Less dramatic version: The fertility rates in Europe, North America, Oceania and the Far East have gradually fallen to or slightly below replacement level, and would lead to "extinction" in the UK in a mere 5000 years assuming everything stays the same. (Extinction in the USA would follow in a mere infinity years.)
Where are you getting those figures? Here are some from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_sovereign_states_and_dependent_territories_by_fertility_rate
United States: 2.05 - already less than replacement level, and even this figure as I understand it depends on high birthrates among early generation immigrants, and would rapidly drop if not continually fed by immigration.
United Kingdom: 1.82
Russia 1.34
Japan: 1.27
A birth rate as low as Russia or Japan means the population drops by more than half in two generations. That means even if the status quo were maintained all the way to the end - which of course it can't be - the sum and total of all future lives lived after that point, the sum of all joy and laughter, of all thought and effort and progress driven by that thought and effort, will be less than in these next two generations.
Two generations. That long ago, we already had nuclear energy, satellites, transistors, jet airliners and mainframe computers. Two generations just isn't very much time in which to get things done.
Which so far just means competing for the same depleted resources without making noticeable progress towards developing new ones.
On the bright side, I have noticed some progress - the graphs for solar energy in recent decades are looking encouraging, for example. More importantly, we are still seeing progress in critical foundation areas like robotics, biotech and nanotech; those are the things we need to master if we want to take off before our runway runs out.
'Overpopulation' is relative to the resource base. Ours may be shrinking alarmingly over the coming years.
It may.
One of the things I'm worried about is this:
I would like to think if we don't make it this time around, civilization can pick itself back up for another shot. Even difficult goals can often be attained if you get to try as many times as you want.
But the development of industrial technology was based on abundant and easily obtainable deposits of coal, oil etc. We haven't run out of those yet - but the easily obtainable deposits thereof are mostly already gone. Yes, we can imagine a future reconstruction of industrial civilization by other pathways, but would that really happen?
Nobody knows. I'd rather not try the experiment. I think we need to behave as though we have to take off on this attempt.
...I would like to think if we don't make it this time around, civilization can pick itself back up for another shot. Even difficult goals can often be attained if you get to try as many times as you want.
But the development of industrial technology was based on abundant and easily obtainable deposits of coal, oil etc. We haven't run out of those yet - but the easily obtainable deposits thereof are mostly already gone. Yes, we can imagine a future reconstruction of industrial civilization by other pathways, but would that really happen?
Nobody knows. I'd rath
Periodically in discussions of cryonics and related issues, people bring up "the overpopulation argument, and the counterarguments that respond to it" without actually describing those arguments in detail. Overpopulation was a big concern of mine prior to exposure to anti-deathism. And so far, it still is. I have no philosophical problem with eliminating death, but it seems to me that getting rid of death BEFORE we eliminate all the other major problems facing humanity is going to make those problems much worse. Death is an enemy that should be vanquished, but it's not an enemy I'm prepared to destroy until I'm satisfied that we'll be able to handle the consequences.
If death is solved via uploads running at high speed, I'm not too concerned. (Still a little concerned, since computers still take up space, but the issue is close enough to negligible that I'm fine ignoring it).
If we're dealing with physical humans taking up physical space requiring physical resources, then I'm worried. Either we're growing exponentially, or we've eliminated childbirth, or we have strict rules in place about people who have children being willing to die. (The latter might work but modifying central aspects of the human life cycle that we are hard-wired to value seems.... challenging, to say the least)
The sense of I've gotten around here is that "exponential growth is okay, because Space is Big". Space certainly is big, and I imagine we could expand for a long time without running into conflict. But if there's even one other alien race who solves their problems the same way (expanding whenever they run out of space or resources), then eventually there's going to be conflict. And the longer we go BEFORE that conflict, the more human suffering it might entail. I'd prefer to have achieved equilibrium as a species beforehand.
I want to expand into the universe, but I think we should do so out of *curiosity* rather than *necessity.*
I assume there's been a lot of discussions about this and I don't want to rehash them. But if someone could summarize the issues at hand and explain what the community consensus is, I'd appreciate it. ("Community Consensus" might mean "there are a few dominant schools of thought here").
Edit: FAWS pointed out that as long as, on average, each person reproduces slightly less than once, growth will not continue exponentially. That's pretty much the answer I'm looking for. The logistics are still significant, but in the long run I think such a law would be enforcible. (Each person only gets to reproduce once, and some people will choose not to. I think there'd need to be an additional disincentive, because over the course of an immortal lifespan, people are likely to try out childrearing at *some* point).
I still think that the issues surrounding overpopulation should occupy at least as much of our attention as ending death (basically ensuring that people are given adequate resources to live healthy, productive lives).