It is a fallacy to say that overpopulation is the cause of poverty and
disease, and that for the simple reason that overpopulation has not yet
occurred. For the growth of a nation we assume that the birth-rate should
exceed the death-rate by from 10 to 20 per thousand, and it is obvious
that in a _closed_ country the evil of overpopulation might appear in
a comparatively short time. The natural remedies in the past have been
emigration and colonisation. According to the birth controllers these
remedies are only temporary, because sooner or later all colonies and
eventually the earth itself will be overpopulated. At the British
Association Meeting in 1890 the population of the earth was said to be
1,500 millions, and it was calculated that only 6,000 millions could live
on the earth. This means that if the birth-rate throughout the world
exceeded the death-rate by only 8 per thousand, the earth would be
overpopulated within 200 years. It is probable that in these calculations
the capacity of the earth to sustain human life has been underestimated;
that the earth could support not four times but sixteen times its present
population; and that the latter figure could be still further increased
by the progress of inventions. But, apart altogether from the accuracy of
these figures, the danger of overpopulation is nothing more or less than a
myth. Indeed, the end of the world, a philosophic and scientific certitude,
is a more imminent event than its overpopulation.