Overpopulation: Biology Review

Overpopulation is a condition where an organism's numbers exceed the carrying capacity of its habitat, and the carrying capacity is the maximum capacity a habitat can sustain indefinitely. Overpopulation affects many areas in the world and is “the number one problem facing this planet.” (Zuckerman 81) What scientists worry about is the amount of stress placed on our already limited resources; all people need food, clothes, houses and access to clean water.

The problem of overpopulation stems from an improvement in our agriculture. Better means for providing for a larger group of people allows the population to expand without the hindrance of lesser resources or supplies. This is the main cause for allowing the entire world to reproduce at a faster rate, but some other causes are beliefs: some people believe that having more children helps their family; ironically, these are the people who do not have the means to support more children, but they do anyway because they believe that having more children gives them the possibility that one of their children will be successful in the future and will be able to support their family. This same reason or mentality could also be used for the thought that reproducing more can lead to a larger force for man power.

Furthermore, the effects of overpopulation are devastating;” it negatively impacts upon our natural environment: (Mweti 213). This rapid increase in the population affects every problem one way or another. Over-looking the possible benefit of a larger force for manpower, the damage caused by overpopulation ranges from depleting resources and causing pollution to high infant and child mortality to elevated crime rate. With a larger population, there’s a higher demand for resources that bring the need to farm these resources more, this causes deforestation, little clean or fresh water, and loss of ecosystems. Almost every type of pollution can be attributed to some amount to the growing human population because of its growing needs; air pollution is caused by the need of fossil fuels, land pollution because of the larger amount of trash generated, and even noise pollution because there are more people who can contribute to it. High infant mortality is caused by lack of resources to keep the child healthy and what little can be found may lead to crime just for survival. It may not even be petty crimes, but it may even lead to civil unarrest or wars.

Nevertheless, this problem is still