Hi Jennifer,
Now that we have left global warming behind us (almost unanimous agreement that it is the result of human activity or rather over-activity, and that its here to stay unless something is done about it urgently) we can concentrate on the real issue, which is, as I believe over population both at the global and local levels.
It seems like the balancing forces of nature, biotic potential and environmental resistance (in the ecological sense), have lost their balancing character in favor of biotic potential. World population has been soaring in the past few centuries in spite of wars, diseases, epidemics and so forth. I have attached an illustrative reference, which shows how world population has increased over the years and how it will reach about 8 billion by 2020. The animation included is really gloomy (Australia does not seem to be effected).
I strongly believe that, unless something is done about human over-breeding very urgently (like having an international agreement on limiting populations on a rational basis) the whole world will be overpopulated in such a manner (like some countries already are!), that the developing countries shall not be able to reach a standard of living of the so called developed countries. Further, because of the continued depletion of resources, the standards of living in the developed countries will reach such levels that severe intra-specific competition (sometimes referred to as “innovation”) will be dominant in every aspect of our lives. Not to mention that present day international conflicts will be much more widespread. So far, we humans have been clever overcoming environmental resistance, it did not work out, let us try to be wise from now on (not wise guys!).
Regards, Haldun
Jennifer Marohasy BSc PhD has worked in industry and government. She is currently researching a novel technique for long-range weather forecasting funded by the B. Macfie Family Foundation.