E portfolio Lani Rush Paper 3

How Many People Can the Earth Hold?
Just last year, many news stories covered the birth of the six billionth person. This story lead to much speculation on the limits of the Earth’s population and the rate of growth of the total population. Many cited improvements in natal care and increased longevity s precursors to overpopulation. In “Ecological Crisis or Sustainable Abundance,” Nye addresses the issue of “carrying capacity” and how it relates to modern technology. His final conclusion that carry capacity is not a specific number, but rather an effect of cultural choices, results from analysis of technological advancement and environmental repercussions. I believe that culture and nature are intertwined, especially as highlighted in the difference between living in the Midwest and the Northeast.
Nye’s essay begins with the progession of technology that changed civilization. Nye traces the evolution of agricultural technologies of the United States from its origins in New England to the farms of California and Arizona. The progression from family, subsistence farming to industrialized farming to “irrigated agribusiness” has increased both mechanization and productivity in agriculture. This increased productivity provides for increased food supplies and general wealth, contributing to population expansion. The increased industralization of the land also caused a cultural shift. While humanity was seen as stewards of the land in family farming, the land became “a source of raw materials to be exploited for human development” by the early 1900’s.
Nye then shifts focus from the technologic progress in the United States to a European view of the after effects of mechanization on natural resources. Europeans began mechanization earlier, thus encountered the environmental effects of “deforestation, fuel shortages, air and water pollution…almost 700 years previous to the United States.” The Europeans then proceeded to export damaging agricultural techniques to their colonies. Although productivity and material goods had increased from the pre-colonial era, was the increased abundance worth the environmental sacrifice?
It is true, the average quality of life increases with every generation, but what of the happiness of each successive generation? There is no true account of intergenerational contentment, and Nye acknowledges that thinkers have realized “that people can easily become slaves to what they own.” This indicates a rejection of the modern cultural value that material possesions are the yardstick by which one measure’s one’s happiness. The idea that possesions are enslaving also seems to contradict the technological progression of the 19th and 20th centuries, but it is possible to find a common ground. Modern technology accounts for the ease of living which we in the developed world are fortune to experiene while providing surplus to those in underdeveloped locales. While some harmful farming techniques reach their peak in certain areas, they are being abandoned in another. This is a result of a cultural choice.
One personal experience I have had of cultural choices hsaping the environment comes from my move from the Midwest to the Northeast. The Northeast supports far more people in a smaller amount of space than does the Midwest and that can be linked to the differing cultures of each region. People in the Northeast mostly bike or use public transit to commute, live in smaller spaces usch as apartments and more modest houses, and tend to be more vegetarian. People in the Midwest tend to use cars as the preferred mode of transport, eat meat at many meals, and live in large houses with yards. These few differences contribute to the population density difference between the two regions and this is a microscale example of how culture shapes our environment. Truly, “Nature’s limits are our culture’s.”