Population
Human population change, ecological population changes, impacts on population change
Article 1: Slower Growth Seen in a Graying World
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Summary: In November 2012, the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (O.E.C.D.) issued a forecast showing that economic growth will slow down as the world grows older in the coming decades. The "old-age dependency ratio" is defined as the number of people over the age of 65 for each 100 people ages 15 to 64, which defines the working-age population. The O.E.C.D. report says that rapid aging in countries partly explains why other countries will overtake their growth rate in less than a decade. The United Nations remains uncertain about future growth rates and has projected charts showing three forecasts based on assumptions of high, medium and low rates. An increase of immigration, however, could prove these forecasts to be incorrect.
Reflection: I have heard different opinions of population growth but was not really aware of the details of population change. I found it fascinating to think about how the ratio of older people to the younger working population affects the future of an entire nation. At first, I didn't understand how it is that people who are of retirement age are dependent on the working population. The "old-age dependency ratio" seems to be a great way to describe this issue. For example, the article says that India will eventually overtake China in economic growth, because India's population is projected to grow at a faster rate than China's. Part of the reason may be China's policy of limiting children to one per family.
Source: New York Times
Reflection: I have heard different opinions of population growth but was not really aware of the details of population change. I found it fascinating to think about how the ratio of older people to the younger working population affects the future of an entire nation. At first, I didn't understand how it is that people who are of retirement age are dependent on the working population. The "old-age dependency ratio" seems to be a great way to describe this issue. For example, the article says that India will eventually overtake China in economic growth, because India's population is projected to grow at a faster rate than China's. Part of the reason may be China's policy of limiting children to one per family.
Source: New York Times
Article 2: Population 7 Billion
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There have been and continue to be many predictions regarding the earth's global population. Antoni van Leeuwenhoek, who lived in the 17th century, was fascinated by the topic of population and was the first to guess how many people might live on the earth. The population is now about seven billion and is predicted to increase over the coming decades to nine billion in 2045. A main concern is whether the planet will be able to handle this large amount of people. Issues including mass starvation and overpopulation have been the cause of fear for many, and though today many are undernourished and the population has surged due to improvements of medical science, these have not proved to be major causes of concern. At one point people believed that the population would exceed 20 billion people and that the very future of the United States was at risk. However, fertility rates around the world began to drop faster than anticipated by the early 1970s. Since then, the growth rate of the population has fallen by more than 40 percent. Despite concerns, the Population Association of America (PAA) is confident that in the second half of this century the population will level out or even fall.
Reflection: Reading this article was very informative. I knew that the current world population is around 7 billion, but I didn't know what it was projected to be or how fast it was predicted to grow. I was surprised by reading that some people thought that the earth could become overpopulated within just a few decades. I think it's really interesting how at first experts from the Population Association of America thought it would grow very rapidly but now they adjusted their estimate to a significantly lower number after seeing that within the last few decades it hasn't been growing in keeping with their original estimates.
Source: National Geographic
Reflection: Reading this article was very informative. I knew that the current world population is around 7 billion, but I didn't know what it was projected to be or how fast it was predicted to grow. I was surprised by reading that some people thought that the earth could become overpopulated within just a few decades. I think it's really interesting how at first experts from the Population Association of America thought it would grow very rapidly but now they adjusted their estimate to a significantly lower number after seeing that within the last few decades it hasn't been growing in keeping with their original estimates.
Source: National Geographic
Vocabulary
Demography: the science of vital and social statistics, as of the births, deaths, diseases, marriages, etc., of populations
Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD): a group of 34 countries, including all of the major industrialized nations, whose goal is to promote policies that will improve the economic and social well-being of people around the world
Gross domestic product: the total value of goods produced and services provided in a country during one year
Black Death: the great epidemic of bubonic plague that killed a large part of the population of Europe in the mid-14th century
“Demographic dividend”: a blissful few decades when the boomers swell the labor force and the number of young and old dependents is relatively small, and there is thus a lot of money for other things
Source: Dictionary.com
Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD): a group of 34 countries, including all of the major industrialized nations, whose goal is to promote policies that will improve the economic and social well-being of people around the world
Gross domestic product: the total value of goods produced and services provided in a country during one year
Black Death: the great epidemic of bubonic plague that killed a large part of the population of Europe in the mid-14th century
“Demographic dividend”: a blissful few decades when the boomers swell the labor force and the number of young and old dependents is relatively small, and there is thus a lot of money for other things
Source: Dictionary.com
Article 3: 3,000 Years of Abusing Earth on a Global Scale
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Summary: This article by David Biello describes the effects we as humans have had on the environment in the Anthropocene, which is an era brought on by many environmental effects caused by the human species. New research has shown that humans have had a global environmental impact for at least 3,000 years. This is increasingly getting worse as the per capita demand for products and ecological footprints are expanding. Although it may seem as though humans have only fairly recently (over the past few decades) started to contribute to depleting natural resources and contributing to abusing Earth, humans have contributed to deforestation and other unnatural activities ever since they have existed on Earth.
Reflection: This article included some very interesting information regarding human-induced effects on the environment. It is crazy to think that humans have severely impacted the place we live negatively, and we continue to do so. I believe that humans in this era are so consumed with what is popular, and getting all the newest gadgets and items, that they fail to consider and realize what harmful effects using and wasting these products can have on the environment. Before I took this Environmental Science class, I was vaguely aware of humans carelessly depleting resources and polluting the environment, but I did not realize the seriousness of the issue. I think that if more people committed to making others aware of these issues that many would take steps to try to help sustain our Earth.
Source: Scientific American
Reflection: This article included some very interesting information regarding human-induced effects on the environment. It is crazy to think that humans have severely impacted the place we live negatively, and we continue to do so. I believe that humans in this era are so consumed with what is popular, and getting all the newest gadgets and items, that they fail to consider and realize what harmful effects using and wasting these products can have on the environment. Before I took this Environmental Science class, I was vaguely aware of humans carelessly depleting resources and polluting the environment, but I did not realize the seriousness of the issue. I think that if more people committed to making others aware of these issues that many would take steps to try to help sustain our Earth.
Source: Scientific American