Uncomfortable question: Is the world overpopulated?

[Filuwaúrdjan]

Overpopulation is a phenomenon that exists but it is one entirely determined by context. Along with governmental disasters (the two things have a nasty tendency to be... how shall we say... co-dependent as well) it is one of the main historical causes of famine, and also of emigration/immigration patterns. Rural Ireland in the first half of the 19th century, for instance, was overpopulated: there were more people eking out a marginal existence than could be supported by the landscape. There is a strong argument that Europe in general was overpopulated before the Great Famine struck in 1315. And with respect to Georgian England, the only reason why Malthus was wrong was because the facts changed: the agricultural revolution and the beginning of mass urbanisation rendered his calculations and assumptions completely irrelevant.

As you'll note from this, overpopulation is mostly a rural phenomenon and usually occurs at a local and regional level. Global overpopulation is a more problematic concept, as populations (and not just human populations) do not really live on a global scale; the global is only the aggregate of the regional and the local.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

I will say that earlier predictions of human overpopulation have often completely failed to account for technological changes in agriculture, including both Malthus in the 19th century and the Ehrlichs in the 20th century.

tfw all your theories are ruined and you are turned into a stock joke for All Time by... the fodder crop.