Infinite Growth on a Finite Planet: The Ecological Cost of Our Economic Model

Due to the internationally globablized (corporate) economic model coupled with over-population, poverty and a desire of infinite expansion, humans have caused unrelenting pollution and now earth’s biosphere is in decline. The biosphere is the system which supports all of life; not just human life, but other species as well. Every living system is in decline and every life support system is in decline as well. 

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This realization is not hard to see. We take immense resources from the earth, convert them to non-biodegradable pollution/waste and dump them back into landfills and the ocean. The world Conservation Union and the Species Survival Commission states: "Life on Earth is disappearing fast and will continue to do so unless urgent action is taken." In 2007 there were 41,125 species on the IUNC Red List and 16,306 of them were threatend with extinction, up 16,118 from the previous year. The total number of extinct species has reached 785 and a further 65 are only found in captivity or in cultivation.

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We are at a rate of species extinction unknown to earth since the dinosaurs. We are continually over fishing our oceans to the point the fish cannot reach the age of development to reproduce. 1 Over fishing occurs when fish mortality reaches a level of negative marginal growth. If current population trends continue it is estimated that in 50 years there will be virtually nothing left to fish. 2

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People who oppose population control will state that the appropriate mod of action to take is the development of more food, jobs, and homes. However, in reality, at some point, that structured mental process must end because of the inability to sustain itself in the real world. Our contemporary economic model wants growth, on average, between two to four percent per year. The problem is that model has infinite needs, eventually allocating infinite resources and dumping infinite waste in a finite world with ever growing recourse scarcity. 

1. Gold, Allan R. “Overfishing Is Depleting a Rich Fishing Area.” The New York Times. June 19, 1999. 

2. Black, Richard. “Only 50 years left for sea fish.” BBC News. November 2 2006. 

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