There are too many people on the planet today. Not too many people for future humans… but for the people we are today, there are clearly too many people. Our behavior is destroying the planet.

Since the beginning of the Industrial Revolution, the world’s population has exploded. Improved agriculture and antibiotics have changed the landscape forever. 

It would be wrong to think that this is an uncommon occurrence. Past humans have certainly experienced similar spikes in the population curve. It is not seen in the above graph because it happens too quickly, and it has never been close to the numbers we see today, but the shape of the curve was always the same. Like when people converted from being nomadic hunter-gatherers to living in farming communities, there must have been a small spike in population. And, with every spike in population, there is a resulting collapse.

Every time humans develop a means to improve their situation, they must go through a process to find a new balance with their environment. This process begins with a spike and collapse in population. The collapse is what alerts people that there are new concepts they need to learn in order to find balance. Fortunately, this process can evolve. Unfortunately, this evolution takes time and repeated experiences.

Below is a graph that depicts the difference between the process of rebalancing between a population that is not conscious of the process (red) and a population that is conscious of the process (blue). The dashed black line is the previous level of balance for a population.

The population that is not conscious of the process experiences a severe decline, dropping below previous population levels, and then has to rebuild to the level of new balance. The population that is conscious still experiences a shocking decline, but pulls themselves together in time to manage a softer landing. And the fact that they are conscious of this event means that their new level of balance will naturally be higher than that of the unconscious individuals.

To speak of the question of consciousness in a population. A conscious population is an entire population being aware of the situation. A small group of people who are trying to secretly manage a collapse as though the rest of the population was of another species of animal does not count as a conscious population. Evolution follows the path of greatest risk. If the greatest risk to survival is a group of billionaires, then one of the lessons the population must learn to become more conscious, and thus find a new balance, is how to survive and manage the group of billionaires. The same is true with the other species we manage, although our arrogance might not allow us to see it.

Below is a graph showing (roughly) the evolution of a conscious population’s ability to manage their own population increases. (Please forgive my horrible graphics skills.) Imagine that each line is one thousand years apart, and the end of each line is at the beginning population level of the next. The order they go in is blue, green, orange, and pink. With each event, people invent something new that encourages them to allow their population to grow too much. With each event, awareness and wisdom from past experiences encourages them to be more cautious. Again, this wisdom and cautiousness is not applied by a Philosopher King, or other form of tyrannical overload, it is a cultural adaptation that the entire population shares in. What many would call… a religion.

We have a collapse coming. There is nothing we can do to avoid this reality. If we wanted to have a growth curve like the pink line, we should have started planning and managing at point A; one hundred and twenty years ago. The orange line, eighty years ago. The green, fifty years ago. To avoid our current situation someone needed to say, “hey, antibiotics are going to make our population grow exponentially. We need to do something to manage the overall impact.” And then everyone would have to agree and work together as a community. Obviously, that did not happen, so the best we can do at this point (B) is the blue line. And if we, collectively, as a population, do nothing,.. we get the red.