The Point: The Empty Planet

If you tell most people that “one of the great defining events in human history” will occur by 2050, they’ll assume you are talking about climate change. But that’s not what the authors of this quote, John Ibbitson and Darrell Bricker, are referring to. The “great defining event” they have in mind is a gradual but inexorable decline in human population that will start right about then. As they chronicle in their brand-new book, “Empty Planet,” somewhere around 2050 the global population will peak and then begin to decline. “Once that decline begins, it will never end.” Now, statistical projections are tricky things. As we’re often told “Past performance may not be indicative of future results.” But this should be yet another nail in the coffin of that destructive “population bomb” lie that caused so much harm and suffering. As I’ve said before, the real crisis is a dropping fertility rate, not “overpopulation.” “Be fruitful and multiply” is just as true today as it was in the Garden of Eden.  

02/8/19