“By 2050, the human population will be 9 billion. Can the meat machine keep up?”
Malthusians write in The Atlantic:
Planet Earth is a giant food machine. It’s done an impressive job cranking out sustenance for the masses, often aided by human ingenuity. Innovations like factory farming or pesticides have helped it keep up with the planet’s booming population, even as it leapt from 2.5 billion in 1950 to 7 billion today.
But by 2050, the population will jump to 9 billion (pdf). The question is, can the machine continue to keep up?
The answer is: not really.
And of course, Paul Ehrlich is all a-twitter:
What a bizarre conceptual framework these people have. Earth is not a “food producing machine.” It is just a hunk of stuff rotating around our Sun in space.
I’m just waiting for the MyEarth app. Here’s a tip, kiddos – everything is not all about you.
Babies are fragile because they’re made with just one screw.
The curve on population growth is bending down as more families can rely on having their children reach adulthood.
The earth would probably be at 7 or 9 Billion if the Ice Age Man hadn’t eaten all the wooly mammoths. Population just wasn’t large enough to sustain man.
Earth Policy Institute. My Bible.
That “Diet For a Small Planet” meme just won’t die, ever since George McGovern put the weight of the U.S. government behind it.
The population “jumps” and “leaps” by billions? Is there some new method of procreation that I am unaware? I’m still trying to figure out the old one.
I didn’t fight my way to the top of the food chain . . . to eat veggies.
Tiresome. Over here we have government public service announcements not to eat meat everyday but to try some veggie crap instead. With smiling people who eat it. ‘for a better world’