CARL SAGAN ON POPULATION GROWTH

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There is a well-documented correlation between poverty and high
birthrates. In little countries and big countries, capitalist countries
and communist countries, Catholic countries and Moslem countries,
Western countries and Eastern countries-in almost all these cases,
exponential population growth slows down or stops when grinding poverty
disappears. This is called demographic transition. It is in the urgent
long-term interest of the human species that every place on Earth
achieves this demographic transition. This is why helping other
countries become self-sufficient is not only elementary human decency,
but is also in the interest of those richer nations able to help. One of
the central issues in the world population crisis is poverty.

The exceptions to the demographic transition are interesting. Some
nations with high per capita incomes still have high birthrates. But in
them, contraceptives are sparsely available, and/or women lack any
effective political power. It is not hard to understand the connection.

At present there are about 6 billion humans. In 40 years, if the
doubling time stays constant, there will be 12 billion; in 80 years, 24
billion; in 120 years, 48 billion. ... But few believe the Earth can
support so many people. Because of the power of this exponential
increase, dealing with global poverty now will be much cheaper and much
more humane, it seems, than whatever solutions will be available to us
many decades hence. Our job is to bring about a worldwide demographic
transition and flatten out that exponential curve-by eliminating
grinding poverty, making safe and effective birth control methods widely
available, and extending real political power (executive, legislative,
judicial, military, and in institutions influencing public opinion) to
women. If we fail, some other process, less under out control, will do
it for us."

-Carl Sagan, Billions & Billions: Thoughts on Life and Death at the
Brink of the Millennium (1998, Ballantine Books)

http://www.treehugger.com/files/2007/09/carl_sagan.php

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