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To continue this threadjacking on over population. The current world population is estimated at 6.7 billion and is not expected to reach 7 billion for a few years. By 2050 population growth is expected to flatten out considerably, sitting at about 12 billion. That 12 billion is well within most researchers numbers on sustaibilty.

As to food production, it should be noted that food production has increased faster than population growth has over the past 50 years. And to the point of lack of food in the industrialized world, give me a break. It is estimated that less than 3% of people in North American and Northern Europe go hungry due to lack of food.

More points to bring up, the number of species are decreasing just not at a rate that hasn't been seen before. Several periods through-out geological history have seen species disappear at faster rates. This is just occuring due to non-natural causes. Also the low number RedBeard stated as being sustainable was surpassed half a millinia ago and we seem to be doing fine.

To say the human population cannot be sustained on this Earth is to say that one has little faith in humanity to solve any problem set before it, IMHO.

You contradict yourself in describing sustainablity. Either it can or cannot keep people alive. Glaciers are melting, they do that. The water table is falling and the sea level is rising, I'm sure that we'll figure out how to turn this into keeping us in our swimming pools. As to lasting environmental effects, lasting how? Mother earth will rebound on us and we will figure out how to live with it w/o wholesale slaughtering of 85% of out fellow man (regardless of the value of those lives).

We are not over-crowded, over-populated, or over-whelming the Earth by any measurable degree.