Estimated World Population to Pass 6,666,666,666 Today 645
suso writes ""The estimated population of the world will pass 6,666,666,666 today. No doubt an interesting number for people everywhere (not referring to any religion connotations). 5,555,555,555 was passed about 14 years ago. You may not realize that only 80 years ago, the population of the Earth was only around 2 billion. This shows how the population of the world has increased at an alarming rate in recent times, although the growth rate is almost half what it was at its peak in 1963, when it was 2.2%. Unrelated but also an interesting coincidence, the estimated number of available IPv4 addresses is getting very close to 666,666,666. It should cross over today as well.""
An update (Score:5, Informative)
Re:An update (Score:5, Funny)
Re:An update (Score:5, Funny)
Re:An update (Score:5, Funny)
Two people go into the building at the other side of the street.
A few minutes pass.
3 people come back out.
First the biologist notices this. And he promptly declares that nature is beautiful. The engineer, a bit more at his senses, states that obviously there simply was someone already inside the building.
But, the mathematician realizes the obvious truth, and announces "You're both wrong. If now one more person enters the building, there will be no-one left inside".
Re:An update (Score:5, Funny)
Re:An update (Score:5, Insightful)
A few minutes pass.
3 people come back out.
First the biologist notices this. And he promptly declares that they reproduced.
The engineer, a bit more at his senses, states that obviously there simply was an error in the original measurement of people entering the building
But, the mathematician realizes the obvious truth, and announces "You're both wrong. If now one more person enters the building, there will be no-one left inside"
Fixed it. Who told you this joke in it's less funny fashion?
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Re:huh, I don't get it (Score:5, Informative)
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How do they know? What about Burma? (Score:5, Interesting)
Besides, whats the fear? Its not like this planet cannot support double that if not more. Do people realize just how much arable land is not in use? Hell on my recent 1600 mile trip to and from Ohio I can tell you this, this country is empty in many spots and I am sure it is in others. Hell I know there are substantial areas of Europe that are essentially empty. Yeah there are villages and towns nearby but its not like we even try to exploit the lands we have. Look at Africa! How much of that is still like America of a hundred if not two hundred years ago?
One thing I have learned in my short time on this planet. Every doomsayer's predictions of over population and food shortages comes to nothing. We always shift how things are done and accommodate it. If we didn't we would not be here today. Food shortages are all the rave now but forever in our history some groups have been short of food but this is how we progress. If the population cannot create more food then it supports less people. Its a horrid fact of life but it happens. We actually do very well in this day and age from allowing nature to takes its course.
It all comes down to need. When the need arises we always step up.
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Re:How do they know? What about Burma? (Score:5, Informative)
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Re:How do they know? What about Burma? (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:How do they know? What about Burma? (Score:5, Funny)
Re:How do they know? What about Burma? (Score:5, Interesting)
And besides, not eating meat doesn't solve all that much of the problem. Cows don't eat crop. They eat grass. That's the stuff we usually don't eat. That's the stuff that grows even where wheat doesn't. Sheep eat... well, damn, everything! They can produce food digestable by humans through stuff that isn't digestable. Humans call it processing, nature does it since forever and a day.
Meals containing no animal fats just don't sate me and I'm willing to bet I'm not alone. Considering that I can go one day on one good steak with a filling side dish, while I get hungry in mere hours from the side dish alone... I am a carnivore. I know that. My body has made that completely clear.
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Re:How do they know? What about Burma? (Score:4, Insightful)
In the US, most cattle are fed corn and soy.
Re:How do they know? What about Burma? (Score:4, Funny)
Re:How do they know? What about Burma? (Score:5, Funny)
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On my last business trip to the US, I ordered a steak "medium rare". What I got was barely even pink in the middle. So, the next steak I ordered (at a different place) was "rare" and came to me cooked in a way that the rest of the world would call "medium rare" (i.e. How I like it).
Based on this, I get the feeling that "medium" is actually leaning towards the "well done" side of things from a non-US perspective.
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Re:How do they know? What about Burma? (Score:5, Interesting)
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Re:How do they know? What about Burma? (Score:4, Insightful)
Unfortunately I'm not surprised that you are so quick to blame man. You are no different than so many creationists who think that whenever we don't know the cause of something, it must be God's work. Instead of blaming/crediting God, you attribute everything to man when no other reason is known. Sometimes, even when the answer IS known, man is STILL blamed ("Man Made" Global Warming causing tsunamis is a good example. Hell Global Warming itself is a good example!).
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Re:How do they know? What about Burma? (Score:5, Insightful)
IIRC, somewhere in the neighborhood of 200,000 people are born and 100,000 die every day. The Burma disaster and/or the Iraq war would throw off the count by only a few hours. The bigger issue is that the entire count is just a gross estimate.
Some estimates say that will happen. Then what? What if everyone in the world manages to raise their standard of living to US levels? Then you'd need to find resources at 5X or more the rate we're currently using. Have you checked commodity prices lately?
The problem is water, without which all that space will stay just as empty as it is now. We're already mining it out of aquifers that are drying up, and we're diverting so much from surface sources that it's causing problems downstream.
Re:How do they know? What about Burma? (Score:5, Insightful)
Some estimates say that will happen. Then what? What if everyone in the world manages to raise their standard of living to US levels? Then you'd need to find resources at 5X or more the rate we're currently using. Have you checked commodity prices lately?
Something has to give, and it's going to be within 25 years. The standard of living is going to start coming down in the US and other highly developed countries, due to demand for resources worldwide.
Sort of some miraculous deus ex machina technology is needed ASAP. Or we'll end up in a world war over resources.
Re:How do they know? What about Burma? (Score:5, Insightful)
There is absolutely no rational reason to think history will repeat itself. There is just as much (actually, much much more) logic to saying that current population growth is unsustainable and there will be a worldwide catastrophe. The simple truth is that poor people breed like rats, and they're going to drag down the rest of the world. Your assumption that we'll just be fine based on some pollyanna view of humanit's history is baseless.
You're basing your view of the future on what happened in the past, which begs the question. There has never been a time in the past when we've had this large a population and this fast a population growth. So your argument is based on the faulty assumption that point A (now) is the same as point B (sometime in the past) and hence point C (sometime in the future) will be something like point D (sometime in our past, and point B's future).
To put it bluntly - we're fucked.
Zero Growth Rate (Score:5, Insightful)
The better the standard of living, the fewer babies people have. Google around and you'll see plenty of studies to that effect and plenty of theories why that is.
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Re:How do they know? What about Burma? (Score:5, Funny)
Ha! Not if we're dead!
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More data here: http://www.census.gov/ipc/www/idb/worldpopinfo.html [census.gov] but basically people stop having lots of kids once their nation becomes industrialized, and most "first world" nations have a significant population decline if you ignore immigration. Japan in particular has a serious problem with population decline.
Re:How do they know? What about Burma? (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:How do they know? What about Burma? (Score:5, Funny)
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Does it cause more problems than having 12 children per family?
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Re:How do they know? What about Burma? (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:How do they know? What about Burma? (Score:5, Informative)
Re:How do they know? What about Burma? (Score:5, Insightful)
Unexploited doesn't mean nonexistant.
The doomsayers had been saying for years that if a cat 4 or more hurricane were to hit New Orleans... but nothing was done.
The doomsayers had been saying for years that if Haitians kept clearcutting the hills for fire wood... and their warnings fell on deaf ears.
If you weren't so ignorant, you'd know about all the tragedies that were foretold, and all the ones that were averted.
[...] We actually do very well in this day and age from allowing nature to takes its course.
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1. We are nature, not seperate from it.
Correct, but irrelevant. In nature, a species often dies when it doesn't "play nice" with the rest of the environment. We are definitely a part of the natural universe, but that doesn't mean we're preferred in it.
Call me humano-centric, but I prefer to survive.
2. There have been many people who forecast apocalypse and were wrong. In fact, ALL of them. This does not preclude an apolalypse, it only shows that prophets have a burden of proof they must live up to before we take their predictions seriously.
Somewhat correct. There have been many "earth ending prophecies", and none of them have come true. There have also been forecasts of less global catastrophes and some of them have been wrong, while some of them have been right. You pretty m
Re:How do they know? What about Burma? (Score:5, Funny)
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going to hell! (Score:5, Funny)
Re:going to hell! (Score:5, Funny)
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For those of us who have some self respect and respect for women, porn is a bad thing.
*Continuing judgemental stare*
Re:going to hell! (Score:5, Funny)
Re:going to hell! (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Distortion of God's identity (Score:4, Insightful)
In an unrelated note (Score:5, Funny)
Re:In an unrelated note (Score:4, Funny)
Did you know... (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Did you know... (Score:4, Insightful)
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No 6 in that resulting number!
Someone care to estmate (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Someone care to estmate (Score:5, Insightful)
Comment removed (Score:4, Informative)
Re:Someone care to estmate (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Someone care to estmate (Score:5, Funny)
7,777,777,777 Get! (Score:5, Funny)
Re:7,777,777,777 Get! (Score:5, Funny)
Re:7,777,777,777 Get! (Score:4, Funny)
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Population Control & Modern Views (Score:5, Insightful)
But a key difference at that time was I was still Catholic.
One of many reasons for divorcing myself from Catholicism was its stance towards birth control. Iâ(TM)m not talking abortion (or âoebaby killingâ as some of them like to refer to it)â"Iâ(TM)m talking about preventative measures like condoms and Plan B. For some reason, the Vaticanâ"the organization that is the Catholic Churchâ"took it upon itself to stop the use of preventative measures. In pre-industrial times, this may have been advantageous to a religion and even a people. However, as it stands now this attitude results in a powder keg leaving the populace open to drought, famine, disease and brutal warfare (probably as a result of the famine) to keep the human population in check. Just look at the enterovirus (EV71) in China [google.com].
I think a lot of the responses are going to be along the lines of what Iâ(TM)ve said so far; that if we donâ(TM)t start to pay attention to population and think of non-intrusive non-immoral ways to keep it in check then weâ(TM)re in some serious trouble. Instead, Iâ(TM)d like to relay some views Iâ(TM)ve heard from people quite close to me on this issue. Iâ(TM)m not sure if this will become a political issue in the near term but I know that, at least in the United States, there are people with conflicting views.
A close friend of mine who is a Christian and a bit conservative voiced concern that the United Statesâ(TM) population growth is lagging behind many other countries. Many of the Western countriesâ"such as those in Europeâ"are also lagging behind those of Muslim nations like Turkey and several others in the Middle East & Africa. He claimed (or âoefear mongeredâ if you will) that if the current trend continued the end state of the world would most certainly be Muslim Dictatorships everywhere. I would like to quickly point out that I do not share his ideas in this Christian Vs Muslim war he believes has been going on since the crusades. I am merely relaying what many conservative Christians in the world are probably subconsciously thinking.
Now just last week my uncle sent me an e-mail that was along his thinking of people should have to have a license to have children. They should have to pass tests demonstrating they can provide food shelter clothing water all the basic life necessities before they can start to procreate. This would require a source of income to sustain a child ⦠he also has said that criminal record and health history should be taken into consideration. He linked an unfortunate story [foxnews.com] and was perhaps half joking.
Are either of these ideas the future? Is the idea of a procreation license issued by the state an unfortunate reality? Is it my friend wrong to push to close the âbirth rate gapâ(TM) between West and East?
Personally, all I can do is rail for education worldwide for all and, with that, the power to do what is right for us and the future of our children.
Re:Population Control & Modern Views (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Population Control & Modern Views (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Population Control & Modern Views (Score:4, Informative)
Licensing would only work if there were consequences, like putting children up for adoptions and sterilization. But that would not fly, even in countries like China. It would definitely not fly here in western nations because both religious sects and politicians want more, MORE people. Reasons are similar, more people => more money from taxes and "donations". There is no regard for long term sustainability.
And sadly, there is very little public forum for this. We, as a population, are not evolved enough to think rationally about real world issues. The only discussion about facts like overpopulation and global warming is emotional tantrums in spite of reality.
Re:Population Control & Modern Views (Score:4, Insightful)
The arguments against a large population are usually resource based: "ZOMG all teh peoplez are eating all our FOODZ" or taking all our oil/copper/whatever.
Historically, however, we've always found alternate resources. We've always increased production, or utilized alternatives.
Now people push for sustainable living, but we don't have a clear idea of what that means. Sustainable at what level? We have no way of knowing without knowing what our options will be twenty years from now.
I think, barring instances (like in China) where there is a clear and pressing need to reduce your population because of obvious and immediate consequences, that the government and the people are doing the right thing by letting population take care of itself.
The situation is so complex that there is effectively no way to intervene without causing significant issues. You can see this in China, with their sex specific infanticide; an unintended side-effect which became inevitable when the government started meddling in reproduction.
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Today Numerology ... (Score:5, Funny)
This is going to sound cold (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:This is going to sound cold (Score:5, Insightful)
"What's the point of a baby girl?"
In China, that is.
Good thing (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Good thing (Score:4, Insightful)
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Your argument is specious.
As the population grows, the use of natural resources increases. The point at which you start using resources past the sustainable limit will come a lot further than the point of massive starvation, etc. In the short term, doing things like clearing forests and irrigating can yield wonderful results. The trouble is that these practices can lead to topsoil erosion and saline soils.
If you wait until the mass starvation are imminent, it is WAY too late to do anything to stop
Just goes to show.. (Score:5, Funny)
And I think I see the problem (Score:3, Informative)
http://www.breitbart.com/article.php?id=D90I4TN00&show_article=1&catnum=0 [breitbart.com]
Yes this is really helping things out....
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Having seen Wyoming, Arizona, and New Mexico ... (Score:4, Insightful)
The actual "global population" is a big number that people wave around for dramatic effect. It is so far divorced from the realities at hand that it's a joke.
"Over population" is relative to the boundaries constraining that population. If the global population drops but the population of China continues to increase then the burden of "over population" in China continues to escalate. Of course, there isn't an "over population" problem in China proper - there is a problem with Population Density near the cities the Chinese Military Dictatorship cares about.
It reminds me of how dedicated coastal city-dwelling folks complain about urban sprawl and population control from their high-rises and college dorms in Boston, New York, and Los Angeles. Take a trip out to New Mexico or Arizona some time. Visit Wyoming. There isn't a lack of land - you just can't to be away from your precious urban island. The idea of lacking having a neighborhood Starbucks, of not being able to slip down to the bistro and meet with your vegan friends to complain about the soulless carnivores, of maybe needing to own a gun - these things are so unthinkable to some.
We've got room in the U.S.A. folks - no need for the current generations to go all "0 population growth" fanatic on us. That negative reproductive rate isn't helping Europe either - they are just importing more immigrants and more unsustainable reproduction in the exporting nations fills the gap. Meanwhile, they are having serious problems assimilating their immigrant population and in some ugly cases (Londonistan, some suburbs of Paris) losing their domestic tranquility and culture in unprecedented fashion.
Re:Having seen Wyoming, Arizona, and New Mexico .. (Score:5, Insightful)
From wikipedia: "The Ogallala Aquifer is being depleted at a rate of 12 billion cubic meters (420 billion ft3) per year, amounting to a total depletion to date of a volume equal to the annual flow of 18 Colorado Rivers. Some estimates say it will dry up in as little as 25 years. Many farmers in the Texas High Plains, which rely particularly on the underground source, are now turning away from irrigated agriculture as they become aware of the hazards of overpumping."
Once the Ogallala is depleted, we're going to be facing another dust bowl. We're going to be increasingly relying on desalination in the future for our fresh water, and that's quite energy intensive. This drives our energy usage up even more. Once our fossil fuels run low, where do we get the energy? We're going to have to seriously expand nuclear and renewables to cope. Empty desert doesn't do much to solve these problems.
Water Resources (Score:3, Insightful)
Having land to stand on isn't the problem. The problem is resources. People need food, water, fuel, electricity, building materials, plastic and metal for their toys, etc. Water especially is a big issue. We're living on borrowed time and resources right now.
To be fair, New York, Los Angeles, and Boston have been "living on borrowed time" in terms of resources for centuries now. Our oldest, largest settlements were built as ports - none of their surrounding areas can feed their population.
We're going to be increasingly relying on desalination in the future for our fresh water, and that's quite energy intensive. This drives our energy usage up even more.
You know, nature has been engaging in desalinization for a long, long time in the water cycle. We're running a water surplus in the U.S.A., but we don't pay much attention to the distribution methods. Heck, we let our water reserves evaporate regularly. Storage and distribut
Do not worry... (Score:5, Interesting)
Less energy means smaller population. The future does not bode well for us.
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What? It's not. Oh. Cheer up anyway. Grand Theft Auto 4 is out, and it is neat.
Slashdot, bringing you the news that matters... (Score:3, Funny)
Film at 11^H^H^H^H^Hall over the Internet.
Planetary capabilities (Score:3, Interesting)
Just wanted to mention this before slash dot fills with Casandra's whom I last heard whining about the population explosion (yeah that old pile of horse manure, when really they were worried about the population explosion amongst the great unwashed) after Alvin Toffler published his rather popular but well dodgy Future Shock.
According to that we were actually all dead now.
No worries! (Score:3, Funny)
Alarmist reporting (Score:4, Insightful)
People are having kids. Exactly why is this "alarming"?
Well. (Score:5, Funny)
Or a meta-meta-beast.
Re:Satanic (Score:4, Funny)
Re:Satanic (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Satanic (Score:5, Funny)
So, uh...do they sell that at Tesco?
Re:Satanic (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Satanic (Score:5, Funny)
Hell, he can probably have two!
Why not? (Score:4, Funny)
Hell, he can probably have two!
Why not?
If I can have two IPv4 class Cs and a
Heck: With all the work he has to do and minions to help him, he could probably use a class A [wikipedia.org] (16,777,216 numbers).
Given that Haliburton and the US Post Office each have one and the US DOD has eleven, maybe he already does. (There WERE internet postings from a computer in the DOD named "beast".) B-)
Re:Satanic (Score:5, Interesting)
According to Robert Heinlein in "The Number Of The Beast" it is actualy 6^6^6 which comes to 2,176,782,336 and we passed that figure a while back.
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Uh, I think you're doing it wrong...