Josiah Strong Quotes

The constant effort towards population, which is found even in the most vicious societies, increases the number of people before the means of subsistence are increased.

The perpetual tendency of the race of man to increase beyond the means of subsistence is one of the general laws of animated nature, which we can have no reason to expect to change.

Futurists don't consider overpopulation one of the issues of the future. They consider it the issue of the future.

The power of population is indefinitely greater than the power in the earth to produce subsistence for man.

One problem in Africa has been a small population. And the natural resources were large. So you could be as foolish as possible. But you didn’t die. You just remained there eating mangoes and bananas. Now the population in Africa is growing. So the idea that you can go on with idiotic policies is not sustainable. Because a big population needs answers.

The whole surface of our globe can afford room and support only to such a number of all sorts of creatures, and by their doubling, trebling or any other multiplication of their kind, they must starve or devour one another. The world is now well-peopled ... neither too full nor too empty and if too many the length of life will be reduced …. plague and war may be, not only a just punishment of the sins of men, but also a wise means to keep the balance of mankind even.

The truth is this: the Earth cannot provide enough food and fresh water for 10 billion people, never mind homes, never mind roads, hospitals and schools.

The power of population is so superior to the power of the earth to produce subsistence for man, that premature death must in some shape or other visit the human race.

How could you fear a dearth? Have not mankind tho' slain by millions, millions left behind?

The human overpopulation issue is the topic I see as the most vital to solve if our children and grandchildren are to have a good quality of life.

As we move towards 8 or 10 billion people on the planet, there's a little less gold per capita. Each one of us will continue to be fighting over an ever smaller percentage of total resources. This is not a happy thought.

Our human population continues to expand at such a scary rate - it's unbelievable.

Another cause of change, one less noticeable but fundamental, is the modern growth of population closely connected with scientific and medical discoveries. It is interesting that the United Nations has set up a special Commission to study this question.

Man tends to increase at a greater rate than his means of subsistence.

There are probably already too many people on the planet.

Thicken Population.

Population, when unchecked, increases in a geometrical ratio. Subsistence only increases in an arithmetical ratio.

There are 6 million people in the world. With organic farming, we will only be able to feed 4 billion of them. Which 2 billion will volunteer to die?

War, infanticide, hardship, famine, disease, murder of the aged, all these are among the positive checks which keep down the increase of population among savage tribes…. Infanticide, most prevalent where means of existence are most restricted, is largely practiced among barbarous nations, the custom being due, to a large extent, to the difficulty of providing food for a large family.

… the mere notion that there are three times as many people on Earth as there were when I started making television. How can the Earth accommodate them? When people, including politicians, set their faces against looking at the consequences—it’s just unbelievable that anyone could ignore it.

The Malthusian Theory - that mankind, for biological and sociological reasons, is so fertile, so fecund, that if you started out with the new continent and plenty of land for everybody, in several generations we would multiply our numbers.

One always returns to the fact that there are just too many of us, the population continues to rise and it's unsustainable.

The prodigious waste of human life occasioned by this perpetual struggle for room and food, was more than supplied by the mighty power of population, acting, in some degree, unshackled, from the constant habit of emigration.

When every province of the world so teems with inhabitants that they can neither subsist where they are nor remove themselves elsewhere.

There's going to be competition because there are not enough resources. Resources grow arithmetically, populations grow exponentially. You can't ever have enough resources and that's the foundation of this idea of competition.