government-isn-t-telling-you-about|archive-date=1 December 2017|url-status=live}}</ref> However, even in countries that have both large population growth and major ecological problems, it is not necessarily true that curbing the population growth will make a major contribution towards resolving all environmental problems that can be solved simply with an [[environmentalism|environmentalist]] policy approach.<ref name="UN World Population Report 2001">{{cite web|url=https://www.un.org/esa/population/publications/wpm/wpm2001.pdf|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20030403112038/http://www.un.org/esa/population/publications/wpm/wpm2001.pdf|url-status=dead|archive-date=3 April 2003|title=UN World Population Report 2001|page=31|access-date=16 December 2008}}</ref>
Continued [[population growth]] and overconsumption, particularly by the wealthy, have been posited as key drivers of [[biodiversity loss]] and [[Holocene extinction|contemporary species extinction]],<ref>{{Cite journal|last1=Pimm|first1=S. L.|last2=Jenkins|first2=C. N.|last3=Abell|first3=R.|last4=Brooks|first4=T. M.|last5=Gittleman|first5=J. L.|last6=Joppa|first6=L. N.|last7=Raven|first7=P. H.|last8=Roberts|first8=C. M.|last9=Sexton|first9=J. O.|date=30 May 2014|title=The biodiversity of species and their rates of extinction, distribution, and protection|url=https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/science.1246752|journal=Science|language=en|volume=344|issue=6187|doi=10.1126/science.1246752|issn=0036-8075|pmid=24876501|s2cid=206552746|quote=The overarching driver of species extinction is human population growth and increasing per capita consumption.|url-access=subscription}}</ref><ref>{{cite journal | last1 = Ceballos | first1 = Gerardo| last2 = Ehrlich| first2 = Paul R.| last3 = Barnosky| first3= Anthony D. | author-link3=Anthony David Barnosky|last4 = García | first4 = Andrés| last5 = Pringle | first5 = Robert M.| last6 = Palmer| first6 =Todd M. | year = 2015 | title = Accelerated modern human–induced species losses: Entering the sixth mass extinction | journal = [[Science Advances]] | volume = 1 | issue = 5 | page = e1400253 | doi = 10.1126/sciadv.1400253 | pmid= 26601195| pmc=4640606| bibcode = 2015SciA....1E0253C|quote=All of these are related to human population size and growth, which increases consumption (especially among the rich), and economic inequity.}}</ref><ref name="Bradshaw2021">{{cite journal |journal=Frontiers in Conservation Science|date=2021 |title=Underestimating the Challenges of Avoiding a Ghastly Future |volume=1 |issue= |pages= |doi=10.3389/fcosc.2020.615419 |last1=Bradshaw |first1=Corey J. A. |last2=Ehrlich |first2=Paul R. |last3=Beattie |first3=Andrew |last4=Ceballos |first4=Gerardo |last5=Crist |first5=Eileen |last6=Diamond |first6=Joan |last7=Dirzo |first7=Rodolfo |last8=Ehrlich |first8=Anne H. |last9=Harte |first9=John |last10=Harte |first10=Mary Ellen |last11=Pyke |first11=Graham |last12=Raven |first12=Peter H. |last13=Ripple |first13=William J. |last14=Saltré |first14=Frédérik |last15=Turnbull |first15=Christine |last16=Wackernagel |first16=Mathis |last17=Blumstein |first17=Daniel T. |s2cid=231589034 |doi-access=free|quote= Large populations and their continued growth are also drivers of soil degradation and biodiversity loss. More people means that more synthetic compounds and dangerous throw-away plastics are manufactured, many of which add to the growing toxification of the Earth.}}</ref><ref name="Dasgupta"/> with some researchers and environmentalists specifically suggesting this indicates a human overpopulation scenario.<ref name="Ceballos2017">{{cite journal| last1=Ceballos|first1=Gerardo|last2=Ehrlich|first2=Paul R |last3=Dirzo|first3=Rodolfo|date=23 May 2017|title=Biological annihilation via the ongoing sixth mass extinction signaled by vertebrate population losses and declines|journal=[[Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America|PNAS]]|volume=114|issue=30|pages=E6089–E6096|doi=10.1073/pnas.1704949114|quote=Much less frequently mentioned are, however, the ultimate drivers of those immediate causes of biotic destruction, namely, human overpopulation and continued population growth, and overconsumption, especially by the rich. These drivers, all of which trace to the fiction that perpetual growth can occur on a finite planet, are themselves increasing rapidly.|pmc=5544311|pmid=28696295|bibcode=2017PNAS..114E6089C |doi-access=free}}</ref><ref name="978-0820343853 p83">{{cite book |editor1-last=Crist |editor1-first=Eileen |editor2-last=Cafaro |editor2-first=Philip |date=2012 |title=Life on the Brink: Environmentalists Confront Overpopulation |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=heOrAAAAQBAJ&pg=PA83 |___location= |publisher=[[University of Georgia Press]] |page=83 |isbn=978-0820343853}}</ref><ref name="Cafaro2022">{{Cite journal |last1=Cafaro |first1=Philip |last2=Hansson |first2=Pernilla |last3=Götmark |first3=Frank |date=August 2022 |title=Overpopulation is a major cause of biodiversity loss and smaller human populations are necessary to preserve what is left |journal=[[Biological Conservation (journal)|Biological Conservation]] |volume=272 |article-number=109646 |issn=0006-3207 |doi=10.1016/j.biocon.2022.109646|bibcode=2022BCons.27209646C |s2cid=250185617 |url=https://www.sustainable.soltechdesigns.com/Overpopulation-and-biodiversty-loss(2022).pdf}}</ref> The ''[[Global Assessment Report on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services]]'', released by [[IPBES]] in 2019, states that human population growth is a factor in biodiversity loss.<ref>{{cite news|last=Watts|first=Jonathan|date=6 May 2019|title=Human society under urgent threat from loss of Earth's natural life|url=https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2019/may/06/human-society-under-urgent-threat-loss-earth-natural-life-un-report|work=[[The Guardian]]|access-date=23 June 2019|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190518041123/https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2019/may/06/human-society-under-urgent-threat-loss-earth-natural-life-un-report|archive-date=18 May 2019|url-status=live}}</ref><ref name="Stokstad2019">{{cite web|url=https://www.science.org/content/article/landmark-analysis-documents-alarming-global-decline-nature|title=Landmark analysis documents the alarming global decline of nature|last=Stokstad|first=Erik|date=5 May 2019|website=[[Science (journal)|Science]]|publisher=[[American Association for the Advancement of Science|AAAS]]|language=en|access-date=11 August 2020|quote="Driving these threats are the growing human population, which has doubled since 1970 to 7.6 billion, and consumption. (Per capita of use of materials is up 15% over the past 5 decades.)"}}</ref> IGI Global has uncovered the growth of the human population caused encroachment in wild habitats which have led to their destruction, "posing a potential threat to biodiversity components".<ref>{{cite book |last1=Uniyal |first1=Shivani |last2=Paliwal |first2=Rashmi |last3=Kaphaliya |first3=Bhumija |last4=R.K. |first4=Sharma |title=Environmental issues surrounding human overpopulation |date=2017 |publisher=Information Science Reference |isbn=978-1-5225-1684-2 |doi=10.4018/978-1-5225-1683-5.ch001 |url=https://www.researchgate.net/publication/312011571 |access-date=20 October 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220129134521/https://www.researchgate.net/publication/312011571_Human_Overpopulation |archive-date=29 January 2022 |language=en |format=PDF |chapter=1}}</ref>
Some scientists and environmentalists, including [[Jared Diamond]],<ref>{{cite web|url=http://people.morrisville.edu/~reymers/readings/ANTH101/WorstMistake-Diamond.pdf|title=The Worst Mistake of the Human Race|work=Jared Diamond, UCLA School of Medicine}}</ref> [[E. O. Wilson]], [[Jane Goodall]]<ref name="Alberro" /> and [[David Attenborough]],<ref>{{cite web|date=15 January 2020|title=David Attenborough warns 'human beings have overrun the world' in new film|url=https://inews.co.uk/news/a-life-on-our-planet-trailer-david-attenborough-new-film-teaser-release-date-385845|access-date=7 September 2021|website=inews.co.uk|language=en}}</ref> contend that population growth is devastating to [[biodiversity]]. Wilson for example, has expressed concern when ''[[Homo sapiens]]'' reached a population of six billion their [[Zoomass|biomass exceeded that of any other large land dwelling animal species]] that had ever existed by over 100 times.<ref name="978-0820343853 p83"/> [[Inger Andersen (environmentalist)|Inger Andersen]], the executive director of the [[United Nations Environment Programme]], stated in December 2022 as the human population reached a milestone of 8 billion and as delegates were meeting for the [[2022 United Nations Biodiversity Conference]], that "we need to understand that the more people there are, the more we put the Earth under heavy pressure. As far as biodiversity is concerned, we are at war with [the rest of] nature."<ref>{{cite news |last=Greenfield|first=Patrick |date=6 December 2022|title='We are at war with nature': UN environment chief warns of biodiversity apocalypse|url=https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2022/dec/06/cop-15-un-chief-biodiversity-apocalypse|work=The Guardian|___location= |access-date=5 January 2023}}</ref>
Human overpopulation and continued population growth are also considered by some, including animal rights attorney Doris Lin and philosopher [[Steven Best]], to be an [[animal rights]] issue, as more human activity means the destruction of animal habitats and more direct killing of animals.<ref>{{cite web |url=https://www.thoughtco.com/effects-of-human-overpopulation-127867 |title=Human Overpopulation |last=Lin|first= Doris |date= 3 July 2019 |website=[[ThoughtCo]] |publisher= |access-date= 20 October 2021 |quote=Human overpopulation is an animal rights issue as well as an environmental issue and a human rights issue. Human activities, including mining, transportation, pollution, agriculture, development, and logging, take habitat away from wild animals as well as kill animals directly.}}</ref><ref name="Best2014" />{{rp|146}}
===Resource depletion===
{{Main|Resource depletion|overconsumption}}
Some commentary has attributed [[Resource depletion|depletion of non-renewable resources]], such as [[Land use|land]], [[Food security|food]] and [[Water scarcity|water]], to overpopulation<ref>"[http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=growing-population-poses-malthusian-dilemma Another Inconvenient Truth: The World's Growing Population Poses a Malthusian Dilemma] {{webarchive |url=https://web.archive.org/web/20131225120645/http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=growing-population-poses-malthusian-dilemma |date=25 December 2013 }}". [[Scientific American]] (2 October 2009).</ref> and suggested it could lead to a diminished quality of human life.<ref name="Nielsen">Ron Nielsen, ''The Little Green Handbook: Seven Trends Shaping the Future of Our Planet'', Picador, New York (2006) {{ISBN|978-0-312-42581-4}}</ref> Ecologist [[David Pimentel (scientist)|David Pimentel]] was one such proponent, saying "with the imbalance growing between population numbers and vital life sustaining resources, humans must actively conserve cropland, freshwater, energy, and biological resources. There is a need to develop renewable energy resources. Humans everywhere must understand that rapid population growth damages the Earth's resources and diminishes human well-being."<ref>David Pimentel, et al. [http://dieoff.org/page174.htm "Will Limits of the Earth's Resources Control Human Numbers?"] {{webarchive |url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160710200107/http://dieoff.org/page174.htm |date=10 July 2016 }}, Dieoff.org</ref><ref>Lester R. Brown, Gary Gardner, Brian Halweil (September 1998). [http://www.worldwatch.org/system/files/EWP143.pdf Worldwatch Paper #143: Beyond Malthus: Sixteen Dimensions of the Population Problem] {{webarchive |url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160303181402/http://www.worldwatch.org/system/files/EWP143.pdf |date=3 March 2016 }}, [[Worldwatch Institute]], {{ISBN|1-878071-45-9}}</ref>
[[File:Food production per capita.svg|thumb|Growth in food production has been greater than population growth.]]
Although [[Food security|food shortages]] have been warned as a consequence of overpopulation, according to the [[Food and Agriculture Organization]], global food production exceeds increasing demand from global population growth.<ref name="Nature 12-1-2015" /><ref name="Nature-2010">{{Cite journal|date=1 July 2010|title=Food: The growing problem|journal=Nature|language=en|volume=466|issue=7306|pages=546–547|doi=10.1038/466546a|pmid=20671687|s2cid=205057552|issn=1476-4687|doi-access=free}}</ref> Food insecurity in some regions is attributable to the globally unequal distribution of food supplies.<ref name="Nature 12-1-2015" />
The notion that space is limited has been decried by skeptics,<ref>{{Cite journal|last1=Young|first1=A.|year=1999|title=Is there Really Spare Land? A Critique of Estimates of Available Cultivable Land in Developing Countries|journal=Environment, Development and Sustainability|volume=1|pages=3–18|doi=10.1023/A:1010055012699|s2cid=153970029}}</ref> who point out that the Earth's population of roughly 6.8 billion people could comfortably be housed an area comparable in size to the state of [[Texas]] in the United States (about {{convert|269000|sqmi|km2|2|disp=or|sigfig=6}}).<ref>{{cite web |title=Overpopulation: The Making of a Myth |url=http://overpopulationisamyth.com/overpopulation-the-making-of-a-myth#FAQ5 |access-date=13 February 2010 |archive-date=11 July 2017 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170711020525/https://overpopulationisamyth.com/overpopulation-the-making-of-a-myth#FAQ5 |url-status=dead }}</ref> Critics and agricultural experts suggest changes to policies relating to [[land use]] or [[agriculture]] to make them more efficient would be more likely to resolve land issues and [[Environmental impact of agriculture|pressures on the environment]] than focusing on reducing population alone.<ref name="Stone-2017" /><ref name="Nature-2010" />
[[Water scarcity]], which threatens agricultural productivity, represents a global issue that some have linked to population growth.<ref>Brown, Lester R. and Halweil, Brian (23 September 1999). [https://web.archive.org/web/20090314104500/http://www.worldwatch.org/node/1661 Population Outrunning Water Supply as World Hits 6 Billion]. Worldwatch Institute.</ref><ref>{{cite book|author=Fred Pearce|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=C0_q-90H1aAC|title=When the Rivers Run Dry: Water—The Defining Crisis of the Twenty-first Century|publisher=Beacon Press|year=2007|isbn=978-0-8070-8573-8}}</ref><ref>{{cite book|last=Worldwatch|first=The|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=1HEwh8nsljQC&q=Outgrowing+The+Earth:+The+Food+Security+Challenge+in+an+Age+of+Falling+Water+Tables+and+Rising+Temperature|title=Outgrowing the Earth: The Food Security Challenge in an Age of Falling Water Tables and Rising Temperatures: Books: Lester R. Brown|date=27 April 2012|publisher=Taylor & Francis |isbn=978-0393060706}}</ref> Colin Butler wrote in ''[[The Lancet]]'' in 1994 that overpopulation also has economic consequences for certain countries due to resource use.<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Butler |first1=Colin David |date=5 March 1994 |title=Overpopulation, overconsumption, and economics |url=https://www.academia.edu/790276 |journal=The Lancet |volume=343 |issue=8897 |pages=582–584 |doi=10.1016/S0140-6736(94)91526-1 |pmid=7906334 |access-date=19 October 2022 |s2cid=30246584}}</ref>
=== Political systems and social conflict===
It was speculated by [[Aldous Huxley]] in 1958 that [[democracy]] is threatened by overpopulation, and could give rise to [[totalitarian]] style governments.<ref>{{cite web | last1= Huxley | first1=Aldous | author-link1=Aldous Huxley | title=Brave New World Revisited: overpopulation | url=http://www.huxley.net/bnw-revisited/index.html#overpop | access-date=9 July 2014}} (A non-fiction book, with the entire book focused on the effects of human overpopulation on human affairs including both societal and individual concerns.)</ref> Physics professor [[Albert Allen Bartlett]] at the [[University of Colorado Boulder]] warned in 2000 that overpopulation and the development of technology are the two major causes of the diminution of democracy.<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Bartlett |first1=Albert A.|author-link=Albert Allen Bartlett |date=2000 |title=Democracy Cannot Survive Overpopulation |url= |journal=[[Population and Environment]] |volume=22 |issue=1 |pages=63–71 |doi=10.1023/A:1006681515521|s2cid=154695448}}</ref> However, over the last 200 years of population growth, the actual level of personal freedom has increased rather than declined.<ref name="Our World in Data" /> [[John Harte (scientist)|John Harte]] has argued population growth is a factor in numerous social issues, including [[unemployment]], [[overcrowding]], [[bad governance]] and decaying infrastructure.<ref name="Bradshaw2021"/><ref>{{cite journal |last=Harte |first=John |date=2007 |title=Human population as a dynamic factor in environmental degradation |url= |journal=[[Population and Environment]] |volume=28 |issue= 4–5|pages=223–236 |doi=10.1007/s11111-007-0048-3|s2cid=18611090 }}</ref> [[Daron Acemoglu]] and others suggested in a 2017 paper that since the Second World War, countries with higher population growth rates experienced the most social conflict.<ref name="Bradshaw2021"/><ref>{{cite journal |url=https://www.nber.org/papers/w23322|title=Population and Civil War |last1=Acemoglu |first1=Daron |last2= Fergusson |first2=Leopoldo |last3=Johnson|first3=Simon|author-link1=Daron Acemoglu |date=2017 |website=[[National Bureau of Economic Research]] |series=Working Paper Series |publisher= |access-date=15 December 2021 |doi=10.3386/w23322|doi-access=free }}</ref>
Some advocates{{Who|date=November 2022}} have suggested societal problems such as hunger and mass unemployment are linked to overpopulation.<ref name="Moody2017" /><ref name="Ripple-2019" /><ref name="Bradshaw2021" />{{Verify source|date=November 2022}}
According to anthropologist [[Jason Hickel]], the global [[capitalist]] system creates pressures for [[population growth]]: "more people means more labour, cheaper labour, and more consumers."<ref>{{cite book|last=Hickel|first=Jason|author-link=Jason Hickel|title=Less is More: How Degrowth Will Save the World |year=2021|publisher=Windmill Books|pages=110–111|isbn=978-1786091215|quote= And of course capitalism itself creates pressures for population growth: more people means more labour, cheaper labour, and more consumers. These pressures filter into our culture, and even into national policy: countries like France and Japan are offering incentives to get women to have more children, to keep their economies growing.}}</ref> He and his colleagues have also demonstrated that capitalist elites throughout recent history have "used [[pro-natalist]] state policies to prevent women from practicing family planning" in order to grow the size of their workforce.<ref name="WorldDevelopment">{{cite journal |last1=Sullivan |first1=Dylan |last2=Hickel|first2=Jason |date=2023 |title=Capitalism and extreme poverty: A global analysis of real wages, human height, and mortality since the long 16th century|url= |journal=[[World Development (journal)|World Development]]|volume=161 |issue= |article-number=106026 |doi=10.1016/j.worlddev.2022.106026|access-date=|doi-access=free|quote=""}}</ref> Hickel has however argued that the cause of negative environmental impacts is resource extraction by wealthy countries.<ref>{{Cite book |last=Hickel |first=Jason |title=Less is More: How Degrowth will Save the World |date=2021 |isbn=978-1-78609-121-5 |___location=London |oclc=1154101160}}</ref>{{page needed|date=March 2023}}{{Verify source|date=March 2023}} He concludes that "we should not ignore the relationship between population growth and ecology, but we must not treat these as operating in a social and political vacuum."<ref name="WorldDevelopment"/>
=== Epidemics and pandemics ===
A 2021 article in ''Ethics, Medicine and Public Health'' argued in light of the [[COVID-19 pandemic]] that [[epidemic]]s and [[pandemic]]s were made more likely by overpopulation, [[globalization]], urbanization and encroachment into natural habitats.<ref>{{Cite journal|last1=Spernovasilis|first1=N.|last2=Markaki|first2=I.|last3=Papadakis|first3=M.|last4=Tsioutis|first4=C.|last5=Markaki|first5=L.|date=19 December 2021|title=Epidemics and pandemics: Is human overpopulation the elephant in the room?|journal=Ethics, Medicine, and Public Health|volume=19|article-number=100728|doi=10.1016/j.jemep.2021.100728|issn=2352-5525|pmc=8530531|pmid=34703871}}</ref>
They both play a significant role impacting human populations, including widespread [[illness]], [[death]], and [[social disruption]]. While they can leave a temporary loss of population, it is followed by significant loss and suffering. These events are not the sole reason for overpopulation, but lack of access to [[family planning]] and reproductive contraptions, [[poverty]] and [[resource depletion]].<ref>{{Cite journal |last=Spernovasilis N, Markaki I, Papadakis M, Tsioutis C, Markaki L |date=19 December 2021 |title=Epidemics and pandemics: Is human overpopulation the elephant in the room? |journal=Ethics Med Public Health|volume=19 |article-number=100728 |doi=10.1016/j.jemep.2021.100728 |pmid=34703871 |pmc=8530531 }}</ref>
== Proposed solutions and mitigation measures ==
Several strategies have been proposed to mitigate overpopulation.
=== Population planning ===
{{Main|Human population planning}}Several scientists (including [[Paul R. Ehrlich|Paul Ehrlich]], [[Gretchen Daily]] and [[Tim Flannery]]<ref name="Agencies-2006" /><ref>{{cite web|date=19 November 2009|title=Flannery calls for population inquiry|url=https://www.abc.net.au/news/2009-11-20/flannery-calls-for-population-inquiry/1149666|access-date=24 August 2021|website=www.abc.net.au|language=en-AU}}</ref>) proposed that humanity should work at stabilizing its absolute numbers, as a starting point towards beginning the process of reducing the total numbers. They suggested several possible approaches, including:<ref>{{citation|last1=Ehrlich|first1=Paul R|title=One with Nineveh: Politics, Consumption, and the Human Future|date=2004|pages=181–205 (chapter 6)|publisher=Island Press/Shearwater Books|last2=Ehrlich|first2=Anne H|author-link1=Paul R. Ehrlich|author-link2=Paul R. Ehrlich}}</ref><ref>{{citation|last1=Ehrlich|first1=Paul R.|title=The Stork and the Plow: The Equity Answer to the Human Dilemma|date=1995|publisher=Grosset/Putnam Books|last2=Ehrlich|first2=Anne H.|last3=Daily|first3=Gretchen C.|author-link1=Paul R. Ehrlich|author-link2=Paul R. Ehrlich|author-link3=Gretchen Daily}}</ref>
* Improved access to [[contraception]] and [[comprehensive sex education]]
* Reducing [[infant mortality]], so that parents do not need to have many children to ensure at least some survive to adulthood.<ref>Lifeblood: How to Change the World One Dead Mosquito at a Time, Alex Perry p9</ref>
* Improving the [[status of women]] in order to facilitate a departure from traditional sexual division of labour.
* [[Family planning]]<ref name="Ryerson 2010">{{cite book|last1=Ryerson|first1=William N.|title=The Post Carbon Reader: Managing the 21st Century's Sustainability Crises, "Ch.12: Population: The Multiplier of Everything Else"|date=2010|publisher=Watershed Media|isbn=978-0970950062|___location=Healdsburg, Calif.|pages=153–174}}</ref>
* Creating small family "role models"<ref name="Ryerson 2010" />
* Secular cultures and societies.<ref name= "Schnabel 2021">{{cite journal|last1=Schnabel|first1=Landon|date=16 July 2021|title=Secularism and Fertility Worldwide|journal=Socius|volume=7|pages=1–18|doi=10.1177/23780231211031320|s2cid=237720715 |doi-access=free}}</ref>
There is good evidence from many parts of the world that when women and couples have the freedom to choose how many children to have, they tend to have smaller families.<ref>Engelman, R., 2012. Trusting women to end population growth. In: Cafaro, P., Crist, E. (Eds.), Life on the Brink: Environmentalists Confront Overpopulation. The University of Georgia Press, Athens and London, pp. 223–239.</ref><ref>Engelman, R., 2016. Nine population strategies to stop short of 9 billion. In: Washington, H., Twomey, P. (Eds.), A Future beyond Growth: Toward a Steady State Economy. Routledge, London, pp. 32–42.</ref><ref name="Crist-2019">{{Cite book |last=Crist |first=Eileen |url=http://dx.doi.org/10.7208/chicago/9780226596945.001.0001 |title=Abundant Earth |date=2019 |publisher=University of Chicago Press |doi=10.7208/chicago/9780226596945.001.0001 |isbn=978-0-226-59680-8|s2cid=134956670 }}</ref>
Some scientists, such as Corey Bradshaw and Barry Brook, suggest that, given the "inexorable demographic momentum of the global human population," [[sustainability]] can be achieved more rapidly with a short term focus on technological and social innovations, along with reducing consumption rates, while treating population planning as a long-term goal.<ref>{{cite news |first=Matt |last=McGrath |url=https://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-29788754 |title=Population controls 'will not solve environment issues' |publisher=BBC |date=27 October 2014 |access-date=16 December 2021}}</ref><ref>{{cite journal |title=Human population reduction is not a quick fix for environmental problems |last1=Bradshaw |first1=Corey J. A. |last2=Brook |first2=Barry W. |journal=[[Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America]] |volume=111 |issue=46 |pages=16610–16615 |doi=10.1073/pnas.1410465111 |pmid=25349398 |year=2014 |pmc=4246304 |bibcode=2014PNAS..11116610B |doi-access=free}}</ref>
However, most scientists believe that achieving genuine sustainability is a long-term project, and that addressing population and consumption levels are both essential to achieving it.
In 1992, more than 1700 scientists from around the world signed onto a "[[World Scientists' Warning to Humanity]]," including a majority of the living Nobel prize-winners in the sciences.<ref name="www.ucsusa.org">{{Cite web |title=1992 World Scientists' Warning to Humanity {{!}} Union of Concerned Scientists |url=https://www.ucsusa.org/resources/1992-world-scientists-warning-humanity |access-date= |website=www.ucsusa.org |language=en}}</ref> "The earth is finite," they wrote. "Its ability to absorb wastes and destructive effluent is finite. Its ability to provide food and energy is finite. Its ability to provide for growing numbers of people is finite. And we are fast approaching many of the earth's limits."<ref name="www.ucsusa.org" /> The warning noted:<blockquote>Pressures resulting from unrestrained population growth put demands on the natural world that can overwhelm any efforts to achieve a sustainable future. If we are to halt the destruction of our environment, we must accept limits to that growth.<ref name="www.ucsusa.org" /> </blockquote>Two of the five areas where the signatories requested immediate action were "stabilize population" and "ensure sexual equality, and guarantee women control over their own reproductive decisions."<ref name="www.ucsusa.org" />
In a follow-up message 25 years later, [[William J. Ripple|William Ripple]] and colleagues issued the "World Scientists' Warning to Humanity: A Second Notice."<ref>{{Cite journal |last1=Ripple |first1=William J. |last2=Wolf |first2=Christopher |last3=Newsome |first3=Thomas M. |last4=Galetti |first4=Mauro |last5=Alamgir |first5=Mohammed |last6=Crist |first6=Eileen |last7=Mahmoud |first7=Mahmoud I. |last8=Laurance |first8=William F. |date=13 November 2017 |title=World Scientists' Warning to Humanity: A Second Notice |url=http://dx.doi.org/10.1093/biosci/bix125 |journal=BioScience |volume=67 |issue=12 |pages=1026–1028 |doi=10.1093/biosci/bix125 |issn=0006-3568|hdl=11336/71342 |hdl-access=free }}</ref> This time more than 15,000 scientists from around the world signed on.<ref>{{Cite journal |last1=Ripple |first1=William J |last2=Wolf |first2=Christopher |last3=Galetti |first3=Mauro |last4=Newsome |first4=Thomas M |last5=Green |first5=Tom L |last6=Alamgir |first6=Mohammed |last7=Crist |first7=Eileen |last8=Mahmoud |first8=Mahmoud I |last9=Laurance |first9=William F |date=7 March 2018 |title=The Role of Scientists' Warning in Shifting Policy from Growth to Conservation Economy |url=http://dx.doi.org/10.1093/biosci/biy009 |journal=BioScience |volume=68 |issue=4 |pages=239–240 |doi=10.1093/biosci/biy009 |issn=0006-3568|hdl=11449/166092 |hdl-access=free }}</ref> "We are jeopardizing our future by not reining in our intense but geographically and demographically uneven material consumption and by not perceiving continued rapid population growth as a primary driver behind many ecological and even societal threats," they wrote.<ref name="Ripple-2017">{{Cite journal |last1=Ripple |first1=William J. |last2=Wolf |first2=Christopher |last3=Newsome |first3=Thomas M. |last4=Galetti |first4=Mauro |last5=Alamgir |first5=Mohammed |last6=Crist |first6=Eileen |last7=Mahmoud |first7=Mahmoud I. |last8=Laurance |first8=William F. |date=13 November 2017 |title=World Scientists' Warning to Humanity: A Second Notice |url=http://dx.doi.org/10.1093/biosci/bix125 |journal=BioScience |volume=67 |issue=12 |pages=1026 |doi=10.1093/biosci/bix125 |issn=0006-3568|hdl=11336/71342 |hdl-access=free }}</ref> "By failing to adequately limit population growth, reassess the role of an economy rooted in growth, reduce greenhouse gases, incentivize renewable energy, protect habitat, restore ecosystems, curb pollution, halt defaunation, and constrain invasive alien species, humanity is not taking the urgent steps needed to safeguard our imperilled biosphere."<ref name="Ripple-2017" /> This second scientists’ warning urged attention to both excessive consumption and continued population growth. Like its predecessor, it did not specify a definite global human carrying capacity. But its call to action included "estimating a scientifically defensible, sustainable human population size for the long term while rallying nations and leaders to support that vital goal."<ref>{{Cite journal |last1=Ripple |first1=William J. |last2=Wolf |first2=Christopher |last3=Newsome |first3=Thomas M. |last4=Galetti |first4=Mauro |last5=Alamgir |first5=Mohammed |last6=Crist |first6=Eileen |last7=Mahmoud |first7=Mahmoud I. |last8=Laurance |first8=William F. |date=13 November 2017 |title=World Scientists' Warning to Humanity: A Second Notice |url=http://dx.doi.org/10.1093/biosci/bix125 |journal=BioScience |volume=67 |issue=12 |pages=1028 |doi=10.1093/biosci/bix125 |issn=0006-3568|hdl=11336/71342 |hdl-access=free }}</ref>
Subsequent scientists' calls to action have also included calls for population planning. The 2020 "World Scientists' Warning of a Climate Emergency" stated: "Economic and population growth are among the most important drivers of increases in [[Carbon dioxide|CO2]] emissions from fossil fuel combustion." "Therefore," the study noted: "we need bold and drastic transformations regarding economic and population policies."<ref>{{Cite journal |last1=Ripple |first1=William J |last2=Wolf |first2=Christopher |last3=Newsome |first3=Thomas M |last4=Barnard |first4=Phoebe |last5=Moomaw |first5=William R |date=2020 |title=World Scientists' Warning of a Climate Emergency |url=https://doi.org/10.1093/biosci/biz088 |journal=BioScience |volume=70 |issue=1 |pages=10 |doi=10.1093/biosci/biz088 |issn=0006-3568|hdl=2445/151800 |hdl-access=free }}</ref> "The world population must be stabilized—and, ideally, gradually reduced,"<ref>{{Cite journal |last1=Ripple |first1=William J |last2=Wolf |first2=Christopher |last3=Newsome |first3=Thomas M |last4=Barnard |first4=Phoebe |last5=Moomaw |first5=William R |date=2020 |title=World Scientists' Warning of a Climate Emergency |url=https://doi.org/10.1093/biosci/biz088 |journal=BioScience |volume=70 |issue=1 |pages=11 |doi=10.1093/biosci/biz088 |issn=0006-3568|hdl=2445/151800 |hdl-access=free }}</ref> it concluded, implying that humanity is overpopulated given current and expected levels of resource use and waste generation.
A follow-up scientists’ warning on climate change in 2021 reiterated the need to plan and limit human numbers to achieve sustainability, proposing as a goal "stabilizing and gradually reducing the [global] population by providing voluntary family planning and supporting education and rights for all girls and young women, which has been proven to lower fertility rates."<ref>{{Cite journal |last1=Ripple |first1=William J |last2=Wolf |first2=Christopher |last3=Newsome |first3=Thomas M |last4=Gregg |first4=Jillian W |last5=Lenton |first5=Timothy M |last6=Palomo |first6=Ignacio |last7=Eikelboom |first7=Jasper A J |last8=Law |first8=Beverly E |last9=Huq |first9=Saleemul |last10=Duffy |first10=Philip B |last11=Rockström |first11=Johan |date=28 July 2021 |title=World Scientists' Warning of a Climate Emergency 2021 |url=http://dx.doi.org/10.1093/biosci/biab079 |journal=BioScience |volume=71 |issue=9 |pages=894–898 |doi=10.1093/biosci/biab079 |issn=0006-3568|hdl=10871/126814 |hdl-access=free }}</ref>
==== Family planning ====
{{main|Family planning|Reproductive rights|Birth control}}
[[File:Familiy Planning Ethiopia (bad effects).jpg|thumb|A [[family planning]] placard in [[Ethiopia]]. It depicts negative effects of having more children than people can care for.]]
Education and [[Women's empowerment|empowerment of women]] and giving access to [[family planning]] and contraception have a demonstrated impact on reducing birthrates.<ref name="The Economist-2019">{{Cite news|date=2 February 2019|title=Thanks to education, global fertility could fall faster than expected|newspaper=The Economist|url=https://www.economist.com/international/2019/02/02/thanks-to-education-global-fertility-could-fall-faster-than-expected|access-date=4 August 2021|issn=0013-0613}}</ref> Many studies conclude that [[Female education|educating girls]] reduces the number of children they have.<ref name="The Economist-2019" /> One option according to some activists is to focus on education about [[family planning]] and [[birth control]] methods, and to make birth-control devices like [[condoms]], [[combined oral contraceptive pill|contraceptive pills]] and [[intrauterine device]]s easily available. Worldwide, nearly 40% of [[unintended pregnancy|pregnancies are unintended]] (some 80 million unintended pregnancies each year).<ref>"[https://www.google.com/hostednews/afp/article/ALeqM5gevGOq7Vctd1FmJkzO3gapTqX4ZA Population growth driving climate change, poverty: experts] {{webarchive |url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120523114015/https://www.google.com/hostednews/afp/article/ALeqM5gevGOq7Vctd1FmJkzO3gapTqX4ZA |date=23 May 2012 }}". [[Agence France-Presse]] (21 September 2009).</ref> An estimated 350 million women in the poorest countries of the world either did not want their last child, do not want another child or want to space their pregnancies, but they lack access to information, affordable means and services to determine the size and spacing of their families{{When|date=February 2022}}. In the [[developing world]], some 514,000 women die annually of complications from pregnancy and abortion,<ref>"[https://web.archive.org/web/20030625081927/http://www.unfpa.org/news/news.cfm?ID=85&Language=1 Netherlands Again Number One Donor to United Nations Population Fund]". United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA).</ref> with 86% of these deaths occurring in the [[sub-Saharan Africa]] region and South Asia.<ref>"[https://www.who.int/mediacentre/news/releases/2007/pr56/en/index.html Maternal mortality ratio falling too slowly to meet goal] {{webarchive |url=https://web.archive.org/web/20131031223858/http://www.who.int/mediacentre/news/releases/2007/pr56/en/index.html |date=31 October 2013 }}". [[WHO]] (12 October 2007).</ref> Additionally, 8 million infants die, many because of [[malnutrition]] or preventable diseases, especially from lack of access to clean drinking water.<ref>{{cite news| url=http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m1571/is_46_17/ai_80774574 | work=Insight on the News | title=Q: should the United Nations support more family-planning services for poor countries? | first=Werner | last=Fornos | date=10 December 2001}}</ref>
[[Women's rights]] and their [[reproductive rights]] in particular are issues regarded to have vital importance in the debate.<ref name="Webb" /> Anthropologist [[Jason Hickel]] asserts that a nation's population growth rapidly declines - even within a single generation - when policies relating to women's health and reproductive rights, children's health (to ensure parents they will survive to adulthood), and expanding education and economic opportunities for girls and women are implemented.<ref>{{cite book|last=Hickel|first=Jason|author-link=Jason Hickel|title=Less is More: How Degrowth Will Save the World |year=2021|publisher=Windmill Books|page=111|isbn=978-1786091215}}</ref>
A 2020 paper by [[William J. Ripple]] and other scientists argued in favor of population policies that could advance [[social justice]] (such as by abolishing [[child marriage]], expanding family planning services and reforms that improve education for women and girls) and at the same time mitigate the impact of population growth on climate change and biodiversity loss.<ref name="WolfRipple2021"/> In a 2022 warning on population published by ''[[Science of the Total Environment]]'', Ripple, Ehrlich and other scientists appealed to families around the world to have no more than one child and also urged policy-makers to improve education for young females and provide high-quality family-planning services.<ref name="Crist2022">{{cite journal |last1=Crist|first1=Eileen|last2=Ripple|first2=William J.|last3= Ehrlich|first3=Paul R.|last4=Rees|first4=William E. |last5=Wolf|first5=Christopher |date=2022 |title=Scientists' warning on population|url=https://scientistswarning.forestry.oregonstate.edu/sites/default/files/Crist2022.pdf|journal=Science of the Total Environment|volume=845 |issue=|article-number=157166 |doi=10.1016/j.scitotenv.2022.157166|pmid= 35803428|s2cid=250387801 }}</ref>
===Extraterrestrial settlement===
{{Excerpt|Space colonization#Alleviating overpopulation and resource demand}}
===Urbanization===
{{See|New Urbanism|Sustainable urbanism}}
Despite the increase in population density within cities (and the emergence of megacities), [[UN Habitat]] Data Corp. states in its reports that urbanization may be the best compromise in the face of global population growth.<ref>{{cite news|url=http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/in_depth/6244496.stm |title=UN Habitat calling urban living 'a good thing |work=BBC News |date=27 June 2007 |access-date=30 November 2011}}</ref> Cities concentrate human activity within limited areas, limiting the breadth of environmental damage.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.michellenijhuis.com/ |title=National Geographic Magazine; Special report 2008: Changing Climate (Village Green-article by Michelle Nijhuis) |publisher=Michellenijhuis.com |date=29 September 2011 |access-date=30 November 2011}}</ref> UN Habitat says this is only possible if [[urban planning]] is significantly improved.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.unhabitat.org/content.asp?cid=2523&catid=5&typeid=6&subMenuId=0 |title=UN Habitat calling to rethink urban planning |publisher=Unhabitat.org |access-date=30 November 2011 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110807191706/http://www.unhabitat.org/content.asp?cid=2523&catid=5&typeid=6&subMenuId=0 |archive-date=7 August 2011 }}</ref>
[[Paul R. Ehrlich]] proposed in ''[[The Population Bomb]]'' that rhetoric supporting the increase of city density is a means of avoiding dealing with what he views as the root problem of overpopulation and has been promoted by what he views as the same interests that have allegedly profited from population increase (such as property developers, the banking system which invests in property development, industry, and municipal councils).<ref>Ehrlich, Population Bomb 1968 p.152-p.53</ref> Subsequent authors point to [[Economic growth|growth economics]] as driving governments seek city growth and expansion at any cost, disregarding the impact it might have on the environment.<ref>{{cite news|url=https://www.nationalobserver.com/2018/03/05/news/david-suzuki-fires-death-zone-trudeau-weaver-and-broken-system|title=David Suzuki fires off from the 'death zone' at Trudeau, Weaver and a broken system|date=5 March 2018|website=National Observer}}</ref>
==Criticism==
{{See also|Population ethics|Economic consequences of population decline}}
The concept of human overpopulation, and its attribution as a cause of environmental issues, are controversial.<ref name="Deutsche Welle">{{cite web|title=What fewer people on the planet would mean for the environment {{!}} DW {{!}} 31 August 2020|url=https://www.dw.com/en/overpopulation-climate-change-emissions/a-54725928|access-date=30 July 2021|website=Deutsche Welle|language=en-GB}}</ref><ref name="Piper-2019" /><ref name="Dyett-2019">{{Cite journal|last1=Dyett|first1=Jordan|last2=Thomas|first2=Cassidy|date=18 January 2019|title=Overpopulation Discourse: Patriarchy, Racism, and the Specter of Ecofascism|url=https://brill.com/view/journals/pgdt/18/1-2/article-p205_16.xml|journal=Perspectives on Global Development and Technology|language=en|volume=18|issue=1–2|pages=205–224|doi=10.1163/15691497-12341514|s2cid=159217740|issn=1569-1500|url-access=subscription}}</ref><ref name="Kaneda-2014">{{cite web|last=Roberts|first=David|date=26 September 2017|title="I'm an environmental journalist, but I never write about overpopulation. Here's why."|url=https://www.vox.com/energy-and-environment/2017/9/26/16356524/the-population-question|access-date=30 July 2021|website=Vox|language=en}}</ref><ref name="www.newstatesman.com-2020">{{cite web|title=David Attenborough's claim that humans have overrun the planet is his most popular comment|url=https://www.newstatesman.com/politics/environment/2020/11/david-attenborough-s-claim-humans-have-overrun-planet-his-most-popular|access-date=3 August 2021|website=www.newstatesman.com|date=4 November 2020|language=en}}</ref>
Some critics, including [[Nicholas Eberstadt]], [[Fred Pearce]], [[Dominic Lawson]] and Betsy Hartmann, refer to overpopulation as a myth.<ref name="Pearce-2010" /><ref name="Nature 12-1-2015" /><ref name="Hartmann">{{Cite book|last=Hartmann|first=Betsy|year=2016|orig-year=1987|title=Reproductive Rights and Wrongs: The Global Politics of Population Control|place=[[Chicago]], [[Illinois|IL]]|publisher=[[Haymarket Books]]|edition=3rd|page=26|isbn=978-1608467334}}</ref><ref name="The Independent-2011" /><ref name="Rao-1994">{{Cite journal|last=Rao|first=Mohan|date=1994|title=An Imagined Reality: Malthusianism, Neo-Malthusianism and Population Myth|url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/4400725|journal=Economic and Political Weekly|volume=29|issue=5|pages=PE40–PE52|jstor=4400725|issn=0012-9976}}</ref> Predicted exponential population growth or any "population explosion" did not materialise; instead, population growth slowed.<ref name="archive.is-2020-2" /><ref name="The Wire" /> Critics suggest that enough resources are available to support projected population growth, and that [[Human impact on the environment|human impacts on the environment]] are not attributable to overpopulation.<ref name="Alberro" /><ref name="www.newstatesman.com-2020" /><ref name="The Independent-2011">{{cite news|date=18 January 2011|title=Dominic Lawson: The population timebomb is a myth The doom-sayers are becoming more fashionable just as experts are coming to the view it has all been one giant false alarm|work=The Independent|___location=UK|url=https://www.independent.co.uk/opinion/commentators/dominic-lawson/dominic-lawson-the-population-timebomb-is-a-myth-2186968.html|access-date=30 November 2011}}</ref>
According to libertarian think tank the [[Fraser Institute]], both the idea of overpopulation and the alleged depletion of resources are myths; most resources are now more abundant than a few decades ago, thanks to technological progress.<ref name="fraserinstitute.org">{{cite web |last1=Peron |first1=Jim |title=Exploding Population Myths |url=https://www.fraserinstitute.org/sites/default/files/ExplodingPopulationMyths.pdf |website=frasterinstitute.org |publisher=The Fraser Institute |access-date=19 October 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20211027161926/https://www.fraserinstitute.org/sites/default/files/ExplodingPopulationMyths.pdf |archive-date=27 October 2021 |___location=South Africa |language=en |date=October 1995 |url-status=live}}</ref> The institute also questions the sincerity of advocates of population control in poor countries.<ref name="fraserinstitute.org" /><ref>[https://www.cato.org/commentary/reverse-handmaids-tale-just-horrifying-get-facts-straight-population-growth A Reverse ‘Handmaid's Tale’ Is Just as Horrifying — Get the Facts Straight on Population Growth] cato.org, Chelsea Follett, 24 April 2018.</ref>
Nicholas Eberstadt, a [[Political economy|political economist]], has criticised the idea of overpopulation, saying that "overpopulation is not really overpopulation. It is a question of [[poverty]]".<ref name="Nature 12-1-2015" />
A 2020 study in ''[[The Lancet]]'' concluded that "continued trends in female educational attainment and access to contraception will hasten declines in fertility and slow population growth", with projections suggesting world population would peak at 9.73 billion in 2064 and fall by 2100.<ref name="Lancet">{{Cite journal|last1=Vollset|first1=Stein Emil|last2=Goren|first2=Emily|last3=Yuan|first3=Chun-Wei|last4=Cao|first4=Jackie|last5=Smith|first5=Amanda E.|last6=Hsiao|first6=Thomas|last7=Bisignano|first7=Catherine|last8=Azhar|first8=Gulrez S.|last9=Castro|first9=Emma|last10=Chalek|first10=Julian|last11=Dolgert|first11=Andrew J.|date=17 October 2020|title=Fertility, mortality, migration, and population scenarios for 195 countries and territories from 2017 to 2100: a forecasting analysis for the Global Burden of Disease Study|journal=The Lancet|language=English|volume=396|issue=10258|pages=1285–1306|doi=10.1016/S0140-6736(20)30677-2|issn=0140-6736|pmid=32679112|pmc=7561721}}</ref> Media commentary interpreted this as suggesting [[overconsumption]] represents a greater environmental threat as an overpopulation scenario may never occur.<ref name="Deutsche Welle" /><ref>{{cite web|date=10 September 2020|title=The best news of 2020? Humanity may never hit the 10 billion mark|url=https://news.mongabay.com/2020/09/the-best-news-of-2020-humanity-may-never-hit-the-10-billion-mark/|access-date=30 July 2021|website=Mongabay Environmental News|language=en-US}}</ref>
Some [[human population planning]] strategies advocated by proponents of overpopulation are controversial for ethical reasons. Those concerned with overpopulation, including Paul Ehrlich, have been accused of influencing human rights abuses including [[Forced sterilisation in India|forced sterilisation policies in India]] and under [[One-child policy|China's one-child policy]], as well as mandatory or [[Coercion|coercive]] birth control measures taken in other countries.<ref name="Roser-2013" /><ref name="archive.is-2020" /><ref name="The Wire" /><ref>{{cite web|last=Follett|first=Chelsea|date=21 July 2020|title=Neo-Malthusianism and Coercive Population Control in China and India: Overpopulation Concerns Often Result in Coercion |url=https://www.cato.org/policy-analysis/neo-malthusianism-coercive-population-control-china-india-overpopulation-concerns|access-date=5 August 2021|website=CATO Institute}}</ref>
Surveys of members of the [[American Economic Association]] have found that general agreement among professional economists in the United States with the statement that "The economic benefits of an expanding world population outweigh the economic costs" has grown from 36 percent in 2000,<ref>{{Cite journal |last1=Fuller |first1=Dan |last2=Geide-Stevenson |first2=Doris |title=Consensus Among Economists: Revisited |date=Fall 2003 |journal=[[Journal of Economic Education|The Journal of Economic Education]] |volume=34 |issue=4 |pages=369–387 |jstor=30042564 |doi=10.1080/00220480309595230}}</ref> to 50 percent in 2011,<ref>{{cite journal|last1=Fuller|first1=Dan|last2=Geide-Stevenson|first2=Doris|title=Consensus Among Economists – An Update|year=2014|journal=[[Journal of Economic Education|The Journal of Economic Education]]|publisher=[[Taylor & Francis]]|volume=45|issue=2|page=138|doi=10.1080/00220485.2014.889963|s2cid=143794347|url=https://www.researchgate.net/publication/261884738}}</ref> and to 58 percent in 2021.<ref>{{cite journal|last1=Geide-Stevenson|first1=Doris|last2=La Parra-Perez|first2=Alvaro|year=2024|title=Consensus among economists 2020—A sharpening of the picture|journal=[[Journal of Economic Education]]|publisher=[[Taylor & Francis]]|volume=55|issue=4|pages=461–478|doi=10.1080/00220485.2024.2386328}}</ref>
=== Women's rights ===
{{See also|Feminization of poverty|Sex-selective abortion|Birth control||}}
Influential advocates such as Betsy Hartmann consider the "myth of overpopulation" to be destructive as it "prevents constructive thinking and action on [[reproductive rights]]," which acutely affects women and communities of [[Feminization of poverty|women in poverty]].<ref name="Hartmann" /> The [[International Conference on Population and Development|1994 International Conference on Population and Development]] (ICPD) defines reproductive rights as "the basic right of all couples and individuals to decide freely and responsibly the number, spacing, and timing of their children and to have the information to do so."<ref>{{Cite book|last=UNFPA|title=Programme of Action: Adopted at the International Conference of Population and development, Cairo, 5–13 September 1994.|publisher=UN Population Fund|year=1994|isbn=0-89714-696-4|pages=Section 7.3}}</ref> This oversimplification of human overpopulation leads individuals to believe there are simple solutions and the creation of population policies that limit reproductive rights.{{fact|date=December 2024}}
In response, philosopher Tim Meijers asks the question: "To what extent is it fair to require people to refrain from procreating as part of a strategy to make the world more sustainable?"<ref name="Meijers-2016">{{Citation |last=Meijers |first=Tim |title=Climate change and the right to one child |date=2016 |url=http://dx.doi.org/10.4324/9781315665320-14 |work=Human Rights and Sustainability |pages=181–194 |place=Abingdon, Oxon; New York : Routledge |publisher=Routledge |doi=10.4324/9781315665320-14 |isbn=9781315665320 |access-date=|url-access=subscription }}</ref> Meijers rejects the idea that the right to reproduce can be unlimited, since this would not be universalizable: "in a world in which everybody had many children, extreme scarcity would arise and stable institutions could prove unsustainable. This would lead to violation of (rather uncontroversial) rights such as the right to life and to health and subsistence."<ref name="Meijers-2016" /> In the actual world today, excessive procreation could also undermine our descendants' right to have children, since people are likely to refrain (and perhaps should refrain) from bringing children into an insecure and dangerous world. Meijers, Sarah Conly, Diana Coole, and other ethicists conclude that people have a right to found a family, but not to unlimited numbers of children.<ref name="Meijers-2016" /><ref>{{Cite book |first=Sarah |last=Conly |title=One child : do we have a right to more? |publisher=Oxford University Press |year=2016 |isbn=978-0-19-020343-6 |oclc=969537327}}</ref><ref name="Coole-2018" /><ref>Hedberg T (2021) [https://www.ecologicalcitizen.net/pdfs/epub-048.pdf The moral imperative to reduce global population]. ''The Ecological Citizen'' '''5'''(1): 47–54.</ref>
=== Coercive population control policies ===
{{See also|Compulsory sterilization|One-child policy|Two-child policy|Three-child policy}}
Ehrlich advocated in ''The Population Bomb'' that "various forms of coercion", such as removing tax benefits for having additional children, be used in cases when voluntary population planning policies fail.<ref name="archive.is-2020-2" /> Some nations, like [[China]], have used strict or [[Coercion|coercive]] measures such as the [[one-child policy]] to reduce birth rates.<ref>{{cite news
|url = http://news.independent.co.uk/world/politics/article2201090.ece
|title = Birth rates 'must be curbed to win war on global poverty'
|work = The Independent
|___location = London
|date = 31 January 2007
|access-date = 20 May 2010
|url-status = dead
|archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20080119183753/http://news.independent.co.uk/world/politics/article2201090.ece
|archive-date = 19 January 2008}}</ref> [[Compulsory sterilization|Compulsory]] or semi-compulsory sterilization, such as for token material compensation or easing of penalties,<ref>{{cite web |last1=Green |first1=Hannah Harris |title=The legacy of India's quest to sterilise millions of men |url=https://qz.com/india/1414774/the-legacy-of-indias-quest-to-sterilise-millions-of-men/ |website=Quartz |publisher=G/O Media |access-date=19 October 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20221016151644/https://qz.com/india/1414774/the-legacy-of-indias-quest-to-sterilise-millions-of-men/ |archive-date=16 October 2022 |language=en |date=6 October 2018 |url-status=live}}</ref> has also been implemented in many countries as a form of population control.<ref>Vinay Lal. [http://www.sscnet.ucla.edu/southasia/History/Independent/Indira.html Indira Gandhi] {{webarchive |url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160729163515/http://www.sscnet.ucla.edu/southasia/History/Independent/Indira.html |date=29 July 2016 }}, UCLA College of Letters and Science</ref><ref name="Roser-2013">{{cite web|last=Mann|first=Charles C.|title=The Book That Incited a Worldwide Fear of Overpopulation|url=https://www.smithsonianmag.com/innovation/book-incited-worldwide-fear-overpopulation-180967499/|access-date=4 August 2021|website=Smithsonian Magazine|language=en}}</ref>
Another choice-based approach is financial compensation or other benefits by the state offered to people who voluntarily undergo [[sterilization (medicine)|sterilization]]. Such policies have been introduced by the government of India.<ref>{{cite web|date=1 July 2011|title='Cars for sterilisation' campaign|url=https://www.bbc.com/news/world-south-asia-13982031|url-status=dead|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160304083235/http://www.bbc.com/news/world-south-asia-13982031|archive-date=4 March 2016|via=bbc.com}}</ref><ref name="archive.is-2020">{{cite web|date=17 May 2020|title=The forgotten roots of India's mass sterilization program – The Washi…|url=https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/morning-mix/wp/2014/11/14/the-malthusian-roots-of-indias-mass-sterilization-program/|archive-url=https://archive.today/20200517041014/https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/morning-mix/wp/2014/11/14/the-malthusian-roots-of-indias-mass-sterilization-program/|url-status=dead|archive-date=17 May 2020|access-date=4 August 2021|website=archive.is}}</ref><ref name="The Wire">{{cite web|title='Population Explosion': The Myth that Refuses to Go|url=https://thewire.in/rights/population-explosion-rakesh-sinha-bill|access-date=20 October 2021|website=The Wire}}</ref>
The Indian government of [[Narendra Modi]] introduced [[family planning in India|population policies]] in 2019, including offering incentives for [[Sterilization (medicine)|sterilization]] by citing the risks of a "population explosion" although demographers have criticized that basis, with India thought to be undergoing [[demographic transition]] and its [[Demographics of India|fertility rate falling]]. The policies have also received criticism from human and women's rights groups.<ref name="The Wire" /><ref>{{Cite news|date=13 July 2021|title=Uttar Pradesh bill: The myth of India's population explosion|language=en-GB|work=BBC News|url=https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-india-57801764|access-date=21 October 2021}}</ref>
=== Racism ===
{{See also|Ecofascism}}
The concept of human overpopulation has been criticized by some scholars and environmentalists as being [[racist]] and having roots in [[colonialism]] and [[white supremacy]], since control and reduction of human population is often focused on the [[global south]], instead of on [[overconsumption]] and the [[global north]], where it occurs.<ref name="Dyett-2019" /><ref name="Thomas-2021">{{Cite journal|last1=Thomas|first1=Cassidy|last2=Gosink|first2=Elhom|date=25 March 2021|title=At the Intersection of Eco-Crises, Eco-Anxiety, and Political Turbulence: A Primer on Twenty-First Century Ecofascism|url=https://brill.com/view/journals/pgdt/20/1-2/article-p30_4.xml|journal=Perspectives on Global Development and Technology|language=en|volume=20|issue=1–2|pages=30–54|doi=10.1163/15691497-12341581|issn=1569-1500|s2cid=233663634|url-access=subscription}}</ref><ref name="Kaneda-2014" /><ref name="Alberro" /><ref>{{cite web|last=Kashwan|first=Prakash|date=13 September 2020|title=How American Environmentalism's Racist Roots Shaped Our Thoughts on Conservation|url=https://science.thewire.in/environment/us-environmentalism-racism-conservation/|access-date=30 July 2021|website=The Wire Science|language=en-GB}}</ref> [[Paul R. Ehrlich|Paul Ehrlich]]'s ''Population Bomb'' begins with him describing first knowing the "feel of overpopulation" from a visit to [[Delhi]], which some critics have accused of having racial undertones.<ref>{{cite web|date=19 March 2018|title=Is the way we think about overpopulation racist? {{!}} Fred Pearce|url=http://www.theguardian.com/cities/2018/mar/19/overpopulation-cities-environment-developing-world-racist-paul-ehrlich|access-date=21 October 2021|website=The Guardian|language=en}}</ref> [[George Monbiot]] has said "when affluent white people wrongly transfer the blame for their environmental impacts on to the birthrate of much poorer brown and black people, their finger-pointing reinforces [<nowiki/>[[Great Replacement]] and [[white genocide conspiracy theory|white genocide conspiracy]]] narratives. It is inherently racist."<ref name="Monbiot-2021">{{cite web|date=26 August 2020|title=Population panic lets rich people off the hook for the climate crisis they are causing {{!}} George Monbiot|url=http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2020/aug/26/panic-overpopulation-climate-crisis-consumption-environment|access-date=30 July 2021|website=The Guardian|language=en}}</ref> Overpopulation is a common component of [[Ecofascism|ecofascist]] ideology.<ref name="Thomas-2021" /><ref name="www.newstatesman.com-2020" /><ref>{{Cite web |title='Eco-fascist' Arm of Neo-Nazi Terror Group, The Base, Linked to Swedish Arson |url=https://www.vice.com/en/article/eco-fascist-arm-of-neo-nazi-terror-group-the-base-linked-to-swedish-arson/ |access-date=6 December 2022 |website=[[Vice News]] |date=29 January 2020 |language=en}}</ref>
Scholar Heather Alberro rejects the overpopulation argument, stating that the human population growth is rapidly slowing down, the underlying problem is not the number of people, but how resources are distributed and that the idea of overpopulation could fuel a racist backlash against the population of poor countries.<ref name="Alberro">{{cite web|last=Alberro|first=Heather|title=Why we should be wary of blaming 'overpopulation' for the climate crisis|url=http://theconversation.com/why-we-should-be-wary-of-blaming-overpopulation-for-the-climate-crisis-130709|access-date=31 December 2020|website=The Conversation|date=28 January 2020 |language=en}}</ref>
In response, population activists argue that overpopulation is a problem in both rich and poor countries, and arguably a worse problem in rich countries, where residents’ higher per capita consumption ratchets up the impacts of their excessive numbers.<ref name="Crist-2019" /> Feminist scholar Donna Haraway notes that a commitment to enlarging the moral community to include nonhuman beings logically entails people’s willingness to limit their numbers and make room for them.<ref>{{Cite book |last=Haraway |first=Donna Jeanne |title=Staying with the trouble : making kin in the Chthulucene |date=2016 |publisher=Duke University Press |isbn=978-0-8223-6224-1 |oclc=1027121011}}</ref> Ecological economists like Herman Daly and Joshua Farley believe that reducing populations will make it easier to achieve steady-state economies that decrease total consumption and pollution to manageable levels.<ref>{{Cite book |last1=Daly |first1=H. E. |title=Ecological economics: principles and applications |last2=Farley |first2=J |publisher=Island press |year=2011 |edition=2nd}}</ref> Finally, as Karin Kuhlemann observes, "that a population's size is stable in no way entails sustainability. It may be sustainable, or it may be far too large."<ref>Kuhlemann, K. (2018). Any size population will do?’: The fallacy of aiming for stabilization of human numbers. ''The Ecological Citizen'', ''1''(2), 181-189.</ref>
According to the writer and journalist Krithika Varagur, myths and misinformation about overpopulation of [[Rohingya people]] in [[Myanmar]] is thought to have driven their [[Rohingya genocide|genocide]] in the 2010s.<ref>{{cite web|last=Varagur|first=Krithika|date=14 November 2017|title=The Muslim Overpopulation Myth That Just Won't Die|url=https://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2017/11/muslim-overpopulation-myth/545318/|access-date=20 October 2021|website=The Atlantic|language=en}}</ref>
== Advocacy organizations ==
{{Main|List of population concern organizations|}}
The following organizations advocate for a limit to human population growth, although their focus may be on related issues such as environmental protection:
* [[Global Footprint Network]], a coalition of [[NGOs]] that calculates the annual [[Earth Overshoot Day]]<ref>{{cite web |title=Mathis Wackernagel Population Voice |url=https://www.overshootday.org/mathis-wackernagel-population/ |access-date=30 June 2022 |website=Earth Overshoot Day |language=en-US}}</ref>
* [[Population Balance]]
* [[Millennium Alliance for Humanity and the Biosphere]] (MAHB)
* [[Negative Population Growth]]
* [[Population Matters]]
* [[Voluntary Human Extinction Movement]]
* [[Population Media Center]]
* [[Church of Euthanasia]]
Organization advocate against limits to human population growth.<ref>{{cite web | url=https://www.bloomberg.com/profile/company/0324506Z:US#xj4y7vzkg | title=Population Research Institute Inc - Company Profile and News | website=[[Bloomberg News]] }}</ref>
* [[Population Research Institute (organization)]]
==See also==
{{div col|colwidth=27em}}
* [[
* [[
* [[
* [[Gaia hypothesis|Gaia principle]]
* ''[[The Limits to Growth]]''
* [[Human population planning]]
* [[
* [[
* [[
* [[
* [[Overpopulation in domestic pets]]
* [[
* [[
=== Documentary and art ===
* ''[[An Essay on the Principle of Population]]''
* ''[[Fatal Misconception]]''
* ''[[Don't Panic — The Truth about Population]]''
* ''[[The Population Bomb]]''
* ''[[What a Way to Go: Life at the End of Empire]]''
*''[[Planet of the Humans]]''
*''[[Ten Billion]]''
{{Div col end}}
==
{{reflist}}
==Further reading==
{{wiktionary|overpopulation}}
{{Wikiquote|Human overpopulation}}
*[[Matthew Connelly]], [[Fatal Misconception|''Fatal Misconception: The Struggle to Control World Population'']]. Harvard University Press, 2010. {{ISBN|9780674034600}}
*[[David Foreman]], ''Man Swarm: How Overpopulation is Killing the Wild World''. Livetrue Books, 2015. {{ISBN|978-0986383205}}
*Karen Shragg, ''Move Upstream: A Call to Solve Overpopulation.'' {{ISBN|978-0988493834}} (published November 2015). [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xW9zVMuXQpc Discussion of the book] by the author, March 2017 (video, 91 minutes).
*[[Alan Weisman]]. ''Countdown: Our Last, Best Hope for a Future on Earth?'' [[Little, Brown and Company]], (2013) {{ISBN|0316097756}}
* Thomas Robertson, ''[https://books.google.com/books?id=F8V-YzywyaIC The Malthusian Moment: Global Population Growth and the Birth of American Environmentalism]'' (2012), Rutgers University Press
* [[J.R. McNeill]], Peter Engelke, ''The Great Acceleration: An Environmental History of the Anthropocene since 1945'' (2016)
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