"Borderlands of Science" - Breathing Space. 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true"><img src="../../../images/respxclr.gif" border=0 height=65 width=65></a> </td>   <td ALIGN=left VALIGN=> <hr width=95%> <img src="../../../images/respxclr.gif" border=0 height=1 width=3 align=left> <img src="../../../images/respxclr.gif" border=0 height=1 width=3 align=right> <table align=center valign=top border=1 cellspacing=1 cellpadding=10> <tr> <td align=left valign=top> <img src="../../../images/respxclr.gif" border=0 height=1 width=315><br> <center><b><FONT SIZE=+2><font color="#000099"><i>"Breathing Space. How Many can Earth Hold?"</i></font></FONT></B></center> <br> <P>Stuck in rush hour traffic on a hot day, you sometimes wonder: Where did all these people come from? You may also mutter to yourself, hey, it wasn't like this when I was a kid.</P> <P>If you do say that, you'll be right. It wasn't. There are more people in the world today than ever before. Next year there will be more yet.</P> <P>Here are some sobering numbers: At the time of the birth of Christ, the world population was around two hundred million. By 1800 that number had climbed to one billion. Two billion was reached about 1930; three billion in 1960; four billion in 1975; five billion in 1988. In 2000 the population will top six billion.</P> <P>Not only more and more, but faster and faster. People are living longer and the old equalizers, famine and plague, seem largely under control. War remains, but the two great conflicts of the twentieth century did little to slow the growth in population. It took 130 years to add the second billion, only 12 years to add the sixth. With any simple-minded projection for the next century apparently zooming to infinity, we have to ask, how long can this go on? Also, where will all the new people fit? Not, we hope, on the commuter routes that we use.</P> <P>A glance at a population map at first seems reassuring. Most of the world still looks empty. A second glance and you realize why. Of the Earth's total land area, one fifth is too cold to grow crops; another fifth is too dry, a fifth is too high, and another seventh has infertile soils. Only about a quarter of the land is good for farming. Empty areas of the planet are empty for good reason.</P> <P>That can change, and is already changing. Sunlight is available everywhere, regardless of how high or cold the land.</P> <P>Plants are remarkably efficient factories for converting sunlight, water, and carbon dioxide into food. By genetic engineering, we are producing new crop varieties with shorter growing seasons and more tolerance of cold, drought and high salinity. In the future, it seems certain that areas of the globe now empty will be able to fill with high-yield food crops, and then with people.</P> <P>According to projections, they will have to. Population estimates for the year 2050 range from eight to twelve billion, for 2100 from ten to fifteen billion. Even these numbers are nowhere near the limit. Provided that we can produce the food (and distribute it), the Earth can easily support as many as twenty billion people - almost four times as many as we have today.</P> <P>The question you may ask, sitting in your car on a freeway that has become one giant parking lot, is a different one. Sure, if we struggle and squeeze, maybe we can handle four times the present population. But do we want to? How many people is enough?</P> <hr width=95%> <div align=right><FONT SIZE=-1>Copyright-Dr. Charles Sheffield-2000</FONT> </div> <hr width=95%> <center><FONT SIZE=-1>"Borderlands of Science" is syndicated by:<br></FONT> <a href="http://www.Paradigm-TSA.com"><IMG SRC="../../../images/box_2c.jpeg" border=0 hspace=0 height=30 width=35><IMG SRC="../../../images/ptsa2.jpeg" border=0 hspace=0 height=30 width=144></a></center> <hr width=95%> </td></tr></table> </td>   <td ALIGN=left VALIGN=top width=165> <hr width=95%> <IMG SRC="../../../images/respxclr.gif" border=0 height=1420 width=3 align=left> <center> <font color="black"><b><font size=4>"Borderlands of Science"</font></b><br> by Dr. Charles Sheffield</font> <br> <IMG SRC="../../../images/sheffield.gif" border=0 ALT="Dr. Charles Sheffield"></center> <br> <hr> <br> <FONT SIZE=-1> Dr. Charles Sheffield was born and educated in England, but has lived in the U.S. most of his working life. He is the prolific author of forty books and numerous articles, ranging in subject from astronomy to large scale computing, space trasvel, image processing, disease distribution analysis, earth resources gravitational field analysis, nuclear physics and relativity.<br> His most recent book, “The Borderlands of Science,” defines and explores the latest advances in a wide variety of scientific fields - just as does his column by the same name.<br> His writing has won him the Japanese Sei-un Award, the John W. Campbell Memorial Award and the Nebula and Hugo Awards. Dr. Sheffield is a Past-President of the Science Fiction Writers of America, and Distinguished Lecturer for the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics, and has briefed Presidents on the future of the U.S. Space Program. He is currently a top consultant for the Earthsat Corporation </FONT> <br><br> <hr> <br> <center><IMG SRC="../../../images/sheffieldwh.gif" border=0 ALT="Dr. Sheffield @ The White House"></center> <br> <hr> <br> <center>Write to Dr. Charles Sheffield at: <A HREF="mailto:chasshef@aol.com.com"> Chasshef@aol.com</A></center> <br> <hr> <br> <center><FONT SIZE=+2><A HREF="sciindex.htm">"Borderlands of Science" Archives</A></FONT></center> <br><br> <hr> </td> </tr> </TABLE> </CENTER> </BODY> </HTML>