I usually avoid discussions about the 'global population problem' of the\u00a0'something must be done before it's too late' variety\u00a0because\u00a0there are usually no sensible policy options on offer \u2013 save ' more education' and\/or 'more economic growth'. \u00a0Rarely does anyone dare to suggest\u00a0anything remotely practical such as free contraception to all who want it, or abortion \/ assisted dying\u00a0on demand \u2013 or, much more extreme \u2013 closing every neo-natal unit.<\/p>\n
Such discussions are also usually free of theory; that is, there's an absence, for example, of any explanatory conceptual framework that enables our\u00a0understanding of human population in the context of how we live our lives in the wider biosphere. \u00a0How useful it was, then, to find Herman Daly musing about these issues in a recent blog<\/a>.<\/p>\n This begins:<\/p>\n A steady state economy is defined by a constant population and a constant stock of physical capital. In a way it is an extension of the demographer\u2019s model of a stationary population to include non living populations of artifacts, with production rates equal to depreciation rates, as well as birth rates equal to death rates. \u00a0The basic idea goes back to the classical economists and was most favorably envisioned by John Stuart Mill.<\/em><\/p>\n The population problem should be considered from the point of view of\u00a0all\u00a0populations\u2013populations of both humans and their things (cars, houses, livestock, crops, cell phones, etc.)\u2013in short, populations of all \u201cdissipative structures\u201d engendered, bred, or built by humans. \u00a0Both human bodies and artifacts wear out and die. \u00a0The populations of all organs that support human life, and the enjoyment thereof, require a metabolic throughput to counteract entropy and remain in an organized steady state. \u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n All of these organs are capital equipment that support our lives. \u00a0Endosomatic (within skin) capital\u2013heart, lungs, kidneys\u2013supports our lives quite directly. \u00a0Exosomatic (outside skin) capital supports our lives indirectly, and consists both of natural capital (e.g., photosynthesizing plants, structures comprising the hydrologic cycle), and manmade capital (e.g., farms, factories, electric grids).\u00a0<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n Recommended reading, perhaps, for all who bang mindlessly on about something needing to be done about population without actually saying anything. \u00a0You know who you are.<\/p>\n