Originally Posted by 1069

There are too many people in the world.
And Americans- although less prodigious breeders than people of third world nations where reproductive choice is unavailable- are guilty of egregious conspicuous consumption.

I don't see that there is any real solution at this point, beyond extreme population reduction- perhaps there will be a convenient new virus that wipes out 30-40% of the earth's people, or perhaps these latest food shortages will create a global famine that will kill almost everyone- and an extreme reduction in the conspicuous consumption-fueled lifestyles of industrialized nations, with the US being the most flagrant offender.
In short, the third world needs to disappear, and the first world needs to begin living more like the third world.
Or, alternately, the first world could disappear, and then the third world could just keep on truckin' and not change a thing.
But since the first world is wealthier and more powerful than the third world, it seems a foregone conclusion that we'd wipe them out before we'd voluntarily exterminate ourselves.

These two options outlined above are the only possibilities, as I see it, for the long-term survival of the human race.
We cannot go on much longer at the rate we're reproducing, and we cannot go on much longer at the rate we're consuming.
That doesn't mean we shouldn't try, though.
We should try everything we can think of, and if it fails, oh well. At least we tried; that's better than doing nothing.
At the very least, we may succeed in prolonging the inevitable for a few years, decades, perhaps even centuries.

But the fact remains: there are simply too many people.