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From: condict@csd1.UUCP (Michael Condict)
Newsgroups: net.space
Subject: Re: Does space relieve crowding?
Message-ID: <118@csd1.UUCP>
Date: Wed, 21-Sep-83 11:57:00 EDT
Article-I.D.: csd1.118
Posted: Wed Sep 21 11:57:00 1983
Date-Received: Thu, 22-Sep-83 07:05:53 EDT
References: <295@pucc-h>
Organization: New York University
Lines: 44

Anyone who thinks that 30,000 square meters of land is a lot (or even
sufficient) per person should consider the following facts:

1) That is a plot of land only 180 meters on a side -- barely enough for
a house and a little bit of privacy (you city slickers probably think it's
big enough to have a farm).  Would you want to live in a world where all the
houses are 180 yards apart?  Of course, you say that the density will not be
uniform, being concentrated in cities, but it is sobering to think that this is
all the space available to satisfy the standard American dream of a house and
a little elbow room.

2) Considering that maybe half of the land surface is desert, artic or swamp,
we're really talking about, say, 15000 square meters per person -- roughly
120 meters square.  Anyone who disputes the unsuitability of the other half
for supporting a reasonable quality of life should go live there (a fitting
punishment).  Notice that I'm willing to allow that jungles are livable; at
least they are teeming with life forms, if not humans.  But I balk at the
notion of sending people to the middle of the Sahara or Gobi deserts or to
the Antartic without very sophisticated and expensive technology.

3) The figure must again be reduced, if these people are to live as Americans
do, because we need at least half (and probably all) of the remaining space
to mine, farm, graze, manufacture and waste dispose (including auto junkyards
and garbage dumps).  In fact it is widely agreed that it would be impossible,
even in the short run, to support the entire world population at the level
of consumption that takes place in the U.S.  There is simply not enough energy,
grazing land (for beef cattle), farm land, and residential living space.
Thus anyone who thinks that there are not too many people in the world either
believes that it is okay for the major cause of death in underdeveloped
countries to be malnutrition, or they have a very naive view of the limits of
current life support technology.  It is extremely unfeeling, if not arrogant,
to sit down in front of your electronic wonder in your energy-intensive
office building with an automobile parked outside that cost more in dollars
and in consumption of resources than a worker in some countries can hope to
earn in a lifetime, and claim that everything is hunk-dory, let's have billions
of more people (as long as they don't move in to share my apartment).

In my opinion, the only reason this tired planet has a chance of survival is
because one of the two impending causes of its demise -- nuclear holocaust --
is likely to provide a horrible cure for the other -- overpopulation (assuming
it doesn't terminate all life).

Michael Condict