Our Number's Up

In a recent issue of Chronicles, Philip Jenkins sounds a somewhat discordant alarm bell for “the global decline of fertility rates”. Now... anyone who is my age, or a bit younger, remembers when “the population explosion” was the issue of the day... when it was on everyone's lips, the very same way “global warming” is now. The human race was doomed to reproduce itself out of existence (an event which, you might think, would qualify as “paradoxical” -- but no one saw it that way back then) – we were about to overtax, and stress, the world's resources to the breaking point – and once that occurred, we would be beyond the point of no return. At that point, the only answer to the population crisis would be mass starvation. Yeah – that's what they said, I'm not kidding. Now granted, there is, in fact, hunger, severe hunger, and even occasional starvation on today's world scene – but it is caused almost entirely by wars and political crises, not by an actual, objective, lack of resources (arable land, crop fertility, etc.). Even if you take the most nutrition-challenged place on earth – inevitably, in sub-Saharan Africa – and subtract war, revolution, genocide, and vicious rulers, you still wind up with, basically, enough food for everyone. If you look anywhere else on earth, everyone has enough to eat, and a lot of people have way too much – like Americans, for instance. And this, mind you, is with a global population that the doomsayers of the 1960s would have claimed was absolutely impossible – unsustainable – catastrophic – etc.

The truth is, we still don't know what the maximum “carrying capacity” of the Earth is, when it comes to human population. Because we are not, overall, anywhere near that absolute limit as yet. If you took all the “farm surplus” of the U.S., plus all the food that fat-assed Americans eat that is above and beyond their nutritional needs, you could feed the entire subpopulation of the world's “starving” or “hungry” people. So have we reached that mythical brick wall yet? Certainly not. But there are other indicators that might be of equal interest. One is that the oceans – which have always served as a kind of back-up to agriculture – are being depleted, and in some cases “fished out”. And this problem is aggravated by massive pollution of the oceans, mainly from waste dumping, which results in things like “the blob the size of the state of Texas” in the Pacific, etc. In other words, ocean-based nutrition has not only peaked, but it's on the decline. And while we're talking about water, let's remember that, in some cases, lakes and rivers have recovered to some extent from the “dark ages of pollution” -- but they will always be insufficient to feed people who live any distance from the fisheries in question.

So that puts us firmly back in the camp of agriculture, i.e. land-based nutritional sources, and let's admit that the various “green revolutions” over the past few decades have enabled millions of people to eat better than they might have otherwise. In fact, countries that suffered recurring famines in years past have now become relatively stable, food-wise; India is actually a food exporter, probably for the first time in its thousands-of-years history. And it also appears that the hybrid crops, which are the main reason for this newfound stability, are relatively resistant to the various plagues and blights that have tormented farmers down through the ages. We are not seeing anything like the Irish potato blight and famine these days, for example – but the extent to which this benign situation is attributable to chemicals and antibiotics is still enough to give one pause. Set the Third World back on its own resources, and see what happens – the result might not be at all edifying.

So what I'm saying is that the current world population – and its relative degree of nutritional sufficiency – could be an artificial phenomenon to some extent, and therefore fragile, and therefore subject to sudden catastrophe... although this has not happened as yet. The most hard-core Darwinist, if you pin them down, has to admit that any conditions that result in increased fertility, and increased birth rates, and increased numbers of individuals growing to reproductive maturity, have to be considered “good”. Which means that, as of right now, world conditions for the human race have to be pronounced “good”. But that would be to ignore the overall environmental impact of said human race, and if you adopt that point of view the scales might swing over to the “bad” side. What I'm trying to say is, it's all a matter of the criterion you adopt. If it's all about human fecundity, we are living in the best world “ever”. If it's about total environmental impact, then... well, who knows how to weigh all those different factors? Some people pretend they do... but they all start out with one premise or another, like “there are too many people on Earth” (to which my response is, “Fine – then why don't you leave?”). Others will cite quality of life – yes, the population of India continues to rise, but do you really want to live in Calcutta? (To which I say – no, but I don't want to live in New York City either.)

So the point is, human populations will continue to rise, and will eventually rise to the detriment of the environment. But there comes a point at which... but let me digress for a moment. It's been a long time since I studied population ecology, but, as I recall, virtually any animal (and plant, for that matter... and fungal, and bacterial, etc.) population has self-limiting capacity, i.e. there are mechanisms programmed into the genome that restrain unlimited growth. Or – there are mechanisms built into the environment that do the same thing. In either case, no population can grow indefinitely... and not only that, but no population can grow to the point where its overall health and survivability is seriously compromised. In other words, no population can grow to the point where all its members are sick and starving. Because if that were the case, then those populations would suffer a catastrophic decline and possibly extinction – and it's just possible that this has happened in the past. So unlimited growth is a “mutation”, in a sense, and limited growth the normal state. Now, the mechanisms by which this is accomplished are as varied as the species themselves. For “lower” organisms, it's simply a matter of limited resources – the healthy members occupy all the territory, or use up all the resources, and no new members can thrive, or even survive (except if they are replacing deceased members). But note – it's never the case that all the members of the species, or group, become weak and sick. Most of them remain strong, and it's only the prospective “new” members that are thwarted. It is, in other words, population control that is imposed by the environment but responded to, in a certain way, by the species. If they all became weak and sick, they would all die – and that would be the end of the species. And again, some may have suffered this fate in the past, but the ones that didn't – that developed a mechanism with which to cope with limited resources – survived.

So – let's get back to the human species. We have not yet exhausted the Earth's resources, despite what the doomsayers say. And no theoretical proof is needed for this – all that is needed is a demonstration that the human race is, still and despite all, increasing in numbers. Case closed! We haven't yet reached the Earth's carrying capacity -- because if we had, by definition our numbers would instantly level off. But we are, nonetheless, straining various resources, and that, it can be argued, is a “quality of life” factor – if only that American liberals like to think that the oceans are clean and unpolluted... that makes their day, even if most people in India couldn't care less. And as I've said, most of what people point to as “evidence” of overpopulation is highly localized, and based on all sorts of non-environmental factors.

So – after this highly-circuitous route, let's get back to the alleged “global decline of fertility rates”. Well, first of all, someone has to demonstrate that the world population is actually on the decline – which it most assuredly is not. It's estimated at 6.778 billion as of today – you know, give or take a few score million. And I remember when it was 2.5 billion for years! So what happened? Again, the “green revolution”, and vaccinations, and sanitation, and health care, and a million other things. So by improving the quality of life for those already living, we also gave rise to the advent of a whole lot more people. Duh! I guess this comes under the heading of “unanticipated consequences”. Most of the world, in fact, has not yet bought into our gentlemanly concept of not even replacing one's own numbers – they are still all about having big families, and “conquering through demographics” (hey – don't laugh, it works).

In fact, according to the Wiki entry, “world population will continue to grow until around 2050”. So what's with this Jenkins guy and “the global decline of fertility rates”? I mean... we're talking about another 41 years of population growth, that's two generations in developed countries and three everywhere else. So what's his deal? Well... it's been my observation that whenever someone starts complaining about “declining fertility rates” they are referring to the white, non-Hispanic populace... and, by extension, to “Western Civilization” and “Christendom” (although someone has to explain to me how Hispanics don't qualify as members of “Christendom” -- unless the speaker is a Protestant, which would, of course, explain everything). And yes, it is demonstrably true that Western European and North American white Christians are failing to replace their numbers. And this includes Catholics, who drank great draughts of population-control Kool-Aid back in the 60s and have yet to realize that they were duped. Who is it that still believes in large families in non-Hispanic North America in this day and age? The Mormons, traditionalist Catholics, Amish, Hassidic Jews, and the occasional rural French Canadians. That's about it. (And note the contribution of religious faith to this phenomenon.) Everyone else is voluntarily consigning themselves to extinction. But hey – according to Darwin, anything that contributes to survival is good, and anything that does not is bad. So by that criterion, religion is good. Ha! Stick that in your pipe and smoke it, all you faithful and fanatical “Darwinists”!

So really – we see that the alleged reversal of the conventional wisdom from the “population bomb” to “global decline of fertility” has not actually occurred – and that the only people concerned with the decline in fertility are those who are worried about the decline and eventually extinction of Western Civilization, Christendom, democracy, Shakespeare revivals, and the like. All of which are real concerns, I admit – but hey, when a culture ceases to be, how can one realistically expect its artifacts to live on, except in museums and scholarly journals? And what, after all, explains the decline of the West, population-wise? Nothing more – as Jenkins points out – than secular humanism, with its ultimate emphasis on the individual, the here and now, and self-actualization, to the detriment of succeeding generations. Closely tied to all of this is feminism and “women's rights” -- paramount of which is the “right” not to have children. Well, fair enough – I'm not into coercing women to have, or _not_ have, any number of children. But let's face it, women world-wide have been sold a bill of goods, by which their self-esteem is now based directly on the extent to which they imitate (no matter how badly or ludicrously) men. In other words, real feminism... real womanhood... is sadly out of style. And when this happens, shazam, the birth rate falls. So the planetary landscape is full of self-actualizing but sterile females. Is this any way to be a good Darwinian? I don't think so. (The fact that the planetary landscape is full of sexually hyperactive but childless males is equally dreary.)

So if the news of the decline of the human race is “premature”, is there, in fact, a problem? Well, if one is radically equivocal as to the relative value of various traditions, cultures, creeds (or lacks thereof), value systems, etc. world-wide, then no, there is no problem. The white race could disappear tomorrow and the world would be no worse off – in fact, it seems downright parochial, not to mention “racist”, to even be concerned about such a thing. Plus, let's face it, the white race has had a good run of it... it's had plenty of chances... and now it's time for someone else to take over for a while. “It's Our Turn”, as the Obama campaign propaganda trumpeted. Hey, I've got no problem with this – I'm one of the few people I know who really doesn't mind living in “history”, as opposed to some fantasy world where history has come to an end. (How crushingly boring that would be!)

But let's not leave this topic without speculating as to what's in store for the human race overall – which is to say, if we haven't reached the planet's carrying capacity yet, when will that happen and how will we know? Well, going back to population ecology – in those cases where the environment itself doesn't impose limits, the species itself seems to be capable of doing this, in many cases – in other words, fertility rates will decline way ahead of the point at which all of the members of the species would wind up weak and sick, and hence unable to reproduce at all. In other words, there is a species-based (as opposed to individual-based) mechanism that seems to insure survival overall (and, once again, species that did not develop this ability are no longer with us). So the decline begins when most members of the species are still strong and healthy, and able to reproduce – but for some mysterious reason they “choose” to reproduce at a slower rate, because there is some way in which they sense that environmental limits are about to be reached. This is not fantasy – it happens all the time, especially in species faced with environmental crises (pestilence, climate change, change in nutritional sources, etc.)
or faced with the consequences of their own fertility (running out of territory, food, water, etc.). In other words, things don't have to reach rock bottom before they start to get better – in fact, they can't! So “smart” species know when to cool it on the reproduction thing... and the question is, do humans have that same instinctive capability or do they have to be forcibly sterilized by governments or killed off in war, or by famine or pestilence? Is nature going to do a “tough love” job on the human race, or will the process be relatively benign? The point is – if there is anything left of our survival instincts as a species, I think you're going to see a “voluntary” decline of fertility – if not the one Jenkins describes, then one that has an actual impact – long before mass starvation and illness set in. But not all voluntary declines in fertility will reflect this phenomenon, either – like the non-replacement rates he cites for Europe. There it is a more conscious, self-centered process – like the low birthrates among liberals in this country. I'm talking about something less conscious and more instinctive – and I don't see any evidence of that happening as yet. If anything, the fertility rate in the more stressed parts of the world (like Congo) seem as high as ever, if not higher. But again, that is a local phenomenon. Will we ever get to the point where the human race, in a kind of mass unconscious self-mandate, “agrees” to start having fewer children? Or, again, is it going to have to be a case of “tough love” imposed by Nature? I honestly don't know. All I know for certain is that we're nowhere near that point as yet.