The Unavoidable Population Catastrophe.

Here’s the bottom line about humanity. We’re animals. We’re animals whose only biological reason for being is to put our genetic material into the next generation. Any greater or more noble “purpose” is less compelling and universal for our species.

As animals, we have achieved what other species have not. We have carpeted the planet with people. We are at the top of the food chain. We did not get to the top of the food chain by being humane. We got there by being selfish and ruthless. This isn’t a judgment, it’s a biological reality. We didn’t feed ourselves by sitting around a camp fire singing “Kumbaya” with the antelope. We ate them, devastated their species, and caused several other species to become extinct. So selfishness, voraciousness and ruthlessness, are adaptive survival traits that permitted us to put our genetic material into the next generation. As a result, some predominant traits passed-on to human offspring are selfishness, voraciousness and ruthlessness.

There are times when humans cooperate with other humans. This is only to satisfy selfish needs or survival needs. Humans may collect into a tribe to guard a watering hole against outsiders. Outsiders will also band together for survival. But when one group approaches the watering hole of another, and the resource is scarce, there is going to be a conflict. The loser will go off into the desert and die. The winner will survive to pass on the biologically-based traits of health, ruthlessness, cunning, violence and selfishness, that permitted them to retain control of the watering hole.

There are times when humans band into larger groups based around ethnicity, community values, government, etc. But again, this is a survival tactic. We wouldn’t place ourselves at the effect of governments and communities if it did not suit our survival needs. Witness how often we slaughter those of differing ethnicities, communities and governments, when their needs conflict with our own.

Currently there is a lot of discussion among human animals about how we are devastating our environment and overpopulating our planet. Many feel that we can come up with intelligent solutions to this problem and avert disaster, if we understand the causes and effects of our actions. They are wrong. It doesn’t matter if human beings understand why they are devastating their environment; they are going to continue to do it anyway. Because we are animals, whose reason for existing is to put our genetic material into the next generation, we will continue to reproduce. Our population will continue to rise until an ecological crisis occurs (a shortage in food, water, energy, etc). At that point, we will battle over whatever resource is scarce, like competing tribes at a watering hole.

Nature did not make enough provisions in our brains for long-term thinking about reproduction and survival. We have enough ability to face immediate survival threats and reproduce. That’s it. None of our planning and thinking over the last 50 years has produced a solution because there is no solution. Our biological need to reproduce is more powerful than our minds. Even the most draconian population control measures in China have failed. There have been small, temporarily successful efforts to control human population, in limited environments.  They will be discussed during the next installment.  But even those temporarily successful (and inhumane) efforts failed when self-contained populations came into contact with expansive populations.  We do not have a biological adaptation that would cause us to control our population.  Anyone who wishes to pit starry-eyed optimism against this reasoning need only answer one question: “Is our population going up, or is it going down?”