Week 4 Population 7 billion and counting

 


The world population recently reached 7 billion. The mainstream media portrays this development in dramatic and dire terms.  The West, in general, has seen the apocalypse approaching as the population rises (Kunzig 2011). 

We started this course with a discussion of capitalism, consumption and uneven development to make the point that these forces bear the greatest responsibility for climate change, species decline, rainforest destruction and so forth. They are also at the root of global inequalities. Yet what we hear about instead are numbers of people.

Read: "Is the environmental crisis caused by the 7 billion or the 1%?" here and "Why 7 billion isn't as scary as you think" here.

On Gapminder, go to Gapminder World, open Graph Menu and choose for the Y axis Children per Woman and Income per person on the X axis. Click Play. What did you see?

From the two readings and your analysis of the graph, discuss what you've learned.

Optional
More on population WBUR or this NPR show.
Nat Geo article by Kunzig
Op ed by Geographer Bill Moseley, A population remedy is right here at home.
Op-ed by Biologist Erle Ellis, Overpopulation is not the problem.