Collapse of civilization within the next decades?

[Skybird]

According to biologist Paul Ehrlich, yes.

https://www.theguardian.com/cities/2...b-paul-ehrlich

Interesting that once again here I read of a scientist who agrees the optimal global population for a sustainable economy is between 1.5 and 2 billion at maximum. I usually summarise my input from various books and sources as "1 to 1.5 billion".



That is a range of numbers that I have so often found in books from authors of so very different branches and directions: biologists, physicists, geographers, historians, antropologists... Its the reaosn why I often ended some postings of mine with the phrase "We are too many." Well, we are too many indeed.

He treats this risk with characteristic dark humour: “The first empirical evidence we are dumbing down Homo sapiens were the Republican debates in the US 2016 presidential elections – and the resultant kakistocracy. On the other hand, toxification may solve the population problem, since sperm counts are plunging.”

In the end, human race is a quite young experiment, and if it fails, it will be greeted by a huge compoany of failed experiments. The only statements that humans are unique and most precious, in the end all come from these humans themselves. From a less egocentric point of view, more sober sense of realism and a strict diusagrerement with this self-definition might be in order. A species extincting itself cannot be that special and exceptionell at all. Its more an exmaple for what kind of designs might not work in the evolutionary game.