This site has some good information, but I think it suffers a bit from that default "impartial scientific observational position". I think a bit more of a sense of urgency is in order. (Though our sense of time is one of the problems in this scenario.)

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You seem to almost welcome a global cataclysm which will reduce the human population to a level that the earth's resources can support.

A more optimistic scenario is one in which technology addresses the inevitable resource shortages. We should put our energies into desalination technology, genetic enginieering of crops, and finding artificial substitutes for nature's resources.

In short, let's think our way out of this problem rather than hoping for the unthinkable.

Just because I think that all available evidence suggests that a car I'm watching is about to go off of a cliff, in no way means I am hoping the car will go off the cliff ;-)

Please note also that a voluntary reduction in human population is not at all inherently "bad". In addition, it's the only way to prevent (or at this point maybe 'reduce' is the best we can do) cataclysmic human suffering in the future. It's the human suffering that I think is bad.

Optimism is simply not supported by the data.

http://www.paulchefurka.ca/WEAP/WEAP.html

Forgive me. It seems that I have mischaracterized your views. You are not hoping for a catacysm, you are instead advocating a global emphasis on decreasing birth rates.

While this approach has obvious benefits, I feel that it epitimizes the optimism you derided in your previous comment.

I would like to reiterate my view that technology is our salvation with an example:

Genetic engineering is in its infancy, yet scientists have already been able to double the growth rate of Pacific salmon.

This achievement is the result of something analogous to uninformed tinkering. As the technology matures, we will see advancements in resource production that are unimaginable by todays standards.

It is not safe to assume that our resource production/utiliation techonology will keep pace with populuation growth, but it is our best hope.

Throughout history everytime we tamper to improve lifestyle it really only results with further more involved problems ( mobile phones contraception the combustion Engine).Over population is the direct consequence of capitalism and the "American dream",that is not to say that I'm picking on americans its just that the world economies rely on growth, therefore until we as a world can survive and satisfy our hunger for PROFITS with a different economy model (not communism either)only then will governments stop encouraging population growth. So the answer really is not technology it is not wars its not any of the current theories out there, its THE ECONOMY OF THE WORLD!!

Certain religions declare that if you die without a male heir to conduct the proper rituals you will not get to heaven, nirvana, the happy hunting ground. India has one of these religions. If I were a poor man in this situation i would not take any chances, but "overbreed' because of the hjgh death rate among the poor.

Imo the religions that forbade birth control from earliest times did so partly out of the desire to outbreed their rivals.

Conclusion: Thousands of years before American capitalism came along we set a pattern for overbreeding.