Some Hard Truths About Human Population Growth

From one billion to eight billion in two hundred years. Is it really sustainable for our planet to try to support so many people?

Welcome!

I write as The Practical Utopian because my twin desires are to be:
• Down-to-earth — I try to write short pieces explaining big ideas that will be broadly useful;
• Idealistic — I write with the goal of helping all of us achieve better outcomes, both for ourselves and for those around us.

Climate Changers

We urgently need to stabilise and reduce human numbers. There is no way that a population of nine billion – the UN’s medium forecast for 2050 – can meet its energy needs without unacceptable damage to the planet and a great deal of human misery. We need to think about climate changers – human beings and their numbers – as well as climate change. It is the elephant in the room that nobody wants to talk about. Unless we reduce the human population humanely through family planning, nature will do it for us through violence, epidemics or starvation.

— John Guillebaud, 2006

The Village Green Preservation Society

This is a rather amazing song by The Kinks, first released in 1968. I loved this song from the moment I first heard it, but my appreciation for it has only grown over the years.

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