Lionel Shriver Quotes

I have just joined the Board of the Population Institute because I am convinced that early stabilization of the world's population is important for the attainment of this objective.

Still, whether we like it or not, the task of speeding up the decrease of the human population becomes increasingly urgent.

To ensure a healthier and more abundant world, we simply must slow the world’s explosive growth in population.

Zero population growth ….

Except for a few oil-rich countries, no developing country has successfully modernized without slowing population growth.

How much longer, for instance, can we continue to crowd more and more people into this world? …. How long can we permit the uncontrolled use of the earth's resources when there is no possibility of replacing them? Indeed, how long will it be before we have completely used up everything our lives depend on? These issues are the politics of the future. Neither Republicans nor Democrats have begun to spell out in substantive fashion the means by which we can control population growth, environmental problems, and the conservation of our natural resources.

Governments have a legitimate concern with slowing population growth. But often this has been attempted with little concern for the individuals most affected.

Our country and state have a special obligation to work toward the stabilization of our own population so as to credibly lead other parts of the world toward population stabilization.

Human population growth is probably the single most serious long-term threat to survival. We're in for a major disaster if it isn't curbed...We have no option. If it isn't controlled voluntarily, it will be controlled involuntarily by an increase in disease, starvation and war.

When it comes to the population explosion, there are two questions on the table. One, is our population growth going to kill us all? And two, is there any ethical way to prevent that from happening?

The good news is world population growth rate decreases systematically and is expected to reach zero by 2050, thanks to urbanisation and women's education.

Yes, population is a huge problem - birth rates are too high. And in order to take care of the environment, we have to make sure that every child that comes here, that arrives, knows that he or she is welcome, is going to be cared for and honored.

The Sierra Club in the United States has now really come out for population control and reduction.

Our planet's lands and oceans are already stretched to meet the demands of 7 billion people. The human population continues to grow. The search for sustainable solutions is an economic and a moral imperative if we are to create the future we want.

In order to stabilize human population growth, we must prioritize the education of girls, the empowerment of women, the provision of ubiquitous access to the knowledge and techniques of fertility management, and the continued raising of child survival rates.

Family planning is the only exit point of the land problem. No other solution is possible.

If government knew how, I should like to see it check, not multiply the population.

Pollution and the exhaustion of natural resources depend and will depend in the future on the absolute level of total economic activity. This means that is necessary to restrain both the rate of growth of population and, at least in the developed countries, the rate of growth of consumption per head.

Any effective national effort seeking to stabilize our burgeoning numbers through reduction in fertility rates (or any other strategy for that matter) has to concurrently demonstrate to the electorate that livelihoods will not be adversely impacted and may even be enhanced.

The best "gift" anyone can give to humankind is to remain birth-free. It is a SIN for any person to birth while earth births exceed deaths. For what purpose would the world need more than 50,000 new Homo sapiens every year?

No technical solution can rescue us from the misery of overpopulation. Freedom to breed will bring ruin to all.

Our primary objective is to reduce British over-population. But many leaders of foreign nations approach us to help them get a handle on their burgeoning population.

We never use the phrase population control. It has an implication of coercion.

… compared to circumstances where the birth rate remains high—a decline in fertility from high to low levels allows a population to save and invest more, both in terms of human capital (ie education and training) and in terms of physical capital (eg roads, factories, machinery.)

The key to understanding overpopulation is not population density but the numbers of people in an area relative to its resources and the capacity of the environment to sustain human activities; that is, to the area’s carrying capacity. When is an area overpopulated? When its population can’t be maintained without rapidly depleting nonrenewable resources.... By this standard, the entire planet and virtually every nation is already vastly overpopulated