By Zachariah Joseph

The world has reached a population of over 8 billion people as of November 15, 2022 according to the United Nations.

In 1804, our estimated population was around one billion, yet a century later it grew to two billion in 1927. Although it took from 1804-1927 to reach two billion, not even a full century later the population is at eight billion.

The rate of how many people we have on our earth has quadrupled in the past 96 years. Some may see this as a great thing and others may not. As the population expands, the consumption of our resources may cause them to deplete quicker. The rise in birthrate will also strain systems that are already struggling to provide in these developing countries.

Malthusianism, the idea that population growth is potentially exponential while the growth of the food supply or other resources is linear, which eventually reduces living standards until the population dies off, and possibly can become the world’s reality if the population keeps staggering up to heights this fast.

An experience like this would be detrimental to life on earth, wars for supplies, increased world hunger, less agricultural resources, etc. The chaos during an event like this would be catastrophic with irreversible damage to the world and to the average human’s daily life.

The International Institute for Applied Systems Analysis (IIASA) in Vienna predicted in 2018 that the world’s population will be around 9.5 billion in 2100. The institute is currently working on an upgrade that will raise that estimate to between 10 and 10.1 billion.

The aspects of the daily person’s life won’t be affected at the moment, but as time passes and days go on, who knows how the world will be affected. Who knows if Malthusianism will stay a horrific idea or become a sad reality we must face in the future.

Yet for the moment, all we can do is wait and watch how human life on earth will unfold.