End Times - 3

Can there ever be too many people?

Can there ever be too many people? This is the taboo question among those opposed to the tyrannical measures aimed at depopulation. It merits comprehensive reflection.
The "alternative" scene does address the issue, but not straight on. It claims, they claim, that Malthus and his doomsday scenario (of population increases eventually exhausting even increased resources) has been refuted. Almost always the "alternative" narrative confuses, or conflates, eugenics with all policies to shape population sizes. Eugenics is about what kind of people, not the numbers. When it has been tried, eugenics has backfired. But that is not the topic here.

I. It is routinely argued that technical fixes (advances) in agriculture have proven that there is no limit on how many people can be fed. This was something allegedly not foreseen by Malthus. (Note: the topic here is not the character of Malthus as a person, or what he may have written on related matters.)
Technically, it may be possible to accommodate and even feed half the population of the world on a small territory or island. No consideration is given as to whether this would be desirable, or if many of us would choose to go there.
Indeed, it may be asked of those who claim there is no overpopulation whether they would accept (with friends & family) a one-way ticket to one of the world?s megacities even if promised there a tolerable level of affluence.

II. A large portion of the hours of "work" in heavily populated areas consists in guarding against fraud, theft or other criminality or, contrariwise, in seeking to manipulate or outwit others. That is, it consists of mutual surveillance. Other people become predators or prey.
Modern work does not consist much in accommodation of, i.e. protection from, the elements. It does not consist mainly in generating immediate and tangible wealth or sustenance. Only a small portion is devoted to child-rearing and basic education.
High density population involves anonymity such that the restraints characteristic of small communities no longer apply. Hence the price paid for high populations is much mutual surveillance.
It may be countered that there is always mutual surveillance, i.e. keeping an eye on one?s own and neighbors, sometimes caring, sometimes suspicious. But as people come to live in greater proximity, whether spatial or virtual, the time expended on mutual surveillance skyrockets. With surveillance comes a reduction in freedom.

III. There is a more fundamental and universal consideration. It is the preoccupation with fertility. Either one's own, or that of others. Either too much fertility or too little.
Most conflicts can be traced back to this fact of life. It is key to much in religion, whatever its form. Medieval Christianity had monasteries, as did some other cultures.
Conflict typically arises between separate communities living on shared or neighboring territory. This co-habitation can remain peaceful for extended periods. But when change comes, with one group growing disproportionately, whether in size or prosperity, resentments and tensions mount. Outbreeding other groups may be a form of long-term warfare, whether done intentionally or not.

IV. It is sometimes argued that there is self-regulation of excess population. People may choose prosperity over fertility, or simply not relish the task of rearing children. But this does not apply to everyone or all cultures. So we are back with some peoples imposing on others and the issue of outbreeding. And, despite the contempt in which Malthus is held, with competition for resources.

V. One resource is the availability of solitude. Solitude in the sense of being alone, as the only human in a broadly natural environment (farmland may do). Solitude in not being able to hear the buzz of other humans, as their cars race along motorways. When there is talk of ?fifteen-minute cities? it might mean, but does not, being able to reach the countryside within 15 minutes.
An aside: When living in cities, this author would regularly drive half an hour and more just to be able to walk in woodland quite alone.
In densely populated areas (for example, the Netherlands or south-east England) solitude is a rare resource precisely because of the excess population.

VI. Although discussions of population size can be found in Antiquity and before industrialisation, it is relevant that there has since been a population explosion.ˇhttps://www.worldometers.info/world-population/world-population-by-year/ˇ: one billion in 1804, two billion in 1927, and eight billion today. Some fanatics are even panicking about a small decline in the near future. But, comparatively speaking, even a sharp decline would only take us back to levels of less than a century ago.
It is irrelevant that there remain areas which are relatively unpopulated. These are mostly inhospitable places either due to a severe climate or to the geology.

VII. The objection to the current clandestine attempts to reduce populations is that these not only destroy lives and the intimate connections between lives, but also the mechanisms we need for a civilised society which is worth living in. There has been an unprecedented assault on truthfulness accompanied by corruption in almost every area and niche. The checks & balances essential to a healthy commonwealth are being dismantled.

VIII. The conclusion here is that there can be too many people and we arguably reached that point long ago. This is not about sustainability, i.e. provision of everyone with bare necessities or even affluence. It is about everyone being able to live a life of liberty.
I do not have any solution. What has happened in the past is that people have turned on each other, with massacres or underhand hostilities such that some groups lose the means to sustain themselves. Examples are Whites exterminating the buffalo so that the native Indians were deprived of this essential resource, or spreading disease (as is happening now via the WHO (the World Health Organisation). It may be that some groups lose the will to live, or at least to reproduce. There is no reason to suppose that these are the least worthy, on the contrary. ˇˇ

Written in 2024