Population Growth
Current research is teasing at the causes of aging and it seems that every month there are new papers published that announce a small break-through in this area.  It can only be a matter of time before we find the way to halt and possibly reverse aging.

Infectious diseases are on the run and infant mortality is mostly avoidable for a normal child where modern medical care is available.

Research into degenerative diseases is progressing and we can conceive of an era not too far away when there is little left to cause death apart from trauma.

Our increasing investment in computer controlled and automatic sensing transportation means accidents will become less frequent.  Protection, the increasing use of robots for anything dangerous, including fighting wars, is becoming more common so we are increasingly cocooned and unlikely to suffer fatal injury.

Food production technology in increasing and death from starvation in poorer regions of the world is increasingly averted.

All the above factors are resulting in rapid population growth.

Population Constraint
One way to restrict population growth is to deny people living space.  If they are crowded into small homes crammed close together, and kept poor enough not to be able to afford anything bigger, they tend to have smaller families.  Unfortunately this causes other health and social problems and some people seem to require no space at all to keep breeding.

There have been legal constraints restricting the number of children people are allowed to have. These have produced problems in communist societies and would never be acceptable in free societies.

Neither of these methods, which focus on restricting child-birth, is going to work if the issue is caused by people living longer and with more years of fertility.

If we wish to deal with the longevity issue we would need to consider euthanasia or genocide. We have too many racial, cultural or religious conflicts already and genocides do occasionally occur.  If nothing else is done they may become the norm as groups seek to acquire greater living space but I will leave a discussion of Nationalism for another paper.

I believe people are a good thing but there are certainly those among us who profess to love the planet but would gladly see mankind swept from it.  If these people are not to gain political traction and move us to having to accept euthanasia as a form of population control, then we have got to find ways to house an awful lot more people on the planet.  In the longer term I’m sure we will progress to being able to launch colonies into space to find new worlds that may be outside even our much enhanced lifespan.  Until then, planet Earth will be our mother-ship.

The Changing World
Currently we are busy researching and understanding the vast range of ecosystems we have on Earth.  This is very important because as the population increases we are going to have to occupy them.  Currently there are plenty of green spaces on which we can build but this is being politically, and sometimes violently, resisted.  This is a shame as the overcrowding it is causing is resulting in the racial and cultural conflict mentioned above and inner city violence which is in the news every day.

There is a further issue that climate change is making some lands uninhabitable and causing people to migrate into already over-crowed areas.

Climate Change
I am with those who say that climate change is normal, largely driven by solar activity and it is impossible to say what the “correct” weather is for any period.  I might accept that mankind is affecting the weather but then so did the ancient buffalo herds. Natural forest fires, geothermal activity and meteorite strikes continue to do so..

This rather puts the current debate on Global Warming into the shade, whether it is man-made or not.  Do people not realize that all fossil fuels where once atmospheric Carbon Dioxide?

The current world population, all wanting to live at lease an equivalent lifestyle to the current western model is going to need more energy than fossil fuels will give us anyway.  We are going to have to harness nuclear, geothermal and solar energy in a very big way.  I cannot see that we can tell the third-world they cannot have refrigerators, central heating, air conditioning, cars, lorries, farm machinery and the list is endless.

This means we are going to have to live with climate change and take control of the climate where we can. The entire planet will have to become an actively managed environment. We will manage and focus the sun’s rays to determine when and where it rains and where is hot and where is cold.

There are obviously massive political hurdles to overcome.  If one country harvests moisture from the wind it could turn a downwind country into a desert.  A solar light collector could cast a shadow over an entire city or more concerning, cause crops to wither and die.

Living Space
People are going to have to be able to live and produce food in areas which are currently jungles, savannas, frozen wastelands, deserts, mountain ranges and even oceans.

If a country becomes flooded by rising sea levels the inhabitants will need to join another country.  How would this be provisioned?  We face a violent future unless the United Nations is reformed into a Global Council and Nationalism is replaced by Globalism.

The lease damaging way forward on current ecosystems might be to reclaim the deserts and farm the oceans.  Oceans close to land are sensitive and protected and mid-ocean is not owned by anyone and unprotected.  Pending global and local political agreement I therefore see the deserts as presenting the best solution.

Living With Change
There are those who will protest at the loss of a desert environment for the snakes and lizards currently there.  If we grow krill in currently barren mid-ocean, the whales and sea-birds will have to be driven off.   Turning deserts into fields of crops will also impact the climate.

There is much grieving over the loss of natural rainforest as the indigenous people seek wealth and living space.  Though we may wish it we cannot turn the clock back.  In Africa and Asia I am amazed that we expect people to live alongside lions and tigers for our satisfaction when we in Europe got rid of our carnivorous predators long ago.  I would not know what to say to a mother whose child or food was taken by such an animal.  These animals will have to make their way in safari parks and the land freed-up for human habitation.

There is much sadness at animals and plants becoming extinct as a result of loss of habitation.  The reality is that millions of new species are created every day.  The vast majority are not viable and die unseen before they are born.  Others are born but die young as they are poorly adapted to the environment they are born into.  Others are infertile or unable to find a mate and die out after a single generation.  A few might make it through multiple generations but die out when there is a change to their living space that they cannot adapt to; this might include the arrival of a predator or new disease.

Clearly all our known species of plant and animal, including man, fall into this last category.  Change creates opportunities for new species and should not be feared.  Extinction like any death is sad but there will be new and stronger species to celebrate.