Most of us reading this will be dead of old age before we have to cope with any of the problems associated with population decline. What we will have to cope with, however, is more humane and efficient ways of moving people around the world to where they are needed, and ensuring that disruption and stress to both existing residents and newcomers is kept to a minimum. I can't think of any better way to achieve this than by doing our damndest to make sure that everyone in the world has a liberal education, human rights and the opportunity for freedom of movement, including our own citizens.

I have no concerns about my hypothetical grandchildren growing up in a country that is half Asian, but I do have concerns about my real children growing up in a world where spurious concerns over population decline are often used as a thin disguise for xenophobia and racialised mistrust.

The obvious global problem of over-population is the most serious crisis facing the world because it is based on the reality of "populate and Perish".Clearly populations must be brought under control and reduced. The water supplies and food production and the worsening of air pollution is leading to global warming and eventual extinction.Industrialisation is growing out of control.

What makes the picture more complex is a cultural one.Some cultures designed out of religions believe in global domination can be achieved by the power of the penis.Each family already has an average of five to six children. It is decreed by imams that Muslims should have large families by way of their duty by their religious beliefs. In countries like Israel where the population of the indigenous population reached ZPG some 10 years ago the Israeli Arab population is exploding to the extent that government determined by universal suffrage or one person one vote will no longer be possible. So there the policy for the Jews is "Populate or Perish". Such is the case in Europe in countries like Belgium where the Belgian population will in less like a decade be inMuslim hands.The Belgians tto have reached ZPG whereas the Muslim population is growing exponentially. Nearly the same is the reality faced in the UK.They have brought political extermination on themselves by misconceived policies of unbridled altruism which has turned around and bitten them on their bum.None of these countries can afford to reduce their ethnic populations if they want to preserve their political identities so they want to populate as fast as possible. They would want to take Cardinal Pell's policy very much to heart. It then seems to become a race to see who are the faster breeders in order to survive. The demand placed on countries by the cry "Populate or Perish " is very uneven andunfair.Therefore the policy will lack any credibility.
There are very real dangers ahead.

socratease

Glad to know that I wasn't the only one who had any difficulty working out what the intent of the article was, VK3AUU.

It should be obvious that human overpopulation is the greatest threat to this planet's environment and, hence, humankind's future. We should certainly not complacently sit back and accept a further rise in the human population to 9 billion. Everything possible should be done to stabilise population and then reuce it humanely ASAP. An article which may be of of interest is:

"Why is the UN so complacent in the face of over-population peril?" of 3 Jul 08 at http://candobetter.org/node/631

Some articles about the aging baby boomers problem claptrap are:

"Catastrophists versus Cornucopians" of 17 Jul 08 at http://candobetter.org/node/659 and

"The demographic false alarm" of 10 May 08 at http://candobetter.org/node/483

Professor Curson, what do you think Australia’s optimum population is?

That is; the best balance, taking into account sustainability, the maintenance of a high quality of life and a healthy economy, national security, and playing our part in global humanitarian and refugee issues.

I’d suggest that the best-balance population level has well and truly been surpassed, being in the order of 12 million. We shouldn’t strive to reduce our population to that level, but we should most definitely strive to stabilise the population quickly… shouldn’t we?

I worry about security, with Australia having a tiny population compared to Indonesia or China. But if we can’t maintain a high quality of life and a strongly coherent society, we won’t be in any position to resist invasion or infiltration.

On the other hand, if we continue to have rapid population growth and increase the stressload on our resource base and life-support systems beyond their ability to support this burden, and our quality of life rapidly declines, interest in overtaking us will decline greatly…..maybe.

Perhaps there is no way to prevent Australia from becoming totally ‘Chinafied’, given the immense size and power of China and our now absolutely vital economic connections and hence dependency on China’s growth. So if we resign ourselves to this inevitability, do we need to worry about security at all? Should we only be worrying about quality of life and sustainability? Or should we not even worry about those things and just continue to grow with no end in sight?

What should the essence of Australia’s population policy be Professor?

I’d love to get your perspective on this stuff. Thanks.

Malthus was a reactionary. His predictions were wrong then and are wrong now. Why do some people think we have suddenly reached the tipping point now with population and resouces rather than say ten or twenty or thirty or forty or (in Malthus's case) over 200 years ago?

Why is it so blindingly obvious to everyone but me apparently that humanity has passed its optimum population level?

If it is because global warming is self-evident, then I think people mistake the cause (the way goods are produced, for profit) for the seeming cause (the demand for consumer goods, for the basics like food and water, housing, education and medical care.)

If it becuase there are "immutable" laws of science which mean there is only so much soil, or oil, or water, or whatever the argument about impending scarcity is, then the counterbalance to that is the creativity of humanity to address those issues. Whether the level of creativty necessary to counter global warming and so called declinig resources can flourish under capitalism today (where creativity is rewarded to make profit, not to satisy human need and ther appears little profit in addressing global warming) is another question entirely.

Malthus is dead, and we should bury the rotten corpse of his ideas with him.

It seems to me that once we get past the pure biology in this topic we get amongst the imponderables. And like discussions on Global Climate Change the list of factors that contribute to the conclusions border on Chaos theory and Philosophy.

Objectives like racial, religious, cultural, national integrities(individual preferences) will in the long run become progressively less sustainable, without reducing civilization to the level of survival of the most amoral i.e. Do we either directly or indirectly eliminate (lesser?) others? (The end justifies the means).

Apart from the philosophical we then get to the myriad of issues, like what to include and what weighting to give each factor most of which are speculation e.g.
• What impact will GCC have on agriculture and food production?
• What impact will GCC have on available area for human and animal habitation?
• Availability of quality water and air.
• By what distribution system i.e. will Capitalism survive?
• Will technology develop quickly enough to cope with food production and the desired lifestyle?
• What quality of life do we want to have?
• How are we going provide infrastructure?
• How will we manage the increasing waste stream?
• What level of pollution will the environment cope with?
• Disease prevalence is based on factors including proximity. How will we deal with this?
• How are we going to control, accommodate the starving masses that WILL out number the developed West?
• What will we do if those starving masses get their hands on Nukes, germs etc.
This list isn’t a compete one.

Having said this people by and large adjust to their reality. i.e. It is unlikely that our grand children will necessarily Honor “cultural” mores or lament changes unless trained to do so. Even so they will define their own.

Projecting the possible numbers and trends are part of the calculation but do the models adequately define the above too. Many responses/discussions are pointless in their specular myopathy