Unit 4 Ethical Essay

Is population growth the cause of decreasing resources?  It very well could be, but there are other factors that need to be looked at before we decide. The growing number of the world's population could be depleting our resources, or it could be the massive use of resources by humans in the more developed countries.

One hundred years ago, in 1908, the world's population was 1,720,300,000 people.  In the year 2000 it had jumped to 6,045,955,000.  That shows enormous exponential growth.  And of course, the more people there are, the more resources are used.  Human beings need land, water, food, and energy.  More and more of those resources are being consumed everyday.  However, as technology increases, new ways are being found to supply more and more resources so we do not deplete our current supply.  In a way, it kind of helps balance out, though there are still some resources that are in danger of us having a shortage.

A typical U.S. child will consume the same resources as 30 children in India and 300 children in Ethiopia.  I got this information from our assignment page.  This statement is actually quite alarming and has a lot to say about the more developed countries.  We are so used to having access to resources that we over use them.  They have become a commodity, and are taken advantage of.  People in the more developed countries use an astonishingly higher amount of resources, which causes depletion of resources.

I think that both population growth and overuse of resources are the problem.