As long as the population increases, Malthus is right. There is going to be some ultimate carrying capacity at some point. Ultimate amount of energy we can harness. It's just a question when. Certainly before our energy consumption is enough to literally boil the oceans.
Plug in different growth rates and the answer could range from tens of years to hundreds of millions of years!
> As long as the population increases, Malthus is right.
Wrong. As long as population growth remains positive without end in sight, Malthus right.
However, THE END OF POSITIVE POPULATION GROWTH IS IN SIGHT.
I mean, I said so in the comment you responded to, and you conveniently ignored it. Instead you went right for the Malthusian fearmongering talking points. "It's just a question of when" -- no, no it's not, not if population plateaus and then shrinks (negative population growth for a while is practically baked in now into the world's demographics).
> Plug in different growth rates and the answer could range from tens of years to hundreds of millions of years!
Why thank you. Hundreds of millions of years is more than there is time for life on this planet. Without our help, each successive glacial period was ending with CO2 lower than the end of the previous glacial period, and plants starve below certain levels (I think it's 150ppm for one kind of photosynthesis, lower for another) and was going to end up below those levels soon enough. Now, thanks to HUMANS life on Earth has millions more years in it because we've put a little bit of the Earth's sequestered carbon back into the carbon cycle.
As long as the population increases, Malthus is right. There is going to be some ultimate carrying capacity at some point. Ultimate amount of energy we can harness. It's just a question when. Certainly before our energy consumption is enough to literally boil the oceans.
Plug in different growth rates and the answer could range from tens of years to hundreds of millions of years!