Dismissing Demographic Realities Because of Their Framing Is Unhelpful: The Human Population Size Is Really Problematic

Abstract

I admit, I used to think that the non-natural sciences were not sciences at all and that some philosophers, most sociologists, and all political scientists were just venting opinions. But I saw the error of my ways and even became appreciative of all these disciplines. Alas, sometimes my prejudices are rekindled. Such was the case with a recent opinion piece by Jonathan Kennedy, who teaches politics and global health at Queen Mary University of London (Are there billions more people on Earth than we thought? If so, it's no bad thing | Jonathan Kennedy | The Guardian).

Though the UN estimates the current human population on earth at a stunning 8.2 billion people, there are recent studies suggesting that this could be a significant underestimation. Kennedy suggests that the number of people living on the planet is not the big problem that those of us who suffer from “Neo-Malthusian anxieties” envisage. How so? Because “…it is important to remember that anxieties about overpopulation are rarely just about the numbers. They reflect power struggles over which lives matter, who is a burden or a threat and ultimately what the future should look like.” Straight at the beginning of his musings, we see the wheels coming off the argument. How does the context in which these challenges to humanity are stated change the severity of the challenges themselves?

I actually have great sympathy with a lot of the points Kennedy makes. Because I also think every life equally valuable, it is utterly unjust to hear people from affluent societies (such as my own) state that we are with too many, when our problems are strongly intensified by “western” consumption, with a further outsized, rather horrifying contribution of the billionaire class. He correctly notes: “Despite stark disparities in consumption—Americans consume 360 times more carbon per capita than Somalis, for example—population control still focuses on the majority world.” He also points out the links between proposals for, and previous examples of, nasty coercive policies to reduce birthrates and the fact that “Ethnonationalists” in Europe and North America see the disparities in birthrates as an existential threat to “Western civilization.” Elon Musk's infamous remark that declining birth rates were endangering civilization is a prime example of such “ethnonationalism” (note, the less obfuscating term is “racism”). I agree that a great redistribution of wealth and power is needed when facing our common challenging future.

But all this does not excuse minimizing the challenges themselves. Let me illustrate. He dismisses Malthus and Paul and Anne Ehrlich, authors of “The Population Bomb,” because they were wrong in specific pessimistic predictions, but does not mention that Malthusian ideas about carrying capacity were a main influence on Darwin's rather successful ideas or the fact that it is entirely possible that we have indeed been borrowing against the future but the due date just has not come up yet. Even more dangerous is the hidden assumption that because human ingenuity seemed to have gotten us out of possibly disastrous circumstances before, we will be able to do so whatever the mess we have created. Kennedy rather humorously repurposes Isaac Asimov's “bathroom metaphor” (too many people per bathroom gives problems) illustrating the famous SF writer's fears about population growth, for his own ends. However, he never defuses Asimov's claim that rapid population growth places severe pressures on natural resources and would erode our common humanity (“As you put more and more people on to the world, the value of life not only declines, it disappears”), which seems to be borne out by recent events. He states that “… apocalyptic visions now concentrate on climate change, resource depletion and biodiversity loss,” leaving out the major challenge of world-wide pollution by the likes of pesticides, (micro)plastics and PFAS and then offers a future “solution” to only one (!) of them (resource depletion). Guess what: sustainable technologies still to be developed. He does not mention that during four billion years of evolution there have been only five major extinction events and humanity is currently causing the sixth. That represents catastrophic biodiversity loss with completely unpredictable ecological consequences. Unpredictability also characterizes climate change with current scenarios of unintended positive feedback loops giving climate scientists sleepless nights. On top of that he completely ignores dangerous connections between species collapse, climate change and pollution. Examples of such mutually reinforcing processes (https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2025/jun/03/climate-species-collapse-ecology-insects-nature-reserves-aoe) are found constantly.

In the end, Kennedy runs the risk that in minimizing our current dangers, he might see those groups of humanity he so justly empathizes with be their first casualties.