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Page added on April 6, 2016
Human Settlers Grew like an ‘Invasive Species’
Bustling cities, sprawling suburbs and blossoming agricultural regions might seem like strong evidence that people have always dominated the environment. A Stanford study of South America’s colonization shows that human populations did not always grow unchecked, but were at one time limited by local resources – just like any other species.In fact, the study, published by the journal Nature, finds that for much of human history on the continent, human populations grew like an invasive species, which are regulated by their environment as they spread into new places. Populations grew exponentially when people first colonized South America. But then they crashed, recovered slightly and plateaued for thousands of years after over-consuming local natural resources and reaching continental carrying capacity, according to the analysis.
“The question is: Have we overshot Earth’s carrying capacity today?” said senior author Elizabeth Hadly, the Paul S. and Billie Achilles Professor in Environmental Biology and a senior fellow at the Stanford Woods Institute for the Environment. “Because humans respond as any other invasive species, the implication is that we are headed for a crash before we stabilize our global population size.”
The paper, titled “Post-Invasion Demography of Prehistoric Humans in South America,” is the first in a series on the interaction of local animal populations, humans and climate during the massive changes of the last 25,000 years in South America. The series will be featured at the Latin American Paleontology Congress this fall.
The study lays a foundation for understanding how humans contributed to the Pleistocene era’s largest extinction of big mammals, such as ground sloths, horses and elephant-like creatures called gomphotheres. It reconstructs the history of human population growth in South America using a newly assembled database of radiocarbon dates from more than 1,100 archaeological sites. Unlike many archaeological studies that look at environmental change in one particular site, the Stanford research’s continental approach provides a picture of long-term change, such as climatic fluctuations, fundamental to human populations rather than a single culture or ecosystem.
The researchers found strong evidence for two distinct phases of demographic growth in South America. The first phase, characterized by logistic growth, occurred between 14,000 and 5,500 years ago and began with a rapid spread of people and explosive population size throughout the continent.
Then, consistent with other invasive species, humans appear to have undergone an early population decline consistent with over-exploitation of their resources. This coincided with the last pulses of an extinction of big animals. Subsequent to the loss of these big animals, humans experienced a long period of constant population size across the continent. The second phase, from about 5,500 to 2,000 years ago, saw exponential population growth. This pattern is distinct from those seen in North America, Europe and Australia.
The seemingly obvious explanation for the second phase – initial domestication of animals and crops – had minimal impact on this shift, the researchers wrote. Instead, the rise of sedentary societies is the most likely reason for exponential population growth. Practices such as intensive agriculture and inter-regional trade led to sedentism, which allowed for faster and more sustained population growth. Profound environmental impacts followed.
“Thinking about the relationship between humans and our environment, unchecked growth is not a universal hallmark of our history, but a very recent development,” said co-lead author Amy Goldberg, a biology graduate student at Stanford. “In South America, it was settled societies, not just the stable food sources of agriculture, that profoundly changed how humans interact with and adapt their environment.”
Today, as the world’s population continues to grow, we turn to technology and culture to reset nature’s carrying capacity and harvest or even create new resources.
“Technological advances, whether they are made of stone or computers, have been critical in helping to shape the world around us up until this point,” said co-lead author Alexis Mychajliw a graduate student in biology. “That said, it’s is unclear if we can invent a way out of planetary carrying capacities.”
22 Comments on "Human Settlers Grew like an ‘Invasive Species’"
makati1 on Wed, 6th Apr 2016 8:13 pm
“Have we overshot Earth’s carrying capacity today?”
At 1st world levels, definitely.
At 3rd world levels, not yet.
Stop the plundering of resources in the 3rd world by the 1st world and there would be few problems. Not what 1st worlders want to hear or even entertain, but fact.
The sooner the 1st world system of plunder is ended, the better for the other 6+ billion. I see that happening when the coming crash takes out the 1st world debt based economy and levels the playing field. We shall see.
Pass the popcorn.
adonis on Wed, 6th Apr 2016 9:58 pm
well hopefully the plundering does stop and human nature changes for the better
Pennsyguy on Wed, 6th Apr 2016 10:09 pm
Adonis: it’s not human nature so much as basic genetic programming in all living organisms. Perhaps the majority of humans would learn this and moderate our intakes if we had a few more centuries. We don’t.
Elmer on Wed, 6th Apr 2016 11:08 pm
Overpopulation everywhere is a major part of the carrying capacity problem. The populations of the 3rd World nations are, to a large extent, physically supported by the growth-based economies of the 1st World. The 3rd World receives money for labor, production and natural resources from the 1st World. The wealth that trickles down to the 3rd World allows them to grow and modernize their own economies and sustain their population base. If the 1st World adopts a Steady State Economy (as it should), the 3rd World will suffer from the reduced 1st World demand and will not be able sustain their current populations. The world is interconnected these days. Overpopulation—anywhere—is a death curse. That is the history of mankind (until cheap energy) and all animal populations.
Daddio7 on Thu, 7th Apr 2016 6:30 am
I was composing a brilliant reply as I read what has already been said. Elmer said it better than I could have.
Davy on Thu, 7th Apr 2016 6:43 am
We have clearly overshot carrying capacity today both in consumption levels and population levels in both 1st and 3rd world. This is a no brainer and is evident everywhere. The 1st world and 3rd world do not live in isolation they are mixed everywhere. They are dependent on each other everywhere. Globalism that supports all our delocalized locals is a 3rd world 1st world mixture.
The 3rd world is a mixed bag of overshoot. Some places show better carrying capacity than others. China and India are a typical example of the extremes of the 1st world 3rd world mix. Even the US is a mix. There are plenty of poor people in the US and growing. These people can be considered 3rd world with some being worse because they are maladapted ex 1st world people thrust into third world standards. Some are immigrants not assimilated.
Anyone that thinks man in any way is not in overshoot to long term carrying capacity with or without technology is blind and deceiving themselves. This is quite often an agenda thing on this board. Some here want to paint the romantic picture of the strong and resilient 3rd world subsistent farmer. Yes some are but taken in aggregate next to overpopulated urban areas with some being mega urban they are just a fringe population ready to be consumed by locust type collapse dispersion.
Even the countryside in many 3rd world countries is past carrying capacity. We know ALL large urban areas are. We could say with the global population at the size it is and with the potential breakdown of complex society we could go so far as to say that every large urban area is in overshoot and would quickly depopulate from lack of support in a catastrophic collapse of living standards. Rome was large but it was a focus urban area for an entire empire. We now have a brittle arrangement with multiple large urban areas all connected remotely by globalism.
It appears per systematic natural law some kind of collapse must happen by necessity. This is what ecosystems do and we are an ecosystem. There is no transcendence of nature evident yet by any species. It is clear at all levels we are at limits and suffering a dangerous catch 22 of problems that put us in an existential predicament. All our fancy technology is approaching diminishing returns because the use of it creates more problems or is hitting limits of affordability. What is worse is we have adapted to technology without the ability to exit technology. There are no plan B’s other than destructive change.
We are eventually going to run out of deck chairs to arrange that is all wealth transfer is and what economic substitution is. Eventually you can’t substitute the basics and you run into Liebig’s Law of the minimum. We are also faced with systematic decay which manifests itself in our complex global society as deflation and decay. Our system is only a growth system. It is not a steady state system nor a degrowth system. You can’t have it both ways with growth or degrowth. We are attempting a cake and eat it party at multiple levels today but it isn’t working.
Again it is time frame that makes the difference for us individually. When and how this happen really matter because it is degree and duration of systematic stress that affects the rate of change. Too much change too fast is deadly for a population. Not enough change fast enough builds up pressures that explode. We needed a period of decline 30 years ago because now there is no avoiding a harsh one. We can help this process be less deadly but we can’t change a self-organizing adaptive system from evolving or in our case devolving.
Davy on Thu, 7th Apr 2016 7:27 am
We will soon get a microcosm of what happens in the collapse of modern society. It may not be complete but it will be significant. The other point to keep in mind is this collapsing nation will be collapsing within a functioning global system then imagine random and dispersed collapse globally. Don’t pass the popcorn and be all smug because Venezuela is a critical nation in the global equation. What happens there is going to affect all of us. Venezuela is too large an oil producing nation to not matter.
“Venezuela Orders Three-Day Weekends To Save Electricity”
http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2016-04-07/venezuela-orders-three-day-weekends-save-electricity
“Now that the economic emergency decree has validity, in the next few days I will activate a series of measures I had been working on,” he said, following Congress’s declaration of a “food emergency.”
“The “emergency measures” in effect, amounted to a shutdown of the country. “Venezuela is shutting down for a week as the government struggles with a deepening electricity crisis,” Bloomberg wrote. “President Nicolas Maduro gave everyone an extra three days off work next week, extending the two-day Easter holiday, according to a statement in the Official Gazette published late Tuesday.”
“The reason for the electrical rationing was the water content of Venezuela’s Guri Dam, which supplies more than two-thirds of the country’s electricity. As The Latin American Herald Tribune writes, the dam “is less than four meters from reaching the level where power generation will be impossible. Water levels at the hydroelectric dam are 3.56 meters from the start of a ‘collapse’ of the national electric system. Guri water levels are at their lowest levels since 2003, when the a nationwide strike against Hugo Chavez reduced the need for power, masking the problem.”
PS, Las Vegas and Rio should be watching these events closely.
Apneaman on Thu, 7th Apr 2016 7:46 am
Elmer, NO. The the rich fat west “receives” the 3rd world resources and slave labour on the cheap through malfeasance, bribery, setting up puppet dictators topped off with military threat. You need to do some research. Maybe start with John Perkin’s “Confessions of an economic hit man” and Naomi Klein’s ” The Shock Doctrine”.
This too.
School Of The Americas: Training Torturers & Secret Police For US-Backed Dictators Since 1946
Over 64,000 soldiers have been trained to oppress, smash dissent, and maintain American imperial order since the “school” first opened.
http://www.mintpressnews.com/212023-2/212023/
If the people of those so called 3rd world countries were getting anything resembling a fair shake, like we had, for our labour and royalties for natural resources then we in the fat countries would have been paying a lot more for our goodies and/or had less, but still more than enough. They get shitty wages, poor working conditions and almost non existent environmental regulations and we get smart phones, flat screens and a dollar store on every corner.
Soon most of us will be kindred spirits with those folks as history shows that declining empires always turn their imperial policies on their own citizens.
As the poor die earlier, Social Security isn’t paying off
“Death and taxes may be inevitable, but they hit the rich and poor in different — and sometimes unfair — ways.
That’s increasingly evident with the expected life spans of today’s workers, given that low-income Americans are projected to die as many as 13 years earlier than their wealthier cohort, while a century ago the rich and poor had relatively identical lifespans, according to new research into longevity and retirement from the Government Accountability Office that was prepared for Democratic presidential candidate Sen. Bernie Sanders (D-VT).”
http://www.cbsnews.com/news/as-the-poor-die-earlier-social-security-isnt-paying-off/
13 years difference in life spans between the haves and have nots. Looks like the 3rd world to me.
Apneaman on Thu, 7th Apr 2016 8:08 am
Record patch of warm waters point to more global heat records being smashed
“From hot oceans to shrinking Arctic ice and glaciers, the evidence of a warming planet has gone into overdrive in the first three months of 2016.
Sydney on Wednesday posted its hottest April day on record, with the 34.2-degree reading beating a mark that had stood for 30 years. Suburbs from Camden in the south-west to Richmond in the north-west topped 36 degrees.
Australia has also just posted its hottest March in more than a century of reliable data after a scorching heatwave to start the month that the Bureau of Meteorology said in some areas approached “record levels for any time of the year”.
http://www.smh.com.au/environment/climate-change/record-patch-of-warm-waters-point-to-more-global-heat-records-being-smashed-20160405-gnzcw9.html#ixzz452PyCWjv
Kenz300 on Thu, 7th Apr 2016 8:34 am
Population growth needs to be slower than jobs growth…………
Too many people……….create too much pollution and demand too many resources….
China made great progress in moving its people out of poverty…….one reason was slowing population growth…..
If you can not provide for yourself you can not provide for a child.
CLIMATE CHANGE, declining fish stocks, droughts, floods, air water and land pollution, poverty, water and food shortages all stem from the worlds worst environmental problem……. OVER POPULATION.
Yet the world adds 80 million more mouths to feed, clothe, house and provide energy and water for every year… this is unsustainable… and is a big part of the Climate Change problem
Birth Control Permanent Methods: Learn About Effectiveness
http://www.emedicinehealth.com/birth_control_permanent_methods/article_em.htm
PracticalMaina on Thu, 7th Apr 2016 8:44 am
Kenz, what if high unemployment was beneficial? I have scene an article saying co2 output has come down somewhat with the latest downturn in exports. I do not think the jobs we have exported to the third world help their ability to deal with crisis at all. Globalization leads to urbanization which demands more power and industrial food, both worsening water stress.
PracticalMaina on Thu, 7th Apr 2016 9:10 am
*seen
Population is a massive issue, but capitalism is set up in such a way that it will continue to be an issue, tough to exploit cheap labor from a lightly populated area where people are living alongside nature.
Dredd on Thu, 7th Apr 2016 10:18 am
And still do eh?
HARM on Thu, 7th Apr 2016 3:11 pm
makati1 said
“At 3rd world levels, not yet.
Stop the plundering of resources in the 3rd world by the 1st world and there would be few problems.”
Wow, and to think I’ve been accused of denying reality. That’s some world class rationalization right there.
HARM on Thu, 7th Apr 2016 3:14 pm
On Track for nearly 10 billion by 2050, 13 billion by 2100. Humans and their food/draft animals already outweigh all other land mammals 20:1. Totally sustainable.
To infinity and beyond!
http://www.kalaharilionresearch.org/2015/01/16/human-vs-livestock-vs-wild-mammal-biomass-earth/
Elmer on Thu, 7th Apr 2016 3:33 pm
Apneaman: I never said the 3rd World was receiving a fair shake. They have been getting screwed by the west for hundreds of years and it is wrong. That said, there is still money moving into the 3rd World countries from the west. It should be much, much more for what we get but it is still enough to allow many to move towards “growth” economies and lifestyles and all the trappings that go with it. Peak oil/carrying capacity fueled economic problems in the west will trickle down to 3rd World countries to the degree they have come to rely on western money to sustain their own societies/populations.
HARM on Thu, 7th Apr 2016 3:49 pm
Elmer’s correct. We could redistribute all the “wealth” equally everywhere today (fat chance!) and it would not change the fact that humans are way into resource/habitat overshoot.
Estimates as to the long-term sustainable carrying capacity vary from ~500 million to 2 billion. But 7.3 billion? 10 billion? 13 billion?
Better get that affordable warp drive engine invented quick. We’ll need 6-7 more habitable planets at least by the end of this century.
Apneaman on Thu, 7th Apr 2016 4:00 pm
Elmer, is that the same degree that the west relies on their natural resources? Who in the west is extracting rare earth’s for all the electronic toys? Coco for chocolate? Coffee beans? Rubber? Any western countries self sufficient in oil? Fuck trickle down. Empires don’t do favours. Anything they got from us is a pittance compared to what we have squeezed out of them for the last 500 years.
HARM on Thu, 7th Apr 2016 4:24 pm
Behind door #1 is the fast-acting terminal cancer that western lifestyle/technology/resource extraction gives us.
Behind door #2 is a slower acting (but just as fatal), cancer that a third world population growth + lower resource consumption gives us.
Either way, we’re dead. And actually, we don’t really get a choice –we get *both* forms of cancer, as where we are born is an accident of geography.
Oh, and for the record, third worlders *badly* wish to become first worlders (witness the industrial rise of China, India, etc. – aka BRICS), and would do exactly the same thing as those devil Americans if given the chance.
Apneaman on Thu, 7th Apr 2016 5:23 pm
Homo sapiens, An Invasive Species
http://www.declineoftheempire.com/2016/04/homo-sapiens-an-invasive-species.html#more
makati1 on Thu, 7th Apr 2016 8:36 pm
The fat lazy, stupid Americans want to blame the 3rd world for their problems when the 3rd world is all that is making their lifestyle possible today. Stop imports to America and see how fast the whole system there crumbles and devolves into the 3rd world, or worse.
Kenz300 on Sat, 9th Apr 2016 8:32 am
Having a child that you cannot provide for is cruel…….
Poverty in the Philippines
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XldM4DtlA-Y
If you can not provide for yourself you can not provide for a child
Birth Control Permanent Methods: Learn About Effectiveness
http://www.emedicinehealth.com/birth_control_permanent_methods/article_em.htm