1) Global Warming. There is a growing scientific concensus that the early phases of global warming may be upon us now but there are still many differing scientific opinions. With each passing year, our knowledge of the situation will increase so that we will know better if the earth is warming, and if so, how rapidly change may occur. Whether or not the earth is warming, it is clear that by pouring increasing quantities of greenhouse gases into the earth's atmosphere each year, we are embarked on a global experiment whose outcome we don't know. We don't know if the effects of increasing the greenhouse gases in the earth's atmosphere are reversible. We don't know if the atmosphere go back to its pre-industrial condition if we stopped all emissions of greenhouse gases, and if it would go back, we don't know how long it would take but advances in computer simulations are providing significant insights to the problem. We do see significant changes in polar ice caps melting. On the scale of a human lifetime, these changes happen very slowly. So the burden of dealing with the unknown outcome of the present global experiment, will not fall on today's political decision makers: it will fall on our children and grandchildren. Present population growth, so ardently advocated by the many in the older generations, is placing the planet at risk without a viable longterm economic plan involving not only nations but religious leaders. For centuries, parents have worked so their children could have better lives and opportunities than they had. We may now be doing just the reverse. We may be guaranteeing that our children will not have the resources, opportunities and environment that we have enjoyed. Beyond 2025, our children will not have the standard of living ae we have enjoyed.

2) The Ozone Hole The destruction of ozone in the high atmosphere allows more ultra-violet light to reach the surface of the earth where it can have serious biological effects on plants and animals, including humans.

3) Food Grain The Worldwatch Institute reports that global annual per capita production of grain dropped from 346 kilograms per person in 1984 to 313 kilograms per person in 1996. This is a drop of 9.5 % in just 8 years. We've all heard it said that per capita food production has been growing ever since the time of Thomas Malthus, and that this growth has proven him wrong. Since the late 1980s grain production has leveled off, so the continuing growth of populations means that the per capita production of food is declining. Perhaps Malthus was right after all.

4) World Oceanic Fisheries Growth in the annual oceanic fish catch stopped in 1989, and since then the available fish per capita has been declining. For many of the world's people, fish is a major source of protein. Most of the world's major fishing areas are seriously depleted. The Grand Banks off of Newfoundland was one of the world's major fisheries, with stocks of fish once thought to be unlimited. Now, these fish stocks are apparently almost gone.

5) Fresh Water A report in January of 1997 from Stockholm indicated that by the year 2025, two-thirds of the world's people will suffer from water shortages, and the report noted that the rate of use of fresh water was growing at twice the rate of world population. All of these problems are caused by population growth, and none of these problems can be "solved" if population growth continues. Today we hear many people talking about "Sustainability," as though we can accomodate continued population growth with something vague and ill-defined that is called "sustainable development." The thought seems to be that there is no need to worry about population: all we need to do is to make minor modifications of our way of life, (conserve, recycle, etc.) and this will suffice to make our society "sustainable." Please remember the First Law of Sustainability: It is not possible to sustain population growth or growth in the rates of consumption of resources.

We now must address two questions:

1) Where on Earth is the population problem the worst? It is my opinion that the world's worst population problem is right here in the United States. This is because of our high per capita resource consumption. It has been estimated that a person added to the population of the United States will have 30 or more times the impact on world resources as will a person added to the population of an underdeveloped nation. Indeed, resource consumption in North America is roughly the same as resource consumption in the entire rest of the world.

2) Where should we apply our efforts to have the most beneficial effect in helping to solve the population problem? The answer is, right here in the U.S. For many people, the population problem is a problem of "those people," in distant undeveloped countries. In early 1997, many people succesfully lobbied Congress to restore family planning assistance in the U.S. foreign aid programs. This was a great victory for the UN Agenda, but it treats "those people" as though they were the big problem. The problem to be solved is how the world is going to plan to bring Third World countries into the 21st Century while eliminating the IMF "economic slavery of Third World nations continuing unpayable loans" and so far the world secular leadership is only promoting more wars as a solution to reducing populations and religious leaders say pray for God's help.

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