Global warming is a huge and a very real problem.  But name me a single environmental crisis -- including but going well beyond global warming -- that isn't being tremendously exacerbated by exponential population growth.

In my opinion the Pope is an environmental criminal for encouraging billions around the world to be fruitful, multiply, and forego the most effective and available forms of contraception.  Sorry, but I can't see it any other way.  It's politically inappropriate, I guess, to point something obvious like that out.  But until we do, we're doomed.

With or without global warming, there is no sign that the massive loss of biological diversity on this planet to the relentless growth of the homo sapiens cancer will turn around in my lifetime.  

exponential population growth

It's not really exponential any more...many estimates think it may peak (Peak Population? Hah!) by mid Century at 8 Billion.

Since we have 6 Billion now, that's only an increase by a third -- large, but not doubling.  

That also means that, assuming it even gets that high, all we have to do is increase our output by 33 1/3% to accomodate everyone at the same level.

There are also trends that may portend a population bust, for example, something like 1/3rd of China's population has one foot in the grave, and it's unlikely that it will be replaced.

India and China and Africa will be building "infrastructure".   You know what infrastructure does right?   It turns an 8 kid family into a 1 kid family.   People will take their breeding desires out by buying Acuras.

Even the most diehard AGW has to recognize that the (A) in AGW is not going to be as big after 2050 and may...collapse!

While it's correct that the rate of human population increase is decreasing, human population is still increasing.  Some of the worst offenders are the U.S., which is the only super consumerist country where population is still increasing and where population increase is thus more harmful than it is elsewhere, and countries like India and Indonesia, where population growth is still encouraged.  (I fully agree with Gonzo Don about the Pope -- and I'd go much farther and indict Christianity in general -- but aside from the U.S., most white countries are experiencing population decline, though the Catholic Church does have massive influence in Latin America where population is still increasing.)

Further destruction of the planet (i.e., building infrastructure, which means destroying natural open space and consuming things like oil) in an attempt to lower human population is not an ecologically beneficial way to lower human population.  In addition to the harm that "development" -- which is really just ecological destruction -- causes, it's been shown that by far the best way to get people to have fewer kids is to empower women to make that choice (wow, the vast majority of women in any culture don't want to have large families, imagine that!).

The bottom line is that regardless of what unpredictable changes in human population take place in the future, arguing that overpopulation is not a severe problem, merely because the rate of increase is decreasing, is ludicrous.  Overpopulation is the biggest and most important environmental and ecological problem on the planet, and if we don't solve it all else will be like rearranging the deck chairs on the Titanic.

I'd like though to point out that this article cites a UN spokesman in response to a republican idea. If you haven't noticed, republicans who are true conservatives don't really have much respect for the UN and think it is one of the greatest perpetrators of this "political concoction," so does it really make sense to even compare them?

We all live in a closed system -- a big one, to be sure, but one as closed as nature can devise.  Now, overlaying a natural global balance which swings between cool and warm cycles, we have increased human population in an exponential curve which surges more and more rapidly upwards and every new birth increases Global Warming by 98.6F degrees.

We also have dragged a tremendous number of warm animals out of the jungles with our civilization, from horses and cows to cats and dogs, each contributing to sway the global balance toward the hot side of the scale.  And we pour more heat into the atmosphere from our use of machinery (internal combustion engines to move us, electrical generation to cook our food, while cooling our beer at the same time).  

I had a cat once.  Used to lie on the dining room table at mealtime while we ate, stretching slowly forward inch by inch.  Then, as she sat up and yawned, one paw 'accidentally' swiped the butter dish and of course she had to lick the paw clean.  That's the way with our contribution to Global Warming.  Little by little it will advance with our permission, until it overwhelms us.

Des Emery

   Since when is population growth in an exponential curve?  What exactly do people think this means?

patrick in Beijing

   To say that population has always been an exponential growth is misleading.  Seen from an extreme distance, this may appear to be true.  But if you want to discuss population as an issue, then you need to look closer.

   Looking closer will show that population growth does not occur in a straight line on a graph, but rather has gone up and (gasp) down at various times due to various factors.

   So what?  Well if you really want to be serious, you need to study the details, to understand what drives population forward (upward) and what slows it down.

   To merely say that population growth is exponential is meaningless alarmist language, mainly used to get people excited (See, "Chicken Little, a case History by Dr. I.B. Fox).

   Looking at gross numbers is often deceptive, so we need to be careful, if we want to seriously address issues.

patrick in Beijing