6.5 Billion

[Katahu]

http://www.wired.com/news/technology/0, ... =rss.index

Read on.

[BFMF]

That's a lot of people

[gottoflynow]

Wow! Lots of people

-gottoflynow

[Scorpiоn]

That's it?  I figured we would be at 7 billion by now.  One more reason why I never understood rewarding people with lots of children.  If a woman has 8 children, the government (at least in the US) rewards her.  Government this, government that.  If anything, the couple should be punished.  This is one (of the many) things where I favor with Red China.

All I can say is I hope Woody's theory was right, and the population will natuarally peak at 10 and decrease.

[RichieB16]

I have read that the population will likely peak somewhere between 9-12 billion according to a bunch of Ecology type things that I don't really understand that well.  Then, begin to decrease.

But, one interesing fact is that the human population is growing at a faster than exponetional rate!

[Katahu]

I have read that the population will likely peak somewhere between 9-12 billion according to a bunch of Ecology type things that I don't really understand that well.  Then, begin to decrease.

But, one interesing fact is that the human population is growing at a faster than exponetional rate!

In that case, the world should stop worrying about global warming and things like that and start worrying about how many mouths it could feed.

[Scorpiоn]

In that case, the world should stop worrying about global warming and things like that and start worrying about how many mouths it could feed.

Funny, that's what I do!

[Poseidon]

In that case, the world should stop worrying about global warming and things like that and start worrying about how many mouths it could feed.

I wouldn't worry about that as clonning will bring solution to this problem with good and bad consequences. The problem would with the results of people activities against the environment. I am not one of those fearing that we could destroy the ecosystem. We have no such power. If we push the ecosystem too much, the conditions on earth will be such so we will not survive and after that nature will start again. But in anycase it would have disastrous concequences on the human race. A further problem with even bigger population expansion would be related to space.

However, I don't believe we will ever be that many. Social needs come into the game. It is not an easy thing to have a big family and maintain a good level of life quality unless of course someone is very rich. In Greece where I live the population decreases. We used to be 10 millions about 10 years ago. The latest demographics show we are 11 millions but if you consider the immigration stream of the last years (which exceeds 1.5 million people) we have decreased. Sooner or later those immigrant's (mostly from Albania, Russia and China) I believe will adopt the Greek habits and reduce their family sizes. Most of families have only one child. As a result not only we are reduced but also the average age is increased. Yes, we are getting old. It is a social phenomenon.

[flyboy 28]

All I know is that I'm not gonna be here when the world implodes.

[Scorpiоn]

What about when the sun explodes?

[Saitek]

Oh well Scorp - we won't be here if that happend either.

EDIT: I'll add - I think war will keep the population down. I'm giving no details - its politics!

[Marlin]

[quote]

[Katahu]

Oh well Scorp - we won't be here if that happend either.

EDIT: I'll add - I think war will keep the population down. I'm giving no details - its politics!

To give you folks an idea on how large a population can be in a given area, let's look at Florida for example.

According to the US political system, there is one Representative for every 200,000 individuals in the state. Florida has about 25 Representatives. That's about 5,000,000 people in the state of Florida alone. That's a lot of mouths to feed.

[Scorpiоn]

Speaking of war, - the greatest thrower-around of statistics - the most amazing thing about stuff like this is just comprehending it.  I could describe the process I do to try and understand, but a picture is worth a thousand (oh the irony!) words.

Each dot equals 1 man.  Now try to start imaging each dot as someone important.  Your beer buddy, your mom, your brother etc.  Each one with their own politcal ideals, childhood history, unique sense of humour and number of birthmarks.  Now imagine them all dead.  1,000,000 of them.  You have Stalingrad.

In instances like this a million people means a whole lot more.  In all honesty, it's hard enough for me to grasp the hundred, much less a million.

The death of one man is a tragedy, the death of millions is a statistic.  -Joseph Stalin

How apropos.

[Poseidon]

Orwell has already mention that side of a war decades ago. I recommend the "1984" to everyone. Apart from the population growth control he menioned war as a mean of resources usage. In his novel he describes three super-nations:
Oceania (America and UK).
Eurasia (the rest of Europe and the ex-Soviet Union)
Far-East (Japan and the rest fo Asia)

Africa is described as an area less advanced but also the war theatre where the three super-nations fight. They don't really need Africa but they keep the war because they want to spend resources. Being that advanced they are very wealthy and they don't know what to do with that wealth. They don't want to use it for promoting their citizens' quality of life and education as this would make their dictatoric positions very unstable. Well educated citizens not struggling to survive become independent in thinking and they practice criticism to their governments. So, they maintain a pointless war just to spend money and resources to keep their citizens in a constant struggle to survive. Of course the governments have anything they want including an extraordinary power on the rest of the people.