At the time of my birth the human population on planet Earth was just over 5 billion people. By the time I had reached 12 years old, that number had risen to 6 billion. By the time I had graduated high school, that number had risen to 7 billion.
There is no easy way to address an issue like overpopulation. At the very root of the problem is the fundamental right of every human being to procreate and prosper, as guaranteed to them by their own birth. Efforts such as eugenics, enforced contraception, and the withholding of medical technologies in the third world, while effective, violate this human right.
In the end, it boils down to the individual: You and I, and every other human being on this planet, must bear the burden of improving the collective quality of life. The only means by which this can be attained is to find equilibrium with our environment. Our species, like any apex predator left unchecked, is beginning to see the negative impact of our actions: In the food chain, in water quality, in global temperature patterns, and within the hearts and minds of our own children.
We seem to forget, that despite God given rights, we also carry the responsibility of controlling ourselves for the sake of others. This control may manifest in myriad ways, not the least of which being satiety.
We have reached a point in our history at which medical advances have made the arbitrary extension of life available to the general public. It is understandable that every person is motivated to continue living as long as possible, but I ask a single favor, from one human to another:
Really think about the consequences of your actions, now, and in the future.
The collective quality of life (including that of every species within man’s dominion,) is objectively more important than the singular pursuit of immortality. If we allow our fear of death to rule all of our actions, we will destroy that which has been handed to us. Transcendence of these human shackles requires faith in a power greater than oneself.
For you see, gravity is not a purely physical force, it influences existence in realms beyond both the third and fourth dimension. We are now aware that light itself can be warped by the gravitational pull of a massive object; time, on the other hand, requires a significantly more powerful well.
We, as semi-conscious beings, often neglect the uncomfortable realization that minutes, hours, days, weeks, months, and years are constructs created and maintained by the human mind, for the purpose of regulation of ourselves and our fellows.
It would do one well to remember that time, as we know it, is merely a standardized division of the cycles of the moon and sun. On a galactic scale, this model holds true, but stretched across the current projection of the known universe, it becomes obvious that our understanding of the passage of moments is woefully inept.
My only trouble with this would be to point out that we can only put our trust and faith in ourselves, and even then not too much. Everything in the Universe is horrific and awe-inspiring. There are no guarantees, no promises here. The great variety of life is not maintained because the Universe respects it; past events reveal in the long run, every species is doomed to starvation, disease, and death until it goes extinct. What we perceive as balance in the ecosystem is actually a monumental, blind struggle against that sort of suffering and destruction. We’ve run the experiments. We know what happens when the environment allows overpopulation. No species controls itself. Except, it would seem, creatures smart enough to notice what’s changed… like ourselves.
Our population has increased because we’ve become better at keeping ourselves alive in nature. I expect our population will decrease because we will become better at living well in nature. Once no one needs five babies just to keep the family line going, there is really only one option: make one or two babies that absolutely will live the best lives possible. As a result, the population spikes we experience as a location gets industry and medicine gradually become more manageable even if the great crowds expecting good living conditions frighten the authoritarians. We’re now experiencing a new development here in the West (and a great many other places are doing it much better than we are). With the introduction of science, existentialism, and the practices of rational thought, we come to expect more than previous generations from life. This, too, will have an impact on our population growth.
As we make life better for everyone, the number of people that want many children will go down. As we increase lifespans and make college-level education available, more people will want fewer children because they mean to do well by them. Plans for children will become something that must be done someday, rather than something that must be done soon. For an increasing number of people, Someday will become Never as they realize that children are not what they actually want from life. Eventually, we will live so long and so well that planning about what we can do outside Earth won’t be dreaming. If overpopulation is still a problem then, we’ll have somewhere new to bring our home ecosystems, allowing us to thrive in spite of refusing to bow down before starvation, disease, and death.