“Bringing a new human to this planet or not?”
This has been a question I have been asking myself and discussing with my friends for the past month. As all of us were of completely different opinions: some were saying “yes of course, it is our natural instincts to procreate”. Some were saying “no because who would want to bring a child to a planet that might be not functioning anymore due to climate change”. As every other human being I have always wanted to have an offspring, yet then I realized why would I want to bring up someone who at the end is going to have to live on a planet we destroyed.
Our planet has already been overpopulating year by year and causing an increasing carbon footprint. I was born in 1997. In this year the world population was 5.9 billion with the amount of carbon in atmosphere 360 parts/million and the remaining wilderness of our planet being 46% (Fothergill & Hughes & Scholey, 2020). I am currently 23 years old and it is year 2020. Do you know how much have these numbers changed over such a short period of time? The population raised by 1.9 billion over 23 years, the current number is 7.8 billion as I assume all of you know. The carbon footprint increased by 55 so currently 415 parts/million. And the remaining wilderness? Only 35%. Who would think that over only 23 years our planet can change that much (Fothergill & Hughes & Scholey, 2020).
All of this then leads me to one concept: intergenerational equity. Where is the fairness between the generation living now and the one in the future of our children? As people we tend to be very short-term driven, it is just part of our nature. The future and long-term is very hard for us to conceptualize and be wary of. Hence, in our heads we are constantly conducting a research called benefit-cost analysis of our present situation. There is a problem with the analysis we constantly perform in our heads and this little issue is called discounting. The weight we apply to the future is naturally flawed because as human beings we are much better at dealing with acute and present-day issues.
Who has ever heard the sentence? “Well. I don’t care I will not be living here on this planet in couple years. I, personally definitely have and not only once. Or it will not be that bad, look they are saying climate change is here but have you noticed any proper changes?” Discounting is a real error of our cognitive functioning on our every day basis, yet it does not mean it should hinder our actions for the future. Before I wanted to have a child I had a high-discount rate, which means I was mostly focused on now. Now when I realized, that I might be bringing a living being to a planet that might be dying I switched to a low-discount rate. Basically, I care about the future now a bit more.
These numbers listed above terrified me and made me think what as human beings can we do to help. Should we try to decrease the number of population like China tried to do with its one-child policy? Or should we just keep reproducing and not care?
The other day, in particular last Friday, after all of my final exams were done, and if you are a university student you know how stressful those can be I watched a movie called ”Life on our Planet” with the narrator David Attenborough. Mister Attenborough mentioned that every species over time reaches its maximum populace and then it starts to decline and stabilize again. This made me think. Human beings are species as well. So this rule should apply to us as well, no? I did some research and I found a curve called “Sigmoid growth curve”. It points to a growth of population that at the beginning is slow, yet with time it is followed by rapid growth and eventually it ends with equilibrium or stabilization of population. This curve has an S shape for you to imagine it easily. This idea shocked me, it basically suggested that our population growth with time will slow down and we will reach stability. What a release I thought! Then it got me thinking a little bit more. How do we actually explain this process better and connect it to the natural environmental quality so climate change does not affect our future generations as severely?
Well here comes the Kuznets curve! Let me firstly explain why. When you think about it - with more and more education, comes more development and as more educated and developed a country is the less the population there is. For example compare Europe(developed, declining population) to some Asian countries with high population and industrial growth. With education and development the population starts to decline and with that in mind the environmental quality starts to come back. And that is what Kuznets curve exactly shows. As development of a country is rising, environmental quality goes firstly down due to high pollution from industrial progress. Then with time it hits so called “turning point” and we get the level of development where the environmental quality starts to go back up. The degradation caused by such high industrial change decreases because now people care about their environment due to their primary needs being met. If you connect Sigmuid growth curve and Kuznets curve together you kind of get an idea of a brighter future for our planet and our children. It also suggests a possible solution we need to focus on to help decrease the intergenerational equity. And the answer is …..(drum sound) ….better education for everyone! The more we educate others and ourselves, the lower will be the population growth and the quicker will our planet stabilize(Fothergill & Hughes & Scholey, 2020).
So what is the answer to the question: Bringing a new human to this planet or not?
Well, I believe that if we as society focus on providing everyone with good-quality educational background based on equity and equality. No matter the gender, social status, race etc. and if we collaborate and try to increase education and listen to science a bit more I believe we will be able to have children without being scared that the future they will have would be disastrous.
Moral story behind this post? Yes. Educate yourselves more, educate others more and believe that with proper action climate change might just end up being a big life-lesson for all mankind. Let's make it happen!
Thank you very much! Go check out the documentary called “Life on our planet” for more education ;).
Katerina Vyskotova
24th of December 2020
ECON 371 002
