Overpopulation is threatening the future of humanity. Overpopulation of any species eventually leads to a often catastrophic population collapse. The explosion of the human population from less than 650 million in the early 18th century to now more than 8 billion has many drivers and many forces are working against any measure to reduce growth or even revert this dramatic explosion. The result is a rapid degradation of the health of the Earth's life-support system. Thresholds that cannot be crossed if a population collapse is to be avoided may already have been crossed or are close to be crossed. We want to understand the drivers, identify the forces promoting more growth or preventing limitations, and we want to detect the thresholds before the tipping point of catastrophic population collapse.
If you are worried about overpopulation and want to help understand the systemic reason for this ridiculous explosion, then join us! We need you.
[Jan. 25, 2025] Did you know?: About 7.5% (about 8 billion) of all the humans that have ever lived on Earth (between 108 and 117 billion in total) are alive this day today! This is OVERSHOOT. It is an explosion! And explosions are know to cause often very much damage. No other species of mammals has ever created such a explosion!
[Jan. 18, 2025] The Overshoot Podcast: This “OVERSHOOT | Shrink Toward Abundance” podcast is moderated by Nandita Bajaj of Population Balance. The people at Population Balance “envision a future where our human footprint is in balance with life on Earth, enabling all species to thrive.” The podcast Beyond Pronatalism" also moderated by Nandita is a place where people can talk about their struggles and efforts to get beyond the pressures of a culture promoting pronatalism everywhere.
[Feb. 24, 2026] New Scenario for 2028 Points to an AI-related Highly Undesirable Future for Economy: Aisha Down and Dan Milmo discuss in their article “‘A feedback loop with no brake’: how an AI doomsday report shook US markets” the scenario study “THE 2028 GLOBAL INTELLIGENCE CRISIS A Thought Exercise in Financial History, from the Future” by Citrini and Alap Shah posted on February 22, 2026 on Substack. This study points out that the financial system of today was optimized over decades for a world of scarce human minds. AI changed this: “This is the first time in history the most productive asset in the economy has produced fewer, not more, jobs. Nobody’s framework fits, because none were designed for a world where the scarce input became abundant. So we have to make new frameworks. Whether we build them in time is the only question that matters.” The authors point out that the economy could find a new equilibrium, and “getting to this new equilibrium is one of the few tasks left that only humans can do. We need to do it correctly.”
[Feb. 12, 2026] Are we already at or close to a Point of no Return?: Damian Carrington raises this question in his article in the Guardian titled “Point of no return: a hellish ‘hothouse Earth’ getting closer, scientists say.” The most recent paper by Ripple et al. assesses “The risk of a hothouse Earth trajectory,” and the author's conclusions are pointing to an increasing probability of Earth moving into a hothouse state. The assessment should be an alarm bell for all of us. Continuing on the current path of our economy and society comes with the high risk of mass extinction, and the current uncertainty could soon turn into certainty.
